Ympe looked up from the laboratory workbench and blinked at Crytomelane as though he didn’t understand. His big eyes gleamed in the way that they always did when he wanted to make Cryptomelane yield about something. Under other circumstances, Ympe might’ve had a chance of succeeding. But they were working in the lab tonight, and one of his blue little arms was reaching out toward a beaker full of……something.
Cryptomelane would need to ask Industria what the something was, aside from “liquid” and “an unfriendly-looking shade of green.” Of course, that was assuming she even knew and that the something hadn’t been left out by General Amazonite or someone else whom she’d permitted into her lab. The fact that Cryptomelane couldn’t identify the substance himself was all the more reason for Ympe not to touch it, but unfortunately, Ympe was perpetually curious. Tonight, that meant staring at the beaker as though he intended Certain Mischief.
“Melly,” he hissed, “what if it needs ta get knocked over?”
“It isn’t ours, I don’t think,” Cryptomelane reminded him, trying to focus on the work before him. One of the starseeds from his personal store sat out on the table, and they were meant to be investigating how the starseed responded to different external stimuli, not messing around with other people’s research. “That means we need to leave it alone.”
Noir Songbird
