Miss Marvelous: Chaotic Summer

I showed up at the SRC center building earlier than I expected, only because I used my shapeshifting powers to get there faster. I had shapeshifted into a harpy eagle and flew high over the camp, until the SRC was in sight.

Then I gradually glided down towards the front entrance, landing successfully into my human form and crawled out of a bush, along with a big school lunch bag that contained me and my foster dad’s lunch.

Brushing off the twigs and leaves, I walked up to the front doors, pulled out an ID card that my foster dad gave me and swiped it through the slot by the door, before it self unlocked and let me inside. From there, I took the elevator up to the second floor where my dad was.

I spotted him and some other employees chatting by the computer area. Once he saw me walking towards him, he motioned the other employees away and then signaled me to come over.

“Hey sweetie, thank you for making us lunch. Are you ready to help me out?” he said, taking the lunch pal gently from my hands and placed it beside his computer.

“Yeah”.

“Great. Follow me”.

Following my foster dad, we went back to the elevator and went down to the first floor (which is not the foyer, that’s below the first floor). It only took a minute or two before we stepped onto the busy floor, buzzing with stressed and concentrated scientists.

As we passed by a pair standing in front of a lab counter, the couple were saying to each other in a hushed voice, “No, that one didn’t have any effect on them; Let’s try the next one”.

I glanced back at them one more time, before me and my foster dad stopped in front of a thick titanium metal door with a keypad. Joe punched in the right numbers and we both walked into a spotless white room with three doors, one door on their own wall before us.

Each door had a label on it at eye level, to notify what was kept behind it.

“Is this where the SRC keep their special items and people?” I asked, as I continued to follow my foster dad to the middle door.

“Yes and no. The SRC keeps the special people in the basement and the special items up here” he explained, as he approached the ‘Magical Weapons’ door and began to punch in the eight digit code on the keypad.

“However, They keep all the magical creatures-” Joe points to the door on his right once the door unlocks and opens itself-“in that room”.

“But why keep the creatures and the special people separate?“.

I followed Joe into the narrow room he just unlocked.

“Mostly because of the worry of spreading the new disease from them to us and lack of space”.

Then my foster dad turned around to face me.

“This room is where the SRC keeps all of the dangerous, magical weapons” he explained, as he gestured to the long shelves that stood against the walls on our left and right.

Then he slid out a giant plastic bin out from the bottom of the right shelf.

“Your job is to sort out the items in here and place them where they belong on these shelves” explained my foster dad, before he gestured to the shelves again.

“Is that all?” I asked, glancing down at the overflowing bin before looking back to him again.

“Yes, all of the shelves are already labelled; I just needed someone who has the time to sort it all out. I’m going back up to my office, if you need anything I’ll be there”.

My foster gave me one more smile before he exited the room to go do other outstanding work, leaving me to do my job.

After the door closed, I crouched down in front of the giant plastic bin of relics and began to sort them. The first relic I picked up that was on top of the overflowing pile, was a small (and surprisingly heavy) silver pumpkin that shined in the light like a disco ball.

What does this relic do? Initiate province wide parties?

I thought, sarcastically. I set the pumpkin on the shelf that was labelled ‘Garden relics’.

The next relic was a slice of a bronze mushroom, which fit perfectly in one hand.

This also goes on the garden relic shelf I thought, setting it next to the disco pumpkin.

As I went through the bin, some of the relics were odder than others and then there were some I just question why they ever came into existence. The box was almost empty, when one of the relics caught my eye.

It was the same small diamond bracelet that I saw with my dad when we were getting a tour of the place. I picked up the bracelet off the bottom of the container and carefully exclaimed it with my right thumb sliding over each square shaped diamond, embedded to a similar shape of metal.

There’s about twelve diamonds in total making up the bracelet. And there’s some unusual markings carved into the diamonds that I can’t quite make out.

Maybe it’s some kind of foreign language I thought, as I ran my thumb down the small indents marked permanently into it.

Then I noticed some small words engraved into the metal on the side of the bracelet.

To Vanessa, my strong and powerful daughter I hope to someday reunite again--love Amanda Fletcher.

This bracelet was meant to be mine, but I honestly don’t know anyone named Amanda Fletcher I thought, as I carefully slipped the bracelet into my front left pocket and finished my job.

Meanwhile back in his office, Joe was digging into his lunch that his adopted daughter made for him this morning. While he was typing up a file on his computer, Joe was about to take another bite into his mayo, lettuce, cheese and pickle sandwich when he noticed a few small drops of a clear substance on top of his bread.

What is that?

Joe took his index finger and scooped it up one motion, bringing it closer to his face to examine it better.

This looks like a slime that a sea creature would have on their bodies to slip out of their predators grasp, he thought, before he slipped it into a small crayon sized bag.

Though I better confirm it with one of my colleges, just to make sure I have the right answer.

Joe picked up his cell phone off of the table and dialed his friend’s number.

“Hey Jim, umm I’ve got something you need to see”.