The Crucible Support Group Presents
Richard W Scott

It was brown.  That was the first problem.  Everyone had said it would be red, but when you got right down to it, it was brown.  Fine, perhaps there was just the slightest touch of red mixed in, but not... well, not RED!  "I HATE this!" the fat man in the blue coveralls screamed at no one in particular. A short, hollow echo mocked him.

He turned from the window.  The nearly endless stretch of sand was somehow both sad and boring.

As soon as the others got back, he would lay into them.  It didn't matter that it wasn't their fault.  They, every damn one of them, represented the establishment.  The organization.  The A-gen-cy.  It was his job to let them know how badly they'd all blown it.  Just plain and utterly blown it.

Dr. Bertram Collinsworth had a lot to complain about.  His quarters were small, too small for a man of his stature, and face it, bulk.  Besides, it wasn't his fault he had gained so much weight since starting this job.  And what about the food?  He guessed he shouldn't complain so much about it.  There was always plenty to eat, and it kept the body going, but the menu was so limited.

Well, he'd fixed that, hadn't he?  One of his specialties was food processing, in his own way he was a "master chef", able to coax the processors into creating just about any kind of dessert...  It was a specialty, after all.  And yes, it did eat up--so to speak--a lot of the unprocessed food blocks, but fewer vegetables meant more chocolate, more caramel, more creams.  He could certainly live with that.  If the others complained?  Well, let them eat cake.

He was given nothing of any importance to do, and he was tired of working on his latest book.  The others would come back from a day's work all ga-ga over this or that, talking about technical issues that he was only remotely conversant with, and almost entirely disinterested in.

He wasn't liked, in fact he was pretty much avoided.  That, in and of itself was amazing, because the compound was so small it was hard to get any privacy on purpose, and yet, Bertie spent a good portion of his time alone every day.  And what was that nickname they'd given him.  Carp!  Carp?  He didn't get it.  Others had nice nicknames, and he was named after a goldfish of all things.  Carp, indeed.  He decided then and there he'd be complaining about that, too.

They were jealous of him, of that there was no doubt.  He was about the best biologist on Earth, with enough diplomas to fill a book.  He had three PhD's, a fourth one just wanting a finished dissertation, a dozen or so Masters degrees that he played down as remedial, and he had forgotten how many honorary degrees he'd received.  He was a published author, and a sought after speaker, a frequent guest on TV science shows, and yet... and yet, he seemed to always be alone.

That people appeared to want to avoid his company bothered him more than he liked to admit.  Certainly he was outspoken, but people liked, and more importantly, respected,  that about him, he could see it in their eyes.  They found him a fascinating conversationalist, one who could speak, at length, on just about any topic you could name, and his sense of humor was classic.

At one time he had treasured his solitude, but of late it had begun to wear on him.  He had attempted to cajole some of the others into a friendly game of chess, but they would always have some excuse or other.  He wondered why that was.  He was a grand master, after all, and it was an honor to play him.  He never lost to a human player, and only infrequently to one of the many computers in the compound.  Still, they all turned him down, and he couldn't understand why.  It was, of course a foregone conclusion that he would win, but they were passing up an opportunity for him to critique their style, make suggestions, teach them, for god's sake.  What did these people want?

Bertram knew what he wanted.  He wanted something sweet.  He walked the short distance to the kitchen and dining area, and waved his hand over the attention sensor.

"Pantry!"

"Yes, Dr. Collinsworth."  The computer system, at least, gave him his due respect.

"I want something sweet."

"Yes, Dr. Collinsworth,"  the machine said again, a blinking light indicating that it awaited further instructions.

"Cake, chocolate... no!  No, make it cream puffs.  Can you do that?"

"Certainly, Dr. Collinsworth.  It will however reduce supplies for other foodst--"

"I don't want to hear about your inventory issues, you stupid machine.  Can you make them or not?"

"Yes, Dr. Collinsworth.  How many would you like?"

"Ten," he said without hesitation.  Then, "no, make it 16.  I have a powerful hunger."

"Yes, Dr. Collinsworth."

The food processor clicked, snicked, whirred, and ejected the first of the cream puffs.  Bertram almost broke the confection pulling it from the machine, and had finished the first one before the second had been fully ejected.  It was perfect.  It was always perfect.

With great patience, he waited for three more to be delivered, and put them on a plate.  He could hold off a bit.  He would eat these, and watch the sunset.  The rest of his colleagues should be back by dark, buzzing about their work, their findings, and avoiding him.  But he wouldn't care.  He'd be cruising on his sugar high.

The sun looked tiny in the sky as it sank closer to the desert floor.  Had it not been for the cream puffs, he would have felt an honest melancholy.  The sky, as always, was clear.  There was never a cloud, and this time of year, hardly ever a dust storm to block one's view of the far horizon.  Usually never.  He did see one cloud, an odd one, come to think of it.  It was more like a contrail than...  well, that was just wrong.  He blinked his eyes, and even as he looked the long thin cloud dissipated. 

Imagination, he told himself.  Not enough moisture for a cloud.

"Time," he called out.

"1911 hours," the disembodied voice of the computer supplied.

That was odd.  It was later than he expected.  The others must have found something especially interesting today to be so late returning.

Bertram stuffed the last of the cream puffs into his mouth, and walked back to the food processor to get the rest of them.  The machine had really outdone itself this time.  They were excellent.

He was wiping chocolate from his fingertips when he noticed the incoming message alert light.  The message output next to the blinking light indicated that the message had been left hours ago.

His colleagues were really falling down on the job, letting a message go that long without being answered.  He'd be sure to give them a piece of his mind when they got back.  Shoddy work.  Shoddy.

Grumbling, he waddled over to the comm panel and pressed the receive button.

"--sage continues.  Hey, Carp ol' boy, hope you're enjoying your snack.  I'm afraid it's about the last one you'll have for quite awhile.  We've reprogrammed the food processor to allow you one last splurge before going back to subsistence level, but trust me, in the long run you'll be glad we did."  It was Jenks, the leader of the mission.

Another voice came on, Sandra.  Ah, Sandra.  Bertram knew that beneath her hard exterior, she really cared for him.  "We had to do it, Carp" she was saying.  Do what?  "We voted, and it was unanimous."

What was?  Screwing with the food processor?  What was this, some kind of weight control intervention?  He was going to tear into them when they got back.  There was no way he'd put up with--

"--it's why we decided to leave.  We're sorry, well, I'm sorry, you're not all that bad, not bad all the time, at least, but the others--"  there was a chorus of assent in the background, "the others just couldn't take it any more.  You've been rude to everyone, you complain constantly, and lately you've begun to smell."

Bertram slammed his hand against the message retrieval button and the voice stilled.  He was outraged.  He had no idea what they were talking about.  Certainly none of those claims were accurate.  There wasn't a nicer, more agreeable person on the planet than Bertram Collinsworth.  He was going to--

--wait a minute.  Leave?  Did Sandra say they were leaving?  A stressed chuckle escaped him.  She couldn't have said that.  There was no way they could just leave.  They couldn't just leave him here...  by himself.  They...

"Computer!"

"Dr. Collinsworth."

"Locate all members of the team.  Exact locations."

"You are the only person currently in residence, Dr. Collinsworth."

"That's not what I meant.  Where are the rest.  Project a map, show their locations.  I want to know where they are and I want to know right now."

"There are no other life signs here, Dr. Collinsworth."

Can't be.  It can't be, his mind was racing now.  OK, OK, he bargained with the Universe, maybe I'm not all that easy to get along with, but I don't deserve to be left... left behind.

"They can't have left me. I'm about the best biologist on Earth," he said aloud.

Yes, the Universe seemed to say to him in reply.  But you aren't ON earth, are you?