Like Oil and Water

The pair once more found themselves before the large door. Looking at it again, it looked to be a heavy steel door that had a small window. It sort of remind Mya of a blast door of some kind. And sure enough, there was a panel that was on the wall next to it. She leaned in for a better look and to let Gadget have a view. It had a few switches and a keypad along with a screen to see selections.

“Well ideas?” Mya turned to her companion.

“The screen says ‘config’ at the bottom. Select it and see if there’s lights or lighting” she offered.

The human shrugged and did so. There was such an option but a few other ones like ‘tools, ‘size’, ‘placement’. Weird but just another thing on the list to look at later. Mya hit ‘lights’ and cranked the option to full power. The sound of fluorescent lights coming on was heard in the room beyond and the resulting sight left both women speechless. As if in a trance, Mya slowly opened the heavy door once more and entered.

The room was huge. Like the size of a barn or maybe half a warehouse huge. There was what seemed to be a raised up viewing platform connected to a Closed off office like room on one side and a large pair of double doors opposite of it. In between, the concrete floor was covered with crates, boxes, tables, racks, lifts, pullies, rolling tables and more. Each of them covered and filled to the brim with tools and materials. A corner set up for cars and cycles had two hogs already set up, one black one dark purple. Another section seemed designed for electronics, another for boats, and… was that half an aircraft block just hanging from the ceiling!?!?! And, of course, off to the side of each section was a doll sized copy, with a larger more complete version of the room near the middle. It was like a dream garage, made to accommodate any mechanical beast that was rolled into the shop. It even had a few couches, old TVs and a couple mini fridges sprinkled here and there to give it that really ‘homey family’ workshop feel. Hell it even had two wash rooms and three emergency showers placed very strategically.

“Spammers, jacks, torque wrenches, sledgehammers…” Mya breathed.

“Welding torches, soldering irons, air compressor, circuit boards…” Gadget had her eyes wide as she took it all in.

“Engines and wheels, is that a metal press over there?!?!?”

“Never mind that!” Gadget pulled at Mya’s hair, “Over there that’s a brand new Fabrication machine!”

“Oil, gears, screws; just holy crap I died and went to heaven, or Santa is finally paying me back. My god this is my dream…,” Mya was slowly spinning around to take it all in.

“I can’t believe it! I can make anything I’ve ever even drafted here!” Gadget was almost vibrating, “It’s like the perfect…”

“Garage!!!/workshop!!!”

A moment or two passed with those words echoing in the room. Slowly each turned to the other, a look of confusion on each other. Almost at once both asked the same thing.

“What did you just say!”

“What do you mean workshop? It’s a garage, we make stuff to fix stuff, this isn’t some kind of wacky home inventor dump that lets him blow himself and half the block up! It’s a business not a play ground!” Mya angrily started. She’d seen too many ‘geniuses’ or backyard inventors treat a perfectly good garage like it was a toy chest, usually cause the owner left the building due to money or they were the local ‘egg head’ of a gang. She wasn’t gonna let someone a tenth of her size run this equipment into the ground.

“You’d just use All this for the sake of keeping things running?” Gadget shouted back, her voice rising and a burning look in her eyes, “Can’t you see the potential we have here, all these parts and supplies? We could make anything! We could make new machines, inventions; I could make my plane in full scale! And you’d just want to waste it all on Upkeep and payment?!?!”

“Your inventions?” Mya was taken a back, “Little miss PHD you wouldn’t know one drill from another. Don’t hurt yourself trying to reinvent the wheel.”

“Oh I wouldn’t would I?!?” Gadget puffed up and jumped from Mya’s shoulder to a nearby table, “Impact driver” she tapped a nearby drill, “Drill Driver” she shouted as she ran up and down to other devices on the table, “Pneumatic Drill, Rotary Hammer Drill, Air Angle Drill; am I Boring you?!?” She shouted, folding her arms.

“The fuck do you have a PHD for!?!?! Someone like you I’d think it was in education or computers! History maybe!” Mya shot back. All of the drills Gadget pointed out were correct(well the hell was an air angle one), but why the hell did she know.

“I worked on planes with my father as a kid! My PHD is in Engineering and Aerodynamics. My minor was in computers though!” Gadget snapped, jabbing a finger at Mya, a small but well understood gesture, “Besides if we’re questioning about qualifications, why should you decide what we do with all this?”

“I beg your Pardon?!?!” Mya fumed.

“You have the size and build but you don’t seem to have the knowledge needed for anything beyond repair work.” Gadget normally wasn’t this… catty, but she wanted some payback for the bath incident(Wait why did she want pay back, she normally want this emotional in the first place), “I just assumed you were a cook or maybe construction with how well worked your hands were. Let someone with vision have the workshop.”

“You dumbass little mouse I worked with my own father in his garage when I was young too, I’m not gonna hand it over to some uppity stuck up know it all brat!” Mya countered leaning down to be eye level with her.

“You… brash dingus punk!” Gadget spat back with a hop.

The women fumed at each other. Both mechanics but from opposite lines of thinking. Hard reality vs hopeful innovative, day to day vs the rocky path forward. At this moment, neither was willing to budge. Instead the just spun on their heels and turned their back on the other.

“We still need to work together to deal with Cupid. We’re still in agreement there right?” Mya spoke through her teeth.

“Correct.” Gadget said with a huff, “The best way to handle this is split the garage in half.”

“That works for me. I get all the big toys though.” Mya said, a grin on her face.

“Hey, that’s not fair! I meant by in half by floor space not volume!” Gadget sputtered as she span back around.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Mya said, patting Gadget’s head, "Are you big enough to use some of these machines? No? Thought not girl, so just play with your fisher price tiny tools and let the big girl have her fun.”

“You…, you.., I can’t stand you! Perfect match Feh!” Gadget snapped as she stomped away to a nearby small workshop blocks., “This isn’t over Mya!” She shouted as she slammed the door to it closed.

Certainly feels like it, Mya grinned as she started to take inventory.

“Agh!” Gadget flopped into the awaiting couch. What she thought was a small work shop for her was instead a small break room. Small doll couch, table, few book racks; even a small TV and bathroom. It made sense to have some of theses but she was too wound up to actually think about it.

Mya, that woman, just aaaaagh. She was like every other small grungy mechanic she’d seen, just concerned with herself and the next wad of bills. She probably did shoddy work just to service more cars too. Anyone else and maybe she’d get along better, heck she tried to at first she really did. But noooo, that woman was just like the rest of them; even though she WAS a woman, just throwing her weight around to get what she wanted.

“Just another big bully! Just… aaaagh what did her brains go to her boobs just,,, ragh!” She kicked at the little coffee table in front of her, sending a purple covered box to the floor. Wait…, was that there before?

Sighing, she got up and picked the box up, seeing a tag on the side. It was addressed to her. Odd, wait was this the gift that robotic voice had talked about? Sitting back down she took the box in her lap. Should she? After all she didn’t want to be indebted to this group that had done all of this? But at the same time, they HAD done all of this, what sort of interesting or twisted thing would a gift from them be? Curiosity won out vs logic, and thus the Pandora’s box was opened….

“And… toy gun. Yaaaay…” Gadget drily commented. The box helped a weird toy day gun of some kind. Dials on one side, keypad and screen on the other. The screen was on though and read “empty” across three bullet points. There was a large instruction book and DVD inside the box as well. She’d seen a few of theses so she knew how to use it. And the small TV did have a player…, so with nothing better to do, she popped the DVD in and started to flip through the book.

The DVD began with a weird vocal jingle. Something about ‘Evil Incorporated’? The screen then clicked with static for a second before a large eye filled the screen before a king up. The eye belonged to…, a pharmacist? Who was standing in the middle of a lab. Honestly he reminded her of Professor Nimnul.

“Hello prospective buyer!” The man said in an accented voice she couldn’t place, “and it is I, Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, with a new product! I present to you,” he moved and threw off a sheet from a large machine, “the Reconfigurator-anator.”

A weird mix of a growl and chirp was made by something off screen, but the doctor just rolled his eyes. “Oh what? -Anator is my branding, hush unless you have a better name.”

“Anywaaaaay, moving on; so potential buyer, your are asking what can this do? Well, observe!” He pulled a switch and the device blasted a beam of energy from its antenna which hit a overly fuzzy recliner. Which left the chair…, unaffected? Gadget was puzzled before the show continued and the crazy man shot a leather chair. When it was over the chair was no longer black leather but instead made of the same fuzzy material as the first one.

“Hahahahaha, you see? This device can copy properties of one object to another. Like So!” The doctor turned and zapped a cow and then a chicken. Said chicken suddenly had the size of a bull.

“And now the local sandwich shop won’t run out of my Parmesan chicken sandwich ever again!” That same clicking sound was heard again, “Oh mock all you want Perry the platypus, but do you know how hard it is to find a shop that sells those fresh and isn’t horribly overpriced?” The doctor turned back to the screen.

“Now I have a number of devices like this, which you can find in the handbook provided. Simply find your model number in the book and” he slowly turned to the side, trying to stare at something off camera to the point he put his hands over his eyes to cut the glare down, “Is that…, a rocket tandem bik…”

Whatever it was it slammed into the doctor and dragged him off screen with a cry of ‘Curse you Perry the platypuuuuuuus…” before a green paw covered the screen and the DVD ended. A very strange video but…, if he was right…

Gadget zapped the white plastic table after reading the book and adjusting the gun’s settings. After she confirmed the ‘property’ was stored, she turns and shot the box the gun came in. To her amazement, he box turned from purple to white.

“Interesting! Oh I cold use this to maybe make self insulated wires with less materials! Oh maybe I can give the property of rubber to metal to make cars safer! Or maybe metal the lightness of feathers! Yes this could be my big chance to… to…,” Gadget trailed off. She slowly picked up the remote and rewound the DVD back to a certain part. When the chicken got bigger.

Could she really? Maybe? After all it would be a shame to not at least test the range out. Right?

Gadget peaked her head out of the break room. Mya was fine but still in the massive room. She was just up on the viewing platform. In fact it seemed like she was going to head into the attached office. At this angle she wouldn’t notice the beam it could she really do this?

Her mind raced back to all the event of the day. Her mind hung up on two thoughts; Mya mocking her size and… how big she was under her clothes. Without a second thought, she fired.

—-

“Whoa.., where’d that woozy feeling come from?” Mya thought as she closed the door. Probably the stress of everything today and the fight with Gadget. Well the mouse needed a wake up call. She’d deal with that later as she looked around.

Office looked like… oddly her dads office. Big fuzzy couch against the wall, big rugged wooden desk, dented filing cabinets. Heck it even had the refurbished soda machine. It was very homey to her and…, off putting. As if someone went into her memories to make this room.

The red box on the table was new though along with the large computer on one side of the desk.. Reading the attached tag, it said it was for her. The day was weird enough so why bother at this point. Mya cracked the box open and was met by… paper work. Riveting.

Flipping though it seemed like an instruction manual for the work shop. It was a gift to her and had other properties that what she had seen. The box even included a, what it called, “Multidimensional Deed” which if it was true in the claim, made Mya and her family owners of the house, workshop and any adjacent land it was on. Within reason, she couldn’t park the house on the White House and claim it…

“Still, I made it.” Mya thought to herself, “All the pain and effort and I have it. My own garage, with enough parts to repair a fleet of vehicles, my own helpers, and all the land I'm gonna need. HA, let's see those thugs and city officials react to this.” She gazed out of the window the office had looking out into the large room. Yes it was actually pretty perfect.

Save for the small purple shape she saw moving on a table.

Gadget was naïve and sheltered, a dreamer when reality was just a series of gut punches if you weren’t ready. That sort of thinking was gonna get her crushed or killed, maybe in some sort of random invention gone wrong. A workshop needed discipline and hard work, not dreams and wishes. Mya flicked the blinds close with a huff as she moved over to the desk, taking a seat in the big chair behind it.

Even with her improvements from Cupid’s Wish(she swore she was a few inches taller too), Mya felt small in the chair. Every time she’d seen her father sit here he had filled it with his presence. Just dominated the room with his size and personality. But she still felt like the small girl in the picture.

To her semi surprise, on the desk besides the computer(modern design which was a surprise), and the documents from her gift was a framed photo. It was one from years ago, when she was little and her folks still alive. Her dad in the middle, mom standing next to him, Granny on the side, and her siblings around his legs. And she was, hoisted on his shoulders, covered in grease and holding up a wrench and a trophy. It was for a tiny ‘craft it’ competition she entered with a mechanical cookie jar opener. She got third but her dad was so proud. Mom less so after shattering five jars.

She chuckled as she leaned back into the chair. Those were the days. It wasn't a full surprise to see the photo here. She had it on her night stand back home before all of this. She wondered if her dad would be proud of her. She put the photo back down, almost knocking over another frame. It was tiny so she didn’t see it at first. What was this one?

The photo showed a mouse posed before a wind up ex plane of some kind. The figure, male by the look of it, had an aviator jacket on, scarf and helmet or was it a cap. Still he looked like a pilot through and through, spanner in one hand and the other on the shoulder of a smaller mouse. One who she knew instantly from the strawberry blonde color.

“Gadget..” Mya muttered.

She never watched she show outside of a few times but she didn’t remember Gadget’s dad in any of those. Was that why the Cupid Wish had put them together? Two girls trying to follow after their fathers? Where as She had lost her dreams after her parents died, just motivated out of bitterness, Gadget seemed to keep hers. She worked hard, helped her friends when she could, even got that PHD; but she never tossed out her inventing and child like ideas. Herself? Mya just kept building spit, and raging against the unfairness of everything.

“…. Geeze. I feel like a heel now.” Mya grumbled as she sunk further down into the chair.