Page 32 of Surge

“Zim, is that thing some sort of outer space alien detector?” Caldwell’s voice carried easily through the thin walls.

“No, Mr. Intelligence.” Zim laughed. “It’s a handheld FTIR, a Fourier-Transform Infrared spectrometer. I need to test the sample tubes Walker procured. Surge’s nose is awesome, but courts want science.”

Delaney tossed the rope on the bed and dove for the door. She jogged out to the cramped living room, Surge behind her. “Zim, you have an FTIR spectrometer?”

He lifted the device that looked like a camera with a trigger and a screen all attached to a plastic dumbbell. Surge went up on his hind legs and sniffed at it. Laughing, Zim hefted the device higher. “No nose prints, thank you very much.”

Surge sat, looking at it.

Zim grinned at her. “Rogue, you’ve heard of these?”

Oh boy, the call sign was catching on, apparently. “Science has always been my hobby-passion since Mrs. Hayes in seventh grade.” She squinted at the device. “I didn’t know there were handheld FTIRs. This is so cool.”

He waggled his brows. “You can help me test the chem vials, if you want.”

“Of course I do!”

Bored now, Surge hopped up on the couch and lay down.

Zim pulled the baggie of tubes out of the equipment bag, and they walked over to the kitchen table.

“You point it at the vials and pull that trigger, right?”

“The lens has to touch them.” He shrugged. “Otherwise, yep, basically the same as taking a picture.”

She grinned and stretched her fingers in and out.

He opened its case and took out a different type of lens. “Damocles loaned this to me, and I am definitely nerding out.” He took off the lens casing and switched lenses, then popped the casing back on. “Here you go.”

She touched the spectrometer to them, pulled the trigger, and handed it back to Zim. Twenty seconds later, it beeped. He looked at the screen and tilted it so Delaney could see. “And there’s our proof.”

The screen read: LIPID 2304A.

“Scientific evidence to back up what Surge’s nose detected—this is definitely Sachaai’s lipid,” Zim confirmed.

They whooped and slapped high fives.

Garrett walked in. He stood inside the door, staring at them, arms crossed.

She and Zim looked at each other like they’d been caught. Caught doing what, Delaney had no idea.

“FTIR spectrometer,” Zim explained. “It identified Sachaai’s lipids in your sample tubes. Success today.”

“No success today.” Garrett’s voice was soft. “Surge failed, and despite having the buy tomorrow, I have no confidence he won’t fail again tomorrow.”

Her stomach fell, having an inkling where this was going.

“I think it best?—”

“Garrett.” She was not going home. “Could I talk to you, please?”

He lowered his head for a moment. “Fine.”

“Wait here a second.” She jogged to her bedroom and brought out her laptop, opened it up on the kitchen table. “I was trying to figure out what went wrong with Surge out there.”

With a grunt, Garrett drew closer.

Stepping up behind them, Caldwell and Zim crowded the small kitchen. She’d known this would happen. But what was she going to do, hide this from the rest of the team to avoid being embarrassed?

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