Chapter 149: Book 3 Chapter 6.1: Frizzled Love

“So gang, I want your opinions on something,” Harley said.

“I don’t like the way you’re saying this,” Lee said. Harley only talked like that when she was about say something that would annoy her.

“You probably shouldn’t,” Harley said. She kicked her feet up on the table and relaxed. “Should I have more or less sex?”

Hawke briefly stopped writing something in his notebook, just long enough to roll his eyes.

“Why would we have an opinion on how much you fuck?”

“Because there’s larger implications,” Harley said. “This is my last year in the time loops. Once I’m done, I won’t be able to have consequence-free sex anymore. So the question becomes, do I have way more sex as a last hurrah type thing, or do I have less sex to start weaning myself off of boning?”

“That...actually is kind of a good question,” Hawke admitted. He’d never actually considered the psychological ramifications of losing the benefits of the time loops. Having lots of sex was one of the more esoteric benefits, but still a benefit.

“Right? How do I cope with this inevitable change in my life circumstances,” Harley said. Lee tried to suppress a momentary nervous twitch. “Anyway, answer the question.”

“More,” Kim said.

“Less,” Hawke added. Samson chimed in with more, and Lee voiced a vote for less.

“Tiebreaker time,” Harley said, as she zeroed in on Vell. “Cast your vote, Harlan!”

“Just have more in the first semester and less in the second,” Vell said. “Obviously.”

“Damn, that actually does make sense,” Harley said. “Vell coming in clutch once again. On that note, Mr. Harlan, want to be part of my first semester spike?”

“No thanks,” Vell said. “Just, uh, not in the mood. Nowadays I can’t be one hundred-percent certain Quenay isn’t watching me fuck.”

The Goddess in question immediately appeared above his shoulder in a puff of indignation.

“I said I don’t do that!”

“You could,” Vell snapped.

“I don’t,” Quenay said. “I’m not a pervert, Vell.”

“Excuse me for being skeptical,” Vell snapped. Quenay stuck her tongue out at him and then vanished once again.

“No, he graduated last year, can’t go to him,” Harley said.

“Sorry, Quenay showed up and got mad I implied she was a pervert, did I miss something?” Vell asked. He found it hard to parse multiple conversations at once, especially where Quenay was involved.

“Just discussing Harley’s sudden odd inability to get laid,” Kim said.

“It is not an inability, it is just a temporary roadblock,” Harley said. “Most of my regulars are indisposed or graduated. Let me call Cane-”

“Oh he won’t fuck you either,” Vell said. “He and Hanifa got pretty serious over the summer.”

“Hanifa?”

“The cosplay chick from last year’s paintball game,” Vell said. “Their hookup actually turned into something.”

“Why haven’t I heard of this?”

“Cane gets weirdly bashful about it, I think he’s embarrassed to have actual feelings,” Vell said.

“He always was a kind of a wannabe masculine stud type,” Harley said. “But, come on, seriously? Even Cane’s monogamous now?”

“You’re going to have to put actual effort into finding a sexual partner, how will you survive,” Lee said, voice dripping with sarcasm.

“Quite easily, actually, Harley B Harley is an apex sexual p-”

Mid-sentence, Harley shut up, sat down, and stared at the table for a solid five seconds. The other loopers let her bask in the moment of shame for a moment before voicing the obvious.

“You were about to call yourself a sexual predator, weren’t you?”

“Yes, and I would very much like it if we could move on from that,” Harley said. “I’m going to go seduce somebody. Be right back.”

“If you want it quick and easy, you could always ask Freddy,” Kim said. “Dude’s been after you as long as I can remember.”

“In his own awkward way, yes,” Harley sighed. “But I’m not interested. In fucking him, at least. I actually do think I’ll go say hi, I’ve barely seen that dude this year.”

Freddy had been much less involved in their escapades this year. It was a bit early in the year, but he had thus far been conspicuously absent.

“Tell him we said hello,” Lee said. “And do keep an eye out for anything that looks explosive.”

Harley nodded, shouldered her book bag, and headed for the theoretical science lab. As the home of Freddy and all the other general purpose super geniuses on campus, the lab was a hotbed of innovation and destruction. Other than the Marine Biology department, Freddy and his fellow generalists were likely the number one cause of apocalypses on campus. Mostly accidentally, but Lee still liked to keep an eye on them.

The lab was bustling on this particular day, usually a bad sign for all involved. Harley did a quick scan of the room to see if any unstable materials were being handled, and clocked three jury-rigged supercomputers and one fusion generator in less than stellar condition. Not off to a great start.

“Hey, Frizzle, are you here?”

“Hmm?”

Freddy looked up from a clipboard, waved at Harley, and then looked right back down.

“Freddy, what’s the experiment for the day?”

“What? Oh, nothing, just a quantum optical scanner for ascertaining particular position and momentum.”

“I’m not a particle physics gal, but am I hearing you’re trying to solve the Heisenberg uncertainty principle?”

“Yep.”

Freddy scrawled something on his clipboard and went to check a power coupling. Harley followed along, glaring at the back of Freddy’s head, and the tangle of fuzzy red hair that covered it. He was being weird today, for some reason.

“Everything alright today, Freddy?”

“Just fine,” he said. “When this works, I’ll have redefined the field of quantum mechanics.”

The tone of voice usually spelled disaster. Harley got in real close and put an arm around Freddy’s shoulder.

“And what if it doesn’t work?”

“It’ll work,” Freddy said. “It’s me.”

Freddy shrugged off the arm around his shoulder and walked away from Harley. Know she definitely knew something was up. Harley touching him at all was usually enough to get him blushing, but he’d barely even looked her way. He hadn’t even tried to subtly glance at her cleavage, and Harley was wearing a very low cut top today.

“Freddo, are you feeling alright?”

“I feel fine,” Freddy said. “Great, actually, better than ever, no need to worry.”

He turned around and waved the clipboard in Harley’s direction, almost as if shooing her away.

“You’re acting weird,” Harley said.

“What? Am I? No I’m not, that would be dumb, why would you say that?”

Some of the awkwardness seeped back in to Freddy’s demeanor as he tried to brush off Harley’s concerns. She put her hands on her hips and stared Freddy Frizzle down.

“Okay, what’s in your head?”

“My...brain? Some cerebral fluid, I guess?”

“Not that,” Harley said. “What is it? Alien parasite? Ghost? Tiny man with a remote control again?”

“Again?”

“Don’t even worry about it,” Harley said. She stepped up and grabbed Freddy by the head. “And don’t try to play dumb with me. I know whoever’s in charge in there isn’t Freddy, and you’re going to-”

“Mr. Frizzle?”

Freddy yelped in distress and jumped away from Harley, pulling his head out of her grip in the process. He held the clipboard in front of his face as his cheeks turned red, and he turned towards the source of the voice. A very concerned looking young woman, with her hair cropped short and thick glasses resting over dark brown eyes, was staring at the two. She gave Harley a quick once-over, and apparently approved, but remained skeptical.

“Is everything alright? What’s going on here?”

“Everything’s just fine, thanks,” Freddy squeaked. Harley knew that tone of voice. She heard it a lot when she was around. She tried to restrain a gasp as the woman turned towards her.

“Who’s this?”

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“This is my friend Harley, I maybe mentioned her. Once. You know. She’s cool. We hang out. Infrequently, not on a regular or established formal basis.”

“Yeah, just now and then,” Harley said. “Just stopping by to say hi and give that frizzy hair a tussle. You know how it is, right? He’s adorable.”

“I guess.”

“I was just going to have a casual chat with him and be on my way,” Harley said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” the woman said. Her skeptical demeanor softened into a friendly smile. “Goldie Falkenberg, I’m a freshman, working the same unit with Mr. Frizzle.”

“Well then we’ll be seeing each other infrequently,” Harley said, as she shook Goldie’s hand. Goldie smiled at the odd joke and then returned her attention to Freddy. She got his approval for a few pieces of work on their machine and then got back to work. Freddy breathed a sigh of relief and let the blush fade from his cheeks. It was wasted effort. The blush returned as soon as he turned back to Harley and saw her eyebrows wiggling.

“Mr. Frizzle?”

“What?”

“You’re not possessed after all,” Harley said. “You just got a big ol’ Freddy Frizzle crush on Goldie!”

All of his odd behavior, especially his sudden disinterest in Harley, fell into place. His awkward demeanor hadn’t changed, it’d just been redirected away from Harley by the change in affection.

“I? What, no, that’s- I wouldn’t- Goldie’s a colleague, a brilliant colleague-”

“And she’s a cutey with a booty,” Harley said. “I assume. That lab safety gear is not flattering.”

“It’s not like that!”

“It is so like that,” Harley said. “You are crushing so hard you could turn coal into diamonds.”

“That’s not possible,” Freddy said. “The carbon structure alone is-”

“Metaphor, Frizzle,” Harley said. She grabbed on to Freddy’s shoulder with one hand and pulled him close. “Are you or are you not super into Goldie?”

“I-”

The look in Harley’s eyes said she was not giving up without a fight, and Freddy knew better than to try and match willpower against Harley B Harley.

“Okay. Maybe I have an interest,” Freddy mumbled. “What do I do?”

“You figure it out,” Harley said. “Good luck!”

Harley spun towards the door and headed out, with Freddy on her heels.

“Wait, wait, can you help me?”

“Not in the way you need to be helped,” Harley said. “You got this, though. Eventually.”

Harley waved goodbye and left the lab. Freddy, still thoroughly befuddled and slightly offended, stayed behind and tried to shake his head clear. He had a machine to work on.

The loopers had already split up and left the lair, but Harley never had a hard time tracking Lee down. She gravitated towards the picnic tables by the beach, and Harley found her sitting on the western shore, chatting away with her gorgon friend Chrysothemis.

“Hey Lee. Hey Chrissy.”

Chrissy waved, but did not look in Harley’s direction. She had her face covered, but still avoided looking directly at anyone if she could help it.

“Harley. Any luck on your hunting trip?”

“It’s been like twenty minutes, Lee, and most of that was walking,” Harley said. “I take longer than that.”

“To what?” Chrissy asked.

“Don’t ask,” Lee cautioned.

“I did say hi to Freddy though,” Harley said. “And get this: there’s some new freshman chick he’s got a crush on.”

“Really? I thought he was quite smitten with you,” Lee said.

“Yeah, but a crush is a crush, it switches around pretty easily,” Harley said.

“Infatuation is like that, I suppose,” Lee said. “How was he handling his new affections?”

“Oh, he was building some crazy big quantum thingamajig to show off, I think,” Harley said.

Lee stared at Harley for a good ten seconds. There was a gorgon six inches away and Harley still felt like Lee’s stare was more dangerous.

“Oh right, doomsday stuff,” Harley said. “Shit. I got distracted.”

“It’s alright, darling, we’ll circle back and-”

Lee stopped mid-sentence. And mid motion, and mid-blink. Harley waved a hand in front of her frozen face, and then tugged on one of Lee’s motionless arms. She didn’t budge, at all. Even her skin was rock-solid, refusing to give under Harley’s grip.

“I didn’t do it,” Chrissy said.

“I know, Chrissy, she’s clearly still meat,” Harley said. She sighed and rolled her eyes. “Heisenberg uncertainty principle. The only way to know where a particle is and what its velocity is at the same time: freeze it in place.”

That brilliant deduction was the last thing that went through Harley’s head before it froze in place.

----------------------------------------

“So Freddy froze the universe because he was trying to impress a girl,” Kim said. “Definitely a normal thing people do.”

“Around here? Yeah.”

“I know, Harley, that was a sincere statement,” Kim said. “I just wish it wasn’t.”

The sarcasm had come through just fine, but the specific situational layer to which it had been applied was not. Kim took notes for next time.

“At least we can kill two birds with one stone this time,” Vell said. “Help out Freddy and prevent the apocalypse all in one go.”

The loopers were big fans of multitasking. Somehow even with two attempts at every day, it felt like they never had enough time.

“Okay, you guys have fun with that,” Harley said. “I’ll go see what Himiko and the bitches are up to.”

“Are you not coming?”

“Not if I can help it,” Harley said. “Freddy had a crush on me, if I go too and try to help him out things are going to get weird.”

Lee shrugged, accepted that as a sensible answer, and moved on. The other loopers followed behind, though Vell cast a skeptical glance over his shoulder just as he left. Harley made sure not to react, but she felt like Vell was catching on anyway.

----------------------------------------

“Hello, Freddy Frizzle,” Lee said.

“Hey Lee...and everyone else,” Freddy said. He had started out only barely glancing at Lee, but did a double take when he saw the whole gang following her. Almost the whole gang. Freddy almost asked where Harley was, but bit his tongue just in time.

“Sorry if we’re intruding, dear,” Lee said. “We’re just still trying to get Samson up to speed, and he hasn’t really been to this lab yet.”

“Yeah, just me poking around, getting acquainted,” Samson said. His attempts to act natural failed spectacularly, and he went for a diversion. “Is this big doohickey always here?”

The Heisenberg certainty device looked just like Harley had described. Big, overly intricate, and clearly cobbled together. Lee knew just from looking at it that this was an apocalypse in the making. It was reckless in a way that surprised her. Freddy’s apocalypses were usually coincidental accidents, not rampant carelessness.

“No, that, that’s new,” Freddy said. “Just something I’ve been working on recently. A particle tracker, maybe solving the Heisenberg uncertainty principle, you know, NBD.”

Vell’s eyebrow went up against his will.

“Did you just say NBD?”

Freddy grabbed his clipboard with both hands.

“Yes.”

“Out loud? With your mouth?”

“I...yes.”

“Don’t.”

“Yes sir.”

The shameful display thankfully came to an end right before Goldie arrived on the scene. Lee was surprised to see that she stood a few inches taller than Freddy. Not that the height in and of itself was a surprise, almost everyone on campus except Harley and Himiko was taller than Freddy, but the fact he had a crush on someone who towered over him was interesting.

“Oh. Am I interrupting something, Mr. Frizzle?”

Freddy loudly cleared his throat and stepped away from the loopers, gripping his clipboard tight.

“No, nothing important, what’s up, Goldie?”

“I just wanted to get some final approval on a few technical details before we get started,” Goldie said. She looked over the group, locked in on Kim’s robotic body, and then made some assumptions about the rest of them. “Are these your friends?”

“Yep.”

“Nice to meet you,” Goldie said. “I’m glad you’re here. From what Freddy’s said, you have a knack for finding potential safety issues.”

“On the rare occasions Freddy misses anything, yes,” Lee said. Even Freddy knew that was wrong, but he didn’t correct it. Not in front of Goldie, at any rate. “Did you want help with something?”

“Oh, you’ll have to ask Mr. Frizzle, he’s in charge of the big picture,” Goldie said.

After hearing it repeated a second time, Hawke finally caught on to Goldie’s weird formality.

“Mr. Frizzle? You get promoted or something?”

“Oh, no, that’s just, uh, Goldie being Goldie, I guess.”

Freddy went red in the face, and so did Goldie, which made Freddy turn even redder.

“I was a little nervous my first day, I was calling everyone mister or misses,” Goldie said. “It turned into my ‘thing’, I guess.”

“There’s worse quirks to have,” Hawke said. Screaming a lot being one of them. His throat hurt sometimes.

“I think it’s cute,” Lee said.

“I don’t mind if you guys take a look around,” Freddy said, eager to change the subject. The longer they dwelled on Goldie being cute, the redder his face turned. “Check things out, give everything a quick look, ask questions before you touch anything.”

The loopers split up to look for any potential liabilities with the machine itself, while Lee stayed behind to deal with any liabilities in the machine’s operator.

“You know, Freddy, after all these years we’ve never really gotten to know the other members of your department,” Lee said. “What’s Goldie like?”

Freddy Frizzle’s face jumped through seventeen different expressions as he tried to come up with a way to describe Goldie that wouldn’t make it immediately obvious he had a crush on her.

“She’s okay.”

“Just okay?”

“Well, she’s really smart and everything, but you know, who isn’t? This is a school for geniuses, everyone’s smart. She’s smart, I’m smart, you’re smart, nothing special, you know?”

“Not everyone’s as good looking as she is.”

“Yea- dang it,” Freddy said. “I was really trying not to be obvious about it.”

“I’ve known you about three years now, Freddy, I can tell,” Lee said. She gave his frizzy hair a friendly tussle as she spoke. “I suppose all of this is to impress her, then?”

Harley’s description had not done justice to the sheer scale of Freddy’s project. The massive particle tracker took up most of the lab, and was growing even as she watched. Vell was carefully overseeing the new expansion, so Lee kept her focus on Freddy.

“Most people would just buy flowers.”

“I wish it were that simple,” Freddy said. “I need to- I don’t know. I need to be special. Somehow. Show something off. But all I’ve got going for me is being smart, and everyone’s smart.”

“So you feel the need to prove you’re even smarter.”

“Lee, it already sounds pathetic, and when you say it like that it’s even worse,” Freddy said.

“Sorry,” Lee said. “I worry, though, that trying to engage with her on a purely academic level will make her see your relationship as purely academic.”

“Oh. Shit. You might be right.”

“Maybe. In any event, any relationship needs to be built on some shared personal interests,” Lee advised. “Talk to her about what she’s interested in, and let her know what you’re interested in. Tell her about your hobbies, what you do in your spare time.”

“I mostly watch anime and play video games,” Freddy said. “Historically speaking, not good for impressing girls.”

“Anime worked for Cane and Hanifa, you never know,” Lee said. “And you do more than that. In the time you’ve spent with us, you’ve marathoned foreign films, played card games, learned to paint -you’ve helped thwart a kidnapping, for heaven’s sake.”

“I wouldn’t call preventing kidnappings a hobby,” Freddy said. “I sure hope it doesn’t become one, anyway.”

“Still, it’s something to brag about,” Lee said. “You are Freddy Frizzle, and you are an interesting, well-rounded person.”

“Right. Right! Interesting, well-rounded person,” Freddy said. He started to toy with his tangled curls, in an effort to straighten them out. “Oh god. How do I look? Do I look good?”

“I’m a lesbian, darling, I have no way of knowing,” Lee said. That excuse saved her from a lot of uncomfortable conversations with male friends. It did not save Freddy from messing with his hair, though. “We’re not on a deadline, if you want to go fetch a comb.”

“No, no, I actually spent half an hour combing my hair this morning,” Freddy said. “It didn’t really help.”

His trademark frizzy hair was a beast that could not be tamed, but Freddy had tried anyway. Whenever he knew he would be working with Goldie, Freddy put much more effort into his appearance, even when he knew it was wasted effort. Freddy continued to waste effort as he toyed with his hair and headed for Goldie. She was halfway through delivering an explanation of an electron tracking array to Kim and Vell, who were very glad for the incoming interruption. They didn’t even know what half the words she said even meant. They waited, in silent desperation and stupidity, for Freddy to interrupt.

In spite of their lack of understanding, Goldie continued, and Freddy showed no signs of stopping her. He stood on the sidelines and let her say the phrase “reduced Planck constants” two more time, before she finally paused long enough that Freddy felt comfortable getting a word in edgewise. He didn’t like to interrupt.

“Uh, Goldie, if I could stop you for a minute?”

“Oh, I was just getting to the quantum superpositioning tracker,” Goldie said. Kim’s digital face flashed the words “Save Me”.

“I know that’s the best part, but I was thinking maybe we can stop for a second,” Freddy said. “Maybe break for lunch?”

“It’s a bit early, but I guess your friends are here. Okay,” Goldie said. “See you soon.”

“Yeah, see you soon.”

----------------------------------------

Freddy finished his sandwich and stared at his empty plate. While the usual hustle and bustle of the dining hall still surrounded them, his table was oddly quiet.

“I don’t mean to criticize, Freddy,” Lee said. “But I do think you may have forgotten to specify Goldie was to eat lunch with us.”

There was an empty seat at the table, right next to Freddy, which they had been saving for Goldie, and which Goldie was not currently occupying. They hadn’t even seen her in the last twenty minutes.

“I get nervous,” Freddy mumbled. Lee sighed.

“We’ll go back and try for round two,” Lee said.