Flexible Thinking for a Modern Life: Chapter 13

 Summary: A commission series for Alfalfa. Iris Fleurs, the stretchy daughter of a slime mother and a human father, tries to live her best life and feel comfortable in her own skin. Teenage rebellion ensues.

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Flexible Thinking for a Modern Life

CHAPTER 13

The gang waited until nightfall; under the cover of darkness, they planned to move out, stake their target, and begin the heist. 

Their target: Big 'N Bargain, a massive discount retailer that lorded over lesser places of commerce. It sure was an impressive sight on the outside - so broad and expansive. You could probably fit eight warehouses in it. 

Kamika and Iris traipsed outside, hugging the walls while remaining well beyond the areas illuminated by nearby streetlights. The lights in the building were still on, but there weren't many cars parked outside; it looked like they'd be closing before too long.

"So, uh, Kamika? You're gonna teach me how to be covert about this, right?"

"Sure, sure, just shut up and let me think," Kamika responded bluntly, her eyes narrowing to observe their surroundings. 

"Because I'm a little out of the loop. Like, we got an actual, knife-wielding ninja watching the home base, right?" Iris glanced down the way we came from. "I'm sure Double Double would know how to handle it reeeeal easy."

"Well, you wouldn't learn anything then, would you?" Kamika glanced over, her mouth flattening. The nerve of the girl to insinuate that Kamika didn't know precisely what she was doing...

"I got that part," Iris sighed. "I just figured he'd know a lot about this. And he'd be good for, I dunno, feedback?"

"You talk far too much. Beside, only one of us is a certified teacher." Kamika continued to survey their surroundings, her tail whipping back and forth.

"Substitute teacher." Iris corrected Kamika.

"Same difference!" Kamika spat, her voice ascending to a piercingly shrill note. "You need proper certification for it and everything!"

"I'm not a hundred percent convinced you didn't forge those documents though..." Iris smirked.

"Oh, stuff it." Kamika scoffed, her head turning both ways. "Let's head to the back."

"The back?" Iris blinked. "They're open, right? We can just walk in through those doors..."

"Rule number 1 of thieving; you gotta find an access point," Kamika pointed out. "And people are real bad about protecting their behinds."

Iris opened her mouth to say something, but decided against it, following Kamika to the back of the building. Behind the store was a vacant lot. It seemed slightly foreboding, and maybe a little claustrophobic; like the bad feeling of being in an alley all alone, except magnified.

Iris sure felt that. This definitely wasn't a place where she belonged. Still, that was part of the fun, to wind up in places she shouldn't be, and stick it to the man.

Adjusting her mask, Iris headed to a metal door at the back of the warehouse. It had a tough, heavy-looking padlock on it. Iris held it in one hand. 

"Think it needs a key..." Iris commented aloud. She glanced to Kamika. "You know how to pick a lock?"

"Oh, absolutely! I used to freelance as a locksmith! Of course, it was mostly an excuse to let myself into rich people's homes and... well, never mind that." Kamika leaned closer. 

"Oh! Then you can show me how!" Iris grinned. "You got a hair clip or something?"

"Ugh, never. I let my hair flow freely, and with reckless abandon~" Kamika ran her long, manicured fingers through her hair with a chuckle. "Besides, why would you need a lockpick? You already have the key."

"What? I don't even work here, why would I-"

Iris' hands squished slightly against the padlock. It clinked in her hands. Her glanced down, noticing how her right thumb had slipped slightly into the keyhole. 

"Ohhhh. This'll be easy!" Her eyes lit up in realization. She held the padlock in her left hand, raising her right hand in front of her. She studied it carefully, before settling on her index finger. Pointing, she lowered it towards the opening at the bottom of the padlock, resting it upon the opening at the bottom.

With only minor resistance, her finger, at least five times larger than the hole, began to slip in, shrinking at the tip, then along the joints. Soon, her entire finger had slipped in. More specifically, it had flexibly liquified, feeling inside for the mechanisms of the padlock. 

She stuck her tongue out, twisting her hand back and forth.

"Easy... eaaaasy..."

Iris tried to concentrate. It was such a strange sensation; she shivered slightly at how chilled the lock's inner components were. She felt for the cylinder and the pins, feeling for them carefully.

Five minutes passed.

"Almost got it..."

Five more minutes passed.

"Neeeearly there..."

And another five minutes...

"...Iris, I understand you're up to your arms in this business, but do you need a hand?" Kamika tilted her head, her foot tapping impatiently on the concrete.

"I-it's harder than it looks on TV!" Iris whined. Now her technique was getting much more erratic. Grunting, she wrestled with the thing, clasping it in both hands as she rattled it forcefully.

"Get! Off! You! Stupid! Piece! Of!"

Click!

The padlock was opened, flung to the ground with an unresounding, metallic thud. Iris staggered back, glancing to her finger. In the mess that happened, it had formed the teeth and ridges of a key all on its own.

She whistled, waving her hand as she grinned to Kamika; with a few flaps, her finger was back to normal.

"See? Told ya I could do it~" Iris snickered, twirling her finger in a small circle. She blew on it like a fired gun, going through the motions of bolstering her hand back to her side.

"Took you long enough." Kamika sighed, folding her arms. "Pretty sure this door will take you to their supply, so you can duck in and out, easy."

"Alright, sounds easy enough," Iris nodded. "So you'll be standing watch, then?"

"Yeah. If anyone notices the lock's gone, I'll make sure they're... properly distracted." Kamika cooed, her tail waving back and forth.

Iris turned back to the metal door. "So, uh, do we have a list of stuff you want me to grab?"

"Uhhh, I was keeping a shopping list." Kamika pulled out a napkin, with chicken scratch scrawled all along it. It had gotten thoroughly smudged in her pocket. "...Uhhh... 'bar jee ink eat', 'Gaymin'... 'Hogan days'..."

"..." Iris leaned over to read. "You, uh, sure you're reading that right?"

"Hell if I know. Ah, screw it, we'll improvise." Kamika scrunched up the napkin and tossed it aside. "Just get a box of those Chocobombs Cereal. Family sized."

"...That's it?" Iris blinked. 

"This is a trial run, sweetheart. Besides, I didn't give your outfit any pockets, so there's only so much you can carry with you, right?" Kamika explained. "Can't be drawing too much attention by cleaning out their entire inventory."

"...I guess you're right." Iris conceded. She placed her hand on the metal door's handle, feeling for it carefully. 

"Gimme fifteen minutes, and then I'll be back outside." Iris opened the door slowly, hoping she wouldn't be met with a loud, obnoxious creaking sound. Thankfully, the door was fairly quiet.

"You'll be fiiiiine. I'll be right here waiting for you." Kamika reassured the girl. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do~"

---

The first thing Iris noticed upon entering the supply area was how wide open it was. It didn't seem all that removed from the warehouse the rest of the gang had holed up in.

There were rows upon rows of large, wooden boxes, presumably containing retail items of all sorts. The question then was, which boxes contained what items? There were so many.

"Do I seriously have to check every single box...?" Iris whined. "I'm not getting paid enough for this..."

"Technically, you're not getting paid at all."

Iris nearly leapt five feet in the air as Kamika's voiced buzzed in her head. Her eyes were wide as sinner plates as she rose her hand to the side of her head.

"Kamika!?" Iris hissed. "What are you doing in my head!? Are you reading my thoughts!?"

"It's an earpiece, genius. I put it inside your mask," Kamika explained, her voice a little staticy and rough. "And keep it down, or someone'll hear you."

"Ah, s-sorry." Iris muttered. "I'll be quiet."

"Good, You said there were a bunch of boxes?"

"Yeah, rows and rows of them. I dunno what any of it is, but..."

"Who knows. Big retail outlets sell pretty much everything. You'll probably have to browse the food section at the front of the store."

"What? Then... then we really should've just gone through the front door then..."

"Hindsight's 20-20. Just get to the main part of the store and-"

"Ah!"

Iris tried her best to stifle a yelp. At the far end of the room, she heard a loud door swing open, and the cacophonous echoing of a multitude of steel-toed footsteps clomping all along the floor. 

Iris had to hide. And she had to hide now. She didn't see a good hiding spot at a glance, but...

Her attention focused on the rows of neatly stacked boxes, and her mind got to thinking. There was a very, very narrow gap between the boxes. Impossible, unthinkable for a normal human to hide in a gap like that.

But Iris was extraordinary. She decided it was better than nothing. 

She held her breath, rushing to the nearest stack of boxes. She pressed her hand into the crack, pushing deeper and deeper. She could feel her palm flattening as she did, slipping into the dark, single centimetre space between the boxes. She pressed her arm deeper, and then the rest of her body, closing her eyes as she inched her way in. 

She felt flat as a pancake, and she felt the rough surface of two heavy crates pressing against her. It was really cramped, and she could barely see. She could try elongating her neck out one of the cracked to see what's going on. But some of the voices were getting closer...

"Catch the game last night, Joe?" One of the workers began in a low, raspy voice.

"Hoo, don't remind me. Never watching playoffs again..." A rather depressed voice responded. "You can't go on a record-breaking winning streak and then drop four in a row when it matters most..."

"Hey, we'll get beers to drown our misery later. Corporate shipped a bunch of barbecues for the sale next month, so let's get to unpacking this shit." A third voice, one that commanded casual authority, set the objectives for the night.

"They're moving everything around...?" Iris muttered to herself. Her eyes squinted, trying to pierce the darkness. "If I can slip through the cracks, I can make my way down and-"

"Alex, you take the forklift. I'll too upset to handle heavy equipment..." Joe mentioned sadly.

"Nah, don't worry about it. Just help me with unpacking when we get these over to the front."

VRRRRRRRR!

"...Huh?" Iris heard an engine revving, followed by the sound of... some kind of loud, obnoxious mechanism. She couldn't put her finger on it, but...

"Ah!"

Iris had to stifle a gasp feeling the crate that she was gripping slowly begin to life up from the ground. Worse still, her flattened body was being pulled up with it! She had to think quickly...

In that split second, she realized what was going on. They were taking all the boxes to the front of the store? Then this would be her ticket out!

She took a closer look at the box. The crate had been reinforced with planks of wood on the sides, criss-crossing in an x-pattern on each of the crate's faces. There was a very small space on the bottom side of the crate that Iris could slip into, cradled by this x-pattern. It was a tight squeeze... but that wasn't really new to her. 

As the crate rose, Iris slipped just under, pressing her malleable body as tightly as she could against the bottom of the crate, so that no part of her body dipped out from underneath. She wrapped her arms against her torso, and folded her legs like so much fresh laundry packed for a tropical vacation. 

She sucked in her breath, holding, scrunching her face so as to not move a single solitary muscle. She became absolutely still, holding on for dear life against the bottom of the crate, sandwiched between the plywood and the metal bars of the forklift. 

She ascended, higher and higher, the deafening sound of the forklift filling her senses, along with the pungent smell of exhaust. She held her breath, hoping nobody would spot her flattened out body hanging out from just underneath the crate.

But from the sides, she was hidden perfectly. And nobody was there to spot her from below. She felt herself being carted along down the storage area, not quite sure where she was going to end up...

She listened intently for any clues. But it was hard to make anything out over the loud noises coming from the forklift. She could hear a loud mechanical door opening, and the forklift continued unabated. 

The floor beneath her changed from stone-cold concrete to scuffed-up linoleum. She recognized it; she had been transported to the store floor!

Soon, the forklift had come to a stop. Iris remained suspended in the area, her mouth flat with the rest of her body. She stared at the floor below. 

VRRRRRR!

Again, the forklift's prongs began to lower, slowly and anxiously. Iris had to get out quickly - she wasn't about to get trapped underneath a heavy crate for a box of cereal.

Peeling herself off, she flapped out towards the front of the crate, unfurling and restoring her proportions rapidly. She made a quick survey of the area, and ducked into the nearest aisles she could see!

Huffing, she glanced behind her. The operator of the forklift didn't seem to notice her. Actually, it seemed like the store had closed not too long ago - many of the lights were already turned off, allowing her to traipse about under the cover of darkness. 

She sighed in relief, her rubbery arms and limbs feeling wobbly. She leaned against a nearby shelf, stocked with kitchen appliances. 

"Are you in? You're sure taking your sweet time." Kamika buzzed in Iris' ear once more. 

"There were a bunch of guys, Kamika! I had to hide under a damn box!" Iris muttered. She didn't need this kind of attitude right now.

"You didn't get caught, right?" Kamika asked. 

"No, I managed to get through them, but-"

"Then there's no problem!" Kamika cut her off. "Just get the goods and meet me outside, pronto."

Iris winced as an audible click silenced the feed. "So fussy..." Iris groaned, straightening herself out. She plucked a splinter of wood from her outfit and looked around.

"I've been here before, just need to get my bearings. I think the food's on the west end..." Iris recalled. Under the cover of darkness, she slowly made her way down the aisles, ignoring anything that wasn't immediately relevant to the mission. 

It took some time, but there weren't a lot of personnel on patrol after closing; as it turns out, Iris had a pretty easy time getting to toe food section. She quickly scanned the aisles, finding the section with the breakfast cereals, and quickly searched for the goods.

"Lesse, popcorn poppers, nut blasters, tuttifruttis... okay, found it. Chocobombs." Iris muttered. "Family sized too. Now I'll just-"

"Yoooooooo. Did you, like, miss the memo?"

Again, Iris nearly throttled herself into the shelf out of shock, spinning around to see a gangly teenager staring blankly at her. He had a pretty bad case of acne, not to mention the greasy hair.

Iris didn't want to say a word. It would give herself away.

"Store's closed, maaan. I'd have to reopen the cash for you, if you were gonna buy that..."

Iris continued her tense stare down, looking for any sort of way out. She backed up a step.

"...Hey, wait a second." The teen swayed back and forth, rubbing the stubble at the tip of his chin. "Do you work here, brah?"

"............."

Iris weighed her options.

"...yes. Yes I just started. What makes you think I don't? Work here..." Iris knew that in order to successfully lie, you had to be unfalteringly confident you belonged in the wrong place. This was not one such place, and she was not a convincing liar.

The teen squinted, leaning forward to look her over. 

"...They didn't give you a uniform yet? Pshaw, fuckin' managers. Cool digs though. Must be hot in them..." 

Iris' mouth opened and closed silently, trying to make sense of this guy. As she studied him more, she realized there was a rather pungent odor about him. Not quite B.O., but closer to... a skunk?? What was that about?

"W-well, I... it was all I had lying around, so..."

Her eyes drifted around, looking for an escape. This idiot would blow her cover. 

"Seriously? Aw man, just pick out something from the fashion section, management doesn't care." The weird teen chuckled lowly. "Could pick out a nice thing for you."

"Great! Sounds great, but I..."

Iris looked up. Aha! There was another vent well above their heads. It was a hell of a reach, but it was nothing for Iris.

"Igottagobye!" Iris blurted, her torso shooting up ten, fifteen feet at once so she could reach the vents above. The sudden movement sent the weird, spacey teen falling on his ass, his eyes following her legs as they slingshotted up to meet the rest of her body. 

The last thing the kid saw was the costumed girl disappearing into the vent, the grate slamming behind her. 

"...Whoooooa." He looked upwards, absolutely astonished. "Gotta send props to my dealer. She said I was gonna see some trippy shit..."

When you're working the closing shift at a major department store, you need all the help you can get just to get through the day. It was a tireless struggle for a part-timer...

Of course, Iris had other things on her mind than to genuflect on the realities of post-industrial capitalism. She had to report to Kamika, STAT! 

...As soon as she found her way out of this confusing, twisting ventilation layout. 

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