“Sure!
Just tell me what to do,” he says, looking around for the labelling
supplies. The thought of using writing utensils was weird, this wasn’t
Night Vale.Carlos went to a box and searched inside it for a bit before pulling out some bags and tiny plastic tupperware. He also took a labeling gun and offered it to Cecil. “Here. There’s some blank labels on my table right there as well as a marker.” He pointed to indicate where the items were. “We use the label gun to mark the place. The labels hand-done in marker are for the dates.”
Cecil grabbed the supplies and went back over to Carlos and set it up so it would be easier for them to leave. He just waited for Carlos to instruct him what to write and what to label them with.
Carlos offered Cecil to sit in his chair and started to point things out. “So these tags I wrote beforehand while collecting, we just transcribe this part into the label gun.” He did one for Cecil for a piece of pumice he found in a river bed. He stuck the label that said “PUMICE – RIVER BED .23KM” onto the top of the Tupperware container. “Then we take one of the blank labels from the sheet and write down the date. The date isn’t as important, which is why I don’t print it from the label gun.
“That sounds easy enough,” he said with a small smile, before getting to work labelling what Carlos gave him. Cecil found it almost relaxing just sitting here and labelling things with Carlos. Perhaps it was just being together again after a long separation, and not having to worry constantly about Night Vale, even if it did way heavy in the back of his mind.
Carlos was just happy to have Cecil with him while they worked. He read out tags he’d made earlier in the day for the labels and sealed the sample containers with a bright and scientific smile on his face.
At one point he leaned in to smooch Cecil on the top of his head.
The Perfect Scientist 