“Um… I have allergies?” Carlos said. “And no, they’re not radioactive. But don’t touch them – I haven’t run them through the dishwasher yet.”
Maria blinked, “Okay what is the coraltion between the allergies and the gem stones? And why does you need to wash them?”
“They’re covered in snot,” Carlos said flatly. “Apparently this time around allergy season for me consists of gemstone loogies.”
“I swear this place gets weirder every day. I want to look through them once they are clean. My love of shiny things is infinite and I will not be denied.” She told her brother immediately.
“What are you, a magpie?” Carlos asked with a chuckle. “If you’re nice I might even let you keep some. I’m going to study them to see how pure they are… I don’t know how to appraise them though.”
“You can call me a magpie all you like, I don’t care. You can study all the ones I don’t want.” She decided with a shrug. “Take them to a jeweller? Or a geologist? You have one of those on your team, yeah?”
Carlos just grinned cheesily at her. He sniffed and turned his head away, just in case. “Yeah, I’ll see if Arnold wants to look at them. He usually prefers sedimentary though – more interesting, I guess.”
The Perfect Scientist 