Coffee Break

Part 1

by Jill W.
9/17/01

It was uncomfortably cold when Jo pried her eyes open and looked around. Her surroundings were more familiar to her than her sleeping quarters. She was on a cot in the Big Guy's Maintenance Pit. She sighed; it had been a long night of repairs and she never did get around to eating. At least she was scheduled for a day off today, assuming that nothing went wrong that would need her particular expertise to fix.

She hauled her watch out of her pocket and squinted at it. The luminescent dial read 06:00. Wow, a decent hour. Will wonders never cease? She shoved the watch back and forced herself into a sitting position. Suddenly, a white Styrofoam cup appeared before her eyes. Jo looked up at Garth's smiling face.

"Wow, breakfast in bed," Jo muttered as she took the cup. "What's the occasion?"

Garth just grinned. "Oh, you'll see in a minute," he assured her. Then he walked off, chuckling.

Jo assumed this meant that she was going to spend her 'day off' fixing something. Oh, joy. She took a sip from her coffee when she noticed something floating in it. She squinted. Something small, cylindrical, brown and flaky was in her cup. It looked an awful lot like...

"MOUSE TURDS!!" was the printable part of Jo's reaction.

Dwayne and Mack jerked around when Jo shrieked and choked. Garth just looked innocent. Mack and Dwayne looked at Garth, who shrugged.

"What's wrong?" Mack asked walking towards Jo.

Jo futilely wiped at the front of her formerly white tank top. "That FREAKIN' IDIOT put MOUSE TURDS in my coffee!" she sputtered.

Dwayne raised an eyebrow.

"I did not!" Garth protested. "It's just some cinnamon."

Mack was kneeling next to the mess on the floor with a rag in his hand. "Cinnamon carefully pressed into the shape of mouse turds, I see," he commented at he wiped up the spill.

"Well, Jo was complaining that our coffee was too boring...." Garth said. "So were you," he added, with a significant look at the coffee cup in Dwayne’s hand.

Dwayne looked down at the Diedrich’s coffee cup in his hand. Since he was limited to the amount of coffee he could drink per day, he wanted it to be GOOD coffee. (Diuretics and being cooped up in Big Guy’s cockpit all day were NOT a happy combination.) Fortunately, there were many good coffee joints not too far from the Dark Horse’s berth.

"Mouse turds weren’t exactly what I had in mind to spice things up," Dwayne said.

"Aw, can’t you take a joke?" Garth said.

"No, but I suspect that you will, soon," Dwayne replied dryly as Jo stormed past them, cussing and wiping at her shirtfront.

"Have a nice day off!" Garth said cheerfully as she passed.

"Garth, kiss my burrito!" Jo growled over her shoulder.

Dwayne just shook his head. Garth was going to pay for that trick, he thought.

On to Part 2!

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