The supply closet ate Frank's requisition before he'd been issued a drop of solvent. One moment the signed form lay under his hand. The next a pink tongue reached out of the drawer, caught its bottom edge and pulled. The drawer closed with a satisfied click. From the doorway RB gave an answering sound that Frank did not care to interpret.
A handwritten sign behind the counter said PLEASE DO NOT FEED THE STORAGE MIMIC. Frank had to lean into the danger area to read it; judging by the teeth marks on the counter, the warning had arrived after the first few complaints.
"That could go on the other wall," Frank said. "Or you could put it on the door before anyone comes in."
Harl came out of the stockroom carrying a ledger against his chest. He was an ogre with a chipped tusk, a heavy working apron and a pleasant manner when nobody was accusing him of losing inventory. At the sight of the closed drawer he shut his eyes briefly.
"Please don't tell me it did that again."
"It was a signed requisition. I need it back, and I need the solvent I came for."
"Would you believe I've been asking for a feed chute since they moved it up here?" Harl put the ledger down and searched under the counter for the key to the outer safety chain. "I've got three crates of solvent I can't account for, two stacks of damaged forms and a creature that's decided paper is part of its lunch."
A row of teeth appeared between the top drawer and the cabinet frame. "Before you go anywhere near that chain, let's find out what it's eaten and when somebody last fed it."
"I thought you'd say that. You're the first person today who hasn't asked whether the missing crates might still be behind the shelving."
"Could they be?"
Harl gave him a look. "One could. The other two had labels on the floor outside its drawer."
RB had climbed onto the rim of Frank's cart and was watching the cabinet with an attention normally reserved for bright screws. Frank was pleased the rat hadn't yet tried to reach one of the brass drawer pulls. The mimic shifted when Harl turned the stockroom key, and RB retreated beneath the cart until the wood settled again. Whatever the little fellow understood about the thing, he had the sense not to stand in front of its mouth.
Frank circled the cabinet from behind the safety line. The wall chain was loose, the feed bowl had dried hard, and the chemical labels were curling where the mimic had licked them. Harl had been told the creature was a cost-effective guard. A guard that ate purchase orders was a particularly expensive way to keep stock safe.
"How many meals did it get yesterday?" he asked.
"Monster Operations is supposed to come twice," Harl said. "They missed the afternoon one. I filled out the missed-delivery slip myself."
"Did it get fed this morning?"
"Not when I was here. The Core keeps calling it cost-effective security, Frank. I can show you what it's cost us in stock. I haven't got a figure for the bite Hesh took last week trying to pull a measuring tape out of its drawer."
Frank moved the rags to a closed crate, staying behind the marked safety line. "Then somebody needs to feed it before we ask it to behave like a cupboard. And I'd have that loose loop repaired before anybody tries moving the thing."
By the time Dree arrived from Monster Operations, Harl had gathered three rejected feeding requests, Frank had found his old inspection drawing, and the mimic had taken another bite out of the edge of the counter. Dree was a wiry goblin who dealt with animated predators for a living; he stopped just inside the door and waited until the cabinet had finished chewing before approaching.
"That thing hasn't had a proper meal," he said. "See the way it's hunting paper? It does that when it's desperate for cellulose. The feed we're meant to give it is mostly mushroom fiber. Who put the bowl on the far counter?"
"Somebody who wanted to keep all his fingers," Harl said.
"Fair. That's why the feeding chute was on the installation plan." Dree pointed to a page in Frank's notebook. "You've still got the sketch."
Frank turned the page to show Harl his own signature beneath the original request. He remembered recommending a feeding chute after the mimic caught a thief during a demonstration. Six minutes of useful security had persuaded the Core to move the creature upstairs; the missed feedings since then had cost everybody else far more time.
Harl settled onto a stool that creaked. “If I report an unfed security creature, Monster Operations says I own it. If I report missing solvent, Finance says I consumed it. My preferred result is to stop feeding paperwork to the first and explanations to the second.” He opened his ledger to the missing-crate column. It was the most Frank had heard Harl say about how the day actually cost him.
"And I need to stop sending handlers into a room where the hungry thing can grab them," Dree said. "If I put feed into that drawer without some kind of divider, it'll learn to bite the hand it recognizes."
Frank tapped the line marked on his sketch. "There's an old conduit behind the cabinet. It may take a funnel if the signal pipe has enough clearance. But we secure the cabinet first. I'm not having it pull off the wall while someone's working behind it."
The Core appeared on the wall while Harl was searching for the original installation order. Its image was so bright that Dree turned away from it to check a feeding measure on his belt.
"My friends, I hear we're having a little disagreement," the Core said. "Surely there's a solution that lets every department feel heard."
"We need approval to install the feeding chute," Harl answered. "The original order was rejected."
"Our security investment has produced tremendous value."
"It's eaten three crates," Harl said.
The Core's smile altered by a fraction. "Perhaps we should focus on collaborative language."
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Frank held up his old diagram, where the cabinet and conduit were drawn to scale. "The hole is already in the wall. I need a bracket and a feed funnel. Dree's got the funnel in the lower pens, and Harl can lend us the bracket. If you approve the fitting, we can stop arguing and get back to work."
"Now that's the sort of constructive proposal I love," the Core said. Frank copied the authorization number onto his sketch while the Core launched into an anecdote about a morale luncheon nobody had asked to attend.
The old conduit was narrower than Frank remembered, with sealant caked inside and barely enough room to align the funnel. Harl steadied the cabinet while Frank tightened the loose anchor. Dree fetched the ceramic feed funnel and a measured ration.
RB came to the open inspection panel and looked into the conduit. He squeaked twice, then stretched his head far enough into the opening to see around the first bend.
"There's a bracket blocking it," Frank said, following the line with his lamp. "I've got the tool for that. You don't have to go in."
RB slipped into the conduit before Frank finished the warning. The ragged tail disappeared past the ledge. Frank didn't reach blindly after him; the mimic's jaws were active on the other side of that wall. He put the screwdriver down, checked the chain, and found his fingers had tightened around the edge of the inspection hatch.
Harl crouched beside the opening, keeping an anxious eye on the mimic's nearest drawer. "You sure that little fellow won't get swallowed?"
"No," Frank admitted. "I thought he had more sense than to go where I've just told him not to."
A faint scratch sounded from the far side. He tapped twice on the pipe and waited. Three quick clicks answered from inside the wall, followed by a metallic rattle. Frank had already marked the bracket's position on his sketch; the noise was in the right place.
"All right, I've got a small wrench," he called. "If you're where I think you are, let me get it to you. And if you can't reach it, come out. It's not worth a leg."
Frank tied the small wrench to a cord and eased it into the conduit. It took two attempts before RB got hold of the right end; on the first try the tool caught across the old signal pipe, and Frank had to back it out rather than force it farther. At last the rat drew the wrench toward the bracket. Metal scraped against stone as the screw moved a fraction, stopped, and moved again.
Dree stood beside Frank with one hand on the feed funnel. Every time the mimic opened a drawer, he watched the position of its tongue and measured how far it could reach. Harl kept the safety chain taut. This was slower than a proper crew might have expected for a simple feeding tube, but any mistake would put the rat on the wrong side of the cabinet with a hungry predator.
The old bracket came back along the cord. RB followed it through the opening, head first, then had to twist his injured hind foot around an edge of masonry before he was free. Frank lifted him onto the cart and checked the joint. It was no worse than before, though the skin beside it had caught a fresh streak of gray dust. He let the rat settle while he threaded the ceramic tube through the cleared passage.
The funnel lip caught against the stone and left a gap that would spill feed into the conduit. Frank removed it, pared the mounting block and tried again. Harl found a matching screw while Dree kept the funnel level. Once the bracket held without shifting, they fed the mimic.
The measured feed slid down the ceramic tube. The mimic shuddered, then tested a drawer against the restraint. Harl put a blank form on the counter, ready to snatch it back, but the drawer closed without touching the paper. Dree warned that one meal did not mean the creature was safe: somebody still had to keep the feeding schedule, and the worn safety chain needed replacing before the cabinet could be trusted.
"It could have been doing that all along," Harl said, handling the paper as though it might change its mind.
"If somebody had let it eat lunch," Dree replied. He was already writing a feeding note for the next shift. "We need a schedule that doesn't disappear when one person takes leave. I'll send a copy to Moss and keep one at the pens."
Harl entered the requested replacement chain and the solvent losses in separate columns. Dree copied the feeding rota into his own book; Frank kept the installation sketch. The old chain remained on the wall, and none of them mistook accurate paperwork for a repair already carried out.
Frank retrieved his requisition form with two tooth marks in its bottom corner. It still had his signature, so Harl accepted it and issued the solvent he'd come for. As Frank pushed his cart toward the exit, the mimic opened one drawer and rolled out a dented washer. RB sprang upward, took the shiny thing between his paws and presented it to Frank before Harl could object.
"I think your cupboard's started paying rent," Frank said.
"I'd prefer cash," Harl replied. He watched the drawer close on its own. "Or those crates it ate."
Frank inspected the washer. It was usable if matched with a sound bolt. He placed it in the salvage compartment, marked its origin, and watched RB make sure the compartment door was shut. Then he left before the mimic developed another interest in paperwork.
The ledger posted sixteen XP for the authorized repairs and secured feed access, bringing Frank to 474. Only twenty-six remained to the next classification. A hungry mimic was still a hungry mimic unless somebody actually showed up with its food tomorrow. Frank shut the window before it could make that concern feel like a completed achievement.
In his quarters, RB arranged the dented washer beside the bent nail and the wrapped glass shard. Frank sat down to oil his screwdriver while the rat shifted the collection from one side of the box to the other. He might have watched that for a while longer if the evening raid on the viewing glass had not shown an adventurer emptying a chamber pot into an old camping drain.
RB'S THOUGHTS
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
Frank knew the grate. He'd installed a makeshift screen above it years earlier after a party dropped a frying pan down the line. The screen was gone now, and the man in the picture tipped his waste into the drain without a second glance. Somewhere beneath him, that branch connected to the banquet fountain's return. Construction had been told not to do that. Construction had done it anyway.
"Don't," Frank said to the screen, even though the man couldn't hear him.
Frank touched the viewing glass to shift its picture to the banquet room. A brown thread of liquid was already seeping over the fountain’s rim. The old return connection had survived twenty years of leaks; an adventurer with a chamber pot might finally have defeated it.
Frank reached for the night bell, then checked the route chart beside the viewing glass. The public camping chamber was still occupied. He couldn't isolate the return from his quarters, but he could report contamination before anyone opened the banquet wing in the morning. He rang the night desk and gave the clerk the camping-drain number, the old fountain connection and the visible discoloration. The clerk promised to flag the morning route check. He would not authorize a closure without someone on site.
After the call, Frank left the plumbing sketch open beside his chair. A note to the night desk was not a closed valve. RB stopped rearranging his washers and watched Frank put on his coat again. He went as far as the staff corridor to check the posted overnight rota and wrote down who was on the first banquet inspection. Only then did he return to his room. "Early start," he told the rat. RB took a bent nail back into his box.