Chapter 8: Saint Judtmiss College

Dad works as a research fellow at the lesser-known Saint Judtmiss college. Having no idea of what he is actually doing there and whether his research ever yielded any useful results, Ava decided to ask him if they might have something resembling a multicellular organisms research facility on the premises. For this, she put up her largest and most innocent-eyed look and even included a 'please' pitched at least four years below her actual age for good measure.

Dad frowned and conceded that they might actually have one of those, although it had seemingly been mothballed only months after opening. It was said that funds dried up after no flashy results came out of their hallmark projects immediately. Some other, much darker rumours were swiftly denied, making them probably true.

Saint Judtmiss college had only been built in very recent years, on the foundations of an apparently much older college structure that were found when a parking lot close to the old Castle Mound developed a massive sinkhole. No records exist of the name and purpose of that previous building, although some pages of an eleventh century ledger seem to have gone missing after the research was done.

In order not to disturb the Central Oxford vibe, the exterior of the new concrete building was adorned with pre-aged baroque sandstone facings and loads of spires, gargoyles and pinnacles. They even organised a two week barbeque event to get that nice coal smoke tarnish right. So far, Ava had only ever seen the outside of the building, with the large rotated eye above the entrance doors

Dad proudly pulled out his large cast bronze key with integrated identification chip and Enigma cypher and phases of the moon ornamentation, that had been hanging from a slightly corroded chain around his neck. Exactly what Ava needed to get into that laboratory housed in the heavily fortified College buildings.

Dad had been hired on the spot when he came to reclaim the remains of the now even rustier family saloon that had been one of the cars consumed by the sinkhole. He had to sign a sheaf of strict non-disclosure-agreement papers right there and then. Mom was still proud of Dad’s immediate promotion from garbage collector to research fellow in a University. According to the Dean, his hands-on experience with all kinds of organic matter made him perfectly suited to perform all kinds of microbiological experiments on. In the meantime, Mom especially encouraged Dad’s fast-track transformation from Delayed Chavhood into Prime Hipsterdom. Growing an actual beard from those soft wisps of chin hair had been a major achievement. Getting his hands presentable took another two months.

That night, Ava went down the stairs on tiptoe, to retrieve Dad’s key from the secret nail next to the backyard door that was always open. (Mom prefers 'private botanical garden' over 'backyard') Back in her room, she pressed the key into a brownish swirled brick made out of as much of the colourful creative clay she had managed to scrape from under her desk and from out of her desk drawers. Using a set of tea lights and a book of matches from the 'safe' kitchen drawer, she started melting one of her old and faded plastic unicorns, to fill the imprints in the clay.

Ava enjoyed the spluttering sound as the flames obliterated the synthetic unicorn hair. Halfway through this process, she walked to the sash window and pulled it open with a mighty groan from both parties involved. That should get rid of the acrid smoke with a penetrant hyacinth smell. Ava stopped in her tracks for a moment when she thought she heard a wheezing sound from under the bed, but she didn't give it too much consideration when it stopped again abruptly. It took another fifteen minutes for the two halves to sufficiently solidify, before welding them together above the flame.

Now it was time for the important bit. Using several of Mom’s facial brushes, Ava applied a generous layer of gold and silver glitter paint to her newly created key, to give it a nice metallic touch, just in case some guard would see it. (blueish plastic with rainbow swirls is not the accepted colour scheme for keys). For a moment, Ava considered putting the new key on Dad’s chain and keep the original, but thought better of it. Losing his job would probably kill him and maybe he would need accurate phases of the moon for his job. (Who knows?)

With occasional crashes and scraping sounds, Ava silently put everything back where it belonged and put out the tea lights before she went to sleep. Some minutes after her snoring had started, something big and hairy slid from under her bed and bounded out of the still open sash window, howling muffled curses into the deep dark of the night.

Caiman Raptor Elk