The Glass Scientists micro-fanfictions

Clean

He couldn't quite explain the way his skin crawled as he gazed upon the shimmer of the metal, but the longer he did the more a stubborn sense of nausea settled itself right into his core. Rationally, Henry knew that, while not impossible, it was not very easy for metal to develop mould, especially not to the degree that it had over the course of less than two hours. It was wrong, and it was disgusting and he would not stand for it. He had intended to wear the pocket watch out, but he could hardly take something filthy with him, that would reflect poorly on him. 

At first he hoped it would come off with just a quick buffering with his handkerchief, and that by extension he had simply read too much into it. He would have very much liked this to be the case, but no matter the force he put into trying to wipe away the offending substance it proved to be altogether inefficient. But all unpleasant things could be buffered away with a bit of effort behind it and there was no way this would be the exception to the rule. He wouldn't let it be. So, he shook out his hand, settled himself down in the office chair and set to work.

If he pushed too hard, he was worried he might cause damage to the internal mechanisms of the timepiece itself, and that would strip it of its use altogether and, if the mould remained, it would be utterly useless. He could tolerate it being internally damaged if he was able to restore its aesthetic qualities it would do for the time being, after all he was sure that he would find the time to get it repaired at a later date if it came to it. 
But in the same vein, of he didn't push hard enough it might not all come off and so be left to grow unchecked into something foul and dreadful, and that seemed far worse. Far, far worse as it would serve as proof that he failed the most basic of tasks and let it happen. He had let it become ghastly and so he would simply have to keep at cleaning it until it was better. Nice and simple, he was sure. 

When the basic act of buffering at it was not enough, he rose from his chair, peering through the glass of his cabinet. Rows upon rows of chemicals, herbs and everything in between greeted him from their neat purgatory, each set precisely where he had decided they were best suited. It was this organisation that made it easy to find what he was looking for. The little bottle of rubbing alcohol was notably more empty than he remembered it being, a fact he would have to remember to rectify when the time permitted, but he still gave it a place upon the table. It was quickly joined by a cloth of a little more substance than the handkerchief. 

He upturned the bottle into the cloth as he sat himself back down again, holding it there just long enough to feel the liquid reach the skin of his hand through the fabric. Folding it once, he set to work gently scrubbing at the casing on the clock again. He made a conscious effort to not allow the motion to become something repetitive, as that ran the risk of missing a portion of the offending mould and therefore allowing it to spread back with a vengeance and, worse, a resistance to the substance he was trying to clean it with. He would have to, he thought to himself, polish the device again once he was done to make sure that the act of cleaning did not, in turn, leave any unsightly blemishes on the surface. It wad horrible enough to think it had become unprepossessing independent of his will, and an outright nauseating thought to think he had a hand in making it all the more repulsive in his attempts to set it right again.

There was a cut on his thumb, he noted with little care in the area, that he had not known about beforehand but was now rather determinedly stinging from the undiluted solutions as if to tell him to stop but he did not listen. Why on earth would he stop if he was so close to setting it right again? He was so damned close but there was just one patch that would not go away no matter how hard he scrubbed. It would go away, it had to. There was not a stain upon the earth that could not be scrubbed clean with a little effort behind it. 
Even if the effort caused the papercut to split a little more, enough to cause it to bleed just enough to serve as a bother but not enough to make it difficult for him to continue. 

But why was it not enough to get rid of the mark? Why would it not just go away like it was supposed to? It was supposed to go away because it was bad and so it shouldn't be there at all, and yet it was so terribly stubborn that it would not completely go, and it left the doctor growing increasingly more and more frustrated with each growing second. 
It should not have been there at all, it had been perfectly pristine and perfectly clean when he had looked at it that morning, and yet here it stood blemished and awful, and frankly doing no favours for his growing headache.

It was really quite fortunate that nobody happened to chose that moment to come into his office as they would have found the good Dr. Jekyll hunched over his pocket watch with the fervour of a madman, eyes wild with a sort of distress that did not seem to come from a place of logic or reason. There was no reason, after all, the pocket watch was just as perfectly spotless as it always was.