Chapter 6

Paige swallowed hard as she stared at the cat who finished cleaning his face and rose to stand. Purring filled the room, vibrating the boxes on the shelf. One crashed down from the top as the cat stalked toward Paige.

"Dewey!" Paige shouted again.

She hurried backward, reaching the corner and spinning on her heel to race toward the main archive.

"DEWEY!"

"Paige?" a distant voice called.

"Dewey!" Paige answered, her voice shaking. "Hurry up. We have a huge problem. And I mean huge!"

Dickens stalked down the aisle, knocking a few boxes down with a swish of his tail. Paige hurried to hide behind another shelf, a worried moan escaping her lips.

She shoved her glasses higher on her nose as she peered around the corner. The cat spotted her, and she leapt back.

A large paw snaked around the shelf, searching for her. She winced, clamping a hand over her mouth so she wouldn't let out another frightened exclamation. She inched away from the paw before it reached farther toward her.

Dewey flew through the entrance from the main archive room. "Hey, Paige, what's the– Whoa!"

He fluttered backward, eyeing the massive cat in front of him.

"Yeah. Same thing I said," Paige answered, her lips still pulled into a frown. "What's wrong with him?"

Dewey darted behind the shelf in front of Paige, flew up over the top, and joined her. "Looks like he may have gotten into the growth serum."

"Growth serum?"

"Or the powder," Dewey added as he rubbed his chin.

"We have both growth serum and growth powder?"

"Of course, Paige. What kind of operation do you think we're running here? Every library keeps them on hand."

"Please tell me we have shrinking serum or powder or whatever."

Dewey rolled his eyes as the cat's paw reached around the corner again. "Of course we do."

"Well, let's get it!" Paige said, flinging her arms out.

Dewey pulled his teal lips back into a grimace, baring his fangs. "Well, there's a slight problem."

"There is a giant cat playing hide-and-seek with us. I'd say the problem is more than slight."

"The thing is," Dewey said, buzzing around in the air, "if he ingested the serum and we give him the shrinking powder, he'll get even bigger, and it'll be permanent."

"What if he ingested the growth powder?"

"If he ingested the powder and we give him shrinking powder, he'll just return to his normal self. We could try the shrinking serum…"

"But?" Paige inquired.

Dewey winced again. "But if we give him shrinking serum and he ate the powder…"

"Yeah?"

Dewey wrinkled his nose, his horns wiggling. "He'll explode."

"What?" Paige asked, her jaw falling open. "Are you kidding me?"

Dewey pressed his lips together and shook his head. "Nope. So we have to be careful."

"Isn't there some kind of universal shrinking something or other we can use? Like a fail-safe?"

"Of course. A shrinking cupcake would work no matter what he took. Serum. Powder. Growth spaghetti. Doesn't matter which format he took."

"Growth spaghetti?"

"Oh, it's really good. And the growth meatballs are amazing!"

Paige shook her head and waved her hands in the air. "As interesting as that is, we have to focus. Where is the shrinking cupcake?"

"We don't have one."

"What? What kind of library is this?"

"The kind without a shrinking cupcake! Shrinking cupcakes are not easy to come by. We have the other two. The idea is to counteract the growth powder if and when needed, but we never planned on a cat wandering through and eating one of them."

Paige clamped her hands onto her head and paced in a small square. "Oh, this is terrible. Okay, we need to think this through. What's the best option? Was he near the growth serum or powder?"

"Both. We keep both on the shelf in almost the same spot."

Paige lifted her gaze to the ceiling as she shook her head. "That's completely stupid."

Dewey flung his short arms out. "Well, we never expected a cat to–"

"Wander around and eat stuff. I know, I know," Paige said with a wave of her hands. "What are our other options? Will he stay that size if we do nothing?"

"Depends. If he took the growth serum, he'll stay huge unless it's counteracted. If he took the growth powder, it's temporary."

"How temporary? Hours?"

"Fourteen days."

Paige pinched her lips together. "Are you kidding me? Two weeks? We can't let him stay that way for two weeks! He'll wreck the place."

"Not to mention if he took the serum and we don't counteract it within five days, he may not be able to shrink even with the shrinking serum."

"Wait, what? So, if he took the serum and we don't act within five days, he'll stay huge, and if we give him the wrong stuff, he'll explode. If he took the powder, the serum will make him stay huge."

"Yes. But he'll be huge for two weeks."

"And if he doesn't shrink, we're stuck." Paige pressed her hand against her forehead. "Well, we can't give him the powder. It may kill him."

"And we can't give him the serum because it may make him bigger."

"But we have to make a decision in five days."

"Or we may be stuck with Thickens over there." Dewey thumbed toward the massive eye peering around the corner.

Paige heaved a sigh, parading up and down the aisle as Dewey fluttered back and forth in his own airborne version of pacing.

"What a nightmare," Paige said as she spun to amble in the opposite direction.

Dewey circled and floated past her.

"There must be something we can do," she cried, flinging her hands out.

Dewey snapped his fingers, coming to a stop as he hovered in the air. "I've got it."

Paige's eyes lit up, and the corners of her mouth pulled back into a slight smile.

"You go over and see if you can find any trace of what he ate, and maybe that will give us a clue as to which one to use."

The smile on her face faded, and she crossed her arms, cocking a hip as she stared at him with narrowed eyes.

He flung his arms out to the sides. "What?"

"What? Your big idea is for me to go over to the giant cat and sniff his breath?"

"No, of course not," Dewey said. "See if there are any traces of powder on his chin or sticky dots that may be remnants of the serum."

Paige held her hands up in the air. "Wait! We'll just check to see which container is open! Solved!"

She stuck her hands on her hips and smiled triumphantly.

"Okay, let's try that. Although…"

Paige slumped her shoulders, and she spun back to face him. "Now what?"

"I don't know how much of either was in each container, so unless he ate all of it, we won't know."

Paige's features turned stony. "Let's think positive, shall we?"

Dewey held his hands up in defeat. "Thinking positive thoughts. Both of them are in the next aisle over."

He tapped a chubby digit in the air over Paige's shoulder.

Paige rolled her eyes at the location before she paraded down the aisle, heading away from the cat that still hid around the corner and slipped around the shelf. Both she and Dewey peered down the corner.

The cat's giant tail swished back and forth across the floor as he awaited another chance to swipe at Paige and Dewey.

"Look at him," Paige breathed, "with his ears flattened back against his head and his tail swatting back and forth. He can't wait to claw me."

"He's a bugger," Dewey agreed.

"Okay, where is the stupid growth stuff?"

"Middle of the aisle, third shelf from the top." Dewey jabbed a finger in her direction.

Paige stared at the tail that reached to the middle of the aisle, then up to the shelf above where the boxes sat askew, heaving a sigh. "Of course it is."

She flicked her gaze at Dewey who floated next to her. "You go look."

Dewey snapped his eyes to her. "What? Why me? He's your cat!"

"You can fly! I'd have to try to avoid his tail and reach up to the top."

Dewey smashed his lips together, letting his arms dangle from his slumped shoulders. "You're such a baby. Fine!"

He buzzed down the aisle and rose to the shelf. His eyes narrowed as he shoved a few boxes around. He picked up a small, round glass container. A glowing yellow residue coated the inside.

He peered into the bottle, squeezing one eye closed before he shoved it back onto the shelf. After shifting a few more items aside, he spun and searched the area around the shelf.

"What is it?" Paige hissed.

"I can't find the pouch of growth powder!"

"Maybe he didn't eat that."

"Then why isn't it on the shelf?"

Paige shrugged, holding her palms up. Dewey gave her a dismissive wave, shaking his head as he flitted around the aisle.

He dove toward the floor, grasping something from a low shelf. "Found it!"

He waved a dark-brown sack in the air before turning it upside down and shaking it. "Empty."

Paige straightened and nodded as Dewey returned to the end of the aisle. "So, he took the powder."

"He definitely took the powder."

Paige clasped her hands together under her chin. "Perfect. So we give him shrinking powder. Where is it?"

Dewey wrinkled his nose and shook his head. "Not exactly. There's another problem."

Paige dropped her hands, her chin jutting forward. "You're kidding me. What now?"

"Well, he definitely ate the powder."

"Yeah? So, what's the problem?"

Dewey winced as he traced the outline of the leather pouch. "He also ate the serum."

Paige's eyes went wide, and she pressed a hand against her forehead. "Okay. So, what do we do? Give him both shrinking powder and shrinking serum?"

"No," Dewey shouted, his eyes bulging out of his teal head. "Oh my gosh, Paige! Are you trying to kill him?"

"What? No!" Paige answered. "But I have no idea what that means! How can we counteract both?"

"Carefully." Dewey tossed the pouch on a nearby shelf as he flew in a circle. "Oh, this is a disaster. If we only had a shrinking cupcake!"

"Well, we don't!" Paige shouted, stamping her foot on the floor. "So, what are our other options?"

"We can't give him the powder or the serum," Dewey said as he rubbed his chin with a claw. "No cupcakes available. We need to research this. There should be a solution."

He flitted over a few aisles and disappeared around the corner.

His teal face poked back around the shelf. "Come on!"

Paige hurried after him, racing down the aisle and pausing at the end. They leaned around the shelf's edge, searching for the massive feline.

"He's gone," Paige said.

"Yeah, let's make a break for it!" Dewey shot from the aisle, buzzing across the open space and through the doorway into the main archive.

Paige darted behind him, running on her tiptoes to remain as quiet as possible. She breathed a sigh of relief and slowed a tad as they made their way across the main archive to the BookTron.

"Okay, let's see what we got," Dewey said as he arrived at the station.

He laced his fingers together, turning his palms away from his body as he cracked his knuckles. He shook his paws before he began pounding on the keyboard. He slapped the enter key and perused the first few entries.

With a shake of his head, he deleted the entry in the search bar and typed something else into it. A set of results populated on the screen. Dewey pressed his lips together, his brow furrowing as he scanned them.

"Here," he said, clicking on one, "this may help."

"What does it say? Does it have a cure?"

Dewey clicked back. "No, it didn't have a cure."

Paige flopped into the chair at the desk. "Like it said, there isn't a cure, or it just didn't list it?"

Dewey clicked another entry and scrolled down. "Here we go! Action!"

Paige straightened, gripping the plastic arms of the chair. "What do we need to do?"

Dewey's eyes darted down the page in search of the remedy. He jabbed a fleshy digit at the screen. "In the event that both growth serum and growth powder have been ingested, a remedy of Tacloosa will return the oversized user to normal size with limited side effects."

Paige tugged her lips back into a grimace. "Limited side effects? And what is Tacloosa?"

Dewey scribbled the name on a sticky note, cleared the search bar, and typed in the name. "No idea, but we're about to find out."

"I hope we have it, whatever it is," Paige said as Dewey clicked on the first search result.

He scrolled through the article to the recipe at the bottom.

"Wait," Paige said, clapping her hand over his paw, "shouldn't we read that?"

Dewey flicked her hand away. "What for?"

"Knowledge," Paige answered, tapping her glasses higher on her nose.

"I don't care what some magical recipe blogger's life story is. I just want to know how to make Tacloosa."

"Oh, I thought it would describe the side effects or more information about the remedy."

Dewey rolled his eyes. "Probably not. Look at the blog. MagicalFarmGal dot com. Basically, some farmer's kid or husband or friend did something idiotic, and they found or created the recipe for Tacloosa. But first, they'll tell you about their life on the farm and their seven cats and the one time their cow got sick in the middle of the night. We just want the recipe."

"Are you sure we should use a recipe from a blog?"

"Why not?" Dewey asked as he jotted down ingredients on another sticky note.

Paige wrinkled her nose as she drummed her fingers on the desk. "I just figured it would come from a magical book or something."

Dewey froze mid-letter and side-eyed her. "You'd trust a recipe from a magical book but not a magical blogger?"

"Yes?" Paige said, her lips wrinkling up.

"You've got a lot to learn, Paige," Dewey retorted as he finished writing the recipe. "Magical bloggers are one of the best sources of information. Anyway, we probably have most of these things. I think we're only missing the Racosa powder."

"What's Racosa powder?"

"It's a reddish-brown powder made from grinding up volcanic rock with a dash of pixie dust."

"Is it vital to the recipe?" Paige asked as she rose to stand, ready to search for the other ingredients.

"Yes and no. We can probably substitute for it. Like using plain yogurt for sour cream or something."

"Are you sure?"

Dewey tapped around on the keyboard. "Mostly."

He clicked an article and waved a claw at it. "Here we go. Substitute straight pixie dust and a smashed-up pebble of any kind."

Paige narrowed her eyes at the simple solution before she shrugged. "Fine, fine. What do we need? Give me a list to find."

"Eye of newt–" Dewey began.

Paige rolled her eyes at him. "Nuh-uh, be serious."

Dewey flashed the pink note stuck to his index finger. "Eye of newt," he repeated with a raise of his fleshy eyebrows.

"I didn't think that was real."

"Of course it's real. It's a fundamental ingredient in many recipes. Just for that, I'm not going to help you. I'll be up in my nest crushing a pebble. You can get all of this from the pantry shelf in the back corner." Dewey waved a finger in the direction he'd searched for Dickens earlier before fluttering off toward his home.

"Meet me upstairs when you're done," he called over his shoulder.

Paige stared down at the six ingredients she needed to locate before she shuffled in the direction Dewey indicated moments earlier.

"Eye of newt. Wool of bat. Powdered snake tooth. Is he serious?" Paige mumbled as she read down the list.

She wound into another area of the archives and continued past several shelves before she glanced up in search of the pantry shelf.

She slowed to a stop and swallowed hard. Standing between her and the ingredients she needed stood the beastly version of Dickens.

"Oh no," she groaned.

The cat spotted her, dropped to his belly, and prepared to pounce on her.