She stared even wider now. But then she remembered her mother's rule; staring is rude! And the last thing she wanted to be was rude to this man. Shaking herself out of her shock induced coma she coughed sharply to clear her throat, and grab his attention. It seemed to work since the one working eye swivelled around on its stalk until it was fixed on her.
"Uhm... a-are you Wilt?" she finally asked.
"That's me!" he answered, his voice surprisingly perky and welcoming for a boiler man. "Can I help you?"
"Uh... um, I..."
They were cut off as four things suddenly fell from the ceiling at once. They were pieces of wooden blocks painted, and hanging from purple ribbon. Wilt's eye zipped back to stare at the four tokens for a few short seconds before picking up a duster and pushing the powder he was working on down a long tube in front of him. "Oh shoot sorry, four soap tokens... guys?" the third arm returned but this time holding a small mallet. It struck down on the giant wheel that was connected to his seat. "Break's over, we gotta get to work again!"
Goo was about to ask who he was talking to, but then she saw. There were 'mouse holes' in the floor, and suddenly the workers appeared. They were tiny black balls of soot with legs and arms, carrying pieces of coal that were bigger then themselves. Goo watched in stunned silence as they carried the heavy lumps of coal over to the gaping mouth. They stepped onto what looked like a petrified springboard and waited until the mouth opened, and threw the coal into the fire. Once they do, they turn and all but fly back through the mouse holes to get more coal.
"Well you see...” Goo began again, walking over a few of the workers. "I'm here for a job."
Wilt continued making powder, sometimes his third (and a fourth!) arm extending to the drawers behind him to retrieve more straw. "Really? Oh then I'm sorry, but I don't really need any other help." Wilt explained as he pushed some powder down one funnel before retrieving another. "I've got a little magic in me so I make it so the soot does the heavy stuff while I have to do all the powders."
"Please, I have to get one!" Goo added, "My parents, they ate a buncha food so they got turned into pigs 'n I don't want them eaten for dinner by frogs or anything creepy like that and Mac told me I should come up here 'n-" Goo was cut off as one of Wilt's extended arms moved towards her.
"Sorry could you move please? Thank you!" as she did he pulled some salts from one drawer and returned to work.
Seeing that this wasn't working, Goo sighed and sat down in the corner of the room so not to disrupt any of the soot workers. She watched them carry coal out, and fly back in. After a few moments of this one of them came out, carrying a piece of coal at least three times its size. It wheezed and heaved for a few seconds before collapsing beneath the weight, and struggled and squeaked under the coal. Goo gasped, and quickly went to pick up the coal. But it was much heavier then she thought it would be, and when she finally did pick it up the tiny soot ball had vanished into the ground. It popped back into existence, before flying back into the mouse holes. Goo blinked. "Hey! Dun leave me out here with your work, get back here!" she said, needing someone to scold after the day she'd had. It didn't come out. "Fine I'll just leave it here mister lazy soot 'n then it'll be in your way and you'll be all 'oh no this big thing's in my way but I can't put one down or else more'll stack up' then you'll get in trouble, you'll see!"
"Oh I'm sorry but that's not okay." Wilt's voice spoke up, and Goo looked over her shoulder at him. His one eye had swivelled so it was staring directly at her. While he wasn’t angry, he still sounded demanding but polite at the same time. "You have to finish what you started, those are the rules. Is that okay?"
Goo felt herself nodding. Despite the weight and the heat, she felt she had a duty to do. So, carrying a piece of coal which felt far heavier then something of this size should be, Goo began to slowly walk towards the roaring boiler. She watched as the soot balls ran around and in-between her feet to deposit their own coal first, but some were lollygagging to watch the human trying to do their job. She finally made it, close enough so as when the angry mouth opened she felt the heat intensify and blast against her face. She took a deep breath, waited until it shut, lifted the coal and as soon as it opened again she threw the coal in. The boiler almost seemed to rumble with satisfaction as it received the coal. She ran back to stand behind Wilt's box, and wheezed from exhaustion. "Something like this shouldn't take so much energy!" her brain said.
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