Wiz looked at the others. "Come on." He wasn’t quite running as he headed toward the computer room, but he wasn’t far from it. The others were right behind him.
Smoke was pouring out of the computer room.
"What the hell?"
"The place is on fire!" Wiz shouted.
Danny ran forward as if to dash into the room. "That’s not smoke," he exclaimed. "It’s cool and wet."
"Fog," Jerry said wonderingly. "The room’s full of fog."
Wiz took a deep breath and charged into the computer room. The air was so clammy he could hardly breathe and the fog swirled around him like the special effects in a bad monster movie. Batting at the swirling mist he fought his way to the back of the room. Thick white clouds of vapor were pouring out of the air conditioning duct at the rear of the room.
"Shut off the climate control," he yelled over his shoulder. "And get a fan in here to clear this stuff out."
Almost instantly a wind rushed through the room, sucking the fog out faster than it could pour in through the vents. By the time Wiz reached the door again, the air in the room was clear. The relays clicked over and the air conditioning died.
Moira was standing in the doorway with her staff in her hand and the wind she had raised tugging at her skirt and tousling her coppery hair. As Wiz emerged she gestured and the winds died away instantly.
"My Lord," the hedge witch said with a smug little smile and arched eyebrow, "explain to me again how reliable mechanical contrivances are."
She looked so lovely with her hair in disarray Wiz forgave her.
It took the programmers and their helpers nearly two hours to get things under control. Water had to be vacuumed out of the soaked carpet, books and papers had to be spread out to dry and a dehumidifying spell was used to help dry out the equipment. Fortunately there wasn’t much damage, but there was a lot of work to be done.
"Okay, " Wiz said grimly. "Somehow the air conditioner and the humidifier both got stuck on. The low temperature turned the high humidity to fog."
"We’re lucky we didn’t take two days off," Jerry said. "We probably would have had ice all over the equipment."
"I’m damn glad we hadn’t powered up the computer," Wiz replied. "That would have been a real mess."
"Hey guys," Danny called from the back of the room. "These things didn’t get stuck on. Someone reset the thermostat and the humidity thingie."
Wiz and Jerry crowded around him quickly. Sure enough inside the clear plastic box covering the controls both dials were at their maximum positions.
"I could have sworn I set those properly," Jerry said.
"You did," Wiz told him. "I double-checked before I left the computer room last night."
"Someone must have messed with them," Danny said.
"Inside the locked cover? I don’t see how."
"Magic," the young programmer retorted.
"From where?" Wiz asked. "Moira, did you…"
"Certainly not!" the hedge witch said indignantly. "Nor did any of the other wizards here. Believe me, my Lord, if there is one thing any apprentice learns early it is not to tamper with another’s magic. Those who do not learn it do not live long enough to become magicians."
Wiz put his hand on her arm. "Of course you didn’t darling, it’s just that…" Then he stopped as he caught sight of something over Moira’s shoulder.
A line of seven little figures marched across the top of the computer console, their arms swinging and their bodies swaying in time to the song they were bawling out at the top of their tiny lungs. Their voices were so shrill that the words were lost, but the tune came through clearly, as if hummed by a chorus of mosquitoes.
eee-eh, eee-eh
eee-eh heh heh heh heh
eee-eh heh heh, eee-eh heh heh
eee-eh-heh heh heh heh
As Wiz watched, the creatures disappeared through an open inspection panel into the guts of the computer. The last one, evidently realizing it was being watched, waved gaily to Wiz before it dived after its fellows.
"Uh, folks," Wiz said just a shade too calmly. "I think we’ve found our problem."
For a moment no one said anything. For a long moment.
"What in the World was that?" Jerry demanded finally.
"I have seen their like before," Moira said. "The mill in my village had one. How the miller would curse when the thing played tricks on him! He had me down there nearly every new moon to try to rid the mill of it."
"I take it you didn’t have much luck?"
"No. Sometimes it would quiet down after I came. Sometimes not. Once it dumped near a barrel of flour on the miller and me as we left the mill after the exorcism."
She paused and shrugged. "I do not know what to call them. They are so rare they do not have a name."
"Gremlins," Wiz supplied. "We have gremlins in our computer. Wonderful."
"Gremlins?" Moira asked.
"Little magical creatures that live in machinery and cause trouble." He jerked a thumb at the infested computer. "You know, gremlins."
Moira frowned in the especially pretty manner she had when she was confused. "Love, how is it you have names for these things if they do not exist in your world?"
"They didn’t exist so we had to make them up."
Moira raised an eyebrow. "That makes less sense than most of what you say."
"That’s because you’ve never worked around complicated equipment. Believe me, it’s enough to make you believe in gremlins even when you know they don’t exist."
The hedge witch sighed. "I will take your word for it."
"The real question is, how do we get rid of them?" Jerry asked.
"I do not know. I was not very successful with the one in the mill. Perhaps one of the Mighty will know more."
"What can you tell us about them?"
Moira pursed her lips and tried to think. "Not a great deal, I fear. They are very uncommon."
"You said there was just one in the mill," Wiz said, "I just saw seven of them go into the computer."
"That is very unusual. I have never heard of more than one at any place."
"I’m surprised you don’t have them around the Capital with all the magical apparatus there."
"Only mechanical things attract them. Aside from that," she shrugged, "I know only that they are somewhat like the other Little Folk, the ones you call Brownies."
"Wait a minute," Wiz said. "Do you think Brownies could give us some pointers on handling these pests?"
Moira considered. "I do not know. We have no Brownies here to ask."