[ WP ] There 's a lot of stories about mad scientists . Write a story about a mad professional in another field .

*Huh. I just wrote this story for a different prompt, but I feel like the story of a mad Shopping Cart Attendant is right in line with what this thread could use. * 
 
 The Lexus driver didn ’ t even see the cart until it was nearly too late. She had been distracted trying to get her daughter settled in to her car seat. Alan had been two aisles over when he saw the reverse lights flash on and the car began to move. He rushed as fast as he could. It wasn ’ t enough. The car and cart collided. The carted skidded and fell over, scratching the paint job of the sedan as it fell. 
 
 Alan arrived on the scene as the driver, a middle aged woman, and her elementary school aged daughter stepped out to examine the damage. The plastic of the cart had rubbed a red streak across the back bumper. The cut in the paint was two inches long. It would take a lot of work to make the car look new again. 
 
 “ Look what you made me do! ” The woman was clearly distraught as she shouted at her daughter. “ You couldn ’ t just put your seatbelt on like a big girl! ” 
 
 “ Ma ’ am, ” Alan interrupted, “ don ’ t blame the girl, I should have moved that cart be- “ 
 
 “ I ’ m sorry, who exactly are you? ” 
 
 “ My name is Alan Quixano, ma ’ am. I am in charge of keeping these cars in control. I should have moved that cart, instead it hit your car. It was my fault and I am sorry. Don ’ t blame the poor girl for my mistake. ” 
 
 The woman took a moment to compose herself. “ Ok. Mister Quixano. I accept your apology. If you don ’ t mind, we need to be on our way. ” 
 
 “ M ’ lady. ” Alan responded. He picked up the cart as the woman and her daughter climbed back into their car. As they drove off, Alan was sure he saw a tear of joy in the young girl ’ s eye. 
 
 The carts were dangerous. That ’ s what no one else seemed to understand. It was Alan ’ s job to keep the carts in line. And Alan was good at his job. 
 
. 
 
 After his shift, he jumped on the number eight bus. Roxie was driving today. Roxie always had a big smile on her face. Alan told her all about the Lexus and the woman. 
 
 “ Its that new wind farm their building north of town. ” Roxie said. “ Bringing in all these folks with their fancy cars all obsessed with development. You ’ re probably going to have more fancy cars to protect from them carts soon. Anyway, Mancha Street is coming up, this is your stop. ” 
 
 This gave Alan a lot to think about. Roxie was right that there had been more and more fancy cars in his parking lot in the last few months. The whole neighborhood was changing as more and more of the wind turbines rose just north of town. It wasn ’ t just fancy cars though. There were also more big trucks from the guys building the turbines. While the fancy cars needed to be protected from the carts, the carts needed to be protected from the big trucks. If a truck hit a cart it would send it careening wildly through the parking lot where it could hit anything. It was getting harder every day to be a cart attendant, and it was harder because of the giant windmills north of town. 
 
. 
 
 Alan and his roommate Sancho liked to watch Netflix and smoke pot in the evenings. Today they were watching Daredevil. It wasn ’ t as good as the comics, but it was entertaining nonetheless. After a few episodes, Alan told Sancho about the woman in the Lexus and how the new wind farm was bringing in new vehicles that were bad for the carts. 
 
 “ Dang ” said Sancho, “ What are you going to do about it? ” 
 
 “ What can I do? The carts have to be kept safe, and that ’ s my job. ” 
 
 “ Oh come on man! What would Daredevil do? He ’ d find a badass way to beat the crap out of these guys. Let ’ s face it, Donna would think that ’ s pretty hot, too ” 
 
 “ If I beat the crap out of a guy, my manager, Miguel, would fire me on the spot. ” 
 
 “ True. You ’ ll have to find some other way to keep the carts safe though. ” 
 
. 
 
 Over the next weeks, things got worse and worse for Alan. People left carts everywhere. It almost seemed like there was no point in using electric cart pusher the store owned. Carts were too scattered to keep in a straight line. At the same time, the contractor building the turbines made a deal with the store where they could use the back of the parking lot as a staging area for some of their work. All of a sudden Alan had half as much room to work. 
 
 Then came the day of the storm, when everything changed. Winds blew carts to and fro through the parking lot. At the same time, the rain made it harder for cars to see the carts, meaning that if Alan didn ’ t stay on top of it, another accident was inevitable. One cart got away. The wind blew it to he back of the parking lot. As the bulldozer pulled in, the driver didn ’ t even notice the cart until it was too late. The worst part about it was that Alan wasn ’ t even the first one to learn about the crushed cart. The construction worker went into the store and alerted management of the crushed cart. Miguel was the first employee to see it. Alan thought that Miguel didn ’ t really even care about the cart. He did care about looking like a big shot. In the same day Alan, the greatest shopping cart attendant you would ever meet lost his first cart and got written up for his efforts. Something had to change. He could do like Sancho said, and try beating the crap out of the construction team, but he new that would do no good. He needed to aim bigger than that. 
 
. 
 
 “ You ’ re crazy! ” Sancho exclaimed when Alan told him what he had planned. “ You ’ re going to get caught for sure if you do that. ” 
 
 “ They have cameras, yeah. But that ’ s why I want to use that horse mask of yours. ” 
 
 “ That ’ s not a horse. ” 
 
 “ Well, what is it? ” 
 
 “ It ’ s a donkey ” 
 
 “ A donkey, okay. As long as it doesn ’ t look like me it should do the trick. ” 
 
. 
 
 > Two news stories would make the rounds in the following days. Security footage captured a mysterious donkey faced figure stole all of the shopping carts from the local department store and drove off with them using the automatic cart trolley. The second story was the power outage that turned out all the lights in the Mancha neighborhood for several hours. Later investigation would reveal that a shopping cart was pushed into a transformer in the Mancha wind farm. The resulting short caused several of the batteries to stop collecting power, setting back construction for several months. 
 
 > What never made the news was the missing persons report filed by Sancho Panza. His roommate had gone out that night and never returned. However stories kept filtering in of people seeing him wandering from town to town, often with several shopping carts in tow. 

