It was just starting to get dark as Sarah arrived at the door to Paragon Tech’s particle physics laboratory. It had been only lightly raining when she left home, and so she hadn’t thought to grab an umbrella, but it was pouring down quite hard by the time she arrived at the lab.
“Lovely”, she thought to herself, “I *so* needed a good soaking tonight.”
She waved to the security guard as she tried to brush herself off a bit under the front awning before continuing on inside.
“Another all-nighter Miss Sarah? Should I tell the night crew you’ll be here?”, he asked.
She smiled and nodded absently towards him as she swiped in her badge and headed in to her lab.
Once there, she shed her wet shoes and overcoat, turned up a space heater, and started powering up her test systems. She gazed about as everything began to warm up, surveying the clutter. Her eyes were always drawn first to the array of odd looking Rikti artifacts in various states of assembly lining the walls like the archives of a museum. Many of them were hooked up to random seeming combinations of small intruments and laptop computers – testament to the myriad ways they had been attempting to attack the problem. As she glanced about each mini-experiment evoked brief flashes in her mind of discarded theories and still forming hypotheses.
Then, as always, she finally found herself drawn to the large and menacing device which dominated the center of the room. Recovered from the engine core of a downed Rikti fighter craft, it was a form of resonance chamber clearly intended to amplify and project Rikti energy shields. Mad tangles of cables, electrodes, and sensors covered its surface, leading to a chaotic array of computer racks and assorted displays. As the systems finished coming online, a low pitched, throbbing hum began emnating from it – just on the edge of sensation between hearing wuth her ears and feeling through her skin. A familiar green-blue haze formed in the air about the chamber as the startup sequence completed.
Sarah’s practiced fingers flew over several keyboards as she initiated the series of tests she had planned for the evening. She then turned off the lights in the lab, leaned back in her chair, and stared at the patterns displayed on the instruments in front of her – lit only by the soft glow from the monitors and the eerie glow from the Rikti resonator.
She grew so entranced by the displays, and so focused on immersing herself in the patterns, that she soon lost all track of time. Hours had passed by the time she was awakened from her concentrated trance by the faint sounds of footsteps in the hall.
“Must be time for the night shift”, she thought to herself, as she turned back towards her tests. But then she heard something more unexpected – low whispers outside the door and what sounded like stealthy fumbling at the lock to her door….
Now she was at full alert. Security knew she was here. The guards would *never* approach in such a manner when they knew she was working. If curious they would knock on the door and ask if she was OK. Something was wrong, and she didn’t like it. She reached for her phone to call security, but the door began to open before she could dial. She quickly slipped back into the shadows off to the side of the lab and kneeled down – heart beginning to beat hard in her chest- thankful for having taken off her wet shoes when she came in.
She watched nervously as the door quietly opened and three male forms slipped quickly into the lab. She didn’t recognize any of them in the low light, but she they seemed to have some idea what they were looking for. One motioned to either side for the either two, and they fanned out along the walls searching her array of Rikti devices. Then they began disconnecting some of the artifacts from their systems…they intended to steal them!
Sarah’s fear began to melt into frustration and anger as she began envisioning what would happen to her work with the loss of the irreplaceable artifacts from which she had been learning. This could not be allowed to happen! They had to be stopped!
She had one large advantage over the intruders despite their numbers and relative size. She knew exactly what the majority of the devices in the lab actually did and how to use them…
She quietly reached up and took the two devices within easy reach without exposing herself and took stock. A hologram projector thought to be a teaching aid and… a power source. Hmmm. There were other nearby devices with potential use as weapons, but she did not think she could reach them without being noticed. Unless….
She quickly hooked up the projector to the power source, and carefully twisted together a few connections her fingers knew almost by rote. She carefully aimed the projector, and then tossed a small screw towards the middle of the room. All three thieves instantly whipped about to face the sound, and she quickly shut her eyes as she completed her last connection.
*************WHOOSH*************
A blinding flash of light and a loud pop as the projector overloaded and blew itself out. She had been unable to see for several minutes when she had accidentally caused such a thing in experiments earlier that month, so she felt confident the thieves would be at least momentarily indisposed.
“Damnit!!” one hissed, as all three stumbled back attempting to shield their eyes. Sarah dashed towards the opposite corner of the lab. If she could just reach the stun ray in the corner….if her assistant had left it functioning….
“I see you girlie!” another growled just as she arrived at her target. Damn! He had recovered too soon! Sarah saw caught a glint of flashing metal out of the corner of her eye, and ducked under the table with her prize just as the “Pfft” of a silenced gunshot hit the wall behind her.
“You can’t get away girlie! And here I thought a few trinkets were all the haul we’d get tonight…” she heard from across the room, as the thief chuckled softly to himself. “Me pals here will want to thank you properly for that little stunt…”
Sarah knew she had little time before the other thieves recovered, and she felt the Rikti stunner warming in her hands. She knew how to operate it, but had little experience aiming such things. She knew she would only get one shot. She aimed carefully around the corner of the table as she heard the thief approaching – her heart pounding as she waited for her split second opportunity to surprise him.
There! Just as his form appeared in view she squeezed the trigger and a bright flash of purple-pink light spat out of the stunner and hit him squarely in the chest. He fell back flailing wildly, crashing into a rack of computers. The resonator jerked madly as several of its cables were pulled – making the soft lights dance crazily about the room.
“Pft Pft Pft” spat softly at the wall as the wildly spasming thief’s finger squeezed tightly on his pistol. Sarah huddled back under the table to avoid getting hit, then heard one last oddly dull “Ping”. Time seemed to stand still as she noticed for the first time that the background hum of the Rikti Resonator was growing both louder and more chaotic. She glanced wildly over at it – just in time to see a brilliant flash of blue-green light, followed by an oddly comforting sort of warmth. Then she anticipated more than actually felt herself flung backwards into the wall, and all went black…..
************BOOM!!!!**********
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