The Incident
“Sam, come on! Let’s go! Now!”
Her voice rang in his ear over all the other activity around them.
“Hold on. Just... one... more... second…”
Sam replied without looking up from his workstation monitor.
**Nanite Swarm at 47%**
The lights in the room began to flicker. Alara’s eyes darted between the door of the lab and Sam, who was still sitting in his chair. She anxiously edged towards the exit. “We don’t have a second! The reaction is already critical. Let’s go!”
“Just one more command…”
“Come on…”
“I know they can make it.”
Sam said with a distracted calmness that didn’t fit in with the current situation.
“Besides,” he said calmly. “The blast wall can take it.”
**Nanite Swarm at 11%**
Sam operated the controls with patient, gentle movements. He seemed completely unaware of the flashing lights, the sirens, or even Alara, who was now tugging on the back of his shirt.
Just then, the floor shuddered beneath their feet.
“There won’t be a blast wall or a building in a second!” she exclaimed.
“Critical Reaction!! Evacuate Immediately!!”
The secret facility’s intercom system blared over the klaxon of the sirens.
“I almost got them…” he said.
**Nanite Swarm at 0.75%**
The three-inch-thick glass observation window in the blast wall seemed to bulge towards them as cracks began to form in the wall itself.
“Sam, leave them!”
“We can make more!”
“They aren’t worth dying for.”
“We have to go now!”
She yelled as the panic in her voice peaked.
A sudden flash of light was the last thing either of them saw before a deafening silence swept over them and everything went dark.
