The Clean Room

“What are you doing here?” a muffled voice said. A man in a white clean suit and a respirator stepped from behind one of four slender, chrome rectangles evenly spaced in the white room. “You’re going to contaminate the experiment.” A low buzz started in the background. The man in the suit waved his arms over his head and ran to the center of the square formed by the monolithic pillars. “No, No! Not yet! It isn’t ready!” he yelled up at the ceiling.

The pillars rose from the floor and slowly rotated around the man, increasing in speed until lightning arced from their surfaces. “Shut it down! Shut it down!” The man’s voice was now desperate.  “You have to help me,” he said, turning to face me. “Behind you is the interior control panel. Hit the yellow switch. Hurry!”

I turned around to a blank white wall. I could scarcely make out a thin grey line where the control panel was hidden. I pressed the panel.  The panel hissed as it lifted from the wall and slid back to the left. As I reached for the switch I heard a yell and a loud crack and thunder. I turned back around to see a grey cloud where the man had stood. The pillars slowly returned to their original positions and the ceiling turned a faint green.

“Matter transfer procedure completed.” a female voice said.  The ceiling turned bright red. “Unauthorized personnel detected. Facility cleanse initiating…”