The Prologue
The janitorial closest in the back of Oxford's Physics department had never seen so much commotion. Never before had a machine of such complication been tested in such secrecy, such haste or such limited space. Never before had a professor as prestigious as Mr Faraday been able to persuade the janitor in charge of the Physics department to leave the closet nearest Professor Faraday's classroom completely untouched. And never before had Professor Faraday felt such a shortness of breath and rush of excitement as he did now.
The professor's fingers frantically flipped through the pages of his precious journal. He concentrated on ignoring the beeping and the whirring of the machine in front of him as he searched the pages for a specific equation. Suddenly, his eyes widened and he breathed, "2.342. Come on..." Immediately, he reached his shaky fingers up and turned the dial to the right. "2.342."
The whirrs of the machine grew so loud that Professor Faraday flinched, bringing his right ear to his shoulder in an attempt to soften the noise. His eyes raced down to his notebook and then his hands flew back up to the machine, pressing buttons and typing numbers as quickly as his thoughts leapt from equation to equation.
"11 hertz…" he breathed as he punched in the final set of numbers. The machine responded in a series of concentrated beeps. Mr Faraday, who was knelt down in front of his experiment as if it were a god, slowly removed his shaking hands from the machine and stared at it in awe. "This is it…" he gasped.
Slowly, he backed away, his knees rubbing against the cold ground as he did. The machine continued to beep and suddenly a new, whizzing sound was added to the symphony of precisely synchronized beeps and bops that whirled in and out of the professor's ears. As Faraday watched in awe, a piercing, purplish white light suddenly sliced through the air in front of him and he screeched, shutting his eyes tight. The sounds of the machine grew even more intense. The buckets, brooms and cans shoved against the edge of the closet began to rattle. Faraday's head bowed, his shoulders slumped and before he could see the end of the hot, bright explosion of light, his body collapsed on the linoleum floor with a thump.
Author's Note: So, I hope you enjoyed the first bit of this story! I really had trouble thinking of a title for the story so I just named it after this equation having to do with time and space. Please don't judge by the title. :( Also, I really do enjoy reviews--good or bad. So please review and help me make my story better! Thank you very very much!
-Got Scots?