He gathered up the smoking remains of the experiment and placed them on a small sideboard at the left of the lab. crimson hair framed his thin pale face and a coarse soot layered his lofty arms. Through worried eyes, he turned and glared at the disheveled forceps and collapsed tables, the ruined books, the torn pages, the singed models of neatly arranged particles all strewn across the tiled floor in a steaming circle. All of his life's work. He felt a little bit of him die inside as he realized this was his life, the divine love crafted in every scratch of writing, in every diagram and conclusion…all gone. Nevertheless, he reasoned this was the price to pay for having a life of chance, a life of excitement and discovery. It was a marvel in some respects that he wasn't already dead particularly after the incident with the sodium and the bath tub just a month before. Turning back to the sideboard he took a deep breath and plunged himself into the matter in hand, which was lying in a mangled heap in front of him. He bit his lip and stepped onto the shabby stool, worn by the many footprints of many-passed scientist and the remnants of their failed and successful experiments, and took a closer look. The broken test tube held a colorless volatile liquid each droplet simmering in the early morning sun, the vapor giving water to his eyes and fear to his heart. His heart lurched with disappointment as he realized how stupid he had been. It was not the reaction he thought ferociously the phosphorus darn it the phosphorus. He whacked a hand to his head and sunk down to the floor sobbing quietly into his hands. Taking one more fraught glace at the wreckage he stood and clumped out of the room to go and make himself at least reasonably presentable. He did not look back. If he had he would have seen the precisely organized boxes of phosphorus completely unscathed lying outside his lab door, and little did he know that he was about to make his mark on that stool and by god it would be mighty.
He looked strait ahead into the mirror and his reflection stared back at him white faced, tight lipped, his expression a mask of suppressed rage. BANG. The room filled with silhouettes. BANG. He turned quickly only to see a wall of smoke greeting him into unconsciousness. Taking the opportunity, he ran headlong into the corridor, and squinted just making out his lab door. It was on fire the great flames licking their way up the framework and to the ceiling. He made out about 10 boxes of phosphorus 2 of them had already exploded and BANG BAANG. He was shortly blinded by the sudden flash of light stumbling into a door then a wall and finally into sunshine. He began to regain his sight his vision a light show of reds and yellows and whites but then the outline of a man holding a test tube and a match running away into the distance. He greeted he ground with his full weight and was gratefully taken by sleep.
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