Please move the science chemical cabinet from room 107 to room 219. You will need to remove the chemicals inside
first. Be careful, there is one
container filled with hydrochloric acid.
Thanks. Science Department.
Jon
laid down the neatly typed note on his desk.
Moving of any sort was never his favorite thing to do, but it came with
the job. Fortunately, it was a
non-student day. That would make things
much easier. No one to work around, empty
hallways, unlocked rooms for easy access.
About the only ones who would be around today would be the principal, a
few administrators and maybe some teachers.
Jon never knew exactly who would show up, but overall, it was usually
pretty quiet.
Jon finished his
coffee and stretched. Walking to the
storage room near his office, he picked up a hand truck and a cart on which he
could transport the various chemicals.
Technically, the science department should have moved the chemicals
themselves, but, as with everything else, small details like that didn’t always
happen. Since Jon had to do the moving,
he wanted to make sure that he was totally safe. Being the safety conscious person he was, he
prepared accordingly. Over the years,
he’d learned to be careful, especially around chemicals. Before heading for room 107, he grabbed a
pair of chemical gloves and some goggles.
He also picked up some rags and packing material so he could transport
the chemicals safely and easily.
Opening the back
door, Jon headed for the building that housed the science department. The day was overcast, and a slight sprinkle
of rain descended on Jon as if he were being christened. Pushing the hand truck with his right hand
and pulling the cart and extra materials with his left, Jon slowly made his way
around the back of the building. Upon
reaching the side entrance to the science department, Jon stopped, removed his
keys and opened the
door. Hooking it
open, he entered the building.
Continuing his trek, Jon walked a few more yards and stood before room
107.
Once again, he
removed his wad of keys from his belt and with a twist of his wrist, he opened
up the door. Entering, he was met by an array of scientific paraphernalia. test
tubes, beakers, pipettes, Petri dishes, microscopes and more. Jon had never been much for science, still,
it was fascinating to observe all the things that one department could use to
study the world around him.
Carefully making
his way through the maze of desks, chairs and unfinished experiments, Jon
reached the door to the teachers work area and the storage area for the
chemical cabinet. Unlocking the door and
walking inside, he was greeted by an area filled with all sorts of odds and
ends. To his left sitting against the
wall was the tell-tale yellow chemical storage cabinet. Setting down his hand truck, Jon walked over
and opened the cabinet. Well.
This won’t be as bad as I thought, Jon said to himself. Inside he found not a cabinet full of
chemicals, but only one shelf full.
Retrieving his
cart, Jon first donned his chemical gloves to protect his hands. Then, he deftly put on the safety goggles
although they made him look a lot like Buddy Holly. Once he’d protected himself with this safety
garb, Jon began carefully placing the various chemicals on the top shelf of the
cart. In between each bottle, Jon placed
a little packing material. He also
padded the outside edge so as to avoid breaking any bottles should he hit any
bumps along the way. Reaching in for the
last container, he noted that it was the jug of hydrochloric acid that the note
had mentioned. Using extra caution, he
carefully removed the jug and placed it on the cart, being sure to enshroud it
with packing material. Once that was
done, the cabinet was ready to be moved.
Jon decided to
get the most dangerous part of this move out of the way. Leaving his oversized rubber chemical gloves
on and still wearing the safety goggles, Jon pushed the cart out of the
teachers’ work area and made his way through the maze of desks and chairs in
the room. Reaching the door of the room,
he opened it and pushed the cart out into the hall. Turning right, he headed toward the elevator
where reaching room 219 on the second floor would be much easier than going
around the building and up the outside ramp.
Jon stopped in front of the elevator doors and inserted his key. Turning it, he pushed the button and the
quiet whirr of the elevator descending could be detected from behind the
doors. Jon tried to remove his key. It was stuck.
The elevator was almost to the first floor. Jon tried again. Wiggling the key, he attempted to remove it
from the lock. It wouldn’t budge. The elevator doors opened. Thinking quickly, Jon pushed the cart inside,
but the front wheel caught in the opening on the floor. The doors began to shut since there was no
safety mechanism to stop them. Jon
jerked on the cart to free the wheel from the opening in the floor and in so
doing knocked a bottle of bleach off the other end. Hitting the carpeted floor of the elevator,
the cap popped off and within seconds a beautiful white patch appeared in the
bright blue carpet. By now, the doors
had jammed against the side of the cart pinning it between the door and the
wall. Jon pushed the button again and
the door opened. Quickly he tried to
free the wheel from the gap in the floor.
On his last attempt, just before the door smashed it again, the cart
popped loose.
The sudden
loosening of the cart sent Jon reeling backwards. Jon stumbled over his own feet, and the cart bounced
up in the air and came crashing down. The
rattling of glass jars and bottles sent Jon’s heart rate sky high. In the process of stumbling, Jon was able to
steady the cart, keeping it from dumping.
Jon, however, fell sideways into the elevator button panel and instantly
snapped off his key in the lock.
Reaching down on the floor, Jon picked up his wad of keys, all of them whole
but one.
“Dog gone it
anyway!” Jon cried out. “Something else
to fix.”
Cooling down,
Jon carefully looked over the cart of chemicals. Nothing seemed to be broken. Everything was intact. The ferric and potassium nitrate, the calcium
hydroxide, the bottle of isopropyl ether and sodium fluoride as well as the
container of aluminum ammonium sulfate, a bottle of ethyl ether, a bottle of cupric
bromide and a host of other bottles that adorned the cart. Most importantly, the hydrofluoric acid was
okay. Breathing a sigh of relief, Jon
now had no choice but to go around the building to the outside ramp.
Turning back
around, Jon headed down the hall to the outside door. Rolling the cart through the still open door,
Jon began his journey around the side of the building and toward the back of
the school. Reaching the back ramp, Jon
began to ascend to the second floor. The
ramp was constructed in a switch back fashion in two levels. Reaching the middle of the two levels, Jon
turned to make his final ascent to the top.
In so doing, the cart caught the edge of the hand rail and was ripped
out of his grasp. The sudden lack of weight
tugging on Jon from behind propelled him forward and he smashed his face into
the brick wall. In the meantime, the
cart began rolling backwards down the first incline. Half dazed, Jon stood there momentarily
trying to clear his head. As he did so,
he began to detect the sound of rattling glass and rolling wheels increasing in
crescendo. Turning around, Jon was
horrified to see the cart three-quarters of the way down the incline. Jon ran
after it. The cart reached the bottom of
the ramp and bounced over the loose rocks that were strewn along the
walkway. The bottle of ethyl ether flew
off the top of the cart and shattered on the ground. When it hit, it exploded. A beautiful orange and yellow fireball roared
to life as Jon skidded to a stop ten feet from the conflagration. Dirt, rocks and shattered glass were lifted
into the air and rained down on Jon.
Dark smoke roiled up from the impact point and drifted into the sky.
As the smoke
cleared, Jon noticed that the cart was gone.
Looking down the path, Jon could see it in the distance still
rolling. Bouncing over more rocks and irregularities
in the ground, Jon knew the outcome couldn’t be good. He started to run. The cart was picking up speed. Bouncing wildly, another explosion rocked the
cart as the isopropyl ether burst into flames due to the violent shaking. That explosion in turn, blew several other
containers off of the cart and at the same time caused the cart to careen
sideways effectively turning it toward the road in front of the school.
Jon ran,
horrified as he watched bottles of chemicals strewn about the pathway and the
cart on a pell-mell mission for anywhere.
As Jon turned the corner in pursuit of the runaway cart, his heart
skipped a beat as he saw the principal’s car directly in the line of sight of
the cart. Jon knew there was no way he
was going to catch it before it smashed into Vance Livingston’s car. Jon
stopped running, his heart sinking and his stomach sick as he watched the
remaining bottles of chemicals bouncing up and down on top of the cart like
kernels of popcorn skittering around inside of a hot pan. The hydrochloric acid was still intact, but
not for long.
As Jon watched, the cart bounced over the edge of the curb and
spun sideways. In so doing, the wheels
locked up and the cart dumped, five feet from Vance’s car. The remaining chemicals spilled, but not on
Vance’s car. A sigh of relief filled the
sickening void in Jon ’s stomach as he once
again began running toward the disaster.
Reaching the scattered bottles and containers, Jon
reached down and carefully tipped the cart back up on its’ wheels. Jon ’s
goggles had fogged up due to his perspiration and the slight mist of rain that
was slowly dissipating. Blinking away
sweat, Jon reached up with his gloves
and moved the goggles up to his forehead.
Perusing the mess, Jon rolled the cart to the side of the road and
figured about all he could do now was get a broom and dust pan to clean up the
mess. Since very few others were around,
and Vance wouldn’t be leaving for awhile, Jon felt safe in running back to get
a broom, dustpan and garbage barrel to dump it in.
Reaching Vance ’s car, Jon
found the smell of burning rubber overwhelming.
Coughing and hacking, he turned away momentarily to catch his breath. Then, looking down, he saw a clear liquid
surrounding the right front tire. A
gooey, rubbery substance was slowly oozing from all edges of the tire. The tire was slowly sinking as if in
quicksand. Then Jon realized what had happened. The hydrochloric acid had run down the
pavement and under the tire. Now, it was
eating it away turning it into black goo.
As Jon stood pondering this new
situation, a low frequency belching sound like that of a bag of flour hitting
the pavement from two stories up filled his ears. Looking down, Jon
saw that Vance ’s right front tire had
blown out. His car sat at an awkward
angle and the cup of coffee inside the car that Vance had left sitting on the
dash spilled and ran down the vents under the windshield.
Horrified at
what had happened, Jon was in a panic as to what to do next. Just then, another low frequency belch
emanated from the front left tire and Vance’s car evened out in the front. Now the back end was sitting higher than the
front making it look like some souped up teenage hot rod. A wave of nausea and a sickening dread filled
Jon ’s stomach again. Walking around the front of the car, he could
see where the acid had trickled underneath and had eaten away the other front
tire. The remaining “juice” was slowly
making its way toward the drain marked “Dump No Pollutants.” Jon knew this wasn’t good, so he turned and
ran back to his office to retrieve some bags of absorbent material that he
could sprinkle on the acid and then sweep up and dispose of.
Reaching his
office, he collected several bags. Jon
quickly returned to the scene just in time to see the drain cover, which had
been eaten away by the acid, drop ten feet into the water at the bottom of the
drain shaft. Jon couldn’t believe what
was happening. Quickly sprinkling the
product on the acid, Jon watched as the
fluid was absorbed. A few minutes later
he swept up as much as possible and dumped it into the roller barrel he’d
brought out. He then sprinkled baking
soda on all the surfaces that had come in contact with the acid and neutralized
them. Thousands of tiny bubbles hissed
and spit as the baking soda quelled the vicious activity of the acid. Sweeping up the rest of the glass and powder
from the other spilled chemicals, Jon was faced with the task of telling Vance
what had happened. Since he no longer
had any chemicals left to transport, Jon figured he’d move the chemical cabinet
another day. He didn’t want to deal with
the situation anymore today anyway.
Making his way
back to his office, the cart and barrel in tow, his head hung low, Jon didn’t
notice Vance walking toward him. At the
last second, Jon looked up.
“Jon. How’s it going today?”
Caught off
guard, Jon just muttered a quick “Okay,” and continued walking.
“Great! It’s a little misty outside, but it should
clear up soon.” Vance
had stopped in front of Jon to chat
thus forcing Jon to come to a
standstill and continue the conversation.
“Well, I hope
so. A little rain in the morning to
clean things up and sun in the afternoon to dry it.”
“That’s the
spirit,” Vance said slapping Jon on the shoulder.
Getting up his
nerve, Jon said, “I need to talk to you about something.”
“Great! Let me run to my car and grab my coffee I
forgot to bring in this morning and I’ll be right back. Where should I meet you?”
Jon was caught
off guard again when Vance mentioned his destination. Fumbling for a reply, Jon
simply said, “In the doghouse.”
Vance laughed
out loud. “Good one Jon. Are you in trouble again?”
Before Jon could reply, Vance
turned and walked away laughing out loud.
Yelling over his shoulder Vance said, “Meet me in my office in five.”
“Okay,” Jon
mumbled under his breath. Turning to
leave, Jon felt a slight breeze on his
left foot. Looking down and lifting his
shoe, he noticed a large hole in the bottom of the sole. The strong smell of acid mixed with the smell
of sweaty socks and feet wafted up from the opening. Disheartened and depressed, Jon dropped his shoe back to the floor and returned
the items he was packing to his office.
He then walked out the door and headed for “the man with only two tires”
office. He knew there was no way out
this time. Reaching Vance’s office, Jon
entered and waited. A few minutes later
Vance returned, whistling.
“You’re
quick. I didn’t think you’d be here already.”
Bewildered at
Vance’s lack of concern over his car Jon looked him in the eye.
“What’s
wrong? You looked perplexed,” Vance
said.
“Uh, nothing,
nothing.”
“Hey, I just saw
the strangest thing.”
“What’s that?”
Jon asked, still puzzled and beginning to sweat profusely.
“When I went to
get my coffee, I noticed another car just like mine down the road a little
further. Same color, make, model,
everything. The only difference is that
it’s jacked up in the back.”
“I thought that
was yours,” Jon said, a crease of worry forming on his brow.
“No, no. Mine’s just out front. The one you saw belongs to the
superintendent. He just got a new
car. Only thing is, I didn’t realize he
was getting the same kind as me. I’ll
have to give him a bad time though about jacking the thing up. What’s he think he is, a teenager?” Vance laughed out loud again and took a big
swig of his coffee.
“So Jon. You had something on your mind?”
Jon looked up at
Vance. Vance sat smiling, his hands
folded neatly on his desk. Only one
thought flashed over and over in his head.
Run Jon ,
run.
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