by samgrossy on Thu Nov 01, 2012 8:43 pm
Day 4: A Good Night’s Sleep. A Bad Day’s Start.
The elements spent the night sleeping well, metalloid and nonmetal alike. Night one disturbed them deeply, the metalloids more than the nonmetals, with the destruction of silicon. If one element destroyed during night one was disturbing, then night two, with two more annihilations, was down right terrifying. The days they could control to an extent (tell that to poor Betiko), but the night was uncertain. But with the destruction of the overreactive fluorine on day three, the elements, all the elements, found a reason to forget some of the pain of the past few days.
They wake up, ready to call I.U.P.A.C. to notify them of the vacancy they created by tossing fluorine into the mass spectrometer. About to pick up the phone, they start to discuss some strategy.
“There are eight of us left,” an element says.
“That means we need five of us to agree again.” Another says
“That won’t take long for us to do that.” A third chimes in.
The phone is dialed and they are almost happy to start the day. Then someone says “Well, it looks like we only need four votes for today. Should take us even less time to reach a decision.” They all turn and look at the element who just spoke up. He explains that there is an element missing. There are only seven of them in the lab. The phone is dropped and nervousness set in as if they never eliminated fluorine. The reality of the situation is that only a serial killer was killed. The metalloid mafia is still wreaking havoc among the remaining nonmetals.
But where is the missing element? The mass spectrometer is showing the last run was fluorine. The flask in the radiation hood is in the same spot. That leaves only one option: The particle accelerator in the basement.
The elements all rush downstairs and realize that their deep, more relaxing sleep last night allowed for one of their own to be thrown into the most devastating elemental killing machines in the building.
The particle accelerator was just finishing its run. An element points to the detector screen that allows for each subatomic particle to be counted.
Quickly one element counts the protons as they fly off into nonexistance, “1, 2, 3, . . . 19, 20, 21, . . . 52, 53, 54. That’s it. 54 protons.”
“Are you positive?” asks another, nearby element.
“Yes. I can confirm that safariguy5, Xenon, Vanilla Townie, has been annihilated.”
It looks like there are two blank spots on the table for the elements to call into I.U.P.A.C. They thought they should be happy at the end of the day yesterday, but this morning has brought them all back to where they were before yesterday’s result.
This begins Day 4. The deadline for Day 4 is 10 PM, November 11. That’s 10 days from now.
With 7 alive, it takes 4 to lynch.
