Chapter 1

Drew, Phillip, Heather, and Anastasia were setting up their lab for the day. It was after school, since they had missed the actual lab day, so they were the only ones there besides the teacher, who was busy on his laptop.
     “All right, so let’s check everything. Goggles?”
     “Check.” Phillip fingered his lab glasses.
     “Apron?”
     “Check!” Heather patted the black apron she and the other three wore.
     “Long hair and sleeves pulled back?”
     “Checkers!” Anastasia chirped.
     “Haha. Okay then,” Drew nodded, “I think that’s it.”
     Heather sighed. “C’mon, let’s just start the lab!”
     They got the Microplate with its little round holes and began filling them with solutions and water. They had to be careful about this part, since serial dilutions had to precise; otherwise their results would be skewed.
     “So you put the five drops of water in all of them?”
     “Yeah.”
     “What about the first one?”
     “You guys, I’ll be right back,” the teacher said, getting up from his desk and walking out towards the door towards the bathroom.
     “That’s where the solution is added first, remember?” Phillip shook his head. “You gotta add it, then take out five drops and—”
     “—put it in the next well, and so on blah blah. Yeah, Phil, we’ve got it,” Drew finished his sentence.
     “Okay, we’re done with the dilution, now we’re adding the other solution,” Heather announced. “Can anyone see anything in this one?”
     “I’ll take a look.” Anastasia bent over it. “…Whoa…”
     “What, you see precipitate?” Drew went over.
     “Er, no…” Anastasia pointed towards the laboratory storage in the back with puzzlement. “I thought I heard some noise coming from back there…”
     Drew leaned his head towards it. “Huh, Mr. Brambleton must’ve gone back there, then.”
     “No,” Phillip frowned, “he was headed for the bathroom. And that’s towards the other direction.”
     “Oh, whatever. Let’s just get this lab finished so we can go home.”
     “Hey, you know what? I’m seeing some precipitate in this one, so I think we should record this one’s concentration and—”
     “…Whoa, okay. I guess this isn’t Kansas anymore, Toto.”
     The four looked towards the new voice. A teenager with blonde, short wavy hair had opened the lab storage room door, and was surveying the room with a mix of bewilderment and curiosity.
     “See, I told you I heard something!” Anastasia pointed.
     Heather’s brows furrowed. “…Uh, are you…a new TA, or something like that…?”
     If he was, he certainly had a weird fashion sense. Either that or he had played one too many fantasy or sci-fi role-playing games. His leather shoes looked like they came out of the middle ages, and on his shoulders he had metal epaulettes. His neck and arms were covered with a skintight black material that stopped short of his fingers. The strangest thing was the futuristic-looking lab glasses and the apron attached to his epaulettes that covered him down to the shins that strangely suggested a scientist of some sort.
     “Hmmm…let me check something.” He glanced at a contraption in his hand that looked like a cross between a remote control and a TI-89. “Well, that explains it! I had tweaked the wavelength by accident. Duh!” He shrugged. “Oh well, might as well take a look around, if you guys don’t mind.”
     The lab group stared.

“This looks kinda like a laboratory, but kinda not…is this some kind of school?” he said, walking in and glancing around, letting the door close behind him.
     Heather was a bit freaked out, since this kid didn’t seem to be entirely sane. There were plenty of dangerous chemicals back there… Of all the times Mr. Brambleton had to go to the bathroom…!
     “Oooh, are you guys doing a lab? Lemme see, which one are you doing?” He peered over their shoulders at their experiment in progress. “Oh, the precipitation lab. I don’t think you finished putting in the solution, you still have other ones over here that you didn’t test out yet.”
     “Yeah, we know that,” Heather retorted, her unease concealed with annoyance. “Will you like, leave us alone now? Go away? We need to finish our lab.”
     “All right, all right,” he held up his hands as if he were surrendering, “I’m going now, I won’t bother you guys. I wasn’t here; it was just a weird dream. Okay? Okay. Here I go.”
     He fingered the device in his hands. Their surroundings glowed and wavered, like ripples passing through water. Everything began shining brightly until nothing could be seen but an encompassing radiance.