Mr Hook's Big Black Box

Marco Schmidt: The Early Riser

I figured that if we were going to keep this Box safe, we need to move it off campus. I didn't know if we're even allowed to do that, but I hadn't seen anything against it in the rules. So I was up early enough Wednesday morning, and I brought my truck around to the back of the Mendeleev building. It was a surprisingly long drive. See, from my flat on campus, I could go over the pedestrian bridge to the other side of the main road, and a few hundred yards down from there was the park-and-ride for town, which I had a season pass for. But because the road's a dual carriageway, I had to turn away from campus when I came out of the car park, and go all the way down to the next junction to turn round. There was construction work too, with a forest of orange cones that meant I had to go halfway round the ring road. So even though it only took me like five minutes to walk to my truck, it was more than half an hour later I got back onto campus. By then it was only ten minutes until we'd arranged to meet; so much for coming early. But I still knew what I was doing.

I had tools in the back of the truck. I thought I could leave the trolley, the crowbar, a hammer, and a bag of panel pins outside the elevator. When the others arrived I'd point to the truck, ask whoever was there to get the engine running and back it up to the loading dock, while I went to bring the Box out. With everything already in place, I could probably spring the box lid, get my picture taken by the cameras in there looking suitably surprised, and then hastily tap six pins in to close it again before bringing it out. If I was super quick, you'd never even wonder what kept me.

"Hey, Marco!" Ferrari ran out waving as I drove round to the back of the building. Of course, as the guy with a truck I'd taken us to society events before. Especially our first few attempts at a reenactment for some culture festival in the town, because I could fit all our gear in. And my truck was black with a blue flames decal along the side, so not something you'd miss if you've seen it before. I cursed myself then, because she'd surely notice if I was carrying a crowbar when I went to get the Box..

"Hi," I rolled down the window, "You're early. I thought I'd better bring the truck round, we've got to move that thing off campus if it's going to be safe."

"Good plan," she nodded, "I was going to suggest meeting in Birkett's, get some breakfast while we talk about where to put it. I think your wheels will be safe here for fifteen minutes."

"We should check it's still there, I think," I had no idea where I was heading now, my plans had all gone out the window. But if I could get in the same place as the Box for a few minutes, any time Ferrari was out of the way, that was all I'd need to end the experiment. I hoped I could look for some opportunity to split up once we got inside, assuming there were no soldiers to deal with.

We went in through one of the side doors, which the janitor had already opened. He'd be going through emptying the bins, the same as if nothing had happened here last night, and would open up the main doors for students on his way out. On the ground floor there were two short hallways signposted the Merriwether Lecture Theatre. The hall occupied the ground level of what would otherwise have been part of the courtyard, and was one of the university's larger lecture theatres. It was also wired with full 7-channel surround sound, an expense which had been partly covered by the cinematography club so they could use the space as an indie cinema. But we were looking for a door covered by a folding screen, between the lecture theatre and the outer corridor.

The lecture theatre had two corridors, giving access to doors on either side. From one, a side door led to the projection room, while on the other side it was connected to the freight elevator. It was here that we would have to unload the Box and bring it around. We hadn't actually used it before, so we had to try both sides before we found which was the right door. Ferrari jabbed the elevator's 'call' button with her thumb, but there was no faint flicker of illumination and no sound of rumbling motors. The breaker was still out.