Slow Burn

The office was damp and humid. The windows were fogged up, hiding the rolling clouds and falling rain behind them. A summer storm was approaching from far off shore, but Don Chalburt wasn't worried about a little gust and thunder. His eyes constantly alternated from the ceiling to his desk, where a small two by six red brick lay diagonally across an oversized calendar. There was nothing wrong with the brick that he could see, yet he did not trust it entirely.

Occasionally, he poked at the brick with the eraser end of his pencil. It always pushed back.

And each time he verified its solid state, he huffed to himself, folded his arms over his chest, and rotated his chair away from his desk. Chalburt was struggling to understand what they had done. Most men believe in their dreams and work their lives to achieve it. Chalburt did not believe his dream was possible, yet he had worked towards it for the better part of a decade. Now that it had come true, he didn't know what to believe.

The brick looked real enough. And yet for a brief three minutes last Friday, the brick had not existed. They had placed it on the transmission platform and thrown the switch and watched as it instantly disappeared. There was a soft popping sound, followed by a low humming and a tinge of smoke. Three minutes later, the brick appeared on the receiving platform across the room, twenty yards away. The entire team cheered from behind the blast windows, congratulating each other with jubilant hugs. Chalburt was silent though, instantly plunged into introspection by his success.