Missing papers

"It's a mystery to me!" said a bemused Carlyle as we passed by the bookstores. "It vanished in front of my eyes! I could not do anything. I feel disgusted, Jerry! All the hard work comes out to this. Even though we have the computerized data on our work and the soft copies of our reports, the judges were asking for the hard copies." Her voice trailed away in a bout of tears, fought back angrily though.

"You are right. I never saw it coming. One instant, the papers were on the table and the next instant, they were gone, like evaporated," I said.

I was thinking hard and so was Carlyle, as we were returning from the annual paper presentation function, where our papers on recycling Titanium waste went missing just minutes before the judges were to visit our stall. We had to take back our entry. Our teachers were disappointed too. We would have to wait another year for such an opportunity.

***

I remember very clearly how it had all started, our project on recycling of Titanium waste. I was enjoying one of my favourite pasttimes : 'Science' magazine along with a delicious bowl of fruit cream custard in front of the TV on which the 'discovery channel showcase' was displaying swords made up of a Titanium alloy.

My mother had always complained of my weird way of studying. 'Indeed', I had thought,' neither did my friends believe me when I had told them that I enjoyed the complete movie the previous night, and still passed the exam on Molecular Physics or mechanics or Chemistry in top ten in the class.' They had always pictured me as a science geek. And even though I had never topped any of my grades, I was very content as opposed to my teachers, parents, friends, brother and whomsoever, who had chatted with me on STAR WARS.

I somehow believe that all of them had been wishing that I could be the next big thing in our high school and myself being content on the very cozy rank no. 5 last year (and the past four years straight), my consistency not withstanding, and had reached at the conclusion that I was a lucky lazy bum.

Enough of me and back to the Titanium tragedy. The Discovery Channel always showcases the best technology and skills in human and animal kingdom and that night, I was admiring the very very beautifully crafted Titanium-Steel swords and cigar cases for the royals of somewhere in the deeps of an African paradise. I was also admiring the fact that humans, including me, find or dream of finding a way to become more and more extravagant and feel stronger, even in this year of 2006 A.D., the age of atomic power, by the mere vision of a slender, sharp, shining sword with an exquisitely engraved handle and a deep red velvet covered case.

I read a lot the next year about Titanium and its great qualities, as we had visited a furnace producing high-purity Titanium steel alloys as part of our mid-term science picnic. Six of us in our class had requested our chemistry teacher to request on our behalf, for an internship, at Fischer Hearth, the Federal funded facility for strategic metals and alloys.

It was not common for the high school students to be at such a place but our teacher, Mr. Scrooge, actually Mr. Dufus Scrooge (I bet his parents were Disney fans) was very well connected and on our request had arranged for a visit for the six of us: me - Jerry Martins, Carlyle Brooks - a brilliant girl I tell you, Marion Suzzane - the deep thinker of our group, Ralph - the dreamer, Shanmugan - the skinny razor sharp dude from the snake charmers' country and finally Stephanie Nichols Bates - the very studious and spectacled Mary-Jane-Watson kind of a girl.

After the visit was over, we had explored on the various chemical techniques of extracting Titanium from scraps of the military wastes generated during various physical shield test routines where a lot of these tough alloys were tested to destruction and then never cared about, for who cares about what has buckled and is mangled beyond recognition by a bombshell. An estimated 5 Tonnes of such high valued waste is lying unattended at any given time at a federal weapons test site. And at a few thousand dollars a Kilogram, pure titanium was like the 'it' material for ultra fine water filtration techniques - the haven for lowest energy consuming water purifiers. We were so excited.

Although a few million dollars every year were being spent at the Fischer Hearth, and similar such programmes, for developing similar techniques, we were on our way to surprise oursleves of our abilities to create something very exciting. We worked diligently the next few months on the topic and had brought it to the shape of a proposal for a new way to efficiently handle such waste and recycle it.

But then it had to happen at the D-day. Mr. Moore's theories are so depressive and yet so true, and as he famously put it, "If something can go wrong, it will," and you bet it did. Our final project report and the papers to be presented went missing.

***

'I had put them on the table after a final review, and then was gone for a drink for a brief moment. Carlyle was discussing with Marion on the subject and Ralph was checking on our working model. And then one strange-looking guy, dressed completely in black, had brushed past the stall admiring the slides and the model. Could he have taken the bundle?' I was recalling the events in my head but suddenly froze.

The same stranger was standing at the corner of the street. I held Carlyle's hand and pulled her closer and whispered to her about the stranger. She noticed him cooling off in the shade near the bus stop with his black suitcase. We walked with our heads down as we passed him.

"Excuse me Mr. Jerry Martin, may I have a word?" he said in a calm and composed tone, slightly adjusting his tie. He sounded friendly enough. We stepped towards him as Carlyle clutched on to my hand.

"Yes! May I ask who you are, sir?" I tried to get past the thought of him as the thief and sounded extremely friendly.

"Tony Hazier, Technical manager, Fischer Hearth. I have to apologize for what I did today." He unlocked his suitcase and took out the bunch of papers (our papers!) and handed over to me. I looked at Carlyle and an emotion of extreme joy and confusion flooded upon us.

“Why did you…do this?” I said as I tried to wipe the tears in my eyes.

“I offer you and your associates internships based on this work. I have talked to your Principal, Madam Hodge, and she has agreed.” He handed me a bunch of blank forms. I did not know whether to scream or to run or to thank god or what, at that very instant and so was the case with Carlyle. He left the scene in his black Volkswagen.

I hugged Carlyle as tightly as I could and we wept, jumping in joy at the same time. We scampered back to the school to tell our group. We gathered and celebrated our little success at my home with a bowl of the delicious pudding and a sci-fi movie.

***