Fritz's Room

Fritz feels like he has slept for two months. He finally wakes up -- his internal clock tells him it might be around noon, but he doesn't like to trust things like that -- and rolls out of bed, strangely hangover free. In fact, he's feeling damn near perky. Then he remembers everything that had happened last night, briefly tries to dismiss it as a dream, but is finally reluctantly forced to accept the truth because of the strange room he is in.

How could I ''just fall asleep in a strange place like this? ''Fritz berates himself. ''I mean, I'm surprised I'm still alive. Still, I guess that's booze for you. I really need to give it up one of these years.''

The German gets up and begins to investigate his room with scientific certainty, not yet sure whether he wants to venture out into the main building. It seems remarkably tasteful, painted with muted colours and bearing only the simplest of decorations. All of the furniture is new and of an uniform black colour. He pulls open a drawer to reveal his shirts. Okay, that's a little weird.

What draws Fritz's attention most is the desk. On one side of it a number of biology books are stacked, all written in German. Next to it, a microscope. ''What is this, a bribe? Some attempt at an apology? Oh right, I'm a German scientist so all I want is German scientist stuff. It's not like I could have any identity outside of that. Well, actually I don't really, but they could at least give me the benefit of the doubt.''

But it was what was on the right side of the desk that really caught Fritz's eye. A large binder bursting at the seams with paper. He opens it and flips through it, not believing what he's seeing. This is it. The Project. The biggest opportunity of his career, and one he had squandered. And here in this binder was every note, every chart, every theoretical hypothesis tied to the experimental results that disproved it. But this can't be it. For one thing, the whole thing was classified by the U.S. government and sealed in a sub-basement of a sub-basement of the Pentagon, likely to never be disturbed again. And on top of that, the notes Fritz was looking at -- scrawled in his own messy handwriting -- were in German, when he had wrote everything in English.

Fritz looked towards the ceiling. "You know, I'm trying to be rational here," he says to the air. "You could at least play along."