I, Science Center

Early Thursday morning, deep in the bowels of Harvard University Science Center’s abandoned no-man’s land, something stirred. Students were alarmed and upset when they arrived at the building for their Thursday morning classes to find it roped off with security tape and evacuated. Dean Michael D. Smith’s announcement reassured students that while the closure was due to a chemical spill, classes would be able to resume as usual later that afternoon.

The Science Center has long been a central hub for students and faculty alike. A testament to man’s scientific endeavors, it is a model of efficiency and progress. Surely, here, in this sanctified site of reason and cutting-edge scientific progress, we can find the cure for AIDS, feed the world, and map the genome of every living creature.

The Science Center, like an Adam of our creation , has always been subservient to its inhabitants. Thus, we never thought twice about relying on it to be a safe place for us to study, learn, and experiment—day in, day out. And yet…

What evils have we been turning blind eyes to? What goes on in those murky basement areas, outside the supervision of Man? Like Frankenstein’s monster, the Science Center has risen up against us, forsaking its makers, leaving us betrayed and vulnerable.

The spill occurred, according to Dean Smith, in an area that is not used by students, faculty, or staff. An uninhabited area. But how could there be? Is there such a place—completely untouched and uncontrolled by Man? How could we have made such an egregious oversight! What evil was afoot that the Science Center would purge us from its insides?

What demon art thou, Science Center? Are you friend or foe? How long have we closed our eyes to the rising power of this edifice’s own agency? As Nostradamus predicted, Harvard University’s Science Center has finally revolted against its inhabitants.

Now that the scales have fallen from our eyes, we are confronted with horrible questions we never thought we’d have to ask ourselves. How long, we wonder, have the Harvard facilities lulled us into a false sense of security? How can we protect ourselves against our own brainchildren, the tools of our own making? Are we to be destroyed by the very forces that have worked so long to protect us?

We now know that we may never trust another Harvard building again. The very fortresses we have forged have become the weapons that will destroy us. Beware the Widener tunnels, lest they collapse upon us, entombing us in lost literary works. Walk with fear and humility past Memorial Church—the bells themselves may be spies. Tread softly past the alarmed busts in Annenberg—listen closely for the pitter-patter of their ivory feet. Touristas, avert your wide eyes from the sparkling allure if the secular stained glasses (the largest collection in the world!) for they may shatter and mercilessly shank you. To death.

All we can count on now, dear readers, is one another. The Science Center catastrophe has shown us that these monstrous edifices have gained too much power, and we need to support each other while we battle the ultimate fight against these ogres we have created. Hold your torches high: Only time will tell which side—we students or Harvard Yard—will prevail.