He looked back at the stylus. On its side, engraved in tiny, perfect Helvetica font, were four letters: .
ChemDraw didn’t just open. It exploded . chemdraw unsw
Leo’s weapon of choice was ChemDraw. To an outsider, it looked like a glorified coloring book of lines and hexagons. To Leo, it was a battlefield. He was trying to force a stubborn cyclopentane ring into a chair conformation it hated taking. He looked back at the stylus
Leo looked at the stylus. It was now cold, inert, just a piece of metal. He had a sudden, chilling thought. He checked the file’s creation time: 2:17 AM. It exploded
That’s when he noticed the stylus. It wasn’t his. It was a sleek, silver thing lying on the edge of his mousepad, humming with a faint, residual warmth. He didn’t remember picking it up. He shrugged, desperation winning over caution, and tapped it on the screen.
He reached out a finger to touch the oxygen atom. It buzzed. The molecule shimmered, and a ghostly, transparent version of the protein it was supposed to bind to materialized beside it. He could see the lock and key—his molecule was a terrible fit. Too bulky on the left side.
He slid it into his pocket.