Peeking Magma

Chapter-1

Work was considerably less tedious today after finalizing the deal with Clarksons' yesterday. My crew were hammering out that deal for a couple of months, and now that we finally made it possible, I've given them a little off the cuff break, before the next phase in that deal begins. The break technically starts from tomorrow, but I decided to finish up early today and go home now.

I've been going home at 3 in the morning daily for the last month, it's only fair I get to go home early today. Picking up my bag and laptop from my desk, I walk out my office and see that Kelly is still working.

"Hey Kel staying up late again?"

She bobs her head up and down, while smiling "Yes ma'am not all of us have interesting lives back home"

"Hey come on now you're not doing so bad yourself!" and the only answer she gave me this time was to laugh.

"Bye Kel" I say walking away from her cubicle and towards the elevator.

That girl will never stop complaining about not having a social life, while actually putting zero effort to have one. She was made for WORK! Well atleast that's what she tells me. I'm not complaining though she's from MIT and also the best there is in the Computers department in my company.

The elevator ding snapped me out of everything Kelly, I'm lucky its empty, I got in pressing the lowest level. The elevator starts it's descent, dropping floor after floor after floor. I feel my stomach do that flip it does when there's a downward gravitational pull.

How long does it take to drop 18 floors? It's still at the 9th floor, why is it taking so long today? It stops again in the 4th floor and a few people get in

Is it the elevator going slow or am I the one who's impatient to reach home?

The elevator doors finally open into the parking. I walked to my spot and got into my moon beige Beetle convertible, yes I'm one of those people who love cute cars better than fast or flashy cars. I considered buying a MINI but I don't know, maybe I was always in love with Beetle, and given it's New York's traffic I have to endure daily while driving I think I made a wise choice by choosing a snug vehicle rather than the speedsters-from-hell Adrian prefers, which he technically drives only when both of us go out together or on the weekends, rest of the time he's just too busy to drive, so to be fair he's not the one who's enduring these roads.

The wiser choice in this city is to walk, it's even faster sometimes, but since my home is 10 miles away from my office, I guess I don't really have a choice. I drive out of the parking and pull into the street. I speed up the engine and start moving through the never-ending line of cabs and cars.

Humans and Automobiles glide past me like on a giant conveyor belt, the city's heavily inhabited streets now slowly receding as I turn into the neighborhood we stay in. The heavy din of the busy streets can now be heard as a slight white noise far away. Turning on the curb I spot the huge wrought iron gates of our house and slow down, on reaching them I swipe my access code across the panel.

The doors swing back smoothly revealing the driveway cutting itself through the cedar and pines trees. Driving down this trail always reminds me of Indiana Jones. As I move further along the driveway, the trees give way to a central clearing. Sitting there in the center of this clearing is the house surrounded by neatly trimmed grass with a central pathway. It's a 11,000 sq feet structure made with wood, glass and concrete. A modified estate home with no sloped roofs and a lot of glasses. The structure opens onto two decks looking out at the wilderness around it. The house and the trees around it cut us off from the world outside enclosing us in a mystifying Terrarium.

Parking the car in the garage I walk around to the front door. Well the drive back home took me a little over two hours, but there's still time. Now to do what I planned on doing.