Royal Society of Chemistry Short Story Competition

Congratulations to the following Y10 students: Saleh, Riva, Asagi and Ria for taking part in the short story competition run by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

You can read the full story below

Plutonium Kills Another

Sicarius.

Tensions were high and the assassins returned. The night had darkened to an unforgiving blanket hiding the darkest of secrets and the latest murders were hidden once more. They had got away with it, yet again. They frequently made the headlines: ‘The assassins with merely 2 electrons in their outer shell, murder yet another.’  

With the impending night, would emerge the threat of the first energetic Plutonium…

He slips through the woods, darting and dashing through each nook and cranny. The pressure was high, and he can feel every bone in his body rattling under his skin. The impenetrable forest did not stand as a defensive barrier in the way of the contaminated Sicarius – he merely passes upon it. 
He did not lurk in the shadows, awaiting his victims but brought down his undying terror in plain sight, ionising the organs of its victims. Heading towards his next victim, his shiny silvery layer turns to a dull silvery colour as it slowly begins to corrode. The chemical reaction between his next victim and himself is relatively inert as he slowly reacts. Tormented, devoured, engulfed – lexemes that were far too weak to describe the vile actions that plutonium executed to form stronger intermolecular forces and ultimately become plutonium dioxide.

But something felt incomplete, the second toxic, contaminated plutonium rapidly strikes its next victim.

Selenium stood all alone in the centre of the city and all the eyes shone down like spotlights. Plutonium had chosen its next prey and it was willing to pounce. Shuddering in her feet, she couldn't move as Plutonium dashes closer and closer, each step solidifying the fate of her impending doom.  Each step, each thud, each heavy footstep sent a ripple of aggression engulfing the small, lifeless skeleton of Selenium. Within seconds it would all be over. Plutonium, the nightmare that had befallen the city would have won and yet another life would have been snatched and captured into the clutches of such an evil perpetrator. Within seconds, the evil will win over the good and all would be destroyed. Her eyes started to water as she clung to her six electrons, protecting them like it was the last thing she could live to do. She screamed in agony as she felt her feet sinking into the ground and Plutonium inching nearer and nearer. His eyes were just focused on her amid the chaos that surrounded them. She couldn't move. Selenium couldn't breathe as she let out a blood-curdling scream. 

As if in slow motion, the radioactive rays emitted into the atmosphere. Terror and fear were about to rain down on the city. Citizens were becoming irradiated, and the irradiation was spreading like a contagious disease at its peak. The menace penetrated anything and everything in its path, ionising cells and causing spontaneous mutations in the victim's DNA. Who knew such a small element could inflict such pain on a whole city?