Stepping into the cavernous elevator, Peterson sighed with relief for the privacy and the fact that he would soon be out of the windowless lab area and striding through the upper halls of the corporate offices. He hit the button for the tenth floor and then leaned against the back wall of the elevator. He closed his eyes and smiled as he imagined what the future might hold. Then the elevator stopped.

Peterson opened his eyes and looked at the control panel. He was stopped at the eighth floor. He'd reached the corporate levels, but not quite high enough. He leaned forward to push the buttons for the tenth floor again when the doors slid open. Standing on the other side of the opening doors stood a woman who looked like a strict school teacher, but her kind smile offset her bunned red hair, steel gray-blue eyes and tight-fitting power suit. She was easily fifty, pushing fifty-five but she held herself like a thirty year old. She looked at her watch and said, "Ahh, Dr. Peterson. Right on time, as usual."

Peterson smiled. "Miss Heintz. I thought we were meeting in your office...We are meeting in your office, right?"

"Call me Nancy, Dr. Peterson."

Peterson relaxed at the offer of using casual names. It was generally considered a compliment if the higher-ups referred to you by your first name, but even more so if they allowed you to use theirs. "Only if you call me Michael," he said.

"Very well, Michael. I was thinking about a different location for our meeting today." Nancy stepped into the elevator and took out a key card. She waved it in front of a small scanner mounted above the floor buttons. A small green light above the scanner blinked on while the metal beneath the floor buttons slid away, revealing a new button marked with the number eleven. She hit the button. The doors closed and Peterson felt his stomach sink slightly as the elevator began to rise.

"I didn't know there was an eleventh floor," Peterson said.

Nancy smiled. "There's not."

The doors opened to the tenth floor and both waited patiently for the doors to close. Peterson shifted nervously. The doors soon closed and they were pulled upward once again. He watched as the number changed from 10 to 11. He was beginning to feel curious about what he was being invited to see.  When the doors opened, it was more than he could have imagined.