Search Olivia's office!

You wonder if you should just pass on the information you learned to Velvet and be done with it, or investigate a little bit further. You figure you have about an hour before you plan to meet up with her, so you decide to go for it. You find the engineering building at the top of a hill near the edge of campus. It's pretty quiet at the moment since it's the middle of the class hour right now, though there are still a few students walking about or killing time chatting. You try to act casual as you enter the building, but for anyone following you, it would be pretty obvious that you're lost.

With the number of hallways and staircases that branch off from the entryway, it's a game of chance as you pick one at random. If you think you've gone the wrong way you turn around and backtrack to the entryway again. On the second try, you end up along a cluster of computer labs, you recognize the room number for your comp sci class. If nothing else, at least you'll know where to go for class tomorrow.

On your third time down an unfamiliar hall, you feel like you've picked correctly. You end up near the back end of the building where the light is dim and more foreboding. It even takes a while before you come across any doors, but when you do you note that there aren't any windows into the rooms. You keep checking the door numbers as you go deeper, thankfully the one you're looking for comes up pretty quickly.

#107, you read off of the nameplate next to the door. That's the one you're looking for. You wonder if you should try knocking, but decide against that. It seemed from Olivia's message that she wouldn't be in until the afternoon. You doubt a student would be pulling full-day shifts on a Monday. You try your luck on the door handle: it won't turn, but to your surprise, the door pops open anyway, as if the latch hadn't caught when it was closed. Curious, but it's your gain. You slip inside and let the door close, making sure that it stays unlatched still.

You look around the room, but it's way too dark. The only light you see is from under the door you came from and what looks like a computer screen in the corner. You run your hands along the wall next to the door looking for the light switch. When you find it, you switch it on. Now when you look around the room, you're not sure what it is you see. There's a desk in the corner, sure, but it seems like you're standing in a workshop. There are some work benches along the wall, some kind of heavy-looking machine next to them, and some kind of exam table like you'd see in a doctor's office, only it has some attached straps and what look like handles coming out of the end. What the hell could Olivia be working on in here?

Either way, you came here with a job to do, so you start poking around looking for Velvet's key. You start at the computer desk. You sift around the articles on top but you don't have any luck. You do find some circuit boards that are plugged into the computer, but they don't seem to have any purpose as far as you can tell. You move over to the various workbenches now. There's nothing small enough to be a key other than some screws and wrenches. You wonder what these large pieces are, though. There are a few narrow straps of sheet metal with a leather sheath attached to one side. There are a few different sizes and shapes that they're cut into and even a few with holes punched into it so that it could work like a colander.

You're starting to give up hope of finding that key today, but you turn towards the exam table all the same, thinking you may as well finish out the rest of the room before turning tail. That's when you hear the door open behind you. Like a deer caught in a car's headlights, you freeze, not wanting Olivia to recognize your face. However, it's not Olivia staring at you now.

"Another corporate spy here to steal my research?" You don't recognize the man's voice. "Good thing I had the motion sensor alarm installed for this year. Now turn around, let me see who I'm dealing with."