Unexpectedly, nothing happened. The people who were crotched on the floor looked at each other in confusion.
The man on the other side was just as confused. There was another beep and a few more hit nothing happened.
The holo-screen flickered slightly as the man's façade dropped
"WHAT DID YOU DO?"
What greeted him was Shen Jin's calm face. He felt utterly humiliated and the screen went dark.
For a long moment, no one spoke.
Smoke from the emergency vents curled in pale ribbons through the air then someone laughed. A sharp, nervous sound that cracked in the silence.
"We… we're still alive," one of the technicians whispered.
A chorus of exhalations followed. Relief bled into disbelief.
Another voice broke through, hoarse and trembling. "The bombs didn't go off… he was bluffing after all."
But then, slowly, heads began to turn toward Shen Jin.
