text: > look around
  Science Tower (Riff Conner)
  This round, tall room must be a tower. I don't know if you were given a description of the manor from the outside, or if it mentioned a tower if you were, but if you were and it did, this is probably that tower. At a guess it's around fifty feet tall, although it's very shadowy up at the top so it's difficult to estimate it accurately.
  
  It appears to be some kind of science lab, although you would expect a science lab to have more stuff in it; perhaps all the stuff that was easily moveable has already been taken away. There's a large table in the center of the room, and everything else is up against the walls: a complex-looking control console, a large chalkboard, a metal cabinet, an old iron ashtray stand, and a wooden barstool with a hamster cage on top of it.
  
  The whole place has a thick smell of science throughout it (assuming science smells like chalk dust, hamster, cigarettes, and electricity), and rain is pounding at the windows. There are exits to the east and southwest.
  
  On the chalkboard is a yellow sticky-note.
  
  Thunder booms loudly outside, rattling the windows.
  
  > eat the single peanut
  someone else.
  
  > examine the ashtray stand
  An old-fashioned and incredibly sturdy wrought-iron ashtray stand, about two and a half feet tall. The actual ashtray is missing; presumably someone took it away to empty it. Judging from the smell in here this required at least two trained professionals with hazmat suits.
  
  > examine the barstool
  It's an old wooden barstool, and is not important except for having a hamster cage on top of it.
  
  A bright flash of lightning illuminates the windows, as presaged by the thunder a moment ago.
  
  > examine Cage
  A largish wire hamster cage is perched on an old barstool. The traditional wheel has been replaced with a tiny chalkboard, and a nameplate on the corner of the cage reads "Dr. Peanut".
  
  There's a little white hamster lying motionless next to the chalkboard. Oh no... poor Dr. Peanut. ;_;
  
  > look at the dr peanut
  Poor little guy. It looks like he got so caught up in his work that he starved to death. ...Probably the fact that nobody's been around to feed him didn't help.
  
  > examine the tiny chalkboard
  This appears to be a little hamster-sized duplicate of the other chalkboard. In fact, it even has the same equation written on it -- except instead of the question marks after the equals sign, it has a couple more symbols and then a trailing-off line that must be where Dr. Peanut... when he... awwww ;_;
  
  > look at the console
  This big metal console is covered with blinking lights and glowing vacuum tubes (do vacuum tubes glow? Well these ones do anyway) and two of those big zappy Jacob's Ladder things, and even a lava lamp for some reason. The front panel has a huge array of dials and switches and gauges, none of which are labelled in a way that makes sense to you. That is, apart from three large central buttons: a blue one, a green one, and a yellow one, labelled "SKYLIGHT", "LIFT", and "ANTENNA", respectively.
  
  > examine the skylight
  (the skylight)
  Far above you, if you squint, you can make out the tower skylight. It's covered with a heavy wooden shutter. Seems like there are some bats flapping around up there too, maybe? It's hard to tell, it's real shadowy up there.
  
  > examine the pointer
  It's a telescoping lecturer pointing thingy. I don't know if those have a real name. It's currently retracted, but you could EXTEND it.
  
  > extend it
  You extend the pointer thingy to its full four-foot length. Very satisfying.
  
  > look at the table
  The large table in the middle of the room appears to be some kind of operating table, or at least that's what you surmise from all the strange equipment connected to it. Thick electrical cables run all around the perimeter of the surface, which is metal engraved with complex patterns of lines and symbols reminiscent of an old nautical chart. Rather than having legs, the table rests on a rectangular central pillar made of steel planks and machinery. All in all, it seems pretty important.
  I beg your pardon?
  
  > enter the table
  You clamber up onto the operating table, careful not to accidentally kick any of the important-looking gizmos attached to it.
  
  Science Tower (Riff Conner) (on the operating table)
  This round, tall room must be a tower. I don't know if you were given a description of the manor from the outside, or if it mentioned a tower if you were, but if you were and it did, this is probably that tower. At a guess it's around fifty feet tall, although it's very shadowy up at the top so it's difficult to estimate it accurately.
  
  It appears to be some kind of science lab, although you would expect a science lab to have more stuff in it; perhaps all the stuff that was easily moveable has already been taken away. There's a large table in the center of the room, and everything else is up against the walls: a complex-looking control console, a large chalkboard, a metal cabinet, an old iron ashtray stand, and a wooden barstool with a hamster cage on top of it.
  
  The whole place has a thick smell of science throughout it (assuming science smells like chalk dust, hamster, cigarettes, and electricity), and rain is pounding at the windows. There are exits to the east and southwest.
  
  On the chalkboard is a yellow sticky-note.
  
  > get the ashtray stand
  You manage to wrestle the ashtray stand up onto the table without dislocating your arms, somehow. Then you stand it up so it won't roll off.
  
  Thunder booms loudly outside, rattling the windows.
  
  > get the egg
  Taken.
  
  A bright flash of lightning illuminates the windows, as presaged by the thunder a moment ago.
  
  > Open latch
  You pull on the wooden latch but it's so rotted that it just disintegrates. The effect is the same regardless: the skylight is now unlocked. Presumably.
  
  > look at the nest
  Just like a bird next except upside down and for bats.
  
  With a loud hiss of pneumatics, the operating table slowly lowers itself to the ground.
  Science Tower (Riff Conner) (on the operating table)
  This round, tall room must be a tower. I don't know if you were given a description of the manor from the outside, or if it mentioned a tower if you were, but if you were and it did, this is probably that tower. At a guess it's around fifty feet tall, although it's very shadowy up at the top so it's difficult to estimate it accurately.
  
  It appears to be some kind of science lab, although you would expect a science lab to have more stuff in it; perhaps all the stuff that was easily moveable has already been taken away. There's a large table in the center of the room, and everything else is up against the walls: a complex-looking control console, a large chalkboard, a metal cabinet, an old iron ashtray stand (on the table), and a wooden barstool with a hamster cage on top of it.
  
  The whole place has a thick smell of science throughout it (assuming science smells like chalk dust, hamster, cigarettes, and electricity), and rain is pounding at the windows. There are exits to the east and southwest.
  
  On the chalkboard is a yellow sticky-note.
  
  > stand
  You get off the operating table.
  
  Science Tower (Riff Conner)
  This round, tall room must be a tower. I don't know if you were given a description of the manor from the outside, or if it mentioned a tower if you were, but if you were and it did, this is probably that tower. At a guess it's around fifty feet tall, although it's very shadowy up at the top so it's difficult to estimate it accurately.
  
  It appears to be some kind of science lab, although you would expect a science lab to have more stuff in it; perhaps all the stuff that was easily moveable has already been taken away. There's a large table in the center of the room, and everything else is up against the walls: a complex-looking control console, a large chalkboard, a metal cabinet, an old iron ashtray stand (on the table), and a wooden barstool with a hamster cage on top of it.
  
  The whole place has a thick smell of science throughout it (assuming science smells like chalk dust, hamster, cigarettes, and electricity), and rain is pounding at the windows. There are exits to the east and southwest.
  
  On the chalkboard is a yellow sticky-note.
  
  > get stand
  After a struggle, you manage to get the ashtray stand off the table and onto the floor, without the intervening step of crushing your toes.
  
  > open Cage
  You open the hamster cage.
  
  > Peanut
  Taken.
  
  Poor little guy.
  
  > put him on the table
  You carefully lay the little dead hamster in the middle of the strange operating table.
  
  Thunder booms loudly outside, rattling the windows.