Soren Almaya awoke to the bleating of his home security system. Quickly throwing on his glasses, he hastily punched in a combination to enter his environmentally sealed and fireproof control center. Taking a seat in the main console, he gasped.
The bright red letters on the screen told him all he needed to know.
Threat: Fire
Location: Home workshop
Swearing profusely, he immediately ordered the CO2 fire suppression system to activate. The next words caused his heart to sink:
CO2 FIRE SUPPRESSION SYSTEM IS OFFLINE
To make matters worse, another warning came up:
WARNING! POSSIBLE INTRUDERS APPROACHING HOUSEHOLD!
"Oh no," Soren muttered. Thinking quickly, he unlocked his gun safe and grabbed his Remington 870 shotgun. Despite the fact that compact laser weapons and magnetic accelerators existed and were commonplace, standard firearms were still very popular -- despite modern armor rendering them mostly obsolete. This was mainly due to their relatively low cost, low maintenance and sheer reliability.
He switched on the external cameras and saw a group of figures running away from his house. He also saw red and blue lights in the distance heading to his house.
He'd wait until they arrived before he got out of the safe room.