Chapter 13
Sparks rained down like fireworks from the shattered server ports as the main fiber-optic cables whipped violently through the air, hissing with discharged electricity. The low, comforting hum of the subterranean bunker instantly died, replaced by a high-pitched, screeching alarm klaxon that flashed an angry crimson warning light across the circular chamber.
Dr. Vance scrambled backward across the concrete, her pristine white lab coat tearing slightly on a jagged piece of metal. She dropped her remote control as the floor beneath them began to shudder violently, vibrating with the force of an oncoming earthquake.
"You fools!" Dr. Vance yelled over the deafening wail of the alarm klaxon, her calm veneer completely shattered into pure panic. "By severing the primary link, you haven't freed yourselves—you've triggered the structural purge! The entire underground facility is set to seal permanently to contain a biological hazard breach!"
"Don't listen to her," Grandpa Arthur shouted, scooping little Toby back up into his arms. "She's just trying to buy time for her security team to lock us down. Leo, help the other kid up. We need to find the emergency drainage shaft!"
The alternate-cycle Leo struggled to his feet, leaning heavily against the side of the empty glass containment pod for support. His eyes were wide with a frantic, desperate lucidity. "There... there's an old maintenance tunnel behind the server racks," he gasped, pointing a shaking finger toward the dark recess of the room where the massive computer banks were beginning to smoke and spark. "It leads straight out to the spillway beneath the lake dam. It's our only way out before the water floods the lower level."
"Move! Go, go, go!" Sarah urged, pushing Toby and Grandma Helen ahead of them as the overhead concrete ceiling began to fracture, dropping small pebbles and dust onto their heads.
The entire bunker was tilting rapidly at a fifteen-degree angle toward the rear wall, the exact same trajectory they had experienced upstairs in the cabin. The heavy archive boxes on their automated tracks began to break free of their electronic locks, sliding across the floor in a massive avalanche of brown cardboard and falling shelving units that crashed loudly behind them.
Leo grabbed his alternate self by the arm, supporting his weight as they stumbled blindly into the dark recess behind the smoking server racks. A narrow, rusted iron ladder bolted directly into the damp concrete wall led straight upward into vertical darkness, with a faint smell of fresh lake air drifting down from above.
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"Up! Climb!" Leo shouted, boosting little Toby onto the first rung of the ladder as Grandpa Arthur scrambled up right behind him to catch the boy.
As Sarah reached for the lowest rung of the ladder, a heavy steel security door slammed shut at the far end of the chamber with a thunderous boom, cutting off Dr. Vance's frantic screams as millions of gallons of lake water began to rush into the lower level from the ruptured intake valves above.
