Salvation

As soon as it was inside the cylindrical metal cave, the inner door slid shut and sealed with a fast succession of metallic clunks. The threader extended ten legs, which engaged with loading pins on the chamber floor.

“In position,” Henry said. He looked up, checking the outer door above the threader. A ring of amber caution lights was flashing around the heavy-duty hydraulic actuators.

“Callum’s almost ready,” Fitz told him. “Stand by.”

Henry drifted over to the airlock at the side of the big egress door he’d just come through and opened it in readiness. Once everything was in place, he was going to have to leave the ventchamber fast. His mInet was throwing up several data columns on the space suit visor, showing him the threader status.

He’d been listening to his friends back in Gylgen for several minutes before Callum said: “Henry, we’re ready. Start threading.”

Henry gave the instruction to his mInet. The smallest of the threader’s three mechanisms started up. At its center was a paired portal, like a particularly thick dark-gray paving slab, twenty-five centimeters wide and one point five meters long.

“Initiating spatial entanglement on unit alpha,” Fitz said, as the data on his displays showed him the system’s progress. “Okay…we have zero gap. Power stable to both sides. Uncoupling now.”

The actuators inside the threader mechanism split the slab apart into identical rectangles whose quantum spatial entanglement transformed them into linked doors. No matter how great the physical distance between the twinned segments, the entanglement provided an open gap that was no length at all: the portal.

Henry grinned in delight as the threader supports holding the portal pair lifted the two identical rectangles away from each other. Actuators moved with the fluidity of metal muscles, sliding one of the twins—short edge first—through the waiting thirty-centimeter portal, its edges just clearing to emerge directly into the Gylgen facility.

“Got it,” Callum said.

In front of Henry, the threader mechanism rotated the remaining portal slab by ninety degrees, so its longer opening was ready to receive the shorter side of the next stage.

“Initiating spatial entanglement on unit beta,” Fritz said.

Unit two was another rectangular portal, larger this time, one and a half meters by six and a half. The support arms pulled its twin segments apart and immediately slipped the short end of the upper segment into the waiting unit alpha portal, with a clearance of less than a centimeter. Inside the threader, the remaining unit beta portal was rotated to present its wider side to unit gamma, the six-meter portal.

“Here we go,” Henry muttered. “Unit gamma ready for you, chief.”

—

Callum caught the unit alpha slab as it threaded through from Haumea and placed it on the floor in the section he’d marked out. Unit beta quickly emerged out of it, and the legs on its back deployed, lifting it up, and flipping the open side ninety degrees so it finished up horizontal. He checked it was aligned with the rails bridging the gulf under the tank. Apollo adjusted its height until Callum was satisfied. Alana fixed its legs to the walkway’s grid.

“Let’s have it,” he told Henry.

The six-meter portal came through, sliding out across the rails. Callum glanced into the opening, seeing the ventchamber’s outer door dead ahead. He watched the data column showing him the state of the rails and their bonding points. Everything was well inside tolerance. “Looks good from here. Let’s go.”

Along with Moshi, Alana, and Colin, he clambered back up the metal stairs to the top of the lattice. Moshi had prepared straps and harnesses for all of them, fastened to the thickest girders. Callum eyed the top of the tank as he clipped himself in.

“Everyone secure?”

“Good to go, chief.”

“Raina, I need you to keep watch on the building sensors.”

“I’m on it, chief.”

“Henry, open the ventchamber door,” Callum said. “Moshi, get ready.”

It began with a faint hissing sound. A breeze started up, plucking at the thick fabric of his hazmat suit. The hissing deepened, quickening his heartbeat. Peripheral vision showed things moving on the walkways that crisscrossed the lattice: old abandoned plastic cups, paper, scraps of wiring, plastic slivers, all wiggling and rolling along.

“Door at fifty percent,” Henry reported.

The hissing had become a storm-roar now. Its force was buffeting him with a lot more force that he’d anticipated. Instinct made him check the harness clasps. Colin and Alana were already on their knees, gripping the walkway rail for extra security.

“Seventy-five percent,” Henry said.

Callum could hear the whole building protesting now. Metal was creaking overhead. When he glanced up, he could see the lights swinging wildly. Above them, the ceiling panels were buckling, starting to peel from the frame.

“Hundred percent!”