Gathering Ashes (The Wonderland Cycle Book 3) by Michael Shean

Author:Michael Shean [Shean, Michael]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 9781620073773
Publisher: Curiosity Quills Press
Published: 2016-11-17T00:00:00+00:00

oon after Kim finished his work, Walken led the climb up the freight chute. Walken had no problem getting through its access shutter, after disabling the sensors that would sense its opening, and by the time the bomb went off, they had climbed several levels. The way Kim explained it, when they paused to make sure no fireball rushed up and turned the chute into an oven, the cylinders he had connected did not contain medical nanocolloid, but a chemical that would transform into a considerable amount of explosive once mixed. Sort of a nanomachine-fueled binary explosive, a particularly fiery variety. Everything below them not made of ultra strong materials or blast proof nanopour would be slagged. That meant basically everything but the superstructure. His clone would be a genetically-identical greasy spot, but one that would confirm his “death.”

They had heard other explosions going off on the level, secondaries kicked off by the blast and the heat that spread through their section of the lab. Walken thought he had just been complicit in the deaths of any number of soldiers and scientists, but Kim assured him that the emergency muster points were in a different part of the level. They would be safe, the data and materials that Kim had been working on would be obliterated, and it would be some time before they could get in to determine just what the hell had happened. All in all, it sounded extremely effective, assuming it worked. They really had no other choice.

The two men made their way up to the processing room, where a fire had broken out and been snuffed by suppression foam that filled one corner like a vast, pearlescent tumor. Past that and into the loading chute, they finally reached the loading room.

“Wait,” Kim said as they neared the end. “The doors are shuttered.”

“I see that.” Walken nodded. It didn’t look like the flimsy steel cover from before, but a slab of heavy alloy an inch or so thick, the kind used to contain blasts. Beyond the barrier, alarms wailed, and something else, the rumble of weight and metal.

“That sounds bad,” Kim muttered. “They must have activated additional security.”

“Additional security,” Walken repeated. “In what form?”

“Possibly the tank suits. They may be evacuating the upper levels.”

“But what about the alarm?” Walken looked around the mouth of the chute, and found a lever marked ‘GATE RELEASE’ along the shutter’s frame. “Wouldn’t they keep people locked down due to protocol?”

Kim shrugged. “Not if they don’t detect radiation in the upper levels. If the labs were affected first, why wouldn’t they try and get people out from elsewhere?”

Walken nodded.” All right. Let me see if I can get this gate up without alerting whoever’s on the other side. Are you ready to play along?”

He got a black squint from Kim in reply. Walken activated the camo system and became part of the backdrop once more. He pulled the release with one hand, while pressing the other against the shutter to slow any upward motion.

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