Fault by Lumen Reese

Author:Lumen Reese
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: lgbt, time travel, gay romance, cozy, age difference, scifi horror, underwater, sea monster, scifi fantasy, aquatic horror
Publisher: Lumen Reese

*

It happens suddenly.

Ceely has brought lunch of sandwiches and apples up on a cart, so that the men may eat while still minding their stations. She goes and a few more hours of focus and drilling ensue. I walk the perimeter of the flight rig, eyes always moving between my screen and my crew, with Jacob not far behind me. The whirring of the drilling and filtration systems, the almost soundless vibration of the flight rig’s engine under my heels all become synonymous with calm to me. It’s when the whirring turns to a grinding sound, then stops that I realize how loud it has been. The silence becomes deafening.

With dozens of eyes on me, the men all looking for answers, I swipe between different applications on my device. Pressure has dropped in the hose leading from the flight rig to the Baton Rouge. One gauge on a pipe in the filtration system of the rig is past acceptable ranges, in the yellow, climbing toward red. It’s some kind of clog.

I grab my radio. “Halt all systems! Go, Jacob,” I order, and he’s moving before I’ve finished saying his name, feet clapping the metal of the catwalk, then he slows on the rope bridge, losing his perch and almost plummeting down between two boards. He makes it to the other side, then disappears in a flash below the deck.

It takes a few seconds for the pilot to radio back to me. “I’m halting all systems. Looks like we’ve got some sort of blockage.”

“Heard,” I answer, still favoring my first legit job as a line cook. “I have my engineer on her way up. I’ll need Aaron and his keys.”

Aaron patches in. “On my way.”

They come, definitely not within the two minutes I had allotted them. Jacob moves quickly, nervously looking to me, then back to Ceely -who moves more calmly behind him- then back to me. She is careful on the rope bridge. I meet her at the end.

“Time to show me what you can do.” I pull up schematics of the machinery where the troubled gauge is.

“Thought I already did,” she breezes, and takes the device out of my hands.

“Some kind of blockage, we’re climbing toward the red.”

“I see that.” She moves around the rig, taking the lead. “Can you give me access to these pipes?”

“Aaron is on the way.”

“Should evacuate everyone from the rig.”

I switch my radio to the intercom function. “Crew of the Baton Rouge, return to the ship. Wait on deck for further instructions.” Passing by the place where the ladder leads down to the lower platform beside the drill, I offer Ralph a hand and help to pull him up.

“Sure there’s nothing I can do to help, Captain?”

“Just get clear.” I run to catch Ceely, then realize Jacob is still following us. “You too, evacuate.”

“I should stay…”

“That’s an order.”

He goes. Aaron is coming around the rig from the other side. He searches a large key ring until he finds the one which opens the panel Ceely needs.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.