The Prisoner - Carlos J. Cortes [66]
“Leave it open,” Henry said, once the chunk of metal was vertical. The men dragged the lid two feet and propped it by the opening. The cover was heavily corroded on the exposed lower side, with lumpy orange excrescences that glistened under the tight beams of the flashlights. Barandus returned the crowbar and stepped down first.
Laurel eyed Barandus’s head as it disappeared below the rim of the utility hole and thought, not for the first time, that she’d barely heard the strange man utter more than single words. What kind of name is Barandus, anyway? One by one they followed.
The shaft, perhaps twelve to fifteen feet deep, connected with a vast rotunda, its center occupied by a derelict turbine. On the other side of the machine, they descended two metal ladders down to another level and a narrow dry tunnel. After rounding a sharp corner, the group spread out in a single line trailing through a network of pipes with obvious signs of maintenance.
“Gas and water mains,” announced Henry from the front. A few tight turns later, Henry stopped at an arched side opening and stepped through. The others followed. The brick passageway opened onto a larger tunnel, but Henry stopped a few steps short. “Lights off.”
One by one the bright LAD flashlights dimmed until there was nothing but thick darkness. Laurel stepped back, a hopeful hand moving toward Raul’s.
“Charlie,” Henry called. “See to motion and light sensors.”
A rustle of steps, silence, then a curious wet twang. After a few seconds, they again heard a strange thwack, followed by a pause. “Done,” a voice echoed, far ahead.
An LAD flashlight flooded the enclosure with painful intensity, then dimmed. “Lights at minimum setting,” Henry said, and marched ahead to a concrete-lined structure. There, they shambled down a seemingly endless six-foot-wide tunnel lined with spaghettilike green cables. “Fiber-optic security wiring; our nation’s secrets beam along these tubes.” Twice more, Henry stopped and ordered the lights doused before directing Charlie to deal with the sensors. After the second time, Raul pointed to a squat box on the top of the arched roof, dripping black gunk.
Laurel peered at the device as they passed under it. “But … how?”
“A catapult,” muttered Susan. “A pellet of tar and rat shit.”
“In the dark?” There was a hint of awe in Raul’s voice.
“Nah.” Susan hawked and spat. “Sensors have LED lights so maintenance crews can see at a glance if they’re working. Easy to see in pitch darkness.”
“But won’t blinding them trigger an alarm?” Raul asked.
“Alarm? These are passive detectors.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Okay, imagine these are switches. If a light detector is blanked, it receives no light and remains switched off, or inactive, if you prefer. Same with a motion detector. They work by bouncing an infrared beam and timing its return. No return, no alarm.”
Laurel smiled. “You were concerned about tunnels with security measures? There’s your answer, and it didn’t need rocket science.” She jabbed Raul with her elbow.
Raul huffed, but in the bounce of a stray beam she could see his teeth gleam. She reached for her Metapad, selected a search engine, and typed >Barandus.
Ahead, the tunnel branched. Henry purposefully marched into the left fork before stopping almost at once before a small steel door, its gray paint flaking and missing in parts where reddish tracks wept.
Once more, Barandus stepped forward, fingered a padlock, and reached inside his coat to produce bolt cutters. After another descent through a round shaft, Laurel cringed at the reek of sewage. Here we go again. They hit a tunnel layered with viscous black goop that sucked at their boots and released a horrific stench; it opened after a hundred yards onto a sizable sewer with a walkway on one side and a whitish stream gurgling along its floor. After a prolonged bend, a large grille with two-inch bars blocked the tunnel. No bolt cutter could deal with those. She glanced at Raul, who shrugged.
“Fear not,” Henry said. He walked slowly along