The Tower: Part Three. Simon Toyne

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СКАЧАТЬ someone had captured a cloud and was storing it here. ‘Helium,’ Shepherd whispered.

      ‘Poisonous?’

      He shook his head. ‘There’s a danger of oxygen starvation if you inhale too much. Other than that it just makes your voice sound funny. It’s the same stuff you get in party balloons. Biggest risk is frostbite and cold burns. It boils at minus four hundred and fifty degrees Fahrenheit and in the pipes it will be liquid, so even colder. The Professor won’t be in there if it’s a liquid spill. Not unless he’s dead. No one can survive long in cold like that.’

      Franklin smiled and stepped behind him. ‘You first.’

      Shepherd looked again through the window at the gas cloud and took a breath. He felt the grip of the gun pressing into his palm as he held it tight in one hand and punched the code into the door with the other. The lock clicked, he pulled it open and stepped inside.

      It was beyond freezing inside the room and the hissing was sinister and loud. Above him the underside of the cloud shifted as the opening door stirred the air, making it look like something was moving inside it.

      He swept the room the same way as before. The vapour in the air reduced visibility but he could make out the lower third of the circular door to the vault in the centre of the room. This was where the hardware was tested and where the leak would most likely be coming from. He moved toward it, keeping low and well below the freezing cloud. It had been cold outside in the freak winter weather but nothing compared to this. His breath was frosting the moment it passed his lips. He glanced up at the thick cloud above his head, formed by the lighter than air helium filling the chamber top down like smoke. There was something wrong about it being there. He dredged his mind for what he knew about the facility. Fragments came back to him, bits of technical information about how it worked – then it hit him.

      Laminar flow.

      He looked back up at the cloud. The room kept itself clean using laminar flow, air blown constantly in parallel streams from top to bottom to sweep particles down to the filters in the floor. But the cloud was not being blown downwards. It just sat there, filling the upper part of the room with freezing vapour. He remembered how it had shifted when he had opened the door. There was no airflow in the room at all. Maybe it had been damaged by the leak. Maybe not.

      He spotted something else that was wrong. In the clinical environment of the clean room, nothing should be out of place, everything had to be stowed away and locked down to prevent dangerous and potentially costly accidents: but there was a laptop lying on the floor over by the vault door. He moved closer to it, squinting through the thick air to get a better look. Shifting hardware in and out of the cryo unit was incredibly precise. Even a scrubbed glove could leave contaminants on a component, so it was all done by computer-controlled robotic lifting arms. The laptop was hardwired into the control panel of one of these. The arm was extended, the gripping claw disappearing into the dense cloud above his head. Shepherd took a step towards it, moving sideways to bring the screen of the laptop into view. There was a number on it, two zeroes followed by a one and an eight. As Shepherd watched, the eight turned to a seven. Then a six. Then a five.

       Countdown.

      He darted forward, grabbing one of the high-pressure hoses used to clean components and pointed it up at the cloud, pulling the trigger at the spot where the top of the arm had to be. The hiss of air joined the shushing sibilance of the room as the cloud parted above him, just long enough for him to see what the arm was holding.

      He dropped the hose and span round, grabbing Franklin by the arm. ‘GET OUT!’

      In his mind he was already sprinting back to the entrance, dragging Franklin with him, but the world had gone into slow motion.

      How long left before the counter hit zero? Not long enough and he dared not turn to look. Say ten seconds at most. Ten seconds to get as far away as possible.

      Something tugged on his arm, holding him back. He looked back and into Franklin’s face, confused and angry. ‘RUN!’ he screamed, pulling him towards the door. No time to explain. No time for anything.

      He counted every step, imagining each one corresponding to the countdown on the laptop.

      … nine …

      … eight …

      Until now, Shepherd had not been fully committed to the idea that his old Professor was in here somewhere, sabotaging key components of Hubble’s successor.

      … seven …

      … six …

      But everything was so deliberate and planned. He made it to the door and yanked it open, heaving Franklin through and charging after him.

      … five …

      … four …

      The roar of the air shower kicked in and for a second he thought he’d got his timings wrong. He carried on running, straight through the second door with Franklin right next to him.

      … three …

      … two …

      So clever.

      Evacuate the building so no one gets hurt … flood the upper part of the chamber with freezing gas … lift a reserve tank of coolant into it with the arm so the gas keeps it cool … until the countdown tells it to drop the tank onto the hard, relatively warm floor …

      … One …

      In front of him, Franklin was halfway through the final door and Shepherd threw himself forward, bundling him out of the scrubbing station and down onto the floor of the entrance lobby.

      Down.

      Stay down. Helium is lighter than air. Helium rises.

      … Zero …

      Shepherd heard a muffled crump then the percussive wave of the explosion ripped through the building, turning the world into torn metal and broken glass.

      And then darkness.

       III

      

      What man is there that hath built a new house, and hath not dedicated it? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in the battle

      Deuteronomy 20:5

       28

      EIGHT MONTHS EARLIER

       Old Town, City of Ruin

       Southeastern Turkey

       Gabriel died shortly after noon on the same day he rode into Ruin.

       A man in a HazMat suit appeared over him, his visor СКАЧАТЬ