Chapter 68 - The Legacy of Ash
The phosphorus flare detonated with a blinding, incandescent white flash that illuminated every corner of the flooded launch bay with the heat of a miniature sun.
Eleanor Vance’s jaw was obliterated by the blast. The two-thousand-degree chemical fire ignited the volatile biological compounds running through her veins, turning her into a screaming, thrashing pillar of white-hot flame. The concussive blast blew Miller backward into the open belly of the escape pod, tumbling over my legs.
Eleanor staggered backward, shrieking as the chemical inferno consumed her flesh, her augmented tissue burning with a horrific, green-tinted flame. She flailed blindly, her burning hands catching the exterior hydraulic release lever of the main launch tube.
"The pod!" Miller wheezed, blood pouring from his throat as he dragged himself upright. "She tripped the early ignition!"
The heavy steel blast hatch of the escape pod slammed shut automatically, severing the outside world in an instant. Through the thick, four-inch quartz viewport on the pod's door, I watched Eleanor Vance fall to her knees as the floor beneath her gave way entirely.
The underwater citadel of Fort Vance fractured down the middle. Millions of tons of pressurized black ocean water slammed into the launch bay, extinguishing the flames and tearing Eleanor’s burning skeleton into the crushing abyss of the Atlantic trench.
Then, the solid-fuel booster beneath our capsule ignited.
A wall of pure G-force smashed me back into the padded seat. The sound was unimaginable—a deafening, roaring thunder as the single-burn rocket tore through the water, propelling the spherical pod upward through hundreds of feet of pressurized ocean.
The cabin rattled violently, rivets popping from the ceiling like bullets, the metal hull groaning as if it would collapse under the shearing force of the ascent. Leo screamed, the pressure popping our ears, while Miller clung to the harness beside me, coughing blood onto the floorboards.
For thirty seconds, there was only darkness, violence, and the terrifying acceleration of three human beings trapped inside an iron cannonball.
May you like
And then, with an explosive breach that sent water spraying fifty feet into the air, the capsule burst through the surface of the North Atlantic.
The pod rocked violently as it hit the open ocean, bobbing amid twelve-foot swells under a freezing, slate-gray dawn.
