The seabed surrounding Airlock Gate Alpha-7 was a forest of stone-hard hot-water chimneys and rusted load-bearing pylons. The massive circular hatch, thirty meters in width, was set deep into the dark rock foundation of the Bermuda Atoll’s outer ring. Its face was embossed with the snake-like world-serpent seal of Project Genesis, overgrown with thick mats of sulfur-eating tube worms and stone crusts that had piled up over decades of deep-sea solitude. Black water swirled around the rim of the hatch. It was driven by the rhythmic exhaust of underground drainage pumps.
Arthur Vance knelt on the stone apron before the gate, inspecting the locking gearwork through his type-list magnifying glass. Beside him, Titus stood as an unmoving bulwark, his heavy breathing releasing steady columns of bubbles that drifted upward toward the black surface five miles above. The giant tortoise kept his limbs anchored deep in the seabed silt. His sense nerves watched the ground-shaking pulses traveling through the fiery rock.
“The high-pressure lines are high-pressure with heavy oil,” Arthur observed, tracing his fingers along the rim of the iron-hard metal casing. “The internal seals are active. That means the air pressure inside this sector is kept at standard one-air baseline. It’s a fully isolated biome.”
