The creature tore the lower grating away from one of its fixings and drove a shoulder through the gap.
Water burst around it. Its forelimbs found the masonry lip, hooked and pulled. The intake did not become a doorway all at once; pieces failed in sequence, each small release allowing another part of the body to follow. Eli watched the broken rail below their walkway bounce when the creature struck it.
Mira moved toward the timer housing.
Eli caught her arm. “Not now.”
“I’m moving it away from the edge.”
He looked. The cabinet beneath the housing had shifted when the lower structure shook. Her hand was reaching for its secured carrying loop, not the key socket. He released her and hated the time they had spent misunderstanding a motion that should have been simple.
Juno called for everyone to withdraw toward the protected upper post. The post itself no longer lay outside the creature’s likely path. The local workers there began moving their records and necessary controls to the second return. One operator needed to close a service partition before the creature reached the corridor behind them.
He pulled the release lever. It stopped halfway.
