Thirty-eight seconds remained on the bronze wall-clock.
038 SECONDS REMAINING.
Beneath the floor of Coach #404, the center transmission inspection plate bucked upward with a thunderous metallic screech.
The three-quarter-inch aluminum plate lifted two inches off its mounting frame. Through the gap, three blind, grease-caked forearms surged into the cabin.
Their flesh was gone, replaced by scarred industrial steel. Heavy eighteen-inch Ingersoll-Rand pneumatic impact-wrenches spun at ten thousand revolutions per minute, spewing clouds of pressurized oily exhaust across the floorboards.
“They’re coming through the seam!” Elena Rostova shouted.
She threw her entire body weight across the floorplate right in front of Clara’s incubator. She jammed the hardened titanium wedge of her crowbar into the opening, putting all her strength into holding the plate down.
Beside her, Clara’s respirator hissed in frantic rhythm.
