The red-hot jaws of the pneumatic crimping iron snapped shut with a blinding shower of copper sparks.
Dr. Victor Corvo shielded his eyes as the primary four-hundred-and-eighty-volt diesel power cable parted in a flash of electrical fire. The thick black conduit writhed across the submerged floor grating like a severed sea serpent. It spat blue bursts of electricity into the boiling brine before the wall breaker tripped with a loud CLACK.
The overhead halogen floodlights flickered and died.
Amber emergency battery lamps clicked on along the brick pilings, casting long, wavering shadows across the flooded chamber.
The great bronze flywheel of the Titan-84 press groaned, its momentum dying away until the massive gears locked in place. The rhythmic clanking of the machinery ceased entirely, replaced by the ominous, bubbling roar of four-hundred-degree geothermal steam.
“Power cable is severed,” Dr. Corvo said, his velvet baritone remaining level despite the sudden darkness. He adjusted his circular spectacles, observing the scene with clinical detachment.
“The internal electric drive motor is dead. The press is cold.”
“Not completely cold,” Mac Cole growled from the platform railing, his boots squelching in the puddles. “The steam jackets are still cooking at three hundred degrees, but without electric power, the rollers can’t spin in reverse. We can’t de-laminate a single sheet without juice.”
