At sixty seconds before midnight, the sound roar of the signal spindle died.
The twelve-foot star-white-gold rotor didn’t slow down. Rather, the surrounding air pressure inside the dome plummeted so sharply that sound ceased to have an air medium through which to travel. The screaming gale collapsed into a dead, choking empty pocket. Lin Tao felt his ears pop painfully. The spit on his tongue began to boil into cold froth.
“Breathe shallowly!” Lin Tao shouted, though his voice came out as a muffled, ghostly whisper. “The air is venting into the upper cloud deep gap!”
Tie Shan gripped Xiao Hu’s canvas shoulder. He pulled the scared youth back from the edge of the open archway. Old Chen pressed his back flat against the marble floor. He anchored his boots between two iron channel flanges.
In the center of the chamber, the spinning star-white-gold spindle ceased to radiate violet light.
Its smooth crystal-clear surface turned a solid, milky white. It flickered with billions of tiny Precursor characters that cascaded from the top rim to the bottom pipe rim in upright columns. The master processing core in the high sky clouds was ingesting the broadcast payload.
Ten seconds.
Nine.
