Chapter Twenty-Five Thirty Hours
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Thirty Hours
The reservoir was not safe.
Eden learned this at sunrise from a gauge that had climbed six pounds overnight.
She checked it twice.
Then woke Rhett.
He slept sitting against a truck tire because Mina had banned him from lifting anything heavier than a cup and he had responded by finding the least comfortable place in camp.
"Pressure's rising."
His eyes opened immediately.
"How fast?"
"Too fast."
He stood, one hand going automatically to his stitched side.
Eden led him into the spill tower.
The ruptured service pipe had been capped, but Sabra's drilling rig had pierced an old equalization line. With the eastern bypass closed and the west spill gate damaged, Reservoir Three had become a sealed bottle warming under pressure.
Rhett stared at the gauges.
"How long?"
"Before failure?"
"Yes."
Eden calculated.
She hated calculations with lives attached.
"Thirty hours. Maybe less."
He did not complain about maybe.
"What fails?"
"Could be the drilled line. Could be the spill gate. Could be a rock seam inside the storage cavern."
"Best case?"
"We lose water into the deep basin."
"Worst?"
"The gorge wall fractures."
He looked toward camp.
Two convoys sat under it.
"That sounds bad."
"Technical term."
"Fix?"
Eden unrolled the control schematic they had hidden at Saint Mercy.
There was one.
Of course there was one.
Pre-Burn engineers had expected outlet failure.
A western relief gate at Blue Vault could lower the head pressure and restore balanced flow.
The catch was forty-three miles of bad country.
Rhett read her face.
"How far?"
"Forty-three."
"Time?"
"With mixed vehicles? Ten hours if the road exists."
"And Tollhouse?"
"Sabra's people use a causeway south of Mirror Salt. If anyone got her emergency burst before we jammed the radio, they'll come."
Rhett rubbed his jaw.
"Sabra."
Still under guard.
Still calm.
Eden disliked that more each hour.
They brought Mina and Esme to the control tower.
No ceremony.
No council table.
A broken map panel, four tired people, and pressure rising under their boots.
Eden explained.
Esme swore.
Mina asked, "Can we leave the reservoir and get everyone clear?"
"Yes."
"Then why not?"
"Because the pressure still blows eventually. We lose the water."
Mina looked at the people outside.
"We have full containers now."
"For days. Not seasons."
Esme folded her arms.
"We're not a settlement."
"No."
Eden traced the Asterline branches.
"But every well between Mercy and the High Basin is failing. If this reservoir goes, caravans go back to Tollhouse wells or leave the region."
Rhett watched both women.
"Blue Vault."
Mina's mouth tightened.
"You're not cleared to drive."
"I wasn't planning to."
Everyone looked at Eden.
She blinked.
Rhett held out the keys to the lead rig.
Not the stolen Tollhouse truck.
Dustline's lead rig.
The vehicle Lyle had once driven, rebuilt twice, still carrying a small red handprint from a child who was now sixteen.
Eden stared at the keys.
"You're serious."
"You're the route surveyor."
"Mina?"
The medic smiled thinly.
"Please. I would pay to watch him sit passenger."
Rhett looked betrayed.
Esme said, "Glass Road takes rear."
Mina's smile vanished.
"Why rear?"
"Because half your people shoot badly."
"And half yours shoot early."
"Excellent. Rear is where ambush arrives."
Rhett put a hand over his face.
Eden took the keys.
"Argue while moving."
That worked.
Within forty minutes, the camp folded into vehicles.
Sabra watched from beside the captured pump truck, wrists bound in front.
When Eden passed, she said, "Blue Vault?"
Eden kept walking.
Sabra smiled.
"Of course."
Eden stopped.
Rhett stopped with her.
Sabra leaned against the truck.
"You're using Caro's west line. Bad choice."
"Why?"
"Because the Forty sank last spring."
Eden's pulse changed.
Sunken Forty.
A four-mile section of old expressway laid over salt mud.
Caro's film showed it as stable.
"How much?"
Sabra smiled wider.
"Enough."
Rhett stepped closer.
"You want to live through the drive, be useful."
Sabra's eyes moved to him.
"You think I'm afraid to die?"
"No."
Rhett's voice remained flat.
"I think you hate being irrelevant."
For the first time, Sabra's calm broke.
Tiny.
Real.
Eden almost admired the accuracy.
Sabra looked at her.
"The south causeway is intact. Tollhouse uses it."
"Which is why Tollhouse will be on it."
"Yes."
"Then we take the Forty."
Sabra laughed.
"You really did learn nothing from your maps."
Eden looked at her.
"No. I learned maps age."
She climbed into the lead rig.
Rhett took the passenger seat.
Mina's convoy rolled behind.
Glass Road followed.
Two old enemies, one road.
No agreement about anything beyond the gauge under Black Mesa.
Sometimes that was enough to move.