The air in the maintenance tunnel was thick with the scent of damp concrete and the metallic tang of coolant fluid leaking from overhead pipes. Zeta stood in the absolute darkness, his pulse a frantic drummer against his ribs. Above him, the library was no longer a place of quiet study; it was a fortress under siege. He could hear the heavy, rhythmic thuds of security robots patrolling the corridors above, their mechanical joints grinding against the floorboards. Each step they took vibrated through the structure, sending tremors down into his cramped refuge.
He checked his pocket once more, his fingers grazing the hard edge of the floppy disk. He had managed to drag the deactivated body of Elias into the sub-level crawlspace before the main archives were fully incinerated. The robot was
