Part I – The Ambush
The group held position.
Weapons up.
Eyes scanning every angle.
Then—
Movement.
Titus saw it first.
High above.
Far corners.
Scaffolding.
Shapes shifting where nothing had been seconds ago.
“Contact—!”
He didn’t finish.
Gunfire erupted.
Flashes lit the upper structures as rounds tore through the space.
The team reacted instantly.
They broke formation—not in panic, but in survival—spreading out just enough to avoid becoming a single target.
“Cover!”
They returned fire, shots snapping upward toward the scaffolding.
Metal sparked.
Echoes cracked through the sector.
One guard dropped.
Hit before he could even reposition.
“Down!” someone shouted.
More fire came from a second angle.
Then a third.
They weren’t just above.
They were positioned.
Titus moved behind partial cover, scanning between bursts.
There—
Movement again.
Clearer now.
Prisoner uniforms.
But not unarmed.
Not desperate.
Armed.
Rifles.
Standard guard issue.
Carlos fired a controlled burst, forcing one of them back.
“What the hell—?!” he snapped. “Why aren’t their restraint bands working?!”
No answer.
Another guard went down.
Then another.
The return fire wasn’t wild.
It was measured.
Controlled.
“Interference?” Carlos added, more to himself now. “Or did someone shut them off—?”
A figure above exposed too much.
Titus took the shot.
One prisoner dropped from the scaffolding, hitting the floor hard.
One.
Only one.
And still—
The pressure didn’t ease.
More movement.
More angles.
They were outnumbered.
Or at least—
Outpositioned.
Titus adjusted his stance, firing again, forcing another retreat.
His mind was already moving ahead of the fight.
This wasn’t random.
This was coordinated.
Titus had seen improvised ambushes before. Desperate ones. People who grabbed whatever angle they could find and hoped it was enough.
This wasn’t that.
The positions were spread too evenly. The angles covered too much ground. Someone had walked this sector before the Code Red and decided where to be.
That meant time.
That meant planning.
That meant someone had known this was coming before any alarm sounded.
And they had walked straight into it.
Titus didn’t say it out loud.
Didn’t need to.
But the realization settled in fast.
They weren’t clearing the sector anymore.
They were in it.
And they were losing control.
Part II – Stalemate
The gunfire slowed.
Not stopped—
Slowed.
Both sides had taken cover.
Neither pushing.
Neither retreating.
The echoes of the last shots faded into something tighter.
More controlled.
Titus stayed low behind a fractured support column, scanning for movement between bursts of silence.
Nothing clear.
Just shadows shifting where they shouldn’t.
They were pinned.
Carlos checked his side quickly.
“Status?”
“Three left,” one of the guards answered.
That was all.
Three guards.
The technician.
Carlos.
Titus.
That was it.
The technician was already checking his equipment, hands moving fast but careful.
“…Ammo?” Carlos asked.
“Low,” one of the guards replied.
Too low.
Carlos exhaled slowly.
“We’re not outlasting this.”
No one argued.
Another burst of fire came from above.
Closer this time.
More precise.
They were tightening the distance.
“We fall back,” one of the guards said quickly. “We go back the way we came—use the side corridors, break line of sight.”
Titus shook his head immediately.
“No.”
“That’s our only shot!”
“It’s a kill zone,” Titus snapped back. “We move now, we’re exposed the whole way.”
Silence hit for half a second.
Not agreement.
Not resolution.
Just tension.
Another shot cracked overhead, forcing them lower.
“They’re closing in,” the technician said under his breath.
He wasn’t guessing.
Titus could feel it too.
The spacing between shots.
The angles.
They weren’t just holding.
They were advancing.
Titus measured the gaps between shots.
Longer bursts now, shorter pauses. They weren’t conserving anymore — they were confident. You burned ammunition freely when you believed the fight was already won.
He looked at what was left of the team.
Three guards. The technician. Carlos.
Six people who had walked into a sector they weren’t authorized for, chasing a problem they hadn’t been equipped to handle, and were now pinned down by prisoners who moved like they’d been trained.
He filed that thought away.
Later.
If there was a later.
Carlos leaned closer, voice tight.
“So what’s the play, then?”
Titus didn’t answer immediately.
He was watching.
Listening.
Measuring.
The pressure was building.
Not just from the gunfire—
But from the time they didn’t have.
Another step.
Somewhere above.
Closer than before.
They were running out of options.
And fast.
Part III – The Flush
Gunfire intensified.
Closer now.
More aggressive.
The technician ducked behind cover, then looked up suddenly.
“There’s another option,” he said.
Titus didn’t look at him.
“Make it fast.”
“This sector—lower priority containment—it has a flood protocol. Emergency measure.”
Carlos snapped back,
“You mean drown everything in here?”
The technician nodded once.
“It doesn’t require full system override. It’s semi-automatic.”
Carlos glanced around.
“Nothing’s working properly right now. You said that yourself.”
The technician pointed upward.
Toward the ceiling.
Toward the structural shafts running above them.
“Those sensors are part of the trigger system. If they detect critical damage, it forces a manual request to the system.”
Titus followed his gaze.
“You’re saying we shoot them.”
“Yes.”
A burst of gunfire struck close, forcing them lower.
“It’s designed to prevent escape,” the technician added. “Last resort containment.”
Carlos looked back at Titus.
“And how do
we
not get contained with them?”
A pause.
“We ride it,” the technician said. “Flow current through the north wing. There’s an override point there.”
Carlos stared at him.
“That’s not a plan. That’s a gamble.”
Another shot cracked past them.
Closer than before.
“They’re closing,” one of the guards said.
Titus looked between them.
At the ceiling.
At the angles the prisoners were advancing from.
At what was left of his team.
There weren’t enough options left to choose from.
He made the call.
“Do it.”
No hesitation after that.
The guards shifted position and opened fire upward.
Rounds tore into the ceiling sensors.
Metal sparked.
Fragments fell.
For a moment—
Nothing happened.
Then—
A deep mechanical shift echoed through the structure.
Panels along the walls snapped open.
Narrow slits at first—
Then wider.
And the water came.
High-pressure seawater burst into the sector from every direction.
“Brace!”
The impact hit like a wall.
The force ripped through the space, tearing bodies from cover, dragging everything with it.
Gunfire broke apart instantly.
Prisoners scattered.
Some ran.
Some kept firing blindly—
Until the water took them.
Titus felt the pull immediately.
His footing vanished.
The current grabbed him hard, dragging him into the surge.
“Stabilize!” someone shouted through comms.
Suit systems activated.
Emergency flotation.
Limited oxygen.
The world became motion and pressure.
They were swept through the corridor—
Fast.
Too fast to control.
Walls blurred past.
Turns came without warning.
Titus caught a glimpse of Carlos ahead—then lost him again in the surge.
Then—
A turn.
Sharper.
The current shifted direction.
North wing.
The flow weakened slightly.
Just enough.
Titus reached out—
Caught hold of a support pole.
The impact jolted through his arm, but he held.
Others managed the same.
Carlos.
Two guards.
The technician.
Not all of them.
The water continued rushing past, dragging the rest into the system beyond.
Titus didn’t watch them go.
There was nothing to do for them and he knew it and looking wouldn’t change it. He kept his grip on the support pole and focused on the water level, on the current’s direction, on the panel the technician was already dragging himself toward.
The math was simple and brutal.
They’d gone in with more. They were coming out with less.
That was the job now.
Getting the rest of them through.
No one spoke.
There wasn’t time.
The technician pulled himself toward a control panel mounted above the waterline.
Hands shaking, he forced it open.
By some miracle—
It responded.
He slammed the override.
The gates behind them sealed.
The flow cut off.
Silence returned—
Broken only by the sound of water draining.
They stayed where they were for a moment.
Catching breath.
Regaining control.
Then—
A sound.
Static.
Titus’ comm flickered back to life.
Weak.
Distorted.
But active.
“…—copy… anyone receiving—”
They froze.
The signal stabilized slightly.
“…this is Command… respond—”
Carlos looked at Titus.
Titus raised his comm slowly.
A new voice came through.
Clearer than the rest.
The Warden.
And for the first time since this began—
Someone was finally answering back.