Chapter 4

"Becky dearest, time to wake up."

Rebecca opened her eyes from Robert's lap and gazed up into his eyes. "I dozed off. I was having the most delightful of dreams. We had just married, and you were petting my breasts on our wedding night... Anything new?"

Robert bent down and kissed her. "No. The water level is now about a foot below the ledge. I thought I'd make another measurement and try the oval with my knife." Robert measured the new level. "Eleven inches to the ledge. Was 71 inches 75 minutes ago. The water is rising at 4 feet an hour. We have about another 13 minutes." Robert poked the oval a bit with his knife for a moment. "Sigh. This thing is one single piece of super hard material, my knife won't scratch it a all. No seams to attack. Becky, do you want to fill the canteens, just in case the door opens on its own when the water hits it? I know this sounds insanely optimistic..."

"I'll fill the canteens. This place is insane. The door opening like that would fit right in." Rebecca opened a canteen and easily dunked it in the water 10 inches below the ledge. "Wow, Rob, this water feels freezing! Much colder than before."

Robert leaned over and felt the water. "You're right, about 45F I think. Quite cold now."

"I just had a horrible thought. What if we had decided to sleep in our original room overnight before trying the oval down there? We would have been hit with 45F water at over twice the pressure, 70 feet below the surface."

"Yeah. The pressure shock probably would have killed us. And if not, we would have died trying to swim out. 45F water is deadly. Life is going to start getting unpleasant for us soon. I can't think of any way of avoiding hypothermia. Slowing getting covered with 45F water over the next hour is a gruesome thought. I am happy though, that I had the chance to tell you that I love you..."

"Robert, I... What? Robert, I saw something! From the door! I think it just jiggled, slid back and forth about an inch!"

Robert and Rebecca examined the door, wondering if it would happen again. The water level was 4 inches below the ledge when the door quickly opened about a foot and then quickly closed again.

"Wow! Did you see that Rob?"

"Yes! Way too fast to dash in, but maybe it'll happen again with a larger opening. You or I should stand by the door edge, and be ready to spring. It'll be dangerous. The door could cut us in half."

"I'll do it! I'm not being braver. I'd rather be cut in two than be slowly killed by rising freezing water! That would be gruesome!"

The water level was two inches below the ledge. The door suddenly began opening, and Rebecca was about to spring when the door closed. She caught herself just in time. "This is horrible! I almost killed myself! I'll have to spring only when the door is at least halfway open."

Time seemed to stand still. Rebecca was still standing on dry ground, but she knew she had just moments before the bottom of her boots would be wet. She was in utter concentration, unwilling to look back at the rising water.

The door gapped open and Rebecca leaped, and then the door slammed shut. "She made it!" thought Robert. A few seconds later the door slid wide and locked open with a click. Robert dashed across the threshold.

"There's just a simple push button to open the door from this side, Rob, and look who was trying to open it!"

Standing next to Rebecca was a golden Labrador, her tail wagging wildly, but also looking very wobbly on her feet. "Well, hello pooch, nice to meet you too." said Robert. "Why, you're just a puppy, aren't you? And I'll just bet your name is Millie!" The dog barked happily at the sound of her name, and then tried to vomit. "Rebecca, the water is seconds away from overflowing the ledge. Can you close the door?"

"I don't know how. This button just seems to open it, and there are no other controls. And look! When I opened the door, the walls of the tank turned transparent! Look at all the spirals!"

Just then a thin film of water crept up and covered the bottom of their boots. Robert noted the time on his cell phone. "We seem to be in a spiral corridor around the outside of the tank. How weird. About 9 feet wide, just like the ledge. Headroom height seems to be a little less than 8 feet. You can see the puddle of water starting to flow down to the right. I guess our path is obvious, move clockwise up the spiral. Come Millie!"

The three quickly walked out of the puddle of water. Millie lagged a bit for the first few minutes, but then was happily walking by their sides and a little ahead. It took them eight minutes to walk 660 meters, the circumference of the tank. They paused to watch the water flowing into the open door beneath them. "The water is about 6 inches over the ledge now Becky. I guess we're safe. We've climbed up 16 feet of the spiral while the water rose 6 inches. It'll be easy to stay ahead of it. Notice that this is a double spiral, a second loop is threaded between where we are now and the door. And the roof of the tank is only about 16 feet up from our ceiling position now. Hopefully we'll find a door to get out of here on top, maybe in just one more rotation. It's hard to see, the tank ceiling is very bright."

"Oh, do you think this tank is submerged then Rob?"

"You're right. I guess I was assuming that. The hoop stress for this tank to be a freestanding structure would be enormous. But this place is so whacky, who knows?"

The two picked up their pace a bit, and Millie bounded about happily. Seven minutes later, Rebecca called out, "Oh, no! I think I see a blank wall ahead. Could this be a dead end? The light is so bright, it's hard to tell."

All three walked to the end of the spiral tunnel. "Yikes, Becky look out! The floor ends about eight feet before hitting the end wall. There's an 8-foot drop into the spiral beneath us. Both spirals just end at this top point."

The true nature of the geometry suddenly struck Rebecca. She gave a cry of anguish and said, "Oh, we have to move! We have to complete the journey in the second spiral before the water hits this height and then comes down and kills us!" Robert hung off the ledge and easily hopped to the floor below. Rebecca handed down Millie and their gear and then finally herself. "Let's move Rob, as fast as we can. I've got a really bad feeling about this. I do believe this place is actively trying to kill us. How much time do we have to get out of here?"

They both started a fast walk down the spiral, with Millie bouncing around in puppy happiness over the exercise. "Becky, the water should reach the top lip of the spiral in 7 hours, 40 minutes. It'll just be a trickle at first, but a one-foot deep waterfall 15 minutes later. I guess we have just about 8 hours from now to get out of here."

"Rob, I'm up for doing a forced march for 8 hours. We're both in pretty good shape. We usually do our 5-mile morning jog in less than 40 minutes. Can you hike 5 miles an hour with that backpack for 8 hours? We can share turns carrying it. That would let us make 12 revolutions per hour. Let's see, 16 vertical feet per loop, 8 hours... Great! That's a drop of over 1500 feet, with an extra 40 miles the water will have to travel to catch us. Maybe we'll be okay! Can I carry the pack?"

"It's custom designed for my back measurements. Here, why don't you just carry my canteen? Actually, I'm very surprised I'm not thirsty. We both have not drunk anything since we came out of our comas. But I just don't feel like drinking at all."

"Me either Rob. Could our bodies have been manipulated not to need water? That seems impossible. Wow, we're one floor directly over the open door now. That water action is pretty impressive."

"For that piece of the spiral not to be filled with water yet implies the spiral is huge. We might need all the time we have. Why doesn't that surprise me? And the water level appears to be rising just as fast as before. Draining into the spiral is not slowing the rise. Additional water must be being pumped into the tank to compensate. Bizarre."

"Not bizarre Robert. Cruel. I think the tank is actively trying to kill us, but for some reason it doesn't mind giving us a chance to escape. I think it woke up Millie just in time for Millie to have a small chance of opening the door for us, and we lucked out. I think the tank is playing a game with us, a very deadly and cruel game."