Chapter 10 - The Sanctuary of Wires
Evelyn sprinted down the carpeted hallway, her breath coming in ragged, desperate gasps. Behind her, she heard the heavy, furious thud of Ethan's shoes slamming against the stairs as he pursued her.
She reached the heavy metal door of the utility room at the end of the hall.
Unlike the polished wooden doors of the bedrooms, this door was utilitarian, made of solid brushed steel with a heavy lever handle and an old-fashioned physical key lock. Ethan had always kept the key on his personal keyring, claiming it contained dangerous high-voltage equipment.
Evelyn grabbed the lever handle, expecting it to be locked tight.
To her shock, the handle clicked downward. The door had been left slightly ajar—a tiny, quarter-inch crack of dark space waiting for her.
She shoved the heavy steel door open, slipped inside with Lily, and slammed it shut behind her, pulling the heavy manual deadbolt into place just as Ethan reached the outside of the room.
BOOM!
Ethan threw his shoulder against the steel door from the hallway, making the heavy metal frame vibrate violently.
"Open this door, Evelyn!" Ethan screamed from the other side, his voice muffled but terrifyingly clear. "You can't stay in there! I have the master override!"
Evelyn backed away from the door, panting heavily, her body trembling with exhaustion.
She turned around to inspect the room. It was pitch black, saved only by the faint green and blue LED lights flickered from rows of server racks lined along the back wall. The air was cold, smelling strongly of ozone, hot copper, and plastic insulation.
"Mommy... it's dark," Lily whispered, her small voice terrified in the dim light.
"It's okay, baby," Evelyn whispered back, setting Lily down gently on a rubber floor mat near the server racks. "Stay right here. Don't move."
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Evelyn turned back toward the server racks. Mounted on the central wall was a massive gray breaker box, surrounded by thick bundles of black fiber-optic cables that fed directly into the house's security network.
And right in the center of the room, sitting on a small metal workbench in front of a flickering computer monitor, was something that made Evelyn's heart stop entirely.
