Joshua zoomed through the last doorway and stopped. Bones jumped off the back wielding ol' Nelly and glaring around the room: dead end. Teddy and Caleb had driven their cart right up against the massive stone doorpost on the right and they were standing on the roof.
"This is the same doorway?" Bones couldn't believe his eyes.
"Nope." Teddy was enjoying disagreeing with Bones. "That one is all the way on the other side of a long tunnel!"
"How do we get it open?" Bones was at his cranky best.
"That is why I brought this!" Teddy held up the container and nodded his head at Caleb. "Now just do what I told you." Teddy lowered the open container and Caleb pressed his hand against the nanoparticles. Lifting his hand from the container, Caleb looked at his palm. His whole hand scintillated in the bright fluorescent lights and pulsed with the security LEDs.
Teddy set the container down and braced himself against the wall on top of the golf cart as Caleb scuttled up his back, careful not to disturb the nanoparticles covering his right hand. Standing on Teddy's shoulders on top of the golf cart, Caleb had no problem reaching the fan shaped impression.
Caleb placed his whole hand in the indentation and pressed. The stone glowed blue-white under his hand and the door began to fall.
"I never thought I would see that." Bones was slack jawed and slump shouldered, bright red ol' Nelly dangling against the floor.
"Get inside, they can't be far behind." Teddy carefully closed the container and handed it down to Caleb who was already in the driver's seat. A three point turn later and Caleb had the golf cart parked in exactly the same spot on the other side of the doorway. Joshua drove right through as Bones peeked out the small white door looking to see if anyone was following them.
"We have company!" Bones shouted at the top of his lungs as he counted six or more technicians following a very thin man that had the gait of… a stork. "I do not think I can hold them. Get that door moving and I will jump through!"
Joshua scampered up the golf cart to where Teddy was waiting, mashed his hand into the gold dust and, standing on his father's shoulders, reached his hand toward the fan shaped impression.
"Wait!" Caleb was fishing in his pockets for something. "I've got to get this on video!" Pulling his phone out he cried: "Go!"
Joshua pressed his hand into the impression and the stone glowed blue-white for a moment as the doorway began to rise.
"Bones!" Teddy shouted urgently as they looked to see their best friend and uncle swinging the pipe wrench back and forth waiting for the enemy to come through the door. He was ready to defend them to the death. Hearing his nickname called, he turned and ran like he was being chased by a bear. Throwing ol' Nelly ahead of him for all he was worth, Bones jumped headfirst over the doorway as it passed waist height and landed in a heap.
Teddy stayed on the golf cart to see The Stork charge through the white door, desperation written all over his face. Delgado was nearly knocked over by several lab-coated men following close behind. Teddy and The Stork locked eyes for a fraction of a second. The stone doorway rumbled into its frame breaking the spell. Just before the door rammed home, Teddy thought he had seen the tiniest wisp of a smirk—it made his blood run cold.
Jumping down, Teddy almost smacked into a white-coated technician—it was the fellow he'd knocked over the head with the broken drill bit. The man must have awakened to a shock—finding himself alone in the tunnel on the wrong side of the door. They both stood and stared at each other. The man raised his hands in a wary gesture. Teddy raised his hands in surrender and the man appeared to relax. Bones rapped the poor guy on the head with ol' Nelly from behind and he dropped once again into a peaceful sleep.
"Into the carts, boys! Pedals to the metal!" Teddy rode with Caleb and Bones rode with Joshua to distribute the weight better. He filled Caleb in on the plan as they buzzed down the passageway at an excruciatingly sedate pace. Teddy knew he could get out and run faster than the carts but not for long—his stamina would give out before they made the exit. They had to use the carts as long as the batteries lasted. There would be plenty of time to run later. Turning back, he saw that Joshua was bringing Bones up to speed. Teddy reached out to touch Caleb next to him, squeezing the boy's shoulder—Thank you, Lord—closed his eyes, leaned his head back and fell asleep.
Delgado paced back and forth glaring at the technicians as they probed the doorway with every machine in the lab: spectrometers, magnetometers, ultrasound, nothing could tell them how to open the door. Delgado covered his ears as men with jackhammers worked at one of the doorpost stones. The hope was that the stone would crack and they could remove it in pieces.
One of the technicians wearing earphones and holding a spectrometer turned toward Delgado and raised his hands, shrugging his shoulders palms up in apology. Delgado didn't betray any emotion as he walked over to the man, if anything, his countenance appeared sympathetic. The man came toward him and bent his ear to receive instructions or encouragement in the deafening chamber.
Delgado snatched a metal pry bar from another technician as he passed, took two more steps and savaged the man. The bar came down between his shoulder and neck and immediately snapped his collarbone—a gurgling sound escaped his lips before the second blow rained down. Delgado didn't stop until the man was unrecognizable. Panting from the exertion, Delgado looked up through blood spattered spectacles.
The display did not have the desired affect. Most of the men were edging toward the exit, only those within his reach redoubled their efforts on the door. Pathetic. He thought. This is why we need to evolve—modern man has no backbone.
The technicians were lined up pouring through the white door to get anywhere as long as it was away from him. Suddenly, several of them came stumbling back into the room pushed by El Oso.
"Where did they go?" El Oso roared, eyes squinting and head still bleeding. He was rubbing his peepers and coughing, but he was ambulatory and enraged.
"Through there." El Hombre Delgado pointed at the massive stone door. His clinical side noting that the excessive bleeding was a side-affect of the treatments.
El Oso moved to the center of the room and stood coughing and sneezing as he surveyed the doorway. Rubbing his hands viciously in his eye sockets, he opened his eyelids to peer out of bloodshot orbs. He was just shutting his eyes again when he caught site of something glinting in the strobes about sixteen feet off the ground on the right side doorpost: gold dust.
Striding forward, El Oso stretched to his full height and reached for the spot. No luck. He was almost seven feet tall, but that didn't get you to sixteen feet of reach.
"Get him something to stand on!" Delgado yelled and the technicians jumped to it. Sliding an oil drum over, El Oso climbed on top. Wiping his face once more, he reached up and placed his hand in the fan shaped impression.
The door began to open.