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“This place was not designed for you.”

Dreven glanced back. Sweat had darkened the hair near his temples, and condensation clung to the black ridges near the bases of his horns.

“It was designed before anyone knew I would need to repair it.”

“Very inconsiderate.”

“I have complained.”

“To whom?”

“The machine.”

Kesta smiled. “Did it care?”

A dry scraping cough reverberated through the shaft.

Dreven looked toward the lower chamber. “Apparently not.”

The humor disappeared as quickly as it had come. They reached the western manifold minutes later. Tavi had been right about the bypass. Someone had opened an ancient secondary route that should have remained sealed, forcing warm moisture across replacement gaskets already weakened by the red organism. Several seals had begun to separate along their edges. Ena crouched beside one and held her portable light close.

“It grows faster here.”

Kesta knelt beside her. The reddish film covered nearly half the gasket, darker where heat from the pipe passed beneath it. She touched a testing strip to the surface and watched the indicator change.

“High protein activity. The temperature is accelerating the breakdown.”

Dreven braced one hand against the wall behind them. “Can you kill it?”

“Yes. Keeping it dead is the problem.”

Kesta opened the alkaline concentrate and tested a diluted drop against the edge of the growth. The red film contracted almost immediately, curling away from the treated area before darkening to brown.

Ena leaned closer. “That concentration will damage the seal eventually.”

“How eventually?”

“Hours at full strength. Days diluted.”

“Days is luxurious.”

Dreven’s expression remained grim. “If the seal lasts days but the organism returns tomorrow, we gain little.”

“We gain time to fabricate replacements and find out where the contamination is entering.”

Kesta stood and examined the pipe network. “But we have to cool the western line first. If we flush it at this temperature, the treatment breaks down before it reaches the deeper seals.”

Dreven pointed toward a thick valve assembly crossing the ceiling. “Close the western intake.”

“Yes.”

His eyes narrowed. Kesta recognized the expression.

“What?”

“That line feeds the garden misting system.”

She looked at Ena. The other woman’s face had gone still.