The maintenance door finished opening before anyone reached the flooded corridor. Its bolts withdrew with a measured clack, and amber lights led past the south water break toward an administrative stairwell that should have been dead.
Owen stood beside the doorway with his old credential sleeve in one hand. The school seal inside caught the amber light, and he looked at it as if it had started speaking in a voice he could no longer ignore.
"I did not authorize this. The system accepted an archived continuity signature and is using the authority I left behind," Owen said, checking the access log on Vasa's tablet.
"How many people can fit through that passage?" Kendra asked, placing two contractors at the flooded junction and motioning Mara's evacuation team toward the library stairs.
"A squad at a time, through the old administration offices and up behind the science wing," Owen replied.
