No answer felt strong enough. Not when he knew that one inmate had already surfaced. If one man had slipped through, others might have too. Daniel sat awake long after midnight, staring at the sinkhole glowing under floodlights. Each shadow in the yard felt like movement. Each sound, a threat.
The interrogation of the captured inmate yielded more than anyone expected. Between curses and silence, he finally broke: there were two of them. One had been caught in the tunnel. The other had made it out. A single man, loose in the night. The revelation chilled Daniel more than the sinkhole itself.