"Break out of this cell?" Mr. Darma repeated Zulfa's words in a tone of half-disbelief, though a glimmer of hopeful light flickered from deep within his exhausted gaze. "Young engineer, do you even know where you are? This cell door is locked using a multi-layered digital steel-circuit system with high-voltage security. The energy-suppressing cuffs on your wrists aren't even off yet."

Zulfa didn't answer right away. He lowered his head, staring down at his wrists locked inside the alloy-steel cuffs glowing with a faint blue light. Though the cuffs sapped his physical stamina, their foundational mechanical structure remained a human-made device—and in the eyes of a municipal engineer, every human creation possessed inherent flaws.

"Cuffs and electronic locks are sophisticated indeed, Mr. Darma," Zulfa whispered calmly, a thin, confident smirk tugging at the corner of his lips. "But their creators forgot one detail: they engineered a digital lock, not a manual mechanical one."

Zulfa spun away from the iron bars, stepping quietly toward the dark corner of his cell illuminated only by the dim red glow. He fished into the slightly torn pocket of his cargo pants, pulling out a small plastic item he had swiped from the military camp's medical station the day before: an old, snapped plastic toothbrush with a thin piece of wire binding tucked in its bristles.

Mr. Darma tracked Zulfa's movements from the opposite cell, his brow furrowing in curiosity. "What on earth are you doing with a broken toothbrush and a tiny piece of wire, Zulfa?"

"Improvising a duplicate key, emergency edition," Zulfa answered casually.

He sat cross-legged on the cold concrete floor, placing the thin wire beneath the dim red glow, then used the tip of the wire to pry apart the toothbrush's plastic head until he was left with a straight, sharp, elastic steel wire rod.

Outside the cell, the silence of the underground prison block was broken only by the monotonous drip of water and the electrical hum humming from the steel walls. Zulfa knew he had to move fast before the guards' next routine patrol rounds.

Zulfa sprang to his feet, stepping back up to the small digital control panel embedded into the outer wall of the cell, right beside the iron-bar frame. That box controlled the power flow and locking magnet for his cell, number 404.

He slid his hand through the narrow gap of the iron bars, feeling along the underside of the control panel box with his fingers. Thanks to his experience ripping apart city hydraulic systems and utility panels, his fingertips instantly mapped the loose exterior security bolts.

Click... click...

Using the flattened tip of his steel wire, Zulfa loosened the panel's protective plastic casing slowly without generating a noisy clatter. The plastic cover parted slightly, revealing a tiny green circuit board packed with low-voltage micro-wires inside.

"Zulfa... are you sure? If your finger slips even a fraction, the shock current from that panel could knock you out cold," Mr. Darma whispered anxiously from across the way, his eyes tracking every motion of the youth's hands with bated breath.

"I don't have a choice, Mr. Darma. If we sit here, we're just waiting around to be turned into the next energy sacrifices," Zulfa replied flatly, his focus locked entirely on the micro-circuit behind the panel.

Cold sweat began beading on Zulfa's brow, sliding down past his temples. He steadied his breathing to keep his hands from shaking. Using his handmade thin wire, he slipped the metal tip into the micro-circuit board's gap, feeling for the digital validation chip trace governing the primary locking magnet.

Sreett... click.

The wire hit the exact contact point.

Inside the panel, a tiny indicator light that had burned a constant solid red suddenly flashed yellow.

"Good..." Zulfa murmured quietly.

He twisted the wire slightly to the right, forging a fabricated short circuit across the cell door's digital logic gate memory chip. The action forced the system to factory-reset its lock status back to the unencrypted default defaults.

Bzzzt—

The electronic circuit's hum buzzed softly from within the wall.

And a second later...

Click!

A crisp mechanical snap echoed down the corridor. The indicator light on the control panel shifted from red to brilliant green, and the magnetic lock on Zulfa's cell iron bars unlatched automatically, letting the sliding iron door drift slightly ajar.

Zulfa exhaled a breathless sigh of relief. He pulled his hand back through the bar gap, then shoved the cell's iron-bar door wide with his shoulder.

"It worked..." Zulfa whispered softly, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his hand.

Mr. Darma across the way widened his eyes in sheer wonder, staring at Zulfa in awe. "Incredible... You actually bypassed military electronic locks with just a wire and a toothbrush?! Young engineer, your talent is completely out of this world!"

"Don't praise me yet, Mr. Darma. We aren't out of this place," Zulfa said swiftly, stepping out of his own cell and walking up to face cell number 404 where Mr. Darma was confined.

Zulfa dropped immediately to his knees before Mr. Darma's cell control panel. Using the exact same method, he loosened the circuit housing, slipped his steel wire into the micro gap, and hunted for the short-circuit contact point.

"Hold on a second, Mr. Darma. I'm going to set you free," Zulfa stated grimly.

"Hurry, Zulfa. I hear the sound of boots... Less than two minutes, and the night shift guard patrol squad will cross this hallway!" Mr. Darma warned urgently, pressing his ear tight against the iron bars as he strained to listen to the faint sounds from the corridor's end.

Zulfa accelerated his movements. The wire in his hand danced nimbly among the micro-wires.

Bzzzt... bzzzt!

The indicator light on Mr. Darma's cell panel blinked yellow, then—

Click!

Cell number 404's door slid open automatically. Mr. Darma immediately shoved the iron door from within, stepping out of his cell with a slight limp born of years trapped inside a cramped room.

"Thank you, Zulfa. You saved my life," Mr. Darma expressed with deep gratitude, wrapping an arm around Zulfa's shoulder for a brief moment.

"You're welcome, sir. Now we have to—"

Before Zulfa could finish his sentence, disaster struck.

The subterranean facility's central security system apparently detected the short-circuit anomaly across two cell panels simultaneously. Overhead in the prison hallway, the dim red emergency neon lamps abruptly shifted into blinding white strobe lights spinning wildly.

Whoop... whoop... whoop!

A piercing, ear-splitting cell alarm blared out, echoing across every corner of the underground prison block.

An automated voice message boomed from the central speakers:

"WARNING: SECURITY BREACH DETECTED IN ISOLATION CELL BLOCK 400. INMATES NUMBER 403 AND 404 ARE ESCAPING. ENGAGE SECTOR EMERGENCY LOCKDOWN PROTOCOL!"

Mr. Darma's face bleached white instantly. "Damn it! The central system realized we broke out!"

Zulfa snapped his head toward the corridor's end. From the dark bend, the glare of tactical flashlights and the heavy thud of dozens of heavily armed guards' boots thundered closer at full speed, bellowing orders to capture them.

"Zulfa! They're coming! Where do we run?!" Mr. Darma panicked.

"Follow me, fast!" Zulfa yelled, grabbing Mr. Darma's arm and hauling the old man into a sprint down the underground prison corridor, plunging straight through the screaming roar of the relentless emergency alarms.