Page 1688 - Enders_Game_Full_Book

"This is Bangkok. We don't have heating ducts." "Any way out."
Suriyawong's whisper changed back to voice. "I'll look at the blueprints. But tomorrow, man, tomorrow. It's getting late and we talked right through dinner."
Bean grabbed his shoulder, forced him to look into his eyes.
"Suriyawong," he whispered, even more softly "I'm not joking. Right now, out of this building unobserved."
Finally Suriyawong got it: Bean was genuinely afraid. His whisper was quiet again. "Why, what's happening?"
"Just tell me how."
Suriyawong closed his eyes. "Flood drainage," he whispered. "Old ditches. They just laid these temporary buildings down on top of the old parade ground. There's a shallow ditch that runs right under the building. You can hardly tell it's there, but there's a gap."
"Where can we get under the building from inside?"
Suriyawang rolled his eyes. "These temporary buildings are made of lint." To prove his point, he pulled away the comer of the large rug in the middle of the room, rolled it back, and then, quite easily, pried up a floor section.
Underneath it was sod that had died from lack of sunlight. There were no gaps between floor and sod.
"Where's the ditch?" asked Bean.
Suriyawong thought again. "I think it crosses the hall. But the carpet is tacked down there."
Bean turned up the volume of the vid and went out the door of Suriyawong's office and through the anteroom to the hall. He pried up a corner of the carpet and ripped. Carpet fluff flew, and Bean kept pulling until Suriyawong stopped him. "I think about here," he said.
They pulled up another floor section. This time there was a depression in the yellowed sod. "Can you get through that?" asked Bean.
"Hey, you're the one with the big head," said Suriyawong.