I kept my voice inside the van without being in it. June drove; Lila shook. The road sprayed up in dirty fans as we peeled along the seawall toward the clinic that still owed us favors. The barrier loomed like a sleeping leviathan—public park by day, blind zones tucked under its arches by design and denial. The windshield wipers worked a two-syllable rhythm: live, live, live.
Lila’s teeth chattered under the noise. I heard it through the van mic tucked in the dash, a thin percussion that threaded into me and pulled. June didn’t waste softness, which is why it mattered when she let one hand off the wheel long enough to flip a dock blanket—oil-brown, salt-stained—over Lila’s shoulders.
“Breathe in the stink,” June said, deadpan. “Smells like family.”
“Smells like K-pier in August,” Lila answered, voice small and oddly proud. The blanket rustled. I pictured the way her fingers would pinch the fringe until the edge burned between them.
“Both true,” I said, riding the radio’s limit. “June, hit the clinic’s back ramp. I pinged Victor; he’ll kill cameras for two minutes when I say the word.”
“I’ll take one minute off that,” June said, then honked a single short note at a delivery truck that thought lanes were a suggestion. The van surged. Drone rotors thrummed above the barrier, that smug cicada noise Harbor Eleven pretends not to notice. “Mara, how’s your prince?”
“Breathing,” I said, and switched channels with my tongue against the implant. “Elias?”
The Spire poured in: elevator chime, then a dull, wet thud against a door. His breath hit the mic, hot and uncoordinated. He’d left the apartment mic open per my earlier instruction; the condenser lived in a vent that had never cooled air. Money buys prediction; it does not buy honesty from vents.
“I’m here,” he said, and my spine relaxed a single vertebra. “Three at the door. One says he’s Legal. One says he’s Maintenance. One doesn’t say.”
“You’re going to the panic-shaft,” I said. “Right now. Closet panel, left of the sculpture you hate.”
“The copper knot,” he said, breath catching a shocked laugh. “Mother’s friend shipped that monstrosity from Basel.”
“Open the closet,” I said. “Count three hinges down. Press and pull. Don’t look at the door; look where you’re going.”
Wood whispered. A magnet thunked. Behind him, a fist drummed, then a heavier strike. The door’s core sang a dampened note.
“They know the layout,” he said. “Or they have the old plans.”
“They don’t have me,” I said. “June, status.”
“Four minutes out,” June said. “Lila’s a bobblehead. I’m not letting her crack her skull on the glove box.”
“I can hear you,” Lila muttered. “And I’m not fragile, I’m—”
“Cold,” I said, to cut the argument before it found pride. “Sip the thermos.”
“Do you always boss three people at once?” June asked.
“Yes,” Lila and Elias said together, and the split-second harmony steadied me more than a clean rifle ever had.
I slid the skiff into the service cove under the barrier and tethered us to a hoop eaten by salt. The algae-lit glass above my head breathed a soft green that made my hands look other, sainted or seasick depending on the angle. The tide-clock at the far marina winked its three-minute lie; the city likes to pretend it’s ahead of the wave. No one is.
“Elias,” I said, forcing my voice down into the register he obeys when panic rehearses rebellion. “Say it back: closet panel, hinge three, press and pull.”
“Press and pull,” he echoed. Hinges squealed. The sound made my burned palm itch along its brand.
“Step in. Don’t close behind you yet. Count six rungs with your hand, then drop. Feet first. The floor at the bottom is rubber; don’t trust it.”
“Copy.” Metal rattled. His breath became a short metronome, fast but workable. In the near channel, Lila coughed hard enough to make the van mic clip. June clicked her tongue and lowered a window a crack to let the iodine wind in.
“They’re breaching,” Elias said. A drill bit whined at the apartment door, then bit harder. “I’m not wearing shoes.”
“Barefoot is quieter,” I said. “Move.”
“You’re with me,” he said, not a question.
“I’m three places with you,” I said. “I’m in your ear. I’m under the barrier. I’m biting through someone else’s knuckles in my head. Down six. Drop.”
A thump, the kind that means a human body chose gravity and didn’t regret it until later. The whine behind him became a roar. A voice—warm, male, falsely patient—announced, “Mr. Vance, we’re here to help you make a clarifying statement.”
“God, I hate that tone,” Elias said, and I could hear his mouth twist the way it does when legalese tries Pilates with ethics.
“Run,” I said.
He ran. The panic-shaft was a narrow throat of steel and poor decisions, but I’d mapped it and bribed the right hum. The cameras in it were old enough to still admire blinking lights; June had taught them to love loops. I trotted the service catwalk under the barrier to keep my mind from going backward into apartments and boards and promises I didn’t owe anymore.
“June,” I said, “you’re passing the algae plant. Victor in thirty seconds.”
“I see his stupid hat,” June said. “Victor, wave if you’re single.”
A whistle came through the van mic. Lila laughed, tiny and alarmed by itself, then pressed her teeth into the blanket edge again.
“Victor,” I said on a third line, “kill south feeds now.”
“Done,” he said, the click of a switch so satisfying I wanted to marry it. “Two minutes starting… three minutes ago.”
“Bless the tide clock,” June said.
“Hate the tide clock,” I corrected, because superstition keeps systems honest. “Elias, speak.”
“Shaft landing,” he said, panting. “There’s a smoke smell.”
“Old fire drill,” I said. “Ignore it. You’re going to see a maintenance door with a keypad. Code is the date we met.”
He made a sound that was not a word. “Which calendar?”
“My calendar,” I said. “Not the marina’s. And not the agency’s.”
I heard the keys count the memory: click-click, pause, click. The maintenance door thunked and breathed a damp gust—the way all doors do when they imagine themselves important.
“Left,” I said. “Not right.”
“Right goes faster,” he said, which told me he remembered the map and wanted to negotiate with it.
“Right goes to the elevator lobby where your clarifying friends wait. Left goes to the stairwell I bored with a screwdriver when I was angrier than I am now.”
“Left,” he said. Footfalls slurred concrete. His breath got louder, closer to the mic, like he wanted to carry me in his mouth.
“June, ramp,” I said.
“Ramp,” she echoed. The van’s turn signal ticked with a cheerful lie. “Lila, you get the mask when we stop. It smells like rubber bands.”
“I’ll take rubber,” Lila said. “Mara, he’s—” She didn’t finish it. She didn’t have to. The city had already tried to make me choose once; I was refusing the question by doing both with two hands and some teeth.
The door behind Elias opened—the apartment finally losing its polite battle. Voices spilled into the shaft like perfume dumped into a sink. Boots hammered. My tongue went to the molar switch out of habit and then stopped, because habit alone gets people dead.
“Two minutes,” Victor said on the side channel. “Then the cameras remember they’re employed.”
“One minute is all I want,” I said.
“You always say that,” June muttered.
“I mean it this time,” I said, and reached the small utility box I’d wedged under a rail on the catwalk after the Scuttle Switch. I’d packed it for the choice I didn’t want to have to make. I opened the lid with my burned hand because pain concentrates. Inside: a thumb-sized flash charge, white-phosphor core caged to flash, not flame. The pull tab wore a piece of red electrical tape because old habits save seconds.
“Elias,” I said. “You’re going to pass the junction where stairwell glass meets the maintenance tunnel.”
“I see it,” he said. “Three shadows behind me. One says my middle name like it gives him rights.”
“Keep running,” I said. “When I count down, cover your eyes and open your mouth.”
“Why open—”
“Open,” I said.
“Copy,” he said, no questions now.
I clipped the flash to the catwalk chain and held the throw line between two fingers. I breathed once, tasted salt and algae and the copper of my own bit lip. I pictured the tide clock and subtracted three minutes, just to be contrary. Then I pulled.
The flash was less a light than a choice the dark made to change its mind. White tore down the shaft in a sheet and shoved itself under the door like a rude guest. Sound clipped into a high whine, then fell back. I felt heat on my knuckles but not pain; the glove ate it, and the brand on my palm sang anyway.
“Now,” I said on Elias’s channel.
He exhaled hard. “Eyes closed. Mouth open.” Boots behind him cursed into their elbows. Metal hit metal—someone swung blind. He ran. I jogged the catwalk in a parallel dream, counting steps and swallows.
“Two flights,” I said. “Then turn where the paint changes from municipal gray to luxury gray.”
“Who decides those shades,” he panted, “should be tried.”
“Later,” I said. “Hatch ahead. Handwheel.”
“I remember this,” he said, breath thinning but true. “We came through when—”
“When I carried you,” I said, hearing the heat memory of Chapter Thirteen tilt the room. “Turn the wheel. It sticks at three o’clock.”
He grunted. The wheel squealed, then gave. Damp air pressed through. River breath. The sound wrapped my ribs—the slow heart I had tuned my life to read.
“Mara,” he said, and the word came out young and tired and stubborn. “Say it.”
“You did it,” I said. “You’re at the river hatch.”
“There’s a seam,” he said, and his voice tilted in surprise. “It’s already—”
“Blown,” I finished, and let myself have the smallest smile. “From my earlier opening. Walk through. Don’t look back.”
On the van channel, a roll-up door groaned. June downshifted; tires chirped against slick concrete. “Victor, hold those feeds a little longer.”
“I’m not a god,” Victor said.
“You are with that hat,” June said. “Lila, mask.”
Rubber squeaked. Lila’s breath changed—muffled, tighter, a brave animal noise trying to be human again. “Mara,” she said. “Don’t get sentimental.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” I said, and my throat burned for a reason that had nothing to do with flash powder. I watched Elias step into memory I’d made for him—river drip, hatch frame, the cold swipe of air that has kissed everyone who ever got away.
“I’m out,” he said. “Where do I look?”
“Don’t,” I said, too fast. Then I eased it. “Head down. Follow the wall left to the grating. I left a coil rope and a civilian jacket in the box labeled Pipe Sealant. You’ll smell fake pine.”
“You are either an artist or a criminal,” he said, voice lighter by a molecule.
“Pick the one that lives tonight,” I said. “June, ETA.”
“Thirty seconds,” June said. “Victor’s hat is sweating.”
“I want royalties,” Victor said. “Ten seconds to camera resurrection.”
“We’re inside,” June said, and I heard the van’s brakes sigh and the clatter of a loading ramp. People moved—steady, practiced. The clinic’s air had a different chill: blood cold, antiseptic sharp, the moral math of triage humming in vents.
“Lila,” I said, “you’ll see a mural with a pelican. Behind it, Victor installed a door that pretends to be plumbing. Wait there. June will get the intake nurse who won’t ask questions.”
“Pelican,” Lila said, dazed but precise. “You picked the ugliest bird.”
“Strong pouch,” I said, and heard June snort.
In the shaft, one of the men regained his courage or his balance. He shouted down where the flash had been and promised consequences in a voice that had practiced them.
“Elias,” I said, softer now. “Left, jacket, rope. Then the under-pier path. The hurricane barrier makes a blind when you hug the algae panels. You’ll hear drones; ignore them. They like drama.”
“Like you,” he said, softer too.
“I like truth,” I said.
“You like both,” he said, and moved. Water slapped something his foot didn’t like. He swore; it made me smile an unhelpful smile into the dark.
“Mara,” June said in my other ear, voice thinner. “We’re at Pelican. Lila’s knees forgot about bones.”
“Hold her upright, don’t tip her,” I said. “I’ll be there in—”
“No,” June cut in, gentle but steel. “Stay on the man who’s running for his breath. I have our fish.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose with two knuckles I could afford to bruise. The catwalk vibrated under me; somewhere upriver, a barge horn mourned the politics of current. I watched for patterns—the way I always have—to find the gaps.
“Elias,” I said, “count your breaths. Four in, hold, four out. Pretend you’re bored. Bored people survive.”
“Teaching me your religion,” he said. “I’m at the grating.”
“Jacket. Hood up. Rope across your chest. If anyone asks, say you’re maintenance and the algae lights are miscalibrated.”
“I can talk to that for hours,” he said, and the door in his voice that had been panic swung the way I needed it to: inward, then closed.
Behind him, a new set of boots arrived—harder, faster. The first team’s vision would be clawing its way back. I palmed the empty flash clip like a coin and considered a second pull that didn’t exist. The tide clock winked again from the marina—the lie I use for truth.
“Go,” I said, because there wasn’t another word to invent.
He went. Water licked steel. The rotors above the barrier chattered like gossip. Somewhere under the arches we’d just left, chalk fish blurred to a white smear and then to nothing at all.
“Clinic has her,” June said, breathy. “They’re warming her slow and calling no police faster. I’m scrubbing plates and paying the union fund twice for the trouble.”
“Make it three,” I said.
“I already did,” she said, and I could hear the smile she didn’t have time for.
“Elias,” I said. “Status.”
“Under the panels,” he said, breathing steadier. “Green light’s warm. Cameras look sleepy. I could nap.”
“Don’t,” I said, and let the word carry everything I couldn’t say about how his body has felt under my hands, burning or shaking or needing. “Two more turns. Then you’ll see a familiar ladder—paint-scratched, one rung bent.”
“From the time we—”
“Yes,” I said. “Up and out.”
He climbed. I heard it in the grind of grit under bare feet and the little hiss he makes when his ankle remembers an injury he never gives context. At the top, the river air took him, and he said my name without making it a question.
“I’m clear,” he said.
Relief drained me so fast I had to sit on the catwalk before my legs voted. I pressed my burned palm to the rail, let the sting recenter me. In the van channel, Lila argued faintly about soup temperatures; June bullied her toward normal.
“Both ops alive,” June said, and I could picture her tapping a phantom scoreboard on the van roof.
“Alive,” I echoed, and let one tear come because I had earned a single drop and no more.
Sirens spooled up across the city, braiding with the drones and the river and the clinic’s muted monitors. Harbor Eleven loves a resilience story; it also loves a purge. I stared at the algae light and thought about the next hour—how victory becomes leverage in hands that hate you.
“Mara,” Elias whispered, the mic catching the soft grit of his cheek against his shoulder as he tucked the phone away from the wind. “Where do you want me?”
I looked at the blind zones under the arches and at the city’s appetite for contrition, and I didn’t answer right away. The tide clock blinked its three-minute boast. I needed a fourth minute that didn’t exist, a minute to decide whether to keep him moving or make him visible and dare the world to touch him.
“Hold,” I said finally, and listened for footsteps that might not be his. “Wait for my voice.”
The river breathed. The drones purred. In the clinic, a kettle clicked. Somewhere in the Spire, a door closed on a man who would be sore and humiliated and angrier now. I kept both channels open and my thumb on a switch that could still tell a story I might not be ready to survive.