Owen broke the glass with the handle of his screwdriver.
A folded evacuation plan hung inside the wall cabinet. He pulled it free, leaving the emergency hammer in place. The paper was stiff with age, and someone had marked several routes in blue ink.
“That’s not the current plan,” he said.
Eli stared at him. “Why is it still there?”
“Because whoever was supposed to replace it hadn’t done it yet.” Owen unfolded the sheet against the wall. “I keep the current one in the maintenance office. That’s on two.”
Another blow struck the service door. Mara brought the boy away from it. The chair wedged beneath the handle shifted an inch across the tile.
Tessa looked at the map. “Can you correct this one?”
“Some of it.” Owen pointed to a rectangle near the old laundry rooms. “These were converted to storage. The corridor still goes past them, but this door was locked after a water leak.”
Eli followed his finger. The map showed a service stair beyond the storage rooms. He remembered a blue door there and a stairwell that led to the rear of the building.
“That’s the one,” he said.
Owen shook his head. “Not if you’re thinking of the door at the end. That opens into the storage room now.”
“The stairs are behind it.”
“They were. The stairwell is farther along, around the corner.”
Eli looked more closely. The blue ink on the plan had been drawn over the printed route. The line led to a different turn than the one he remembered.
“When did it change?”
“Before I started working here. The old stair opening was sealed off.”
In Eli’s memory, he had approached the door from the opposite direction during an Aegis exercise. He had seen it open. He had never needed to ask what was on the other side of the wall, and he had never made this trip with injured residents behind him.
He could have insisted. The urge came quickly, almost automatically. He knew the building—or a version of it—and the door he remembered had led somewhere useful. But Owen was looking at a plan he had marked with his own pen. Eli had only a memory of walking past a door years from now.
“Can you check it?” he asked.
Owen glanced at the service door. “Someone needs to stay here.”
“I’ll go,” said Mrs. Larkin’s son.
“You don’t know the lock,” Owen said.
“I know where the corridor turns.”
Tessa folded the edge of the plan to make the blue line easier to see. “Go as far as the turn. If the door isn’t visible, come back. Don’t open anything unless you can tell what’s behind it.”
“I can do that.”
“What’s your name?” Eli asked.
“Daniel.”
Tessa handed him the pencil Owen had used to point at the map. “Mark the turn when you see it. If you have to come back quickly, we need to know which doorway you checked.”
Daniel took the pencil. He looked at his mother, then started down the corridor.
“Take the light,” she said.
He had left his phone beside her on the green blanket. He picked it up, switched on the flashlight, and gave her hand a brief squeeze before going.
Eli watched the beam move past the apartment doors. Daniel reached the corner and disappeared.
Tessa knelt beside Mrs. Larkin again. “We’re checking the route. While he’s gone, we can get the carry ready.”
“I heard,” Mrs. Larkin said. “I haven’t gone deaf.”
“No. I wanted you to know why we’re waiting.”
The older woman looked at the service door, then at her injured leg. “My son won’t leave me here.”
“Neither will we.”
Tessa said it without looking at Eli. He could not tell whether she intended him to hear the difference between that promise and his suggestion to bring her out alone.
Owen crouched to help fold the green blanket. “It needs more grip,” he said. “If we roll the edges, we can carry her close to the floor.”
The injured woman whose husband had escaped—her name was Leah, Eli learned when Tessa asked—offered her own belt to secure one end. Tessa told her to sit until they knew whether her leg could bear weight. Leah sat, then held the blanket while Owen worked.
Mei remained between her brother and husband outside six-eighteen. The improvised splint looked awkward, but her toes were visible beyond the torn trouser leg. Tessa checked them and asked if she could feel a touch. Mei answered yes, then asked whether the team outside would know she needed help.
“We’ll tell them,” Tessa said. “First we’re going to get you to a place they can reach.”
The boy watched her hands. His name was Ben. Mara kept one hand over the dressing on his arm while he held the other against her sleeve.
“Is that door going to break?” he asked.
The chair scraped again. Mara pulled him closer.
“It might,” Eli said. “That’s why we’re finding another way down.”
Ben looked at the metal bar in Eli’s hand. “Can you stop it?”
“I can slow something down. I don’t know for how long.”
Ben seemed dissatisfied, but he did not ask again.
Eli moved the chair farther beneath the handle. The door opened inward; the chair would not hold against much weight. He looked for a heavier object and found a narrow table outside an apartment. One leg was cracked. He turned it on its side and placed it behind the chair, making sure he could still move both pieces if a person needed to come through.
Mara watched him. “My husband went down the other stairs.”
“When?”
“Before the shaking started. He was going to bring back help.”
“I met a responder and a volunteer there,” Eli said. “I don’t know if either was your husband.”
“He wears a yellow coat. He’s tall.”
The responder had worn a dark emergency jacket. The woman with the shield had a cut on her forehead. Eli did not remember a yellow coat.
“I didn’t see him,” he said. “That doesn’t mean he isn’t outside.”
Mara pressed her lips together. “All right.”
A call came from the end of the hall. Daniel appeared around the corner, his flashlight shaking.
“There’s a blue door,” he said. “It’s locked.”
Eli felt a sharp, unreasonable triumph. “That’s it.”
Daniel raised his hand. “I looked through the glass. It’s storage. Shelves, buckets, a mop. There’s no stairwell.”
Owen tapped the plan. “The next turn?”
“A metal door with a sign. It says service access. There’s a stair symbol.”
“Did you open it?” Tessa asked.
“No. You said not to.”
“Did you hear anything?”
“Water. Maybe a pipe.”
Owen took the plan and walked to the corner with Daniel. Eli followed. They could see the blue door at the end of the corridor, just as Daniel had described. A narrow pane in its upper half showed shelves stacked with supplies. The room beyond had no visible exit.
Eli put his hand against the glass. If he had led everyone here, they would have had to turn the carry sheet around in a confined corridor while something approached from behind. He tried to picture the Aegis exercise again. Had the blue door been held open? Had someone entered from the actual service access and propped it in place? He could not make the scene clear enough to settle the question.
Owen pointed around the corner. A gray metal door stood beneath an illuminated running-person sign. A hand-painted arrow on the wall pointed toward it.
“That goes to the stairs,” he said. “If the landing’s still intact.”
“Can it be locked from this side?”
“No. It’s a fire door. The closer catches sometimes, though.”
He lifted the handle. The door opened onto a small concrete landing. A stairwell descended to the right. A light burned one flight below, but the one immediately above them flickered.
Daniel started forward. Eli held out an arm.
“Wait here,” Eli said. “I’ll check the first landing.”
Tessa had asked for a route check, not a lone search to the bottom. Eli took the stairs slowly, keeping one hand near the rail. On the next landing, a cleaning cart lay across the floor. A plastic bucket had overturned, leaving a line of water that ran toward the steps. The sound Daniel had heard came from a pipe dripping into it.
Eli shifted the cart. One wheel caught between the rail and the wall. He pulled it free and parked it against the inner corner, leaving a narrow path past it.
The stairs continued down. The light at the next level was out. He could see the landing’s edge, but not the corridor beyond it.
From somewhere below came a series of quick taps. They stopped when he stopped moving.
He waited. A pipe knocked once, then the taps resumed: uneven, close together, with a faint scrape between them. It could be someone using a handrail badly. It could be a creature climbing.
Eli backed up the flight. He did not run. At the top, he closed the fire door without letting it latch and told Owen what he had heard.
“Could be the pipes,” Owen said.
“Could be. I couldn’t see.”
Daniel looked down the corridor toward his mother. “Can we use it?”
“The first landing is clear. We need another check below before the carry team reaches it.”
They returned to the group. Tessa listened to the report without interrupting. When Eli described the tapping, he made himself say that he could not identify it.
“Could you hear it moving up?” she asked.
“I think it got closer. I’m not certain.”
Mara glanced at the barricaded service door. “Something on both stairs?”
“Possibly,” Eli said. “I only saw the creature in the west stair. I didn’t see what’s below this one.”
The distinction sounded weak next to the noise behind them. Still, no one else could use the information if he turned a suspicion into a fact.
Owen spread the plan again. “If we go down the gray stair, there’s a fire door at the bottom that leads to the rear service court. From there we can reach the street.”
“Does it need a key?” Tessa asked.
“No. There should be a release bar.”
“Should be?”
“It’s been stiff. I reported it last week. The contractor was meant to replace the closer.”
Eli looked at him. “Could you open it now?”
“Usually. If the frame hasn’t shifted.”
The old plan gave them a route, but it could not tell them whether a damaged door would work. Eli wanted to go down and force it before anyone followed. The group could not remain here indefinitely while he explored, and if he met a creature alone in the dark, the people upstairs would lose the person who had fought one before.
“What about the main stairwell?” Tessa asked.
Owen pointed to another line. “Through the lift lobby and west corridor. It’s wider.”
“The creature was on that route,” Eli said. “The responders were keeping it back. I don’t know how long they can hold.”
A deep thud sounded beyond the service door. The table rocked against the chair. Nobody needed a second description.
Tessa addressed the group. “We’re moving to the gray fire door. The first landing is clear. Eli heard something farther down, so no one goes ahead alone. If the stairs are blocked, we’ll come back to the west corridor and reassess.”
“Reassess?” Leah asked. “What if that thing gets through while we’re deciding?”
“Then we move away from this door,” Tessa said. “We won’t wait for it to reach us. But I’m not going to tell you that the other route is safe when we haven’t checked it.”
Leah’s face tightened. “My husband is outside.”
“I know. We want to get you to him.”
Tessa turned to Daniel and Mei’s brother. “Can you take the front of the blanket? Owen and Eli, the back. We’ll change people before anyone loses their grip.”
“I can walk,” Leah said.
“Show me.”
Leah stood with the wall supporting her. She managed two steps before her injured leg buckled. Eli reached for her, but Tessa was already beside her.
“Put your arm over my shoulder,” Tessa said. “Mara, can Ben walk?”
“He can.”
“I can walk,” Ben echoed.
“Good. Stay between Mara and me. If we stop, you stop. Don’t run ahead to the door.”
He nodded, trying to look older than he was.
They lifted Mrs. Larkin on the count of three. The blanket sagged between their hands, and she caught a breath. Daniel immediately lowered his corner.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t drop me because you’re sorry,” his mother said. “Tell me before you move.”
Eli hid a smile. “We’re lifting again. One, two, three.”
This time the four carriers raised her together. Tessa checked the position of her injured leg, then led Leah toward the turn. Mei and her family followed. Mara brought Ben between them and the carry sheet.
The corridor was not long, but it took time. The blanket shifted whenever the carriers changed their pace. Owen called out a loose tile; Daniel stepped over it without pulling his corner too high. At the first turn they nearly caught Mrs. Larkin’s shoulder against the wall.
“Stop,” Tessa said.
Everyone stopped. The silence afterward was filled by the rasping behind the barricaded door.
“Daniel, take a half-step back. Eli, move closer to the wall. Now turn together.”
The blanket cleared the corner. Mrs. Larkin held her son’s wrist until they steadied her again.
At the gray door, Eli set down his corner carefully. “I want another look below.”
Tessa nodded. “Take Owen. Stay where you can still hear us.”
Owen held the fire door while Eli went down to the first landing. The cart remained where he had parked it. Water dripped from the pipe into the bucket. For several seconds he heard nothing else.
Then the tapping returned. It came from the dark landing below, faster now, followed by a scrape along concrete.
A shape moved through the weak light from above. Eli caught a glimpse of a low back and a forelimb that bent the wrong way.
He stepped back. The creature did not charge. It paused at the edge of the light, its head tilted toward him.
“Something’s there,” Eli said to Owen. “One creature. Maybe more behind it.”
Owen’s face went pale. “Can we close the door on it?”
“Not from here. We can shut the upper door, but it won’t protect us forever.”
The creature took a step up. Eli struck the rail once with his metal bar. The sound rang down the shaft. The creature stopped, then lowered its head.
Eli retreated to the top and let Owen pull the door almost shut. He kept one hand on the edge so it would not latch behind him.
The group watched them. Daniel looked at the blanket. Mei leaned more heavily on her husband.
“One creature on the lower landing,” Eli said. “It saw me. I didn’t see anything behind it.”
Tessa looked toward the corridor they had left. The thudding there had become irregular. The barricaded door might hold for another minute or another hour; neither guess was useful.
“Can it get around you on these stairs?” she asked.
“The flight is narrow. If I stay ahead, I can slow it. I can’t promise to stop it.”
“And the west route?”
“Wider, but the creature and the responders are there. We don’t know whether the lower landing is still open.”
Tessa looked at Owen. “If we go down this way and have to turn back, where can we wait?”
“First landing has room if we move the cart all the way against the wall. Not much room. We can get back up to the sixth floor from there.”
“What would we need to carry Mrs. Larkin through?”
“Turn her at the landing. Four people, maybe two at a time on the stairs.”
Daniel began to object, then looked at his mother and held his breath.
Tessa asked her, “Can you tolerate being moved down one flight? We’ll stop at the landing.”
Mrs. Larkin’s face was drawn with pain. “I can try.”
Tessa looked at Mei. “And you?”
“With them,” Mei said, indicating her husband and brother. “I can take one flight.”
The decision was not Eli’s, though he could feel everyone waiting for him to make it. He had the badge. He had experience with creatures. He had also sent Daniel to the wrong door.
Tessa faced the group. “We’ll take the first flight. Eli and Owen will watch the lower landing. We keep the upper door open and stop at the turn. If we can’t pass the creature, we come back before everyone is committed.”
No one cheered. Daniel picked up his corner of the blanket. Mr. Chao adjusted his grip around Mei’s waist. Mara checked Ben’s dressing, then helped him to his feet.
Eli went through the fire door first. Owen followed, leaving it propped open with a rubber wedge from his bag. The building shook lightly under them, and the creature below scraped a claw against the step.
Eli raised the metal bar. Above him, the carriers began the difficult descent, one careful step at a time.