The first patient crossed the turn without touching the guard.
Tessa watched from the staging side while the carriers changed their grip at the mark. The receiving team called clear only after the foot end reached the wider landing. Then the entry keeper let the next group advance. Sera’s candidate had become a working corridor, narrow enough that every movement still showed why it had been tested empty first.
Behind Tessa, annex workers checked the revised list against rooms and actual departures. People missed by the original boundary had names now in their own keepers’ records and places in the departure order. The common aggregate traveled onward without their private details. Nobody was permitted to erase a room because its occupants had left the building; they came off the waiting number when the receiving side confirmed them.
A smaller transport rolled toward the next collection point. Its driver had the confirmed route and knew the corridor itself was for people and equipment, not vehicles. The wide powered rack remained at staging while its transport handle was prepared under Maelin’s instruction. The source supply had to accompany the patient through the transfer. A battery placed on the wrong trolley would be just another object arriving safely without the person who needed it.
