The Aegis transport stood beneath the loading arch with its engine running and its rear doors chained shut.
Eli first saw it through a gap between the support frames. Four hunters guarded the wheels. Two more watched the road beyond the arch. A seventh, a young woman with a freshly replaced strap across her breastplate, was looking toward the evacuation corridor instead of the street.
She could see the stretcher team too.
The carriers had stopped beside a shallow drainage cut. One was on a knee, still gripping the rail. Their patient lay under a blanket pulled tight around the chest, mouth open, while the other carrier tried to keep the stretcher level. A wheel from their carrying trolley had broken off at the cut. There were only a few steps between them and the Aegis line.
Eli moved toward the gap.
Behind him, a jack handle struck the floor. Juno swore and asked the bracing crew to stop moving the timber while she checked its head. The sound caught him between two obligations. He looked back long enough to see Kellan signal that the piece was stable for the moment, then went to the edge of the loading bay.
