The cart lost a wheel before they reached the warehouse.
It happened at a seam in the pavement. Kellan was pulling, Eli steadying the stacked straps, when the left wheel lurched sideways and rolled into the gutter. The empty cart tipped toward a woman carrying groceries. Eli caught the handle; Kellan caught the frame before it struck her.
“Sorry,” Kellan said.
The woman checked her bags. A jar had shifted but not broken. “Are you boys moving a house?”
“Medical supplies,” Eli said.
“Then fix the wheel before you put them on it.” She stepped around the cart and continued toward the crossing.
Kellan retrieved the wheel. The retaining pin had bent, allowing it to slip from the axle. He held up the pin for Eli and Sera to see.
“I checked the tire and the frame,” he said. “I didn’t check this closely enough.”
“Can we repair it?” Eli asked.
“With a replacement pin. I wouldn’t straighten this one and trust it with a load.”
The nearest hardware shop had a pin of the right diameter but not the correct length. The owner found a compatible fastener in a tray behind the counter and lent Kellan a pair of pliers. Kellan fitted it while Sera held the cart upright. They tested the wheel with Kellan’s weight on the frame, then rolled the cart over the pavement seam several times.
“Now we know,” Sera said.
“Now we know this fastener held that test,” Kellan replied. “We check it again under the load.”
They were twenty minutes late when they reached the public side of the warehouse entrance. Tessa was waiting under an awning with the waterproof folder. She had come separately after her morning patient, leaving Ruth to receive the goods at the clinic. Leah held the second receiving sheet and had agreed to be the outside contact for the collection. If the team missed its check-in, she would call the warehouse and then the emergency service, according to the plan they had written.
Tessa examined the repaired wheel. “Would you still use it?”
“Yes, within the load we planned,” Kellan said. “If the warehouse gives us more, we split the trip.”
She handed him a copy of the order. Two receiving sheets listed each item, with spaces for shortages, damage and storage conditions. Ruth had the clinic copy. Tessa kept the other.
Sera stood at the edge of the loading ramp and activated her communication device. Eli walked toward the fence while she spoke into it. Her voice remained clear until he reached a concrete pillar, where it broke into static.
“Dead spot,” he said when he returned.
“Mark it.”
Kellan used a removable strip of bright tape on the public-side railing. They agreed to check in from the open pavement near the entrance rather than from behind the pillar. Sera tested the signal twice more. It held at the agreed point.
Eli took out his phone and called Leah. She answered on the second ring.
“Testing,” he said.
“Congratulations. The telephone works.”
“We’re at the entrance. The cart needed a repair, so we’re late. We’ll call after handover or if anything changes.”
“I’ve written the new time. Ruth has the receiving sheet.”
A truck passed through the gate, its driver leaning out to show a card to the guard. The warehouse beyond looked much as Sera had described: a concrete yard, a broad loading building and signs for several contractors. A crane rose beside the upper floor, its boom angled over a row of pallets. Eli noticed a line of fresh tape stretched across the nearer entrance.
A man in a warehouse vest approached. He had a radio clipped to his shoulder and a clipboard beneath his arm.
“Collection?” he asked.
Tessa gave him the reference number. He checked it, then looked toward the tape. “I’m Calder, the manager. We’re temporarily closed. Come back later.”
“What happened?”
“Quarantine.”
“The supplier confirmed collection yesterday and gave us a lower threat rating.”
“The situation changed.”
“Are our supplies inside?”
“Yes.”
“Are they safe to move?”
“I can’t release anything until the quarantine is cleared.”
A worker came through the yard carrying a tool case. Calder called him over and asked whether the loading entrance had been secured. The worker said it had, but the upper-floor door was still being checked. Calder sent him back for a report.
Kellan studied the tape. “What is the quarantine for?”
“Possible gate contamination.”
“Creatures?”
“Possible.”
Sera moved toward the public notices. The page she had photographed had been replaced again. The new version carried a higher threat rating and instructed staff to keep clear of the building pending assessment. It did not show the time the rating had changed.
Eli took out the supplier’s confirmation. The lower rating was printed beside the collection instructions. “When was this revised?”
“After an inspection.”
“When?”
“I don’t have the time in front of me.” Calder spoke into his radio, asking someone to bring the entry log. A burst of static answered. He repeated the request and got no reply.
Tessa looked at the upper windows. One had a dark curtain or tarp hanging behind it. Another reflected the clouds. Then a sharp flash appeared in the third window, vanished and appeared again.
“Someone’s up there,” she said.
Calder followed her gaze. The flash came a third time, longer. A hand moved behind the glass, holding what looked like a lamp or a reflective piece of metal.
“Who is inside?” Tessa asked.
“Hunters. They entered after the quarantine order.”
“How many?”
“I don’t have the count.”
“Are they trapped?”
“I’ve called the response team.”
As if in answer, a figure struck the glass from inside. The window opened a few inches. A woman’s voice carried down, thin beneath the sound of traffic.
“Help! Someone’s hurt!”
Calder ran toward the building, stopping at the barrier. “How many of you?”
The woman leaned farther out. “Three—”
A crash came from inside. She turned away from the window. Her answer broke off, and the opening slammed shut.
Tessa grabbed the radio from her bag and checked the channel. “Leah, we have a possible emergency at the warehouse. Stay available. I’m calling the public response line now.”
She gave the dispatcher the address, the quarantine notice and the report of an injured person. The dispatcher asked whether anyone had entered. Tessa said no, described the visible window and gave Calder’s name as the manager on site. A response team was being sent, but the dispatcher could not promise an arrival time.
Kellan moved the cart away from the entrance, leaving the ramp clear. Sera stood near the wall, eyes narrowed in concentration. Eli saw her fingers spread, as they had in the training gate.
“Something moving under the stairs,” she said. “Or a moving source in that direction. The building is full of background currents.”
“Can you tell what it is?”
“No.”
The woman appeared at the window again and waved. She held up two fingers, then pointed inside. Eli could not tell whether she meant two injured people or two other hunters. He waved back and shouted that help had been called. Traffic swallowed his words. Tessa cupped her hands and repeated the message. The woman nodded once.
A woman in a warehouse vest ran out through the side gate carrying a hard-sided case. She stumbled on the curb, and the case flew open. Gloves and a roll of tape scattered across the pavement. Sera caught the case before a passing car reached it.
“Is anyone else inside?” Tessa asked.
“The upper crew went in before my break. I heard the alarm and came out the side.” The woman gathered the gloves with shaking hands. “They said the lower floor was clear when they went up.”
“Did you see how many?”
“Three at the entrance. Another might have joined them later.”
Tessa helped her move away from the traffic and checked whether she was injured. The woman had scraped her palm when she fell. It was a small injury, but her breathing remained fast even after she sat down.
“Can you tell me your name?” Tessa asked.
“Sal. I work for the packing contractor.”
“Did anything follow you out?”
“I didn’t see anything. I heard something hit the stairwell door.” Sal looked toward the building. “My friend was supposed to be up there. Garin. He said they’d be out before lunch.”
Tessa asked her to describe the sound. Sal said it was heavy and repeated, like a cart striking a door, but she had not stayed to look. Sera wrote the location and time on her map. Sal gave her the name of the side entrance and pointed to a narrow door at the end of the building.
“Does it lock?” Kellan asked.
“From the outside. There’s a bar inside.”
“Could the upper crew use it?”
“Only if they reach the lower corridor.” Sal pressed her clean hand against her knee. “I should have waited for Garin.”
“You got out and told us what you heard,” Tessa said. “That’s useful.”
Sal wanted to call her friend’s family. Tessa suggested waiting until they knew who was inside and whether Garin was hurt, but she did not take Sal’s phone. Sal called a coworker instead and asked him to check the shift list. The coworker promised to come to the public entrance with what he knew.
Sera returned the scattered tools to the case. A small lamp lay beneath the roll of tape. She tested it and found the beam was strong enough to reach the upper window. She flashed it twice. The woman above raised a hand, then flashed her own light once in reply.
“We have a signal,” Sera said. “One flash for yes, two for no?”
She demonstrated the pattern. The woman at the window repeated it, although a passing truck obscured the exchange. Sera shifted to the open pavement and tried again. This time the answer came clearly. She asked whether anyone was hurt. One flash. Whether there was a safe stairway. Two.
“Can you tell us how many?” Sera called.
The answer was lost when the window shut again. A second crash sounded behind it, louder than the first. Sal rose halfway from her chair; Kellan steadied her before she could run toward the barrier.
Calder returned with a key ring and a sheet of paper. “I need you to stay outside the barrier. The response team will take over.”
“How long until they arrive?” Eli asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Can the people upstairs reach another exit?”
“The west stairwell may be blocked. I can’t confirm the east one.”
“Do you have a floor plan?” Kellan asked.
“In the office.”
“Can you get it?”
Calder hesitated, then called the worker with the tool case. The man came back with a laminated plan and laid it on the bonnet of a parked car. The upper floor contained storage rooms and a narrow corridor leading to two stairwells. The window where the woman stood opened above the loading area, near the crane.
Tessa pointed to the public road. “Where can an ambulance stop without blocking the gate?”
Calder showed her a side lane used for deliveries. She gave the location to the dispatcher and sent Leah a message with the same detail. They had come for a collection, not a rescue, but the injured person upstairs would need somewhere to be taken if the response team reached them.
The window flashed again. This time the signal was irregular, rapid, then still. Eli felt his hand tighten around the rope in the cart. The warehouse’s lower rating had been on their paperwork. The new notice was higher, and they did not know when it had changed. The woman above them had no reason to care which page was correct. She needed help.
“We should go in,” he said.
Kellan looked at the plan. “We need to know what we’re going into.”
“We can see someone needs us.”
“We can see a window and hear one voice. We don’t know what blocked the stairs or whether the floor will hold.”
Another impact sounded from inside. Dust fell from the upper window ledge. The woman reappeared, waving more urgently.
Tessa opened her medical bag and checked the contents. “I can set up here. Eli, ask Calder for the entry log and the briefing given to the hunters. Sera, keep watching that movement. Kellan, see whether there’s another way to the window.”
No one had agreed to enter. Eli went to Calder, the rope still looped over his hand, while the light flashed above them again.