Eli had placed the six stored imprints on the cloth in the order he knew them. He did not need their shapes to remember the losses associated with them. Darius’s sight lay first, and his hand paused over it before he moved to the next.
Anchor and Load Share occupied the two equipped positions. Load Share remained stopped. Movement had been benched for much longer than his body wanted to admit when he looked across the broken routes near the gate. The narrow earlier permission for Anchor did not answer whether he should bring another talent into use now.
Tessa put the clinical sheet beside the cloth.
“The surface clinician has the line,” she said. “She needs to hear from you before we discuss the rotation.”
He looked toward Juno. The central room waited behind the guarded controls. Mira’s first-wave brace had bought a bounded opportunity, and every new conversation seemed to use it.
Juno stayed by the engineering table. “We’re preparing what doesn’t need your talents.”
The clinician’s voice was unfamiliar. That helped. She asked Tessa to identify her own location and role, then confirmed that she herself was at the school receiving station, outside the command chain deciding when release would begin. She had received the earlier restrictions and wanted Eli’s present account before offering any change.
