The ground-floor lobby of Dormitory Building Number Seven was bathed in warm, incandescent amber.
It was the first time in forty-five nights that the building’s original 1964 lighting circuits burned without the sickly green hum of proctor tubes or the carmine-red glare of emergency distress flares. Four hundred students from the fourth-floor study hall sat in quiet, disciplined rows across the marble floorboards, wrapped in blankets from the linen closets, sipping hot water from cafeteria urns.
Near the front vestibule, Marcus Wu sat propped up in a heavy leather armchair where the two varsity rowers had carried his stretcher up from the sub-basement dumbwaiter moments ago.
Beside him stood freshman Leo Park, holding a clipboard with the names of all twelve infirmary patients, and sophomore Hana Cho, her violin case resting securely against her shins. Sora Takahashi was checking the brass door bolts, ensuring every secondary lock was engaged along the massive entrance frame.
“All four hundred and twelve are accounted for, Supervisor,” Leo Park reported as Julian, Elena, and Lin Mei stepped through the basement stairwell doors into the inner foyer. “No missing faces.
No grey-chalk progression. The skin discoloration completely cleared up ten minutes ago.”
“Good work, Leo,” Julian said, nodding to the freshman as he set his father’s sixteen-ounce solid brass boiler calibration weight onto the marble reception ledge beside the 1964 charter plaque. “How is the air in the hallways?”
