Neri’s bridge had survived the turn by becoming crooked.
The upper span between Rung Ward and the clinic landing had shifted sideways at its middle joint. One rail bowed outward, and the deck plates overlapped like badly dealt cards. The ropes Neri had tied across both entrances kept people from stepping onto it, but a crowd was gathering on either side. Some wanted the clinic. Others wanted the homes behind them.
Iven arrived with a bag of wedges and found Neri lying on her stomach at the bridge edge, looking beneath the first deck plate. Dessa held her belt so she could lean farther out.
“Tell me something cheerful,” Iven said.
“The lower beam hasn’t torn.”
“That is cheerful.”
“The bolts holding it have.”
“Less cheerful.”
Neri wriggled back onto the deck. Dust marked her cheek. “The far support moved with the turn. If we force the plates straight, we’ll put the load into the broken bolts. We need a temporary path across the sound side.”
Jem had brought two lengths of timber from the workshop. They were not long enough to span the entire bridge, but they could carry a narrow walking lane over the displaced joint if each end had a firm support.
“How many people?” Iven asked.
“Two at a time. No carts until we rebuild the joint.”
A woman at the rope heard him. “My father can’t walk.”
“We’ll carry him,” Neri said. “We won’t put a cart on the bridge.”
The woman wanted to argue. Then a distant crash shook the rail, and she looked at the gap beneath the overlapping plates.
“Where do you need me?” she asked.
“Keep the lane clear. Tell people what we’re building and make them wait behind the chalk line.”
The woman took the job seriously enough that Iven heard her ordering a larger man out of the way before Neri had finished marking the timber.
Iven seated clamp bridge, plate brace, and winch draw. Spring step remained in his library; he could reseat it if he needed it. He anchored a short pull to the near rail and drew the first timber across the gap while Jem guided its end. Neri refused to attach it to the bent rail. She drove a pair of ordinary steel clamps around the lower beam instead, then checked the second support with a hammer.
The beam answered with a solid note. The bolt beside it did not.
“That one’s loose,” Iven said.
“I heard.”
“You might have missed it.”
“I might also push you into the lane.”
He held the timber while she tightened the sound fasteners and replaced the loose one with a longer bolt. Dessa crossed on her stomach to fit the far clamp. She moved carefully, keeping her weight over the lower beam. Iven maintained the grafted clamp only while she needed it; the ordinary steel carried the load once she finished.
A low scraping came from beneath the bridge.
Dessa froze. “That’s not the timber.”
Iven leaned over the edge. The space beneath the span opened into a maintenance trough lined with pipes. A pale creature climbed over one of them, its armored back brushing the underside of the bridge. It was smaller than the one he had fought in the collapsed building, but its limbs were longer and its hooked feet found the gaps between brackets with practiced ease.
Kesh appeared at the far end of the bridge, her shield over one arm. She had been guiding Brell’s crew toward the clinic. When she saw the creature, she put a hand out to stop the workers behind her.
“It’s coming toward the damaged joint,” she called.
The creature reached the overlap between the deck plates and pushed its head into the gap. One plate lifted. The crowd at the rope retreated as if pulled backward together.
“If it gets between those plates, it’ll move the timber,” Neri said.
Iven looked for a way to draw it away. The maintenance trough had no clear exit on the near side. On the far side, the creature could climb into the lane where Kesh’s workers were waiting.
“Get your people back,” he called to her.
Kesh did. She moved them behind a solid support, then returned to the bridge edge with her shield. She did not approach the creature until Iven had finished changing his active patterns. He released winch draw and seated piston strike. The few seconds felt longer with the creature’s head beneath the deck plate.
Iven stepped onto the first timber. It flexed under his weight but held. He kept his feet over the beam Neri had secured and moved toward the joint.
The creature raised its head. A strip of dark fluid ran along one plate of its armor. It might have come from the damaged tissue below, or from its own body. Iven did not have time to determine which.
“Come on,” he said.
The creature lunged upward. Iven caught its head on a compact brace and drove a piston strike into the joint behind its forelimb. The blow turned it sideways. Its hooked foot caught the timber and pulled.
The near clamp held. The far end shifted an inch.
“Off the timber!” Neri shouted.
Iven jumped back on ordinary legs and discovered their limits in the same instant. He caught the near rail, swung his weight onto the sound deck, and landed hard on one knee. Pain flashed through it, but the joint held.
The creature hauled itself onto the bridge. Its weight bent the timber toward the damaged plate. Kesh struck the rail with her shield, making a sharp sound. The creature turned toward her.
“Don’t bring it to the crowd,” Iven called.
“I’m bringing it to me.”
She backed along the far edge, keeping the solid support between herself and the workers. The creature advanced. It had three limbs on the timber and one on the old deck, distributing its weight better than Iven had expected.
He released clamp bridge and seated spring step. The change took the familiar few heartbeats. Neri and Jem used them to secure a rope around the timber’s near end. Dessa pulled the displaced clamp back into position from the far side, keeping low.
The creature reached Kesh. She met it with the shield, turned its head away from the lane, and stepped backward. It struck again, hard enough to knock her shoulder against the support. Iven ran across the repaired section, used a short spring impulse to clear the worst overlap, and landed beside it.
He hit the creature’s flank with his hammer. The ordinary blow cracked a thin plate but did not stop it. He followed with a piston strike at the exposed joint. The creature’s leg folded. Its weight shifted toward the gap.
Iven caught the timber before the fall could drag it free. Neri had tied the rope to a sound post; he pulled against that anchor, not against the creature alone. Kesh moved clear. The animal slid into the maintenance trough and struck the pipe below with a heavy clang.
It moved once, tried to climb, and fell back. A second pale shape appeared farther down the trough. Iven could not tell whether it was approaching the first or the damaged joint. He did know the bridge was no place for another fight.
“Close the trough cover,” he told Kesh.
She found the old service panel and pulled it across the opening with the help of a worker. It did not seal every gap, but it blocked the easiest route to the deck. Iven returned to the near side while Neri checked the timber and replaced the shifted clamp.
The crowd had watched the fight in silence. The woman whose father needed carrying was the first to speak.
“Can we cross now?”
Neri looked at the bridge, then at Dessa. “Test it with me.”
They crossed together, each keeping to the sound side. The timber dipped at the joint and returned. Neri marked the safe path with white chalk and tied a handline along the rail.
“Two people at a time,” she told the crowd. “If I say stop, you stop.”
The woman’s father came first on a stretcher carried by two workers. Iven walked beside the near end, ready to brace the timber if it shifted. Kesh guided the far end. The stretcher crossed without touching the broken plate.
The father looked up at the sky when they reached the landing. “I preferred the old bridge.”
“So did I,” Neri said.
The next crossings were slower. A woman carrying a child stopped in the middle when the deck moved. Iven offered his hand and walked beside her until she reached the far support. A man with a crate insisted he could manage it alone, then accepted help when the crate caught on the handline. No one was allowed to take a cart across.
At the clinic landing, Tavin had turned Cage Seven into a local transfer station. He used it to carry injured people between the damaged lane and the clinic level. The cage was not leaving Mercy. It moved between two points on the same saddle, a short route made difficult by the broken stairs and shifting frame.
Sera’s assistants met each arrival with water and clean cloth. The clinic’s waiting room had filled, so they had opened the old bath hall below it. Empty basins held supplies. The broad floor gave stretchers room to pass.
Iven reached the landing with Kesh after the first group crossed. Tavin was arguing with a man who wanted to use the cage for six crates of trade goods.
“The crates can wait,” Tavin said.
“They’ll be stolen if I leave them.”
“Then take them to the guarded store on the upper lane.”
“My shop is on the other side.”
“And the clinic is on this side. I’ve got three injured people waiting.”
The man looked at the stretchers. His argument weakened, but his fear did not. “Will someone guard the store?”
“I’ll send a runner to Jora,” Tavin said. “I won’t promise a guard until she answers.”
The man nodded reluctantly and began moving his crates toward the upper lane.
Iven helped carry a stretcher into the cage. The injured woman on it held a small wooden box against her chest. He offered to carry it separately, but she tightened her grip.
“It’s all right,” he said. “Keep it.”
Tavin checked the gate, gave the signal, and moved the cage toward the clinic. The mechanism groaned but ran smoothly. Iven watched the guide wheel he had tightened earlier and made a note to inspect it again after the next load.
Neri arrived with a list of materials for a stronger bridge repair. She wanted two longer beams, six sound bolts, and a crew to anchor the far support. The nearest workshop had the bolts but not the beams. Jem had gone to the freight yard to ask for them.
“We can keep the walking lane open,” she said, “but not if the saddle shifts again in the same direction.”
Sera came out of the bath hall wiping her hands. “Is it going to?”
“I can’t tell from the bridge.”
Elian approached with a folded survey. “The forward saddle reports a similar shift. The rear moved farther.”
“Can you map the direction?” Iven asked.
“I’m trying. The reports don’t agree on the timing.”
“Get the people who saw the horizon,” Kesh said. “Not just the people who felt the deck.”
Elian nodded and went to the upper lane with his notebook.
A runner arrived from Brell’s heat chamber. The local branch was still closed. The upper control room had shut another regulator cylinder, but the pressure in the return line continued to fluctuate. Harl had been seen leaving the gallery with the last of his crew.
Sera read the message. “Good. At least they’re out.”
“Can the regulator be restarted?” Tavin asked.
“I don’t know whether it should be.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“Then I don’t know that either.”
The cage returned. Iven inspected the guide wheel while the next stretcher was loaded. It had held its position. He tightened the locknut a fraction and marked it with chalk so Tavin’s crew could see if it moved again.
Across the lane, the bridge carried another pair of residents over the white line. Neri stood at the near end, watching every step. Her crew had built a narrow path through a broken structure, and people were using it to reach help. It was a small victory in a city full of sounds that suggested much larger failures.
Iven put his hammer back on his belt. The next stretcher was ready. He took one end without being asked.