Dimitri's smallest finger split across three upper gallery beams.
The black fiber beneath his wrist wanted five directions. He gave it three and used the remaining two fingers to hold a patient rail against the floor. Twelve beds rested behind his changed hand. Their wheels had stopped turning, yet every bolt carried the weight of the roadback beneath it.
Below Tower Five, address bells fell past his bare feet.
He tried lowering one finger toward them.
The upper gallery moved with it. A bed climbed out of its floor cups, taking an old woman's breathing hose tight across her mouth. A ward worker caught the frame while Dimitri returned his finger to the beam.
As the bed dropped into place, the woman's hose loosened. His answer felt worse than ignorance.
Jade stood inside the tower mouth with one hand around Ty's ankle. Her cold arm remained driven through an iron rung behind her.
"Your hand is on the upper gallery. What are you doing for the people below it?"
