People move in controlled lines now, the chaos gradually settling into something resembling order.
I scan the crowd.
And then?—
There.
Tilda.
She stands near the evacuation zone, Jesse in her arms, Fenn beside her.
Relief hits me so hard it almost drops me to my knees.
They’re safe.
They’re okay.
I walk toward them, slower now.
Because there’s something else riding under the relief.
Something heavier.
Guilt.
Uncertainty.
Because I don’t know what happens next.
I don’t know what this disaster cost her.
Cost us.
I stop a few feet away.
She looks up.
Our eyes meet.
For a moment, everything else fades.
“Hey,” I say softly.
Her gaze searches my face.
“You’re alive.”
“Last I checked.”
She exhales.
A small, shaky sound.
Jesse peers at me from her arms.
“Big lizard,” he says.
“Yeah,” I reply. “Big lizard.”
