"Is this real?" she asks.
"Yeah."
"You sure?"
"I'm sure."
She stands. She walks past me into the hallway without looking back. She's barefoot. Her feet leave no sound on the floor.
The fourth room. Growth charts on the wall. Small cots. Children's cots.
Two of them are occupied. Small shapes under thin blankets. One of them sits up when the light from the hallway hits. A girl. She watches me without blinking.
I can't do this room. I can't be the right person for this room.
"Simone. Second floor. Fourth room."
She's there in seconds.
I step aside.
Simone walks in. She goes to her knees beside the first cot. She's shaking. Her hands, her jaw, her shoulders. She's shaking, and she doesn't hide it, and she doesn't stop.
"I was where you are," she says. "I got out. You're getting out now."
The girl watches Simone's face. Studies it. Then she reaches out and touches Simone's hand.
Simone breaks. Silent. Just her face crumpling and her hand closing around the girl's fingers and her other hand pressing flat against the mattress to keep herself upright.
The second child. Smaller. Curled under the blanket with only his eyes showing. He hasn't moved. He's watching Simone, the girl, and the open door behind me, and his body is pressed flat against the wall like he's trying to disappear into it.
Simone sees him. She doesn't move toward him. She holds still. Holds the first girl's hand. And she waits.
The boy's eyes move from Simone to the door. To me. Back to Simone.
He uncurls. One limb at a time. Slides off the cot. Crosses the two feet between his cot and Simone's knee and stands there. Simone opens her other arm, and he steps into it and presses his face against her shoulder.
Alexei stands in the doorway.
I keep moving. More doors. More locks. I pop each bolt with a focused twist, and I stand in each doorway, and I say my name, and I say I'm here.
Through the comms, Julian's voice. Steady. Tight. "Southern strike complete. One hundred forty-three. All rooms cleared."
I keep opening doors.
"Western strike complete." Marcellus. "Two hundred and nine. No human casualties."
The numbers land in my chest and sit there, and I keep moving because if I stop to feel them I'll stop moving.
Maximus is in the basement.
"Lower level. Iron door. Alexei was right about the template." A pause. Then the sound of hinges shrieking. "Door's open."
"Celeste."
"Go ahead."
"There are cribs down here."
