The safe house comes into view like something unreal.
Lights on. Perimeter intact. Guards moving at their posts with the same steady precision as always. Radios murmur. A gate slides shut behind the vehicle with a clean mechanical sound. From the outside, it looks untouched. Orderly. Functional.
Like the ground did not just try to bury us alive.
I step out of the vehicle and my legs finally remember everything they have been holding back. Pain blooms sharp and bright through my shoulder, down my ribs, into places I will deal with later. It is the kind of pain that waits patiently until the danger passes, then announces itself all at once. Dust coats my clothes so thick it dulls the black to gray. My boots leave pale footprints on the concrete. Someone else’s blood streaks my sleeve, dar
