Chapter 45: The Moving Ring

Su kept Evan dry for eleven steps. On the twelfth, a steel pallet hit the water beside him and skated away hard enough to burst a warehouse window. He stopped in the middle of Airport Way. "Release this." "It is keeping glass from your foot." "It's throwing it at everybody else." Behind them the service-yard wall folded outward and brown water spread across the road, carrying slabs of concrete, the blue office door, and three white buckets that stayed nested together with insulting neatness. Qing and Daniel hauled Tomas between them. The woman from cell five came after, silver blanket over her shoulders, the padded pouch against her chest. Nathan came last, his hurt arm clamped to his ribs. The ring opened to let them through and closed behind them. Qing stepped across the boundary. Water rose to her waist, shoved at her jacket, then parted around Evan without touching…