The square looked like a camp made of nerves.
Dozens of survivors huddled on car roofs and courthouse steps, staring upward as if the sky itself might pass judgment. Above them hung the half-formed dome — a trembling glass spiderweb, threads of pale light humming in the breeze. When the wind moved, it sang; a thousand invisible strings brushing stone.
Ethan and his group lingered at the edge, half-hidden behind a toppled food cart. Marcus shifted his weight like a man who only knew two states — still or striking. Kira had a hand hooked in the back of his jacket, a quiet anchor. Ravi studied the crowd the way a chess player studies a clock.
Caleb stood beside Ethan, jaw tight, trying to stand taller than the shakes still riding his limbs.
Then a crash ripped through the noise.
A shopfront on the far side of the square exploded outward, glass scattering like rain.
A twisted figure hit the street in a snarl.
The crowd broke instantly. Screams. Running feet. Someone fell and vanished beneath others as panic took shape like a living thing.
"Roamer," Marcus muttered. "Just one."
"Just one can stampede a hundred," Ravi said, eyes narrowing. "If we blow our cover, every desperate fool out there will come for us — and for him." His chin tipped toward Ethan. "Think before you move."
Ethan's gaze caught on a woman pinned beneath the lip of an overturned bus. She'd crawled partway under to avoid the rush and gotten trapped. Her leg was twisted unnaturally, blood soaking her jeans.
She saw him watching and bit back a cry — then couldn't hold the next one in.
"I can spare a little," Ethan said. His voice came out low, scraped raw. "Not the big thing. Just enough to keep her with us."
"Go," Kira said, already scanning the angles. "I'll cover."
They slipped along the edge of chaos, hugging shadows while others screamed.
The roamer stumbled through a line of cars, head jerking side to side, no sense of direction. It moved wrong — every step too sudden, too violent, as if it fought against its own body.
Ethan knelt beside the bus. "Hey. Stay with me. Breathe."
He tried the frame. The metal wouldn't budge.
No lever. No miracle left to spend.
Marcus's voice cut through the din behind him: short, sharp orders to other survivors. "Move that way — no, not you. Eyes up. Hold."
"Name?" Ethan asked the woman.
"Maya," she gasped.
"Okay, Maya." He set a hand on her thigh and let the green fire answer.
It flowed slow and steady — no blaze, just a warm stream. The tension bled from her face. Muscles realigned. The bleeding stopped. Her breath evened out.
He felt a sliver of essence burn away. Accepted the ache that followed.
"Thank you," she whispered. "I thought—"
"I know," he said softly. "When I say crawl, do it slow. Don't fight the metal. We'll lift it later."
Kira crouched beside them, ready. Together they guided Maya backward inch by inch until she was clear.
Marcus and Darren stood ahead, forming a wall with crowbar, pipe, and a length of rebar held low.
Across the square, the roamer slammed into a parked car, leaving a deep dent. It turned, screaming, jaw split too wide. A voice shouted from the courthouse steps:
"Hold the line! Don't run!"
A handful of survivors had banded together near the stairs — four, maybe five — using a sheet of plywood as a makeshift shield. Their leader wore a construction vest and a torn sweater, tools duct-taped to his belt like charms.
"Push," he ordered, and they did — slow, synchronized, nudging the monster off-balance without giving it something solid to crush.
"Smart," Ravi murmured. "Civilians who already failed at panic."
"They'll be dead if it finds a new target," Marcus said. "Want me to break it?"
"Not unless we have to," Ethan replied. "Let them prove themselves. If we step in, we become the show."
The roamer pivoted, head twisting the wrong way, claws twitching.
Then it saw a cluster of survivors pinned between a bench and two cars — and charged.
Marcus moved before Ethan could speak. Not a sprint, just a heavy, quiet glide toward the impact point. Kira followed like a shadow; Ravi ghosted behind.
Caleb started to move too, but Ethan caught his arm. "You'll help by not dying. Stay with Maya."
The roamer lunged.
Marcus hit it at an angle — short, brutal — and spun it half around.
Kira flickered in, grabbed a trapped woman's ankle, yanked her free, and disappeared again before the monster could track her.
Ravi barked, "Two steps back, now!" and the group obeyed without knowing why.
The creature crashed into the bench, folded over it, and tumbled hard onto the street. The plywood team advanced and shoved, sliding it further away.
They didn't chase. They didn't scream. They just held.
Ethan exhaled slowly. Not victory — just a fragile balance restored. The square was learning to breathe with its predators instead of against them.
A woman in a gray coat climbed the courthouse steps and raised both hands. Her voice cut clean through the chaos.
"Listen! We have to stop stampeding each other. The dome — it's almost ready. If we hold, if we stay quiet, we'll make it inside when it seals!"
"Who made you boss?" someone yelled.
"No one," she said. "I'm asking you to pretend someone is."
A few turned away. Most didn't.
The plywood crew fell back toward the steps. Someone started handing out bottles of water. Another quietly taped the handles of the makeshift shield.
Above them, the lattice hummed louder, threads of light fusing one by one.
Ethan felt the static raise the hairs on his arms. Ravi's eyes widened. "It's accelerating. Pressure's changing. When it seals, we'll feel it."
"Will it keep the roamers out?" Darren asked.
"It'll keep something out," Ravi muttered. "Maybe them. Maybe us."
A thin man pushed through the crowd, eyes wild. "You're the healer," he said, voice shaking. "The one from the library. You can bring them back."
Heads turned.
Kira's jaw tightened. Marcus's fingers shifted higher on the crowbar.
Ethan's voice stayed level. "Not today. I'm spent."
"You have to try!" the man cried, pointing at the roamer still circling the fountain. "That's my brother's jacket! He's still in there!"
Ethan's exhaustion threatened to become anger. He swallowed it. "I'm sorry."
"You won't even try?"
People were watching now — that brittle, hungry watching that always came before a crowd broke bad.
Marcus stepped in. "He said no."
Just two words. Enough.
The man stepped back, shaking, torn between fury and despair. He spat at the ground, a small, ugly act that cost him more than anyone else. Then he walked away.
"Word's spreading," Kira said quietly. "We won't stay anonymous long."
"For now," Ravi said, eyes flicking to the dome, "the barrier is louder than any rumor."
The lattice brightened — no longer a web, but a shell.
The roamer hurled itself at the fountain crew. The plywood shield held.
The crowd moved together now, less panic, more rhythm — strangers learning how to exist side by side again.
Then the air sang.
A hum rolled through the city like a struck bell. The dome flared white and sealed.
It didn't slam down — it simply was.
Pressure shifted; Ethan felt it on his skin like an elevator stopping too soon. The roamer hit the barrier and rebounded, sliding sideways as if the air had turned solid.
A hundred people exhaled at once.
But the seams weren't perfect.
Where the threads hadn't fully meshed, the pressure warped. A man tried to slip through too soon and bounced back, knocking over others. Panic flared. The plywood crew struggled to steady their line.
"Here," Marcus said, grabbing a corner of the shield. "Slow. One at a time. You—step. You—wait."
Ethan, Kira, and Ravi moved toward one of the unstable seams. A woman touched the barrier and recoiled, shock stealing her breath.
"Wait for the pulse," Ethan told her. "You'll feel it rise — step with it."
She stared, trembling. "How?"
"Like stepping onto a moving walkway," Ravi said, then sighed at her confusion. He took her hand, placed it near the shimmer. "Feel the hum. Now—step."
She did. The barrier accepted her, pressure easing as she passed through.
Kira pointed to the next. "You. Then you. Not together."
They built a door out of timing.
The chaos eased. The crowd learned. For the first time since the world fell apart, people acted like a unit.
Caleb tugged Ethan's sleeve. "They're letting us in."
"Not yet," Ethan said. "We wait until it's ready for all of us. No one gets crushed trying to be first."
Caleb nodded, swallowing.
The thin man from before stood near the seam now. He looked at Ethan, then at the roamer, still clawing uselessly at the barrier. Something in his face unknotted.
He joined the line and waited his turn.
The dome pulsed again. Inside, the light softened; the air smelled cleaner.
The woman in the gray coat clapped twice, pointed once, and somehow made a crowd of terrified strangers move like one patient creature.
Ethan checked the quiet ledger in his mind: essence low but steady; Reversal locked; group intact. He looked up at the dome and let himself hope — just a little.
"Your sister," Kira said softly. "If she's alive, she'll see this light."
"She will," Ethan answered. "Or I'll find her before she does."
"You can't do both," she said, not unkindly. He didn't argue.
Marcus called from the front. "Our turn. Move."
They stepped through together.
The barrier hummed and gave, then sealed behind them.
Inside, the air felt different — cooler, gentler. People sagged with relief they didn't know they were holding.
A woman in a maintenance vest approached with a scavenged clipboard. "Welcome," she said. "We don't have food. We have barely any water. We have one rule: no pushing. The dome hits harder than we can afford."
Ravi nodded. "We can help with order, with mapping."
Marcus lifted his crowbar. "With holding the line."
Kira gestured at the flickering seams. "With fixing the parts that still hiccup."
The woman studied them, then nodded once. "Then help."
Ethan let out a slow breath. The dome's energy pressed softly against his skin — a steadying hand that almost felt kind. For a moment, he imagined just… resting. Sleeping while the world tried and failed to reach him.
Then the lights flickered. The dome gave a single, low growl — a sound like thunder swallowed underwater.
Ravi's head snapped up. "That wasn't nothing."
Marcus frowned. "What was it?"
Ravi stared at the barrier. "A pressure test. Something big hit the outside. Not a roamer. Heavier. Maybe smarter."
Kira's whisper was barely sound. "Beasts. The ones the gods warned about."
"Maybe one arrived early," Ravi said.
Ethan looked through the shimmer at the broken city beyond.
He pressed his palm against the invisible wall. The barrier pushed back — gentle, unfeeling, solid.
"Hold," he whispered. To the dome. To himself. To whatever was still alive out there.
Somewhere beyond the glow, something pushed back.
The shell sang — a single warning note — then settled again.
The woman in gray raised her hands. "All right," she called. "Keep moving. No screaming. No heroics. The gods love a show. We are not a show."
No one laughed this time. They didn't need to.
For a moment, humanity was just people — tired, scared, learning the shape of a new wall.
Ethan closed his eyes for one long breath, felt the ache in his bones, then opened them again.
The Sanctuary held.
For now.