I did. Once. Twice.
Then the boards above us groaned under heavier weight, two men walking in rhythm, carrying something. A metal latch clicked, a door opened somewhere to the side, and cold air spilled down through the floorboards.
“Load her in,” a voice ordered.
A scrape. A grunt. Then the slam of a truck door above us, hard enough to rattle dust loose from the beams.
Silence came back slow, heavy.
I kept my eyes on the ceiling, like I could see her through it. Whoever she was, she wasn’t coming back.
“We’re not dying here,” he said into my hair, setting the words down like a tool on a bench.
“Okay,” I whispered, hating that my voice sounded like it needed permission.
A chain ticked from the next cage, my right, not Cap’s side. Sunshine whispered, thin. “My fingers.”
“What about them?” Cap asked, no alarm in it. Just steady.
“They won’t… go where they should.”
Across the aisle, Juno clicked her tongue. “Don’t tell him anything.”
Cap didn’t bite. “Your call,” he said to Sunshine. “You want help, I try. You don’t, I don’t.”
The pause felt like a test.
“Only if she’s there,” Sunshine said, meaning me.
“I’m here,” I said before he could answer. I shifted right until my cheek took the wire’s cold, found the seam where her cage met mine. “I’ve got you.”
Her hand came through the diamonds, swollen knuckles, nails chewed raw. I fed my fingers in from my side, so she had something to hold. Her skin felt tight with hurt. “Okay?” I asked.
“Okay.”
Cap leaned into my left seam, so his heat ran the length of my shoulder through the wire. He angled himself between me and the room without making a speech of it. “I’m going to talk her through it,” he told me, quiet. “You set; she breathes. Ready?”
“Ready,” I said, and Sunshine squeezed once.
“Index first,” Cap said. “Gentle traction, straight line. Don’t yank, just a steady pull. Now press the joint back toward the hand until it sits. You’ll feel a slide.”
I did what he said. A small, hot crack dipped my stomach and then let it right itself. Sunshine hissed but didn’t yank back.
“Good,” Cap murmured. “Next one. A little more pressure. Same motion.”
The second took longer, sharper click. Sunshine went very still the way kids do when they refuse to cry.
“Breathe,” I told her. “Don’t be brave for me.”
A shaky laugh leaked out of her anyway, and a lump came up in my throat.
Cap stayed at my left, a wall that didn’t brag about being a wall. He didn’t say thank you. None of us were at that part of the story.
“I’m getting you out,” he said after a beat, not just to Sunshine.
Silence sat with it.
“Me too?” a hoarse male voice asked from farther down, first time I’d heard a man speak down here. He’d been keeping his breaths small, like he could disappear if he didn’t spend any air.
