Chapter 979: Ty Holds The Space Between Downs

The gap behind Nessa widened until the roadbacks stopped touching Tower Five together.

Lower Nine’s mouth dropped toward Iri and her four residents. The upper ward moved the other way with Tressa’s pulley, thirty two workers, and every occupied bed. Between them, Nessa held her marked plate against her chest while the suit inside her glove reached for Ty’s ribs.

Ty pulled the nearer loose bone from his hip tie before the glove could choose it.

Jade caught his wrist.

"Which bone are you giving her, and where does it return?"

"The upper loose rib by my right hip. One crossing line, then it returns to me."

Nessa kept both hands on her own arm.

"I accept one rib for one line, and my suit keeps its opinions inside this plate."

"That is the nicest thing anybody has promised one of my ribs today."

Ty drew the second loose rib from Holl’s remaining tie. One carried an old chain groove. The other had two wheel cuts from Iri’s medicine cart. Neither held the gray white thread seated around the crooked rib inside his chest.

He passed his jaw chain through both loose bones.

His right foot stayed inside Dimitri’s outer measurement ring. The white band pressed below his knee while the open inner ring waited near his chest.

Dimitri still held the upper gallery with his changed hand.

"The band follows any piece that answers you across both directions."

"Then keep your hands busy with the beds while mine answers."

Nessa opened the marked black plate. Its raised cuts pressed through the blood inside her glove. Ty placed the wheel cut rib across it and waited until her living left hand, rather than the suit, closed the plate.

"Your rib enters under my name and leaves when I release this count."

"Agreed, and my jaw keeps the chain outside your pulse cage."

She lowered the plate toward Lower Nine. Vale tissue gripped the rib only where Lera’s cut ended. The rest of the bone passed through an iron loop above Iri’s head.

Ty set the grooved rib against the upper ward rail. His four present fingers held it there. Tressa fed one empty bed strap around the bone and clipped the strap to a floor cup.

The jaw chain stretched between both ribs.

One bone fell toward Lower Nine. The other pressed into common down beneath Ty’s hand. Green pressure pulled across his sternum and found every old crack between them.

He remembered Harven’s kitchen dropping after a release command reached the wrong piece.

"Jade, ask me where everything is before each person crosses."

"I was already going to do that, genius."

"Cruel, but familiar enough to keep my skull useful."

Jade wrapped one arm around his chest without touching the inner ring. Her living hand settled behind his skull.

"Who holds your skull, and which foot remains measured?"

"You hold my skull. My right foot remains inside Dimitri’s outer ring."

"Which piece holds the lower roadback beneath us?"

"Nessa’s plate holds my wheel cut rib. My right hand holds the grooved one."

The answers reached every part of him in the proper order.

Iri clipped her rope around the chain and tested it with both hands. The gap had grown wider than Nessa’s body.

"Mero crosses with Brann because Brann carries the ampules. Mero keeps one hand on him and one on Ty’s chain, and anybody who decides the medicine matters more than either man can argue while hanging here."

Brann tightened both arms around the padded rack.

"The medicine reaches the ward even if I land underneath it."

"You reach with it, or Tressa gets no medicine from you."

Ty shifted the upper rib beneath his fingers.

"I support Iri’s management style from a medically safe distance."

Jade tightened her arm around his chest.

"You are currently the entire medically unsafe distance."

Mero clipped Brann’s waist cord through his own and stepped onto the chain. Both downs took them. Their boots separated toward opposite roadbacks until Mero hooked one knee around the lower rope.

Nessa turned the plate by one finger. Ty’s lower rib followed. He lifted the upper rib against Tressa’s strap, drawing the chain level enough for Mero to move.

Brann crossed against Mero’s chest. The ampule rack struck the chain twice. Glass knocked inside the padding but stayed whole.

At the midpoint, Mero’s free hand slid through black dust. Ty felt the grip as pressure against the lower rib, then at the tips of his right fingers.

"Mero needs one link toward the ward before his hand leaves."

Tressa released one bed strap buckle. Ty pulled the link through his jaw and gave Mero enough chain to catch the upper rail.

Ward workers took Brann first. Mero refused their hands until the padded rack rested on the ward floor beside Tressa’s boot.

Tressa pressed each ampule through the cloth.

"Three arrived sealed, and both residents arrived attached to themselves."

Ova came next. Her waist cord had frayed where Lower Nine’s tooth caught it. Senn pulled one boot lace free and wound it around the damaged section.

"This lace held Ova through the first turn, so leave it until she reaches Tressa."

Ova looked at the boot now loose on his foot.

"Your ankle will blame me for the rest of this evacuation."

"My ankle complains for free, and you already paid with the buckle."

She clipped onto Ty’s chain.

Jade asked where his skull was. Ty named her hand. She asked which rib held Lower Nine. He named Nessa’s plate and the wheel cuts under its edge.

Ova moved hand over hand.

The lower mouth dropped another half body length.

Her repaired waist cord pulled tight. Senn’s lace held, but Ova swung below the chain and kicked toward empty air.

Ty told the lower rib to lift.

His right hand opened.

The grooved rib slipped against the ward rail. Tressa’s bed strap caught its lower end, but the chain dropped beneath Ova’s hands.

Jade pulled his skull against her shoulder.

"Ty Hockenson, who is holding your skull right now?"

Her name reached him after Nessa’s plate and before the white ring around his foot.

"You are, Jade. My skull is above common down."

"Which piece is holding Lower Nine below your chain?"

"Nessa’s plate holds my wheel cut rib, and Ova hangs beyond it."

"Tell me what your present right hand is holding."

"The ward rail and my grooved rib, using four fingers."

Ty closed those fingers.

The upper rib returned beneath his palm. He bit the chain and hauled until Ova reached Mero’s waiting arm. Tressa cut Senn’s lace only after Ova stood inside the ward rail.

The two ribs pulled farther apart. One chain groove split to its old depth. Green pressure pushed through the fracture and tightened behind Ty’s sternum.

Senn made Iri cross her rope around his waist before he stepped onto the chain.

"I keep the lower end until she reaches the midpoint, then I follow her pull."

"You cross first, and I keep my own lower end."

Iri untied his rope from hers and shoved him toward the bridge. Senn had enough sense to argue while moving.

He crossed with one hand on Ty’s chain and the loose boot clenched beneath his other arm. Ova dragged him over the ward rail by his coat.

Iri remained alone at Lower Nine’s mouth.

She counted four residents through Tressa, then made Brann lift the ampule rack where she could see all three padded shapes.

"Four residents and three ampules reached the ward. Keep the count open until I arrive."

The lower roadback turned beneath her. Its rope tore free from the last Tower Five hook and pulled Nessa’s marked plate sideways.

Nessa’s bent cage needles shifted under her sleeve. She held the plate with both hands and kept the suit from climbing farther along Ty’s bone.

Ty felt the wheel cut rib begin to leave him.

"Jade, say my name while Iri clears the final span."

"Ty Hockenson, keep your skull with me and both ribs inside your answer."

Iri clipped her waist rope around the chain. Ty pulled with his jaw while his right foot pushed against Dimitri’s outer ring. The measured bone cracked at the ankle, closed, and held.

Iri climbed. Lower Nine fell away beneath her boots.

The old groove in Ty’s upper rib widened. Nessa’s plate drove deeper across the lower bone. Both pains arrived in his chest from different directions, and Jade’s hand remained the one place that stayed where he expected it.

Tressa caught Iri’s forearm. Mero and Senn took her waist rope. They pulled her into the ward as Lower Nine’s mouth dropped beyond the chain.

"Five from Lower Nine and three sealed ampules are inside the ward."

Nessa opened the marked plate.

Ty called the wheel cut rib home.

It left the Vale tissue and started up the chain. The outer ring around his right foot brightened. A white line ran from Dimitri’s wrist band, crossed Ty’s ankle, and traveled along the links faster than the returning bone.

The line closed around the wheel cut rib.

Dimitri’s damaged fingers tightened across the upper gallery.

"The band counted that bone while your soul answered in both directions. Under standing retrieval authority, it can preserve the measured piece even if the rest of you remains outside my ring."

Ty pulled the chain against the new white loop.

"That sentence contains two errors and one approaching theft."

The loop dragged his rib one finger width toward the open inner ring.