“The group by the portals is checking those coming through. Making sure they’re not too angry or reckless, and that Cheit isn’t sending any double agents to us. There were some in the evacuation camps already.”

“Fuck,” I said under my breath.

“That group is the one that’s going to help us get down there with this many people,” he said, indicating the group to the side.

The Patrol, as suggested by the Warden, followed after capes. Leading the way, so the civilians in those camps didn’t have to be the people making the first steps.

And then the civilians. With ten portals open, each wide enough for people to pass through in pairs at a time, there were easily dozens. I could ballpark it. Twelve, twenty-four, thirty-five or thirty-six. A classroom but not an army. Fifty?

A cape near the portals reached out to grab someone by the arm. Another cape joined them, and they steered the person away from the main group.

The small disturbance didn’t seem to stem the flow of newcomers. A hundred?

Some more Patrol groups. More people, in steadier numbers this time. People that looked scared. People that looked agitated. Some who looked awed by this place we were now in, and how far that staircase in front of them seemed to extend up. If they only knew the building’s true scale.

It was weird and complicated to see people I might have said were too young. Teenagers. Strange and uneasy to see people who wore shirts beneath unzipped coats that had capes and cape logos depicted on them. There were people who looked like they were despairing before we’d even fought this battle, a far cry from Natalie and the Patrol who seemed so collected in the face of this, and there were those who looked too hopeful, too proud to be here. Like they hadn’t realized the risk, or they’d heard people would die and couldn’t believe those people might include them.

You’re heroes, I thought, looking at the group.

I might have fit something like that into my speech, but it felt self-congratulatory. I hadn’t wanted to ruffle feathers.

How many was this? Two, three thousand? People were only trickling in now.

The portals closed. Others opened. Half the number. More Patrol emerged. They were followed by more civilians.

Would this be four thousand? Maybe five?

It felt like not enough, considering the population of the city, it felt like a lot, considering what we were up against. I’d asked them to put their lives on the line with no notice.

I pulled my much-abused phone out from the pocket beneath my armor. That fucking crack from Eric smashing it into the table. I typed one-handed, phone at my side.

I want to remember their faces. Can you save them? These people are stepping up and that shouldn’t be forgotten.