Hesh's stair crew could stop the broad plate by dropping the third-floor landing.
The demolition bolts were already inside the concrete.
Jori Neh held the firing handle while Sani Koro's treatment corridor moved beneath his boots.
Ten Basalt Mile people remained inside that corridor.
The plate carried them on its front face.
If Jori broke the landing, three hundred tons of Hesh concrete would strike the corridor before it reached the metal joints behind it.
"No shot," he said.
The bolt crew removed the firing wire from his hand.
They did not remove the charges. Hesh might still need the landing after the occupied plate cleared.
The six-footed frame pushed from below with three repaired legs and three twisted ones.
It kept the Basalt Mile corridor between its body and every reachable Hesh stop.
Sani braced Vik Em's blood-wet bed against the threshold.
"The corridor is not its shield," she said. "This is our hospital."
"Both facts are current," Jori answered.
