The six-armed body climbed until its shoulders struck the storage roof.
It had no face to turn toward the seventy-six people behind Rack Eleven. Its skin looked poured rather than grown: gray plates around black seams, each plate carrying tool scratches from a different workshop. The empty socket along its left side reached from ribs to hip.
Farah ordered no common statement.
Veki Orl rang the hand bell for current exit. Boro Tann took the Ash Quarter survivors toward the east evidence rooms. South Bank residents moved west under their own stair keeper. Injured people used the center corridor after storage workers cleared three disposal tables.
The east rooms could hold thirty people if nobody opened the cabinet doors. Boro counted twenty-seven living Ash Quarter residents inside and kept Mevi's grease-stained card in his coat. He did not count her as missing or place her body in the room.
