Jade let the first phone ring until Waddell looked ready to put it through a wall.
The shelter had enough broken walls, so she kept both hands flat on the cafeteria table and watched the screen flash with a number she had never seen. Another phone started near the freezers. A soldier's pocket buzzed next. Caleb Morris's phone joined from inside the sandwich bag around its cracked screen.
The cafeteria filled with thin, angry vibration.
Mason Bell covered both ears, dinosaur tucked against his ribs.
"Please make the phones stop before they make everyone stupid."
Jade wanted the same thing.
Wanting had become unreliable. Sharp want moved the white thread under her skin, and the thread cared about pull, death, and the narrow space between someone breathing and someone already counted.
"Nobody answers until I choose which hook goes in."
Waddell's jaw worked hard enough to show the muscle.
"If this is emergency traffic, delaying could cost us."
