Two months moved past the memorial the way months do, one unremarkable week at a time.
The TRB finished its verification in the seventh week.
The Floor 20 clearing guide went out under restricted release to every qualified Floor 19 Challenger in the country. Formation requirements. Bride behaviors. Resistance thresholds. The known ways to die.
Within a day of its release, the Bureau opened applications for Ireland's second twenty-person raid.
James, Finn, and Maeve had not touched Floor 21.
They could have. The gate had been sitting unlocked in their interfaces for two months, the first three names on Earth with access to it.
They trained. They gave the Bureau their testimony hours. They went home.
The gate stayed shut, because Team Zero had settled it in one short conversation at Finn's kitchen table weeks ago. Five had started this. Five would climb the rest of it. Nobody entered twenty-one until Ronan and Cillian had twenty behind them.
