The South Ward door saved six families before it asked where they were going.
Mira Sol held it with both hands. Concrete had pinned the manual latch for four days. The mercy event lifted the lock from inside the wall and gave her a clear corridor to daylight.
Parents carried children through. Two old men carried one oxygen bottle between them. A woman pushed a shopping trolley full of documents and one broken lamp.
The final child cleared.
Green arrows lit beneath their feet.
```
SAFE DESTINATION:
CENTRAL CIVIC SHELTER.
```
Mira put wet cardboard over the first arrow.
The door began to close on her arms.
"Trolley," she said.
The woman with the documents shoved her trolley into the gap. Steel crushed the broken lamp and stopped against the frame.
The opening remained wide enough for one person sideways.
On the other side of the city, Bay Twelve's flood stair lifted three people from black water.
