Ty pulled the second brick loose before the next vent fired.
The service pin shook in his hand. Heat ran through the metal and into the joints of his fingers, where bone grit had already started to set again. He kept his wrist low, dragged the brick through the paste, and turned it sideways across the paired slots.
The vent struck from below and bucked the bridge.
White powder slapped the brick and split toward the outside rail. Some climbed anyway. Less than before. Enough still reached the runner and packed under the guide tooth until JJ drove her shoulder into the case.
"That one bought us barely half a breath," JJ said. "I need the next one before the case climbs again."
Ty set the bent pin into the third brick hole.
"Then stop counting breaths and start counting lifts," he said. "Tell me when the runner starts rising again."
"I can do that while something crushes me," JJ said. "My talents have become deeply depressing at this point."
Blue kept the dead fuse down with both hands now. The cloth around it had browned at the edge, and each small scrape made the sickles open wider above the board. Their hooks followed Ty’s bricks with narrow attention, always turning toward the path the pressure chose after each block moved.
"The sickles are listening to the pressure change," Blue said. "Keep making the vents choose the outside rail."
"I heard the part where the room rewards ugly carpentry," Ty said.
Rusuf’s laugh broke in his throat. He adjusted the maintenance sword by a fraction and lifted the stone lip before the hook could dip. His burned palm left another dark smear on the grip.
Yun-Jin saw the bloodless smear on the grip.
"Trade hands before the sword leaves your control," she said.
"Both hands belong to the same bad owner," Rusuf said. "A trade would only insult both hands equally."
"Symbolism is useless under a corpse wrist right now," Yun-Jin said. "Hold it higher before the hook drops again."
Rusuf held it higher without looking away once.
The hook rose away from the buried wrist ring. The cloth in Yun-Jin’s hands smoked again, and she twisted it to a clean patch without letting the copper edge drop. Ty saw the strain in her shoulders. JJ saw it too, but the case dragged her sideways before either of them could speak.
"Right runner lifting on my side again now," JJ said. "It is trying to climb over the paste."
Ty pulled until the pin cut into him.
The third brick refused to move at all.
The cradle around it had packed full of stabilizer grit, and heat had cooked the paste into a hard rim. The service pin bent farther. Ty shifted his grip, hooked the pin through the brick hole, and braced one foot against the rail support.
His knee dragged against the sealed powder behind it.
Powder had sealed behind the joint. He struck the knee against the rail once, then twice, and felt the crust crack inside the hinge. The pain came dull and late. The joint moved badly after that, but it moved.
"Runner is still climbing over here on this side," JJ said. "Ty, I am losing the guide tooth now."
"Push the case toward Blue and hold it there," Ty said.
"That moves it closer to the board and every bad decision," JJ said.
"It buys my brick angle without giving the hook the wrist."
JJ cursed under her breath, then shoved the case toward Blue. The frame scraped over the crooked runner. The glass body inside leaned with the shift, one finger sliding across the panel as if it approved of the direction.
JJ slammed her forearm across the frame and pinned it.
"You can ride quietly or crack your face on the glass," she said. "Those are your available options until I invent worse ones."
The finger stopped moving under her arm there.
Ty yanked the pin with his wrist and shoulder together.
The third brick broke loose from its cradle.
It jumped from the cradle and knocked against his shin. A burst from below hit the open slot before he could place the block. Bone grit shot upward and packed across his left hand. Two fingers locked around the pin.
Blue shifted one hand from the fuse and slapped the board edge.
The sickles snapped down by a finger width.
The pressure line bent away from the open slot long enough for Ty to drag the brick across it. The next burst split around the block and guttered toward the outside rail. The case dropped back into the guide tooth with a hard clack.
JJ’s whole body sagged over the case frame.
"That was closer than my pride will admit later," she said.
Blue put her hand back on the fuse.
"My hand leaves the fuse again and the sickles may close," she said. "Make me do that twice and we lose timing."
"I will schedule my mistakes farther apart from now on," Ty said.
"That would be a welcome professional improvement today," Blue said.
The next two bricks moved easier through loosened paste.
Ty found the rhythm after that. Pin through hole. Pull low. Turn the block sideways. Let the burst hit the block and split outward. Knock paste from his fingers before it set too deep. He worked the row from left rail to right, each brick buying a little more guide and a little less lift.
The bridge fought him for every inch afterward.
Heat climbed through the metal. Bone grit packed under his feet. The service pin bent into a hook that tore grooves in each brick hole. The glass case tried to drift whenever JJ changed pressure. Rusuf’s sword dipped whenever his grip slipped. Yun-Jin’s cloth shrank each time the hook kissed heat.
None of them had enough usable hands left.
That shortage became the shape of the work.
JJ learned to hold the case with her hip while using both arms to flatten the frame. Blue called the vent pairs without looking away from the fuse. Yun-Jin used her elbow against Rusuf’s wrist when the sword grip started to roll. Rusuf stopped pretending his hand worked normally and locked the sword under his forearm.
Ty moved bricks until the row stopped being a repair and became a wall.
The wall looked low, crooked, ugly, and real.
The powder struck the wall and chose the outside rail. White grit spilled over the edge of the bridge in steady sheets. The runners cleared. The guide teeth showed again, dark and wet around the base, but visible.
JJ leaned hard into the case and eased it back to center.
"It is sitting in the track properly again," she said. "Please let that sentence stay true for more than one breath."
The fire channel punched below them and tested the wall.
The brick wall held through the next burst.
The vents breathed outward. Powder spilled away from the runners and fell through the side gap, leaving the case track clear enough for the receiver tray to stop rattling. The sickles above Daemon’s cut closed halfway, then paused with both hooks aimed at different bodies.
Ty felt the pause before anyone named it.
The room had stopped arguing about the track.
That only made the next argument easier to hear.
Under the stone lip, the buried wrist ring gave one slow click.
Inside the glass case, the body answered with the same click against the panel.
JJ went still over the frame and held pressure.
"Tell me that was only the track settling," she said.
Blue looked from the fuse to the wrist ring, then to the finger pressed against the glass.
"The track settled before those clicks answered each other," Blue said. "Those clicks came from both bodies under our hands."
Rusuf lifted the sword another fraction. The lip opened just enough for Ty to see the wrist ring more clearly. Old marks ran under the powder, half hidden by heat and dirt. The ring had two shallow grooves where something used to clamp it shut.
The glass body’s finger rested over matching grooves in the case seal.
They were matched by purpose rather than identical shape.
Ty felt his hand close around the bent service pin.
"The bricks cleared the route between both sides," he said. "Now it can reach both sides without using the hook."
Yun-Jin held the copper edge away from the ring and stared at the case.
"If the route reaches both, it may ask both to answer," she said.
The sickles turned again toward both answers together.
One hook aimed toward the buried wrist ring. The other aimed toward the case seal. Daemon’s dead fuse stayed caught in the cut between them, keeping both blades from falling fully toward either body.
Blue’s face changed into calculation without enough good numbers.
"The fuse is keeping the receiver from choosing one body over the other," she said.
JJ looked through the glass at the body inside.
"What happens if it gets tired of waiting?" she asked.
Nobody answered before the next vent burst below.
The brick wall held through another vent burst. Powder spilled outward in clean sheets, and the case stayed centered. The repair had worked. That was the problem. Nothing blocked the receiver now except a burned hand, a smoking cloth, a dead fuse, and Ty’s bent piece of metal.
The buried wrist ring clicked again under the lip.
The case seal clicked back from inside the glass.
This time the board under Daemon’s cut warmed beneath Blue’s hands, and the two sickles opened to the exact same width.
Ty looked at both bodies and understood the shape of the next demand.
"The route is asking for two signatures at once," he said.