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"Out. Now." I kicked the door frame and the whole thing shuddered like it was going to fold.
Reina looked up from her bunk, one boot on, one off. "What—"
"Everyone on your feet!" I grabbed the nearest kid—Danny, always Danny—and shoved him toward the hall. "Building's coming down."
"Sir, it's just a drill, right?" That was Collins, skinny engineering track kid, still half-asleep.
"Does this feel like a drill?" The floor lurched. Dust rained from the ceiling panels. Someone screamed two rooms over.
Reina had both boots on now and was already pulling her roommate off the top bunk. "Move, Kessler. He's serious."
"How do you know?" Kessler's voice pitched high.
"Because he looks like he's seen a ghost." Reina locked eyes with me for half a second. "What hit us?"
"Don't know. Don't care. Get them out." I counted heads. Nineteen. Twenty. Where were the others?
Another boom from below. The lights cut out. Emergency strips flickered on, bathing everything in sick green.
"Sir!" Danny was back at my elbow, breathing hard. "West stairwell's blocked. Smoke coming up."
"East?"
"Haven't checked."
"Then go check." I pushed past him into the hall. More kids stumbling out now, coughing, shouting questions I didn't have answers for.
"Is it Veil?"
"Are we under attack?"
"Where's Rodriguez?"
I grabbed the door frame to Rodriguez's room and yanked. Stuck. I slammed my shoulder into it. Once. Twice. The third hit, something cracked and I went through.
Rodriguez was on the floor, pinned under a beam that had punched through from the ceiling. His leg bent wrong.
"Hey." I crouched next to him. "You with me?"
"Can't feel my foot." His pupils were too wide. Shock setting in.
"You're going to be fine." I got my hands under the beam. "On three, you pull yourself out."
"I can't—"
"You can. One."
"Sir, I really can't—"
"Two." I braced. The beam was still hot. I could smell my palms starting to cook.
"Three." I lifted. Not much. Just enough. Rodriguez screamed and dragged himself backward.
I dropped the beam and it punched a new hole in the floor. We both stared into the room below. Orange light. Black smoke.
"We're over the server room," Rodriguez said.
"I know."
"That's where they keep the liquid coolant."
"I know." I hauled him up. He couldn't put weight on the bad leg so I got under his arm. "Walk or I carry you."
"Walking. I'm walking."
We made it to the hall and I passed him off to Reina. "Get him out."
"What about you?"
"Headcount's still off."
"Sir, the building—"
"I know what the building's doing." I started toward the north wing. "Move."
Reina moved. She was good like that. Didn't waste time arguing when it mattered.
Danny caught up with me again. "East stairwell's clear but it's getting hot. We've got maybe two minutes."
"Then we use two minutes." I tried to remember who bunked north wing. Carter. Yamada. Bright. "Check the study rooms."
"They wouldn't be in there at 0600."
"Check anyway."
He split off. I kicked open the first door. Empty. Second door. Empty. Third door stuck and when I forced it, smoke poured out thick enough to choke on.
Someone was coughing inside. I dropped low where the air was clearer and crawled in.
Yamada was wedged between the wall and an overturned desk, trying to pry a window open. The frame had warped in the heat.
"Leave it," I said.
"It's right here—"
"Leave it." I grabbed her collar and pulled. She fought me for a second before her brain caught up and she let me drag her out.
In the hall she bent double, hacking up black spit. "Carter and Bright?"
"Looking." I got her pointed at the east stairwell. "You know where to go."
"I'm not leaving them."
"You're leaving or you're dying. Pick one."
She picked leaving. Smart kid.
I found Bright in the next room, already unconscious from the smoke. I got him over my shoulder and kept moving. He wasn't big but he wasn't light either and my lungs were starting to burn.
Danny met me at the stairwell door. "That's twenty-six. Carter's still missing."
"Where'd you check?"
"North wing, both study rooms, the john—"
"Armory."
"It's locked after hours."
"Carter doesn't care about locked." I shoved Bright at him. "Get him down. I'll get Carter."
"Sir, there's no time—"
"Then I'll be fast."
I ran. Not smart. Smoke was thick now and every breath felt like swallowing glass. The armory was down one floor, accessible by the interior ladder most of the kids didn't know existed.
I knew Carter knew because I'd caught him using it before to hook up with someone he wouldn't name.
The ladder was hot enough to blister skin. I went down anyway.
Armory door was open a crack. I pushed through.
Carter was inside, frantically stuffing something into his pack. When he saw me he jumped.
"Jesus, sir, you scared—"
"What are you doing?"
"I was just—"
"Building's on fire and you're looting?"
His face went red. "I wasn't—"
"Save it. Move." I grabbed his arm and hauled him toward the door.
That's when the floor above us gave out.
I saw it start—heard the groan of metal supports failing—and shoved Carter toward the ladder.
"Climb!"
He climbed. I was right behind him. Halfway up, something exploded below. The shockwave hit like a fist and I lost my grip.
I fell back into smoke and heat and the certainty that this was bad, this was the worst it could be.
I hit something that broke under me. More pain. Couldn't tell where. Everywhere.
Footsteps above. "Sir!" Danny's voice, cracking with panic.
I tried to answer but only got smoke. My chest wouldn't expand.
Danny came down. Stupid kid. Should've stayed up.
"I got you." He got an arm under me. "Come on. Come on."
We made it three feet before the second explosion. This one was bigger. The liquid coolant, probably, going up all at once.
The world turned white and hot and loud.
Danny was pressed against me, trying to shield me or maybe I was shielding him, I couldn't tell. His hand shoved something small and metal into mine.
"Flare," he choked out. "Signal—"
He didn't finish. The wall of fire took us both.
I felt my skin crack. Felt my lungs cook. Felt every nerve ending scream and then go mercifully quiet.
This was dying, then. Faster than I thought. Slower than I wanted.
The last thing I heard was the building collapsing in on itself, and all I could think was that I'd gotten twenty-six out. Twenty-six out of twenty-seven.
One more. I'd needed one more minute.
The fire took that thought too.
Then nothing.
Then—
The six a.m. bell rang, sharp and bright and impossible.
I opened my eyes.
I was in my bunk. In my quarters. Staring at the same water stain on the ceiling I'd stared at yesterday morning.
My hands were clean. No burns. No blisters.
The bell rang again.
Someone knocked on my door. "Sir? You awake?"
Danny's voice.
Danny, who I'd just watched burn.
"Sir?"
I sat up. My chest worked fine. My skin was whole. The flare Danny had shoved into my hand was gone.
Outside my window, morning light slanted across the quad exactly the way it had yesterday.
The exact same way.
"Sir, we've got PT in twenty. You coming?"
I looked at my hands again. Turned them over. Nothing.
"Yeah," I heard myself say. "I'm coming."
Danny's footsteps retreated down the hall.
I stood. Walked to the window. Counted buildings. The dorm was still standing. Whole. Undamaged.
Twenty-seven kids were in there right now, getting dressed for morning drills, complaining about the cold showers and the coffee.
All of them alive.
For now.
I checked the clock on my desk. 0603.
In seventeen hours, the building would explode.
In seventeen hours, they'd all be dead.
Unless I—what? I pressed my forehead against the glass. It was cool. Real. Everything was real.
Except I'd already lived this.
I turned from the window and saw the duty roster on my desk, exactly where I'd left it yesterday.
No. Not yesterday. Today.
This morning.
Again.
"What the hell," I said out loud, just to hear my own voice, to prove I was still here.
No one answered.
The bell rang a third time, calling everyone to formation.
I pulled on my boots and reached for the door.
My hand stopped on the handle.
If this was today again—if I was really back—then somewhere out there, one of those twenty-seven kids was about to make a choice that would kill all the others.
And I had seventeen hours to