Zeyu watched the injured employee lower the bar.
The man supporting his wife followed the gesture toward the mobile base. His wife lifted her head from his shoulder and looked through the windshield at Zeyu.
Until then, she had seemed too tired to notice much of what was happening around her.
He knew what they saw. The windshield was damaged, but everyone behind it was clean. None of them had blood soaking through a towel or pieces of sunshade wrapped around their skin.
"We aren’t taking passengers," Zeyu said through the speaker.
"She won’t cause any trouble," the husband replied, adjusting his arm around his wife. "I can wait here until the others come back."
Zeyu wanted to explain. He could tell the man about Zhiyi’s injuries or everything they kept inside the vehicle. But the husband would listen for a problem he could offer to solve, hoping Zeyu might change his mind.
"I’m not opening the door," Zeyu told him.
Behind the couple, the injured employee gave a disgusted snort.
"Of course you aren’t," the employee said, looking up at Zeyu. "We can work until our hands fall apart, but we’re not good enough to sit on your seats."
Blood was seeping through the towel around his forearm. Zeyu remembered telling him to stop hitting the passenger, still expecting the man to listen because he was the one giving the order.
Now the employee was asking something of him, and Zeyu had refused.
"Put me down," the sick woman said, tugging at her husband’s sleeve.
"You can’t stand," her husband replied, bending his head toward her.
"Then help me sit," she grumbled as she nodded toward the shade beside a parked car. "I don’t want to fall while you argue."
Her husband led her away from the van.
When he tried to lower her, the blanket caught beneath his arm, and he struggled to free it without letting her go. Lili climbed out of the van and took the blanket from him, spreading it on the pavement.
Zeyu watched her kneel beside the woman once she was sitting. The older woman who had recognized Lili stayed close with her tied bag, glancing between them and the van.
"We need to decide who’s going," someone called from beside the fuel containers. "We can’t stay out here all night."
The injured employee turned back to the loading. Nobody else came over to the couple sitting beside the car.
Manager Chen approached the cab, the radio hanging at his side.
"Director Song, at least stay until we know they’ll let everyone go," Manager Chen asked quietly. He had stopped between the vehicle and the others, keeping his voice low. "Distribution Manager Gao will listen if he thinks you’re involved."
Zeyu looked at the manager’s swollen face. He was frightened, but staying would let him keep telling people that Zeyu was handling things.
"He knows I’m here," Zeyu replied. "Don’t use my name to promise them anything else."
Manager Chen glanced at the damaged windshield. Zeyu waited for another argument, but the manager stepped back and looked toward his sister-in-law, who still stood near the showroom with her bag.
Zeyu switched off the exterior speaker.
"Is the lane clear?" he asked Jingwei.
"It’s clear ahead," Jingwei replied, checking the rear camera before returning to the side view. "Wait for Manager Chen to move back."
Zeyu kept his foot on the brake until the manager turned away. Then he let the mobile base creep forward, giving everyone time to step clear.
The husband looked up from beside his wife but stayed on the ground. Lili kept a hand on the sick woman’s shoulder. Zeyu watched them until the parked cars blocked his view.
A hand slapped the side of the vehicle.
Zeyu started to brake, but Jingwei was already checking the camera.
"He’s clear of the wheels," Jingwei told him. "Keep going."
The injured employee was walking beside the trailer, shouting over the engine. Zeyu couldn’t make out the words. The man struck the side again with his palm while the bar hung from his other hand.
Zeyu kept moving until the employee stopped following.
The service entrance disappeared from view, followed by the cars on blocks and the damaged fence. The company sign was the last thing Zeyu could see above the showroom.
Less than a year ago, he had approved paying for a new one.
At the next intersection, Shichen told him to turn west. Zeyu followed his directions without asking how far the road would take them. For now, he wanted to get away from the dealership and the people still loading fuel into that van.
No one tried to tell him he had done the right thing. He was glad they let him drive without having to answer.
They passed a bus shelter draped with sheets. Someone had painted a warning on the road in front of it, but Zeyu couldn’t read it before they drove over the words.
Farther along, a man crouched beside a bicycle, wrapping cloth around a pedal so he could touch it.
The fading light made the streets look cooler. Zeyu checked the outside temperature and wished he hadn’t.
"Your water is beside your right hand," Zhiyi told him from the seat behind his.
The bottle was where he had left it before they reached the underpass. He rested his fingers on the cap without lifting it.
"I’m driving," Zeyu replied, keeping his eyes on the road.
"Then drink when we stop," Zhiyi said. "You keep swallowing. You haven’t had any water."
Zeyu glanced at her in the mirror. She was resting against Hanchuan, who had shifted so she could lean on his shoulder without twisting her ribs. His hand covered hers on the armrest. They were both watching him, and neither looked away when he noticed.
Zeyu returned his attention to the road.
"I thought Manager Chen would know what to do once he found out Distribution Manager Gao had lied," Zeyu admitted.
Beside him, Jingwei watched a man pull down a shop shutter as they passed.
"He knows what happened now," Jingwei replied. "He still wants to get his family somewhere safe."
Zeyu drove on without answering. Learning the truth hadn’t given the manager another vehicle or somewhere else to go. His employees’ families were still missing, and the men who had taken them were offering to make a deal.
Zeyu wanted to ask what his friends thought would happen at the workshop. Instead, he followed the road past the last of the repair shops, where it widened between strips of dead grass.
Something was moving at the intersection ahead.
He eased off the accelerator, trying to make sense of the shapes in the fading light. At first, he thought people had piled debris across the road.
Then someone stood up, pulling a handcart behind them, and he saw the crowd coming out of the city.
People filled both lanes with bags, carts, and bundles carried between them.
Several were helping others walk. A man walked backward beside a wheelchair, arguing with whoever was pushing it. Farther back, a woman had stopped to tie a sheet over her head while people squeezed past her.
The crowd stretched around the bend, too far for Zeyu to see where it ended.
"Stop before the intersection," Jingwei told him. "We don’t want to get caught in the middle of them."
Zeyu brought the mobile base to a halt well short of the crossing. No one seemed to have noticed them yet.
Then a shout rose from somewhere in the crowd. People began hurrying, pushing past those who were moving more slowly.
A cart tipped onto its side, and two people bent to gather what had fallen while everyone else went around them.
A man near the front looked up and saw the mobile base.
He raised both arms and ran toward them, pointing urgently back the way Zeyu had just come.