“I can’t.”

“Yes, you can. You’re going to do the next breath. That’s all. Just the next one.”

Behind her, the rhythm of David’s ventilation stopped.

Abigail spun.

Albert Pendleton had dragged his chair close to David’s bed. Somehow, with his own lungs failing, the old veteran had taken the Ambu bag and squeezed it weakly, trying to keep the younger man alive while Abigail tended to Camilla. Now his hands cramped and the bag slipped from his fingers.

His oxygen cylinder gauge read empty.

“Albert!”

“Give it to the kid,” Albert wheezed, nodding toward Leo. “Give the air to the boy.”

A fierce anger flared through Abigail so hot it burned away fear.

“Nobody is giving up their air,” she snapped. “Not on my watch.”

She thrust the Ambu bag into Sarah Harding’s shaking hands.

“Squeeze this every time you count to six. Hard enough to see his chest rise. Do not stop unless I take it from you.”

Sarah nodded, eyes wide. “I can do it.”

“I know you can.”

Abigail grabbed the Maglite and forced open the fire door just enough to squeeze through.

The exterior corridor had become a nightmare. Rain blew sideways through shattered windows. Standing water covered the floor. The wind howled so loudly it erased thought. Ceiling tiles hung like wet skin. Debris flew in unpredictable bursts.

She remembered a maintenance closet near the east stairwell.

Old welding tanks. Spare regulators. Maybe oxygen. Maybe nothing.

She pushed forward, shielding her face with one forearm. Twice she nearly fell. Once a metal chart holder hit her thigh hard enough to numb it. She reached the closet and found the door warped shut by pressure and moisture.

“No,” she said.

She backed up and slammed her shoulder into it.

Pain exploded through her collarbone.

The door did not open.

She hit it again.

Wood split.

Again.

The frame gave way with a crack, and Abigail stumbled into the dusty dark.

The flashlight beam swept shelves, rusted tools, broken mop handles, paint cans, chains.

Then green.

Two tall medical oxygen H cylinders chained to the wall.

They were heavy, over a hundred pounds each, and Abigail’s body had already spent more strength than it possessed. She unhooked the first chain with shaking fingers, tilted the cylinder carefully, balanced it on its rounded bottom edge, and began rolling it out inch by inch through wind, water, and debris.

By the time she forced it through the fire door gap, her arms were trembling uncontrollably.

But the regulator fit.

The tubing held.

Albert gasped when the oxygen reached him, his eyes fluttering shut in relief.

“God bless you, girl,” he whispered.

“Save your breath,” Abigail panted.

Then Camilla screamed.

“He’s coming! Abby, the baby is coming now!”

Abigail slid to her knees beside her.

The next twenty minutes became a battleground of life in a hallway the storm had tried to turn into a tomb.

She set the flashlight on a chair, angled its beam, and worked with sterile towels, gloves, trauma shears, and every memory she had from obstetric emergencies she had prayed never to manage alone.

“Breathe, Camilla. Now push. Good. Again. I see the head. Don’t stop. You’re doing it. You’re doing it.”

Camilla screamed until her voice broke. Albert talked to her between oxygen-starved breaths. Sarah kept bagging David every six seconds, sobbing silently but never stopping. Leo covered his ears and watched from his blanket nest, eyes huge.

“One more,” Abigail said. “Shoulders next. Push!”

With one final cry, Camilla pushed.

A tiny, slippery body slid into Abigail’s gloved hands.

Silence.

No cry.

No movement.

The baby was blue.

Abigail’s heart stopped for one awful beat.

“No,” she whispered. “Come on.”

She cleared the airway with a bulb syringe, rubbed the tiny back hard with a towel, flicked the soles of his feet.

“Breathe. Come on, little man. Breathe.”

The baby jerked.

Then a sharp, furious wail cut through the dark corridor.

It was the most beautiful sound Abigail had ever heard.

A collective sob of relief moved through the patients. Leo lowered his hands. Sarah laughed and cried at once. Albert whispered something that might have been a prayer.

“It’s a boy,” Abigail said, tears mixing with sweat and blood on her face. “Camilla, you have a beautiful baby boy.”

Camilla reached for him with trembling arms.

Abigail clamped and cut the cord, wrapped the baby in a thermal blanket, and placed him on his mother’s chest.

Then she saw the blood.

Too much.

Bright, fast, spreading across the sterile drapes beneath Camilla.

Postpartum hemorrhage.

The victory vanished.

“Camilla,” Abigail said sharply. “Stay awake.”

The young mother’s eyes rolled.

Abigail began fundal massage, pressing hard into Camilla’s abdomen to force the uterus to contract. Camilla cried out, weak and fading. Abigail shifted her weight, using her whole body, both hands locked, arms shaking.

“Albert, talk to her,” she ordered. “Keep her awake.”

Albert lifted his head. “Listen here, sweetheart. You got a boy to raise. You don’t get to fall asleep on duty.”

Abigail pressed harder.

No Pitocin. No transfusion. No surgeon. No operating room.

Just pressure, time, and refusal.

Minutes stretched until they lost shape.

The bleeding slowed.

Not stopped.

Slowed.

Camilla’s pulse, thin and thready, steadied enough for hope to enter the room without permission.

At 6:15 a.m., Abigail slumped against the wall.

She did a head count.

David: breathing with Sarah’s help.

Albert: oxygen flowing, chest rising.

Leo: curled beside Albert, awake but calm.

Camilla: pale, alive, newborn on her chest.

The others: cold, frightened, injured, but alive.

Twelve patients.

One newborn.

All breathing.

Abigail let her head fall back against the concrete and closed her eyes.

For the first time in nine hours, she allowed herself one breath that did not belong to someone else.

Then she heard it.

Not wind.

Not water.

A deep rhythmic thudding vibrated through the walls.

Thwack. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.

Helicopter rotors.

Heavy ones.

Not the high whine of a Coast Guard Jayhawk.

This was deeper. Military. Familiar.

MH-60M Black Hawk.

Camilla stirred and grabbed Abigail’s collar with surprising strength.

“In my bag,” she whispered. “Hidden pocket. Satellite phone.”

Abigail stared. “Camilla, rescue is here.”

“No.” Camilla’s eyes locked on hers. “If they ask, my name isn’t Reynolds. Tell them Thomas Sullivan’s daughter is here.”

The name hit Abigail like impact.

Before she could answer, an explosion rocked the roof.