Barnes started toward him, but the crowd surged again as someone near the back pushed for the exits. Panic moved like a wave.
One person moved, then ten, then fifty.
"Sit down," Barnes shouted. "Sit down. Nobody leaves until we clear the doors."
Troopers spread out, arms extended, blocking the aisles without grabbing anyone, redirecting movement with their bodies and their voices.
It worked, barely, enough to keep the crowd from stampeding. In that moment, Pell made it to the side exit, and someone else moved, too.
A man in a work jacket, local, anonymous, the kind of face you didn't remember, slid up behind Martha in the half-light.
Martha sensed him more than saw him, the closeness, the sudden shadow at her shoulder. His hand shot for her folder.
Martha reacted on instinct, twisting her body away, but the man's fingers caught the edge of the plastic wrap and yanked.
The folder tore half an inch from her grip. Dean moved instantly.
He didn't swing. He didn't shove. He simply clamped his hand over the folder, pinning it back to Martha's chest, and stepped into the man's space like a door slamming shut.
"No," Dean said low.
The man tried to back away into the crowd. Barnes saw the movement and snapped his flashlight beam onto it.
The sudden bright cone revealed the man's face, eyes wide, jaw clenched, hands still half raised like he'd been caught reaching into a pocket.
"Trooper!" Dean called loud enough. "He tried to take her documents."
Barnes was there in two steps. "Hands," he ordered.
The man lifted his palms fast. "I was just... she was falling."
Barnes didn't listen. He grabbed the man's wrist and turned him toward the aisle light.
"You came from the front row," Barnes said. "You came from Pell's side. Who sent you?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," the man snapped, voice cracking.
Barnes tightened his grip. "Then you won't mind waiting outside while we figure it out."
Two troopers appeared as if summoned and took the man by the elbows. He protested, but not too loudly, like he knew the line he couldn't cross in front of state uniforms.
Martha stared after him, chest heaving. "They're trying to erase it," she whispered.
Dean nodded once. "They're trying to buy time."
Outside, the side doors opened briefly and the cold morning air cut in, damp and metallic.
Ellison's voice carried in, urgent. "Barnes, someone hit the service box behind the gym. Deliberate damage, fresh tool marks."
The word deliberate hit the crowd even harder than the darkness had. People began shouting again, angry now, not just scared.
"Who would do that?"