Another voice. "Me, too."
Barnes let the moment land. Then he turned to the investigators. "Begin intake."
Folding tables appeared like a switch had been flipped. Real intake, not glossy buyout forms.
Troopers directed people into lines. The plain-jacket investigators began collecting names, addresses, offers made, notices received.
Cameras recorded the process. Everything was visible.
Pell tried to speak once, lifting his cuffed hands as if he still had a microphone in his throat. "This is... this is a misunderstanding. My company..."
Barnes cut him off without looking at him. "Save it for counsel."
Halverson said nothing. But when he was escorted toward the doors, his eyes found Martha for a brief, ugly second.
Not rage, not even hatred. Something colder. Like a man seeing the moment he lost the ability to control the story.
Martha didn't blink.
Outside, the parking lot started filling in a new way. Word traveled fast in a small county, and it traveled faster when it had engines behind it.
By late morning, the first line of motorcycles rolled in. Not a dozen, not fifty, hundreds.
They came in controlled formation, not roaring for attention, not circling like predators. They parked along the edges of the lot in neat rows, leaving lanes open for ambulances and relief trucks.
Helmets came off. People stepped down and immediately started unloading.
Generators. Chainsaws. Tarps. Water pallets.
A mobile kitchen trailer. A box truck full of lumber. Medical kits. Work gloves by the case.
Somebody had printed simple signs: debris crew, meals, power charge, supply runs.
Three hundred returned.
The town stared as if it couldn't process what it was seeing. Not intimidation, logistics.
Dean walked up to Martha near the gym doors, rain drying on his jacket now that the wind had calmed. He didn't smile. He just looked exhausted and present.
"We're here," he said. "In daylight, with permission, with state eyes on everything."
Martha's throat tightened. "You broke curfew."
Dean gave a small, humorless exhale. "They broke the law first."
Caleb appeared behind Dean, pale but free. Hoodie pulled up, eyes still too wide.
He stopped in front of Martha like he didn't know what to say. Martha stepped forward and put a hand on his shoulder.
One brief touch. Steady.
"You did good," she said. "You didn't give them what they wanted."