Just as someone was approaching the trailer door, Mikhail straightened from his crouch beside the crate of scaffolding clamps, brushing dust from his palms. The hinges creaked. Lars stepped in, a flashlight cutting a beam through the low-hanging dust and stale warmth.
"Are you counting bolts in the dark again?" Lars asked, letting the door swing shut behind him.
Mikhail offered a dry smile. "I find it calming."
Lars held up a folded sheaf of papers in one hand. "Got something for you. Numbers are off."
Mikhail took them without protest. He scanned them quickly, eyes narrowing as he reached the equipment rental estimates. "Damn," he muttered. "I missed the variable compounding rates on the crawler crane lease."
"Not just the crane," Lars said, pulling up the rickety stool opposite him. "The tie rod inventory, the rebar quote, we need a ten percent buffer minimum. Otherwise we're wide open."
Mikhail tapped the page with a knuckle. "You're right. I rushed it."
Lars watched him, eyes keen. He expected pushback, maybe even defensiveness. But Mikhail only pulled a red pen from behind his ear and began marking corrections. No fuss. No ego.
"You're not like most architects I've worked with," Lars said after a beat. "Half of them draw their little kingdoms, expecting the world to fit inside."
Mikhail didn't look up. "Buildings fail when their plans are made to impress, not to hold weight."
Lars snorted. "You sound like a guy who's seen a few collapses."
Silence stretched, the scribble of pen on paper the only sound. Then Mikhail spoke, soft but firm. "I've seen foundations sink, trusses shear, and scaffolding fall. I've seen the math go wrong and lives pay for it."
Lars nodded slowly, watching the younger man's hand hover over the beam span notation. "Yeah," he said, almost to himself. "That's what I thought."
He leaned over the table, tapping the blueprints rolled up in the corner. "That new central slab you drew last week. You designed it with a post-tensioned grid, didn't you?"
Mikhail looked up. "Yes. It'll resist shear without doubling material."
Lars gave a low whistle. "That's some advanced stuff. Clean work too. That load distribution is tighter than a drum. You sure you haven't built a few dozen plants before?"
"Only in theory," Mikhail said. "Until now."
Lars smirked, rubbing his stubble. "Well, your theory just saved us ten grand and three weeks of headaches. Most men don't know how to hold a t-beam in their mind, much less redesign one under budget."
A small smile tugged at Mikhail's face, but he stayed quiet.
Lars stood and stretched, joints cracking. "Alright. Let's rerun the materials list before dawn hits. You've got a good head for load paths, but you still suck at counting bolts."
Mikhail chuckled, rising. "Deal."
But just as he reached for the next crate, a sharp rap hit the trailer door. It wasn't a worker's knock,too precise, too firm.
Lars frowned. "Are you expecting someone?"
Mikhail shook his head. "Not at this hour."
Lars moved toward the door, cautious. "Then let's find out who's knocking on a skeleton of steel at midnight."
"Then let's find out who's knocking on a skeleton of steel at midnight."
Lars swung open the trailer door with a sharp creak. Outside, the night was thick with the scent of concrete dust and diesel. A single figure stood under the glow of the halogen work lamp, Kat, jacket half-zipped, boots streaked with mud. She looked like she hadn't meant to stop by, but something had pushed her out here.
"You're both up," she said, stepping inside.
"We were recalculating the budget," Mikhail replied. "Come in."
Kat slipped past Lars and dropped her notebook onto the makeshift desk. "Then you'll want to see this."
She flipped open the cover, revealing a hand-drawn stress analysis grid over Mikhail's slab design. "The central tension lines will need doubling if we push the output volume you listed in the forecast," she said. "I ran the numbers three times."
Lars raised a brow. "You're not wrong."
Mikhail studied the lines, fingers resting lightly on the edge of the paper. He didn't challenge it. Instead, he took the red pen again and drew two faint diagonal slashes across the middle span.
"I can reframe it," he said. "Post-tension will still hold, but we'll shift the ducts."
Kat watched him closely. "No protest?"
Mikhail gave a tired smile. "I want it to stand. Not just stand, endure. That's the whole point."
She leaned against the table, arms folded. "Then let me help. I can run CAD layouts this week. You shouldn't be shouldering every load."
Lars chuckled. "Funny how your people are just as obsessive as you are, DuPont."
"We're not his people," Kat said, but there was no heat in it.
Mikhail glanced up, locking eyes with her. "You are. All of you."
That quiet admission held no command, no arrogance. Just the truth. For a moment, the three of them stood there, engineer, builder, architect, each one holding a part of something larger than themselves. Something real. Something is rising.
Lars clapped his hands once. "Well then. I'll update the supplier list, get new bids on tension cables. We'll need reinforced ducts if we're raising the pre-stress."
"I'll send the new form diagrams to Erik," Kat added. "He'll want to adjust the cost brackets."
"Good," Mikhail said, finally feeling the tiredness in his shoulders ease. "We do it together. We build it right."
He moved to the whiteboard and began redrawing the slab outline. Kat stepped beside him, sketching structural annotations in the margins. Lars leaned over the desk, flipping through the updated vendor packets.
Three minds, one design.
But just as Mikhail was outlining a new pour sequence, the radio on the corner shelf crackled, white noise at first, then a clipped voice breaking through.
"…unauthorized equipment shipment… southern gate… repeat, possible theft in progress…"
Lars straightened.
Kat's eyes darted to Mikhail. "That's our inventory."
Mikhail grabbed his coat from the hook. "Let's move."