Lannie knelt by the front steps of the red brick school, scooping a wandering beetle into her clear plastic carrier. Three pill bugs already huddled inside. A spider watched from the corner of the lid with steady, careful eyes. Lannie sighed. She saved them every morning. By afternoon, they crawled right back into danger. "They keep returning," the spider said flatly. His name was George Silkweaver. "I have mapped it. Four rescues. Same tile. Same bug." A small june bug shuffled up beside her shoe. "I keep thinking the grass is safer," he said. "I keep thinking that every time." He stared at a boot print in the dirt and said nothing more. Lannie looked at the carrier. She looked at the wide lawn behind the school. Saving wasn't enough. They needed somewhere to stay. Somewhere shoes could not reach. She spent the afternoon building it. Scrap wood, smooth stones, soft moss, tiny doorways at every level. She added shelves, hollows, and a little porch with flowers in cups. By sunset, a small wooden house stood tucked beneath the hedge, far from any footpath. Lannie opened the carrier lid. George Silkweaver stepped out first and inspected the third doorway. The june bug followed, quiet as ever. The pill bugs rolled inside. For the first time, Lannie's rescues had a home — and tomorrow, she would need to tell the others where to find it.

Morning came, and Lannie found the hedge crushed flat near the shelter's entrance. A heavy boot print sat in the dirt. Inside, George Silkweaver huddled against a stone, shaking. Lannie's stomach went cold. Someone had come close. She pulled out her phone and opened the ring camera app. The footage played. The gym teacher stood at the hedge, scanning, then stomped down hard before walking off. Lannie saved the clip. Evidence. She found Oliver Beetles by the first grade door, bug shirt and all. "I need a watcher during gym class," Lannie said. Oliver nodded once. "I'll log every move," he said. "He won't see me." Outside the fence, the stray orange and white dog was sniffing the grass. Lannie crouched and offered half her sandwich. "Guard the hedge," she whispered. The dog sat down beside the gap like he'd been waiting for the job. She still needed to hide the crushed spot. Lannie carried over the small wooden garden sign from the planter beds and staked it in the broken gap. Leaves draped. From the path, it looked like the sign had always been there. By lunch, the shelter was hidden, watched, and guarded. George Silkweaver stopped shaking. But Lannie kept glancing at the old greenhouse past the field, its glass dim under vines. If the boot came back, she'd need somewhere new.

By Tuesday, the shelter was hidden, watched, and guarded — but Lannie couldn't reach it. The gym teacher had started walking the field before school, after school, and twice during her prep block. Lannie watched from the science room window as Coach Sandra Martinez paced a fresh white line that hadn't been there last week. Crisp running lanes now stretched across the grass, ending three steps from the hedge. "She painted lanes," Lannie said. The science teacher didn't look up from her beetle tank. She slid a brown leatherbound book across the counter. The cover was soft from handling. Inside, blank pages waited. Lannie took the journal to the window and started logging. 7:42 — Coach at the south lane. 8:15 — Coach at the hedge corner. 10:30 — Coach running drills. 12:05 — Coach eating a sandwich on the bleachers, watching. By Thursday, Lannie had three pages of times. A pattern showed up between 1:50 and 2:10, when Coach Martinez was inside reviewing relay tape. Twenty minutes. Enough to refill the shelter's water dish and check on George Silkweaver. On Friday at 1:51, Lannie slipped out the side door with the bug carrier. She crossed the painted lanes and crouched at the garden sign. George Silkweaver was already at the entrance, waiting. "Three nights of dry weather," he said. "Water level dropped by half. I logged it." George JuneBug sat behind him on a pebble. "I keep thinking the grass is safer," he said. "I keep thinking that every time." Lannie poured fresh water and set down a bottle cap of sugar paste. Eight minutes left. She was zipping the carrier when sneakers stopped on the path behind her. Coach Martinez stood at the edge of the lane, clipboard under her arm. "You're on my track," Coach said. "I know your schedule," Lannie said before she could stop herself. Coach Martinez looked at the journal sticking out of Lannie's pocket. She looked at the garden sign. She looked at the hedge. "Field day's in three weeks," Coach said. "After that, the lanes come up." She walked off without waiting for a reply. Lannie stood there with the carrier in her hand. Three weeks. The patrol wouldn't stop — it would get worse, every day, until the relay was over. The twenty-minute window was the only one she had, and now Coach Martinez knew about it. Lannie tucked the journal deeper into her pocket and looked past the field, toward the old greenhouse under its vines. She would need the backup shelter ready before field day, not after.

Monday morning, Lannie found them before the first bell. Five strangers, all clustered near the chalk start line where sneakers would land in under an hour. A long-legged fly on the lane paint. A woolly caterpillar inching across lane three. A bumblebee low in the clover. A ladybug on a hurdle leg. And, half-tucked under a rubber starting block, a masked hunter bug with its front legs folded like a knife. Lannie crouched. "Names?" she whispered. Each one answered George. She wrote it down five times. The ledger sat open on her knee, its red cover smudged with grass. She filled a fresh page: George the Long-Legged Fly, George the Woolly Caterpillar, George the Bumblebee, George Ladybug, George the Masked Hunter Bug. She drew arrows showing where she found each one. The shelter under the hedge was out. Coach Martinez would be on the field in twenty minutes, and the garden sign was being watched. The greenhouse wasn't ready. Lannie had nowhere to put five bugs, and the painted lanes were about to fill with running shoes and the long metal benches the coach dragged out for timing heats. She looked at the bench stand parked at the curve of the track. Five seats bolted to a steel frame, waiting to be wheeled into place beside lane one. Whichever George she missed would be under it by third period. Lannie stood up. She had a shed key, a roll of window screen in the supply closet, and a free prep block. She ran. By 8:40, she had it built. An old wooden cabinet from the custodian's overflow, dragged behind the science room and stood upright against the brick. She drilled air holes. She lined the inside with five small mesh compartments, each one labeled with a strip of masking tape and a name. Water dish. Leaf. Twist of damp paper towel. A separate cage for the masked hunter, because it ate the others. The science teacher passed her in the hall, glanced at the cabinet, and said nothing. She came back two minutes later with a jar of aphids and set it on top. Lannie carried the bug rescue carrier out at 8:52. She got the fly first, then the ladybug, then the bumblebee in a folded index card, then the caterpillar in her palm. The masked hunter she coaxed onto a stick. By 9:04, all five Georges were locked in their compartments behind the science room, fed, watered, and breathing. Lannie closed the ledger. The cabinet wasn't a home. It was a holding cell, and it would hold for maybe a week. She had until field day to finish the greenhouse, and now she had five more lives counting on it.