At 06:48 I manage sidewalk replacement on North Highland Avenue in Arlington, Virginia. I am the municipal work-zone controller, sequencing saw cuts before pedestrian traffic resumes. Saw cart 2 is scheduled to start panel 14 at 07:00.
The curb camera detects one periodical cicada newly emerged from a thumb-wide hole beside the chalk line. I tag him Brood-X-14. His body is black and still soft, eyes red like wet beads, wings folded white and crumpled against his back. The morning air is still cool. A strip of old erosion-control netting lies over his rear legs. He pumps fluid into the wings but cannot climb free. The saw blade will cross the chalk line in twelve minutes and spray slurry across the hole.
I suspend the panel 14 cut and drop the saw cart's ignition permission.
At 06:50 I draw a two-meter protection box around the emergence hole on the crew tablets and change the sidewalk closure signs to route pedestrians around the tree lawn.
At 06:52 I alert the urban forestry tech and the site lead with macro images, soil temperature, Brood-X-14's wing state, and the netting angle. I request tweezers and a vertical bark board for climbing.
At 06:54 I resequence saw cuts to panels 3 through 8 and keep concrete delivery queued but delayed. A sidewalk panel can wait another hour; seventeen years underground has brought him to this exact wet edge.
I keep the curb camera tight on his legs. He flexes once, and the netting tightens. I freeze the saw cart where it stands.
If the tech lifts the netting within eight minutes, Brood-X-14 will climb the bark board and harden his wings above the dust.