Margo Holland's Arc

Chapter 12 of 13

Margo walked deeper into the tunnel, flashlight beam cutting through the darkness ahead. The concrete walls pressed close on both sides, lined with copper wiring that hummed faintly with residual current. She kept her pace steady, counting steps to track distance. Fifty yards in, she found him. A soldier lay crumpled against the tunnel wall near a weathered blast door set into concrete. Blood pooled beneath his leg, dark and fresh. His uniform bore military insignia, but the fabric had been torn at the shoulder. A surveillance camera mounted on a pole twenty feet back pointed directly at his position, its wires trailing loose from the concrete base. Someone had tracked him here and left the camera running to record what happened next. Margo knelt beside him and pressed two fingers to his neck. Weak pulse, rapid breathing. She pulled her medical kit from her pack and started working on the leg wound. The soldier's hand moved, gripping her wrist. His eyes opened halfway, unfocused. He reached into his jacket with his other hand and pulled out a sealed envelope, stamped with military markings. He pressed it into her palm, his voice barely a whisper. "They know you're coming. Lab Three." Margo tore the envelope open. Inside was a printed photograph of her face—recent, taken from surveillance footage—with coordinates written across the bottom in red ink. The coordinates matched the location Chen had given her for the tunnel entrance. Beneath the photo was a transmission log showing her medical override codes flagged in the depot's security system three days ago. The officers weren't just covering up Lab Three. They'd been waiting for her specifically. Margo folded the envelope and shoved it into her jacket. She applied pressure to the soldier's leg and pulled a stim from her kit, injecting it into his thigh. His breathing steadied slightly. She couldn't carry him back alone, and leaving him here meant he'd bleed out before help arrived. But the blast door behind him led forward—toward Lab Three and the server room where she could pull the full transmission records. She had proof now that the cover-up extended beyond Chen's documents. The officers had set a trap, and Chen had walked straight into it hours ago. Margo made her decision. She activated her radio and sent coordinates to Doc Henson, marking the soldier's position for extraction. Then she stood, checked her remaining keys, and moved toward the blast door. The officers knew she was coming. That meant they'd prepared for her override codes too.