Margo Holland's Arc

Chapter 5 of 13

Margo left before dawn with the deserter's coordinates memorized and Doc Henson's field kit strapped to her pack. The fifteen-mile trek east took her through territory she'd only mapped from a distance—broken ground where the old mining operations had left the earth split and uneven. She found the dragline first, its steel frame rising against the morning sky like a monument to abandoned industry. The cables hung slack between the towers, and beneath the boom's shadow sat an old bunkhouse with peeling paint and broken windows. The Land Rover was there too, exactly where the deserter said it would be—jungle camouflage faded to gray, tires rotted to nothing. Margo checked the bunkhouse door. Still locked. She picked it in under a minute. Inside, dust covered everything except a metal lockbox on the table. The deserter had left supplies—water purification tablets, ammunition, a first aid kit that matched Doc Henson's descriptions. But what stopped her breath was the keyring at the bottom. Six brass keys, each labeled in faded ink: Research Wing Main, Archive Storage, Lab Three, Equipment Cage, Server Access, Emergency Exit. The deserter hadn't just found a back way in. He'd stolen access to the entire research wing before he ran. Margo tested each key against the light, checking for damage. All intact. The override codes she'd memorized would open security doors, but these keys would let her move through the research wing without triggering every alarm in the system. She pocketed the ring and pulled out her notebook, adding a new line to her entry plan: silent approach through mining access, keys for internal doors, override codes held in reserve. The mission had just shifted from infiltration to methodical extraction. She had everything she needed except one thing—the mining entrance itself. Time to find out if forty years had collapsed it or left it waiting.