Margo Holland's Arc

Chapter 6 of 13

Margo was already packing the medical scanner when the runner collapsed in the hospital corridor. Doc Henson caught him before he hit the floor, calling for her even as she grabbed her field kit and crossed the room in six strides. The man wore a courier's pack and had the lean build of someone who covered twenty miles a day between settlements. Sweat soaked through his shirt despite the cool morning air, and when Margo pressed two fingers to his neck, his pulse hammered weak and irregular. She pulled back his eyelids—pupils dilated, whites showing the same yellow tinge she'd seen in the wounded soldier. Her stomach dropped. She needed a tissue sample now, but not here where anyone could walk past and see what she found. Doc Henson helped her drag the man to the old quarantine shed behind the hospital, the one with reinforced walls and a door that locked from outside. Inside smelled like rust and disinfectant. Margo worked fast—drew blood, swabbed tissue from his gums, ran the scanner over his torso while Doc Henson monitored his breathing. The readings came back in ninety seconds. Same mutation markers. Same cellular breakdown. She checked them twice, then pulled out her notebook and compared the data point by point against the soldier's results from three days ago. Perfect match. She walked to the metal filing cabinet in the corner and pulled out a fresh folder, labeling it with the date and the vintage milepost marker she'd seen at the settlement's edge—the route this runner had taken before he ended up here. Two cases now, different exposure sites, same progression pattern. The depot's equipment wasn't just useful anymore. It was the only way to track where this mutation was spreading before every settlement started bringing her bodies instead of patients. She locked the cabinet and turned to Doc Henson. "We leave for the mining entrance tomorrow. No more delays."