Chapter 4
The screaming stopped before Ruth reached the door.
That frightened her more than if it had continued.
Medical Seven opened inward on hydraulic hinges.
White light spilled into the tunnel.
Clean floor.
Clean walls.
Clean glass.
The room looked less like a prison than a private clinic.
That was worse too.
Cruelty had easier names when walls were dirty.
Inside, six beds stood behind transparent partitions.
Four occupied.
One empty.
One hidden behind a curtain.
Dr. Emil Varga waited in the center.
Alive.
Thin.
Older than television remembered him.
He wore no government uniform.
Only a gray shirt and surgical vest.
Two security men stood behind him.
One held a rifle.
The other held a remote control.
Ruth looked at the remote.
Varga noticed.
“Good.”
His voice was exactly the one she remembered from plague broadcasts.
Patient.
Reasonable.
The tone of a man who could explain horror until it sounded administrative.
“You still look at hands first.”
Ruth stared.
“You tracked me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He smiled.
“Your sister.”
“Where is she?”
“Near.”
“Show me.”
Varga looked at Soren.
“General.”
Soren raised his pistol.
“Doctor.”
“You failed to keep the city.”
“You failed to die.”
Varga smiled.
“Official death was useful.”
Maya stepped beside Ruth.
“Where is Lena?”
Varga looked at her.
“Architect.”
Maya’s jaw tightened.
“You used my shafts.”
“You built excellent systems.”
“Not for this.”
“You built them for people who paid.”
Ruth felt Maya flinch.
Varga enjoyed precision too much.
Ruth said, “Stop.”
He looked at her.
“You want me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Blood compatibility.”
“That is not an answer.”
“It is the beginning.”
He gestured toward the occupied beds.
Ruth saw ports.
Monitors.
Scars on arms.
Not one type of treatment.
Multiple.
“Continuity was not one program,” Varga said.
“Of course.”
“It began with emergency medicine. Blood substitutes. Radiation countermeasures. Immunological research.”
“On prisoners.”
“Eventually.”
Ruth felt sick.
“Eventually?”
“When volunteers became politically difficult.”
Maya whispered, “Jesus.”
Varga looked annoyed.
“Do not become morally theatrical after building a military ventilation network.”
Ruth said, “You keep trying to make everyone else guilty enough that you disappear inside the crowd.”
Varga’s smile faded slightly.
Good.
She continued.
“You did this.”
“I directed parts.”
“Parts.”
“Continuity had committees.”
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The word people use when nobody wants a hand.”
Soren gave a grim smile.
Varga ignored him.
Ruth pointed at the curtained bed.
“Lena.”
Varga did not answer.
Ruth moved.
The security man lifted his rifle.
Soren lifted his.
Maya drew her pistol.
For one second, everyone became a trigger.
Then a voice came from behind the curtain.
“Ruth.”
Her sister.
Ruth forgot the guns.
She crossed.
Varga said, “Do not.”
She did.
The rifle moved.
Soren fired first.
Not at the man.
At the ceiling light.
Darkness flashed.
Maya tackled the second guard.
Ruth ripped the curtain aside.
Lena lay in the bed.
Thin.
Hair cut short.
Face older.
Alive.
Ruth stopped.
Eight years collapsed.
Lena looked at her.
Then smiled.
“You still hate olives?”
Ruth began crying.
“Shut up.”
Lena laughed.
Then coughed.
Ruth grabbed her hand.
Warm.
Real.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
“Can you move?”
“Define move.”
Same sister.
Ruth looked at IV lines.
“What are they giving you?”
“Mostly saline now.”
“Mostly?”
“Long story.”
“Short version.”
“Varga is a bastard.”
“Useful.”
Behind them, struggle.
Maya yelled.
Soren cursed.
A shot.
Ruth looked back.
One security man down.
Alive.
Bleeding from leg.
Maya had the remote.
The other guard had surrendered.
Varga stood with both hands visible.
Too calm.
Ruth hated calm.
Soren pointed the pistol at him.
“Where are the explosives?”
Varga looked bored.
“What explosives?”
“The ward.”
“No explosives.”
Soren’s face hardened.
“Gas?”
“Already failed.”
Maya held up the remote.
“What does this control?”
Varga looked at her.
“Doors.”
“Only?”
“Mostly.”
Maya laughed.
“Mostly is becoming a dangerous word.”
Ruth examined Lena.
Pupils equal.
Pulse fast.
Old bruising.
Surgical scar along abdomen.
“What happened?”
Lena saw her looking.
“Later.”
Ruth met her eyes.
“Your choice.”
Lena’s face softened.
“Thank you.”
That mattered more than Ruth expected.
She checked the bed chart.
Codes.
No normal diagnosis.
Genetic markers.
Cellular assays.
Ruth felt cold.
“Family match.”
Lena closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
“What did they need me for?”
“Not me.”
Ruth froze.
“What?”
Lena looked toward the other beds.
“Child.”
Ruth’s stomach dropped.
Maya stepped closer.
“Tomas?”
Varga’s calm finally cracked.
Tiny.
Ruth saw it.
She turned.
“The child in the ministry.”
Varga said nothing.
Lena whispered:
“He’s the last one.”
Ruth stared.
“Last what?”
Varga spoke.
“Do not.”
Lena laughed weakly.
“You kept me alive eight years. You don’t get to become shy now.”
Ruth looked at her sister.
Lena said:
“Last surviving child from Cohort T.”
The words meant nothing.
Ruth hated that.
“Explain.”
Lena swallowed.
“Continuity tested hereditary immune resistance in families exposed to the North Fever.”
Ruth remembered the epidemic nine years earlier.
Thousands dead.
The regime claimed it had contained the outbreak.
Lena had investigated missing hospital records afterward.
“Families?”
“Yes.”
“Children?”
Lena nodded.
Ruth’s stomach turned.
“Why Tomas?”
“He was born to two former Cohort subjects.”
Maya whispered, “So he carries markers.”
Lena nodded.
Varga stepped forward.
Soren raised the gun.
“Stay.”
Varga stopped.
Lena continued.
“The regime tracked pregnancies.”
Ruth felt cold.
“His parents?”
“Missing.”
“Dead?”
“I don’t know.”
Varga said, “Alive at last report.”
Ruth turned.
“Where?”
“Another sector.”
“Which?”
Varga smiled faintly.
“Now we negotiate.”
Soren cocked the pistol.
“No.”
Ruth raised a hand.
“Don’t.”
The general looked at her.
“He knows prisoner locations.”
“So do maps.”
“Incomplete.”
“Still.”
Varga looked at Ruth.
“You understand triage.”
Ruth’s face hardened.
“Do not use that word.”
“Why? Because medicine becomes ugly when resources are finite?”
“No.”
“Because triage means choosing who can be saved.”
“Yes.”
“And that is what we are doing.”
“No.”
Ruth stepped toward him.
“You built the fire and now call yourself the person choosing which rooms get water.”
Varga’s expression went still.
Good.
Maya said, “What is Cohort T?”
Lena answered.
“The child group.”
Ruth stared.
“How many?”
“Originally forty-two.”
Silence.
“Tomas?”
“Last confirmed living.”
Ruth felt the world tilt.
Varga spoke carefully.
“Confirmed is not certain.”
“You tracked them.”
“Most.”
“What happened?”
“Disease. complications. transfers.”
“Experiments.”
He did not deny it.
Ruth wanted to kill him.
That frightened her.
She looked at Soren.
He already knew what that kind of anger became.
He saw her face.
“Do not.”
She almost laughed.
“You?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because dead men stop answering.”
He was right.
Again.
It was unbearable.
Maya walked to the control panel.
“There are other medical sectors.”
Varga said nothing.
“How many children?”
“Not children now.”
“What?”
“Other cohorts aged.”
Lena whispered, “Some have been here a decade.”
Ruth stared.
“Thousands under the city.”
“Yes.”
“Not all political prisoners.”
“No.”
Some were research subjects.
Witnesses.
Relatives.
People turned into categories.
Maya looked at the infrastructure map.
“We need to open sectors.”
Varga said, “You cannot.”
“Watch me.”
“No power.”
“We have manual.”
“Not all doors.”
“Then tell me.”
Varga smiled.
“Negotiate.”
Soren hit him.
Hard enough to drop him.
Ruth turned.
“I said later.”
Soren looked down at Varga.
“Later arrived.”
Varga wiped blood from his lip.
Then laughed.
“You still think violence makes truth move faster.”
Soren’s face hardened.
“Sometimes.”
Lena said weakly:
“Stop.”
Everyone looked at her.
She pointed toward the monitor.
“Battery.”
Ruth checked.
Low.
“What happens when it dies?”
“Nothing dramatic.”
“Lena.”
“Heart rhythm gets annoying.”
Ruth looked at Varga.
“What did you do?”
“She has conduction damage.”
“From what?”
He said nothing.
Lena answered.
“Treatment.”
Ruth felt rage again.
She forced it into work.
“Need portable monitor. Electrolytes. transport.”
Maya said, “Upstairs?”
Ruth looked toward tunnels.
Opposition.
Unknown loyalties.
Collapse risk.
“Not yet.”
Lena grabbed her wrist.
“No.”
“What?”
“Not command.”
Ruth stared.
“Why?”
“Because Darek knows.”
The name hit.
Colonel Darek.
Opposition central command.
The man who ordered tunnels collapsed.
Maya went still.
Soren smiled without joy.
“I told you.”
Ruth looked at Lena.
“Knows what?”
“Continuity.”
“How?”
“He was in it.”
Silence.
“What?”
Lena swallowed.
“Not prisoner.”
“Staff?”
“No.”
“Then?”
“Funding channel.”
Maya stared.
“The opposition colonel funded regime research?”
Lena closed her eyes.
“Before he was opposition.”
Soren said, “Many people became revolutionaries late.”
Ruth turned.
“You knew?”
“I knew Darek moved medical imports through his transport company.”
“Why wasn’t he arrested?”
“He paid everyone.”
Of course.
Lena continued.
“He later financed the uprising.”
Maya’s face hardened.
“So if prisoners come out…”
“They can connect him.”
Ruth looked at the dead speaker.
The order to collapse tunnels.
Possible escape route.
Maybe true.
Maybe also convenient.
“Evidence?”
Lena pointed weakly toward her own head.
“I remember accounts.”
Ruth’s throat tightened.
Human archive.
“That’s why you’re dangerous.”
“Yes.”
“To both sides.”
“Yes.”
Varga stood slowly.
“And useful.”
Ruth looked at him.
“Do not.”
“Your sister holds the ledger everyone wants.”
“She is not a ledger.”
Lena smiled faintly.
“Thank you.”
Then an alarm sounded.
Different.
Maya looked at the panel.
“Surface breach.”
Soren frowned.
“How?”
A speaker crackled.
Not Varga.
Elias.
“Maya!”
She grabbed the wall intercom.
“Elias?”
Static.
Then:
“Central command entered the ministry.”
Ruth’s blood went cold.
“Darek?”
“His people.”
Maya looked at Lena.
Elias continued:
“They say they are here to secure prisoners.”
Soren laughed.
Ruth ignored him.
“How many?”
“Forty.”
“Where is Tomas?”
“With me.”
“Do not hand him over.”
A pause.
“Why?”
Ruth looked at Lena.
Then answered:
“Because he is the last child of Cohort T.”
Silence.
Elias whispered, “What the hell is Cohort T?”
Ruth said:
“Exactly what Colonel Darek may want buried.”
The intercom clicked dead.
Varga smiled.
“Now you understand.”
Ruth looked at him.
“No.”
“What?”
“I understand why everyone wants us afraid.”
She turned to Maya.
“Open every door we can.”
Then to Soren.
“You help.”
He stared.
“Why would I?”
Ruth looked at him.
“Because if you want anyone to believe you kept people alive, now is your first chance to prove it.”
Soren’s face changed.
Lena whispered:
“And Varga?”
Ruth looked at the doctor.
He stood in his clean clinic, blood on his lip, surrounded by the consequences of years he had called necessity.
“Tie him to the bed.”
May you like
For the first time, Lena laughed like herself.
“God, I missed you.”
