I do not activate the emergency channel.
I am already moving. The medical supplies I requisitioned three days ago are stored in the cabinet beside my station: broad-spectrum antibiotics, IV fluids, antipyretics, sterile dressings. I told the supply clerk it was for a routine restocking. He did not question the request.
I knew this might happen. I prepared for it.
The corridor is empty as I run toward the Processing Room. My footsteps break their usual rhythm, urgency overriding discipline. The biometric scanner accepts my palm with agonizing slowness.
I enter the room. The amber light shows me what the infrared could only suggest.
He is dying.
His skin has taken on a grayish pallor beneath the fever flush. His lips are pale, almost blue at the edges. His body trembles with continuous shivers. When I press my hand to his forehead, the heat is alarming.
His eyes flutter open. They are glassy, unfocused.
“Papa,” he whispers. “Papa, I tried. I tried to be good.”
He is not speaking to me. He is speaking to ghosts.
I work quickly. The existing IV line is hot and swollen, the surrounding tissue angry red. I pull the old line and apply pressure. I find a new vein on his other forearm. The needle slides in. He doesn’t flinch. He’s too far gone.
I hang the fluid bag. Antipyretic next—injected directly into the IV line. Then cooling measures: cold packs at his neck, armpits, groin.
Antibiotics follow. The injection site is the muscle of his upper arm. I deliver the dose with efficiency.
“Mama.” His voice has changed. Softer. Younger. “Mama, don’t go. Please don’t go. I’ll be whatever Papa wants.”
I retrieve a cloth and dampen it. His forehead is slick with sweat, hair plastered to his skull. I wipe the moisture away.
“She left anyway,” he murmurs. “She left and Papa said it was because I wasn’t strong enough.”
His mother died when he was seven. Official cause: cardiac failure. But he mentioned stopped medication during his hallucinations.
His mother chose to die. That is what he believes.
The parallel to my own history is uncomfortable. I set it aside.
“Dmitri.” The name emerges with force. “Dmitri, you always wanted it. But you weren’t good enough.”
He breaks off, coughing. I support his head while the fit passes.
“The fishery,” he says when the coughing subsides. His voice drops to a conspiratorial whisper. “Dmitri doesn’t know about the fishery. Papa only told me. It’s in Severomorsk. Near the old naval base. TheKrovavaya Ryba. Bloody Fish.”
I freeze.
“There’s a cellar,” he continues. “Under the processing floor. Papa hides things there when the northern routes get too hot. Money. Documents. Sometimes people.”
The address is specific. The details are specific. This is not rambling; this is disclosure.
I reach for my tablet.
The action is automatic. My fingers move across the screen, documenting the address, the identifying details. TheKrovavaya Ryba. A Petrenko safe house that does not appear in any intelligence database.
This is valuable. This is the asset Ivan has been demanding.
I send the coordinates before I can reconsider.
The message transmits instantly. Three seconds later, my tablet pings: RECEIVED. TEAM DEPLOYING.
