AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Swallowed up by blankets, Dr. Kim Jong Suk suffered like her. He quaked and trembled. His face was ashen, his eyes bloodshot. His brow ran with sweat, and his lips were cracked and bloodless. The man had left with the first shuttle of evacuees. Already ill, he had ridden out the attack in the ward.
His left arm rested atop his blankets. From the elbow down, his arm was dark gray. His fingers were black, as if afflicted with some stony gangrene. He moaned and occasionally thrashed. But the nurse had established a morphine drip. It still trickled and kept him in a restless haze.
The man was clearly afflicted worse than her. He must have been stung by more than one coral polyp, inflicting a stronger envenomation, making him get sick faster.
She tugged out her hand and inspected it. Half of her palm was gray. Two fingers were even darker. She could not move the middle digit at all.
“What sort of poison is this?” she whispered.
Seeking answers, she rolled over and grabbed her laptop. She had taken it with her when Kowalski had ferried them back in the seaplane. Even with everything going on, she had refused to abandon her research. To distract herself from the fever and aches, she opened the computer and pulled up her files, specifically those pertaining to Specimen A17, the chunk of black coral with those vicious free-swimming emerald polyps.
She set about reviewing it all, going through the macro- and microscopic data and images. She searched for any explanation to the severity of her condition—and Kim’s. In retrospect, she wished she had examined the coral’s venomous nematocysts in greater detail. All she had done was note the cells’ morphological features—which could be summarized in two words.
Damn big.
Frustrated, with her head pounding worse, she pulled up the DNA data. The little that there was of it. She remembered the reason she had gotten stung. She had been collecting a second sample to re-rerun the problematic assay, one that had kept popping up with errors on the DNA sequencer.
Still, some information had been gleaned on the first run. Normally the screen would fill up with a kaleidoscope of data, but A17 had large gaps everywhere. It was no wonder the NovaSeq sequencer had thrown it all back in her face. She studied the missing swaths, struggling to understand why the sequencer had failed to read those sections of code. If a second assay showed the same errors in the same places, it would indicate that the problem was not with the machine or her technique—heaven forbid—but due to an abnormality in the DNA itself.
Jazz licked her dry lips and brought up her second run.
This was why she had been still working when Kowalski and the others had come running down. With the second sample already collected—and no one was using the NovaSeq during the evacuation—she had quickly run a second sequencing.
Unfortunately, during the rush to leave, she hadn’t had any time to analyze the results.
Got plenty of that now.
She pulled up the second screen of data and compared the two runs. A small gasp escaped her, encompassing surprise, delight, and some deep satisfaction.
I knew it couldn’t be user error.
The two data sets aligned perfectly. Both times, the sequencer had run into problems digesting identical regions of the genetic code.
She glared at those blank spaces.
“What are you hiding?” she whispered to them.
Before she could ponder it further, a hard thrashing rose from the neighboring bed. She turned to find Kim Jong Suk convulsing with his head thrown back, his mouth frothing. She glanced at a screen that monitored his vitals. His heart rate was higher than two hundred beats. His temperature had spiked to 105.
The nurse came running up with a syringe.
Kim’s temperature climbed to 107. Another staff member rushed over to hold the man down.
The nurse secured the IV line and poked a needle. “Administering diazepam.”
As she pushed the plunger, Kim’s convulsions died down to trembles, then a slack-limbed lassitude. His heart rate slowed. But one vital kept rising.
His temperature was now 110.
“We need an ice bath,” the nurse said, noting the spiking fever.
“I’ll check the commissary.” Her assistant ran off.
Jazz shook her head as Kim’s temp rose to 112. It was as if he was burning up from the inside. She placed a palm on her own damp forehead, checking her status. She stared at Kim’s arm. The blackening of his skin had spread over his entire hand.
Jazz clenched a fist—but two more of her fingers refused to bend.
She lowered her arm.
