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Chapter 267 The City's First Infected

Dr. Zhang sat on a swivel chair in the emergency room of the Central Hospital for a while, rubbing the corner of his eye.

The wall clock showed 2:17 a.m., and he had been working continuously for 36 hours.

The front of the white coat was stained with blood, and the inside of the goggles was fogged up. When they were taken off, two red marks were pressed into the bridge of the nose.

"Dr. Zhang!" Nurse Xiao Wu ran down the corridor, her blue striped nurse uniform still dripping wet. "Five more have been brought in, with the same symptoms as before."

Dr. Zhang stood up, holding onto the back of the chair; the plastic floorboards creaked under his feet.

The benches on both sides of the corridor were full of people, including students in school uniforms, old ladies carrying shopping baskets, and a young man in a suit with his name tag showing: "Wang Qiang, Urban Construction Bureau".

He bent down and pulled a new pair of gloves from under the cart, the rubber making a soft sound on his fingertips.

The newest stretcher was parked at the entrance to the treatment room. The middle-aged female patient's fingernails dug into the sheets, her knuckles turning white.

Her skin was so white it was translucent, her forehead was covered in sweat, and black lines crawled down her neck, spreading like tree roots towards her collarbone and arms.

Dr. Zhang reached out to check the pulse; it was beating fast and erratically, like a stone hitting a piece of metal.

"Temperature: 42 degrees Celsius," the nurse announced, holding up the thermometer.

Dr. Zhang drew a tube of blood, and the liquid in the test tube had an unusual dark purple hue.

He wrote in the medical record: "23:17, female, 47 years old, dark stripes on the neck and upper limbs, high fever, pulse 132 beats/min, blood pressure 90/55 mmHg."

Turning the pages, the previous records were densely packed, with seventy-eight similar cases recorded from early yesterday morning until now.

"Dr. Zhang," Xiao Wu said, handing over the examination form in a low voice, "the old man in bed number three just scratched his daughter, who was accompanying him, until she bled."

She pointed to the end of the corridor, where an elderly man in a striped hospital gown was restrained to a hospital bed, making hoarse sounds, his eyes staring blankly at the ceiling.

Dr. Zhang didn't say anything, but added at the end of the medical record: "Some patients showed aggressive tendencies."

He took out his phone, pretended to adjust his goggles, quickly took a few photos of the patients, then opened his encrypted email, packaged the data, and sent it to Lu Zhao.

The attached note states: "The Southwest region accounts for 63% of the cases, which overlaps with the water source area mentioned by Mr. Lin."

At 3 p.m., footsteps suddenly echoed in the hospital lobby. Dr. Zhang came out of the changing room with a cup of coffee and saw six soldiers in camouflage uniforms standing by the triage desk. Their tactical vests had sealed bags hanging from them, and their helmet visors were reflective, obscuring their faces.

The leading officer slammed his identification on the table: "Looking for the dean."

Half an hour later, the loudspeaker came on.

"Attention all patients and their families: In accordance with the Emergency Public Health Ordinance, patients with persistent high fever or abnormal skin texture will be transferred to a specialized treatment facility. Please cooperate with staff for registration."

Dr. Zhang tightened his grip on his coffee cup. He saw Xiao Liu at the nurses' station, her eyes red, tidying up medical records, and a soldier pushing a sealed stretcher into the corridor. The stretcher was covered with a transparent film and had rubber sealing strips at the four corners.

“Dr. Zhang,” the hospital director came out of his office, loosening his tie, “Don’t stop us. We can only comply with orders from above.”

Dr. Zhang slammed his coffee cup down at the nurses' station. He followed the convoy out of the hospital and hid behind the green belt.

The military truck spewed exhaust fumes as it drove out of the city. He rode his electric scooter, which was parked at the back gate, keeping a distance of two hundred meters.

The car was parked in a wasteland on the outskirts of the city. Dr. Zhang hid the electric scooter in the bushes and squatted behind a sloping hill.

The barbed wire fence was three meters high, with barbed wire wrapped around the top. Guard posts stood every twenty meters, and sentries walked back and forth with rifles in their hands.

As the truck drove through the iron gate, he took three photos with his miniature camera. The lens showed the gray buildings inside the wall, with satellite antennas on the roof.

My phone vibrated; it was a message from Lu Zhao: "Received the photos. Don't expose them."

Dr. Zhang stuffed the camera back into his pocket, the electric scooter key leaving an imprint in his palm.

He recalled the patient's family members on the truck earlier, stopped by soldiers outside the iron gate. The woman cried and tried to get on the truck, but was pushed and stumbled—"We just want to take a look!"

No one paid any attention to her.

At 6 p.m., Dr. Zhang was pulled into the isolation ward by the head nurse.

"Dr. Zhang, please come and see!" The head nurse's hands were trembling. "Old Li in bed number five, he..."

The ward door opened a crack. Dr. Zhang saw a military doctor in a white coat and a patient who was bound hand and foot.

Old Li's skin turned grayish-black, his right fingers were stuck together, and his nails were so long they could scratch the bed rails. He let out a low growl, the restraints were stretched taut, and the bed legs dragged two deep marks on the floor.

"Another case of accelerated mutation." The military doctor wearing gold-rimmed glasses inserted a syringe into Old Li's neck. The moment the blue liquid was injected, Old Li went limp and his eyes rolled back.

"This is the third case today." Another military doctor pulled off his glove. "Headquarters needs live samples; we're preparing to transfer them."

Dr. Zhang took out his phone and recorded a video through the crack in the door. In the video, Old Li's deformed arm gleamed coldly under the light, bearing a resemblance to the patterns on the remains of the Weaver that he had seen at Lin Che's place before.

The video had just been encrypted and sent out when the ward door slammed shut. Dr. Zhang took two steps back and bumped into a fire hydrant.

Lu Zhao's phone vibrated. He replied, "The team has been synced. Team Leader Su has confirmed that the infection matches the system's prediction."

At 11 p.m., Dr. Zhang was organizing maps in his office. He drew a circle in the southwest area with a red pen, and then drew arrows along the water pipes—the earliest cases were like water droplets falling into ink, spreading outwards along the pipes.

The latest red dots are scattered in the east of the city and have nothing to do with the water pipe network.

He wrote in his notebook: "Human-to-human transmission is possible. The initial symptoms are similar to the flu, making it easy to miss."

The pen stopped in mid-air as the door was pushed open.

A man in a black suit stood at the door, with two soldiers behind him holding guns.

The man, wearing a National Security Bureau badge on his chest, smiled without his lips moving: "Dr. Zhang, Chen Li, National Security Bureau Special Operations Team."

Dr. Zhang pushed his notebook into the drawer, his fingertip pressing the emergency button on the corner of the table.

"what's up?"

"The photos you've taken and the emails you've sent recently are all considered leaks of state secrets."

Chen Li took two steps forward, his leather shoes tapping on the floor tiles. "Come with us now and cooperate with the investigation."

Dr. Zhang stood up, the chair scraping against the floor with a harsh sound.

He reached into his pocket for a USB drive containing all the original data.

"I am a doctor, and recording medical records is my duty."

"Doing one's duty?" Chen Li loosened his tie. "Spreading panic is also one's duty?"

He nodded to those behind him, and two soldiers stepped forward.

Dr. Zhang pressed the emergency button, and the laptop in the drawer began to automatically delete files.

As Chen Li grabbed his arm, he heard his phone "ding" – the data had been successfully sent.

In the fortress command center, a message popped up on Su Wanqing's terminal. She glanced at the analysis sent by Dr. Zhang: "Infection rate 0.5%, about 50,000 people, possibly reaching 5% in a week."

Then, looking at the location of the emergency signal, the coordinates were marked at a secret facility in the east of the city.

"We have to go save him." Xiao Ran put his tactical knife on the table, the hilt making a dull thud.

Lin Che stood by the window, the blue lines on the back of his neck slightly burning: "The information he has is too important."

Su Wanqing pushed the terminal to Lu Zhao: "Can you pinpoint the exact location?"

Lu Zhao tapped a few keys on the keyboard, and a satellite image of a gray building popped up on the screen: "Eastern City Military Research Center, Temporary Detention Center."

"How long will it take to prepare?" Xiao Ran asked.

Su Wanqing touched the jade bracelet on her wrist; it was warmer than usual.

“Tonight,” she said, “his data mentions an infection spread pattern that unusually matches what Lin Che said about the water source. We can’t lose this informant.”

On the other side, Lin Che was bending over to check the instruments at the water treatment center. He closed his eyes, his consciousness extending southwest along the water pipes.

The flow of groundwater has changed, like a pool of water disturbed by something, with a sticky, viscous quality—not ordinary pollutants, but something alive.

“Lu Zhao.” He picked up the walkie-talkie. “The water at the Southwest Base is abnormal; it’s more active than before.”

Lu Zhao's voice came through the walkie-talkie: "System analysis of energy fluctuations suggests it may be preparing to open a portal. The data matches the second phase data from the sealed chamber."

Lin Che straightened up, the blue lines on the back of his neck burning even more. He looked out the window; the city lights were blurred into a hazy yellow in the fog.