The news from the Kojin Foothills was a constant, keening siren in Reuben's mind, a Category-4 threat that took every second of his concentration. He and Anna were well into strategy, their maps of the region spread out across the clinic table, their late-night planning sessions. The success of the mobile clinic had set the precedent, but the Foothills were a different beast—distant, suspicious, and logistically atrocious. They were about to sink their precious resources, a gamble that would test the HON to its maximum.
It was in the middle of one such tense planning session that the System beeped—not the cacophonous warning bell of the Kojin forecast, but a softer, more questioning trill. A pale, shimmering blue icon began to pulse on the edge of his National Map, far to the south of the
