The vial of ZM-99, last-resort broad-spectrum antiviral, seemed to be colder than ice in Reuben's palm. There was only one in camp. Only one for five hundred miles. It had taken all his remaining 800 DP, a king's ransom for a solitary, desperate roll of the dice. It was not a cure for "Crimson Star," but the System had calculated a 38% possibility it could delay the viral replication long enough to allow one of its patient's immune systems some chance to catch up. In the dismal arithmetic of the Red Zone, 38% was an oasis of hope.
He now clutched it not for some unknown patient, but for a friend.
Dr. Nalini Sharma lay on a cot in the confirmed ward, wheezing a wet, ragged fight. A star epidemiologist for the WHO and perhaps the most single-mindedly focused individual her friend had ever
