Chapter 2 #2
Eira’s tone cooled. "Then if Blake doesn’t call me today, tell him I expect Mr. Varga at my clinic tomorrow for a recheck. Otherwise, I escalate through the medical ethics board as per my contract."
The nurse gave a tight nod. "Understood."
She returned to the room, adjusted the IV and took another set of vital signs. Before stepping out, she adjusted the angle of his bed to ease the swelling in his ankle.
She handed Aurelia a printed copy of the vitals log with her annotations and orders. “If anything changes, you contact my clinic directly. Use the emergency code.”
Before leaving, she leaned close to the patient’s ear.
“Mr. Varga, remember this for me.” She whispered a date and time.
It was a simple, personal marker. She’d use it as a test, not just of memory, but of lucidity and orientation.
If he repeated it later, she'd know he could recall, reason, and recognize her again.
She took a photo of him for clinical documentation and saved it to her encrypted drive. Then she wrote the patient ID on her wrist.
The skiff was waiting for her at the dock. She didn’t look back.
THE CLINIC
The clinic felt wrong before anything was confirmed.
Eira stood in her office, the pictures of Varga’s chart open in front of her. Aurelia’s notes were precise. Too precise for what she’d come to expect from Tevenne. That was the first thing that didn’t fit.
The second was Varga himself. High fever. Early atelectasis in the left lung. Flu made sense. But not like this. Not this fast.
She picked up the phone and dialed.
“Dr. Blake.”
“This is Dr. Montgomery from Kasavoa.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’ve seen the intake notes. Sorry for wasting your time.”
“You didn’t waste my time. He’s not stabilizing,” Eira said. “Fever’s not breaking. Lung involvement is starting.”
“Flu,” Blake said.
“You don’t know that yet.”
“It’s the most likely diagnosis.”
Eira stared at the chart. “It’s not the only one. If this progresses, we’re looking at pneumonia.”
A soft exhale on the other end. “You’re escalating early.”
“I’m paying attention early.”
“You’re not on Tevenne,” Blake said. “We manage our own cases.”
“He needs a physician assigned,” she said. “Not observation under security protocol.”
“That is not your call.”
Eira’s tone cooled. “It becomes my call when he crashes and you call me back.”
“You’re reading too much into this,” Blake said.
Eira didn’t let it go this time. “I’ve treated on Tevenne for years. I’ve been in those underground corridors. I’ve handled trauma, complications, emergency cases. And this is the first time I’ve seen a detailed note.”
“Then consider it an improvement.” He chuckled. Bastard was dismissive.
Eira’s eyes narrowed slightly. “If he worsens, I escalate.”
“To whom?” Blake asked.
“The ethics board.” She ended the call.
A knock. “Come in.”
Liana stepped in, already reading the room. “You called Blake.”
Eira nodded.
“Do you trust them?” Liana asked.
Eira didn’t hesitate this time. “No.”
TEVENNE
Aurelia Fowler had learned when to stop talking.
Years of travel nursing taught her that.
Different countries. Different systems. Different kinds of work.
She had worked under pressure, under shortage, under doctors who were brilliant, arrogant, exhausted, or all three.
But she had never worked with one like this.
And she had never worked somewhere like Tevenne.
She looked at Dr. Blake. “His fever isn’t responding.” She held the chart steady. “We’ve cycled medication. Fluids are running. Output is dropping.”
Dr. Blake didn’t look up. “Continue supportive care.”
Aurelia didn’t move. “Doctor, his breathing?—”
“Is within acceptable range.”
“It’s changing. He’s working harder.”
That got his attention for only a few seconds. “You’re overinterpreting.”
She was dismissed again. “He may need escalation.”
Blake looked at her with the coldest look she’d ever seen. “You are a nurse, not a diagnostician.” Each word was said through gritted teeth. Then he added, “You’re on an eight-week contract. I can end it early. Send you home.”
She had walked out of contracts before, out of hospitals that cut corners. Out of systems that treated patients like numbers. But she had never walked away from a patient who needed her.
“Understood.” She turned back toward the room, back to Varga.
Back to the heat rolling off his skin. The shallow pull of his breathing.
The early warning signs no one else was naming.
And as she picked up the chart again, one thought settled in clear and certain: this place is wrong. And so is the man running it.
THE CLINIC
By mid-afternoon, the island clinic settled into its usual rhythm of controlled chaos. The clinic looked like any other island structure from the outside with its stone walls bleached by salt and sun, wooden shutters painted soft blue, and bougainvillea spilling down from the roofline.
To the casual observer, it passed for a beachside guesthouse or a low-key government office.
Inside, it was something far more. Reception opened into a cool, controlled space of polished stone and softened light, divided between a soothing adult wing and a brighter children’s area filled with books and underwater murals painted by small hands.
To the left, a secured intake corridor handled those brought in by patrol, double doors marked only by a thin red sensor strip. Beyond, two mirrored wings stretched outward: six adult treatment rooms and six pediatric rooms softened with warm light and comforts.
At the center, a full-service lab ran constant diagnostics.
It was now processing Mr. Varga’s blood.
Nearby was a glass-walled lounge for the clinic’s staff, while her office sat just beyond, beside a kitchen and secured supply room.
At the rear, a single door opened to the garden, where a narrow path slipped through banana trees and frangipani toward a small cottage at the jungle’s edge.
It was Eira Montgomery’s—close enough to reach the clinic in seconds.
In pediatric exam room two, Eira knelt beside the narrow treatment bed, eyes fixed on the flickering grayscale image on the ultrasound monitor. Michelle, a twelve-year-old patient with elbows like twigs and sea-glass eyes, lay curled slightly on her side, trying her best not to cry.
“There.” Eira paused the screen with a tap. The inflamed appendix glared back at her in sharp contrast. “Appendicitis. It’s early but hot. If we wait too long, she ruptures.”
Liana, standing nearby with a tablet in one hand and a reassuring palm on the girl’s shoulder, nodded. “Want me to call the patrol?”
Eira didn’t hesitate. “Yes. Have them bring the Jeep around and prep for a fast run to the hospital.”
There was no formal ambulance system on Kasavoa, but the island patrol regularly worked with the clinic for urgent transfers.
The ten-bed hospital, nestled higher up the ridge, was staffed by a rotating crew of volunteers from Chase Medical.
All were experienced physicians and trauma medics who came for six-week shifts.
Eira tapped a quick message to the on-call doctor through the secure internal comms.
Incoming: 12 y/o F, acute appendicitis. ETA 15–20. Stabilized. Needs OR. – E
She turned to Liana. “I told Gabe she’s on the way. He’s already seen two appendectomies this month. He’ll handle it.” Gabe was a physician out of Maine’s Chase Medical facility. He had also served in combat, so he considered Kasavoa a vacation.
Liana was already moving. “I’ll go with her. Better safe than sorry if she dips under.”
Eira gave a curt nod. “Good. And take the small crash bag. You won’t need the full kit, but I want airway gear just in case.”
She turned back to the girl, whose lashes were wet, but not a single tear was shed. She was braver than most adults. “Michelle,” she said, soft and even. “We’re going to take you up the hill to our hospital. There’s a doctor there who’ll take the pain away and make you better.”
The girl sniffled. “Will I have to stay overnight?”
“Maybe one night,” Eira said. “But you’ll be back before the chickens even notice you’re gone.
” She smiled gently as she found a vein in the girl’s forearm, her movements swift and practiced.
The IV slid in without a hitch. She started fluids and followed that with a low-dose pain medication, just enough to take the sharp edge off.
As the girl relaxed into the pillow, Liana returned with a compact trauma bag and checked her vitals again, whispering something that made the girl crack a faint smile.
Minutes later, the low growl of the island patrol Jeep rolled into the gravel loop outside. A uniformed officer stepped inside with a stretcher. “Single passenger?”