The proposal would have sent nearly everything to the capital.
It had arrived from an anxious planning group with a sensible-looking justification. The capital held the largest population, the greatest concentration of response equipment and the administrative offices through which wider relief could be coordinated. Protecting it might preserve the means to help everyone else later.
Tessa read the smaller cities’ allocation twice.
Their existing staff would maintain local readiness. Mobile reinforcement would be reviewed after the capital perimeter stabilized. No time was given for that review. The patient-transfer window appeared in a footnote as a secondary requirement.
“No,” she said.
The planner who brought it looked exhausted. “There isn’t enough for everything.”
“Then show the shortage. This calls it a sequence, but it gives the other cities no response before an event nobody can time.”
“We’re trying to preserve the center.”
