The three brass snap-buttons on Elena Rostova’s medical scrub coat clicked as she popped them open.
The heavy white poplin fabric was stiff with decades of dried biological starch, carbolic acid, and old arterial blood. The coat was an ancient working relic from St. Jude’s Trauma Center, worn through seventy-two consecutive triage shifts during the river ward riots of nineteen ninety-six.
It had survived chemical spills, steam burns, and autoclave sterilizations. The heavy cotton weave had been saturated with so many layers of medical fixatives that it felt less like cloth and more like flexible ballistic canvas.
Stitched in faded red thread over the left chest pocket was her permanent medical registration: E. ROSTOVA, R.N. -- WARD 4B CHARGE NURSE / BADGE #SJ-404.
Above her, the ceiling ductwork shrieked like tearing metal under unbearable downward torque.
CREEEAAAK-CRACK!
A torrential waterfall of pitch-black ocean water roared out of the jammed steel louver of Vent #4.
The brine fell four yards in a thick, churning cataract, striking the linoleum floor with concussive, thunderous slaps. The spray filled Aisle 1 with the freezing reek of dead bladderwrack, bilge oil, rotting timber, and shredded black laminate pulp. Droplets splattered against the metal shelving of the first-aid aisle, fogging the glass jars of cotton balls and streaking the cardboard boxes of sterile gauze.
