Free The Chimera Sequence by Elliott Garber Page B

it when they realize you’re not really inviting them in for more.”
    “And what makes you think I won’t be?”
    Olsson looked into her eyes, waiting for the smile to break. But it never did.
    “Just be careful. We’re a long way from Scotland Yard, you know.” He ducked in through the tent’s entrance. “Enough of that. Didn’t you want to see some of our patients?”
    Claire followed the doctor through the canvas flaps and welcomed the wave of cool air that rushed over her glistening face. The window unit in her room at the lakeside Ihusi Hotel had coughed up a blast of musty warm air when she first checked in a week ago, and—despite several visits from an overly confident in-house electrician—it was still losing the battle against the pervasive tropical heat.
    “Welcome to Goma General Hospital, your highness,” Olsson swung out an arm in an exaggerated flourish. “Proudly representing the finest medical care in the eastern Congo.”
    Claire raised her eyebrows. Was he being serious? She knew Doctors Without Borders was the real deal, but this seemed like a very basic operation.
    “Yes ma’am, ever since the last of Goma’s local doctors fled to Kinshasa last month, we’re the only shop in town.”
    “Well, can’t say I’d like to find myself in need of your services.”
    Claire felt her eyes adjusting to the dim filtered light glowing through the white canvas tent. Everything was white, she noticed. White folding cots arranged in long rows, made up with white cotton sheets. White doctors and nurses dressed in white scrubs and lab coats. A glaring white surgical light at the far corner of the tent. Everything except the patients, that is, who were black black black . Claire wasn’t a racist, she was sure of that. But it was harder than she expected to be in the minority all the time.
    “If anything happens to you, we might be willing to do some initial stabilization before putting you on a chartered flight back to London.” He lingered on the might a little longer than Claire would have liked. “If you play nice, that is.”
    “I don’t plan on getting myself shot or blown up, but thank you for that assurance. I’ll be sure to behave myself.”
    She followed as he stepped towards the nearest cot and knelt down beside a sleeping child. “Most of our patients don’t have that option, to simply fly on out of here. We’re their only hope, and unfortunately we can’t save everyone.”
    He pulled the sheet back to reveal a bandaged stump just below the girl’s left knee. Claire exhaled slowly.
    “What happened?”
    “Wrong place at the wrong time, just like most of the civilians we’re taking care of.” He adjusted the flow of intravenous fluids running into the girl’s arm. “The hardest thing is that we often don’t know who’s innocent and who’s not. A little girl like this, that’s easy. But almost anyone else could have blood on their hands.”
    “And so you would turn them away, let them die on the street, if you just knew their crimes?”
    “There are only a hundred beds in this little inflatable hospital of ours, Claire. We try to focus resources on those who are not instigators in the conflict, but in reality it’s almost impossible to discriminate.” He stood up again and started walking down the central aisle. “As long as they don’t come in with a rifle strapped to their backs, we’ll do what we can to provide a healing touch.”
    Claire’s eyes lingered on each cot as she passed. She had never seen such a concentrated display of human suffering. Every combination of missing limbs was joined by burned faces and bandaged heads. Those were the obvious injuries, though. She couldn’t tell what was wrong with most of these anonymous Africans, and she honestly didn’t want to know. Claire felt the heaviness lift off as she refocused on the real reason she was here. There would always be more humans living and dying and destroying the rest of the earth while they