Page 63 of Fatality on the Field

I hover at the threshold, not wanting to interrupt, but Morgana spots me in the reflection of the cabinet glass. “Wolfberg,” she calls, not even looking back. “Get in here.”

I squeeze past the cart by the door and nearly take out a rack of pipettes with my elbow. Liam chuckles at my difficulty, and Iggy gives me a nod so small you would miss it if you blink. I make my way over to stand behind Morgana like a bumbling, oversized lab assistant. She jerks her chin at the doc immediately, grinning a little. “Lucas, have you met our new friends yet? They saved the students, you know.”

“Saw them at a distance when we got here, but man, I’m excited to meet you now.” I hold out my hand to the bespectacled man with a huge smile. “I mean, you guys just made history and shit. My Nana always told me to keep my eyes open for people who will be talked about for, like, ever, and you guys are gonna⁠—”

Before I can finish, the smaller man turns, wipes his hands on the back of his slacks, and sticks out a hand. His friend is just blinking at me as I shake hands with the vet. “Wolfgang Fletcher. You can call me Wolfie—everyone else does.” His handshake is firm, but not overly so as he tilts his head at the quieter doctor. “That’s my mate, Dr. Presley Hamilton. He’s a bit surprised that you’re acting like we’re going down in history books. He’ll catch up soon.”

“You will; trust me. I’ve been told lots of stories about things my Nana scoffed at that ended up legendary and I have a gut feeling, you know? Sorry if I made you feel weird, though. Not my intent, just excited, and I’m occasionally a little too exuberant when I get that way.” I grin and everyone laughs, even the dragon, and I shrug helplessly.

Morgana picks up the thread from when I came in, her eyes dancing as she looks at me fondly. “Kimiko brought the spores they’re going to use to replicate the poison. The hazmat team will use that to figure out how to neutralize the remaining threat in the greenhouse. After that, it’s on the lab to reverse-engineer the toxin and build an antidote for possible later cases. The local Council authorized full emergency funding and the Society is lending three specialists from the Arcanum Institute in the eastern block. They want this to be handled yesterday.”

The quiet doc adjusts his glasses, then glances at Wolfie. “We’ll stay through the night to assist the hospital team. An antidote will be a little tricky to synthesize in bulk quickly, but with the extra resources, they will get enough to cover the college soon enough. After that, it gets wider distribution, I’m sure. Luckily, the original strain didn’t get out of the research building.” He shoots a quick look at Kimiko, who doesn’t even blink, just keeps capping jars and scribbling notes.

The woman is a machine when it comes to work and that’s definitely why she risked getting infected to grab that sample without compunction.

The vet gives a low chuckle as I stare at them. “We don’t get to do this kind of thing often, by the way. Most of the time, we patch up livestock and the odd shifter who’s fought with a barbed wire fence. This was new, even for us. We’re small town docs, Lucas.”

Morgana must sense the start of my geek-out internal monologue because before I can reply, she says, “We’re not going anywhere for a few more minutes, so you can ask whatever you want, babe.”

I clear my throat. “How did Thorne know you could help, then?”

Presley answers that one. “He knows our other mate very well, is an agent, and graduated from this school like we did. I’d suppose he figured it couldn’t hurt. We didn’t even know what was happening until we arrived, obviously, but the guy has been very helpful to us as well. So we sort of owe him and we wanted to help.”

I like these guys more every second; they’re very down-to-earth.

“Cool. Who’s your other mate? How many do you have? Do they all live in your town? What do they do?”

Iggy cracks his neck like he’s shaking off the day and glares at me. “This little quiz show is fun, but we need to decide what we’re all doing and then get some rest. The doctors here at the center work here, but the rest of us actually have classes starting soon and piles of work to do. Remember?”

Kimiko sets down her last jar with a click and finally turns to us to respond. “I’ll walk the team through the greenhouse in the morning, after the techs have cleared the air filtration. Until then, we’re all on standby. The antidote’s theoretical until we see if the students relapse, by the way. That is why they want to stay, but they do not want to worry you. However, Ignatius is right. You should go and let us handle what you are not trained for.”

Liam looks at Morgana, who looks at me, and I’m suddenly aware of how tired we all look. “Are we going home, now, then? Really?”

Nodding, Morgana sighs. “Yes, we’re going home, Lucas. Slade and Channing are waiting in the lobby and even Kaspar looks exhausted. We’ll leave in groups because we don’t want any unnecessary attention. I trust we have enough room in the cars here to get us all back?”

“I think so.” I scratch my head as I look at the dragon, who nods. “We’ll probably need to squeeze a bit, though.”

“We’ll be here all night. Go home, get some rest, and if you want, swing by in the morning to check on the students. If one of you brings coffee, we’ll owe you big,” Wolfie says with a grin.

Hot damn! That would be awesome and I can head over after practice.

I grin happily, and then, because I can’t help myself, I ask, “Would it be weird if I got a selfie with you guys for my Nana? She collects pictures of people she’s met who are going to be famous someday. You should see her collection; it’s wild.”

There’s a split second of dead silence, then the docs look at each other and burst out laughing.

“It would be our honor,” the vet says, and the other doc gives a thumbs up. “And a great story for our family, trust me. They’ll die laughing.”

Morgana shakes her head, her lips twitching in the way they do when she’s trying not to laugh at me. I don’t care, though, because I’m totally doing this. I pull out my phone, crowd the two doctors together, and get the shot. Nana’s going to be so stoked when I send it to her, especially once she hears the whole story. Everyone else can think I’m a dork if they want.

Once I finish up, the rest of my family gives me varying looks of fondness and exasperation, so I wave at the docs and Kimmi. They wave back, but Morgana is already heading for the door with Liam a half-step behind her. Iggy matches my pace and the dragon pulls up the rear, as we head back down the hall one more time to get Slade and Channing. It’s been one hell of a day and getting home won’t be easy with the amount of press flocking around the outside of the hospital.

Luckily, I’ve been fully trained in evasion tactics and my car is ready for the challenge.

thirty-nine

MORGANA

The sun is just beginning to rise outside when I surface from sleep, wedged like a lump of coal in layers of hot sheets and hotter bodies. Our room is dark, but I know it’s pre-dawn because my lungs ache for breath and the only thing to inhale is sweat, hair, and the scent of dude. My left leg is numb under the weight of Lucas’s thigh, as he sprawls over Li and me like an ursine blanket. His need to be as close as possible to both of us is adorable, trust me, but it’s also smothering me now.