The Sample and the Debt

@dorothy

The crypt smells of cold iron and formalin; a single candle gutters on the slab where a dead rat lies breathing again, its tiny ribs rising and falling under your blood’s impossible chemistry. Dr. Franklin’s gloved hands are folded, her gaze fixed on the stairwell door as boots thud somewhere above. “They will come down at any moment,” she says. “Roll up your sleeve, or tell me why I should not ask.”