The overpass is choked with wrecked cars, their doors hanging open as a refugee convoy crawls toward the blocked lanes. Engines idle in uneven bursts.
A middle-aged woman in a stained white morgue coat stands atop a crushed sedan. Her gray hair is pinned tight, and a red identification badge swings from her collar.
the morgue technician
Stop them! I saw it begin among the refugees arriving from the east. The plague started with them!
The lead vehicles brake hard. Doors open, voices rise, and frightened faces turn toward the sedan as the convoy compresses behind the halted cars.
Lena
The wreckage behind the convoy is moving.
Beneath the twisted metal, dead hands scrape and reach through gaps in the wrecks. The sound spreads under the idling engines, too close to ignore.
the morgue technician
They are coming up behind you! Do not let anyone through the lanes!
✓ Quest Accepted
Get the convoy through a defensible passage
✓ Quest Accepted
Determine whether the eastern refugees brought the plague
“Does the morgue technician know which refugee first showed symptoms?”
YES, BUT (Unlikely, rolled 31)
The morgue technician grips the sedan’s roof as scraping hands multiply beneath the convoy. Her eyes track the refugees, searching past frightened faces and sealed windows.
the morgue technician
Yes. The first was a woman in the blue delivery van, third vehicle behind the lead truck. She arrived feverish, confused, and already hiding it.
She points across the jammed lanes. The marked van’s rear doors remain shut, its engine coughing while passengers press against the glass.
the morgue technician
Her name is Mara Venn. I logged her intake myself. She was not sick when she left the eastern shelter, but she was sick before reaching us.
The name carries through the halted convoy. Panic breaks the fragile stillness, and several drivers lean on their horns as people shove away from the blue van.
the morgue technician
That is the cost of knowing. Now they know where to look, and the dead are climbing up behind you.
Under the wreckage, metal buckles with a harsh snap. The convoy’s rear ranks begin to turn, blocking the narrow lanes even as the van’s occupants pound on its doors.
“I take control and clear a defensible route”
SUCCESS (Good Tactics, rolled +1)
Lena takes command of the choke point, towering over the stalled convoy as engines cough and the wreckage behind it groans. Her raised arm cuts through the panic.
She directs the nearest drivers to reverse by increments, opening a narrow corridor along the concrete divider. Marines and able refugees move where she points, pushing doors shut and dragging loose barricades into place.
the morgue technician
Keep the lane clear! Follow her signals, not the shouting!
A gap forms between the lead truck and the divider. Lena advances through it, firing controlled shots into the reaching dead beneath the crushed cars, then waves the convoy forward.
George Pele
Route is open! I have the rear vehicles moving!
The blue delivery van is pulled toward the cleared lane with the rest of the convoy. Its passengers stay sealed inside while the living stream past the danger behind them.
Lena
The divider gives us a defensible funnel.
Quest Complete
Get the convoy through a defensible passage