The Year I Stopped Being His novel Chapter 176

Garrison's phone vibrated incessantly. He stepped out of the helicopter, walking to the edge of the helipad as he answered the call.

"Dawson." It was his assistant.

"Dr. Foster!" Assistant Dawson's voice was frantic, breathless, as if he had just sprinted across the building. "The Vitas Strain Remnant—it's gone!"

Garrison's chest tightened.

"What exactly happened?"

"I just got to the lab this morning, and all the safes were wide open!" Dawson's voice shook violently. "The liquid nitrogen tank holding The Vitas Strain Remnant... it's completely empty."

"Didn't I tell you to upgrade the security protocols?" Garrison's voice dropped to a lethal octave. "No one was allowed inside that lab except you and me."

"I did upgrade them!" Dawson sounded on the verge of a breakdown. "Fingerprints, retinal scans, passcodes—I changed all three locks! But the surveillance feed is completely dead. From eleven last night to four this morning, it's just static. The access logs show zero entries or exits, but the safe was still breached..."

Garrison's grip on the phone tightened until his knuckles turned bone-white. He fell silent for a few agonizing seconds. "How has the remnant been growing lately?"

Dawson hesitated. "...Really well. Incredibly well, actually. Much faster than projected. When I checked it yesterday, the mycelium had completely covered the petri dish. But Dr. Foster, without The White Microbe—"

"How long can it survive?" Garrison cut him off.

"At most... a month."

A month.

Garrison closed his eyes, dragging in a deep breath. "Understood."

This remnant was the only remaining hope he had of saving Sloane's life. Was he... was he truly out of time?

"What happened?"

Wyatt wandered over at that moment.

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