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S tudents milled about campus, walking to their various lectures and activities, still buzzing with the excitement of a new year at Trinity or the start of adult academic life at all. It was always easy to spot the Freshers. They spent the first term oscillating between pure joy, hugging their books to their chest with a skip in their step, and twitchy exhaustion, bookbags weighing down their shoulders, a wild-eyed caffeine buzz coating them like a dark aura.

A lone brown leaf crunched under ’s shoe and she smiled. The trees hadn’t yet changed, still hanging onto the last breath of summer, but the air was crisp and the drizzle had gone for the time being. She was one of those peculiar students who felt the thrill of academia every year, all year long. The last six years without hallowed academic halls and papers to write and books to study, she’d felt adrift. That didn’t mean she hadn’t still written papers, and conducted her own research, and read countless books, but it was different to be surrounded by a place, by a people group dedicated to the pursuit of knowledge, especially in a time such as theirs.

When attended Trinity for undergrad, the Plague was but a distant scare. A sickness violently befalling a few select individuals here and there. Partway through the summer after her graduation, so many cases had popped up that the powers that be erected HPSC’s secret places of science, medicine, immunology, and research. Very little was known about this organisation and its advancements in dispelling the Plague had been minimal.

was not one to accept when things were on a ‘ need to know ’ basis, so she’d spent a great deal of time in the fall of ‘87 researching the researchers. She wasn’t able to discover the name of the shadow organisation, only the fact that they knew very little about the origin of the Plague. What they had discovered was a peculiar spore had been found in Patient Zero during the initial autopsy prior to incineration.

A spore of unknown origin.

A spore that sent into a six-year-long obsession.

She did not for one moment believe the spore was bacterial. Nor did she think for one moment that Achilles House didn’t already know that. They had to, or she’d made a grave error in taking that cadaver with the flowering lung to them.

Another student brushed past her, knocking into her shoulder without a backward glance. She was loitering in front of the lecture hall doorway after all, with only seconds left until class began.

The pain began at the base of her skull, pulsing up and forward, sliding down over her eyes in a ghastly hallucination. A young woman reclined in a cracked vinyl chair, like the kind in an old 50s-style kitchen. A small television, antennas erect, glowed with static snow. The walls were bare behind the girl, save for a slash of creeping vines. Something between Acanthus Spinosus and English Ivy. The hallucination wrinkled and shifted, and saw the vines crawling down the girl, her hands limp at her sides, nailbeds bruised. No, the vines weren’t crawling along her—they were part of her, making up her spine, her head pulled off her neck and held aloft by the vines, her lifeless, glossy eyes open.

gasped, and the images cleared, the sharp pain receding to her temples. It would be a nasty migraine, she expected. She should have gotten more sleep. Grabbed coffee. Stolen one of Imogen’s stimulant pills.

Shaking it off, bustled in and slid into one of the last seats available in the back, the worn wooden desk and chair combination groaning as she did so. She always wondered just how many students had learned at these desks over the years. If the right information was sought out—the year these particular desks were brought in and how many students had taken the classes in this hall—she could arrive at an answer, but there were more important things to think about. Namely, the professor at the chalkboard addressing the small group of students and directing them to open their Biodiversity textbooks to Page 394.

Removing her notebooks, pens, and textbook from her satchel, laid them out neatly as the professor began etching out the various parts of a vascular plant on the chalkboard. The diagram on Page 394 of the textbook had a similar sketch, though more refined and really quite beautiful. Beside the fern, the professor jotted down terms, his chalk tapping against the blackboard with each new letter stroke and kicking up enough chalk dust that a girl in the front row sneezed. When the professor turned back to face the rows of students, began to scribble down what he’d written before he commanded they all do so.

Xylem

Phloem

Sporophyte

The rest of the class had their heads bent low over their notebooks, scribbling furiously as the professor droned on and on about the defining characteristics of vascular plants, their tissues and phases, but merely listened, letting the lecture confirm what she’d already known since she was a little girl. Since her grandfather began teaching her the intricacies of botany when he wasn’t teaching her how to autopsy a body.

By the time class let out, had already drawn her own sketch within the textbook and a two-page spread in her notebook just above the assignment: a 3,000-word essay on Vascular Phases due September 12th.

At least one of her classes was a breeze. Though Intro to Biodiversity was a beginner’s course, her undergrad studies had been vastly different. To pursue her Masters in Biodiversity, she was required to have the basic courses on her transcript, and didn’t mind having a refresher that directly correlated with her personal projects. Not that she had much time for those.

Back out on the green, she checked her watch. Her next class wasn’t until 2:00, and she might have enough time to grab a bite to eat before heading to the library. She had two assignments due by week’s end and one of them was going quite poorly if her desk in the suite was to be used as evidence.

Though the Dining Hall was an 18th-century stone building one would expect to see Mr Darcy lurking in while Lizzie dances, only lunch was served there, and arrived at the technical time for Second Breakfast and not quite Elevensies and certainly not Luncheon.

Electing to go into The Buttery, filled a cafeteria-grade bowl with the crushed remnants of Banana Bubbles Cereal and poured in a bit of milk that was probably borderline expired. She sat down at the edge of one of the long tables, only a handful of other students milling about. Something smelled delicious next door and she wished she’d gone to the library then gone into the Dining Hall for lunch instead. After stirring her unwanted cereal for a minute, she decided to just discard it and check her letterbox. It was rare to find anything in there after the first week of classes, what with all the Welcome Back! news and flyers asking students to join various clubs, so she only checked it every couple of days. During undergrad, her mother sent care packages monthly and was feeling a bit homesick, finding herself hoping her mam would continue that tradition through grad school.

Alas, there was only a flyer for a student play being put on in a couple of weeks and a red envelope. Curious, she ripped it open to find it was a summons to see her student advisor, Mrs O’Sullivan, as soon as possible.

sighed, folding the flyer and note to stow them away in her satchel. So much for her much-needed study time in the library.

Mrs O’Sullivan’s office was a long walk across campus on the opposite side from the Botany building. The weather was shaping up beautifully, though, a crisp breeze teasing at her hair. slipped on her headphones and clicked play on her Stowaway. The mix-tape of her own making made the walk even more pleasant, the notes of Chopin’s Nocturne Op. 27, No. 2 putting her mind in the perfect place to contemplate her private research. She would go to meet with her advisor and take notes in her 2:00 lecture until her hand hurt, then she could check on her cadaver beneath Gallaghers’ Morgue in between her shift duties.

was almost at the student offices building when she first noticed the new signage.

Be Vigilant. Inform HPSC of any Plague symptoms immediately, by phoning the hotline.

shook her head. It would help if they knew what those symptoms were before it was too late.

In the early days of the Plague, the whole of Dublin entered a dangerous Group Think somewhere along the treacherous lines of: It could never happen to me. And, in their defence, it hadn’t happened to most. But who it did happen to was usually unexpected and wholly unpredictable. The sickness did not breed in lower-income areas, it didn’t happen to those who were in close contact with the Infected, and it didn’t always happen to those in pre-existing poor health. It was an enigma. A curious, confounding disease that began with an unidentified spore in Patient Zero and spread how it saw fit, making the Infected first mildly ill, then quickly fading into organ failure and eventually death, their teeth coated in the black blood and bile they coughed up.

The spore.

The black blood.

Those were the things zeroed in on.

“Morning!” was greeted by a cheery woman behind the front desk as she entered the Admissions Office in House 5. “Where can I direct you?”

“Mrs O’Sullivan’s office, please.”

“Sure thing, love. Name?”

“—” She caught herself. “Sorry, habit. Ariatne Morrow. Grad student, Botany.”

The bubbly brunette picked up the receiver of her phone while turned to look out the windows, studying the students as they walked by down below, Campanile standing sentry and HPSC notices in their hands.

If Achilles House or someone could discover what all the Infected had in common, it would make things much clearer. thought the notices from HPSC were most likely bogus, created to lull the general populace into thinking they were accomplishing something with their research. In turn, if that was the case, it meant they’d actually accomplished nothing.

The thought was depressing.

“Miss Morrow?”

turned to face the desk clerk.

“Mrs O’Sullivan will see you. Third door on the right.”

She found it easily enough having been there before, and went in the open door, preparing herself mentally for the number of cat figurines crowding the small office.

“Hello there,” her kind, lovely and round advisor greeted her. “Have a seat Ariatne.” Mrs O’Sullivan smiled, gesturing to the only other chair in the cramped office.

“Oh, it’s ,” she corrected, avoiding eye contact with the creepy cats. loved cats as much as the next reclusive, bookish girl, but she drew the line at figurines.

Dropping her bag to the floor, she took a seat on the upholstery that hadn’t been updated since at least the early 70’s. It was a horrid shade of pink, situated across from a porcelain cat statue posed mid-paw cleaning.

“No one calls me Ariatne except for my gran, and that’s only because I was named after her.”

The advisor opened a file in front of her with ’s Christian name stamped on it in ink slightly smudged on the w of Morrow. “See now, I thought you were named after Agatha Christie’s heroine.”

“Ah, nope. That is spelled with a d , not a t. But if you ask my gran, she’ll tell you Ariadne Oliver was named after her.”

Mrs O’Sullivan chuckled. “Your gran sounds like a delight.”

“She is.” fiddled with her thumbnail. “Em.” She cleared her throat and sat straighter. “I’m sorry, but I’m not sure what I’m doing here.”

“At Trinity?” Mrs O’Sullivan’s brows met in the middle over her red cat-eye glasses. was wildly out of fashion herself, but she was certain those glasses had been purchased in the same year as the chair she was sitting on.

“No, in your office.”

“Oh!” The advisor bopped and bobbled in her seat. “Right. Well, dear.” Fitting her fingers together, she set her hands on ’s file and looked at her with what had to be pity. “I’m afraid it isn’t good news.”

A thousand thoughts assaulted . Her father had another accident. Her mother was dead. The Plague was shutting down Trinity?—

“The majority of your funding was not approved.”

uncrossed her legs and sat forward. “What?”

Mrs O’Sullivan lifted a hand placatingly. “Not all of it, but the larger portions we were hoping for were denied. The grants and scholarships.”

“I— I don’t understand.” Her voice was breathy, like a laugh, the hysterical kind that follows horrific news because the brain shuts down and leaves only mania. “I received near-perfect grades in undergrad.”

“Yes, Ariatne?—”

“ ,” she snapped. “Please.”

“Right, yes. Of course. . Your grades were outstanding, but that was six years ago.”

“So?” Fuck , she was being rude. “Sorry.” She squirmed in her seat. “I’m sorry. I just don’t understand.”

The look she received was even more pitiful than before. “There are a lot of young people vying for that money, . What have you been doing for the last six years? Your paperwork says you’ve been working in a morgue and that you have the same position here in Dublin.

“It— It’s the family business,” she stammered, feeling light-headed.

“Right, okay. But it has nothing to do with your undergrad degree or your master’s program.” She looked down at the file on her desk and back at over her glasses. “It says here your undergrad degree was in Folklore with a Religion component?”

’s mouth was too dry to speak, but she managed a small nod.

“That makes your pursuit of postgraduate studies in botany seem more recreational than vocational. Do you understand?”

understood that she’d like to punch Mrs O’Sullivan in her ruddy throat.

“The point is, it doesn’t look good to the powers that be. You have been denied.”

“Is it hot in here?” pulled at the collar of her turtleneck, looking around—for what, she wasn’t sure. A window to throw herself out of?

Mrs O’Sullivan rose and poured a glass of water from a pitcher in the corner decorated with little black cats, sliding it across her desk to . “We have a couple of options.”

“Oh?” held the glass just to feel the coolness against her palms.

“You could always see about taking out a loan.”

A snort escaped before could stop it, a dribble of the water sloshing out onto her tights and seeping through to her leg. “I don’t make enough money to qualify for something like that.”

“What about your parents, then? Perhaps they could help out. They’re business owners, yes?”

blinked at the well-meaning woman who clearly grew up without these types of problems. Without having to pray for ends to meet or wondering where the next meal might come from. “There isn’t a lot of money in caring for the dead.” She looked down into the water, watching the ripples keep time with the pulse in her hands. “You’re thinking of funeral homes.” —that rip off the bereaved for their own benefit. Thankfully, kept that last part to herself.

“I see.” Mrs O’Sullivan’s pink lips pursed together in thought. “There is one more option.” brightened and Mrs O’Sullivan held out her palms. “Classes have already been in session for a couple of weeks, so I don’t think it will be possible, but we can see.”

“Anything. I’ll do anything to stay here.” To stay in a place of knowledge and books and information. Where her inquisitive research can delve deeper.

Mrs O’Sullivan sighed. “We do have jobs on campus.”

“But I already have a job.” One she couldn’t give up. It would defeat the entire purpose of what she was after. Or, at least, cut off her access to what she needed.

“And does it make you enough to pay tuition?” Mrs O’Sullivan had lost her benevolent constitution.

“No. You’re right. Go on, please.”

“There are Teacher Assistant positions that offer a significant tuition discount in lieu of payment, as well as boarding and three hot, three cold meals a week available at The Dining Hall or The Buttery.”

’s heart rate began to slow. She didn’t know how she could swing a full course load and two jobs, but she would figure it out. There was still hope.

“It won’t cover everything, but it’s a massive start.”

“Yes. Of course.” scooted to the edge of her seat. “I’ll do it.”

“I don’t know that there are positions available, but you paid some upfront to be enrolled”—she checked her records for the amount already knew, her entire savings—“and that covers you for a couple of weeks.” Mrs O’Sullivan looked at solemnly. “Go to the rest of your classes today and I will see what I can do.”

Numbly, left House 5 and walked back across campus in a daze. If she kept her job at the morgue and pilfered bodies for Achilles when she could, it might be enough to cover what the TA position couldn’t.

If Mrs O’Sullivan even managed to find her a TA job at all.