The following days took on the thick, suffocating consistency of molasses. For Dylan, the camp, once a symbol of movement and purpose, had become a cage under an open sky. Every palisade, every familiar tent, every known face reminded him of his new condition: that of an observed man, a specimen dissected on borrowed time.
Martissant's order had filtered through, transformed and distorted by whispers. Dylan was no longer greeted in the same way. Nods were quicker, glances evasive. Some, the superstitious, stared at him with morbid curiosity, trying to catch a glimpse of the famous marks. Others, the pragmatists, avoided him outright. A risk was a risk, even if it wore the face of a former brother-in-arms.
His first "evaluation" took place three days after the report. It happened not in the archives tent, but in a makeshift laboratory set up away from the main area, near the beast pens. The air smelled of dried grass, hay, and acrid chemical traces.
