Chapter 625: [Extra] Boundary Marker - 4 - The Tumor That Must Be Excised

Pittsburgh City Hall, the Mayor’s Office.

This was the heart of the Steel City, its center of power.

Outside the massive floor-to-ceiling windows, the city skyline twinkled in the cold winter night.

Searchlight beams from the Inland Port cut through the darkness, showcasing the powerful pulse of industrial rebirth.

The office was brightly lit.

Joe Miller stood before the desk.

The former homicide detective looked even more exhausted than he did on stakeouts during snowy nights.

The hem of his trench coat was speckled with wet mud—dirt from the Pennsylvania border.

He placed the thick investigation report on the mahogany desk.

THWAP.

The sound of the file landing was soft, yet it made the air in the room feel even heavier.

Leo Wallace sat in a large leather chair, a Montblanc Pen in his hand.

He stared at the bright red "Top Secret" stamp on the cover.

"How bad is it?" Leo asked.

"Worse than we thought."

Joe Miller’s voice was hoarse, with a gravelly texture worn by tobacco.

"It’s a complete black market supply chain."

Miller extended a rough finger and flipped open the first page of the report.

It was a shocking chart.

The curve representing the Mutual Aid Alliance’s drug inventory was plummeting at an abnormal rate, while the curve for capital expenditure was skyrocketing.

"Over the past two weeks, our consumption of insulin, antibiotics, and specialized heart medication has exceeded normal demand by three hundred percent."

Miller pointed at the red numbers.

"Pittsburgh doesn’t have that many patients. These drugs... they’re all being smuggled out."

"They’re crossing the border into Ohio, West Virginia, and even as far as Kentucky. In those places, a single bottle of this medicine costs ten, or even twenty times, what it does here."

"We’re subsidizing the black market for all of America."

Leo took the report and skimmed through it.

Every line of data was like a knife, slicing into the main artery of Pittsburgh’s finances.

Pittsburgh’s pool of funds was finite. It was meant for repairing roads, building factories, and paying salaries.

Now, that money was turning into profit in the pockets of drug traffickers and a lifeline for patients in neighboring states and counties at an astonishing rate.

"This is arbitrage," Leo said coldly.

"Organized, large-scale arbitrage. If this were just about saving lives, the consumption wouldn’t be this high. Someone is hoarding stock. Someone is getting rich off our subsidies."

He flipped to the page with the investigation’s conclusions.

It listed several key nodes: community pharmacies, senior centers, and abandoned gas stations along the border.

And the man known as "the Doctor."

Edgar Stone.

"Who is this man?" Leo asked, pointing to the photo of an old man in a filthy white coat.

"A former country doctor who had his license revoked," Miller answered. "He’s the end of the line for this network. He opened a black-market clinic on the border, specifically to receive the drugs flowing out of Pittsburgh and sell them to outsiders who can’t afford the high prices."

"Have you arrested him?"

"No."

Miller shook his head.

Leo looked up, his gaze sharp as he stared at Miller.

"Why?"

"Because the place was lined with people."

There was a hint of conflict in Miller’s voice.

He was a tough man, but the experiences of the past few days had put a crack in his hardened heart.

"Leo, you’d understand if you saw it. It’s not a drug den. It looks like a field hospital."

"The people buying the medicine... they drive here from hundreds of miles away in beat-up cars that are about to fall apart. There are mothers holding their children, veterans with missing legs, and retired workers spending their only pensions."

"They can’t afford the three-hundred-dollar medicine at CVS. That old man sells it for one hundred and fifty, and they think it’s a gift from God."

Miller took a deep breath.

"The old man said something to me. He said he makes a profit on the transport, but he saves those people’s lives. He asked me, who’s the real criminal? Him, the middleman, or you, the one who drew this border and left a path to survival only for the people of Pittsburgh?"

Silence fell over the office.

It was a moral trap.

Leo Wallace had created an isolated island of privilege.

He had built a paradise in the middle of hell.

Now, the people from hell wanted to climb in, or at least steal a few crumbs from paradise.

Was that a crime?

If you looked at it from the perspective of all humanity, it wasn’t a crime. It was survival.

But Leo wasn’t God.

He was the Mayor of Pittsburgh.

He stood up and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window.

Outside, the lights of Pittsburgh shone brilliantly.

On the construction sites in the South District, the night shift was busy at work.

In the distance, countless families were gathered around their dinner tables, enjoying the warmth and food.

All of this was built on a fragile balance.

And the foundation of that balance was money.

If the pool of funds was drained, Pittsburgh’s prosperity would pop like a soap bubble.

’Mr. President,’ Leo thought.

’They’re accusing me. They say the border I drew is a sin.’

’They’re right.’

Roosevelt’s voice echoed in his mind.

’A border is, by its very nature, an act of exclusion. The moment you decide to protect one group of people, you are inevitably abandoning another.’

’It’s like a lifeboat.’

Roosevelt offered an analogy.

’The Titanic has sunk. There are thousands of people struggling in the sea, but your lifeboat can only hold thirty. If, out of sympathy, you let even one more person climb aboard, the whole boat will capsize. And then, the thirty people who were already on board will die, too.’