The Last Prescription

Chapter 1: Three Deaths, One Symbol

At 11:43 p.m., Dr. Mojtaba received a call that would change the course of his career.

A patient had died in the intensive care unit.

The man, Farid Hassan, was sixty-two years old and had been admitted two days earlier with symptoms that initially appeared manageable. His medical team had followed the prescribed treatment plan, yet his condition had deteriorated unexpectedly.

Mojtaba reviewed the chart, searching for an explanation.

Then he noticed a prescription clipped to the final page.

At the bottom corner, beside the prescribing doctor's signature, someone had drawn a small black symbol: a circle crossed by three short lines.

It looked deliberate.

Before Mojtaba could investigate further, another report arrived. A woman had died at a different hospital. Her prescription contained the same mark.

By morning, a third patient was dead.

Three patients. Three different doctors. Three separate medical facilities.

And the same strange symbol.

Mojtaba laid the prescriptions side by side beneath his desk lamp.

The handwriting differed. The doctors were unrelated. The patients had never met.

Yet the symbol was identical, down to the smallest stroke.

He called the hospital's chief administrator.

“Someone needs to investigate these deaths.”

“The cases are already under review,” the administrator replied.

“Then explain this.”

Mojtaba sent him a photograph of the symbol.

The line went silent.

Finally, the administrator spoke.

“Doctor, stop looking into the prescriptions.”

“Why?”

“Because this is no longer a medical matter.”

The call ended.

Mojtaba stared at the screen.

For the first time, he wondered whether the symbol was not merely a clue.

Perhaps it was a warning.

Chapter 2: The Doctor Who Lied

The next morning, Mojtaba began by interviewing the doctors who had treated the deceased patients.

Dr. Samira Rahman, a respected physician with twenty years of experience, appeared genuinely shocked when he showed her the marked prescription.

“I didn't draw that,” she insisted.

“Did you notice it before the patient died?”

“No. I signed the prescription electronically. The handwritten mark wasn't there when I approved it.”

“Who had access to the record afterward?”

Samira hesitated.

“Several people in the medical records department. The system administrator. Possibly the pharmacy liaison.”

That answer gave Mojtaba his first lead.

The prescriptions had been generated at different hospitals, but all three records had passed through a shared medical documentation platform used by a regional healthcare network.

Someone could have accessed the documents after they were signed.

But why?

Mojtaba requested the original records and audit logs through the proper hospital channels. He also reported the suspicious deaths to the hospital's safety officer and the appropriate authorities.

That afternoon, he discovered an unusual pattern.

Each patient's file had been accessed shortly before the patient's condition deteriorated. The access records showed the same unfamiliar administrative account.

The account belonged to someone named Elias Venn.

Elias was a former medical records supervisor who had resigned from the network eighteen months earlier.

His departure had been recorded as voluntary.

His personnel file, however, was missing.

Mojtaba returned to the chief administrator.

“Who is Elias Venn?”

The administrator's face changed.

“I told you to leave this alone.”

“Three people are dead.”

“And if you continue, you may become the fourth.”

Chapter 3: The Forgotten Research Project

Mojtaba searched archived hospital documents and discovered references to a clinical research initiative called Project Aster.

The project had operated seven years earlier, studying the reliability of medical documentation and the detection of prescription errors across multiple hospitals.

It had been discontinued after an internal audit identified serious governance failures.

Several records had been sealed pending review.

One of the project's consultants was Elias Venn.

Another was Dr. Helena Cross, the former director of clinical research at Mojtaba's hospital.

Mojtaba found Helena in her office, surrounded by shelves of research binders.

When he mentioned the symbol, she stopped writing.

“Where did you see it?”

“On three prescriptions connected to three deaths.”

Helena closed the office door.

“That symbol was used in an internal review of Project Aster.”

“What did it mean?”

“It marked records that required independent verification. It was never supposed to appear on a patient's prescription.”

“Who used it?”

“Only a handful of people knew about it.”

“Then one of them is connected to these deaths.”

Helena looked at the window.

“Or someone wants you to believe that.”

She explained that Project Aster had uncovered irregularities in a supplier's documentation. Certain records had been altered, and concerns raised by staff had disappeared from the official reports.

The investigation had never reached a clear conclusion.

Mojtaba asked for the original audit.

Helena shook her head.

“The last complete copy was transferred to the network's legal department.”

“Can you help me find it?”

“I can help you find where it went,” she said. “But I can't promise you'll like what it tells you.”

Chapter 4: The Fourth Prescription

That evening, Mojtaba returned to the hospital and found an envelope waiting on his desk.

There was no return address.

Inside lay a single sheet of paper.

It was a prescription bearing the same black symbol.

The patient's name was clearly printed at the top.

Dr. Helena Cross.

Beneath her name was a date: tomorrow.

Mojtaba immediately called Helena.

No answer.

He contacted hospital security and the authorities, then went to her office. The room was empty, but her laptop remained open.

A message flashed on the screen.

You were never meant to find the archive.

Mojtaba photographed the message and alerted the investigating officers.

He refused to interpret the paper as proof that Helena would be harmed, but it was enough to establish a credible threat requiring urgent attention.

Security footage showed a person entering the administrative corridor shortly before the envelope had appeared. The individual wore a visitor badge, but the face was hidden by the camera's angle.

The visitor had used a temporary access card issued by the hospital's records department.

Elias Venn's name appeared again in the access logs.

Mojtaba felt the investigation tightening around him.

The symbol had led him from three unexplained deaths to a forgotten research project, and now to a direct threat against the woman who knew its history.

He had to find the archive before whoever was behind the case destroyed it.

Chapter 5: The File That Was Never Meant to Exist

With authorization from the investigating officers, Mojtaba and a forensic records specialist examined the recovered Project Aster archive.

The documents revealed that the original review had identified inconsistencies in supplier records and unexplained changes to medical documentation.

Some of the alterations had occurred after clinicians approved the records.

Others had been attributed to accounts belonging to former employees.

But the most disturbing discovery was a confidential report documenting the disappearance of a whistleblower's evidence.

The whistleblower had been Elias Venn.

He had claimed that someone inside the network was concealing repeated documentation failures connected to a pharmaceutical supplier. His complaints had been dismissed, and his employment had ended shortly afterward.

The symbol had been his way of marking records he believed had been compromised.

But a critical question remained.

If Elias had created the mark to expose wrongdoing, why was it appearing on prescriptions connected to the deaths?

The archive contained one final file: a signed statement from Helena Cross.

It said she had discovered the irregularities and recommended an independent investigation. Before that review could proceed, the relevant records had been transferred to legal custody.

The statement also identified the person who had authorized the transfer.

The hospital's chief administrator.

Mojtaba finally understood the administrator's fear.

The symbol did not necessarily identify the person responsible for the deaths.

It identified the trail someone wanted erased.

Chapter 6: The Man Behind the Mark

The authorities located Elias Venn at a small apartment outside the city.

Mojtaba accompanied the investigators as a medical witness, carrying copies of the records that linked Elias to the investigation.

Elias looked exhausted when he opened the door.

“I wondered how long it would take you,” he said.

“Why did you mark those prescriptions?”

Elias stared at the papers.

“I didn't.”

“Your account appears in the access logs.”

“Someone used my old credentials after I left. I reported the breach, but nobody investigated it.”

“Then why did you disappear?”

“Because the people I reported had more influence than I did.”

Elias revealed that he had preserved copies of the original Project Aster audit. He had been trying to establish whether the altered records were connected to a wider cover-up.

He had no evidence that he had caused the deaths.

But he did have evidence that the prescriptions had been accessed and modified after approval.

The investigators seized the archived material and began tracing the access records to actual users, devices, and authorized system changes.

Elias identified the chief administrator as the person who had ordered the original complaints to be closed.

But the administrator was not necessarily the person who had altered the prescriptions.

The final answer would depend on forensic evidence, not suspicion.

Before leaving, Elias handed Mojtaba a small envelope.

Inside was a copy of the original symbol, drawn beside a handwritten sentence:

The mark is not the crime. It is the evidence that someone wanted you to notice.

Chapter 7: The Last Prescription

The investigation reached its turning point three days later.

Forensic analysts matched the suspicious access events to a compromised administrative account. Further evidence linked the unauthorized changes to a contractor who had worked with the network during Project Aster.

Financial records and communications obtained through the investigation revealed that the contractor had been paid to conceal documentation failures involving a pharmaceutical supplier.

The evidence did not establish that every alteration had caused a patient's death. Determining the medical causes of the three deaths required separate expert reviews.

But the records showed deliberate interference with patient documentation, and the suspicious prescriptions had become central evidence in a criminal investigation.

The contractor was arrested on charges related to the alleged tampering and fraud. The chief administrator was suspended pending a separate inquiry into the suppression of earlier complaints.

Helena was found safe. The threatening prescription had been part of an attempt to frighten her into silence.

Mojtaba returned to his office after midnight and placed the three original prescriptions in a secure evidence folder.

For days, he had believed he was searching for a killer who had left a signature.

Now he understood that the symbol had served a different purpose.

It had connected three deaths to a system in which people had been able to hide behind procedures, titles, and incomplete records.

He thought the case was over.

Then a hospital courier delivered a sealed evidence envelope from the investigating team.

Inside was a newly recovered prescription from the original archive.

The paper was yellowed with age. The ink had faded.

The symbol was unmistakable.

At the bottom of the document was a name Mojtaba had never expected to see.

His own.

The prescription was dated seven years earlier, during the final weeks of Project Aster.

Mojtaba stared at the paper, trying to remember why his name appeared in a case that predated the three deaths.

On the reverse side, a message had been written in small, careful letters:

“Ask Dr. Mojtaba what he saw that night.”

He looked toward the dark hospital corridor.

Somewhere in the building, a clock struck midnight.

And the investigation he thought he had solved began again.

To be continued…