Double Helix Ch. 05

The CO2 generator arrived by mail order several days after the Himura-kai bust, and Sasha and I installed it after carefully dismantling and sterilizing every part of it in the shower room, taking most of a day to get done. We wouldn't see any real results from it for a few weeks, though.

I got the job at the hospital, working three nights a week. My college courses were less helpful than I would have hoped, but I liked the change of scenery and chance to meet new people. The pay was meager, but with almost no expenses of my own, any amount at all would be helpful. I had gotten a used bike cheap with some of the money I had left in my bank account, so at least I had a way to get there faster than walking.

I had intended to save the money from my job and use it to keep making improvements to the basement, but I realized that I couldn't do that in good conscience. The pay was weekly, and when I got my first paycheck, I cashed it and handed it over to Sasha without complaint or regret. She gave me only a curt "thank you". I also applied for food ration vouchers using my fake identity, but there was a backlog of paperwork, and the worker who took my case told me not to expect anything for at least a month. It made me wonder what happened to people who didn't already have a support system in place.

Nissi did her best to take my mind off our problems. Most nights, she slept with me in my room, though we used her room on occasion, when she wanted to listen to her records. Her love of music served to broaden and enhance my own. She lived and breathed it. She seemed to know every work of every single important singer, composer, songwriter, and band of the last five hundred years, and dozens I had never heard of. Sometimes she would start off onto some obscure point of theory or bit of trivia and I would just listen and nod, often completely lost, but enjoying her company and her excitement for her topic.

I started learning a martial art, quite by accident, and from an unlikely source. One morning I had woken up earlier than usual and slipped out of bed to see if anyone had put on coffee yet. Passing by Wendy's room, I could hear slow rhythmic steps on the concrete. I found that Nock had put coffee on and I poured myself a cup with a grateful nod. On my way back, I stopped, curious. "Are you in there, Wendy?" I asked.

"Yeah, you need something?" she asked, pausing for just a moment before resuming whatever she was doing.

I pushed the curtain aside carefully. Wendy stood, hands held out in front of her, knees bent, one foot in front of the other. As I watched, she lifted one foot, pivoted, and moved both hands as if knocking a blow aside in slow motion. She stopped and looked over at me expectantly, one hand held in a fist up above her face and the other out in front of her.

"Oh, sorry," I said, suddenly embarrassed. "I didn't mean to interrupt."

"It's okay," she said. "I was almost finished anyway."

"What was that?"

"T'ai chi Chu'an," she said, in a passable Chinese accent--Mandarin, if I wasn't mistaken. "It means 'supreme ultimate fist'. You want to learn?"

She guided me through some simple forms, relating how she had started learning it twenty years earlier, when her job began to demand more from her and she started keeping late hours at the research lab. She had taken a simple self-defense course, but felt like she wanted something with more form and discipline.

"What does that have to do with these forms?" I asked. The slow movements didn't seem to me to be a very effective way to fight.

"The forms teach you correct posture, balance and movement. Watch."

She abruptly launched a series of open-handed strikes and low kicks, pivoting smoothly as though fighting multiple opponents. I whistled appreciatively when she stopped, breathing hard. "When do I get to learn that?"

"We'll see how quickly you learn the basics. Maybe a few weeks. Try getting up a half hour earlier and come see me tomorrow morning."

Three weeks since the events in the greenhouse, after a delicious but less than filling lunch of rice noodle soup, I was sitting next to Nissi at the table. Her hand was on my knee and she had been making pretty obvious innuendos, a sure sign that she wanted to sneak off to my room with me for a bit of fun. All thoughts of that went out of my head when I heard a crash and Wendy's shout. "Norm! Norm, come quick!"

I threw a glance at Nissi and jumped up, heading back to Tilly's room. Next to the door, the remnants of a bowl lay scattered around a puddle of soup. I stepped over it to get inside, spotting Wendy kneeling next to Tilly, who lay on the bed. Wendy turned at the sound of my approach. Her voice shook as she spoke. "She got a box knife, Norm. She's bleeding." She had a hand clamped over Tilly's wrist, and blood welled between her fingers. More of it dripped from Tilly's limp hand and into the large plastic mop bucket that was normally stored next to the bathroom. I knew that it held about four gallons, and from the amount of blood in it, Tilly had already lost at least a few pints.

"Let me," I said. When Wendy didn't understand, I shouted at her. "Move, Wendy!"

Wendy scrambled out of the way. I took Tilly's arm and gingerly examined the wound. It was deep, not a hesitation cut as her first few scars probably had been. I clamped my hand around the cut to put pressure on it. "I need the first aid kit," I said.

This time Wendy moved immediately, running for the kit that was next to the basement pantry. She almost collided with Nissi coming the other way and I heard her apologize before dashing on.

"Oh my God," Nissi said, taking the scene in.

"Go, get Sasha now!" I yelled. "And tell the others to keep back. They'll just get in the way."

Alone with Tilly, I gave myself a moment to think about what I could do here. I had gotten my four year degree in biology, intending to go into med school, but had changed my mind and gone for a PhD instead. I had plenty of theory. What I lacked was practical knowledge and experience. My time at the hospital had filled in some gaps, but I was hardly a real doctor. If I made a mistake now, Tilly could die because of it.

I caught that thought, held it for a moment and crushed it. If I did nothing, her death was almost a certainty. I needed to know how bad she was. Her eyes were partway closed. I asked if she could hear me and she mumbled something incoherent. Her skin was pale, cool and clammy. I felt at her neck for a pulse. It was fast and weak. She was already in shock.

"Here, I got it," Wendy said, putting the first-aid kit down on the floor and opening it for me.

"I want to get this bandaged first," I said. "Get some gauze and bandages ready."

"On it," Wendy said, finding the items for me.

"Gauze," I said. I took it from her with my free hand and pressed it onto the wound. "Now start wrapping. Make it tight, but not too tight, got it?" I let her finish dressing the sound and cleaned off my own blood-soaked hands with some of the gauze. "Keep pressure on that, please."

I heard footsteps outside a few moments before Sasha appeared. Her gaze jumped from Tilly, to me, to the bucket of blood on the floor. She hissed something in Russian and snatched her phone from her pocket. I waited while she called her agency contact and explained the situation. There was a heated exchange for a moment, ending with Sasha saying, "You will do better than that. If she doesn't pull through this, I'll come down there myself and beat the living shit out of you, you understand?"

She punched the button to hang up the phone and addressed me. "An hour, they say, possibly longer, to get help here. Will she last that long?"

"Hard to say," I said. "She's in shock. She might go into a coma if we don't get her blood pressure up soon."

"What do you need? Tell me and I'll get it."

I thought furiously. We could get Tilly to the nearest hospital in about ten minutes. They could probably save her life, but they would also perform a routine test for genemod markers. They would take her into custody, they would revert her, and the FBI would open an investigation on whoever had brought her in. There was no option there. "You said you had medical supplies stocked. Where?"

"Five minutes from here."

Do you have blood?"

"No."

I knew that had been a long shot. You can't freeze blood, so it couldn't be stored long term. "Any plasma?"

"No."

"Empty blood packs?"

"No, sorry."

"Saline? Sutures? Antibiotics?" I got a nod for each one. "IV catheters?" I held my breath for the answer. She nodded and I felt a surge of hope. "She needs a transfusion. Do you have medical records for everyone here?"

A sharp nod. "Yes."

"Go get everything I mentioned, as fast as you can. When you get back to the house, I need blood types. We need a match for Tilly. Can you do that?"

"On it," she said, racing away.

Stan appeared in the doorway. "Norm, is there anything I can do to help?"

I pushed the bucket towards him. "Find out how much blood is in there. Be as exact as you can."

"You got it."

"Norm, I'm scared." The words from Tilly were slurred and barely audible. Her eyes kept trying to close.

"Just hold on, stay with us," I told her firmly. "You're going to be okay." I tried to will myself to believe the words. I didn't know if Tilly could sense a lie in her weakened state, but I didn't want to chance it.

I heard what sounded like an argument starting up outside. "Stay here and talk to her," I told Wendy. "Try not to let her fall asleep." I got up to go check what was happening.

"You had to have seen her," Nissi said.

"Yeah, she came out last night. I didn't think anything of it." Nock's voice this time.

I emerged into the main room to find Nissi and Nock standing six feet apart, Nissi slowly advancing on him as she gesticulated. Her voice rose in volume. "She hasn't left her room in over two weeks. So she comes out here, gets a box cutter and a bucket, and you don't even say anything? She's bleeding to death in there, you asshole!"

"I didn't know," Nock protested. "She does weird stuff sometimes. I just leave her alone."

"Hey!" I yelled at them both. Nissi ignored me and started browbeating Nock again. I didn't have time for this. "Nissi, shut up!" I might as well have slapped her, by the look on her face. I went on. "You're right, she is dying, but we're going to save her, so I need you to lay off the blaming right now, got it?"

"Yeah," she said, somehow managing to sound both angry and contrite.

Shaking my head, I hurried to the bathroom to scrub down.

"Norm." Stansy stood in the doorway. "What can I do to help?"

"Do you have a pad and paper?"

"Sure, be right back."

"Norm!" Wendy's cry was panicked. I shook the water from my hands as I ran back to Tilly's room.

"She's unconscious," Wendy said. "I kept talking to her, but she passed out and won't wake up."

"That's okay," I said. "You didn't do anything wrong."

"My God, she really did it," Stansy said, stepping into the room behind me.

I turned to her. "I need you to take notes. Wendy, I need a timer. Give me fifteen seconds." I felt for Tilly's pulse. "Mark."

Wendy looked at her watch, counting the seconds. "Mark."

Tilly's pulse was close to 140. Not good. I did all the tests I could think to try with what I had available in the med kit and in the room. I didn't think she was in a coma, but it was bad. Probably stage four shock.

Stan appeared in the doorway. "It's just over three pints, Norm. Call it three and a quarter." Stansy jotted this down as he said it.

"You're sure?"

"Yeah, Norm."

I just nodded, though I wanted to curse. Given her size, that had to be close to half her blood volume.

"I am here," Sasha said, hauling a plastic bag full of medical supplies. She handed me several sheets of paper. I rifled through until I found Tilly's. "She's A negative," I said, gesturing for Stansy to write it down. "Possible donors are. . . Nock. He's A negative, too. I flipped through the papers again, checking to be sure. There's, um, there's no one else." I couldn't keep a note of panic from my voice. I was going to need at least two pints of blood, and I couldn't take that much from Nock without endangering his health.

"What about me?" Sasha said. "I'm O negative. Will that help?"

I gave her shoulder a squeeze, almost laughing in my relief. "Yes, that will work."

I found a box of rubber gloves in the supplies and pulled on a pair. I began to set up the saline IV to boost Tilly's blood pressure, and Wendy was looking dubiously at the items that Sasha had brought. "How are we planning to collect the blood? We don't have any blood packs."

"I'm not sure yet," I said. I recalled that Wendy had been a biochemist before she went into hiding. "Do you think you can improvise something with what we have in the house?"

Wendy considered a moment. "I think so. Maybe. Can I borrow Nissi and Stan?"

"Yeah, go."

Wendy grabbed some tubing from the supplies Sasha had brought and hurried out.

Sasha was staring at Tilly. Moving slowly and carefully, she lowered herself onto the top of the dresser opposite the bed. "This is my fault," she said, "my responsibility. Whatever happens--"

"We'll deal with that if we come to it," I said. Like hell, this is your fault, I thought to myself. I had been the one to push Tilly over the edge. "Go get Nock in here."

Sasha returned with him a few moments later.

"You need my blood?" Nock said, his brow furrowed over those slit-pupiled eyes.

"It's the only way we can save Tilly."

"Okay, I'm in."

I started readying my supplies. "We don't have anything to store it in yet, but I want to get you prepped."

"Shit, I hate needles," he said with a shudder, when he saw the catheter. He sat on the ground and rolled up his sleeve. "This gonna hurt?"

I grinned wryly as I rubbed alcohol on his arm. "I have a small confession to make. I've done IVs before at the hospital, but only back of the hand. We'll have to do your median-cubital, up here inside your elbow. You'll be my second try at this. Tilly was my first."

"Oh, that's just great," he said.

"Squeeze your hand in a fist, please."

Nock averted his eyes as I brought the catheter close to his arm. I slid the needle into the vein in a quick jerk of movement I had learned, blowing out the breath I had been holding when blood quickly seeped up into the clear tubing. It looked like I had hit the vein dead on. I closed off the tube and taped him up quickly. "Not so bad, huh?" I said.

Nock looked at his arm in surprise. "Hey, yeah. Just a little sting. Not too bad."

I checked on Tilly. About half the saline was gone, so I took her pulse again. It had slowed slightly. The saline solution was bringing her blood volume up, but we really needed to replace her lost blood cells.

"Now you," I said, and got to work on Sasha. She sat through the process without complaint or comment, other than to pull out her phone several times to see if her contact had messaged her. When it was done, I knelt by Tilly's bedside, checking her vital signs about once per minute and reporting them to Stansy to write down.

"Norm," Wendy said behind me. I turned. She was wearing rubber gloves and carried in her hand a one quart canning jar. The tubing she had taken had been connected somehow to a pair of rubber grommets that went through a hole in the lid and gripped the tubing tightly, forming a seal. One tube snaked down to the bottom of the jar while the other ended just inside. There was even a small hand pump that had been fitted to attach to the smaller tube as a bellows. "We made a transfusion flask. Will it work?"

I stood and moved closer. "You sterilized it?"

"Of course. Stan and Nissi are finishing up the second one. One of them will be down with it any minute."

I took the apparatus from her and examined it. "I think it might work. Now I'm just worried about clotting."

Wendy shook her head. "Sasha had sodium citrate on hand for canning. We made a solution from it. There's some already in the bottom of the jar."

"Wendy, I could kiss you." I hooked the improvised flask up to Nock's catheter and opened the tube. I used a felt pen to mark the bottle at just over a pint. "Keep squeezing your arm," I told him. "It will help pump the blood out faster."

Nissi arrived with the second flask and I hooked Sasha up. I checked on Tilly again when that was done. Her pulse had definitely slowed some more, but she was still unconscious. "Hang on," I whispered to her. The waiting was nerve-wracking. I knew that it took time to draw off blood, but I kept thinking how every moment brought Tilly closer to dying. I used some of that time to suture her wound closed and re-bandage, with Wendy's help. As Nock's jar neared the level I had marked, I moved close, poised to disconnect him the moment it was reached. "There," I said, closing off the tube.

I quickly swapped out the nearly empty saline bag and replaced it with the jar, working the pump a few times to prime the pressure. Once I was sure that the blood was moving into the tubing and that there was no air in the lines, I slumped back against the wall. I was feeling shaky and a little sick. Close to forty-five minutes had passed since Wendy had first found Tilly, and I was starting to come down from my adrenaline high. Still, I had to remember to pump the jar at regular intervals to keep the pressure inside up

"I'm done," Sasha said, bringing me back to full awareness. I went to unhook her.

"What—what's happening?" Tilly said. Her voice rasped.

Wendy moved in quickly to calm her while I worked on Sasha. "You're going to be okay," she said, stroking a hand through Tilly's hair.

I finished up and came back to Tilly's side with the flask of Sasha's blood. I could see her gaze darting around, taking it all in. "You're giving me a transfusion? Why?"

I checked the flask. It was nearly time to change it, so I stayed at the ready, poised above Tilly. "You would have died without it," Wendy said. The admonishment in her voice was clear. Tilly looked away in shame. "But we're glad you're back with us," Wendy added.

"I wanted to die," she said, so softly that I doubted that anyone in the room but Nock or myself would hear. "I can't live with this anymore." The desolation in those words went straight to my core. For just an instant, I felt an echo of what she must have felt.

"That's enough of that talk." The rumbling source of those words surprised me enough to take my focus off the transfusion flask for a moment. That had been Nock. "You're going to live. You're going to get this problem figured out. But first you're going to thank the people that saved your life. You understand me, girl?"

Tilly stared wide-eyed at Nock, as if seeing him for the first time. "I'm sorry, Nock. And thank you."

I clamped the tube and changed out the empty flask for Sasha's full one while the others had words with Tilly. She didn't speak much, but she acted much more like the woman she had been before our last session in the greenhouse. I removed the needles from Nock and Sasha's arms and bandaged them up. "Okay, everyone out," I said. "Tilly needs her rest."

After they had gone, Tilly spoke to me. "Stansy and Nock don't despise me any more." Her voice had a touch of awe in it. "Why is that, Norm?"

I sat on the edge of the bed and took her hand. "Empathy," I said. "Human beings are funny that way. Most of us have the ability to understand and empathize with another person's pain, but we also have the capacity to ignore it. What you did today made them realize how deeply your pain goes. They finally understand what it has done to you."

"Sometimes I think I'd like to not know what everyone is feeling. You're all so worried about me. And worried that I'll try this again, I think."