The Cure

CARTER ONLY NEEDED THAT NIGHT TO prepare what he believed was necessary to initiate his testing. Any other work that had to be done could be finalized during the preliminary testing period to pass the time while he waited to see how his patient would respond. He had more than enough of the serum produced to give Sammy the treatment she needed, and anything beyond that could be manufactured during the time he was going to spend with her at this house. It was a nice place, in a very convenient location, just on the outskirts of the city but not close enough to warrant any unwanted attention. It had only one floor, but it was a spacious floor that had a few bedrooms and a fairly big bathroom. There was enough room to do what was needed and still had a little personal space to move around. After everything was all set up, Xavier insisted that they both crash for the night and get a good night's sleep and start her treatment at exactly noon the next day. Sammy didn't feel like disputing the doctor and called it a night as they both went to their separate rooms to rest. It wasn't the most comfortable bed he had ever slept in, but after numerous nights on a couch or on crappy hotel beds, this bed was just fine.

Xavier was a light sleeper to begin with, so he was back up and working about six hours after he went down but stopped working when he heard a rustling in the kitchen. He quietly strolled out to the living room to notice from there Samantha had woken up and was boiling the kettle in the kitchen. Xavier relaxed when he realized it was just her and calmed approached her.

“Having trouble sleeping?” he inquired.

“Just a bit,” Sammy confirmed as she poured the boiling hot water into the mug, “Would you care for a cup of tea?”

“Please,” Xavier said as he walked over. “Two sugars, thank you.”

As he took the cup from her, he could notice there was a little shake in her hands, which he knew was normal considering what they were about to do that afternoon.

“There is nothing to be nervous about,” Xavier tried to reassure her, “I will be here with you the entire time. I’m going to have you hooked up to various machines to monitor your status during the entire treatment as well. I also have a lot of medical supplies here and am prepared for all kinds of situations should they arise.”

Sammy took a deep breath. “That's nice to know. Do you have an idea of what problems might arise?”

“I have a reasonable idea,” Xavier bluntly answered. “Personally, I'm the kind of guy who always prepares for the worst but hopes for the best. If all goes well, you'll spend the next few days in bed feeling like you had a bad head cold and that's it.”

“And the worst?” Sammy asked.

“I'm not going to sugar coat it, Sammy.” Xavier started, as his tone worsened, “The worst cast scenario is death. It doesn’t get any worse than that.”

“That would be a real bummer,” Sammy said with a hint of sarcasm, trying to use humor to lighten the moment.

Xavier took a small sip of his tea. “What I’m worried about is that the serum could be too aggressive when attacking the tumor and that could inadvertently cause brain damage. This kind of attack could cause you to go into a vegetative state, a coma, or even die. This is why I plan to introduce the serum to your system and the tumor in very low dosages. I’m going to send in one tactical unit at a time rather than send in than entire army.”

“How will you know if any damage is occurring?” Sammy quickly asked, as she was eager to know how he would be on top of the situation.

“Not only will I have monitors attached to not only keep an eye on your heard, but to observe your brain activity as well.” Xavier explained to her, “If I notice any changes or fear that your fragile little noodle is suffering because of the treatment, I will stop the treatment and see if your condition improves from there.”

Sammy seemed to look a little more relaxed as she got more information about what was going to happen.

“Okay,” She replied, “I appreciate your efforts to be prepared.”

“Yes, of course,” Xavier confirmed, “I would never walk into this blindly without at least an inkling of what might happen. There are always bound to be side effects that one can’t anticipate, but most of the ideal situations I have predicted and am prepared to take care of should they occur.”

He finished his tea and placed the mug back on the counter. He was never the kind of guy to nurse a hot drink and preferred to finish it before it lost its ability to scold.

“Are you going to try to get a little more rest?” he inquired.

“If it’s all right with you,” Sammy started as she put down her tea as well, “I would prefer to get started. I’d rather not wait.”

“Are you sure about this?” Xavier asked.

“I’ve never been more certain about anything in a long time.” Sammy answered.

“Alright then,” Xavier said as he held out his hand, “Let’s get started.”

She took his hand, and he led her into the guest room where he had been preparing the room for her.

“You’ll be sleeping in here for the next few days while undergoing your treatment.” Xavier explained, “And no, I won’t be taking your room. I’ll be crashing on the couch in the hallway so I can hear the machines should they sound any alarms.”

“I appreciate that,” Sammy said as she walked over and took a seat on the guest bed that was now in the center of the room and surrounded by the machines that were going to monitor her stats. Xavier then tossed a medical gown onto the bed. She looked back up at him, “Are you serious?”

“I’m afraid so.” Xavier said with an innocent look, “You can keep your undergarments. I doubt they’ll get in the way but if your life is on the line, I make no promises. Understood?”

“Alright, I get it.” Sammy paused for a moment, which was long enough for Xavier to take the hint.

He quickly left the room to give her the privacy she needed to get changed into the gown he had left her. A few moments later she was in the gown and under the cover of the spare bed.

“I’m decent now.” she called out.

A moment later Xavier returned, collected her clothes, and respectfully moved them to another part of the room. It took him about ten to twenty minutes to hook up the monitoring devices, but to Sammy it seemed like forever. She lay there and Xavier could tell she was tense, nervous, and quite afraid of the unknown. As he was strapping on the sensors, Xavier placed a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“I’ll be here the entire time,” he reminded her, “And will do everything in my power to make sure this goes well.”

Xavier took a deep breath and looked her dead center in the eyes.

“Last chance Sammy,” he informed her, “As one would say this is the point of no return. Once we cross this line, I can’t guarantee we’ll be able to abort. I could stop adding future doses if something goes wrong but once a dose is in, it’s not coming back out. This is it, Sammy. Are you ready?”

Sammy’s heart was beating very fast, which proved that the machines were working because that heart rate was being recorded accurately. She nodded.

“I’m ready,” She said with no break in her voice. “I want to do this not only for myself, but for the others who might benefit from this if it works.”

“You’re very brave, Sammy.” Xavier added, “I can only imagine what you’re going through and I appreciate the help you’re providing. Words cannot express the gratitude I feel for your help with this research. I genuinely hope this works because I believe world needs more brave people like you to hang around a little bit longer.”

“Thank you.” Sammy said.

“No Sammy, thank you,” Xavier said, as he took a syringe from the table that was beside them and it had the serum inside it and was ready to be administered.

She looked at the needle. “Why is it pink?”

Xavier paused for a moment to laugh. “They always ask that, but for some reason the chemicals I use to form the compound create this color naturally. If I had the ability to pick the color, I would have gone with something more calming. This one seems to freak people out a bit, but it could have been worse. At least it wasn’t green or blue.”

“That’s true,” Sammy agreed, “Those colors would have scared me a bit. Movies have given green liquids in needles a very bad rap.”

“Tell me about it,” Xavier said, as he was amused by the humor in the banter, “But all kidding aside here Sammy, we have to get started.”

Xavier took her arm, and a few moments later he poked it into the inner part of her elbow directly into her vein. A moment later he squeezed the syringe and pushed the pink serum into her system, and it was done. He removed the needle from her arm and placed a small cotton ball there to stop the bleeding and sat there with her to watch her initial reaction.

Xavier quickly grabbed a stethoscope to monitor her heart’s initial reaction, but it all seemed to be going rather well. He started to check her vitals and they were normal as well. Carter also checked the machines to make sure they were working and reading her stats correctly and they were. Things were normal for the moment, and hopefully they would stay that way.

Sammy laid back in her bed and huffed. “Now what?”

“Now we wait,” Xavier answered, “If nothing too serious happens between now and noon tomorrow, I will administer a second dose.”

“So, what am I supposed to do in the meantime?” she quickly asked him.

“Stay right there and try to relax,” Xavier said, “I’ll get something to help you pass the time.”

There was a cable outlet in the guest room that Xavier had spotted when he was setting up his lab, so he took the medium sized television that was in her bedroom and brought it into the guest room. Once hooked up, he passed her the remote and a few extra pillows that would allow her to sit up in bed while watching the tube.

“The noise isn’t going to bug you while you do your work?” she quickly asked.

“It’s all right,” Xavier replied, “I’m used to working in noisy environments. I also want to be by your side as much as possible, and thankfully this room is rather spacey. I’ll be fine.”

With that Sammy turned the television on and immediately flipped over to the soaps, while Xavier went over to a desk at the other side of the room and started to work on producing some more of the serum while watching her very closely at the same time. He made sure that he was seated in such a way that she was always in his line of vision so he could look over her way with minimal effort. The first few hours flew right by, and Carter stopped working on the serum to take a sample of her blood for analysis to check up and see how things were going. He was looking at the sample in his microscope and marveling at what was before him.

“This is very interesting.” He said to no one in particular.

“What is?” Sammy quickly asked.

“It’s nothing to worry about,” Xavier said as he looked back up at her from his machine. “The serum is in there and doing its thing, that much I can see. But as I anticipated, it’s very aggressive. If I didn’t inject you with the serum myself, I would have sworn this was a full dosage you were given this morning based on the sample I am looking at right now.”

“Which means?” Sammy inquired.

“It means I was right,” Xavier said as he winked at her, “It was a fair precaution to not give you a full dose right off the bat. We just have keep watching to see how much more aggressive this thing is going to get.”

“When do we break for lunch?” Sammy said as she started to suddenly feel very hungry. “You are the designated cook since I’m a little tied up here.”

Xavier let out an amused chuckle.

“That you are.” The young doctor agreed, “I’ll go to the kitchen and whip you up something very light. I don’t want to overwhelm your system with anything right now.”

“No problem, just don’t take so long.” She snapped at him.

“Alright, I’m on it.” Xavier said, as left the room and wandered into the kitchen to prepare a very light lunch. He tossed together a quick ham and cheese sandwich with mayo, a leaf of lettuce, and cut it in half diagonally for a touch of class. He also tossed a small handful of potato chips onto the plate to give it a nice warm deli-like feel to it. Combined with a small glass of water, this was all he was comfortable giving her right now. Xavier was putting the water filter back into the fridge when the alarms started to go off. Leaving the lunch on the countertop, he darted back into the room where Sammy was to see that her vitals had started to go off the charts and she was in the middle of having a terrible seizure.

“Aw crap!” Xavier screamed to no one in particular, as he darted into the room and started to care for his patient.

He put something in her mouth to prevent her from chewing or choking on her tongue and held her down until the seizure had ended. It took a little over three minutes for that to happen, but when it was all over Sammy had not regained consciousness. He walked over to the machines to make sure they were still working, and they seemed to be. After the seizure had ended, her vitals had returned to normal, and everything was back to normal rhythm. According to the other scanners, there was still brain activity, so the mind was still functioning on some sort of basis. Xavier grabbed a small doctor’s light and started to test the pupil for cognitive response. Her eyes were responding but she wasn’t. Something appeared to be going terribly wrong.