I pulled myself out of the memory painfully, needing to pull myself together for Anna's sake. I slowed my breathing down forcefully and focused on the lab in front of me. Anna was lying on the table, still not moving, her eyes closed, and I was terrified to look too closely and see if she was alive or dead. If she was alive, I had just minutes to figure something out to save her with no blood and not much real medicine.
A large needle and tube caught my eye from the supplies cupboard, and I got a horrible but perhaps life-saving idea. I was feeling okay comparatively, so sharing a little of my blood shouldn't be an issue. I made up my mind and rushed to her, ready to insert the line. She had lost so much blood her veins were practically nonexistent, making the process more difficult than it would be normally. I poked around on her hand, trying to find that vein, and she didn't seem to come around from the pain until my third try. Her bright blue eyes opened weakly, watching me insert the line, never complaining about the pain that she must have felt.
I tried to hide my hands shaking from her, but I could barely get the I.V. in me from how badly they were trembling from both the virus weakening me and the terror of losing her.
"You'll die faster. You don't even like me," she asked once I was done, realizing what I was doing.
I pushed her blond hair out of her face gently, taking in every detail with guilt and love.
"Foolish child. Of course I do. I love you with everything in me," I told her with total honesty.
She seemed confused, but the exhaustion took over, and she passed back out, having made peace with death more so than I did, or perhaps just more exhausted than I was. I watched my blood transfer slowly from me to her, buying her precious time and taking mine away like an old-fashioned pocket watch.
Ethically, it was completely immoral of me to use my blood to save her, considering I was one of the only doctors who had the knowledge to end this virus. Her life was not more important than the millions of lives I could potentially save if I was alive long enough to find a cure or way to treat it. I felt a little guilt as she slowly picked up, and her breathing became a little deeper. Some choices were easier than others.
I thought I was feeling fine, but after about 30 minutes, I started getting woozy. I held her hand, exhausted from being up for days straight researching, and laid my head down on the table next to her, hoping I wouldn't sleep more than a few minutes with how important every second was.
Anna POV:
Waking up was possibly one of the most unpleasant things I had experienced in my life. My head was killing me, and I felt weak and shaky all over my body. Death would have been more merciful. I grimaced and sat up, taking in my surroundings. I was a right mess, covered in dried blood, and I had somehow ended up in Jason's office. I had been so out of it I didn't remember even coming down here or how I got here.
More surprising than my location was the fact that Jason was sleeping on my legs, clearly exhausted, and he was holding my hand in an affectionate way. He wasn't the type to show affection easily, so he must really have been worried to bother with such dramatics. I tried to disentangle my hand from his, but we were attacked by an improvised bloodline.
"Idiot," I mumbled under my breath, realizing exactly why I was still alive. He should have let me die and just focused on the virus. I very carefully untangled him from me and disconnected the I.V. line. He was so exhausted he only started a bit with all the commotion, breathing my name at one point before settling back into what had to be a very comfortable nap.
I grabbed the I.V. tube and took it to the microscope to look at what I could find. He was still alive despite sharing his blood with me, and he actually looked somewhat okay. Clearly, his body was fighting off the infection somehow; the question was how.
I started up the microscope in an absent-minded way, not really thinking about it. I just somehow knew how it worked, the knowledge clearly stored in a different part of my brain than personal recall. Even spreading the blood for the slide was a habitual feeling that felt just right. I was in my element and didn't even know that it was my thing. Every day, I found out something new about myself, but this was by far the most exciting of all of them.
Looking at the slide under the microscope, I was able to identify the various organisms and cells that I saw, including the disgusting virus. His phagocyte cells seemed to identify the invading virus and triggered the T cells to kill the virus almost instantly.
My control specimen's phagocyte cells were just too slow-acting to protect the body from infection. I couldn't tell why his phagocyte cells seemed to know already that the virus was an invader and produced the T cells needed to fight it off. Perhaps it was just genetics and luck of the mutation, or perhaps they had encountered something somewhat similar, and that was close enough for his phagocyte cells to misidentify the invading virus but in a positive way. If his immune cells could fight off the virus, then that meant others could, and the 100 percent mortality rate we were quoted was invalid.
The phone rang, interrupting my thoughts and drawing me back into the present. "Hello?" I asked, writing my findings down in my notes at a rapid pace so I didn't lose track of my thoughts.
"Hello? This isn't Jason?" The voice on the other end said, confused, with a thick Indian accent.
"Obviously not. He's currently passed out. What do you need?" I asked absently, adjusting my microscope to get a better look at the T cells.
"Passed out? Does he not realize we have a wave of people dying here?" The voice asked, aghast.
I hummed, looking back at the very pale Jason leaning over the table I had been sleeping on. Alive but clearly too weak to stay conscious. "I will let him know if he wakes back up. He gave me a blood transfusion with the most ghetto contraption ever, so I think he gave me just a bit too much of his blood," I explained, wondering if I should try to wake him or let him be. If I woke him, he would most likely take over and ruin my progress, so I turned back to my microscope, ignoring him again.
The voice on the line was silent for a moment. "Anna? Is this you? This is Rahul! I thought you lost your memory? Not to mention, what fool would risk his life when literally everyone is depending on him? No offense to you, obviously," he asked, horrified that his one hope had gotten himself knocked out with his stupidity.
"I'm fine. I can remember everything needed for this, so don't worry," I said, brushing him off.
"You know, that's actually kind of sweet. Risking his life for you. He was in very bad shape when I last talked to him. You're sure he's not dead, yes? That would be just like him to kill himself trying to protect you. Foolish, foolish man. I have to respect that, though," he said, clearly way more involved in our personal relationship than he needed to be and some sort of old friend.
"I hardly see him being the type to risk his life. I think he just felt guilty for giving this to me," I said, shaking my head and losing focus on my work. No one would tell me much about Jason, but Rahul seemed perfectly happy to share his thoughts.
"I highly doubt it. You were the light of his life. Never before have I seen someone so in love. He worshipped you. I mean, for goodness sake, the man almost died pulling you out of the car, you know? Seconds after he got the two of you out, the car exploded. I bet he didn't even mention that. He's not one to flaunt his emotions, you know? More of a sullen, deep thinker, I think. He would only open up to me after some strong whisky. But don't think he doesn't care. He cares too much, if anything," Rahul explained happily, clearly content gossiping even with the urgency of our work.
I looked back at Jason, my emotions even more conflicted than before. I couldn't imagine him being emotional. Though I had seen it... hadn't I? He had seemed to enjoy me in control last time we were together, and yet, there was this softness he showed. It was like he was scared to trust me at first to let himself be under my control, yet it was there. The way he had looked at me while on his knees was submissive in every way and yet so obsessed with me. Why he hid it from me and why he refused to bond with me left me flabbergasted.
"I guess in a weird way," I said, not sure if I fully believed Rahul's assessment.
"Don't worry. He will come around. He just needs time. He's a tough cookie. Though we may not have much time yet to enjoy. I take it you got the virus, too?" He said thickly between his accent, and it sounded like he had a runny nose. Evidently, he had the virus also.
"Yes, I have isolated some phagocyte cells that are producing the correct T-cells for this virus from Jason. He seems to be fighting off the virus as insane as that sounds. We need more, like A LOT more, but I have a DNA amplifier here I just need blood. If he's able to fight this off then so can other people, and once they are identified we will be able to get shots in arms in no time," I explained, confident in my plan.