The Fourth Afternoon
On the way back to the cave, her mind was ablaze. The first, best choice was surgery. Of course, that wasnât an option. Even if the Arcturans would allow her a field-hospital-quality surgical set-up, she had never done anything
this
extensive. This would require a full-fledged trauma team. She wasnât about to let him die, whatever the Arcturans might find âentertainingâ. That left
one other option.
She lay him face-down on the ledge next to the waterfall and pulled the rest of the arrow out of his torso. The bleeding was steady, not arterial. They were lucky in that respect. There was an ample supply of the latest liquid bandage material in the medical kit. It was waterproof, which was exactly what she would need now. She applied it liberally to both wounds. While she was waiting for it to set, she withdrew the hypodermic, rubber tube, bandage strip and sterile swipes from the med kit. She looked down at her forearm, still not believing she was going to go through with this.
Giselle tied off her bicep with the tube, swabbed the inside of her elbow, selected a good vein and inserted the needle. She drew off two CCâs, then applied the bandage strip over the puncture. She upended the syringe, tapped it a couple of times to dislodge any air bubbles, then slowly eased the plunger up until the blood beaded at the tip. Capping it, she repeated the procedure of finding a vein on Geoffâs arm.
Giselle picked up the hypodermic once more and uncapped it. She stared at the syringe of what could only be described as pure poison, then at Geoffâs unconscious form. His life was on the line; it was
this
or certain death. She sighed deeply, realizing there might not be a difference. âGod forgive me,â she muttered. Then, she injected him. After applying liquid bandage to the tiny puncture wound. She eased his body into the frigid waters of the pool under the waterfall. Making certain his face would not slip beneath the surface, she sat down on the ledge next to him â and waited for the ordeal to begin.
His forehead was warm to the touch within ten minutes.
So quickly! That couldnât be a good sign.
She would have no idea how high the fever would run, butâŠ. The digital thermometer materialized on the ledge next to her right hand.
The Arcturans
! Bless their black little hearts. They couldnât have any idea what she was doing to him, but they had seen her repeatedly feeling his forehead and were playing the perfect little Yuppie facilitators. They must be loving this; the helpless femaleâs last, desperate, feeble attempt to save her mate.
Laugh it up, Furballs. You will be choking on it soon enough.
The thermometer already read one-oh-one-point-two.
Oh, if only it would stop there!
She knew better than that. This was only the beginning.
After one hour, the thermometer read one-oh-three-point-three. Geoff was going up like a five-alarm-fire. She hoped the chilled pool would be enough to hold him together. Giselle herself had topped off at one-oh-six-point-five, but
she
had been packed in ice. Ice? Well,
why not?
She dragged him out of the pool and onto the ledge.
âHydrogen Oxide, zero degrees Celsius, two hundred kilograms in one-point-two-five centimeter cubes.â
Never let it be said the Arcturans didnât appreciate a good joke. The mountain of ice appeared on the ledge next to Geoffâs inert form. She started shoving the cubes over him
Eight hours in. He was at one-oh-six-point-six.
Stay calm, Giselle. Brain damage doesnât begin until one-oh-seven-point-six.
She had already replenished the ice once and would continue doing so as long as the Arcturans would give it to her. She sang to him. She recited poetry: Keats, Dickenson, Shelley, Elizabeth and Robert Browning, and her personal favorite, Robert Frost.
Two roads diverged in the yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as long as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowthâŠ.
Fourteen hours. One-oh-seven-point-two. She remembered the reports. Swifty Pike had tried so hard to keep the wording clinical, unemotional. Thirty-six attempts. Thirty-six catastrophic failures. Thirty-six brave volunteers. Soldiers. Marines. A couple of SEALs. All gone. The process had required anywhere from forty-eight to seventy-two hours to run its course. Each had spiked between one-oh-nine and one-thirteen. Thirty-two had died outright.
Crispy Critters
. They had been the lucky ones. The other four had survived the transition â at least, their
bodies
had. Swifty Pike was one of the most decent human beings it had ever been her privilege to meet. He had ordered the four euthanized. All thirty-six had been autopsied, of course, then buried with full military honors.
She
knew how to make it work. Despite her credentials, the others were disinclined to follow her recommendations. So, she had worked alone â and became Number Thirty-Seven. General Pike told her later he had almost stroked out when he found her on the lab floor with the syringe still in her hand. But she had been different;
way
different. She was way outside the testing parameters. Her numbers had been way different too; nowhere near the other thirty-six. In the end, she had been different in the only respect that really mattered;
eighteen hours in, she woke up intact.
Eighteen hours. One-oh-seven-point-four.
The spike was slowing!
That had to be
hopeful
, wasnât it? Geoffâs case was different, too. He had been spared the full wrath of the serum itself, having received her antibodies instead. That
had
to make a difference! She talked to him. She told him of her childhood, the glories of her misspent, misbegotten, over-the-top youth. She told him of the Proms she had never attended, the romances she had never had, the relationships that never were, all because she had wanted to
be somebody
â who, in the end, she wasnât.
She begged him, pleaded with him, promised she would be his âQueen, consort, or concubine, however he would have herâ, fuck his brains out every day of her life and count herself
blessed
for the opportunity, just please, please,
donât give up on her!
She had a gnawing pain in the pit of her stomach she was going to lose him. Without him there to hold her, she already felt so alone.
Twenty-two hours. She had been awake the past thirty-four. Fatigue, anxiety, and stress had taken their toll. Her vision was swimming. She had long since run out of intelligent things to say. Now she was reduced to nursery rhymes and limericks.
There once was a man from NantucketâŠ.
She glanced again at the thermometer for the⊠thousandth?⊠ten-thousandth time? She couldnât even focus on the digital readout anymore. She blinked several times, trying to force her eyes to tear. Finally, her vision settled down enough to make out the numbers: one-oh-seven-pointâŠ
four?
She shook her head. She must be delirious. She looked again. One-oh-seven-point-four.
Donât get cocky, Giselle! It could be a plateau. The others went three times as long.
For the second time that day â twice more than in the past four decades - Giselle RenĂ© Du Mont prayed.
Twenty-three hours. She was on auto-pilot now. She was sitting cross-legged on the ledge, his head in her lap. She was stroking his fevered forehead with one hand, just looking, hoping for the best, fearing the worst. She looked again at the thermometer, her best friend and worst enemy in this or any other lifetime.
One-oh-seven-point-two!
She started rocking back and forth, big, fat, silent tears rolling down her cheeks.
Thank you, God! Thank you!
She hoped God really
would
forgive her for pretending to be Him. She looked down at Geoffreyâs comatose form.
âWelcome to
Project Lorelei,
My Love. The Few. The Proud. The Damned.â
She hoped, one day,
he
would find it in his heart to forgive her, too. That would have to wait. They werenât out of the woods, yet. He still had to
wake up.
She gently lay his head down on the ledge, then stretched out next to him. She was asleep in moments, holding his hand.
Geoffrey opened his eyes in the late evening of the fifth day. Though sound asleep, Giselle felt his hand flick and awoke with a start. She sat up, lifted his head into her lap, and began stroking his forehead. His fever had gone down dramatically. She had to find out if the fever had caused any impairment.
âHi, Tiger. How are you feeling?â
âBetter than you look. Giselle, you are a
mess
!â
âI love you, too. Geoffrey, be a dear and tell me the square root of eighty-one.â
âExcuse me?â
âThe square root of eighty-one, Geoffrey. Surely you know it.â
âOf course I do. Itâs⊠nine. So what?â
âSo what, indeed. What is the capital of Zaire?â
âUh,
Kinshasa
, and havenât they gone back to calling it the Republic of Congo?â
âThey have, indeed. Now, listen carefully:
At the hole where he went in
Red-eye called to Wrinkle-skin.
Hear what little Red-eye saith:
Finish it, Geoffrey.â
â
Huh?
â
âFinish the quote, Geoffrey.â
âI canât.â
Giselle slipped her hands through the remains of the ice and gripped his shoulders tightly.
âThis is important, Geoffrey. Kipling.
Rikki Tikki Tavi
. Finish the quote.â
âI just told you, I canât.â
Her heart sank. They had been
so close
. He sounded normal enough. How extensive
was
the damage?
âPlease try, just for me.â
âGiselle, I really donât know what this is all about and I
really
hate to disappoint you, but I never memorized
Rikki Tikki Tavi
. I thought I was doing well with Robert Frost.
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, and sorry I could not travel bothâŠ.
â
He couldnât fathom how reciting poetry â American poetry at that â would make her laugh and cry at the same time. He really didnât think he would ever understand her.
âErm, Giselle? Why am I lying in a puddle of ice water? ItâsâŠ
a little cold.
â
She cleared away the remaining ice and helped him slowly to his feet. He would be disoriented and weak as a kitten; she knew that. She lookedâŠ
up
into his eyes. As nearly as she could estimate, Geoff was about three inches taller and
a lot broader
. He wasnât bulky; he was really toned, well-defined, like a decathlete. Back in California, they would call him
ripped
. There wasnât a hint of what had previously been the near-mortal wound; not even a scar.
