2125

Hank Landry had an incredible opportunity to get several uninterrupted hours of sleep. The mining teams were on their way, the medical staff was preparing for the radiation treatment, and the scientific and maintenance personnel were working to contain it. The higher-ups had been briefed. Once the mining teams returned, he would be needed.

And so he should have been sleeping. He'd even gone to a real bed in a real, private room. But he stared at the ceiling, exhausted, irritated. His body was over-tired to the point of fighting sleep, as Carolyn had done so often as a toddler.

But laying her down had accomplished nothing. No, they'd had to run her through her paces until she dropped, so he shoved the blankets back in the dark, pushed to his feet, and headed for the infirmary.

It looked different. Barren. The curtains were up, but almost everything extraneous had been removed – even the chairs in the waiting area. Anything soft about the place was gone, leaving only the cold cement walls and floor. A member of the maintenance staff was fitting the windows in the door with a dark, heavy material he assumed was meant to block the radiation.

"Doctor Lam's in her office, sir," a nurse offered.

He hadn't spoken to her since their argument earlier in the day, and hadn't meant to now. But they would have to mend bridges sometime – at least work together – so he supposed he could stop in for an update. He knocked softly and let himself in.

He nearly tripped over her. She was curled on her side on the concrete, her head pillowed on one arm. It couldn't have been comfortable, but if she was as tired as he was, she probably hadn't cared.

But he did. Silently backing out of the room, Hank flagged down a nurse. "Are there any blankets left in here?"

"Not for long," she warned, but she disappeared a moment and returned with one in her hands.

"Thank you." He waited until she left to reopen the door. Unfolding the fabric, he doubled and straightened it before laying it over his daughter as gently as possible. Silently closing the door behind him, he headed for bed.

~/~

"Knock, knock."

The greeting was getting old, but Jack tried not to scowl at the nurse who stepped through the curtains with a cart. Daniel was snoozing on the other side of the bed next to Cam, so he got up to let her in. He had to pee, anyway. "I'll be back in a minute."

Mitchell watched with interest as the nurse opened a packet and pulled out what looked like a square bandage. She peeled back the adhesive and pressed it ever so softly onto Sam's arm above the wrist. She repeated the process with a second package, then a third, creating a line of flesh-toned patches up her patient's arm. "What are those?"

"Transdermal medications," the nurse answered with a smile. "They get absorbed through the skin and into the blood. I can tell you about each of them, if you'd like."

"No, no, that's okay." But since she was here... "Hey, question."

"Sure."

"Am I crazy, or is her pulse getting faster?"

The young woman glanced at the monitor – specifically, at the "74" blinking in the corner. "Well, that's within the average range," she said, "but I would expect Colonel Carter's to be better than average when she's healthy." She took a break from the patches to pull out the chart at the foot of the bed. "You're not crazy; it is going up."

Well, that was both good and bad, he supposed. "What does that mean?"

"It's probably a combination of several things. Stress," she suggested. "But she's low on red blood cells right now, so her body isn't circulating the volume of oxygen and nutrients it needs. Her heart is working harder to try and catch up. We can help a little. Colonel Carter? Can you wake up for me for a second?"

It took some coaxing, but the woman blinked slowly. "I'll let you go back to sleep in a minute," the nurse promised. "I'm gonna put some medications under your tongue, okay?"

"I guess," Carter breathed. "Where's-" Jack stepped through the curtains, and she didn't bother to finish the question. "Yeah, go ahead."

"Okay." The nurse stepped her through the process with each medication – five in all – then said, "Are you feeling lightheaded at all? Short of breath?"

Sam shook her head. "A little dizzy, I guess."

The nurse nodded. "I think we need to get a little more oxygen in your system." Her patient made a face, but didn't complain as she removed the tube around her nose and gently replaced it with a mask. "Can I get you anything else?"

"A blanket, maybe? Please."

"Of course."

Jack took his chair back as the nurse rolled her cart out of the room, then waited for her to lay another blanket and leave again before he said, "That mask is super sexy."

Sam smiled. "Get some sleep, Jack. There's nothing to do for awhile."

If only that weren't true, but the mining hadn't even begun yet. As far as he could figure, they were at least eight hours from starting the treatment she so desperately needed. And there was no word on whether it had helped Stolz. "I will," he promised. "You first."

"Mmm." She closed her eyes and drifted away.