BIG thanks to my beta, belowthesky, for working overtime and getting these chapters edited and back to me so I can post them more often!
It had been a few weeks since their return from France and Cosima and Delphine were logging in long hours at the lab. They made a nap nest on the couch for Cosima when she needed a break, and they were making progress. Minimal process, at a snail's pace, but they were moving forward. She required high-flow oxygen twenty-four hours a day now, more pills than fit in the palm of her hand and Delphine even broke out the big guns, a heavy hitting course of injectable corticosteroids, but her spirits were more or less pretty good. There were good days and bad, but most remained somewhere slightly above the middle. Today was a good day-no, a GREAT day even because the day finally came that Beth's rehab team decided the worst of her detoxing was over and she was allowed visitors.
"Do you have the uhhh...the drawings from the kids?" Alison asked.
Sarah held up the neatly packaged neon file folder full of art projects, cards and random colorings from Kira, Oscar and Gemma.
"And the candy, do you have the candy? Beth asked for gum. Lots and lots of gum. And those sour things, what are they called again?"
Cosima held up a bag bigger than her head full of candy. She, Helena and her nieces had quite the field day filling that up. Resulting in Helena currently back at the house with her BFF Donnie singing her praises to the porcelain throne. Turned out there was such as too much, even for Helena. It was Cosima's fault for bringing her. She knew better. It was probably for the best, though. Helena didn't do well in places like this. The only explanation she ever gave was that it brought back memories.
"Alison, bloody hell, relax!"
"We have everything, Alison." Cosima assured, shooting Sarah a look to knock it off. None of them had seen Beth in weeks. Cosima was the last when they dropped her off, so they were all a little anxious, but it was different for Alison. They were all sisters, yes. Biologically, but Alison and Beth were raised together. It was a different kind of bond none of the others would ever share no matter how close they were.
Alison mumbled a simple "hmm" as they entered the facility, going right to the desk. "Beth Childs?"
The young, probably just barely out of high school kid behind the desk took all of their IDs, his eyes wide, not leaving their identical faces as he took down their info in the visitor log. They often forgot they were identical and seeing this many identical people in one place wasn't a typical thing. As he handed the IDs back, Sarah couldn't help herself.
"Make sure the right one of us stays here when we leave, yeah? Would hate for the wrong one to get out."
"Room fourteen." He said with a shaky breath, pointing down a hall.
"That's your old room Alison, innit?" Sarah asked, always instigating.
"I thought Beth was still in detox?" Cosima asked, pushing Sarah behind her so she couldn't keep pushing at their sister's buttons. Sarah had a heart as big as the rest of them, but for the most part she acted like the bratty little sister no one asked for. It was all in good fun, though sometimes Sarah couldn't read people's limits and took things too far. Right now she was trying to calm the nervous energy rolling off Alison in thick waves, but Cosima knew Alison was stretched like a guitar string and with one wrong pluck she would snap.
"He-ey dipshits!"
Collective sighs of relief came from all four women before they launched themselves into a massive group hug. Even the wild one shed a tear or two. They could all still hear Alison's voice on the other side of that phone call, feel the tears streaming down their faces when they thought Beth was dead. The fear and sadness they felt every day that passed without a word on how Beth was doing while going through her withdrawal had them all constantly on edge, but here she was standing in front of them with a smile that said, 'I told you guys I could do it.'
"Oh, God, please, no tears. I'm okay, really. Don't tell me you've all gone soft without me around?"
"I thought you were still in detox?" Cosima asked, handing her sister the massive bag in her hands.
Beth's eyes lit up. "Nope," she smiled, gesturing around for them all to sit, helping Cosima with the oxygen tank she was permanently attached to nowadays before diving right into the bag of treats, passing it around to her sisters after she filled her hands.. "Let me out early for good behavior," she joked. "Surprise! Now I just have to get through this place. One day at a time, right?"
For the next three hours the sisters sat around catching up. For the hell she had been through, Beth looked amazing. Her eyes were clear, her smile genuine, her hands steady. She told them how excruciating detox was and how, for the first few days, she legitimately thought she was going to die. "But, I pushed through. I thought of you guys and my nieces and nephew and my dip-shit of a partner."
"Your boyfriend?" Sarah pushed, she and Helena sharing a knowing look between them.
"I did think of him. Once. Called him as soon as they gave me phone privileges to dump his ass. I tried calling him for a few days, but he never answered. Settled for leaving a message."
Sarah, Cosima and Helena shared a knowing smirk. Paul Dierden got what he had coming to him. Cosima only knew because Sarah and Helena were drinking after and Helena called her and confessed. Rightfully so, she was quite proud of herself.
Cosima's flight to France was the next day so she and her sisters were doing a quick dinner together.
"Has anyone heard from Paul?" Alison asked. "He's her boyfriend you would think he would be worried about her, but he didn't even show up at the hospital."
Sarah smirked, nudging Helena next to her. "'Lena, you know where Paul is?"
Helen shrugged. "Maybe he is taking a very long nap."
"A nap?" Alison asked.
"A trip." Cosima corrected. A trip was much more believable than a days long nap.
"Why do we care? Guy is a prick. Beth's better off without him." Sarah said in her usual gruffness and the topic of conversation quickly changed. Paul Dierden wouldn't be bothering any of them again.
Beth didn't know what was going to happen with her job. Her drugs of choice weren't common knowledge. Most were prescriptions, anyway, so unless her bosses found out about the cocaine, which was unlikely given the confidentiality of the program, it wasn't likely she would lose her job. Technically her drug use never interfered with her work so she was in a sort of grey area. Art was going to visit her soon and would know more.
It was good to see Beth smiling again. See color in her cheeks, hear her voice and her sarcasm. "You know they make grown ass adults do arts and crafts?"
Of course Beth wanted to catch-up on everyone else's lives as well. Sarah was par for the course. For someone who could never be still, she was doing a better job at it than any of them. Running Clone Club and driving the car pool. If her younger self could see her now she would have jumped in front of a train. Alison, too, was in a sort of holding pattern. She took care of the kids and did crafts, she explained, with a pointed look at Beth.
Then there was Cosima. Beth wanted to know all the juicy details from her time in France. "Seriously, tell me everything. I'm dying in this dry, sexless place. And the not-so-juicy details," she said, her eyes traveled up the long tube from the oxygen tank. "You're going to do this surgery, right?"
Cosima looked around at each of the expectant faces around her before slowly nodding. "Yeah. First surgery is tomorrow. We'll see how it goes." Cosima always subscribed to the motto, 'go big or go home,' and this was going big. She decided she needed to fight with everything she had in her and agreed to three surgeries over six months. The first was tomorrow, next would be mid-March and the third mid-June. That would give them a good chunk of time to make some decent headway with the gene therapy. After six months they could re-evaluate. With Duncan's serum, things wouldn't get any worse. They would get better for a short amount of time after the treatment. As the masses in her lungs broke down. Until they regrew and Duncan's continued testing in Paris determined that they would re-grow. It wasn't a cure and it didn't last very long, but she wouldn't get worse.
"What about this gene therapy?" Alison asked. "How's that coming along?"
"We've made some progress, but it's still at months before we might have anything. Or we might not," she told them honestly. "Sometimes I think we are so close, but then I turn around and whatever it was we were working on failed. Feels like something's been against us from the start."
"And you and Delphine?" Beth asked, a concerned expression replacing her teasing smirk. "You guys good now?"
Cosima couldn't hide her blush if she tried. "We're great."
"Can't believe you got a bleedin' sex toy through customs." Sarah joked, deepening Cosima's blush.
"Where there's a will, there's a way." Beth said, the light, teasing tone of the moment instantly vanishing.
"Well, our wills are changed now." Cosima began, looking at each of her sisters. "We are all going to fight." She looked at Sarah. "To be happy." She looked at Alison. "To be healthy." She looked at Beth and reached out for her hand, giving her fingers a tight squeeze. "And for each other when we don't have the strength."
"You better be gentle in there." Cosima instructed as she was wheeled into the operating room the next day. "Seriously Delphine, Christmas is in two weeks. Do you know what Alison will do to you if I'm not back to normal in time for her Christmas party? She goes absolutely ape shit if we aren't in pristine condition for her yearly family Christmas picture. She will kill you and in my condition, I'm in no shape to defend your honor."
"Why is this all on me? I am not the surgeon." As great as Delphine was, this was all over her head. It took a lot to get the clearance to even be allowed in the operating room, but she promised Cosima she would be there for everything and she would be. Even if she had to argue with Leekie and anyone else who stood in her way to do it.
"You are neither a surgeon, a nurse or an anesthesiologist. Nor do you even have her blood type should she need a transfusion. What value could you possibly have in there?" Leekie leaned back in his chair, a knowing smirk on his face. "Your leverage is running out, Delphine."
Delphine glared down at her boss and threw the paperwork for Cosima's surgery down on his desk. "I will be in that room with her."
"Yeah, well, tell that to the Judge. I still have to do, like, all my shopping too," she sighed. "Thank God for Amazon Prime." With everything going on they all agreed on no gifts except for the children. Beth was in rehab, Cosima and Delphine were fighting for Cosima's life, the club was busier than ever keeping Sarah extremely busy, Felix was preparing for a big art show he had the day after the New Year, Siobhan was out of the country, Alison wasn't technically busy, but she had two kids and a husband who all required constant monitoring which just left Helena and she usually insisted on getting everyone jell-o. Granted lots of jell-o, so they agreed no gifts.
However, that still left her nieces, nephew, her mother, and Delphine to shop for in the next two weeks after having surgery and recovering. Delphine tried to get Cosima on board with the no gift deal for them too, but Cosima flat out refused. She didn't care if Delphine got her anything, but there was the very real possibility that this would be her last Christmas so she was going to do it right. Starting with ignoring the no gifts thing entirely!
Cosima gripped her girlfriend's hand tighter as they were momentarily left in the big, sterile room by themselves while everyone got ready. Delphine leaned down and kissed Cosima. "You will be fine."
Cosima nodded. "I know."
"I will be here, by your side, every second."
"I know." Cosima smiled, reaching up with her hand not sporting the IV and caressing the side of the blonde's face. "I seriously can't thank you enough for all you've done for me."
"Cosima-"
"No, let me get this out." With a deep breath Cosima shook her head. "You have done so much for me. I can't-"
"Are you ready, Ms. Niehaus?"
Cosima's hand dropped back down to the bed as her eyes shot to the anesthesiologist who so perfectly interrupted their moment. "Baring my soul here, dude."
"Sorry." For his part, he did look genuinely apologetic as he took up his seat by her head. "But we're already running behind and Dr. Leekie-"
"Yeah yeah." Cosima waved him off, looking up at Delphine. Delphine was her rock. Looking up into her warmth, her love, was the last image Cosima wanted seared into her brain before she went under. "I love you."
Delphine leaned down and gave her girlfriend another kiss, her thumb tracing her lower lip for a moment after she pulled away. "Je t'aime."
"See ya on the flipside, dollface." She joked, her tongue poking out behind her teeth. Joking helped. If she joked, she didn't panic. If she joked and kept her eyes locked onto her girlfriend, she didn't feel so scared. Delphine gave her so much strength just by being there. Even on her worst days, she was there silently giving Cosima the strength and courage to go on. Without words she made Cosima believe that everything would be okay in the end. As they say, if it's not okay, it's not the end. Alison recently embroidered her a pillow with the phrase on it, so Cosima assumed it was something the theoretical they said, anyway. "Oh, and hey, happy anniversary."
Delphine's face fell. "Cosima, I completely forgot. I-"
But Cosima was having none of it. She waved her off. "There's been so much going on Delphine. I almost didn't remember myself. Honestly, don't worry about it. We couldn't celebrate any better than we did last night anyway," she said with a wink.
Delphine chuckled and leaned down for a better kiss, the anesthesiologist be damned. Last night was amazing. The kind of love making people wrote sonnets and poems about. The kind of connection two people shared that most of the population of Earth would never experience. It was beyond anything that could be articulated or seen. It could only be felt. When they pulled away a grin broke out over Delphine's face as she pulled a single purple rose from behind her back and bopped Cosima on the nose with it.
"You sneak, you didn't forget!" Cosiam exclaimed, taking the rose and properly smelling it. It was beautiful. A purple rose, symbolizing love at first sight. Being so rare, purple roses had a reputation for being magical or from another world altogether, much like love at first sight. They represented creativity, openness and infinite possibilities. "Where were you hiding it?"
Delphine smirked, taking the rose back and bringing it to her own nose. "I'll have it in your room when you get back." With a nod from Delphine, the anesthesiologist injected the drug into Cosima's IV and placed a mask over her mouth and nose. "Count back from ten."
Cosima was asleep before she got to seven, her hand still tucked securely into Delphine's. "Sleep tight mon amour."
"Cosima? . . Cosima? . . ." Delphine sighed and checked her watch again. As gently as she could, she lifted each of Cosima's eyelids and shone a little light on them to check the reactiveness of her pupils. They looked fine. Her heartbeat looked fine-great, even. The three incision sites and her chest tube looked fine. Her oxygenation looked fine. Her temperature and blood pressure looked fine. She just wasn't fine.
"She should be awake by now." Sarah said, pacing by the end of the bed.
Delphine nodded. "Yes, she should."
"Why isn't she?" Felix asked from his spot across the room.
"I don't know.
"The hell you mean you don't know?" Sarah snapped, grabbing onto the plastic footboard to prevent her hands from reaching for the nearest object and throwing it. "You're her doctor. It's been months. If you're as good as Cosima insists you are, you should know a little more about this...disease by now."
"I'm not a surgeon," she explained, trying not to take Sarah's anger and agitation personally. Whenever she was around Sarah she tried not to take anything personally. "Cosima?" She tried again.
"Maybe you should take your top off."
Delphine's head whipped around and if she were anywhere else people would have been calling for a Priest. "Excuse me?"
Sarah sighed, her features softening as she looked from her sister lying lifeless in the hospital bed connected to various wires and tubes, to Delphine. "If I have to bloody hear about your bloody sex life one more bloody time I will lose it, but it makes Cos happy. It..." Sarah fumbled around, trying to think of the right words. "Gives her that...boost or whatever she needs to go on, you know?"
Delphine's eyes went to Cosima. Sarah's idea was absolutely ridiculous, but there was a good point in there somewhere she was trying to make.
"I wouldn't say it's a very good idea." Felix shrugged. "But it's not a bad idea either. Give her a little show or something. We won't look. Touch her or … something."
Delphine would do neither of the sort with her girlfriend unconscious in the hospital. She knew her girlfriend wouldn't have a problem with it, but touching her in any way other than for what was medically necessary while she was unconscious felt inherently wrong, but … "Maybe a kiss?" She offered, hesitantly. She was okay with holding Cosima's hand when she wasn't conscious and stroking her cheek, but anything further she liked for her girlfriend to have the option to say no, even if she knew she wouldn't.
It had been over six hours since Cosima's surgery ended. Patients were expected to wake up within the first hour, with it rarely taking even that long. Two at the very latest. To say six hours was worrying didn't come close to covering it. Cosima had been for a detailed MRI, but that hadn't given them any more information than the other tests they ran that also showed no reason for her current state of unconsciousness.
Nothing was working. Not stimulants, external stimulation, intravenous caffeine, loud noises, different colored lights placed over her eyelids, pain, even those God awful ammonia inhalants/smelling salts didn't do the trick. That had been a last resort as they work by irritating the nose and lungs, but even that hadn't caused so much as a blip in anything...There was nothing left but to wait, so why not try it? It wouldn't cause any harm. Worst case scenario, she looked like a complete fool and Sarah made fun of her for the rest of her life, but at least she would have tried. She promised to try anything.
"It worked for Snow White." Felix argued.
"I thought it was Sleeping Beauty?" Delphine asked, turning back to look at Felix.
"Oh! No, no, you're right." Felix nodded, staring far off as he recalled the stories. "Snow White was love's first kiss which you guys are long passed. Sleeping Beauty was true love's kiss."
"You two are bloody mental."
"Do you have a better idea?" Felix snapped to which Sarah glared. "I thought not." Turning back to Delphine he went on, "Snow White was technically dead anyway, so probably best to skip that story altogether."
"Great story for kids." Sarah added under her breath.
Felix glared at his sister. "Don't be bitter just because you have yet to find your true love darling. Good things come to those who wait."
"Both of you, please! Just..." Delphine faltered. "I need to think."
From this slumbering
she shall wake
When true love's kiss
the spell shall break
What did she have to lose?
With a look to Sarah, the brunette walked over to the window and looked out, giving them some privacy and Felix turned around in his chair. Though even as she brought her lips down to her girlfriend's, Delphine could feel both sets of eyes burning into the back of her head, hopeful.
"Now what?" Delphine asked when she pulled away.
"You're asking me?" Sarah scoffed. "Hell if I know. I didn't have anyone around when I was young to read me bloody fairy tales now did I?"
"Well you..." Delphine stopped. She was about to say that Sarah had to have read fairy tales to her daughter when she was young, but Cosima told her that Sarah was in and out of Kira's life until she was about eight, so her fairy tale reading was probably pretty limited.
Delphine's father used to read her all sorts of stories when she was little. Her favorites, which she was sometimes ashamed to admit, were anything with blonde haired characters. As a child who felt so unlike everyone else around her, she yearned to feel a connection even if it was only by hair color. Alice in Wonderland, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Goldilocks and the Three Bears, Hansel and Gretel. The very books her father once read now sat on a shelf in the small bookcase beside the window seat in the guest bedroom. Whenever Kira was over she begged Delphine to read from them. They were in French, but Kira was proving to be a quick study and, along with learning the language in school, probably knew more than her Aunt at this point.
"True love's kiss my arse."
With a sigh Delphine drew her gaze from her girlfriend to the identical woman across the room, before settling on the rose on the bedside table. This was certainly not how she ever imagined spending her one year anniversary with the love of her life. "The stories are meant for children," she reasoned, even though a small part of her deflated. She was a grown woman and a scientist! True love's kiss wasn't a real concept, neither were its fabled powers of quasi-resurrection. It was stupid to put any amount of hope into a concept so fundamentally flawed. Maybe the childlike hope within everyone never completely died. Some part of you wants to believe in magic and the power of love and good prevailing over evil even though adults knew better.
"What's true love anyway?" Felix commented.
What determined someone's true love? Was that the same as their soulmate? In that case, a lot more fairy tale princesses would be dead because it was a mathematical rarity for someone to find the one person on the planet made for them. The one person out of billions. It was statistically, nearly, impossible.
With a deep breath Sarah kicked the wall, hard, causing Delphine to jump, grabbing Cosima's hand tighter as she did. "More bloody bullshit."
"Duuuude..." Cosima croaked out softly. "Don't harsh on true love. It's totes..." Stopping for a moment with a grimace on her face to take a couple deep breaths, Cosima finally opened her eyes and smiled up at her girlfriend. "Real."
Felix and Sarah rushed to their sister's side, clear relief and disbelief etched across their faces. "Holy shite! That actually worked..." Felix exclaimed, mouth open wide in shock.
"What worked?" Cosima groaned.
"True love's kiss or whatever. It's not just a bleedin' fairytale. Wait until Alison hears about this."
Delphine paid Sarah no mind as she moved her stethoscope to her ears and gave a quick check to Cosima's lungs. There was no change in the raspiness yet, and wouldn't be for probably at least a week, but there was air moving in both lungs which was always a good sign after lung surgery. She checked and rechecked the monitors and Cosima's chest tube output, listened to her heart, checked her pulse, her oxygenation levels, blood pressure, temperature, the incision sites and made some notes in her chart before she took a deep breath and let the fear she had been trying so hard not to drown in the past six hours finally be felt.
Cosima heard her girlfriend gasp and tore her eyes from her sister and Felix, their conversation quickly dying down.
"We'll just...go...get you uh...pudding or...something." Felix said, grabbing Sarah's hand and pulling her out of the room.
"Jell-o? I'm sure Helena has a couple batches ready." Sarah joked before Felix pulled her out and closed the door behind them.
Once they were gone Cosima turned to Delphine with a smirk. "I actually woke-up in the middle of that whole conversation," she said slowly, on short, raspy breaths, with a cheeky smirk. "I just wanted to see what you all would do. Did you see their faces?"
Delphine shook her head, trying desperately to calm herself down by focusing on Cosima's chart. "How are you feeling?"
Cosima sighed. She could see Delphine hiding behind her emotions and, while she understood, she didn't like it. There was pain written clear as day on her girlfriend's face and while it was unlike the physical pain she currently felt, it was no less important. "Like I just had my chest hacked into," she answered honestly, completely deadpan. For as much pain as Cosima was in, she wanted to get the questions over with so she could take Delphine in her arms and reassure her that she was okay.
"Are you in pain? You have a morphine pump, I know it's your favorite." Delphine attempted to joke.
"Delphine." Cosima said softly. "Will you just come here?"
Delphine closed the file and held it to her chest, shaking her head.
"Please." Cosima pressed, tilting her head to the side in that way Delphine never could resist.
Knowing holding her emotions back was a lost cause, Delphine admitted defeat and just let the tears fall. She let herself feel all the emotions she had been holding back since she last looked into Cosima's eyes. There were no words she could find to accurately describe how she just wanted to panic these past few hours. Her heart was in her throat every second that passed by so she forced herself into doctor mode. Dr. Cormier could handle a patient not waking up. It would be worrisome, yes, but as a doctor she could handle it. Dr. Cormier was cool and calm. She was in control and detached and didn't let her emotions show. Delphine, on the other hand, wanted to scream and yell and cry and drag anyone she could find in here until they figured out why the love of her life wasn't waking up!
Cosima smiled and raised her right arm, holding the blanket up. "See, I've even got a good side for you to snuggle up to. Come on."
As carefully and as she could, Delphine crawled into the small bed beside Cosima and wrapped an arm around her waist, holding her as tightly as she could without risking hurting her. "It's been six hours since your surgery, Cosima." Now that Cosima was awake and she was sure she was going to be okay, her emotions flowed freely from behind the wall she erected to keep them contained. A feeling would come to her and she would recognize it, let herself feel it. Then just when she thought she had a handle on it, another came from deeper within that feeling. Like a Matryoshka doll, more and more feelings revealed themselves.
"Shhh. You know me, always kinda late." Cosima cooed, covering her girlfriend with the blanket and pulling her tight against her side. "Maybe if you would stop looking so damn sexy every second of every day, I could resist the urge to throw you down on the closest available surface, and I wouldn't need to be drugged into unconsciousness to catch up on my sleep."
"So this is my fault?" Delphine chuckled.
"Maybe," Cosima shrugged, wincing slightly. Probably best not to move any part of her left side for a bit. Delphine looked up at her with a raised brow. "I'm okay," she assured her girlfriend quickly. "Maybe not okay okay, but I'm awake, you're here and I'm going to get better," she let out a shaky breath, trying to breathe through the pain.
Delphine carefully reached across her girlfriend and handed her the familiar grey hand control, pressing the red button before she let go, releasing a dose of morphine into her girlfriend's IV line. "I may look like shit now, but this time tomorrow I'll be doing a tap dance."
Delphine nodded with a smile, pressing the button for her girlfriend again as she gently nuzzled as close into Cosima as she could, feeling and smelling as much of her around herself as she could. As much as she wanted to do this when Cosima was still asleep, neither Felix or Sarah had left Cosima's side. Felix was actually helpful. He was a good conversationalist. He tried to distract Delphine with tales from his days as a prostitute, current art projects he was working on and his current infatuation, a morgue attendant Beth introduced him to months ago named Colin, but Delphine was only half listening at most. No amount of distraction would ever take the place of simply feeling Cosima in her arms where she belonged.
"You couldn't have seriously believed kissing me would wake me up. I wouldn't peg you for the kind to believe in true love's kiss." Cosima teased after a while, breaking through the silence.
Delphine chuckled, wiping her face with a turn of her head. With a shaky hand she cupped Cosima's cheek and guided her lips to her own. "Sarah and Felix made a compelling argument."
"I'm sure they did." Cosima chuckled, reaching for another kiss which was quickly granted. "Maybe there's something to it. The hell do I know anyway?"
Delphine raised an eyebrow in her girlfriend's direction. Cosima was a little high, but she had certainly seen her higher. Her eyes couldn't seem to stay open and her head kept falling to her chest. "Just sleep, ma chérie. You need it."
"I'm not saying true love's kiss is real." Cosima continued, opening her eyes wide and gesturing with her free hand. "I'm just saying," Her head dipped down again with Delphine rubbing soothing patterns across her stomach. "That I'm willing to think that maybe there are more to things than what can be explained. There's a whole big messy...grey area."
"Maybe. Or maybe it had been six hours and you knew you were about to give your girlfriend a heart attack." Delphine half-heartedly chastised.
"Maybe," Cosima mumbled as she lost the battle to stay awake.
Delphine watched her girlfriend drift off, content she was now simply asleep and not still unconscious. Her body was fighting so hard just to exist that this kind of surgery would really wipe her out. They injected over two hundred masses from her lungs and trachea of various sizes. They tried to measure them as best they could, but that was difficult to do without cracking Cosima's chest and opening her lungs. They took detailed measurements yesterday as part of the presurgical work-up so they did have the measurements from that. Delphine just hope they would have been able to get more exact ones during the surgery. The measurements they had were pretty accurate and would have to do.
The masses in her diaphragm would stay, for now. As would the ones in her larynx. Delphine pushed for Cosima to let them inject those too, but they couldn't get to either from her lungs which would mean more incisions and getting to the masses would be trickier in both places. Cosima argued the masses on her diaphragm weren't impeding her breathing at the moment or causing any real harm other than at least daily hiccups, but those were more annoying than anything else and, "Honestly, even if they fully invade my larynx, assuming I can still breathe obvs, I'm sure everyone would be happy because then I would finally be forced to shut up. Besides, we'll wipe them all out when we find the cure."
What mattered was they got all the current masses in her lungs and trachea. The masses would already be beginning to breakdown, the cells swelling with Duncan's serum. Cosima would be pretty uncomfortable for a couple of days, but as the swelling went down and the cells started to fold in on themselves and shrink the masses, the relief would quickly follow. The steroids would help with Cosima's comfort level and to speed up the process. They should begin seeing changes in a week, but for right now they could both rest. This wasn't a cure by any means, but it was the first real step toward getting Cosima well.