Chapter 44

In response to Elsa's request of the evening before, Sarah showed up shortly after dawn on Sunday. Soon she and Elsa were settled before a warm fire, talking about combatting contagion.

"Do you have any advice for dealing with the flu?" asked Elsa.

"Yes. Do as we do in Corona. Cure and contain," said Sarah. "Although you do need to be able to track down everyone exposed. Folks in Corona have learned that chasing down carriers and forcing them to take 'The Dose' keeps everyone safe." She frowned as a problem occurred to her. "Hmmm.. Your citizens don't know about the medicine. They might be suspicious, especially since it's of foreign origin, and that'll make compliance a problem."

"I wish there was some way to reassure them," said Elsa pensively.

"Well, how about this?" suggested Sarah. "For the first curing mission, send Princess Anna, the castle physician, and others who work closely with you. Make sure they're well exposed to the disease. And then, in view of as many people as possible, have them take the medicine. Make sure they have an escort who can get them all back to the castle when the side effects kick in."

"Why would I put Anna and my staff in harm's way?" asked Elsa. "What if they bring the flu back to the castle?"

"They probably won't. One of the peculiarities of the medicine is that it boosts immunity, but if your body isn't actively fighting off a disease at the time, you don't acquire a long term resistance to it."

"So we can't just give it to everyone in the castle to keep them from catching the flu? They have to be exposed to it and then get the medicine?"

"Exactly. The best time for the medicine is between when they're exposed to the disease and before they start spreading it. The caregivers ought to have time to treat the three sick families before they can spread the flu."

Elsa had a thought and asked, "Since the medicine isn't specific to the flu, will it work for any disease?"

Sarah smiled and said, "Excellent question. It works as I described for anything that a person can become immune to: chicken pox, mumps, measles, smallpox, and the like. It can cure other diseases and helps fight pretty much any infection, but it doesn't confer immunity."

Elsa shook her head in amazement. "This medicine sounds incredible! Corona must be the healthiest place in the world."

Sarah just shook her head. "It is pretty good, but sadly, no. As I said a week ago, some of the ingredients are pretty rare. There's one plant in particular that has been very hard to get enough of."

"What is it?"

"Well, it's rare enough that it's never officially been named. Up until a quarter century or so ago it was thought to be only a legend. As far as I know, only one specimen has ever been found in the wild. The plant's flower was supposed to have amazing curative powers, and once the plant was found it was uprooted and the flower harvested so it could be used to cure Queen Eleanor when her pregnancy became dangerous."

"But if the plant was uprooted, how did the medicine come to be?"

"When they discarded the rest of the plant, I took it and replanted it. After a few weeks it recovered from being uprooted and thrived. It's a remarkably robust little plant. But in all the time since, it has never flowered again. No flowers means no seeds. And it doesn't reproduce by putting out runners."

"So how is there enough to make any medicine at all?" asked Elsa.

"About five years ago I was able to figure out how to grow daughter plants using cuttings from the roots."

Elsa looked skeptical. "It's hard to believe a single plant could survive for however long it took to become a legend."

"It is hard to credit until you remember that the medicine tastes horrible." Sarah grinned. "Most of the other ingredients are there to try to disguise the flavor of that one plant." She chuckled. "On its own it's bad enough that nothing eats it." She laughed out loud. "I guess that's a good thing. Imagine if all of this were moot because some.. some.. goat had eaten the most marvelous healing plant in the world."

Elsa chuckled. "Well, I'm grateful that we got as much of the medicine as we did." A frown crossed her face. "But with only a couple of thousand doses we may run out."

"All the more reason to get your outbreak contained as quickly as possible," said Sarah.

Elsa stood and Sarah followed suit.

Elsa said, "Thank you, Sarah. I'll have Anna and some of the castle staff take the medicine and some leftover stew to the families that couldn't attend the ceremony last night."


Sarah headed to the lab, stopping along the way at the kitchen for a mug of coffee. She heard voices as she approached the lab's door.

"Can you do anything when I feel this?" asked Alex.

Olaf giggled, then said, "Nope!"

Sarah opened the door to see Alex and a dissected Olaf. Well, an Olaf with his parts separated. His head was on a chair, blindfolded, his thorax on a table, his abdomen on another table, his arms on the window sill, the small balls of snow he used as feet on a pair of chairs, and his nose sitting on a shelf in an open cabinet. His flurry, uncertain about which piece of Olaf needed the most cooling, was scuttling frantically between them. Alex was tickling one of Olaf's feet.

Alex reconnected Olaf's feet to his abdomen, taking time to test their adhesion. "How about now?" he asked, then tickled one of the balls of snow again. This time in addition to giggling, Olaf wiggled his feet to evade the tickling.

"Alex, put poor Olaf back together before he melts," said Sarah.

"Ah, Sarah," said Alex. "How did it go with Queen Elsa?" He started gathering up bits of Olaf, attaching thorax and arms to the already assembled abdomen and legs.

"Pretty well. She understands how to use the medicine, and what needs to be done to contain the flu."

"How's she going to keep from catching it?" Alex brought and attached Olaf's still blindfolded head to the rest of his body.

"The first people who'll be tending the sick are those that live and work closest to her."

"Huh!" Alex grunted in surprise. "That's a very good idea."

Sarah curtseyed and said, "Thank you."

Alex grinned and said, "I should have known." He eyed the mug in her hand. "Can I borrow that?"

"Sure. What for?" asked Sarah as she handed it over.

Alex took the mug to the cabinet where Olaf's nose resided. He waved the carrot over the mug. "Do you smell anything, Olaf?"

From the carrot in Alex's hand came the sound of sniffing. Sarah laughed at the look of perplexed surprise on Alex's face as he stared at the carrot.

"Coffee!" said Olaf.

"How far away can you be from your nose and still smell things?" asked Alex as he removed Olaf's blindfold and handed him his nose.

"I have no idea," said Olaf as he sat up on the edge of the table and carefully placed his nose on his face. "I don't usually break apart my face."

Sarah asked, "Is that your original nose?"

"Yep!"

Alex went from perplexed to intensely interested. "Really? I've never known a carrot, even a cold carrot, to last for over a year without rotting. Do you have any idea why your nose is so well preserved?"

"Maybe it's magic?"

Alex harrumphed. "I'm really starting to get sick of that non-explanation. Hmmm. Have you ever tried switching out your nose?"

"What?"

"You know, tried to use something else as a nose?"

"I don't understand."

"Perhaps a parsnip, or a beet?"

"But.. but.. Anna gave me my nose," said Olaf, a little upset.

"Oh. Sorry," said Alex. "I didn't realize you had an emotional attachment to your nose as well as a magical one."

"That's ok," said Olaf as he jumped to the floor.

"Well, thank you for letting me experiment on you, Olaf. I learned a lot."

"No problem," said Olaf. "Let me know if you need me for anything else." And with that, he left.

After Olaf had gone, Alex started tidying up the lab and asked, "Anything else come up during your discussion with Queen Elsa?"

"She's worried that there may not be enough of the medicine to keep the flu under control. She might be right. First year compliance issues may keep the contain part of 'cure and contain' from working."

"That's.. going to be trouble," said Alex.

"You don't have to tell me," worried Sarah.


A/N - Sorry for the short chapter. Early May was very, very bad for my family and it will have ongoing ramifications. If I'd waited until I had a full chapter ready to publish it would have been June before anything came out. So it's going to be short chapters for a little while.

Thanks to the reviewers of Chapter 43: Concolor44, PascalDragon, ptahaegyptus2, and SharKohen. Your reviews lightened a very dark couple of weeks.