Chapter 2



Meanwhile, in the hospital, a PA announcement rang over the hospital. "Code Blue, room 294." Mark rushed to the room where a patient of Jesse's was. It was Richard Donovan. He tried to restart the heart of the patient, but to no avail.

"Died of organ failure," Mark stated. "I don't understand why his fever wouldn't go down. I don't understand what went wrong."

"Sometimes, there are questions that even doctors can't answer," a nurse tried to reassure Mark. He nodded, and hurried to the ER, ready to receive Jesse.



"Steve…" Jesse muttered, opening his eyes a bit.

"Jesse, what is it?" Steve asked anxiously as they pulled into a lay-by.

"Don't feel good," Jesse said, trying to keep himself from passing out.

"It's okay," Steve told him. "It's okay. We're almost at the hospital."

"My hand," Jesse muttered. "My hand…" Jesse's eyes drifted shut, and his head slumped to one side.

"Okay, Jess," Steve said, starting the engine and carrying on the journey to the hospital.

It felt like forever, but soon enough Steve had driven through the gates and had stopped the car outside the ER entrance. He jumped out, ran around to the passenger side of the truck, and undid the door.

Steve lifted Jesse out of the truck, and hauled him over his shoulder, as if he were a fireman carrying a person out of a burning building.

"Someone get a gurney," Mark called as he saw Steve carrying Jesse through the ER doors. One was produced, and Steve carefully laid his friend on it. Steve noticed how his boots came nowhere near the end of the bed, and at any other time he would have made a joke of it.

As Steve stepped away, doctors and nurses surrounded the bed with breathing equipment and drips. As some attached them to Jesse, others were talking, going through information about Jesse's condition. Steve could only stand and watch as his friend was wheeled away into a room. He didn't even notice Amanda walk next to him and silently watch the same scene.

"He'll be all right," Amanda tried to comfort him, her eyes not leaving the rolling bed.

"You don't sound convinced," Steve asked, his eyes also still fixed.

"If Mark is right, then…" Amanda could not finish her sentence. She didn't want to finish it. "Come on. Lets get a coffee and wait somewhere else." Reluctantly, both of them headed off to the Doctors' Lounge to wait for news."

Sometime later, Mark came in. Amanda knew that the news was not good.

Mark sat down with a cup of coffee. "Jesse has got the same disease that the other three patients have got."

"I thought that there were four," Steve queried.

"There were."

Steve sat in silence, understanding what his father meant.

"He is still unconscious right now. What we have to find out is how he got it," Mark continued with urgency in his voice. "If it is contagious, then we could have an epidemic on our hands. Steve," Mark turned to his son. "Did Jesse say anything, anything at all, that might help?"

Steve thought for a moment. "He said something about his hand. That's the last thing I heard him say. He just kept saying about his hand, and then he passed out."

"Which room is he in now?" Amanda asked as the two men got to their feet.

"255," Mark told her.

"I'll drop in later," Amanda called as the two men left the room.

Mark and Steve arrived outside Jesse's room, and opened the door quietly. Inside, they heard the regular beeps of the machinery inside. They could see Jesse's chest move up and down slowly as he lay still on the bed.

Mark and Steve walked over, and looked for his hands. On one hand was a Band-Aid..

"That must be something to do with it," Steve said as he pointed to it.

"Yes," Mark said slowly. He felt Jesse's forehead. "Still burning."

"Is that how the last guy died?" Steve asked, not really wanting to know the answer. Steve need only look at Mark to know the answer, and to know that it was not good news for Jesse.

"Once we get the results back from Amanda, we should be able to get an idea of what is going on," Mark said, looking at one of the monitors attached to Jesse. "Before that, I think I'll go and have a talk with some of the patients." He paused for a moment. "Once we get those results, you could have another murder investigation to work on."

Steve nodded. Mark left the room, but Steve wanted to stay. He wanted to be there when Jesse woke up. This was partly so that he could have any information that might help with an enquiry into an investigation, but mainly because he hated to see his best friend in pain, and knowing that there was little that he could do about it. Steve drew up a chair next to Jesse's bed, and sat as the sunset and the orange rays were cast through the window.



The first patient to see was Darren Thompson. He had been the first patient brought into Community General with those symptoms. Of course! Mark snapped his fingers as a new thought dawned on him. What if there are patients in other hospitals with the same symptoms?

He walked swiftly to the nearest reception desk, and asked the nurse on duty for a phone directory. In there, he found the telephone numbers for the nearest hospitals, and began the search for any other patients that there might be.

"Thank you," Mark said, putting the receiver down as he finished the last call. Only one hospital had any information, and that was that a man had come in on the Wednesday of that week and had died that Friday morning from organ failure. No other hospitals had any information, but they told Mark that if they did, they would contact him immediately.

"Hey, Mark," Amanda called, heading his way with an autopsy report. "Here's the preliminary report for Richard Donovan." As she reached him, she noticed a frown on his face. "What's up?"

"I called other hospitals in the area, trying to find out if there are any patients with the same symptoms as the ones here."

"That's good thinking," Amanda observed, "what did you find out?"

"There was only one hospital that knew anything, and that patient died this morning."

Amanda opened her mouth as if to say, "No!" No words left her mouth.

"I think we should ask for the autopsy report of the other person," Amanda said. "We might get a clearer picture if we compare both reports."

"That's a good idea," Mark said. "I'll send them a fax, but I'd like to look at this report first."

Mark and Amanda lost all track of time as they pored over the report, searching for any information that might help them to piece together the puzzle of the strange disease. It was about half past ten when Steve came in for a coffee.

"Still here?" All three of them asked the same question at the same time.

"Yeah," all three of them replied at the same time, and chuckled.

"Is this the preliminary autopsy for Donovan?" Steve asked, taking a seat at their table. His father nodded. "Well," Steve continued, "have you established what happened to this guy, and what we can do to help the others?"

"Steve," Mark began, about to tell Steve something that he did not want to hear. "To make an antidote for this could take weeks. And that is if we figured out what it was. You and I both know that the chances of them living long enough for an antidote to be made are slim, and if they did survive long enough, there might be some side effects. But, I am sure that whoever made this disease made an antidote, in case they got it themselves. What we need to do is to find the person responsible, and then find the antidote."

Steve nodded, knowing that his father was right. As soon as he could, he would question the patients with the disease, and find out anything he could.

"I'll question the patients in the morning," Steve told his father. "Want to join me?"

"I thought you'd never ask," Mark replied with a small grin on his face.

"For now, I'm going to wait for Jesse to wake up," Steve said. "I still want to ask him about his hand. That keeps bothering me."

"Me too," Mark said, getting up to leave.

"I've got to go home," Amanda said, looking at her watch. "My sitter will be worried. I'll see you guys in the morning. Page me if there is any news on Jesse."



Jesse was still asleep when Steve and Mark went into his room. They talked quietly about the case in hand, waiting and hoping that their friend would wake up soon.

"So," Steve began, "Darren Thompson was brought in on Monday, Richard Donovan on Tuesday, Christina Morris on Thursday and Donna Bradley today. Why did they skip Wednesday, if that was the pattern?"

Mark frowned, remembering that Steve did not know about the other patient. "They didn't skip Wednesday. I checked with the other hospitals, and there was another patient that came in on the Wednesday."

"And?"

"He died early this morning."

Steve grimaced. "That's two," was all he could say.

At that moment, Jesse began to stir in his sleep, and slowly his eyes opened.

"Steve? Mark?" Jesse murmured, not quite being able to focus. "What happened?"

"We went to a diner, but you started throwing up and you lost consciousness on the way to the hospital," Steve informed him, trying to refresh Jesse's memory.

"Was the food that bad?" Jesse asked with a slight grin on his face.

"Jesse, you may have been delirious at the time, but in the truck on the way to the hospital, you said something about your hand," Mark reminded him.

"My hand," Jesse repeated slowly, and then he remembered. "My hand! I think I know how I got whatever I got. When I took Donna Bradley's blood sample, the nurse dropped the sample. I cut my finger ever so slightly on the glass. I thought it was only my blood on my hand."

"At least we have established how you got the disease. How do you feel?"

"Hot, tired, dizzy, nauseous," Jesse described to Mark. "And the light really hurts my eyes."

"That's how all of the other patients feel. You've got a high fever. Somehow, we'll have to keep that down."

"I think that there is something else you might like to know," Jesse spoke to the two men.

"What?" They both asked together.

"Ask the patients about dentist," Jesse replied slowly, trying to fight the need for sleep.

"What?" They repeated.

"It's probably nothing, but ask the patients about the dentist. It might help you." Jesse's eyes fluttered shut, and soon he was asleep again.

"Is that what he is going to be like until we get an antidote for this?" Steve asked. "Is he going to be awake for five minutes a day and then sleep for the rest of it?"

"Probably," Mark said, pondering about what Jesse meant by dentist.

"It's two in the morning," Steve exclaimed with a yawn as he looked at his watch.

"I think we had best come back in the morning after the other patients are rested before we question them," Mark told him.

"Sure," Steve agreed, "but what Jesse said about the dentist is going to be bugging me in my sleep."

"You're not the only one," Mark muttered as he quietly closed the door behind him.