The door to Amanda's room had barely been closed when Quidd turned on Lee and said, "I know that look, Scarecrow, and you can just forget asking about taking her out of here. She's in no cond-"
"I'm not asking, Doc," Lee cut him off with a cool glare. "I'm telling you right now that I AM taking her out of here. Did you see her in there? Just being in that room is making it harder for her to recover. The stark white walls, the bright white light...It's like she's still a prisoner. Aren't you familiar at all with white room torture and what it does to people?"
"Don't be stupid! Of course, I am! Have you forgotten that I helped treat some of the hostages from the Iran affair in '81 and I am sick of you," He pointed an accusing finger at Kelford, "Both of you, trying to tell me how to do my job!"
"No one's telling you how to do your job here," Kelford said, "we just have to consider everything. With the new information that Lee's given us, even you have to consider that maybe Mrs. King's mental condition isn't as bad we thought she was."
Lee turned to Dr. Kelford and asked, "What's her physical condition, Doc?"
"Didn't you see her in there?" Quidd replied hotly.
"I'm not asking you!" Lee retorted just as heatedly."You already made it clear that you don't know jack about what going on inside her head and you don't care to! If you had questions about what was real and what wasn't, maybe you should have looked a little deeper or you could have asked me. I was there with her part of the time. Or you could have been in on Birol's debriefing. It wouldn't be the first time you've questioned suspects! If you ask me, you need to get out of your office a little more."
Quidd made a move as if to reply, but was shushed with a wave of Kelford's hand. "Come on, Scarecrow, let's take a walk." Kelford then gently reached for Lee's arm to guide him down the hall toward his office.
"You're not getting rid of me that easily," Quidd said as he trailed behind them, catching up to the other two men just as they reached Kelford's office. "I should be included in any decisions that are made about Mrs. King's care. She's my patient too."
Kelford sighed and said, "This is MY office and you're not setting foot in it unless you can keep your temper under control and just sit down and listen for a change the way you do with your patients during therapy sessions. You were the one who suggested that we needed to discuss her situation with her next of kin and since Melrose won't budge on that point, Scarecrow here is the closest we've got."
"But he's not actually family," Quidd protested as they entered Kelford's office.
"Yeah, well I'm the closest thing she's got right now, Pal," Lee countered.
"He's right," Kelford agreed. "He's her fiancé," He then turned to Lee, "or at least I'm assuming that she said yes when you asked her to marry you."
"Yeah," Lee answered with a smile as his mind flashed back for a moment to his impromptu proposal.
"And he's the father of her child, so he should be in on any decisions that are made about her care. We just need to forget for a moment that he's her partner and just treat him as we would any other family member.
Quidd nodded and conceded, "All right," as he sank into one of the chairs.
"Now, Scarecrow, to answer your question, she's not doing badly for what she's been through. She has some bumps and bruises, but they're mild. When she came in last night, she was severely dehydrated, but I've been keeping her on an IV to replace the fluids she's lost while captive and her vitals are looking much better."
"Good," Lee breathed a sigh of relief.
"The concern for her physical health right now is that she's been unable to keep any solid food down. Now, this could be a result of many things. It could be a side effect of the drugs Birol gave her; it could be a side effect of the zap gas, it could be just morning sickness due to her pregnancy or a combination of all three. The side effects of the drugs and the zap gas could simply be making her pregnancy symptoms more severe."
"It also could be her digestive system treating solid food as the enemy since Birol wasn't exactly making sure she was fed regularly. The type of torture he used on her is all about sensory deprivation, the soundless white room, the sleep deprivation... Victims are often fed only white rice, if they're fed at all," Quidd explained in a calmer tone that he'd had earlier.
"Doc, I know all of this. I've been there," Lee replied.
"The real issue here is that all of this was done while she was pregnant, so her fatigue, her nausea, the confusion, those could be just because of the sleep deprivation and dehydration or could be related to her pregnancy," Kelford continued.
"Look, I know you're trying to help her, but I think that I can help her more. You need to let me take her home."
"She needs medical care, Scarecrow," Quidd said pointedly.
"No, what she needs is to feel safe," Lee argued. "You saw her in there, how scared she was of that room. You also saw how she calmed down when I got in there, how her confusion cleared up just by me talking to her. I know how to treat dehydration at home. I've been there. Both of you should know how much I hate hospitals, so I've taken care of myself a time or two. Besides that, if anyone can get through to her and help clear up the fog in her mind, it's me."
"I'll make you a deal, Scarecrow," Kelford said, "And Dr. Quidd here should be willing to go along with this compromise." He glared sternly at Quidd who nodded to indicate that he was listening. "Give me a couple of hours to finish off her IV, get some more fluids in her then I'll let you take her home, but on one condition."
"I'm listening," Lee answered.
"If she develops a fever of more than 100 or she starts having more hallucinations, you bring her right back here," Kelford stated firmly.
"I have a condition of my own," Quidd added. Lee turned to him with a frown, folding his arms across his chest. "Don't give me that look, Scarecrow; this is for her own good. She's going to need some intense therapy to deal with her trauma. You're to make sure when she's feeling better physically, that she come to see me so I can ensure that she's healthy mentally."
"Yeah, I can do that," Lee agreed, then turned his attention to Kelford and asked, "With her being pregnant, is there anything extra that I should be doing for her?" With that question out there, he began to wonder if what Birol had said was true, had she begged for the life of their unborn child? If she had, that meant she'd known she was pregnant before her abduction and he couldn't help but wonder why she hadn't told him. He searched his memory banks for any hints that she might have dropped about it and his mind lingered on one particular moment.
"We're the luckiest two people on the face of the earth," Amanda gushed wearily as she leaned into kiss her new fiancée'
Lee couldn't help but chuckle a bit at Amanda's statement. Only she could be so optimistic in the face of death. "Yeah, we are," he agreed as he kissed her soundly. "I should have asked you forever ago and I'm sorry that I didn't. I...Uh...It just feels like the timing is never right for us."
"No, it never is, but when has that ever stopped us?" Amanda responded with a smile.
"You're right." He softly caressed her face and was tickled when she clasped his hand, kissing his palm. "I shouldn't have let that stop me. Two people who love each other as much as we do...we should be making plans...plans for a future together."
Amanda nodded and said, "The sooner, the better." She lightly ran her fingers across her stomach and hesitantly began, "there's...there's something that I should have done forever ago too. Lee, we-"
Her words were cut off by the door being flung open, causing both of them to jump. Birol stepped in and in a menacing tone, said, "Made your decision yet?" When neither replied, he glared icily at both of them. "Remember, one hour," he reminded and then was gone just as quickly as he'd come.
It occurred to Lee now in reflecting back on it, that Amanda had been trying to tell him about the baby then, but Birol had ruined her plan, just as he'd ruined his plan for giving her a proper marriage proposal.
As he shook off the memory, he noticed that Kelford had now sat behind his desk and had been writing the whole time. "I'm going to give you a couple of prescriptions for her that you'll need to get filled before you pick her up later. One is a mild sedative that you should give her only in the event that she's still having trouble sleeping; the other is for a prenatal vitamin."
Lee took the slips from Kelford. "Right," he said. He started to say something else, but then hedged.
"What is it, Scarecrow?" Kelford asked.
"I..." He sighed, wanting to ask his question, but unsure if he wanted to know the answer. He began pacing trying to decide whether it was better to know or not know. After a few minutes of this, he finally halted abruptly in his pacing and leaning across Kelford's desk he blurted out, "Is the baby okay?"
"At this point, we just don't know. It's a little too early to tell," Kelford replied honestly. "We don't know what kind of effects the drugs and the zap gas are going to have. We couldn't find any data on how either affects a pregnant woman. She's still in a very early stage of her pregnancy, so anything can happen. She'll need to be monitored very closely for the next few weeks, by a qualified obstetrician." Trying to be positive, Kelford added, "What I can tell you is that there's a good strong heartbeat. That's a very good sign."
Lee sighed again, managed a weak smile and trying to be optimistic as he knew Amanda would be, he replied, "So, everything might be okay?"
Kelford gave Quidd a look when he saw that it looked like he might say something negative and answered Lee with a smile, "Yes, everything might be just fine."
"Good," Lee said and breathing a sigh of relief, repeated, "Good."
Quidd would not be deterred by Kelford this time, "Lee, you have to be realistic. This kind of trauma this early in her pregnancy could result in harm to your child. I'm not trying to be negative here, but you need to know that between the stresses that this ordeal has put her under and the physical harm done to her, there's a chance that she may miscarry. I don't want you living on false hope or giving her false hope either. My advice to you is to take it one day at a time."
Lee grimaced at Quidd's words and replied, "Well, I'll just have to make sure that we do everything we can to prevent that from happening. He paused for a beat and said, "I...uh...I should get going if I'm going to get ready to take her home with me, get these filled, pick up some stuff to take care of her with, maybe run by her place to get some of her stuff."
"You're not taking her to her house?" Quid questioned.
"No," Lee answered with a firm shake of his head. "There's no way I'd be able to explain her condition to her mother or her kids. It's better that she stay with me until she well enough that they won't know anything's wrong."
"That makes sense," Quidd replied, for the first time agreeing with Lee on something.
"I...Um...I should go." Lee shoved the prescriptions in his jacket pocket and exited the office, intending to head back to Amanda's room to inform Billy and Francine of what was going on, but halted abruptly when he saw Addi Birol being led down the hall in chains by two armed guards.