dirin69

[dirin69]

Experiment One: Asphyxiation

The nurses wheel her into the procedure room on the other side of the two way glass. Her eyes dart around the room nervously, but as the leads are attached, her heartrate is already settling. He can't help think if it was him, his heart would be racing. She's brave. Strong. Exactly what they need. 

She had been carefully selected for the experiment. No known cardiac history. Extensive examinations performed to ensure there were no asymptomatic congenital defects. She had several arrests on her record -- criminal ones, not cardiac. But that didn't bother them. She'd lived a difficult life. In his opinion, that only made her a better candidate. A stronger one. 

CW: Cardiac arrest, medical experimentation, cardiophilia, adult content, female subject, willing subject, asphyxiation

Her rythym beeps across the monitor, steady and slowing to a relaxed rate of 68 beats per minute as she gets used to the room and the sound of her own pulse. The nurse starts an IV and hangs a slow saline drip. 

He looks sideways, glancing at the benefactor. They look back at him and nod. It's time to begin.

Stepping into the room, the nurse helps him into a surgical gown. The EKG shows the subjects pulse increases slightly at his presence, and when he turns around, she meets his eyes. Hers are bright and green. That wasn't in her chart. He swallows hard. 

"For this first experiment," he starts to explain. "We'll begin with something fairly simple."

"Asphyxia," she murmurs, her voice sweet, her pulse speeding up ever so slightly in anticipation. 

He nods. "We will administer a sedative before occluding your airways. Your heartrate will increase as it struggles to pump oxygenated blood to your organs, and then your blood pressure and heartrate will fall until you suffer cardiac arrest. At that point, we will hyperventilate you with oxygen, and begin rescusitation efforts."

He locks eyes with hers. "We will have to prime your system with certain drugs and circulate them with CPR. Once that's done, we can administer the R-3. As you know, it's still considered experimental, but R-3 has shown remarkable potential for reversing cardiac arrest in a variety of conditions. Srill--there is a chance we won't be able to get you back."

"I know what I signed up for," she murmurs. "I consent, and... I have a request."

He tips his head, listening. 

"I don't want to be sedated," She says. 

His eyebrows crease and he evaluates her for a moment. "You want to be awake while you're asphyxiated?" 

She nods, visible goosebumps spreading over her skin. 

"It could be... traumatic. Disturbing," he cautions her. "You will likely be very afraid."

"I won't," she says softly. 

"I don't understand..." He starts, but she looks sure. He glances at her heartrate, plodding along with determined certainty. "If we begin the experiments without sedative...we will have to replicate those conditions for each one. Do you understand that means--" 

"No sedatives," she agrees, her lips turning up at the sides. 

"All right. Let's get an updated signature on those consent forms."

He crosses to the two-way mirror, looking through the glass like he can see the benefactor where they stand. When there's been enough time for them to express any objections, he crosses back to the patient. 

She's watching him, flecks of dark green like emeralds in her eyes, eyelashes heavy and long. He reaches across her chest and unties the top of her patient gown, gently pulling the top down to expose her chest. Two, large, round breasts, splayed heavily to each side of her ribs emerge from the paper-like fabric. The ridge of her breastbone is prominent between them, the dip of her collarbones leading the eye. Her nipples bead in the cool air, hardening while he watches. He gives her a reassuring smile as he traces the monitoring leads around her heart, as if he were checking their placement. 

"Are you ready?" He asks. 

She has been watching him closely, pupils already blown wide. She nods. 

"Intubation kit," he instructs. "Administer 0.4 mg per kg of sux."

Her eyes flick up and he covers her shoulder. "Not a sedative. It will cause paralysis for a short period, just to help us insert the tube."

She seems to relax, and the nurse pushes the medication. Her body goes slightly slack, jaw falling open. He firmly takes her face in his hand and uses the laryngoscope to guide the tubing down her throat, past the vocal cords, deep into the trachea. The balloon inflates to hold the tube in place and then it's finished. A nurse attached an ambu bag to the endotracheal tube and starts to inflate her lungs with the rythmic depth of the bag.

Releasing her, he steps around to her side and uses his stethoscope to auscilate her lungs. Equal and present breath sounds. He watches her breathing, chest rising and falling, her eyes fixed on him as he moves around to her head. He waits a few minutes like that, letting her be filled and emptied, heartbeat slightly elevated, waiting for the sux to start wearing off. When the majority of the drugs influence should be subsiding, he nods to the nurse, who removes the bag. Her breathing studders for a second as she takes back control, her chest hitching and then rising and falling at a more natural depth and rate. 

"Prepare for occlusion," he murmurs. 

The nurses carefully help her into soft restraints, her wrists, and then each ankle. She makes a small sound around the tube as he steps up to the head of the bed. He has the cap in his hand, and he reaches up and presses it over the end.

She can't move at first, still partially paralyzed. her eyes widen slightly, chest hitching as she tries to inhale, but her lungs don't fill. There's nothing there. She seems calm. Her heart rate increasing only minutely, she blinks at him. He can tell exactly how long she's comfortable holding her breath. One minute and 42 seconds. As the sux wears and her panic grows, she starts to buck weakly. Her hands make white knuckled fists. Her perfect, round breasts bounce from side to side as she starts to theash. Her eyes bulge. The machine starts to alarm as her heartrate becomes tachycardic. 130. 160. He moves closer and presses the stethescope between her breasts, moving it to the tender apex of her heart. Her strong, healthy pump is working so hard, pounding in her chest, faster and harder, harder and faster. It stumbles over itself, going too quickly to keep up, like a newborn colt. 

Three minutes now. Her movements are becoming weaker. Her eyelids start to flicker open and closed, conciousness dwindling. He ausiclates again, using the movement to cover as he brushes his hands over the bare, cold skin of her chest, bumping against her nipple. Her eyes are open but staring and still, her heart stutters, skipping beats sporadically under his steth before it finally starts to slow. 

Six minutes. Heart rate in the fourties now. She's bradying down. Her chest has stopped moving, she's no longer trying to breathe. Respiratory arrest. He waits, nurses hovering, stethescope over her heart as it plods and fails. That healthy, confident organ realizing that it is useless. Pushing blood around the body devoid of life giving oxygen. It's working so hard for nothing. 

Seven minutes. Heartrate in the 30's. 20's. The beats become languid and spread thin. Heart clenching once, twice, pausing. Like a runner who stops to gasp. Almost mirroring his thought, her body jerks back, back arching slightly as her brain sends the desperate signal to her lungs to fill. But they can't. There's still no air. She makes a hard grunting sound against the tube. Her heart spasms. 

It beats weakly.

It doesn't beat again. 

Cardiac arrest. 

The monitor shows her heart in desperate PEA. He listens through the steth as it vibrates uselessly. For the experiment, he must wait until the monitor shows asystole. He's itching now to begin. 

"Asystole," the nurse says brightly as the monitor blares in alarm. 

"Timer," he instructs. 

The clock starts to tick. Thirty seconds. One minute. He almost jumps when her body gives another shudder, trying to draw air, arms jerking against the restraints. She's still in full cardiac arrest, just the last electrical impulses of a dying brain. 

"Let's go," he says urgently. "Start with high dose epi, bag her." 

One nurse unscrews the top on the tube and attaches the ambu bag, another pushes the first epi into the IV. He steps up to the side of the bed and rolls his shoulders over his hands, threading his fingers and driving the heel of his palms against her chest. Her breasts slap against his hands as he drives her sternum against her spine, forcing blood out of her dying organ, and when he lifts his weight, knowing it will fill. 

The experiment requires at least one dose of epinephrine in her system before the R-3. He pushes her heart down again and again to circulate the medication, feeling the resistance as her rib cage springs back against his hands. He thrusts against her to a count of thirty, then draws back for a pulse check, his fingers pressed to her pale neck while he watches the monitors. 

"Asystole," the nurse announces. 

"Push another epi," he instructs, rolling up his sleeves as he dives back over her chest. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. He dutifully helps her dying pump circulate the epinephrine through her body, priming her for the next phase of the experiment. Ten. Eleven. Twelve. He looks up at the two way mirror. 

"Get the R3 inter-cardiac injector," he grunts. Twenty. Twenty-one. 

His hands drive down, her pump compresses, ejecting the blood from inside the organ. His hands lift, and her pump sucks the blood from surrounding arteries up into inflating ventricles and atriums, moving it all with terrifyingly poor efficiently compared to the natural process. But it'll keep her brain alive. It *should* keep her brain alive. And that's his function. 

"R-3 ready," the nurse announces. 

He counts thirty, breathing hard from exertion. As he draws back, he can see deep red bruises developing on her pale skin between the arches of her breasts. 

"Pulse check?" 

"No change."

He holds out his hand and the nurse presses the inter-cardiac injector into his palm. He finds his markers on her chest, taking his time as her lips pale, dark green eyes seeming to watch him from beneath heavy lids. When he has the placement, he jabs the injector firmly against her chest, the needle plunging through muscle and cartilage and directly into her heart. It clicks, the medication drains from the syringe, and it clicks again. 

He looks at the monitor. A long, flat line mocks him. Glancing at the two-way mirror, he sees nothing but his own confused reflection, standing over the patient he's killed. 

Heat burns up the back of his neck. Tossing the injector onto a metal tray with a clatter, he rolls back over her chest and plunges down with his palms. 

"Anything?" He grunts between thrusts. 

"Still in asystole..." The nurse murmurs, sounding as nervous as he feels. 

"Push another epi." 

One nurse hyperventilates while another pushes the drug. His arms are tired, his shoulders and abs starting to burn. He circulates the R-3 at the same time as the epinephrine, watching the monitor with his mouth a grim line. 

"Hold compressions," a crackling voice instructs over the speaker in the corner of the room. The Benefactor. 

The doctor's brows crease. He glances from the speaker to the glass. 

"I need to keep her--" 

"Hold compressions." The voice instructs a second time. 

The doctor slows his thrusts, gentles his touch to her chest, then pulls away. She lies still, pale. Empty. He looks from her face quickly to the monitor, watching the flat line crawl from one side of the screen to the other. Nothing. Asystole. Failure. How could they have failed on their first experiment? Is it possible that R-3 isn't as promising as they thought it was? 

His hands are curled into fists that cut his nails into his palms, breathing hard through his mouth. And then -- he freezes. Forgets to breathe. The line on the monitor jumps, a beep, and then another. And another. Studdering at first, and then steady. 

"Sinus rythym," he gasps, eyes jerking to the two-way mirror before he walks around to his patients head, opening her eyes one at a time and shining his pen light quickly at her pupils. 

"Equal and reactive," he murmurs.

"Good work," the Benefactor's voice fills the room. 

Walking back to her side, he unfurls his palm and fingers over her chest as though he's still going to pump her up and down. Under his hand, her chest rises and falls, her skin, covered in goose flesh, is starting to warm. Reaching for his stethescope, he ausiclates around her heart, listening to the efficient little pump as it returns to strength. And when he glances up at her face, her eyelids are softly parted, and this time there's conciousness behind her gaze. She's watching him. 

He places his hand gently on her shoulder and leans close. 

"The experiment was successful," he murmurs. "The R-3 brought you back." He squeezes her shoulder, then draws away, noticing how her body, her hips, draw toward him slightly. He lifts the top of her gown to cover her breasts, gently inserting his stethescope below the fabric to continue listening to her pump. 

Spontaneous return of circulation. From asystole to sinus. He'll make a recording, take vigorous notes. And in a week, they'll run another scenario. R-3 could save so many lives. And his patient... He glances up at her face. She's still watching him. 

He clears his throat, removing the buds from his ears as he lets the steth drop around his neck. Moving to the head of the bed, he smiles. "Let's cough, I'll remove the tube."

She follows instructions, every sign of her intact intelligence makes his heart beat harder. Deflating the balloon, he slides the tube free while she coughs and softly gags, sucking in air like a desperate, hungry thing. Her chest rises off the bed as she tastes clean, cool oxygen. 

"You did great," he murmurs. "How do you feel?" 

She smiles at him, languid as the nurses remove the restraints. 

"Ready..." She croaks. "Ready for more, doctor." 

He chuckles, taken aback, his gaze drifting down to the red mark visible under the neck of her patient gown. 

"Soon," he murmurs back, slipping his stethescope under the thin fabric and replacing the ear buds so he can ausiclate her lungs and heart again. She flinches at the cold bell against her skin, and he smiles. "I promise."