One glance at the deathly pale faces of the girls, and I knew he was right.
“They have an eighty percent chance of dying from this, Arun,” Victor said. “Don’t you think it’s worth the risk?”
“If they died from my antidote—,” Arun said.
“They’ll probably die anyway if you aren’t willing to help,” Victor cut him off, sounding furious. “I’ll inject them myself if I have to. I know you brought the antidote; I can see it in your face.” He jumped to his feet and stalked over to Arun’s open backpack.
“All right!” Arun rose, following. “I’ll do it.”
Victor stepped out of the way, and Arun retrieved a long case, pulling two syringes from it. “I’ll do it,” he said again, barely audible this time.
“I agree with Victor,” I said. “You said yourself you were so close.”
Arun shook his head. “?‘So close’ is not good enough in science. ‘So close’ is not what you inject into your friends. But you’re right: It’s worth the risk if you look at it from a statistical vantage point.”
I almost smiled, because this was so Arun. I was certain he didn’t agree to use the antidote because of our emotional pleas. Arun had agreed because he had done the mathematical probability in his head.
He crouched by Iris and uncapped the syringe, but his hand shook too much as he held it near the crook of her elbow. He straightened and drew deep breaths until he leaned down again, this time, injecting the antidote into Iris’s arm. Arun then moved to Lingyi’s bedside and did the same.
Victor and I stood at the feet of their beds, silent, like witnesses in some ancient ritual. Arun joined us after he was done, fists clenched at his sides. “Now we wait,” he said.
“How long before we know?” I asked, my eyes never leaving the girls’ pallid faces.
“If the nanobots do what they’re supposed to, it’ll take a few hours for them to stunt the existing H7N9S viruses in their systems. Then it’s a matter of waiting for their immune systems to take over.” Victor folded his arms across his chest. “We’ll know within eight hours how this will go.”
Victor threw an arm around Arun, and Arun let him. “They’ll be all right,” Victor said, trying to sound confident. “They’re strong. They’ll pull through.”
Arun slung his arm around my shoulder too, so we stood together, like oath brothers. My heart felt heavy. I wanted to believe him.
? ? ?
We stayed with the girls. Their complexions remained pale, with a bright flush in their cheeks. Both began to shift more in their beds, sometimes mumbling incoherently, or moaning as if in pain. They succumbed to ragged coughs, even in their sleep. Half-conscious, Iris’s eyelids fluttered once, and I took the opportunity to prop her up gently, giving her water to drink. She opened her eyes fully after she finished the cup, but they didn’t focus on me. Instead, she turned her head toward Lingyi, and a small whimper escaped from between her lips, a weak noise that I would never have expected from her. Iris, who was unfazed in any situation, who seemed indestructible. Quick to wink and smile, quick to rebel, but always emotionally distant somehow. Closed.
I laid her head gently down, and her lashes flickered again, as if she was struggling to remain conscious. Then, with obvious effort, her arm snaked out from beneath the thin sheet, damp from her sweat, and she reached over to clasp Lingyi’s forearm. Lingyi didn’t stir. Iris’s fingers worked slowly, like a lumbering spider, toward Lingyi’s wrist, before gripping Lingyi’s hand in her own.
Iris let out a soft sigh, and her eyes closed. But she never let go of Lingyi’s hand.
Arun had pulled up a chair and sat five feet away from us, palms clasped. His leg jittered. I didn’t think he was even aware of it. If the nanobots’ programming went haywire, Arun had explained, if they began to self-replicate by themselves or infiltrated an organ—the brain, the heart, the lungs—if the nanobots went rogue, the girls could be dead within hours. The damage to their internal systems would be quick, painful, and irreversible.
I remembered the monkeys’ convulsing bodies in those clear cages, blood dribbling from their noses and mouths, and had to force myself not to shudder.
Behind me, I could hear Victor pacing, back and forth, back and forth, with restrained grief and fury. I had been designated the main caretaker, since I had already had this flu. I wiped the girls’ faces and upper chests with a cold, damp cloth, trying to cool their fevers. Three hours in, Arun gave me a large iced sugarcane juice to drink, along with two hot steamed pork buns. “You need to give yourself some fuel too,” he said. And although I had no appetite, I washed my hands and ate and drank everything.
Arun’s brown complexion had an underlying pallor I’d seen after his mom died. He hovered over me, then walked circles around the sitting area, flicking his eyes toward the girls nonstop.
“Is it my imagination or are they looking more flushed?” Victor asked.
I touched Lingyi’s forehead. “She’s burning up.” I scrambled to Iris and touched her cheek—she felt just as hot. I took their temperatures, and both had fevers over 103?F. My heart raced, feeling helpless.
“This can’t be good,” I said, barely choking the words out. “They’re getting worse.”
Arun gave me another bucket of iced water. He wrung out a cloth and passed it to me. “All we can do is to try and keep them cool for now. Their bodies are fighting the virus. They might get worse before they get better.”
But Arun looked like I felt—like we were ready to cry at any moment.
I ran the cold cloth under Lingyi’s chin, across her shoulder blades and her upper chest. She was dressed in a light blue tank top—her favorite article of clothing, in a rainbow of bright colors, no matter what the weather. I then did the same for Iris. Her arms were slack, weighted. It was hard to believe it was these same arms that had taken down three guards with lightning speed just a few nights ago, the same arms that could climb and strike with such strength.
Another three hours passed, and we said nothing to each other. Time seemed to stretch on endlessly, as I tried my best not to follow the girls’ every breath, deathly afraid that this one might be their last. The only sounds within our headquarters were the ragged coughing fits from Iris and Lingyi that rattled their entire bodies. I gave them water when I could and continued to try to cool them down with a damp cloth.
In the early evening, Arun stopped midpace and said, “I think they’re looking less feverish.”
I had been watching the girls so closely, my vision felt blurred. I touched Lingyi’s cheek, then Iris’s, then took their temperatures. “They’re both just below 100?F!”
“Yes!” Arun exclaimed. “The antidote must be working.”