Preset by Preset (epub)

Author:Preset (epub)
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-03-30T23:26:37+00:00

On the operating table lay a woman motionless from anesthesia. Blue fabric draped her from the chest down with only the hill of her abdomen exposed. Try as she might, Eleanor could not take her eyes off the round abdomen housing a tiny life. She felt as if she was staring down a cliff—an urge to jump, an electric impulse inside her own stomach. The call of the void.

“The patient, who we’ve been monitoring at the hospital the last week, has severe cramping and abdominal pain,” Dr. Raiya Iravani said.

She had called Eleanor at the crack of dawn. As director at Research & Intelligence, Eleanor consulted with different councils, and they with her. It was their way. This time she was here to witness what Raiya warned might happen. Eleanor did not want to see it. Still, she knew she had to. For herself and for the other survivors.

“She’s in week twenty-five. Extreme preterm,” Raiya said. “The mother has preeclampsia. Both she and the baby are in distress, and we have to deliver via C-section. Doctor Wood is about to make the first incision. Another team will handle the baby after delivery.”

Eleanor noticed the group next to an incubator nearby. The doctor standing over the pregnant woman pressed a scalpel on the skin of her abdomen, making a long line. Blood oozed out. For the next five minutes, Eleanor watched as the doctor cut through each layer of tissue until she reached the embryonic sac. A small puncture and fluid oozed out.

What Eleanor saw next made her want to scream out loud. The baby in Dr. Wood’s hands did not look human. Where the eyes should be were black spots covered with a thin film. The nose was flat against the face with small holes where the nostrils should be.

“It’s not breathing!” Dr. Wood said as she handed the baby over to a waiting doctor and turned back to close up the mother.

A team of physicians and nurses swarmed the newborn. Eleanor stared at the baby. Its skin was so transparent she could see its internal organs. A tiny stomach. A tiny brain. A tiny heart inside its chest. All of them still. Lifeless. It was too fragile for this cruel world. She felt both sad and relieved and hated herself for feeling the latter.

Sharp, incessant beeping sounds came from the heart monitor, startling her. All eyes turned back to the unconscious mother, skin as diaphanous as morning fog.

“Her HR and BP are dropping. She’s lost too much blood!” Dr. Wood yelled.

“She’s not clotting,” a nurse next to her said. “We need to control her blood pressure.”

A sustained high-pitched beep emitted from the heart monitor. Dr. Wood checked the patient’s pulse. “No pulse! She’s not breathing.”

She started performing CPR on the patient. “Code blue! Get the crash cart ready!”

Eleanor stared wide-eyed at the scene in front of her, her hands to her mouth. Raiya ushered her out of the room. Once she was on the other side of the door, Eleanor ripped off her mask and gulped in air.

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