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"She is gone," Madhuri said, her voice an octave lower than usual.

"No!" Betsy cried. To Romy's horror, she'd had to watch while Betsy cracked open Meerm's chest and manually compressed her heart. She was still at it, working like a mad woman. "We've still got a chance!"Advertisement

"Betsy, she is dead."

Romy looked at the anesthetist's black eyes and noticed they were rimmed with tears. Joanna's too. Romy knew they mirrored her own. They all knew that Meerm wasn't coming back.

She reached across and gently gripped Betsy's forearms. "She's right, Betsy. Meerm's gone. You did your best but - "

"I should have brought her in sooner!" Betsy wailed. She leaned forward over Meerm's inert heart, and sobbed. "But I was worried about the baby! Damn it, damn it, damn it!"

"You did all you could," Romy said, touching the back of her sweat-soaked scrubs. "But she - "

Zero burst through the OR doors. "We have to go! SIRG just stormed into the lobby, armed to the teeth!"

"Who's SIRG?" Joanna said, gaping at Zero's mask. "And who the hell are you?"

"A friend," Betsy said, ripping off her bloody gloves. She'd regained some of her composure but seemed exhausted.

"And SIRG," Romy added, feeling her gut clench, "is a group that wants to kill that baby."

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"Like hell they will!" Joanna cried.

"Let's go!" Betsy said. "We've got a minute, maybe two at the most before they're here!"

"But what about Meerm?" Romy said.

"We'll have to leave her."

"No - "

"Romy," Zero said softly, "I grieve for her as much as you - more than you - but they won't be interested in Meerm now; they'll want her baby, and we can't let them have her."

"We'll take her," Joanna said. "Madhuri, Betsy, and me. We'll put her in an isolette and hide her in a motel or something."

"What's an isolette?" Patrick asked. He was still holding the baby and seemed very protective.

"It's an incubator of sorts," Madhuri said. "A special enclosed container we use for preemies. Keeps them safe and warm."

"Good idea," Betsy said. "Since they probably know my car, we'll leave it here and take one of yours."

Joanna said, "We'll rustle up a portable isolette and meet you at the doctor's entrance."

She and Madhuri bustled off while Betsy and Romy pulled a green sheet over Meerm's body. As the rest of them hurried out into the hall with the baby, Romy hung back. She rested a hand on the lifeless form beneath the sheet.

"You never had a chance, did you," she whispered. "But things are going to change. And whenever people talk about the change, they'll mention your name."

Small goddamn consolation, she thought as she hurried away to catch up to the others. pqdm.com