I texted T. Laine, asking if null pens could be brought to the para unit of UTMC. If there was any chance to help the patients, we should take it.
She texted back, On it. Will messenger them over.
I tapped on the glass door and was let in by a woman dressed the way I was, in a sky blue paranormal biohazard gown, gloves, mask, and booties.
I identified myself. She said, “Robinelle Langer, Thomas’ sister.” Her dark eyes looked exhausted above the blue mask, her dark skin salt-cracked and rough from tears. “Have you people figured out anything? What caused this? Who did it? Any way to treat it? Anything?”
“We’re working as fast as we can. I promise.” I looked at Thomas’ bandaged hands. There was a little blood there too, and the stench was familiar from Stella’s house.
“They say he’s in cascading organ failure,” Robinelle said. Tears leaked from her eyes and she sniffed beneath the mask. “Nothing’s working. He’s dying.”
I had no idea what to say. There was no way to question Thomas.
“He had such a great time on the tour,” Robinelle said as the ventilator punctuated the quiet. “He was on top of the world. Stella Mae was like family. We all loved her.”
“How long had Thomas been with the band?” I asked carefully.
“Since the very beginning. He started out with Stella back in the commune.”
I didn’t know exactly what that meant, but I guessed, and her tone suggested that I should have understood her words. I pushed on. “Did you communicate with your brother while he was on tour? Text or phone calls?”
“Constantly. Not that he ever said anything substantive.” She turned to me. “You think there’s something in the texts? I can send them all to you.”
“I don’t want to abuse your privacy,” I said while my PsyLED half was shouting to see them right now. “But if you don’t mind, yes. There might be something there that would help.”
“No time like the present,” she said. I followed Robinelle’s lead when she pulled off her gown and gloves, scrubbed her hands at the sink, and motioned me out of the room. Robinelle was pretty, in a spare, bare-boned way, with good bone structure, no makeup, and blond braids up in a big bun with loose hair sticking out all over from the hat and the elastic bands of the mask. She moved like a self-assured, accomplished woman. Nobody’s victim here, even with her brother in such bad shape. I wondered what others saw when they watched me move, victim or not-victim, confident or prey.
Standing in the hall, she pulled up several months’ worth of texts between her and her brother and forwarded them to JoJo at HQ. When she was done, Robinelle handed me a business card that told me she was a tax attorney. “You’ll let me know if you hear anything? Please?”
“I’ll tell you anything I can,” I said.
As an attorney, Robinelle seemed to understand that meant almost nothing, was more platitude than anything real. She made a face that was angry and sad and futile. The beginnings of grief. It wasn’t standard operating procedure to touch people, but I couldn’t help myself. I held out an arm and she moved into me, her face dropping to my shoulder, her arms going around me. We stood there, hugging, long enough that her breathing calmed. She sniffed and stepped back. “Thanks. I needed that.”
“Me too,” I said. And I realized that I really did.
The next patient was Connelly Darrow, who played bass guitar and had been among the first to be stricken ill, along with Langer. Just as I got to the door, an alarm went off and I was shoved out of the way as medical personnel dressed out and rushed in, and family was pushed into the hallway with me. I stood there with her weeping family as the team drew the drapes around the bed and tried to help their patient. Tried to save her. In shadows against the drapes, we watched as the medical team compressed her chest. Ventilated her. Drew blood, gave meds. As people rushed in and out. The curtain caught on the ventilator and we gathered at the corner of the glass doorway, watching.
Connelly’s right big toe fell off and splatted onto the floor in a spray of greenish goo. Someone picked up the toe and closed the curtain.
From behind the curtain I heard the words, “We have a pulse.”