Chapter 8
When Kim, Josh and Dr. Marstairs got to the hospital, it was plain something was going on. There were police cars, ambulances, the parking lot was stuffed, and a news crew was setting up in the parking lot to the donut shop across the street.
"What's happening?" Josh asked.
"Good news, of a sort." The doctor said, when the two teens looked at him, he smiled grimly. "At least the authorities are responding to the emergency as they should. Young man, I'm afraid that you'll have to drop us off—I doubt there will be any parking available to you." Josh nodded, pulling up to the curb, and letting Marstairs and Kim get out, the doctor helping the teen with her wheelchair. He took off, looking for a parking place as Kim and Marstairs headed into the hospital.
As they came to the doors, Bonnie came charging out, sobbing, followed by Ron. Ron stopped briefly looking at Kim.
"Kim-"
"Ron, what's wrong?"
"Tara-she's bad." Kim didn't hesitate.
"Then don't stop here." Kim said, and Ron, without another word, followed Bonnie into the night.
Inside, the hospital was barely organized Chaos. In one corner Kim saw a girl she knew from the chess club quietly dissolving into hysterics in her parents arms, while in another, Officer Hobble was trying to calm down a well dressed man who was demanding that something be done for his son, in a voice that had started out loud and determined, but was itself beginning to scale up. Kim shivered. She understood the mood—she had had it, when they had told her what the rest of her life was going to be like…but at least she had had some preparation, knowing how badly she'd been hurt. But this mood…it was contagious, and she could see that other people were beginning to stand up and go to the man's assistance in his confrontation with the officer, as other police came in.
"This is bad." Kim said under her breath.
"Indeed." was all the doctor said. They got to the nurses station, and for the first time in Kim's memory, she wasn't allowed to go any further.
"I'm sorry honey, but they've sealed the rest of the hospital-" Dr. Marstairs held out some ID.
"I am Doctor Karl Marstairs, and I have some information on this drug. It is urgent that I speak with Dr. Possible." The woman looked at him for a moment, then nodded.
"Go on in." This time, Kim was allowed to pass, and they continued through the hospital, quieter now.
In the lab, Dr. Possible was working on a computer read out, looking up at Kim and Karl.
"Kimmie, I thought they wouldn't let- who is this?" Kim opened her mouth but Karl beat her to it.
"Karl Marstairs."
"Oh—I remember you—you were at the degenerative neural diseases conference."
"Yes, and I know about this drug—I invented it." Kim winced, feeling even worse as her mother simply looked at Karl, evidently not jumping to conclusions.
"I take it not for this use." She said.
"No." He responded, "It was an attempt to moderate various forms of degenerative neural conditions—most specifically things like senile dementia."
"I…never heard about it." She commented.
Karl sighed, "I expect not—it never made it past animal testing and the company I worked for before canceling the program was very concerned about premature publicity—for exactly this reason, I must add. The last thing they wanted was for people to believe we were developing some form of "smart pill".
"I can see why—and the reason it never made it to human trials?" Karl looked over at Kim for a moment and then quietly said.
"Because in each and every case a momentary improvement in memory retention and intelligence was followed by a swift, and irreversible degeneration, resulting in death."
"Before or after the compound was administered?" Dr. Possible asked, "Tara showed her first symptoms after she stopped taking it."
Karl raised his eyebrows at that one. "No… I don't recall us doing that sort of experiment—no animal lasted long enough, for one thing." Andrea sighed, looking at the read out.
"I have 20 children who have been taking this—I was considering having them continue to take it, since it seemed like Tara's stopping caused the problems, but…"
"But if they track to the animal tests that would simply postpone the reaction by a short time, and make it much worse."
"I've put in conference calls, for the best in the field—can you put together a synoposis of the drug?"
"Yes—one thing we might try-" Kim lost all track of the conversation as the doctors started in on the technical details of the situation, understanding maybe one word in five. She waited, until there was a sound of someone clearing her throat. Kim turned around in her chair.
"Mom's busy right now." She said, to the brown haired woman wearing an eye patch who was in the room, with two other men.
"That's not a problem, Kimberly Ann Possible. I'm here to talk to you, after all."
TBC.