AoO Its In The Blood
Age of Origin TP Log - Its In The Blood
Who - Zachary, Sushmita, Dr Teana Leeford (NPC Doctor), NPCs
Where - Chimera Wing - Sublevel - Derrial Book Memorial Hospital
When - Aug 21st
Rating - PG-13 for...blood.
Summary - Blood samples are studied at the Book along with other test results and they make some disturbing discoveries.
Like the strange mythical creature she is, Sushmita is inhabiting the Chimera Wing where her lab and other virology facitilies are located. Right now she's called a crisis meeting to study the MRIs and CT scans she had ordered from the weirdo that arrived yesterday. <English>
Zachary arrives late to the meeting, after Sushmita has begun to explain the analysis that Sushmita and Kyra have prepared for the staff. However, he has electronic tablet in hand a grim expression on his face, and is ready to listen. When he catches Sushmita's attention, he signals that he will have something to add after she has concluded. <English>
Sushmita has drawn up a large chart on a wall with the photos and names of the patients so far and is adding info to it while she speaks. "So, we have six patients now who all show the same symptoms... and none has anything that we know from the books. The blood work on each patient shows that red blood cell count is low, while the white blood cell count is high. MRI's consistently show brain swelling, but what exactly causes the swelling I don't know yet." She pauses when Zach arrives and nods to him. "Anything else, Doctor MacAbrams?", she asks, all formal-like with so much staff around. <English>
Zachary inclines his head while he settles into a chair near the back of the room. "Unless I miss my guess, we'll have another patient matching this profile within a few hours." He taps his tablet and continues, "A friend sent a wave to me this morning. She thinks that her fiance has the same symptoms that we're seeing here. They were on Sihnon when she called. If this is showing up on other worlds, it could be an epidemic of some kind." <English>
Sushmita frowns at the news. "With the daily shuttle services and private flights all the time it is hardly possible to contain an outbreak to one planet these days.", she sighs, "We need to send an alert verse-wide. I also believe that it would be best to have patients brought here if they can be transported to bundle our energies. Is the patient in question transferable?", she asks, "Who is he?" Apparently ready to add another patient name to her big white board. "Another thing -", she then turns to the room in general: "This disease seems to be highly contagious and spreading fast, so take precautions when you handle them. Masks and gloves all the time, scrub intensely after each patient contact. Another symptom is that they seem to be highly aggressive and tend to violent behaviour, so I'll have security on standbye - please do call them when you need." <English>
There's a young woman with golden brown skin, and cherubic like features that makes her look younger than she is, hazel and a sprinkling a cinnamon like freckles across her nose speaking to a mixed heritage. Her hair is dark blonde, curly and pulled out of her face in a bun with a satiny pink ribbon as she moves along with a confidence taller than her...'size' (Seriously, she's 4'11). Dressed in pink scrubs, she just looks very concerned as she's working with her hands shoved in one of those glass boxes with the gloves, carefully using a dropper of an unknown fluid to drip a tiny bit on a sample of blood, peering through a microscope as she does so with an expression of disbelief.
10 minutes later, she's jogging down the hall and buttoning up her shirt and smoothing down her skirt seeing as she had to change out of her scrubs, her...pumps are indeed within 'regulations' but...they are pink, to match her bow. She smooths down her doctor's coat with the little cutesy buttons and pins along the collar and on the pockets. "Am I late?" Introducing...Dr Teana Leeford - Hematologist/Oncologist. A soft pant goes here. "Sorry just...well the blood was all talkin' to me and It would've been rude to uh...just leave..." She flashes a sheepish smile. <English>
Zachary nods while Sushmita speaks, especially when she recommends the need for extreme caution and security. "You're late but it's completely understandable, Dr. Leeford," he answers when The diminutive hematologist arrives. He seems quite familiar with her tendency to anthropomorphize when talking about her samples. The trait amused him when she interviewed, but he couldn't ignore her rigorous qualifications from the University of Osiris. Shifting his attention to Sushmita, he answers her questions. "It's Selene O'Connell. You might remember her from the Guan-Yin II. Dr. O'Dowd was quite ... distraught. I urged her to bring Selene here as soon as possible and administer sedatives if necessary to keep her quiet." Glancing to the other professionals, he explains, "Dr. O'Dowd is a former Alliance officer and doctor. Her insights might prove very valuable to this." <English>
Sushmita frowns a little at the late doctor, but just nods and gestures for her to take a seat. "So, any of you have any suggestions what treatments we should try?", she asks everyone, though her eyes return to Dr Leeford who's been busy with the blood work. "Personally I suggest to tap spinal fluid as well and do further tests on the brain, since this infection seems to cause atypical behaviour." <English>
The little doctor clears her throat and even though she's most known to be reading Sunrise novels in the background and decorating her office with momentos of different vampire novels, she seems to be all business today, standing up and holding up a little drive where she's saved information. "Doctors...I think ya'll need to see this." She moves forward to hook it up to whatever monitor the meeting room has and she hooks that up to her PDA, making sure the video can be seen by all. Its the microscopic images of the blood work she's been doing. "This here...is the first blood sample we received...as you can see...it kinda resembles anemia don't it? That's why they called me in initially, cuz well I do the whole blood thing. This little girl...I was preparing to put her on an IV to increase the iron and stuff in her system." She clicks to the next vid. "This is her blood...work...2 hours later..." And there is when you start to see the foreign little buggers in there...the 'virus' of a sorts and they are multiplying pretty quickly...and fighting against the white blood cells in there trying to fight it by...multiplying. "We thought it could be an infection so for her own good she was put in that medical coma..." She sighs. "24 hours after being admitted." She clicks to the next slide...even more little buggers and a crazy low amount of red blood cells. "Since she was getting worse...I had them feed the iron supplement like solution into her system via the IV, like we do Anemic patients cuz when that new man, the lil' one that scratched a hole in his chest? He kept asking for meat? Well...meat tends to have like the iron in it and stuff so...we tried this...the IV..." Then she looks a bit hesitant. <English>
Zachary listens, nods, and takes occasional notes on his tablet. Although the lithle hematologist would not win points with Toastmasters, she makes important points about the virii and that correlation to iron deficiency. He questions, "How does the patient's general blood profile compare with samples from samples of the dermal rash?" <English>
Sushmita remains silent now, while taking notes on every image the other doctor display. "Did that work, Doctor?", she finally asks, "If the patients are suffering iron deficencies, there are easier ways to supplement them than feed them half a cow per day." <English>
"The rash." Teana takes a deep breath. "Well here." She clicks to a picture of the rash when the girl was first brought in. "Initial tests said it had something akin' to an allergic reaction quality to it." She clicks again to the next slide of a picture of the rash where it has spread all over the girl's arm and up to her chin, covering half of her face. "This is what the rash looked like after we put her in that coma, it spread crazy fast."
She points to Sushmita. "And yes. She went from shriveling up to things seeming to get back to normal, however...I took a sample of the blood afterwards...that's what I was working on. So I could try to see what's going on, how its improving. Her blood, the blood of the new little man and one of the other patients and I added a tiny drop of the special solution I had made up...with just the iron...and I ain't no Virologist but..." She clicks back to the video taken. The blood sample with the crazy amount of those virus or bacterial buggers attacking whatever substance was in that dropper, and then growing...and each one splitting into two more. <English>
Zachary frowns when he sees that last video, and nods to Sushmita. "Other methods would be healthier for the patients, too," he notes. Shifting back to the petite physician, he questions, "What did you use to stimulate that phenomenal growth?" <English>
Sushmita shakes her head at the video. "The virus is feeding on the iron.", she muses, "But we cannot deplete a body of iron completely. I must conduct further research into the substance of the virus, so we know what we can use to attack it. We might have to do an external blood cleansing." <English>
The little doctor worries her bottom lip before she clears her throat. "I-I ain't never heard of a virus needing to /eat/ before...well I mean like that. It's a catch 22 really. Damned if we do, damned if we don't. I've never seen a blood disorder like this so I don't think it is one, I think the blood is just a vector for it, a comfy place it can multiply and sit as it spreads..." She trails off. "I don't know, all I used was a simple little solution...like the IV treatments I give my patients who have iron deficiencies. It doesn't seem to be /enough/ however. Usually one treatment can last like...1 week to 2 weeks. For two of these patients, including the little girl and her daddy I've gone through like...3 weeks of treatments per patient in just two days." <English>
Zachary considers, "We can't deplete the iron completely to starve this virus, but Dr. Khan might have a point about cleansing the blood. If the virus thrives on iron, perhaps we could use that externally as the cleansing agent, literally like a magnet to attract the virus and hold it." <English>
"We do have hemodialysis facilities here at the Book.", Sushmita confirms, nodding to the female doctor whose speciality this is, "Can you work out how to cleanse the blood of iron without killing the patient by using hemodialysis or aphereis?", she asks, "It should be something like leukoreduction. I don't know, work it out, Doctor Leeford. I will do further research into the structure of the virus. Doctor MacAbrams, please ask Dr O'Dowd to bring her patient over here, we can also use her assistance. And please do put all hospitals in the verse you can reach on high alert. We should also prepare to take in more patients... many more patients. Now go and take care of those we have." She dismisses them all with a nod and only when the staff has dispersed, she heaves a sigh, her shoulders slumping. <English>
Dr Leeford's lips press together in a grim line before she just bows her head to the senior doctors. "I do hope ya'll are right and I'll do what I can." She gathers her PDA and leaves the video clips for folks to look over if they like before she pauses on her way out to look over her shoulder. "But what...if we remove the iron...and that ain't really what its feeding on?" She turns her head to the side and gives a shiver. "I'll start working with my team." And then the little Blood Fairy -err...that is the little doctor quickly makes her way off, scanning through her PDA. <English>
Zachary nods to the hematologist. "We need to be sure that the conclusion about iron is legitimate. Do check for other factors, but report back to us as soon as you are confident about your results." Then he adds, turning to Sushmita, "We'll need a press release detailing the symptoms that might signal this ... condition, so that people can seek medical attention as soon as possible." <English>
"While we have no clear diagnosis, we have to try finding one by eliminating potential sources.", Sushmita explains to Dr Leeford, "Test with one patient, see what gives. If it doesn't work... find other solutions. Do some research on the cortex if necessary. I remember the Corey-Mayland virus that was found on Londinium three years ago, which ate red blood cells. Only a few people were affected and it was gone relatively quick - they traced ground zero to a particular building where a deep tunnel had been dug and bacteria were released into the atmosphere - but there may be similar things that affected someone somewhere sometime. We WILL get to the core of this. Just don't expect to get any sleep till we do.", she smirks and nods to Zach. "Yes, please write one up and run it by me before it goes public.", she says, then she wanders off. <English>
