The writer gives life to a story, the reader keeps it alive.
Jarad spent the morning looking for Alexand, as they had argued the night before and he knew that she had hidden from him. He found her in the military camp, administering the vaccine. It has only been a day since their honeymoon, but desperate to keep her, and frightened of rejection he sits next to her, to help administer the antidote to the infected.
Heyem has spent two hours working with the military relief team, injecting victims of the Amanojuko’s secret project, with the antidote. She has been assigned to a tent which deals with the more obviously infected patients. It was arranged that patients be split into groups depending on the severity of their symptoms. This group of patients are symptomatic, some almost as sick as Alexand had been, before she was cured. Heyem is having a tough time dealing with all the suffering.
Heyem has been back on her university campus for the past three weeks. She has arrived between terms, and arranged to begin teaching in the New Year. The army have set up camp inside the grounds, and have recruited members of the faculty to help administer Katherine’s Bullet. The trails of potential infected stretch out onto the streets outside the university, and she decided to take a five-minute break for herself, to recover.
Abouna Panak holds up the antidote, and passes it to a very happy Colonel Merek.
Katherine, and Ajeeta Kothari have spent a month attempting to isolate the antibodies responsible for immunity in their three blood samples.
Alexand is wired up to many observation machines, and so remains in her bed. She takes the mirror, and reluctantly holds it up to her face. (Congratulations to the LGBT community in India for the Supreme Court ruling to decriminalise same sex relationships.)
Jarad returned to Nan Ha and spent the next few days sitting beside Alex, as she lay unconscious, trying to think of ways to tell her about Lord Anderson’s escape. (Thank you to everyone who has read these stories this year. I now measure time through releasing them, so this year has disappeared very quickly. Happy Christmas and best wishes for 2018)
Alexand attempted to follow Jarad, despite being blind, but ended up collapsing by the doorway. She lay there, staring at the darkness, unable to move, calling out for someone to help her. Her cousin Toreth came, and carried Alex back into her bed, then called for Doctor Azizi. He sedated her and she has spent the night sleeping. She has woken again and insisted the doctor help her get out of bed. Doctor Azizi has spent the past few minutes scolding her for ignoring his advice.
Alex wasn’t well enough to get out of bed, but she had been visited by most of her family once the news of her being awake spread. It’s night time now, and the last of the visitors left half an hour ago. Alex is exhausted, but quietly happy, knowing her family accept her. Jarad has been by her side for the past half an hour, reading to her.
Jarad had helped Alexand to walk away from Lord Anderson’s tomb, and heavily disguised, the two of them caught the train home, towards the village they grew up in. After leaving the train, Alex is finding it harder to walk, but she is too stubborn to let Jarad carry her. The village is a mile away, and Jarad is getting nervous.
Alexand and Jarad head towards the last room in the hotel, where Alex promises a solution to the problem of hiding Lord Anderson. (Thank you to everyone who has joined Alex on her journey these past seven years. To celebrate issue 300 and seven years on wordpress, Part 1 is released today and part 2 of the anniversary special will be released on Sunday 25th June, exactly seven years to the day of the first release back in 2010.)
Jarad follows Alexand towards the creepy hotel, in which she is planning to hide the captured body and soul of Lord Filius Anderson.
As they walk the corridor, the guard begins talking about the Amanojuko proposals for the new world order, making Heyem shiver with the horror of it. (Thank you to Siddiqui Fayesal for interviewing me. You can see the first part of the Interview with a writer, on his website, “Ho Hum… Well we’re going to die anyway!“)
Alexand waits in hiding, for the Amanojuko scientists to leave the laboratory.
Alex follows the Amanojuko scientists into their laboratory, hoping she will discover the cure inside.
Professors De somme and Sumian, took a very frail but relieved Katherine to Inajda’s cabin in Russia (after giving her a blood shield) The cure has stopped her body degenerating further, and will allow her to recover in time, but she is very weak and can’t walk. They have left her on a bench outside Inajda’s cabin and told her they will collect her in a month’s time.
Katherine sits by the window in her laboratory, synthesising more inhibitor for the patients in the sickbay. She is getting nervous, today is the day she was promised a visit from a future version of herself, and the cure to her illness.
Katherine, although getting very weak, has spent most of her remaining time in her laboratory, despite having to share it with the encroaching Dr Kothari.
Ajeeta Kothari returns back to her laboratory in Saskatoon from her visit to the Amanojuko base in Russia. She notices that Katherine De Somme is absent, and as Lord Anderson has ordered, needs to know exactly where Katherine is and what she is up to. She learns that Katherine hasn’t been in her laboratory for weeks, and against protocol visits Katherine at home to see for herself that Doctor De Somme is finally near to being deactivated.
Katherine has decided to undergo a scan to determine how much time she has left.
Katherine had isolated herself in her apartment for the last few weeks. The trust fund her father set up for her, as severance, has enabled her to pay for a live in nurse, who gets her in and out of bed, but Katherine being a private woman and needing a lot of space, retreated to her laboratory, despite her reservations about Doctor Kothari.
Katherine is still uneasy about sharing her laboratory with Doctor Kothari.
When Katherine and Alex returned home, Katherine went straight to bed as she felt exhausted. She and Alexand lie next to each other, contemplating their future. (There are five stages to Katherine’s illness, hair loss being the third; her immune system is starting to attack healthy cells.) (CLICK HERE for the first story in this series) CLICK HERE for next story in series
Katherine has added Amanojuko blood to a sample of her own. Five minutes have passed but nothing has happened. (CLICK HERE for the beginning of this story) CLICK HERE for next chronological story.
