Aiken stood with his wrist resting against the sterile counter top, the tip of the pen he grasped poised and trembling slightly above the single sheet of paper lying in front of him that held so much weight. An image rose up in his mind's eye of a heart monitor emitting agonizingly drawn out beeps while its needle shiiick, shicked in little hiccups across a green screen. He quickly shook it away.
"And you're sure this is safe, Doctor Jude? Her best option?" Though his hand betrayed his nerves, his voice held a quiet but steady resignation.
The swarthy, straight-backed doctor held his ground in a stance not unlike a Nazi soldier defending an instilled belief held so strongly that it must stand above all reproach. Yet in the same way many a Nazi soldier had carried more sins that years, Doctor Jude's face was barely yet lined.
"Young sir, this treatment is the cutting edge. We haven't even documented any side effects as a result of the medication. Your sister will come out on the other side a new being, and nothing more than the carefree young girl she once was."
Aiken couldn't help but flinch at the term "cutting edge." And yet the thought of his other half finally free of the burdens she'd been hoarding within shone a thin ray of hope that had been hidden behind a dense ceiling of clouds until now. He didn't know what else to do.
So he signed his sister's life away in blue ink.
