The First

Chapter 70

Recent advances in harvesting mitochondrial DNA had decreased the processing time to around four hours. Alexa didn't have to worry about contamination, quantitation, or amplification protocols due to her perfect and plentiful specimen. Once she'd extracted the cells needed from the preserved after birth, the analysis hadn't taken long.

Teagan's screams and Ray's incessant complaints hadn't helped during the fifty-two minutes it took her to create the gene therapy.

Ross huffed and held up his index finger. "Give me ... a second." He looked as if he'd run a marathon, sprinting those last one hundred yards to the finish. Smelled like it too.

"Perimeter's clear. Any progress?" This was the second time he'd toured the neighborhood to ensure their safety.

"You betcha, secret agent man," Ray piped in over the speaker phone. He'd been on the line throughout the process feeding her data into their systems at OHSU. Scientists worldwide had connected to them. Each piece of data instantly transferred. None had questioned her expertise.

Alexa frowned. "Thank you, Ray."

"No doubt, boss ..." She pressed the 'end' button on her phone.

"Well?" Ross's right fingers tapped his slung left arm. Another miracle by Gavin the medic. He'd sutured the wound and made Ross wear a sling with a second bandage fixed around his shoulder and chest.

Alexa filled the syringe and flicked it, releasing the bubbles. Clear fluid dripped from the tip of the needle. There wasn't time to doddle. The idea of Teagan being the first human trial didn't sit well with her, but the task had to be completed by someone.

"Now it's done." She capped the needle and wiped her brow with a hanky from the desk drawer.

Ross let out a long sigh and smiled. "That's my girl."

"You're what?"

"Mom!" Teagan screamed—again.

Armed with a syringe (and a half-naked FBI guy) Alexa hurried to the front room. They'd pulled out the couch and covered it in her good 800 ply double-thread sheets.

"Back bedroom?" Ross asked.

"Most likely." She followed him down the hall and into the spare room.

Teagan lay in the spare bed with her legs spread wide. A towel covered her genitalia. Homemade stirrups made from bath towels, trash cans and shower rods held her ankles in the air.

"Mom." This time she pleaded.

Ross examined the makeshift birthing center Gavin had erected. "Wow! André McGuyver. Nice work."

The pun wasn't lost on her. Though she only knew about André the Giant from watching The Princess Bride with Teagan when she was six and had heard about the TV show McGuyver from friends in medical school.

Light guffaws from the gentle giant gave an air of comfort to the intensity filled room.

Ellie wobbled.

"Up you go." Ross offered his good arm.

"Thanks, hunkaboo." Ellie stabled herself and gave him a half-hearted smile. Mascara smeared about her face, mostly under her eyes. Alexa had no doubt Ellie grieved for Alissa's loss and her own double mauling. Given her situation, the girl had remained her usual sarcastic self.

Alexa did her own inspection of the room. "This was a good idea."

"Gavin told us to get her off the couch and into a bed. So, we carried her in here. Well ... he did all the lifting. I just gimped next to them. Little Liza's sleeping in the other room."