Exum: New Earth

Chapter Four

The doctor, Cameron Evans, had Toby into a machine that works test his ability to withstand the heat of a flare, laying down behind glass, begging to get out with his arms and legs trapped down. 

"Quiet now, Toby. It's time to see what you're mother gave you. " She said and smirked, turning on the machine.

The temperature rised slowly and Toby tried to fight, screaming and burning until his skin was a bright red. It felt extremely painful but when the machine cooled down, he was still alive. The doctor's assisants brought him to another machine, one again with a glass viewing panel. Cameron carefully put one paraworm in the tube with Toby. He was too weak to do much and so he tried to stay as still as possible. He really didn't want the parasite burrowing into his stomach or it's eggs hatching and burrowing out. The worm moved closer to him and crawled out his stomach. He held his breathe and closed his eyes. Soon he felt Cameron take the worm away and he sighed in relief. Though.... this did mean he was what Cameron wanted; what Exum wanted- a fertile person who could survive outside the dome. They needed to restart humanity and Toby was just the person for that task- they needed a lot more like him and so the logical next step was genetic alteration the same as Toby had received and lots of breeding.

"Perfect! " Cameron smiled happy with the results getting her works to take the injured and scared Toby back to his hazard room cell. She looked at him with a bright smile though the glass and started typing on her chart

"That sunburn will heal; at that level of radiation you should have died...melted even. And that worm didn't care for you one bit. This is good.  Eventually we'll be able to safely leave the dome. Now of course we have to keep you down here so you don't talk. "

"I won't. Please just let me go. Maxwell will be worried about me by now.  He'll look for me. "

"Darling, barely anyone knows this place is even here and you're a flight risk to begin with."

The next month was filled with all kinds of tests to find out why he was more resilient to the new outside world; from MRI and catscans to blood samples. He'd started feeling nauseous and blamed the radiation testing but today they were doing to do an ultrasound to find out if Caneron's hopes came true- that Maxwell had gotten Toby pregnant before he was taken.

Guards escorted Toby to the lab from his cell like room. He crawled onto the exam table and laid down, silent and feeling sickly from presumably morbing sickness. He saw a new doctor at the foot of his bed but one he recognized as the other doctor that worked with Maxwell.

"You know Max! Is he going okay? Is he looking for me? How are you here?" Toby sat up asking a million questions a minute.

"I'm here to do an ultrasound as I'm the best obstetrician and pediatrician in Exum. And I've been sworn that i can't tell Max or anyone about this.  They'll kill me if i do or exile me....he hasn't stopped trying to find you even though everyone is saying you ran away after the flare...he says you would have at least told me you were leaving....now lay back. "

Toby did so with pleading eyes, he knew if he asked for help the guards would hear so all they had was looks.

"My name is Adam, by the way. I'm going to be your doctor for the next few months so i thought you might like to know. " he said with a forced smile.

Toby nodded and pulled his shirt up when asked. At first, he didn't want to look at the screen- knew this baby would probably be taken from him but he couldn't help but look. He wanted to see the child Max helped him to create. Adam circled a blob on the screen and wrote baby Holter.

"He's never going to see this baby. Neither will i if they have their way."

"I know." Adam said simply, "This baby isn't genetically altered though. It may not be immune or fertile and they are looking for both. The sooner we can replicate what makes you immune to unaltered patients, the sooner Exum grows outside the domes... your child would likely be experimented on. "

Toby sat up, "she...i....no, you can't! Please." Toby started to cry. He held his mouth and ran to the sink, emptying his stomach. He wiped his mouth and huffed out an exhausted breathe, "it hurts to much for a little baby to have to go through. I want my baby to have a happy life. "

"Well, i need to take the results back to Cameron and you need to rest. The guards will escort you back. "

______

A few hours later, Adam was meeting in secret with Maxwell and another friend of theirs, Adam's partner Nick. They had the idea of using the artifact trip coming up to sneak Max and Toby out of the dome. First, Adam had to secure a way for Nick to get Toby to the cargo bay. Then Nick had to successfully sneak Toby out and finally Max had to keep him hidden and convince his team to let it happen. Adam also had to teach Maxwell as much about pregnancy as he could so he could take care of the baby while they were gone. This was Plan A anyway.

"So I'll go in as a guard and Adam will make sure i go to Toby's room with him.  Of course, i won't be doing that."

"We'll have to take out the security systems without notice before hand so you can take Toby through the back entrance of the building. And we'll need two uniforms one for you and one for him. "

"I'll make sure to be on the artifact retrieval team. And get extra supplies for the trip. "

They were heading to a bunker Max found on the long journey back to Exum from his near death mission that his other crew members weren't ship fortunate to have made it back.  They readied themselves for both plans in the weeks time they had- hoping that Plan A didn't fall threw.