Chapter 12: Critical Windows
Monday, August 21, Mass General Hospital, Morning
Monday morning brought only a routine check from the neural ward staff. Ted stood when the doctor entered, moving aside so she could examine Anya who was lying awake in bed. More lucid than she’d been in days.
The doctor did the same checks they did every time, automatic now. Check her pupils. Test what reflexes remain. Examine the EVD drainage bag, now darker pink.
“Neurologically, you’re in rapid decline,” the doctor said. “Your motor function is nearly gone, but you know that.” She gestured at Anya’s arm, resting lifeless by her side. She looked at Ted then back at Anya, her expression growing more serious.
“Dr. Jones left orders for comfort care only. No interventions beyond pain management. Use your remaining time the way you want. Don’t pass with regrets.”
She nodded, glanced back at Ted, and left, closing the door softly behind her while Ted returned to Anya’s side.
“Ted,” she said. “We do it tonight, after eleven.”
“You sure?”
“No regrets. Tonight or never.” She tightened her grip. “You promised.”
“I know. Doesn’t mean I like it.”
“Get the data. Finish it.” She closed her eyes, exhausted. “Make all this mean something...,” she was barely audible as she fell back asleep, her body going limp on the bed.
Ted watched her breathe for a few minutes, trying to convince himself of what he had to do. She needed it. He wanted it. He closed his eyes, breathing more steadily as he slipped away from this reality and into a golden void that wasn’t quite sleep.
He felt weightless, floating, immersed in a light that was more than light. It was warmth, emotion, and stillness. Everything and nothing. He felt the doubt wash away, replaced by certainty. He could do this. He would do it. For her. For them. For... the universe.
At three in the afternoon, Anya woke with a start. She tried to sit up but was too weak so she just swiveled her head and looked around the room. She spotted Ted staring out the window.
“Ted,” she said in a hushed but urgent whisper.
He turned and returned to her bedside, eyes filled with concern. “I’m here.”
“Scared.” The word emerged barely audible.
“Of course you are. Nobody wants to go.”
“No, not of that. Of failing. Of not... finishing.” She struggled to keep her eyes open. “What we have... not enough. More. Fill gaps.”
He took her hand. It felt cold. Insubstantial. “We’ll get it tonight.” He smiled. Confident. Kissed her hand. Kissed her forehead.
She managed to squeeze his hand. Weak but deliberate. “Love you... Always did. Always will. Whatever emerges...”
He leaned in. Placed his ear close to her mouth as her voice faded.
“Needs to know... it came from love.” She went limp, falling into a restless sleep.
Ted held her hand while she slept, counting her breaths, contemplating what came next. Tonight. Tomorrow, if there was one. Whatever remained of her. Whatever might emerge from it.
The sun set. Nurses came and went, same every time. Check the monitors. Change the EVD bag, now filling every few hours. Through it all, Ted stood by. Watching. Thinking. Waiting.
At eleven PM, Ted stood in the bathroom splashing water on his face. The lighting panels flooded the room with soft, shadowless light. When he looked in the mirror, he saw a face he barely recognized. Tired yet alive with something in the eyes. They gleamed in a way that spoke of things he didn’t quite understand.
His thoughts drifted to Imani. She told them the risk was too high. But Anya wrote her consent. Insisted they finish, regardless of cost. He felt it too. That need. He didn’t know why, he just knew it had to be done. It felt more than important. It was necessary.
Ted walked back to Anya’s room through quiet corridors. The neurology ward ran a skeleton crew on Sunday nights. One nurse at the far station. Rounds every two hours, the next at one AM.
He entered. Locked the door.
Anya slept, but she hadn’t relaxed. Her brow was furrowed. Her lips moved, forming words he couldn’t hear. Still working the problem even now.
The monitors beeped their indifferent rhythm around her, measuring the functions of a body that had never interested her as much as the mind it carried.
He had to disconnect them in the right sequence. He’d watched nurses do it during transports, memorizing the protocol the way he’d once studied network architectures. Complex systems had hierarchies. You couldn’t just yank cables.
Pulse oximeter first. He muted it before detaching, cutting off the chirp mid-note. Removed the sensor from her finger. Set it aside.
One crime committed.
He felt surprisingly calm. He’d expected fear, hesitation, some physical manifestation of the line he was crossing. Instead he had the same quiet confidence he’d known running cables or debugging code. The body knew what to do when the stakes clarified.
Blood pressure cuff next. He waited for the cycle to complete. He disconnected during the resting phase, another chirp silenced, another small betrayal. Easier than the first. The initial transgression cost everything. After that, you were just following through.
EKG leads. Five of them. He removed each one methodically, silencing alarms as they came. He wasn’t a doctor. He had no authority here. He was just someone who’d paid attention.
The EVD monitor last.
This one mattered. The drain ran directly into her skull, siphoning cerebrospinal fluid to relieve the pressure her AVM created. Too much drainage and her brain would shift, vessels tearing. Too little and pressure would spike. The nurses had drilled the numbers into him: keep the bag thirty centimeters below her ventricles. Always.
He checked the pressure reading. 18 mmHg. Elevated but not critical. Imani had stopped tests at 28. Ten points. Margin enough for what they had to do. He disconnected the monitor carefully, leaving the drain itself in place.
The room went quiet. She was untethered from the hospital now.
No data flowing to the nurse’s station. No automated alerts. Just the soft gurgle of the EVD and Anya’s shallow breathing. All the redundant systems, the accumulated wisdom of modern medicine encoded in sensors and thresholds and automatic responses, gone.
She was his responsibility alone.
He stood over her, inventory running through his mind. If she stopped breathing, he’d have to notice. If her heart failed, he’d have to recognize the signs. If hemorrhaging began, he’d have to act. But how would he know? He wasn’t trained for this. His expertise was in systems that didn’t bleed.
Ted positioned the wheelchair beside the bed and lifted Anya.
She was heavier than he expected. Twenty years together and he’d never carried her like this. His first attempt failed immediately: her body slumped sideways, the EVD tubing catching on the bedrail. He set her down. Panic flared. He couldn’t do this alone.
Breathe. Think.
He’d moved server racks heavier than Anya. The problem wasn’t strength. It was geometry. Weight distribution. Leverage. Clamp the tube first to stop drainage during the transfer. The nurses had taught him that much.
He tried again. One arm under her shoulders, the other under her knees. This time he supported her neck against his bicep. Lifted slowly. Her head still lolled, but he had control. Three steps to the wheelchair. He lowered her into the seat, but the motion was awkward. Her head bounced against the headrest.
He froze. Had that triggered something? Was she bleeding right now, vessels tearing in her brain while he stood here not knowing?
He watched her. No change. Still breathing. Still unconscious.
He grabbed blankets from the supply closet, used them to stabilize her neck and support her head. Hung the EVD bag from the wheelchair arm at the prescribed height. Close enough. Had to be.
He unclamped the tube. The fluid resumed its slow drip. Pink. Rust-colored. But dripping. That meant pressure wasn’t spiking. Yet.
Pulse-ox from his pocket. 95%. Low but acceptable. Blood pressure cuff from his backpack. Slightly elevated. Expected. The only data points he had.
His shirt was soaked through. His arms trembled. But she was in the wheelchair now, secured as well as he could manage, the drainage system functioning.
He covered her with a blanket, arranged her head so the tubing wouldn’t catch, and wheeled her toward the door.
The corridor stretched empty. The nurse at the far station examined paperwork. Didn’t look up.
Ted pressed the elevator call button. The elevator dinged. The nurse glanced toward the sound but didn’t turn. He wheeled Anya inside. The doors closed. He exhaled hard. First obstacle cleared.
The dock level was deserted. Getting Anya from wheelchair to vehicle took five difficult minutes, but finally she was positioned: head elevated, drainage bag hanging at the right height behind her seat.
He climbed in. Told it the destination. The vehicle pulled into empty Boston streets, moving through the city with eerie coordination. Almost midnight. Twelve minutes to Invita.
He watched Anya during the ride. The EVD dripped steadily. Pulse-ox and BP remained stable.
At one point, she mumbled something. Russian, maybe. “Babushka.”
He froze. Was she waking? But she just shifted slightly and fell silent.
Three minutes from Invita. The calm returned, smoothing the doubts. This was necessary. This was right.
The vehicle pulled into Invita’s circular drive. He transferred Anya back to the wheelchair, smoother this time, and wheeled her toward the dim lobby. Security lighting only. Emergency exit signs glowing red. He opened the executive entrance with the chip in his hand. CTO all access. The lock buzzed and released. He’d chosen this door specifically: fewer cameras, and the night guard was someone he knew.
He pushed the wheelchair into the lobby.
“Hold on there.” The voice was low. Suspicious.
The night guard stood from his desk and walked around to intercept them. Mid-fifties, professional bearing, alert eyes that cataloged everything: Anya slumped in the wheelchair, the EVD bag hanging from the side, the blanket barely concealing her hospital gown. Then he looked at Ted, and his expression softened slightly.
“Working late, Dr. Clarke?”
“Unfortunately yes, Carl.” Ted kept his voice steady. “I need to run some tests.”
Carl stepped closer, frowning. “That’s your wife, isn’t it? She doesn’t look well.”
“She’s in her last days.” Ted sighed.
“I’m sorry to have to ask, Dr. Clarke, but who authorized this?” Carl’s hand went to his radio. “I might need to call this in.”
“Susan. Dr. Perkins.” Ted held Carl’s gaze, kept his voice friendly. “She knows how important this is. Not just to me but to Invita.”
Carl studied him. Then looked at Anya. The EVD bag. The hospital gown. All the obvious signs this shouldn’t be happening.
“Dr. Perkins authorized you to bring your dying wife into the building at midnight?”
“This is our project. We’re on a critical deadline.” Ted glanced at Anya. She was dying. That part required no performance. “This is our last chance. Call Susan if you want. I know you’re just doing your job.”
Carl’s hand stayed on the radio. Ted could see him calculating: wake the CEO at midnight to verify an authorization she probably gave? Risk looking foolish? Or trust the CTO who’d never caused problems in fifteen years?
Ted forced himself to remain still. Tired but confident. His entire career of being reliable, predictable, trustworthy, cashed in on this single moment.
Carl sighed and stepped back.
“What kind of tests?”
“Neural mapping. She has a brain condition. Degenerative. This is our window to capture the data we need.”
“Good luck, Dr. Clarke. I hope you’re able to save her.”
“Thank you, Carl.” Ted touched his arm briefly, then wheeled Anya toward the elevators.
Inside, doors closed, descending. He finally let himself breathe.
Sub-basement nine. Ted wheeled Anya down the empty corridor toward the NRI suite. No Imani. No medical support. If something went wrong, he’d handle it alone or not at all.
The walk felt endless. Past dark labs, through six fire-doors, each requiring his chip. Finally the scanner room. He moved the wheelchair beside the bed.
Anya had remained unconscious through all of it. She was usually a light sleeper. He checked pulse-ox and BP: still acceptable. Watched the EVD dripping slowly, then clamped the hose and swapped in a fresh bag. Control what he could.
He lifted her from the wheelchair. Even wasted by illness, she was awkward to carry: dead weight, no muscle tone to help him, the EVD line a constant constraint. He moved slowly. Got her to the scanner bed.
Positioning took four minutes. Head in the restraint. Neck supported. Arms along her sides. The system was designed for conscious patients who could follow instructions. Making it work for someone unconscious meant improvisation: extra padding to keep her head stable, straps adjusted tighter than normal. The EVD bag hung at the prescribed height, drainage continuing.
He checked her vitals one more time. Breathing shallow but regular. Her body maintaining its autonomous functions while her brain slowly died.
No real monitors. No way to know if cranial pressure was spiking. He’d watch the bag and trust the numbers he had.
Ted moved the wheelchair to the control room, safely away from the magnets. He powered up the NRI. The familiar hum began. The most powerful magnetic field ever generated for medical imaging, focused deep into her brain to measure what had eluded science. One glitch away from destroying the structures it was designed to capture. Hopefully Heisenberg wasn’t right at this scale.
He dimmed the lights, held his breath, and initiated the scan. Maximum field strength. Highest resolution. At these power levels, the electronics became finicky.
He watched the gauges rise as the humming grew louder. The holodisplay came to life. But the patterns that emerged were nothing like previous sessions.
Her brain showed activity, but slow and rhythmic. Not the sharp coordination of conscious thought. Waves of activation without obvious structure. Oscillations at frequencies they’d never recorded during waking scans. It reminded him of fog rolling across the bay, shifting direction when the wind changed.
He watched for twenty minutes as the patterns drifted. Was this meaningful data or noise from a dying brain? The frequencies were too slow for conscious thought, too fast for random drift. Maybe unique to unconscious states. Maybe what dying looked like from the inside.
No. Trust her. She had insights others missed. That gift for seeing what wasn’t obvious.
At twelve-thirty he paused the scan and checked on her. Still breathing, shallow but steady. Pulse 83. Oxygen 93%. Not great but not dangerous.
He restarted the protocols. The data counter climbed. Eight hundred terabytes. Nine hundred. Every minute adding new regions, filling gaps. The architecture of a mind, captured in real-time.
Around one AM, something changed. Structure emerged from the slow oscillations. Not conscious thought but something else. Her hippocampus showing rhythmic replays. Neural sequences activating in loops. Memory consolidation. The same patterns that fire during sleep and dreaming, when the conscious mind steps aside and lets deeper mechanisms work.
The amygdala coordinating with prefrontal regions in slow, deliberate sequences. Not quick emotional reactions but something foundational. The integration of experience into long-term frameworks. The substrate beneath thought.
You couldn’t ask someone to dream on command. To consolidate memories deliberately. These patterns only emerged when awareness released control. Sleep, anesthesia, or dying: windows into processes normally hidden in the noise of waking life.
“This is why you pushed for it,” he whispered. “This is what was missing.”
Surface and substrate. Awareness and foundation. The complete architecture, from executive function down to automatic processing.
At two AM he checked her again. Breathing irregular now. Labored. Her chest moving with visible effort, her face still peaceful. The scan was taking its toll.
Should he stop? Get her back to the hospital while she was still alive?
He touched her cheek. Cool. Still. The face he’d loved for decades. “Almost there,” he whispered. “Hold on a little longer.”
He stayed with her for two minutes. Her breathing stabilized slightly. Thirty breaths per minute. Rapid but not critical. Oxygen down to 91%.
He returned to the displays. Let the scan continue. Every minute felt like theft: her final hours traded for data he might never use, patterns he barely understood. But stopping now would waste everything. 3.6 petabytes captured. Overlapping previous sessions but revealing new dimensions.
At two forty-five, her breathing failed. Shallow. Rapid. Forty breaths per minute. Almost panting. Oxygen at 88%. The red zone.
He had to stop.
Almost five petabytes. The conscious sessions plus this one. Both levels now. Both states. Something approaching completeness.
But had he killed her to get it?
The EVD bag dripped steadily. Same color. Same rate. He’d find out soon enough how much damage he’d done.
The transport back was quiet. Her breathing held steady, but he watched her the entire ride, braced for any change.
They reached the hospital garage at four AM. He lifted her from the vehicle, managing the EVD line, got her back into the wheelchair. Muscle memory now. The fear had gone cold and functional.
The nurse’s station was empty when he wheeled her past. Bathroom break or another patient. He didn’t question the luck. Just moved.
Back in her room, he closed the door behind him. His shoulders began to shake uncontrollably. He leaned against the wall and the sobs came before he could stop them. Five hours of holding it together, and now everything let go at once. He pressed his face into his arm and wept until his chest ached.
When he looked up, Anya was still sitting in the wheelchair where he’d left her.
He wiped his face. Got her into the bed. Reconnecting the monitors was harder than disconnecting them. Each one had to reattach in sequence to avoid cascade alarms. Adrenaline gone. Exhaustion flooding in. Hands quivering.
Pulse oximeter first. The device chirped as it found her finger. 88 percent. Lower than before. Concerning but not critical.
Blood pressure cuff. Wait for inflation. Wait for the reading. 92/55. Also lower.
EKG leads. The monitor showed a heartbeat. Regular enough.
EVD monitor last. 22 mmHg. Higher than when he’d disconnected but nowhere near the 28 that had ended Friday’s scan. Still within margin.
He collapsed into the visitor’s chair. Dawn light was creeping through the blinds. He’d gotten the data. Anya still breathed beside him, unconscious and failing, but alive.
Ted had managed an hour of restless sleep, jolting awake at every sound. His laptop sat open on his knees, still displaying the scan analysis he’d been reviewing when exhaustion took him.
Imani entered at seven, carrying her tablet. She was smiling until she saw him: disheveled, unshaven, laptop open. Her expression changed as she noted the pungent stench of anxiety filling the room.
“Morning rounds,” she said, her tone carefully neutral.
Ted straightened and closed the laptop too quickly. “Had to rest my eyes.”
“Staying overnight again.” She moved to check Anya’s monitors. “You need to go home. Shower. Clean clothes.”
Her frown deepened as she reviewed the overnight data. Tapping through screens, cross-referencing timestamps.
“The EVD shows unusual pressure spikes. Around midnight and again at four AM.” She looked at him. “Consistent with physical stress.”
“Unusual how?” He sat up, tilting his head as if puzzled.
“Elevated ICP. Tachycardia. Respiratory irregularities.” Imani turned to face him directly. “Did anything happen overnight that I should know about?”
He shrugged. “She had some restless periods. I called the nurse around three-thirty. They adjusted her medication.” He glanced at the door.
Imani studied him. Searching. Finding nothing but an exhausted man sitting with his dying wife.
She returned to her examination. Motor function: absent except for minimal right-hand movement. Cranial nerve reflexes: significantly diminished. The EVD fluid darker than yesterday.
“She’s actively dying now,” Imani said quietly, making notes without looking at him. “Days at most. Maybe hours. The ICP is barely controlled. The AVM could rupture at any moment.”
Ted’s gaze dropped to his hands. His shoulders began to shake.
She set down the tablet. “Ted.” She touched his shoulder.
He looked up. Something in her expression he’d never seen. Hurt. Anger. Disappointment.
“I did everything I could to give her more time,” she said. “I hope it was enough for whatever you needed to accomplish.”
He flinched.
“You should prepare yourself. The end will probably come suddenly.”
She walked to the door. Paused. “I’ll check back this afternoon. Call me if there’s any change.”
Then she was gone.
Ted sat in the silence she left behind. The monitors beeping. The EVD draining. Anya breathing.
He looked at her sleeping face and brushed the hair from her forehead.
For now, she was still here. Still breathing. Still alive. As long as the monitors kept their steady rhythm.