by
Donna and Abs
The
evening was getting late. Everyone was still having a good time, although some
of the men from the fort had passed out from excessive sampling of Methos' brew.
Katherine, as she promised, had behaved herself, staying off her feet for the
most part mainly because she was helping to provide the music. After she and
Connor had returned from their little private reunion, the Highlander had sat
down at the piano on the stage with her and had started to play along with the
other musicians, much to everyone’s surprise.
Gideon
had been having a lot of fun himself. All the girls seemed more than happy to
dance with him and when he wasn’t dancing, he was helping with the food. But
as the evening wore on, people were starting to notice that he looked very
tired.
When
the nurse mentioned that to him, and suggested that he call it a night, Gideon
grinned and agreed. "You are right, Miss Sarah Jo," he told her.
"I am getting very sleepy. But I would like to dance with you before I go
home to bed."
Doc
Adams and Duncan had taken up a lot of her time, of course, but Adams was
talking to Alex Taylor and Duncan was off dancing with Carol.
Giles had managed to get into Melissa's good graces by asking about her
health, and even though she only danced with him once, he was in heaven and far
beyond rational thought. Robert
Helm seemed disjointed and angry for some reason, so Doc and Alex decided to
avoid him.
Katherine
was playing a lovely, almost haunting melody on her flute with Connor and Daniel
softly accompanying her with the piano and fiddle. Sarah Jo, who had danced for
the first time herself earlier that night, positioned Gideon's hands right, and
together they started moving to the music. He grinned at her happily. It was
fun! He liked all the attention he was getting from the ladies. But suddenly he
stopped, a confused and almost frightened look on his face. "Miss Sarah Jo,
I feel funny," he said, backing away from her.
"Gideon?
What's wrong?" she asked, reaching for him. His eyes rolled back, and he
collapsed backwards to the ground.
Sarah
Jo was a nurse, but as she cradled Gideon’s head on her lap, she automatically
looked for a doctor. Doc Adams came
running forward. "He's
bleeding from the nose," he said. "Come,
someone help me get him back to the clinic!"
Volunteers
immediately gathered around, and the unconscious man was picked up and spirited
away to the clinic. Once on a bed with his head elevated to keep him from
choking on his own blood, they started to loosen his tie and shirt. About that
time his eyes fluttered open, but other than smiling weakly at them, he did not
respond to any questions that they asked him.
Although
he was not senior doctor, Giles was the older of the two more modern physicians,
and he took control. "Alex,
take a blood sample and run it through the microscope. Sarah Jo, please take his blood pressure."
She
did so immediately, reporting it to be 70 over 45. Way too low. "Do you
want an IV started?" she asked, concern on her sweet face for her friend.
"Yes,
please. Odd that it would be low,
with a nosebleed. You'd expect it
to be high." Sarah Jo nodded, and immediately went to work. She had a deft
and gentle hand, and managed to get the needle into a vein with the first try.
"Giles,"
Alex said from the microscope as the nurse started the IV drip.
"Come look at this." Giles
did, and he sat heavily in a chair.
"Dear
God," he said. There were
twice as many white blood cells as there should have been, and the red blood
cells that were there looked immature and even malformed.
"What?"
asked Adams and Helm, and both took a turn looking. They might not know modern procedure, but both could identify
leukemia when they saw it.
They
looked over at Gideon, who was lying quietly in the bed with a calm, accepting
look on his face. "My leukemia is back again, isn't it?" he stated in
a matter of fact tone.
"You
knew about this?" asked Robert Helm.
"I
know." He smiled, closing his eyes for a moment. He was tired. So terribly
tired. "It was my secret. I did not want anyone to worry about me. Will I
be going soon?" Gideon had already accepted the fact that he was going to
die from the disease.
"Not
if I can help it," muttered Giles.
"Come
on," hissed Helm, "everyone knows it's fatal!"
"Not
with a bone marrow transplant," Alex noted.
"And
we have plenty of donors," finished Giles. "At least, theoretically, it should work."
Adams
and Helm did not know what the others were talking about.
"Could we even do the procedure?
We don't have any modern equipment," moaned Alex.
But
Giles was still deep in thought. Finally
he said, "Let the patient rest for tonight.
We'll work on this in the morning."
They made Gideon as comfortable as possible, and Sarah Jo said she would stay by his side all night. Adams immediately volunteered to stand watch with her, and as the other doctors slipped out, the two of them began their long vigil as Gideon slipped into an exhausted sleep.