Richard Mabry: Lethal Remedy

Rip crouched protectively over Sara. "Don't move. Let me have a look." She lay a few feet from the doorway of her office, huddled in the fetal position, sobbing quietly. Rip looked at her legs. A scorch mark ringed the hem of the right leg of her slacks. The bottom of her right shoe was burned, and a violet coloration marred the black finish. Rip eased the shoe off. The skin on the bottom of Sara's right foot was red, but there was no blood and no soft tissue damage.

There'd been plenty of noise, but apparently the damage had been minimal. "Can you sit up?" he asked. Sara complied, scooting back further from the doorway in the process. "What… what happened?"

"You put your foot down and there was an explosion- a very limited one, but with plenty of flash and bang to it." Lillian leaned over Sara and spoke in a soft voice. "I don't know what it could have been." "I'm pretty sure I do," John said. He knelt at the edge of the doorway and sniffed. "Smell that? Smell like iodine to you?" At first no one seemed anxious to get close to the danger area, but eventually they crept forward and smelled the air there. There was a general murmur of assent. "Maybe it's my misspent youth, filing away trivia about things that go 'boom,'" John said. "Perhaps it comes from working my way through pre-med as a clerk in the chemistry department stockroom." He pointed at a tiny area where dark brown crystals dotted the metal threshold that marked the junction of carpet in the outer and inner offices. "That's nitrogen triiodide." "I remember that," Rip said. "My high school chemistry teacher did a demonstration with it.

Man, that produced a bigger bang than anything I'd seen, even bigger than when we dropped a sliver of sodium metal into a bucket of water.

But how did someone make this? And why put it here?" "Nitrogen triiodide is the easiest thing in the world to make, if you don't care whether you lose a few fingers in the process," John said. "Mix a couple of common household chemicals, filter out the precipitate that forms, and as long as it's wet it's supposed to be stable. But when it dries, the slightest touch, sometimes even a drop of water landing on it or a strong breeze, can set it off. I've heard of snowflakes detonating nitrogen triiodide. Depending on the amount involved, you can do quite a bit of damage with it." "Should we call the police?"

Lillian asked. "We can if you want to have the building evacuated while bomb-sniffing dogs go through it and the bomb squad detonates the rest of this stuff," John said. "If you just want to make the area safe, I suggest you call someone you trust in the biochem department.

I seem to recall that you can deactivate this stuffwith chemicals like sodium hydroxide or sodium thiosulfate." By this time, Sara had risen from the floor and stood next to Rip, leaning on him to take weight offher right foot. "Let's get this cleaned up and move ahead with our plans. I'm not going to let a ruined pair of shoes stop me. We're too close." Lillian looked at her watch. "I'm due back in clinic, and Sara, you are, too. We need to take care of that first." Rip had his cell phone out already. "I've got a friend in biochem that I think will handle this for us. I'll call him." "And I'll stay here to keep you company," John said. "Meet back here at five?" Sara said. "And Lillian, walk back with me, would you? I've got to come up with a story to explain this burned right shoe."

By five o'clock, an instructor in the biochemistry department assured the group clustered around the secretary's desk that they could safely enter Sara's office. "I neutralized the nitrogen triiodide, then disposed of it. You're good to go." He fixed Rip with a serious gaze. "Don't you think this should be reported to the police?" "We're trying to keep it quiet." "Well, I'll tell you. I've done some work with nitrogen triiodide, and this guy meant business.

If your lady friend had stepped a little more to one side or the other, she'd be walking on crutches for a while. This was no prank."

"I know." Rip didn't want this conversation to go on much longer. He moved toward the door and was grateful when the visitor followed.

"Thanks again, Fred." "No problem. Makes a change from grading freshmen medical students' mid-terms." "And you'll keep this under your hat?" "Sure thing. Dinner at Ruth's Chris Steak House will get you all the silence you want. I'll call you to set it up." Fred touched his finger to his forehead in a mock salute and sauntered away. The group shuffled into the office, eyes down, watching for telltale brown specks on the carpet. Finding none, they settled into chairs. Sara took the chair behind her desk. She leaned back and closed her eyes. Rip broke the silence. "Who could have done this? And when?" "When my secretary got back, I asked her about that," Sara said. "She said she got a call to go to Shipping and Receiving to sign for a package. When she arrived, there was no package, but because that's two blocks away from this building, the trip took her out of the office for almost forty-five minutes." "And anyone could have had access during that time," Rip said. "Let's try to refocus on the problem at hand," Sara said. "John, are you still feeling okay?" "Now that my pulse is back to normal, I'm doing fine. I tolerated the OMAL with no problem. Of course, we don't know if I was in line to get a late complication anyway, and if I were, it would occur several weeks down the line, so this doesn't prove anything except that patients who've had their immune system modulated by Jandramycin can tolerate a dose of that drug." "That's good enough for me," Sara said. "I told Mrs. Ferguson I'd give Chelsea her dose tomorrow, but I don't want to wait. I'm going over to her room and administer the OMAL now. I don't have anything else to do, so I'll stay with her tonight until I'm sure she's going to be okay. Then we just watch and wait, and pray for improvement." "I'll stay with you," Rip said. "Are you sure?" "I don't have anything on the docket. Nobody is waiting for me at home either."

Lillian looked at John. "Actually, that goes for us, too. Want us to keep watch with you?" Sara shook her head. "No, I don't think so. We can stay in touch by cell phone. You two go ahead home." After John and Lillian departed, Rip said, "Okay, truth time. How are you feeling after all that?" "Actually, other than a little soreness of my foot and being royally ticked at the damage to my favorite pair of shoes, I'm doing pretty well." "Are you sure you don't want to go home and get some rest? Another day probably won't make that much difference in Chelsea's status." Sara was on her feet before Rip finished speaking.

"On the contrary, I don't think I can rest until I've given her the injection. But you don't have to hang around." There's nothing I'd rather do than hang around. "Call it professional curiosity if you want to, but I'd like to see this thing through with you." Rip pushed back his chair and stood. "Let's get going."

An alarm bell intruded into Sara's consciousness, and she was on her feet before she realized where she was. A quick glance brought it all back. She was in a corner of Chelsea Ferguson's hospital room. Rip dozed in another chair next to her. Chelsea was in her hospital bed.

Her mother stood watch at her side. The bell stopped as quickly as it began. Rip roused long enough to say, "Somebody accidentally unplugged something. Nothing to worry about." He yawned and stretched. "How long has it been?" Sara needed no explanation. He meant, "How long has it been since we gave Chelsea the dose of OMAL?" She did a rapid calculation in her head. "Ninety-seven minutes." They shared a glance and a silent message passed between them. Most reactions to this drug occurred within the first ninety minutes, all within two hours. They were almost home free. "Let's wait another half hour or so to be sure," Sara said. Mrs. Ferguson tiptoed over to where Sara stood and whispered, "Can we talk outside?" Sara moved toward the door. Mrs.