Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ Cat's Paw ❯ Chapter One: the Fashionable Intern ( Chapter 1 )

Cat's Paw 01

"Hello? Anyone alive in there?"

I fight to open my eyes, my body struggling against my efforts every step of the way. Who knew how complicated it was to convince your eyelids to move? I wage battle for a few seconds, then finally succeed in my endeavor. I blink my eyes open and peer blearily through my lashes. I am rewarded by the sight of a young, blonde intern, his face mostly concealed by one of those stupid surgical masks. He is holding a bag of murky-looking fluid in his gloved hands and is wearing about three of those gauzy surgical gowns. He looks like Dr. Frankenstein. I vaguely wonder if he's going to start cackling and screaming, "it's alive!"

"Oh, good. You're awake. That'll make things a bit easier, now won't it?" he mildly states, crossing the room to my bedside. His feet whisper unnaturally across the linoleum floor. I know if I could look over the side of my bed, I would see that he is wearing some of those ridiculous cloth booties over his shoes. One of the advantages of living in a "protective isolation room" is that you get to see the height of medical style first hand. I should start my own magazine. Call it "the Fashionable Intern."

As I try to convince my body that it is in fact awake and my mind isn't just going for a joy ride, the intern gently changes the bag on my IV stand. He keeps up a steady stream of chatter while he works, his voice gentle and reassuring. Today he's updating me on his conquest of the stray cat population near his house.

"... finally got the hint. I've been leaving it food for months and he only just now realized that he could trust me. Isn't it funny how long it can take to earn an animal's trust? I've met paranoid schizophrenics who are more trusting than that cat is!" He chuckles. "I'm trying to think of a name for him, now that we've bonded. Any suggestions?"

My brain isn't tracking too well and, when I try to speak, my mouth is too dry to allow for speech. The intern notices my dilemma and takes a glass off my nightstand, holding the straw to my lips. I gratefully sip at the tepid water, hoping my stomach won't rebel too strongly against the intrusion. Thankfully, I manage to contain my upchuck reflex, although the intern holds my puke pan ready. The blonde -Quatre, my mind supplies very belatedly- nods approvingly. I think he's just glad I didn't vomit on his khaki Dockers.

Nice pants. Thanks, I barfed on them myself! Hmmm. That could be my magazine's first cover. Quatre in vomit-riddled pants. "Do It Yourself Fashion Tips," the headline would read. Now all I need is some financial backing...

"Well, you must be getting pretty excited!" Quatre chirps. "Your GVHD is almost cleared up! I guess those Corticosteroids did the trick. Why, soon you'll be able to move to a regular room. Just think. This time next week, you could have a roommate!"

I dredge up a grin for the enthusiastic blonde. "Pity... them," I rasp weakly.

Quatre laughs. "Now there's the Duo I remember! Ready to wreak havoc at a moment's notice!"

"Someone has to... liven things up," I manage. My eyes are doing their best to fall shut. I am too tired to even feel pain, although through the haze of drugs I can tell my body is far from comfortable. At this moment in time, I simply don't have the energy to take note.

"No, no. Not yet, you don't." Quatre gently pats my cheek, prompting me to open my eyes again. "Let me check your catheter first. Hold still." He carefully draws the covers down to my waist, exposing me to the chill air. I shiver slightly as he gently undoes the buttons on my flannel top. One of the other advantages of long-term hospital stay was that they let you wear real pajamas, even if they did have to be chopped apart to ensure they didn't get entangled with the various tubes. Mine were blue, black, and green plaid. They've been washed so many times, the fabric is becoming pilled and thin. I don't care, for the fabric is soft against my abused skin.

Maybe I could be in the magazine, too. Only my headline would read, "Functional and Flirty Flannels." There'd be a glossy photo layout featuring me in my frumpy PJs in various locations around the hospital, doped up on painkillers. Duo, looking pensive by the lobby fountain. Duo, lounging in the MRI machine. Duo, drooling in his sleep. Look out, Victoria's Secret!

Quatre makes sure the catheter isn't infected or jarred loose. It's been in place for close to two months now and I know it'll likely be three or four more before it comes out. I've started to think of it almost like a pet. My pet cat, maybe. I could call it Leech. Leech the blood-sucking catheter. Of course, he gave as good as he took, so that perhaps wasn't fair. Vomit Comet might be a better name. Or maybe Drippy. Drippy... the long lost eighth dwarf. Snow White, eat your heart out.

That's the other funny thing about the drugs. They really play havoc on your imagination.

~+~+~

I've been in the hospital for close to three months now. I'm a bit of a permanent fixture here at the Winner Medical Center. A few of the hospital's veteran employees have taken to calling me a bad penny. I just keep coming back. That isn't to imply that I am disliked or unwelcome by the staff. It is merely an inside joke and, if you know my background, is actually rather humorous in an odd sort of way.

My visits had first started about five years ago when I'd suddenly become ill with a fever and completely lost my appetite. I was listless, bruised at the slightest touch, and had awful pains in my joints. I was living in a Catholic orphanage at the time, the only home I'd known in my ten years of life. I'd been an orphan seemingly from birth and had never known my family. I'd been raised by nuns alongside fifty other orphans and when I'd first fallen sick, they'd attributed it to normal childhood illness. When I was still feeling badly a month later, however, they'd finally taken me to the WMC, where there was a free clinic. It was there that I was diagnosed with ALL, or Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia.

I'd spent the next two and a half years living in the hospital, undergoing radiation and then chemotherapy. Though normally leukemia patients are able to live at home for most of their treatment, the conditions in the orphanage prevented me from doing so. The hospital administrators, the Winner family, had agreed to let me stay at the hospital during the course of my therapy, serving as a make-shift hospice. So with the state footing the bill and the Winner family making special accommodations, I got the help I needed.

Though the nuns from the orphanage visited me faithfully, the hospital staff became more of a family to me than they could be. After all, they did still have the other children to look out for. They did their best, but gradually their visits ended. For the last year of my treatment, I had no visitors except the occasional charity group. It was a lonely time, but the hospital staff kept my hopes high. Finally, after the intense course of treatment was completed, my cancer went into remission. I was then able to return to the orphanage, fragile and frail, but alive.

Three nondescript years passed and then I had abruptly relapsed. A routine check-up revealed that leukemia cells had once more appeared in my bone marrow. I was admitted to the hospital that very day, the Winners once more paying for my treatment. This time they embarked on a much more intrusive course of therapy: bone marrow transplant.

The process isn't quick or simple. You're kept in virtual isolation for nearly the entire time, since you're so susceptible to illness. It's akin to having no immune system at all.

First they stick a catheter into a large vein in your chest. In the coming months, this will be used to draw and give blood, administer drugs, and feed you intravenously. It will also be used to transplant your new bone marrow. After a few days of testing, you begin to undergo intensive chemotherapy and whole body radiation. This destroys all the cancerous cells in your body as well as your healthy bone marrow. You're then pumped full of medications to manage and lessen the side effects of the high-dosage chemotherapy and radiation. You're put on antibiotics because you're susceptible to infections. You get blood transfusions and are fed through the catheter. You puke like its your job, are nauseous when you're not puking, lose all your hair, can't eat a damn thing, get the worst sore throat you can imagine, run a mild fever, and generally do nothing but sleep. Your skin gets itchy and red, your mouth dries up, everything tastes funny, and you get weird rashes. You get really dehydrated, but your body still retains water and your feet and hands swell up. Your whole body aches and throbs. It's absolutely miserable. This lasts for about two weeks.

The next step is the actual bone marrow transfusion. They transplant it through the catheter. The new marrow travels through your blood to your bones where it begins making new red and white blood cells and platelets. It takes about a month after the transplant for this to happen. Around this time, if you're lucky, you develop a wonderful little illness called Graft-verses-Host Disease or GVHD. This happens because your new bone marrow -which is essentially your new immune system- decides your body is an infection and fights it. You get some really kick-ass bacterial infections, lose a ton more weight, and your skin gets all hard and splotchy. Then they put you on a course of steroids and other lovely medications, all with new side-effects to enjoy.

While your immune system is sorting itself out, you usually get a few other gifts from God, such as pneumonia. You can also have some truly inspiring nosebleeds. Toss in a few random viral infections, and you suddenly need all your fingers and toes to count the number of medications you get on a daily basis.

About two or three months after the transplant, you get to leave the isolation chamber and go home. However, you remain an outpatient for the next year or so. At first you visit the hospital three or four times a week, then slowly taper down to once a month. It takes a full year for you to regain even a semblance of your former health and you have to continue taking a montage of medications. However, at the end of it all, you're alive.

Currently I am nearing the end of the isolation process. It's been about two months since I had my transplant. My body is slowly returning to a functional state. Though exhaustion is still my constant companion, now I can consistently remain awake for hours on end. This is a massive improvement over the past couple of months where ten minutes a day was all I could hope for.

As Quatre had noted, my GVHD has almost cleared up. I'm still plagued by pneumonia, but it's nowhere near as bad as it was. The nausea is starting to diminish and my hair is growing back. Although I'm skin and bones and resemble a concentration prisoner, the swelling is almost gone from my joints. The rashes are fading, the nosebleeds less common, and my mouth is finally starting to once more lubricate itself. Overall, I can see massive progress.

Of course, there's still a long way to go. But at least I know I'm going to wake up to see tomorrow.

-end chap one-

Zooie Notes

I already have about 60 pages worth of this fic written out. I'm going to post one part every other day, but if you really want to read the whole thing now, it'll be on my webpage. You can link to it through my profile. However, since I'm not yet done working on this, if you read the whole thing now be prepared to see revisions made. Possibly serious revisions. CHANGES WILL BE POSTED HERE FIRST.