Chapter 9 - The Code Blue
Elias reached the ruined foyer just as his radio buzzed frantically.
"Dr. Thorne!" Marta cried out, her voice hysterical. "It’s Sam! He’s crashing! His lips are blue and he’s not breathing! I can't feel a pulse!"
Elias stopped dead in his tracks. The baby was in cardiac arrest. The extreme hypothermia had finally overwhelmed his tiny heart.
"Marta, listen to me," Elias commanded, his surgical training overriding his adrenaline. "Place two fingers in the center of his chest, right below the nipple line. Press down one and a half inches. Rate of one hundred beats per minute. Do it now!"
"I don't know if I'm doing it right!" she sobbed.
Elias was torn. Julian was right outside, regrouping for a final assault. But a child was dying in his basement. The choice was made in a microsecond. He abandoned the front door and sprinted down the hallway toward the hidden access panel to the wine cellar.
He punched in the code, and the heavy door hissed open. He flew down the concrete stairs, bursting into the freezing cellar. Marta was weeping, doing clumsy compressions on the tiny infant lying on a wooden wine cask.
Elias shoved his shotgun aside and took over. His massive, skilled hands were incredibly gentle yet perfectly precise as he began two-finger compressions.
"Come on, Sam," Elias gritted his teeth, sweat mingling with the freezing water dripping from his hair. "Don't you dare give up. Your mother died to get you here. You are going to live!"
He grabbed a pediatric ambu-bag from his trauma kit, placing the mask over the baby’s face, squeezing the bag to force oxygen into the frozen lungs.
May you like
Thirty compressions. Two breaths. Thirty compressions. Two breaths.
For two agonizing minutes, the basement was entirely silent except for the frantic counting of a surgeon refusing to let death win. And then, a miracle. Sam’s tiny chest lurched. He let out a weak, raspy, beautiful cry.
