Tracing A Drop Of Blood Through The Heart Novels & Stories

My mind focuses on removing the silver from her blood stream. Trusting this process is truly happening, I look to her heart. There is a tear at the edge which caused her to lose so much blood so quickly. I mend that with the heat from my hands and look around for any other damage. I cannot see anything and am trusting myself intuitively to have taken care of anything that was causing her to lose her life.

Frank said with a hint of sterness. Winter quickly scrambled to her feet, standing near him as she explained, "I'm done with every other part, but her heart… I'm just afraid…" Frank could see what she meant right away—a tiny bone fragment was cutting into the patient's left ventricle, and blood was trickling out around it. The bleeding only increased as the patient's heart continued pumping, and the only option was to extract the bone fragment. However, that was no easy task. Extracting an object from a puncture wound in the heart could easily destabilize the patient's blood pressure. When that happened, blood would shoot out like a geyser from the wound, and there was no stopping it.

Ribs spread under metal hands, opening like the pages of a book that had stayed closed too long. There it was. His heart. It thudded between his lungs, encased in pericardium she quickly nicked and peeled back. Muscle flexed, contracting and releasing with stubborn, imperfect rhythm. The lesion she’d seen on the scan had a physical counterpart now—slightly thickened fibers along one part of the conduction system, pale and wrong. She slipped her fingers in, gloved fingertips cradling tissue that could end a dynasty if she let it stop. “Mapping catheter,” she said.

My breathing became uneven. "Please..." I whispered desperately. "Not again..." A strange warmth spread down my leg, making my heart stop. Slowly, with trembling hands… I lowered my gaze. A crimson drop landed on the polished marble beneath me. Then another.

My heart slammed against my ribcage as I moved closer, each step heavier than the last. It was blood. My knees nearly gave out as I stared at the crimson streak. It wasn’t a small drop—it was a trail. My breathing became shallow, my chest tightening with fear. “God, no,” I whispered, tears springing to my eyes. I wanted to scream, to run, to do something—but I was frozen. Every horrible possibility raced through my mind as I stood there, staring at the blood on the floor. Something terrible had happened to them.

I stopped in my tracks, and stared at the covered stage, hoping to see a person on it. The curtains still covered the entirety of the elevated platform, but I could hear silent footsteps behind it. Then, a gentle strum of an electric guitar echoed in the hall. “What…?” I quietly gasped. That was so clean! I could feel goosebumps from every part of my body, and I stood stone in my position, overwhelmed. A gentle chord after chord followed in pursuit, and as I listened closely, it felt like I could discern the emotions behind the played music. Grief, loneliness… anger.

Glancing down the hall, I walk over to it and crouch down, touching it. Blood. My stomach twists as I look at the sticky red liquid on my fingertips. Scanning the floor, I see more red splashes leading down the hall… Standing up, I follow it. I hear a muffled growl and tense but it's not close by; it is coming from somewhere ahead. My stomach is churning, the feeling that I might get caught at any moment clawing at me, but it’s not enough to make me turn away. I follow the blood, but it soon stops. However, a few faint cries are enough to lead me in the right direction.

I tell her Done! Now hurry! She informs me. The needle slips into my skin and I tap a vein watching the luminescent blood fill the gauge. I don't know the precise measurement I will need so I decide to fill the needle all the way. I yank the needle from my arm and feel the small wound heal immediately. As his aura only shows that slight pink color I jab the needle into his heart and push the plunger down with heavy breath. I remove the needle from his chest and toss it across the room.

I poured every ounce of my will, every thread of my awakened Alpha strength into the grip we shared, trying to anchor him to the living world. "The heart is struggling," the second healer warned, his eyes fixed on the electronic monitor beside the bed. "The arrhythmia is worsening. The silver residue is too close to the main valve." "Give me the neutralizer," Sarah demanded, her hands steady as she reached for a glass syringe filled with clear fluid. "We have to flush the pericardium now." Before she could press the needle into the tissue, the steady, rhythmic beeping of the monitor changed.

For one brief second, I thought of Evelyn asking me what I would do with everything I knew. Then I put the thought away. “Time out.” The room went quiet. We confirmed the patient's identity, the procedure, the injury, the blood availability and the emergency consent. Everyone answered. Everyone knew what they were doing. Then we started. The damage was worse than the scans had suggested. Blood had collected around the heart, putting pressure where there was no room for it. Once we began evacuating it, the source became clearer. “There.” The tear in the vessel was already bleeding heavily.