"She was here this morning, but she got temporarily spooked by the gun and the craziness. She'll be back, though."
"When?"
"I took care of it, trust me," Van de Vliet declared. "In the meantime, I'll try to maintain Kristen's mother under sedation as long as possible. But we can't keep her out of touch forever. That would be flirting with kidnapping."
"I'll send Ken over to West Eleventh Street to check out her place," Bartlett said. "If she's there, he'll get her."
And he signed off, the image on the computer going dark.
Van de Vliet felt a wave of apprehension. Every day it got worse. Would any of the other patients develop the Syndrome? Or was its development unique to the Beta?
Kristen had agreed of her own free will to undergo the Beta, and she'd been warned that any experimental procedure involved significant risk. She'd signed release documents absolving Gerex of any liability. But when treatments go awry, patients tend not to recall the releases they signed. Undoubtedly, she'd now conveniently forgotten that fact. Assuming she still remembered anything.
Time to go back to the OR and see how Katherine was doing. If she seemed completely stabilized and coherent, she could be moved down to the intensive‑care area in the floor below, the subbasement. That way absolutely nobody could get to her. He clicked off the computer and walked back to the OR.
"Karl, she's awake," David said as he walked in. He'd been monitoring her. "It's probably okay to move her."
Thank God, Van de Vliet thought. Maybe there's some way to reason with her rationally. He moved over and looked down. Her hair was soaked with sweat and she looked very, very tired.