Chapter 26 - The Emergency Injunction
"Wait! Where is my husband?!" I cried out as the orderlies propelled my bed out into the corridor at a dead sprint.
"He's en route from the garage!" the nurse shouted over the mechanical clatter of wheels racing over tile. "Get the neonatologist! Call the blood bank for two units of O-negative! We have three minutes to deliver before fetal hypoxia!"
The bright lights of the ceiling whipped past in a sickening blur. Every breath felt like inhaling crushed glass. The pain in my abdomen wasn't coming in waves anymore; it was a permanent, crushing vice squeezing the life out of my body.
*Fight,* I whispered to the babies inside me, pressing both flat palms against my stretched, trembling skin. *Fight, please. Mommy is right here. Stay with me.*
The heavy double doors of Operating Room 3 banged open.
The cold air hit me like a slap. A dozen masked faces surrounded me, gloved hands prepping my abdomen with brown antiseptic, strapping my arms to padded arm-boards, slipping an oxygen mask over my nose and mouth.
"Clara! Clara, I'm here!"
Through the swinging doors, Ryan burst in, clad in blue paper scrubs, a hairnet crooked on his head, his hands gloved. His eyes were wide with a terror that no amount of money or legal victory could ever soothe.
"Ryan," I sobbed through the plastic mask, feeling the sudden, cold sting of the spinal anesthesia radiating down my lower half. "Don't let them take them."
"Nobody is taking anything," Ryan vowed, falling to his knees beside my head, his forehead pressed against mine, his tears hot against my cheek. "Carter is outside with Harris. Brianna and Croft are in federal custody. It's over, Clara. It's just us now. Bring our babies home."
"Beginning incision," Dr. Althaus's voice rang out, cold and commanding, slicing through the mechanical whine of the monitors.
I couldn't feel pain, but I felt the violent tugging, the immense pressure of hands working furiously against the clock. The room became an orchestra of clipped orders: *Suction. Clamp. Retractor. Prepare the infant warmers.*
"Twin A is coming out," the assistant surgeon announced.
A tense, agonizing silence fell over the room. No sound except the oxygen hiss.
Then, breaking through the sterile chill of the room like a silver trumpet, came a tiny, sputtering wail.
"Time of birth: 5:42 AM," Dr. Althaus said. "A boy. Six pounds, two ounces. He's breathing on his own."
"Our son," Ryan wept, kissing my temple over and over. "Our son, Clara."
"Now Twin B," Dr. Althaus’s tone instantly dropped an octave. "Cord is wrapped twice around the neck. Give me the shears! Suction immediately!"
My heart stopped. The monitor flatlined into a warning chime.
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"She’s not breathing," a nurse whispered near the warmer. "No spontaneous respiration. Heart rate is forty. Beginning infant CPR."
***
