Emma Bragdon

"Alfons! What a surprise, come in, come in." Cain Fury was a short man, and probably just a couple of years older than Alfons himself. His short black hair was a mess, and his large-rimmed glasses were left askew on his nose.

Obviously, he wasn't expecting visitors. He couldn't have been sleeping, could he? No, not in the middle of the afternoon.

"I'm sorry to just drop in on you like this. Noah was on the phone, and you know how long women can talk," Alfons joked. He was lying of course. His real reason for not calling from the apartment was that the phone was right next to Edward's room, and he still didn't know about his condition. Whatever it was, nobody was even sure.

As Alfons walked past Fury, he noticed the suspicious look on his face. There was no way he just believed that.

"You haven't told them yet, have you?"

"No." Alfons sighed in resignation and sunk into a plush armchair, surveying his surroundings. The apartment was small, much smaller than the one he shared with Edward and Noah. books lined the walls in giant stacks, and the bookshelf n the corner was nearly empty, with just a few books on the bottom shelf. Upon closer inspection, all of the their titles started with letters later in the alphabet. Fury must have been organizing them when Alfons intruded.

"Anything I can help you with?" the doctor's apprentice asked, feeding the fire in the fireplace a little more wood and finally taking a seat across from the young scientist.

"Yeah. I'm not sure whether or not I'm really helping or not..."

"Come again?"

"I've been attempting to give Edward blood transfusions." When he noticed Fury's shocked face he continued quickly. "None of the doctors in the city would do it for him. They all said that it was too expensive or risky, or that they would 'waste their precious materials' on someone who is doomed to die. I even made some calls hospitals in Berlin, Frankfurt and Cologne. They all said the same thing. They wouldn't even try to save someone with a burst appendix." There was a trace of desperation in his voice. "What was I supposed to do? Just let him die?"

Cain watched his visitor thoughtfully for a moment. Alfons could see the gears turning in his head. Finally, he spoke. "Well, I can see where they're coming from. The doctor I work for would never allow the hospital to support that kind of surgery. With an economy like this, a war just ended, another one seemingly on the way and a ton of unrest still everywhere, you can never really be sure when you'll need every bit of medical equipment you can get your hands on.

"Even still, a full-body blood transfusion is still considered experimental. While a good doctor can manages a pint or two of blood, a transfusion on such a large scale is extremely dangerous right now. Most of them are done in labs for research, not in hospital."

"Full-body?" Alfons asked, surprise drenching his voice. "So small amounts at a time won't do it?"

"No, is that what your were doing?"

"Yes, I assumed it would dilute the toxins in the blood until it was all clean."

"No, it will only poison the rest of the blood."

Alfons sighed. For once in his life, he hadn't done enough research beforehand. Normally he wouldn't go into a situation without looking at everything from every different possible angle.

But Fury wasn't done talking yet. "In theory, full-body transfusions shouldn't be that hard. There are several ways to do it, though t is slightly time consuming. I would have suggested doing one, but I don't have any of the materials necessary. Well, at least not without stealing them."

"I have the materials."

"What?" Cain looked like he was mildly shocked.

"Well, most of them. I can et anything I'm missing.

"How could you possibly do that? Even I can't get them."

"I work in a science laboratory, remember. Between the factory and the university, I can get my hands on just about anything. Especially when I tell people that I'm picking it up for Edward, who works in the chemistry department, then it's extremely easy. With your knowledge, we could probably make this work."

Fury just nodded, standing up in his chair and looking around at the Mount Everest of books. Finally, his gaze settled on a particular stack of volumes with titles about medicine of different sorts. Pulling out a few (and sending many more flying), he came back and set them on the small coffee table.

"Here,

There was a feeling swimming around in Alfons' stomach. It was a little emotion, growing slowly stronger until it filled his whole body. A little like happiness, and a little more like anxiety, Alfons finally pinned down what it was. It was hope. A hope that Edward just might, maybe, if everything was done right, and he prayed, and had a lot of luck no his side to boot, have a almost insignificantly small chance at survival.

It was more than he had five minutes ago.