Two Pronged Attack

Chapter 3: Death From Within

Over 60 years ago nuclear bombs were exploded over two cities in Japan, ushering in the 'nuclear age' to the general public. Behind the scenes though in laboratories in Europe as early as the 1930's the use of radiation was discovered to have the ability to be an invisible knife in the battle against cancers.

ZURICH - 1930
"Azz you ken kleearly see. Zee radeeachon akts, like.....hmmm akts, like .... meelyons ov tinee boolets.", Dr. Petrov Kinsky struggled, through his weak English to get the even more complicated message about the benefits of radiation in the treatment of tumors of the breast to his colleagues who had gathered in Zurich for the conference.

A long-fingered hand attached to an even longer arm, rose from the third row. A hand and arm recognized by Petrov, that of Dr. Steven Marsden, from Boston College Medical Center - a man who still believed that radical surgery was the one and only sure-cure for cancer.

"Pete, Pete, Pete!" Marsden shouted - knowing that the Ukranian hated how this American butchered his name - "You and I BOTH know that the only REAL way to cure cancer is to CUT IT OUT!"

From the podium, which he gripped with whitening knuckles, Dr. Kinsky took a breath, trying not to engage the American in an argument in front of this group of international doctors.
"Doktor Mar-a-deen!" Petrov said - intentionally mangling the American's name in mock revenge.
"Eeen feefty yeers you veel see dat radeachon tarapee veel be as common as drunkeen Ireeshmen een Boston." The assembled crowd of professionals chuckled at the return shot.

Chapter 4: A Cocktail of Cure, or a Beaker of Poison

CHICAGO - 1961
Holding the beaker of slightly yellow solution, watching the light from the florescent send an almost psychedelic pattern on the pages of her notebook, doctoral candidate in biochemistry, Pamella Wilkinson talks out loud.
"I just don't know. I just don't know if it's right... It works in the lab....I just hope it doesn't kill anyone."

The door to the lab crashes open and in walks the red-bearded rotund, Dr. Humphrey O'Connor, bearing two more cups of coffee, and two large bagels, well, one large one, and one half-eaten.
"So, Teaser! What have you got for me this morning?" O'Connor sat his load down on the lab counter, wiped some bagel crumbs from his beard and grabbed the notebook from his student.

He calls her 'Teaser' not because of any thing sexual, she was young, overly beautiful for a biochemist and brilliant, yet  lacked confidence in her work, and every time she explained something she had the habit of reaching out with a notebook, or a beaker, or a petri dish, and retracting it over and over as she explained why or why not a sample would or wouldn't work... hence the name, 'Teaser'...

"Well, the formula is right." she reaches out with the beaker.
"It contains all four of my chemicals, I call it STAR. But...." she retracts the beaker.
"I have spent the last sixteen hours playing with the dosages." she extends the beaker.
"It works on the cells in the dish. But..." she retracts the beaker.
"I am not sure that it won't kill the patient as well as the cancer." she extends the beaker.
"If we don't get it right..."

O'Connor grabs her arm with one hand and the precious beaker with the other.
"It's time to try..."

Chapter 5: Epiphany in the Shower


HOUSTON - 1985
Stacks of yellowing journal articles litter the desk in his bedroom office, their pages, scrawled with notes, highlighted in green, yellow and blue. Patient charts, test results - various readings circled in red ink, crossed out, connected with lines of blue ink. The trail of papers creates a path that marks the hectic daily movements of Dr. Calvin Hopstra, chief of Medical Oncology at the University of Texas.

Steam filters the light from the bathroom door, which, could not close because of the bound volume of the Journal of Oncological Science that leans, flopped open in the door jam.

Accross the room Mary Hopstra, wife of the obsessive oncologist flips the pages of Cosmo as she waits her turn in the shower. "Honey, are you do...."

"Oh, My GOD YES!!!!" bursting from the bathroom like some kind of wild beast, her husband appears, soaking wet, with shampoo dripping from his head down his shoulders, over his chest.
"I think I have a way to treat Mrs. Thompkins without killing her! If I combine BOTH targeted radiation therapy AND a cocktail of chemotherapy, they SHOULD work TOGETHER to kill the tumor while increasing her chances of survival!"
He rushes over to the bed, reaches out and plants a wet kiss on his wifes forehead. "I got to get to the hospital. Have you seen my pants?"

Chuckling over her husbands enthusiasm at his discovery she adds, "Uh, you might want to finish toweling off before getting dressed!"

Struggling to get his soppy pants off his leg...."I guess so..."

Origins

PROLOGUE

This new blog will appear as the text of a comic book, anyone wishing to illustrate it can contact me! The adventure will explore the role of the Cancer Patient as a reluctant Hero. The persoon who becomes the cancer patient is thrust into this role by the very nature of battle that the disease presents. A person with cancer faces many unknowns, has many questions and deals with life changing events that quite naturally -- and unavoidably -- alter the path that the patient walks for the rest of their life. The struggle has many stages, as I have mentioned in my other blog (secondbattle.blogspot.com), but no matter the diagnosis there is always that subtle transition, and awakening that foreboding of change, that the reluctant hero knows cannot be controlled, or avoided, the PERSON becomes the PATIENT, and there is no turning back.

CHAPTER 1: Taxing the System

Going over the Linson file for the third time, things just don't add up, something is off with the numbers. Leaning back in his leather chair, Reg Ularguy, gets up and walks around his desk. He makes his way to the coffee maker on the other side of his office. He pours himself a cup. Takes a drink.
"Damn, this tastes like crap."
He calls to his assistant, "Carmella, can you make a fresh pot of coffee, and find me the 2008 numbers for Linson, please?"
Carmella walks in, carrying not only the file he needs, but a steaming pot obviously fresh coffee. She hands him the file and takes his mug from him, walks to the sink, rinses it, returns to his desk and fills it with fresh coffee.
Still standing, Reg, stares at the coffee, but hesitates to pick it up.
"Something wrong, sir?"
"Na, my stomach is acting up again. I just need a couple ant-acids. These last couple weeks trying to figure out the Linson mess has been pretty taxing."
Carmella chuckles, that special way she does, one of the many qualities he saw in her when he hired her six years ago, fresh out of Temple University Business School. " 'Pretty taxing?' That's pretty funny Mr. Ularguy."
She knew that Linson was a client that owed the IRS several million dollars, and it was her boss's job to try and straighten it out. So, it was no surprise to anyone who worked around Reg that he might be under  a bit of stress. She also knew that he always bounced back from these times, returning to regular form as the legal stand-out he was.
She watched him walk the hall to the executive washroom, where he disappeared. Before returning to her desk, she slid open the drawer on the credenza behind his desk, retrieved the bottle of Tums, and set it next to his still steaming mug of coffee.

CHAPTER 2: Repeat Performance

The fire in his inside always seems worse at night, when he is trying to get some much needed rest. Reg sits up at his bed side, glances at the clock. How long has it been since he had a good nights sleep? Two months? Three?
"Damn, 3:30 in the morning!"
He sits still, listening to his wife's, slow regular breathing as she sleeps. He glances out his bedroom window, sees a street sweeper moving down the street, it's steady whirring brushes almost calm his stomach. Then, like a dagger the pain returns, and he has to make a dash for the bathroom, barely making it to the toilet.
He sits, in the dark and finishes his 'mission'. After washing up, he is thankful for the dim light of the night light, plugged in next to the sink. He is about to flush and go, when something inside him tells him to flip on the bathroom light and take a look at the bowl.
Expecting nothing out of the ordinary, he takes a quick glance, and there it is, again. That faint swirl of red -- something he knows shouldn't be there, something that he has ignored for a while. As he stands there, the pain knifes into his belly again.
"Man! This is ridiculous." he says to him self as he crunches a few of the chalky ant-acids, which he thinks will help.
Washing the chalky residue down with a quick splash of water he says out loud, "I gottta call somone."
He walks quietly back to his side of the bed, laying down - careful not to disturb his sleeping wife.
He lays back, covers up and fumbles in the the dark for his PDA on his night stand. He taps a few times and the blue glow illuminates his face.
Tapping quietly he sends a message to his assistant:
'carm, please call dr. warfel and get me an appt asap. thnks, REG'
The device beeps once softly as he presses 'SEND'. Rolling over, he places the phone back on its charger, and looks at the clock.
"Shit, 4:30. I gotta be up in an hour!"