An episode of Snow Blood: A Not Quite Dead Story
IN WHICH: Alfie’s hand is forced and the situation becomes more than he can bear. Neige must step beyond his opinion to help Alfie hold to his values in a moment of overwhelm.
Content Warnings
- Discussions of blood
- Sounds of medical equipment (infusion pump, oxygen concentrator)
- Descriptions of blood draws
- Depictions of characters in distress
- Medical malpractice, including inappropriate use of sedatives
- Threats of violence
- Depictions of violence
- Scenes with blood drinking
Transcript
[SOUNDS OF DRIVING. A PHONE IS VIBRATING]
ALFIE
Hi, Haley, hi—
HALEY
Why did I have one of the most celebrated haematologists in Argentina sobbing to me on the phone this morning?
ALFIE
He seemed alright, when I left!
HALEY
You just told him vampires are real, handed him a vial of blood that will put him on the hit list of every single one of them, and told him to forget about it!
ALFIE
I didn’t think he was actually going to call you! He didn’t seem to want to get involved.
HALEY
He doesn’t have a choice, now. You’ve involved him.
ALFIE
What was I supposed to do? It takes to long for samples to reach you! Even if I flew you out here—
HALEY
Absolutely not! I am not having another Paris situation. I have a job.
ALFIE
I know! Which is why I didn’t—
HALEY
What could possibly justify bringing in some poor old man, days from the end of his career?
ALFIE
That’s why I picked him. I needed someone good, whose life I wasn’t going to royally fuck over. Who is thinking about defending a legacy, not a career.
HALEY
Did something go wrong with your research?
ALFIE
He didn’t tell you what I brought him.
HALEY
He was curiously tightlipped. Perhaps it was all the mortal terror!
ALFIE
Uh. There’s a guy.
HALEY
For crying out loud, please don’t tell me this is about a fucking booty call.
ALFIE
No. God, no. He’s sick. There’s traces of vampire blood in his bloodstream, tiny amounts, but from a huge number of different vampires. I don’t know any of them. But he was really fucking scared when he called us. Desperate, even. He thinks people are watching him.
HALEY
Jesus. If someone has set up a lab to farm vampire blood, you’ll be drained and tossed away like horseshoe crabs!
ALFIE
I know. I know. I just. There are so many steps you’d need to take make it work. You could keep production secret, maybe, off the books, smuggle the blood across borders. But there’d be evidence of it amongst end-users. People would be dying of toxicity, or accidentally turning themselves into walking corpses all over the place. I have to believe this is something small scale. Maybe just for this one guy.
HALEY
But you said he had the blood of more than one vampire inside of him.
ALFIE
There are ways someone could track it down. Vials of our blood do circulate around antiquities dealers. Most of it is fake, but some of it isn’t. It’s a better preservative than honey, it doesn’t matter how old it is, if you got hold of it, you could use it the same as if it had been drawn fresh.
HALEY
That’s… not a bad theory, I suppose. You need your caller to talk. Let Neige go at him.
ALFIE
I can’t. I told you, he’s sick. It’s really serious. We’ve got him sedated and on a vent.
HALEY
Oh, Jesus Christ.
HALEY
I’m flying out there.
ALFIE
No, no. Don’t. I have access to a lab, now. Anything I need to check out, I can do myself. I’m not risking your safety as well as ours.
HALEY
What am I supposed to do?! I’m suffocating, here!
ALFIE
I’m not risking your safety as well as ours.
HALEY
So far I’ve managed to keep fangs out of my neck. At some point, we need to expand the scale of this if we want it to be a useful project.
ALFIE
And yet, you called me to bitch about the fact I brought in Argentina’s best—
Ah!
Fuck. Fuck.
HALEY
What? Are you okay?
ALFIE
Yeah, I— Jesus. There’s something wrong with him.
HALEY
Who?
ALFIE
The guy, the caller! Jesus fuck, I left him with Neige. I’m sorry, I’ve got to go.
HALEY
Alfie—
INTRO MUSIC: This is Snow Blood, a vampire story. Episode 3: Blood Struck
[THE DOOR SLAMS OPEN]
[RUSTLING, THE SOUNDS OF AN OXYGEN CONCENTRATOR AND AN IV INFUSION PUMP]
NEIGE
Alfie, sacre bleu, thank goodness you are back! it’s happening again, I don’t know what to do!
ALFIE
You promised, you promised!
NEIGE
I didn’t hurt him! He’s shaking, I can’t stop it.
ALFIE
I— fuck! Fuck. It’s a seizure. That’s– he was doing this before.
NEIGE
Yes! I tried to call you.
ALFIE
I was— I was driving, I—
NEIGE
I don’t know what to do.
ALFIE
He’s— there’s blood in the vent. He’s haemorrhaging again, he’s fucking crashing, I—
NEIGE
What can we do?!
ALFIE
I— I—
NEIGE
Alfie, his heart, he’s going to die!
ALFIE
No! Not— no. No.
NEIGE
Drain him!
ALFIE
I can’t!
NEIGE
But you want it! He’s a risk to us and he might not even know anything, but—
ALFIE
No. I can’t— I can’t! We need to talk to him.
NEIGE
You only have two options. If you want to save him, you have to do it now.
ALFIE
He doesn’t know what it means!
NEIGE
He already had vampire blood in his system! You can assume he consents, especially if it would save his life.
ALFIE
It was below the threshold! He— it wouldn’t have— this is different, pulling him back from this means he’s definitely going to die and it will be my blood that fucking kills him.
NEIGE
If you don’t drain him first. Which would be okie! In fact I think this is the better option. But you have to decide now. Or—
ALFIE
It’ll hurt.
NEIGE
Yes. It’ll hurt you.
ALFIE
Ah. I feel it, it’s like a fucking— a rope around all of my organs and it’s burning, it’s burning.
NEIGE
Because he is going to die. You have to make a decision, now, or. Alfie. Please. I don’t want you to suffer.
ALFIE
I want— I want—
NEIGE
To kill him, I know! It’s alright, you can do this, but—
ALFIE
We’ve gone through all this trouble and I want to know what he fucking knows and I don’t want to kill him like this. I want it to feel good, I want him to know, I want—
NEIGE
So you have to give him your blood!
ALFIE
I— a syringe, I—
NEIGE
Here. Let me. Your hands are shaking.
Is okie, is okie, you are alright, we will save him.
ALFIE
Not for long.
NEIGE
Is this enough?
ALFIE
Yeah.
NEIGE
You want me to—
ALFIE
No. I’ll do it, I’ll do it.
[ALFIE INJECTS HIS BLOOD INTO VASILY’S CENTRAL LINE. HE MAKES A SMALL, DESPERATE SOUND]
NEIGE
You felt it?
ALFIE
Yeah. Oh, it’s right— it’s right in his heart.
NEIGE
It flutters. Like wings.
ALFIE
It’ll take a few minutes to spread. Faster than oral administration.
NEIGE
More efficient too. Human guts are so full of nastiness.
ALFIE
Ugh. It’s a wonder they can extract nutrients at all.
[MOVEMENT. AN INFUSION PUMP BLEEPS AS ALFIE CHANGES ITS SETTINGS.]
NEIGE
What are you doing?
ALFIE
Changing the dose of midazolam.
NEIGE
But after your blood, he won’t be in the kind of trouble he was in before.
ALFIE
I don’t want him waking up. No.
NEIGE
Alfie. What was the point in saving him if—
ALFIE
Shut up! I can’t, I— I need. I need.
NEIGE
You need time.
ALFIE
I. We need to change his vent tube. There’s blood in this one. No point bothering with all of that if he aspirates.
NEIGE
I will help.
ALFIE
Thank you.
[WAVES CRASH ON THE SHORE. ALFIE IS SMOKING. NEIGE SITS DOWN HEAVILY BESIDE HIM]
ALFIE
You left him alone.
NEIGE
Eh, he’s not in immediate danger now, and he’s got a scary amount of benzodiazepines in his blood. He will be fine.
ALFIE
Hmm.
NEIGE
What is it you think caused the seizure? Bleeding? I didn’t smell it until after he started. I should have noticed. I would have called.
ALFIE
It’s unlikely. The micro doses of blood I was giving him was doing enough to help counter the bleeding and gave the clotting factor enough time to work. There must’ve been more swelling on his brain than I realised. I should’ve— god no having our own MRI would be mental.
NEIGE
It’s already mental and it can’t help us now anyway.
[A QUIET. THE WAVES CRASH AND ALFIE SMOKES]
ALFIE
I’m sorry I yelled at you.
NEIGE
Merci.
ALFIE
I wasn’t. Expecting.
NEIGE
Non. Of course not.
ALFIE
I’ve killed him.
NEIGE
You just saved his life.
ALFIE
Not for fucking long. He’ll need another dose just as large in about twenty hours. After that, more, sooner. And sooner. He’s got a week. Maybe a fortnight, tops, before he gets to the point where the amount he needs will be toxic to his system and he’ll go into irreversible shock if I give it to him. And if I don’t, he’ll go septic, then go into septic shock, which is also near irreversible, and because he’s a fucking haemophiliac who was already catastrophically ill and has a partially fractured skull, it’s definitely not going to be recoverable. I’ve killed him. Just not today.
NEIGE
I maintain that haemophilia is a stupid name for a bleeding condition.
ALFIE
It’s because they thought people had too much blood inside of them and that’s what was causing it. They used to treat new born infants with leeches to try to stop the blood coming out of their cut umbilicus.
NEIGE
Heh. And now a different kind of leech is treating them.
ALFIE
It’s not like you to call us that.
NEIGE
I will say what I like when I think it is funny.
ALFIE
I love you.
NEIGE
Je t’aime aussi, mon râleur.
[ALFIE SIGHS]
ALFIE
I shouldn’t have drugged him again. He needed it before, he doesn’t now.
NEIGE
Non. But you needed time and that is okie. You are taking the best care of him that you can. This is a specific circumstance.
ALFIE
It’s abuse.
NEIGE
I threw him at a wall.
ALFIE
You were trying to help me.
NEIGE
And you are trying to help yourself, too. Maybe it is not medical standard practice but how often is a patient at risk of their nurse becoming overwhelmed and tearing out their throat? You have to make allowances for the circumstances. You are what you are.
ALFIE
Maybe I shouldn’t be playing with this shit.
NEIGE
Playing? I don’t think you are. For it to be play, you need to be having fun. You take it all so seriously. You almost just subjected yourself to an immense amount of pain out of fear that your patient had not been able to give you consent to the treatment you gave him to save his life.
[A MOMENT OF SILENCE]
NEIGE
Anyway, surely there are protocols which are different in circumstances where a patient will die without help and they are unable to give consent?
ALFIE
Obviously. That’s why I didn’t blink when we gave him the central line and stuck a ventilator into his trachea without him knowing. This is different. It’s not just a treatment, not like it was before. It’ll kill him. I just told you that.
NEIGE
And I already know. But without it he would have died right now and you do not want that, even though it would be sensible.
ALFIE
He wouldn’t have felt it, then.
NEIGE
He would not feel it now. Not with all those drugs in him. You can still do it.
ALFIE
I want to talk to him before. Before I.
NEIGE
Before you kill him.
ALFIE
Fuck.
NEIGE
It is okay to want this.
ALFIE
I hate myself.
NEIGE
No you do not. I can love you enough for both of us until you remember how, however long that is, afterwards.
[ALFIE SOBS]
ALFIE
I’m so sorry. We never should have gone to meet him. You were right.
NEIGE
You couldn’t have let it go. It is okay. Come here. Ça va, je tai.
[FOOTSTEPS, MACHINES WHIR. THE CALLER, VASILY, CHOKES ON HIS VENTILATOR TUBE]
ALFIE
Hey, shh. It’s alright. Don’t worry. I’m going to take that tube out now, alright? Yeah?
[VELCRO SCRATCHES]
ALFIE
Alright, it’ll feel funny, but you’ll be okay. I need you to cough for me. I’ll count to three and then you just cough, hard as you can. Can you do that? Vasily?
NEIGE
He’s not conscious enough, he is panicking.
ALFIE
I know that, I can hear his heart perfectly well myself. Okay, I’m going to pull, it’ll be uncomfortable. Just cough for me in three, two, one—
[RAW COUGHING, SPLUTTERING]
ALFIE
Good, great job. Breathe in? Good. Keep doing that for me.
NEIGE
He still can’t keep his eyes open. Have we done this too soon?
ALFIE
No. He— he’s coming around. He’s been fighting the vent for ten minutes. We left it any longer he’d have been fully awake.
NEIGE
And you don’t want to hurt him.
ALFIE
No.
[THE OXYGEN CONCENTRATOR CLUNKS AS ALFIE TURNS IT OFF, AND PLUNGES THEM INTO QUIET]
NEIGE
You are doing a good job.
ALFIE
Please don’t.
NEIGE
His lungs sound good.
ALFIE
Better than before, anyway.
NEIGE
Should we put a mask on him?
ALFIE
Not yet. I want to see if his oxygen saturation is going to dip. It shouldn’t with the blood I gave him. If we can get him off as much intervention as possible, that’s a good thing. It’ll make it easier if we take him with us.
NEIGE
The catheter?
ALFIE
I’d rather keep using it.
NEIGE
Not the one in his chest.
ALFIE
Oh. Well. I don’t want him walking around, so.
NEIGE
You take out the tube in his throat for comfort but leave the one in his dick. Strange priorities.
ALFIE
We want him to talk, don’t we?
NEIGE
Are you suggesting—
ALFIE
Ach, no I am not suggesting whatever it was you were about to suggest! I just mean he can’t very well talk with a tube in his mouth, can he? And if we want to keep him. Contained. It’s easier for everyone to leave the urinary catheter there.
NEIGE
I see.
ALFIE
(sighing)
Good.
[FABRIC MOVES]
ALFIE
Vasily?
VASILY
Mm.
ALFIE
You might be a bit groggy. You’re coming out of sedation. It’s alright. Take it slow.
VASILY
Wa— wa—
ALFIE
Water? Not yet. You’re not awake yet.
VASILY
Pjah snodri.
ALFIE
What are you— what’s…
NEIGE
Fire inside, he says.
ALFIE
Your— youthroat hurts? Yeah. You’ve been on a ventilator. I—
VASILY
Ugh. Oomiryah.
NEIGE
Death. Tibi cybortnya nia umriosh.
VASILY
Pjah.
ALFIE
What…?
NEIGE
I tell him he will not die today. He is still talking about the fire.
VASILY
Fire. Fire inside.
ALFIE
You do speak English.
NEIGE
You know this because of the phone calls.
ALFIE
I—
VASILY
Ah. Proselyutsa. Mmpf. Please. Water. Mmf, please.
ALFIE
You can’t, you— you’re going to choke. N—Neige, can you dip one of those swabs in some cough syrup? It’ll help.
NEIGE
Okie.
ALFIE
Here.
[A MOMENT OF QUIET AS HE SUCKS THE SWAB]
VASILY
What hospital?
ALFIE
Not a hospital. This is a safe place.
VASILY
They are looking for me.
ALFIE
Who?
VASILY
Bad people.
NEIGE
They will not find you here.
VASILY
Mmf. We should leave.
ALFIE
You can’t, not yet. I need to be sure you’re not going to crash before I can risk taking you away from all of our equipment.
NEIGE
They will not find you here. By the time they work out where you are, we will be gone. You are safe.
VASILY
I’m dying.
ALFIE
Not today.
VASILY
I don’t— you came to see me. I don’t— I don’t. You came to see me. I cannot think.
ALFIE
You hit your head pretty hard. We had to sedate you to try to protect your brain. It might come back, it might not.
VASILY
Oh. My head? Does not hurt?
ALFIE
I’ve given you some morphine. And even if I hadn’t, you. You might not feel much of the pain anyway. While you were sleeping, there were a couple of complications. I had to make a decision quickly to save your life. I’m sorry. It will mean that you won’t have much longer to live, but it does mean you are alive right now. I’m sorry.
VASILY
I was dying already.
ALFIE
I know. I’d hoped— I’d hoped maybe I’d be able to keep you below the threshold where— but I couldn’t, I—
NEIGE
Alfie. Is okie. Breathe.
VASILY
What is happening?
NEIGE
He had to give you his blood. He does not like to do this without explaining what it will mean first. If he had not done it, you would have died six hours ago. But he saved you, for now. He feels guilty for this.
Alfie. You can tell him now. He is listening, yes? You can explain it.
ALFIE
I. I’m sorry.
NEIGE
Alfie. Is okie. He knows this, that is not the important part.
ALFIE
There is an amount of our blood a human body can tolerate without too much of a problem. It might cause a mild fever as it wears off but overall the effect is to alleviate pain, reduce symptoms of most medical conditions, and allow other treatments more time to take effect. But. Past a certain point, when it wears off, it will cause your blood to develop a severe infection. It’s called sepsis. Sometimes, sepsis can be treated, but…
VASILY
Because my blood likes to leave my body it will kill me, yes, this I know.
ALFIE
I’ll need to keep giving you my blood, now. Or it’ll definitely kill you. And as time goes on, the damage it’s doing to your cells will mean that you’ll need more and more of it. At a certain point, you’ll reach a dosage that is too high. It will be immediately toxic to you, and no amount more I can give will alleviate the symptoms. You will go into irreversible shock. I’m sorry.
VASILY
Mmf. How long?
ALFIE
It’s hard to say, exactly. I’ve never done this with a person who has haemophilia before. It could be weeks. It is more likely to be days.
VASILY
Da.
ALFIE
Yes?
VASILY
Da.
ALFIE
I’m sorry.
VASILY
Why did you not just kill me?
ALFIE
What?
VASILY
Why let me wake up if you are going to do this?! Why not just— ah.
[A QUIET]
ALFIE
You hate me.
NEIGE
He does not.
[VASILY IS GROANING IN DISCOMFORT AS ALFIE’S GRIP ON HIM TIGHTENS]
ALFIE
I feel it. You hate me. Why?!
VASILY
Let go of me!
ALFIE
I can’t! Oh, god. You hate me.
VASILY
You’re hurting me.
NEIGE
Alfie!
ALFIE
Oh god. Neige he hates me Neige he hates me I can’t I can’t I can’t I—
NEIGE
Non!
[STRUGGLING, A SLAM]
[ALFIE WAILS]
NEIGE
Get up!
ALFIE
Let me, let me—
NEIGE
You do not want this! He doesn’t hate you he is just afraid! Get up.
ALFIE
No, no—
NEIGE
Then I will take you.
[ALFIE RAGES]
NEIGE
Stop fighting me! I will win!
ALFIE
Neige, Neige, Neige.
[DOOR SLAMS, NEIGE PINS ALFIE TO A BED AS HE CONTINUES TO STRUGGLE AGAINST HIM]
ALFIE
He hates me he hates me he hates me I need to fucking tear out his throat I need to feel him bleed I need to watch him die I need it he hates me I need it he hates me.
NEIGE
He doesn’t hate you! You need to eat, that is what you need.
ALFIE
I will drain him dry! I will fucking sink my teeth so deep there will be nothing left of his neck I will drink every last drop.
NEIGE
Those instincts are counter intuitive! You will get more out of him if you bite carefully.
ALFIE
You’re right, you’re right, you’re so clever, let me go, let me have him, he hates me I need to feel his blood in my mouth I need it feel his heart slow as mine picks up I need it I need him to stop.
NEIGE
He doesn’t hate you, he’s just scared. It will get easier. Let him have some time to process, give yourself some time to process, it would be bad to decide this now when you are so overwhelmed.
[ALFIE IS FINALLY SLOWING HIS STRUGGLES]
ALFIE
It hurts. He hates me and it hurts.
NEIGE
This is why it is important to treat those you make yours well.
ALFIE
I don’t want him, I want him dead.
[ALFIE MOANS, WHACKING THE BED IN TIME]
NEIGE
You don’t. You have told me this at length. When you were inside your own mind, you were so sure you wanted him alive it outweighed your ethical concerns about saving him.
ALFIE
No.
NEIGE
He is having a reaction to what you did, and it is stronger because this is the first time you are feeling the full strength of your connection, and you have more of your blood inside him now. It’s deeper than it was. This is normal. He needs time. He does not hate you. Nobody could hate you. You are wonderful.
ALFIE
No. I’m stupid I’m a monster I want to kill him. I want to die. I want to die.
NEIGE
I am not too convinced of these things.
ALFIE
He hates me.
NEIGE
He doesn’t hate you! He is upset. He needs time. So do you. If you still feel this way in an hour I won’t stop you.
[ALFIE HAS FINALLY STOPPED STRUGGLING AND IS NOW QUIETLY MEWLING TO HIMSELF]
ALFIE
It’ll kill me before that.
[ALFIE BREATHES FAST AND RHYTHMICALLY AS NEIGE SPEAKS]
NEIGE
It won’t! It is painful but it will not kill you. Your body wants him dead. It is not an unwise impulse. But you are not yourself in this moment. You should eat. It will help you focus.
ALFIE
I want to eat him. I want to give him more of my blood so his pulse gets even stronger before I do it. I want him to feel strong. I want him to fight me. I want him to fight me until he can’t and then I want him to die with my teeth in his neck.
NEIGE
Alfie! Stop! Arrete!
ALFIE
It’s true.
NEIGE
It’s not. You are feeling his anger. You are projecting it. Breathe.
ALFIE
No.
NEIGE
Sacre sang!
[HE TEARS INTO HIS OWN ARM WITH HIS TEETH]
ALFIE
Neige, no—
NEIGE
Don’t waste it! Drink.
ALFIE
Ugh!
[ALFIE DOES AS HE’S TOLD, NOISIER, MESSIER THAN USUAL]
NEIGE
Is it helping?
ALFIE
Shut up.
[HE KISSES HIM]
NEIGE
Bon, again.
{ALFIE KISSES HIM AGAIN]
NEIGE
Bite me. Bite me.
[ALFIE DOES AS HE IS TOLD]
NEIGE
Ah, yes. Bon, bon. You are doing so well. So well.
[ALFIE IS SOBBING. NEIGE KISSES HIM]
NEIGE
Ca va, ca va, ca va.
ALFIE
Bite me back.
NEIGE
That will not help.
ALFIE
Hurt me.
NEIGE
Ach. I should not—
ALFIE
BITE ME.
[NEIGE DOES]
Thank you, thank you, thank you. Oh god. Oh god.
NEIGE
I did not take more than a mouthful.
ALFIE
No, I know, it’s good, it’s good.
NEIGE
Drink more.
ALFIE
Yes, yes.
[ALFIE OBEYS, AND BEGINS TO CRY AS HE DOES, GETTING HARDER AS NEIGE SOOTHES HIM]
NEIGE
Bon. Bon. I love you, it’s okie.
ALFIE
I need to kill him.
NEIGE
Breathe through it. You are doing so well.
ALFIE
I wish he was dead. I wish he was dead. I wish I was dead.
NEIGE
No you don’t. I’m right here.
ALFIE
I can’t live like this.
NEIGE
Nobody can for long. But you don’t have to do it forever. Just a few days. That is all. A few days and it will be over. He will die, we know this.
[ALFIE CRIES QUIETLY]
ALFIE
Neige. Neige, I’m awful.
NEIGE
No, no. No. You are what you are.
ALFIE
Which is awful.
NEIGE
No, no. What you are is magnificent and kind and clever. Be what you are. It is hard right now, but it will all be okie. I promise you. I promise you this. I have been there, with this feeling. It will be okie. I promise. I promise you.
I am with you, I will help you. You are not on your own with this. I will keep you safe. I will not hurt him or let you hurt yourself. It is going to be okie. I have you. Ca va.
[ALFIE CONTINUES TO CRY]
[END]
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