The central tiered arena of Vault 4 fell into a running theater’s sacred silence.
The only sounds were the soft, rhythmic hiss of Arthur’s oxygen control valve, the steady breathing of Titus beneath the running tray, and the distant hum of the world-size mantle shaking through the white iron-hard metal floor.
Arthur stood over Vesper, his hands scrubbed and gloved in micro-pore latex.
“Grimm, pulse check,” Arthur commanded softly.
Grimm rested his heavy, black chin against Vesper’s left rear paw. His sensitive lips felt the rhythmic beat of her main thigh blood vessel. The hound gave a single, firm grunt: seventy-two beats per minute. Strong, steady, and remarkably calm for a feline facing open-chest osteoplasty.
Pip hovered three feet above Vesper’s chest. His golden feathers glowed with a focused, shadowless white radiance that lit up the razor-sharp field with three thousand lumens of clean, sterile light.
Arthur picked up his air-powered needle, loading an ampoule of packed silver-saline nerve block.
Pssssht.
