Chapter One
ELENA
Elena Herrera hurried through the parking garage of the Seattle Neurological Institute, mentally cataloging her disaster of a morning. Historically, she was a bit of a heavy sleeper. To combat this, she used the loudest and most obnoxious alarm she could find, titled Nuclear Alarm Siren (LOUD). It was an unpleasant way to start the day, but usually it worked. Today, she didn’t wake until the third alarm, setting back her morning routine by fifteen minutes.
And then there was the egg situation. Her twelve-year-old son, Miguel, had a very specific order for his morning eggs: gently scrambled and cooked medium-rare. So he was quite displeased when Elena had the nerve to cook his eggs well-done and frantically scrambled.
"They're overcooked," Miguel had said, poking at the plate with his fork. Not angry, just disappointed, which was somehow worse.
"I'm sorry. I'm running late." She'd already been grabbing her bag, keys jingling in her hand.
"It's fine." He set down his fork with finality. “But we should probably sit down later and figure out some kind of system.”
“A system?”
“For the eggs.”
Elena felt a smile tugging at her lips despite the morning chaos. “I love you, mijo.”
“Love you too,” Miguel replied with exaggerated patience.
Elena checked her watch as she hurried down the hallway. Seventeen minutes late now. She slowed just before reaching the conference room, taking a deep breath before entering.
The conversation halted. Eight pairs of eyes turned toward her, but she only registered Paul's narrowed gaze from the head of the table, his presentation paused on the screen behind him. Paul Thompson was the Director of Research Administration. Nice enough guy but he had a short temper for disrespect of guidelines. Paul took his eyes off Elena for a moment to passive-aggressively look at his watch, then looked back at Elena.
"Dr. Herrera, we’ve already started. Please take a seat.”
Elena felt heat rise in her cheeks but kept her expression neutral. "My apologies for the delay," she said, sliding into the only available chair, which was positioned, of course, directly in Paul's line of sight.
Rachel Sampson, her ally in the department, scooted her chair to make room, offering a subtle eye-roll that only Elena could see. As Paul resumed his monotonous presentation about quarterly metrics, Rachel slid her notepad toward Elena's elbow.
"You didn't miss much. Paul's computer needed updates. Five-minute meltdown," the note read in Rachel's neat handwriting.
Elena bit the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling and scribbled back, "Devastating. My whole day is ruined."
Rachel's shoulders shook slightly with suppressed laughter. She added to their covert conversation: "I’m sure the IT department will be hearing about this."
Elena tacked on, “Don’t forget about the Microsoft corporation. They might have a lawsuit coming their way.”
While Paul droned on about department updates, Rachel sketched a quick caricature of him with steam erupting from his ears, his tie askew, and his mouth open in an exaggerated shout. She added a speech bubble containing nothing but punctuation marks. Elena had to disguise her laugh as a cough, which earned her another disapproving glance from Paul.
"If Dr. Herrera and Dr. Sampson are finished with their correspondence," Paul said abruptly, "perhaps we could discuss the matter at hand."
The room went still. Only then did Elena notice how quiet it had become. The atmosphere shifted while she was distracted.
"As I was saying," Paul continued, his voice now carrying a more serious tone, "the board has reviewed our research timelines for the fiscal year. Due to budgetary constraints, they’re accelerating Dr. Herrera’s timeline. Six months for preliminary results.”
Elena's body went stiff. Her timeline to show results just got cut in half. This research was the culmination of years of work, theoretical frameworks she'd developed throughout her entire career. It was all aimed at developing a treatment for the symptoms of traumatic brain injuries. Something that provided a lasting impact, not just temporary relief. Her mind raced through the implications. Six months to find a protocol that worked consistently. They'd been testing variations for eight months already with mixed results at best. Some patientsshowed improvement, others plateaued, and they couldn't identify why.
They still needed to figure out the optimal session length, frequency, and intensity levels. Each protocol adjustment meant starting over with a new patient group, minimum of four weeks to see if it was working, and another four to confirm the results weren't coincidence. And that assumed they could even recruit enough participants, people with traumatic brain injuries who met their criteria and could commit to weeks of sessions. The imaging center was booked solid, so getting consistent scanner time was already a nightmare. And all of this because?—
“Budgetary constraints? That was their only reason?” Elena asked.
Paul hesitated, and she could see him struggling to find an answer that would make this make sense. He opened his mouth, closed it, then managed a slight nod that told her everything she needed to know.
Rachel's voice cut through the silence. "This is ridiculous, Paul. They’ve cut her timeline in half. Did you even try to fight their decision?”
A fight against the board would have been useless. In the time that she had been with the Institute, that had become abundantly clear. Whenever they made a decision, it was final. The sympathetic look on Paul’s face agreed with this sentiment.
