“We all labour against our own cure, for death is the cure of all diseases.”
Mate went on to bemoan the stigma associated with cellular cessation, and subsequent moral cowardice exhibited by physicians when dealing with parathanatological phenomena. As the ultimate caretakers of body and that fiction known as “soul,” we must do everything in our power to demystify the process of life termination, utilizing the scientific tools at our disposal to avoid needless prolongation of “life” that is the fruit of theology-based myths.
In this regard, quantification of precise time of death will be useful in robbing the myth mongers of their fictions and save costs that accrue from the needless employment of so-called heroic measures that create nothing more than respirating corpses.
Along these lines, I have attempted to discern which outward physical manifestations advertise the precise shutoff of vital systems. The central nervous system often continues to fire synaptically well after the heart stops beating and vice versa. Even a high-school biology student can keep a pithed frog’s heart beating for a substantial “postmortem” period through the use of stimulant drugs. Furthermore, brain death is not a discrete event, and this fact leads to confusion and uncertainty.
I have thus looked for other changes, specifically ocular and muscular alterations, that correlate with our best judgment of thanatological progress. I have sat at the bedside of numerous premortem patients, gazing into their eyes and studying minute movements of their faces. Though this research is in the formative stage, I am encouraged by what appears to be a dual manifestation of cardiac and neurological shutoff typified by simultaneous twitchlike movement of the eyes combined with a measurable slackening of the lips. In some patients, I have also discerned an audible noise that appears to manifest sublaryngitically— perhaps the “death rattle” commonly cited in popular fiction. However, this does not occur in all patients and is best dispensed with in favor of the aforementioned ocular-muscular phenomenon I label the “lights-out” syndrome. I suggest that this event be studied in great detail for its potential in serving as a simple yet precise indicator of cellular surrender.
Interns back then worked hundred-hour weeks. This intern had found the time to indulge his extracurricular interest. Sitting and staring into the eyes of the dying, trying to capture the precise moment. My hunch about his intentions, confirmed. Early in the game, Mate’s obsession had been with the minutiae of death, not the quality of life.
No comments from the Swedish journal editor. I wondered how Mate’s side activities had been received at Oxford Hill Hospital.
Leaving the reading room, I found a pay phone in the hallway, got Oakland Information and asked for the number. No listing. Returning to the computers, I looked up the call.
When I pulled up, Milo was standing in front with two men in their late twenties. Both wore gray sport coats and dark slacks and held notepads against their thighs. Both were tall as Milo, each was forty pounds lighter. Neither looked happy.
The man to the left had a puffy face, squashed features and wheat-colored blow-dried hair. The other D-I was dark, balding, bespectacled.
Milo said something to them and they returned inside.
“Your little elves?” I said, when he came over.
“Korn and Demetri. They don’t like working for me, and my opinion of them ain’t too grand. I put them back on the phones, recontacting families. They whined about scut work—oh this younger generation. Ready for Zoghbie? Let’s take my Ferrari, in case we need a police presence.”
He crossed the street to the police lot and I followed in the Seville, waiting till he backed out, then sliding into his parking space. Signs all over said POLICE PERSONNEL ONLY, ALL OTHERS WILL BE TOWED.
I got in the unmarked and handed him the material I’d printed from the Internet. He put it on the backseat, wedged between two of the file boxes that filled the space. The car smelled of old breakfast. The police radio was stuttering and Milo snapped it off.
“What if ?” I said, pointing to the warning signs.
“I’ll go your bail.” Stretching his neck to one side, he winced, cleared his throat, pressed down on the gas and sped to Santa Monica Boulevard, then over to the 405 North, toward the Valley. I knew what I had to do and my body responded by tightening up. When we passed the mammoth white boxes that the Getty Museum comprised, I told him about Joanne Doss.