At Georgia's words, Leda chuckled.
"You really are misunderstanding me, Miss Lane. I'm also a member of Mr. Price's research staff."
At that, Georgia was reeling while Riley chimed in.
"Leda graduated from a top of the line university, majoring in biopharmaceutics and specifically genetics. She has a doctorate as well. I did play around with you using Leda's past with Robert, Georgia, but I let her in my team entirely on the merit of her capabilities. I hired her for a good sum. She has great ability, which is why I brought her over today. Even though she just joined my team, she knows the data well. Ask her if you have any questions. You'll get more professional answers than you can from me."
"I've been too short-sighted. Apologies."
Georgia still felt complicated about it, but she still apologized. Capable people deserved respect.
She hadn't started chatting about professional knowledge with Leda yet, but if Riley was saying that, it wouldn't be off.
"Let's go. I'll take you to see Robert, then show you the collected data. I hope that after you see it, you could send your own treatment methods over.
"Right, please send your compiled information to me as well. Now that we're pooling intel, I hope we can help each other."
"Of course."
Leda smiled. Georgia, Antonio, Ivan and the others brought Leda and Riley over to see Robert, then had them look at the most recent ways Robert's body was reacting, and the checkup data.
After a while, Aston and Adolf arrived as well.
Georgia explained the situation in brief, and the group started discussing other details of Robert's condition.
After that, Leda turned to Georgia.
"Georgia, this isn't particularly serious yet, but if he isn't treated, Robert's condition is going to continue to worsen."
"Then how should we treat him?"
Georgia asked worriedly, and Leda spoke seriously.
"You're a researcher too. Normal people have an important type of immune cell in the body called macrophages, discovered in 1882 by a Russian biologist. This sort of macrophage takes in the remains of cells, outside bacteria and other pathogens. They also consume already wasted cancer cells, but they can't completely devour the cancer cells just when they're budding and eradicate the cancer directly.
"That's because there's organic anticancer cells in the body that secrete a macrophage colony-stimulating factor that 'buys out' the macrophages, so to speak, making them turn a blind eye to cancer. We have a better method on this end. Through direct stimulation of the macrophages with message pathway inhibition technology, we can put the macrophages to work. I'll send you a document on the tangible method. I believe you would have researched this angle before, but we have ripe technology already that can avoid damaging other, normal cells, and we've done live patient testing. We've treated Mr. Price's lover with this for several years already."
Georgia's eyes started gleaming. She'd studied such a method before, but there had been too many factors preventing success.
But from what Leda was saying, they already had mature technology on their hands. She took Leda and Antonio over to the computers and looked at the documentation, going through a more detailed explanation.
By the time Leda sent out the tangible data and Georgia confirmed that the treatment was viable, she finally reached an accord with Ivan, Antonio and Aston to treat Robert with such a method for the moment.
Robert had been in a fever all along, and the regular substances in his body couldn't kill the cancer cells now. The equilibrium had been broken, and now outside intervention was required.
After confirming that, Antonio agreed, and Riley brought his team over.
Antonio wanted to learn new technology as well, and to see the actual process.
It began in the afternoon. The treatment wasn't complex. They had specific surgery tools and instruments for injection.
They injected Robert every hour, then continued the injection following the test results. Any abnormalities, and the plan would have to be adjusted.
From starting in the evening into midnight and the small hours, Robert came down from the fever and slowly stabilized.
Georgia heaved a sigh of relief, and Ivan spoke next to her.
"You haven't slept properly for a long while, Georgia. Robert's condition is normal now, so just go and catch some sleep. Robert might wake up tomorrow, and you'll be able to talk to him then."
Georgia was tired and would probably pass out the moment she laid down.
But she didn't want to sleep at the moment.
"I want to wait for him to wake up. I want to be the first person he sees when he wakes up. No need to dissuade me. If I can't see him wake up, I'm afraid I'll have nightmares when I sleep. You can go bed down first.
"Come on, Ivan. You must be dead tired bringing Riley and his team over and back. No need to worry about me. I'll be fine."
Ivan didn't try to convince her further.
He really was dead tired. He hadn't rested at all after flying back to the country and had gone to see Riley straight away, then brought him over straight away as well. He hadn't shut his eyes for two whole days.
After Ivan left, Georgia sat next to Robert's bedside.
She took Robert's hand, the worry in her heart still lingering.
"Your fever's gone, so you should be waking up now. Come on, Robert, wake up and talk to me. Give me a surprise."
She was only saying that out of expectation.
She never thought she'd see Robert's hand move.
Georgia leant down excitedly next to his ear.
"Did you hear me? Wake up, Robert. I'll reward you with a sweet kiss, or I'm going to go flirt with other men right away. Didn't you feel like Antonio was smart? I could see how jealous you were of him. There's a lot of men here, and careful I don't cheat on you!"
At that, a familiar voice that brought warmth into her heart rang out by her ear.
"You said it. A sweet kiss. If not, I'm going straight back to sleep, maybe for a long while."