When Dr. Aris finally burst through the mudroom door, his coat was caked in frozen sleet and his face was flushed from the wind. “The drifts are five feet high near the creek,” he panted, dropping his bag and rushing toward the kittens. He didn’t waste time with pleasantries. He knelt on the cold linoleum, pressing his stethoscope into the thick, damp fur. As he listened, his brow furrowed in a deep, troubled confusion. He checked their round pupils and the unique set of their ears, his hands beginning to move with a frantic, clinical speed.
“How exactly did you say you found these, John?” Aris asked, his voice low and tight. He didn’t look like a man who had a diagnosis; he looked like a man staring at a biological impossibility. He reached into his bag for a portable oxygen mask, but it wouldn’t fit their wide, flat muzzles. “I’ve seen a lot of things in thirty years, but this…” He stopped himself, shaking his head as if to clear it. He didn’t explain what he suspected, but his tone shifted into a high-gear urgency that sent a chill through the room. “We can’t treat this here. I don’t even know if my clinic has what they need, but we have to try. If we don’t move in the next five minutes, their hearts are going to give out.”