Halcyon Antiviral Trial Log — Compound R-17

Day 1:

R-17 has slowed viral replication in every subject. Fever dropped, tremors eased, and two early-stage patients regained enough clarity to recognize family through the glass. It is not a cure, but for the first time we may have bought ourselves time.

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Day 3:

Progression continues, only slower. Confusion, insomnia, paranoia, and memory loss are still advancing beneath the improved bloodwork. Subject 2 asked me the same question twenty-three times today. Subject 4 stopped recognizing his own hands. We extended the window, nothing more.

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Day 5:

Liver enzymes are climbing. Kidney function is collapsing. Cardiac rhythm is becoming unstable across the entire group. R-17 suppresses NERVA-9 by forcing the body into a metabolic state it cannot survive. Administration wants to call the additional days “treatment response.” They are not recovery. They are borrowed time paid for with organ failure.

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Day 8:

All six subjects are dead. None converted before death, which is apparently enough for someone upstairs to label the trial “partially successful.” R-17 does not save the infected. It prolongs the fear, slows the loss of self, and then kills the patient from the inside out. We gave them a few more days to understand what was happening to them. God help me, I’m no longer sure that was kindness.