Repairing the damage

Posted on Thu Jun 9th, 2011 @ 6:29am by Walter Jones & Jan Valentine & Morgan Pass

993 words; about a 5 minute read

Mission: Session 4: The Humans are Dead...
Location: Med bay

"DOC, GET YOUR ASS IN HERE!" Jones yelled as he help Jan up onto the table, the piece of metal still hanging from Jan's leg.

"I'll see if I can get you some pain killers." Jones went over and started rooting through one of the medical cabinets.

Morgan appeared at the door, not in any particular hurry. He took a moment to survey the scene.

"If you don't mind, Jones," He said dryly, "I would like to be able to find my antibiotics when I need them."

He crossed to a separate drawer and pulled hypospray and a blue vial from it. He crossed to Jan.

"I see your new implant has allowed you to find new ways to injure yourself? Let's have a look."

He pressed the spray to Jan's leg which went numb, leaving the rest of him awake. Pass then pulled a scalpel and began to cut away the suit surrounding the wound. This proved to be quite difficult, since the suits were designed to resist tearing and punctures. Eventually enough of the material was clear for the doctor to look at the injury.

"Humph," he said eventually, "You have better luck than most. It missed your major muscle groups and blood vessels. It is a wide injury though and it has dragged a large amount of suit fibres into the wound. It has also been exposed to vacuum, which means lots of broken secondary vessels. This is going to take some time, especially with the tools I have."

He looked at Jan, "I would like to operate immediately, while we are not at Warp. You are less likely to need him, and I am less likely to have power fluctuations and so forth."

"Right," Morgan looked at Jan, "the process will take a couple of hours. You want to watch, or would you rather be out?"

"I'll watch, maybe not for long though..." Jan said.

Morgan pulled on some gloves, "For future reference, the Transporter containment field can make a very effective temporary tourniquet, especially in vacuum. You need to restrict the focus, but it is a simple operation... I am told. Anyone want to tell me HOW this happened, and if I should expect more such injuries?"

"Did you feel a big jolt about 4 minutes ago? That was an antimatter bomb that we barely managed to detach from the ship. It had these hull penetrating hooks, and one happened to skewer my leg in the process of attaching itself to the ship." Jan said.

"I thought that jolt was uncommonly shoddy piloting from Air. A hook would explain the fibres and material itself as well as the wound pattern."

Morgan spread the fabric with a couple of clamps and began sterilizing the outside skin with an alcohol swipe, muttering under his breath about barbaric tools he had at his disposal. He braced the leg and pulled the remainder of the metal leg in a swift, smooth movement. he packed the wound and began the process of pulling individual metal splinters and suit fabric from the wound.

At one point he shook his head, "You are losing a lot of blood. I had wanted to avoid giving you any form of infusion. I can create a replicated Blood group, but it has all sorts of risks of rejection. I don't suppose you know of anyone on this ship who is a compatible donor to you? I haven't found any frozen blood stores. That at least is a practice I would like to instate. Still, for now, a donor would be best."

"I have no idea, I barely remember my own blood type, let alone anyone else on board." Jan said.

"How great is the risk of rejection for a replicated blood group?" Jan said.

Morgan considered, "I have a small supply of anti-rejection drugs. I stocked up in case there were any issues with your implant. By the way, your blood group is B negative. Fitting, don't you think, and unfortunately rare. The chances of another B- donor on board are... remote."

Pass tapped some commands into a PADD and handed it to Jones, "Put these into the Replicator and set the acuity up to 97.8. Bring back the bag of blood surrogate liquid stat."

He set up a stand for a drip and placed a cannula into Jan's arm. When the captain returned the drip was quickly set up and the cleaning continued. The process was slow and mucky, with a large number of individual strand needing extraction. Twice Jones was sent for more blood substitutes, but eventually Morgan found and removed all the debris ans was able to pack and bind the wound.

"That," he muttered at tying of the bandage, "Will hurt like hell for a week or more. If you treat it carefully, you should get full recovery. Given the track record of this crew, however, you will not do so and will have a permanent slight limp. Congratulations, if you manage to damage your back you will be a perfect for the Christmas rendition of Richard III."

Morgan looked around his work space. There were bloody tools, and bottles of antibiotics as well as discarded intravenous bags. He gave a sigh.

"Better help him to his bunk, Captain, while I try and repair THIS damage. Out of interest, how many crew did you loose, on average, before I joined?"

"Only ones that needed to die, if that helps at all. We've been pretty lucky to be honest. I think you might just be a harbinger for bad luck and wounds." Jones looked over at Jan. "Need a hand buddy?"

"Thanks." Jan said, grabbing Jones' hand.

"Doc get everything situated, when we get back to dock let me know and we'll get you some more medical equipment if they have any on the station get a wish list together. Within reason." Jones helped him off the table and threw Jan's arm over his shoulder. "Sound good?"

 

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