Posted by Lieutenant Siegfried Abel (Chief Medical Officer) in Side sim - I’m not a Medic, but I play one… (CMO)

Posted by Lieutenant Ka’Lissi Rosh (Chief Engineer) in Side sim - I’m not a Medic, but I play one… (CMO

She was cradling her arm as she headed for medical. The holo program had won, again. At least, this time, it hadn’t drawn blood. She had deflected the blow of the blade, but her hand had twisted at an odd angle and something had popped. She hadn’t given it any thought till two more strikes later, her fingers went numb and she had dropped the blade. She stopped the holo before the Klingon warrior could slice back towards her unprotected midsection.

But now, here she was, an hour before end of second shift, walking into medical and heading straight for the far wall where several drawers and cabinets lined the wall. She was looking for the pain hypo and a muscle relaxer. The drawers had been rearranged since the last time she was on the ship. A soft frown lit her face as she moved thru the drawers, careful to not mess the contents up. A nurse walked by commenting on the holo winning yet another one. Lissi smiled and shook her head. “Yeah… At least no blood this time,” she said as the nurse went went around the corner.

Lt Ka’Lissi Rosh
CE

A pleasant but questioning voice came from behind her. “Um… hello? You really shouldn’t be doing that. Can I help you?” The man behind her was red haired and with bright,strikingly bright, green eyes. He had a slightly puzzled look on his young-ish face.

Able, CMO

She didn’t turn at first, a slight hiss of pain added to her words. Thankfully she wasn’t hurt so bad she was snippish. “Looking for the Pain Hypo and the Anti inflammatory. They were in the third drawer last time I was here.” She went thru the 4th and 5th drawers before continuing. “It’s all right. The Doc knows I,” she turned around to ask for help, “do this all the… OH!” she realized it was a CMO before her. And it wasn’t who she had expected.

“I’m uh… I’m Ka’Lissi Rosh. I umm…” she held up the slowly swelling wrist, “little mishap on holodeck.” She smiled warmly like nothing was amiss. Her forehead ridge was barely there. Most didn’t see it if they weren’t looking. And other than her slightly sharper teeth, it was almost impossible to tell she was half Klingon till she was scanned. The eight chamber heart and slightly heightened metabolism were the only real signs.

Lissi
CE

Able smiled and said “Ah, yes… the wayward Chief Engineer that has never responded to my requests for an updated physical.” The words were harsh, but the smile was genuine. “Hypos are no longer pre-loaded for anything other than the crash carts. Now…” and he held an arm indicating a bio bed, “… I will ask you to kindly stop rummaging through my drawers and take a seat, and I will take a look at that wrist.”

Able, CMO

She grit her teeth and inhaled then exhaled. “Of course,” she finally said and moved to the bed. “I have been seeing to my own designs for some time before I departed. And I assure you, I have not ignored you. Till this evening, I have not had opportunity. But I will be happy to come back in the morning and let you poke and prod to your heart’s contentment if you will just be kind enough to give me a slight pain killer for the pain shooting up my arm and the anti inflammatory for the muscles that were wracked about 30 min ago, now.” She merely nodded to him with respect at the request and then to the cabinets where she guessed they were but hadn’t had a chance to look.

Lissi
CE

Abel’s smile never left his face, but his green eyes flashed. “Lieutenant, may I ask you a question? And dont answer, because that was rhetorical. Do you ever see me in Engineering at odd hours, rummaging through your tools and equipment because I knew better how to fix the replicator in my quarters than you? And did I ever tell you how to repair the replicator in my quarters while I was arm deep within its components? Again.. rhetorical. The answer is ‘No.’ You haven’t seen that. And do you know why? Because I trust you to do what you know how to do. So… instead of you and I playing doctor, how about you let me look at you, do what needs to be done, and then we can see about that physical, ya? Excellent.” and he held out his one hand and pulled a medical recorder from his doctor’s coat pocket with the other.

Able, CMO

“My apologies, Doc. You are right. I guess sometimes old habits die hard. I shall work on coming to the medical bay and seek medical attention from those within instead of riffling thru the drawers.” She sighed and held out her wrist. There was a dark patch on her wrist bone at the base of her thumb where something had struck her hard. The swelling and color moved out from that location.

Perhaps if she just gave in, quietly, she could get out of there faster.

Lissi
CE

Abel looked at it and ran the tricorder over it. “What did you get hit with, Lieutenant?” he asked as a furrow creased his brow. “And it’s not the first time, is it?”

Abel, CMO

She frowned, the crease on her brow shadowed slightly. “No, sir. It’s not. And a bat’leth handle struck it.” She hadn’t had to account for her late night aches, pains, and injuries in a long time, either. And it bit her deeply that she would have to start the whole exercise of trust over again. “Just a sparring practice is all.”

Lissi
CE

Abel closed the tricorder and looked at her. “Well, no sparring for a week. You have a radial fracture of your trapezius bone and a severe subdermal hematoma. So you, my dear Lieutenant, get to spend the next four to six hours on my bed. So lay back and let me work.”

He went to a set of drawers and came back with an osteoregenerator. Setting the device, he attached it to her wrist and then said “Scale if one to ten, what is your pain?”

Abel, CMO

She frowned and started to shift her hips back and forth on the table to scoot back without using her wrist to push her. “I guess… well, I mean, it’s a ten. But I’ve been at this level often enough, and worse, that it feels, at this point, like a… a seven? I never know how to answer that. Head was swimming when I came in. Just pounding now, from the pain.” She would rather discuss the pain than the reason for it. And she wasn’t one to normally lie off the bat. So while part of her was still leery about the Doc, the other part of her knew it was a friend she should make.

For both their sanities.

Lissi
CE

Abel listened to her as she spoke but watched the biobed monitors and the device on her wrist. “Let me rephrase my question. On a scale of one to ten, where one is no pain and ten is you being slowly boiled bit by bit for weeks on end until your bones liquify all the while you are covered in ice cold acid, what is your pain?”

Abel, CMO

Lissi laughed and relaxed a bit. “Very well put… well on THAT scale, probably a seven.” She watched him a moment and smiled. “Careful, Doc. I think you may be the first Medical person I don’t hate just on principle.” She exhaled and let the wrist relax. Unfortunately, it made it throb. “Ok, I lied… an eight. I guess it was more than a sprain.” It was the closest she would probably get to an apology. But it’s all she had to offer.

Lissi
CE

He looked at her with a look on his face of ‘Really? Ya think?’ and then smiled and shook his head. “One moment.” he said and went back to the cabinet and returned with a hypo spray. Dialing in a dose, he held it to her neck and pressed the activation. A short hiss, and he put the device in his pocket.

“There. Give that a minute and you should feel better.” and he moved a chair and took a seat next to the bed. Still looking at the monitors, he said “I overheard the nurse say ‘again’. I take it this is a normal occurrence, then?”

Abel, CMO

Her return look was a shrug and ‘what did you expect?’ but she silently took the pain killer and closed her eyes a moment to will it to work faster, despite knowing it wouldn’t work. When she heard the chair move, she opened them and looked at the Doc. “The hand? Well, usually its the hand or arm.” She took a deep breath and sighed as she turned to her head to look up at the ceiling, wanting nothing more than to escape. “There is a sparring program I use with the safety a bit on the low side. Not ‘off’ mind you, but still. You can’t learn if you can’t get hurt. Right?” She looked at him for validation on the thought process.

Lissi
CE

He looked at her, a combination of humor and confusion on his face. His to e was that of addressing a friend who just said something a bit foolish and he was ‘calling them out’. “What? No! Of course you can learn without getting hurt. That’s the whole point of learning, to do it right with limited error. Perhaps you should focus on mastering the basics before you lower the safeties. At least then, you would be able to practice more often without time off for injury. As is the case…” and he held both of his hands out palm side up as if presenting the regenerator on her wrist for the first time “… right now.” and he smiled and shook his head, looking back up at the monitors.

Abel, CMO

She frowned. “I have the basics down. You can learn all the moves, all the counter moves. But until you are in a real time, real situation,” she closed her eyes a second and laughed. “Or rather, simulation,” you can’t get the muscle reflex. You can’t train your biceps to press back against the smack of their blade on yours. You can’t train your other muscles to tense on a strike. That’s just flexing. But without resistance, without the slamming down of steel on steel, you can’t learn it truly.” She looked at him and her words were filled with the past failings of her life. “You can learn what to do at any given moment, your whole life. But you can’t know it till you experience it.” She glanced down at her wrist still encased in the small machine.

After a sigh, she glanced back up at the ceiling and shook her head. “And if I miss of working the sim again cause I sprained my wrist, so be it. It’s better than laying on this bed for a week while you rebuild my leg, or arm, or spine…” her voice dropped slightly, “or worse…”

Her left hand, hopefully tucked out of sight as she thought of it, was clenched tightly to keep from railing. He didn’t deserve it.

Lissi
CE