Posted by Ensign Rand Farquharson (Yeoman First Class) in side-sim: The Reckoning

Posted by Commander Roman Alden (First Officer & Chief Science Officer) in side-sim: The Reckoning

(snip)

She smiled, “A week?” Her look turned a little teasing, “That means for a whole week I don’t have to chase you down for reports.” She squeezed his hand again. “A week isn’t so bad, and you have all those recordings and observations from Kelmao to go over. You can do that here while I’m on duty, and I’ll stay with you until you get out. I promise. And I will find out exactly what light duty will mean and we‘ll get around that too.” When he said that it depended on the recovery she gave him a look. She knew that meant it depended on his attitude. “PT isn’t too bad. You like to stay fit and that’s all that is, just not jiu jitsu. Aaannnddd,” she drew the word out with a soft grin, “they do that in the gym. So I’ll just make sure I’m there to do yoga at the same time.”

He smiled a little. “When I’m not too out of it. The pain meds are mandatory. Elbbirt wouldn’t budge.” That and the fact that Elbbirt had said this recovery was going to be hard told Roman there was good reason not to avoid the medication. But that didn’t make him like its side effects any more. His smile became a little less tight when she stressed the ‘we’ in ‘we’ll get around light duty.’ “It means no walking or prolonged standing. Sitting only. I called it paperwork duty.” He said. PT was uncomfortable, controlled exercise in the presence of a doctor. Not as fun as jiu jitsu or running with Rand. Especially when it was a leg injury like his had been and was now, it mostly consisted of stretching. Or at least it had last time. And then he’d gradually been allowed to work into working out and doing exercise to restrengthen the muscles. She was succeeding in relaxing him, at least a little. His arms around her grew less stiff and he smiled when she said she’d make sure she was doing yoga at the same time. Then she could be there with him and it would be like when he was practicing jiu jitsu… and she had been watching. PT wouldn’t be quite as interesting to watch. But at least he could look over and see her there.

Rand squeezed his hand again, “There is no reason for you to be in pain. Especially considering how hard your body will have to work after the surgery. Besides,” she bumped his shoulder just a little, “if it makes you sleep, you can bank all that sleep for later.” She shook her head, “You know there are such things as rolling chairs with adjustable height. I’ll make sure to get one in lab for you. You’ll still be able to do all your lab work and not stand too much. And since it has wheels you can still move around the lab and feed and observe the animals. Just because you have to sit, doesn’t mean you can’t work.”

Roman smiled a little and shook his head. “If only sleep worked that way.” Her idea of a rolling chair sounded ridiculous. He pictured himself in an office chair with wheels, wheeling himself around the lab like a twelve year old. But she was right, it would get him around the requirements Elbbirt had set out for ‘light duty’. And he was sure there was a rolling chair that would look like it belonged in a lab. “Then you’ll have to chase me down for my reports again, but I’ll have wheels.” At least he was relaxed enough now to tease her back for earlier.

She took a moment to breath. An hour, well less than now. Then she looked him in the eye and nodded firmly. “Good. No reason to wait, you have to get better. Besides the waiting is worse than the doing.” Thank goodness for her acting, her voice didn’t crack. She couldn’t hide the fact she was worried for him, but at least her confidence in the doctors wasn’t wiped away by her blubbering. “I love you.” And then she kissed him.

Rand

Roman knew she was right. He knew, from his basic knowledge of anatomy, that part of the rush was to deal with the clots. One of those could cause problems at literally any minute. He nodded, a little less stiffly than before, keeping his eyes on hers. She was clearly worried for him, but she seemed more confident than he was, which seemed opposite usual to him. It actually made him feel a little better. If she was relaxed, what was he worried about? He was too worried himself to realize she was using her acting skills to seem more confident. The time was going by too quickly. Roman knew they’d be coming for him soon, but he was glad they’d given him time alone with her. Then she said what she said and he smiled again. “I love you, too.” She kissed him, and though he was more tense than usual, his hug still got tighter when he kissed her back.

Rand was in no hurry to end their kiss or stop hugging him. She could tell he’d relaxed a little, she didn’t expect a lot but was glad she seemed to help some.

Then the door opened and there were nurses coming in to get him ready for the surgery.

~ Lt Cmdr Alden, XO/CSO

It was Randy and Shrine. Shrine and Elbbirt had figured out Rand and Roman’s relationship before anyone else and she wasn’t phased to find them in an embrace. She just moved into the room busying herself. Rand sat up a little straighter, “I’ll be here when you wake up.” Then she looked at Randy, just to confirm that and he winked at her. He’d taken care of everything. Randy helped her down and took her back out to her biobed. “Try to rest Rand. I’ll be back later.” He returned to Alden and helped Shrine prep him for surgery. “Just remember Cmdr, when you wake up, your leg will be numb from the nerve block. We’ll remind you, but it will probably be the most disorienting thing right after.”

The kiss ended as Randy and Shrine entered, but Roman kept hold of her until Randy helped her down. “I’ll hold you to it.” He said as Randy helped her back out. Surgery prep made him feel more nervous again, something he wouldn’t show near Shrine. He nodded to the reminder. The nerve block would keep nervous signals from travelling to the brain from that region of the body. It would be handy in controlling the pain immediately after he woke up, but it would be like his leg was gone. He wouldn’t feel anything at all. It was infamously disorienting.

Soon it was time to put him out. They let Randy stay while they gave him the meds to put him out. As he felt himself losing consciousness, his body started fighting against it, trying to stay awake. It made him feel panicky and anxious, a feeling he was unaccustomed to. With a little more time and Randy’s help, he was fully out and ready to go.

The surgery was long. Randy was not a surgical nurse so once Alden was out he had to leave. He sat with as much as he could. Finally he ended up giving her something for her anxiety, put on one of her favorite films, and let her drift off for a few hours. Shrine set up the IVs and medications: pain, electrolytes for the potassium, anti-myoglobin, and precautionary antibiotics. Elbbirt was careful and methodical. The removal of the dead and damaged tissue was easy. The transplant of the vein and artery was also easy, but time consuming. Without the nerve block the pain as blood and oxygen returned to the area would have woken him, feeling like he was burning from the inside out. The tissue graft was placed and the dermal regenerator was put to work binding it to the remaining tissue. The neural regenerator was hard at work too. What took the most time, was going after each of the clots and removing them without damaging the arteries and veins. Elbbirt let the regenerators work for as long as he could after he was done and closed off the site.

The surgery was many hours long. Elbbirt’s methodical style made it take longer, but it was a good thing, it meant he was careful and thorough. After the leg was finished, fishing clots out of arteries and veins was never easy, but after Elbbirt’s work, the most threatening ones that were too large to break apart naturally were gone. It was a good thing they had anticipated the spike in the chemicals. Once blood returned to the area, it was not long before the sudden increase in potassium had his heart rate on the incline. But the preventative medicine kept him stable.

They moved Alden to surgical recovery along with the regenerators. Rand woke up a bit later and asked for Randy. “He did good. He’ll be asleep for a bit longer. The longer he’s out the better. We both know that.” His voice lowered, “But we aren’t supposed to let anyone in the recovery room, but I pulled a few strings. When he starts waking up, I’ll take you.

Roman was fully asleep for another hour and a half. The nice thing about medically induced sleep was, there was no dreaming. At least, not for Roman, there had never been. It was just inky blackness, and then an indescriminate amount of time passed, and it was over. Waking up came slowly as if paying him back for taking so long to go out in the first place. He stirred slowly, his fingers twitching before he had any awareness to what was around him.

True to his word, when Roman started to come out of the anesthesia Randy took Rand back to the room and set her up with a couple chairs beside his bed.

Rand and Randy

Roman felt groggy and tired. He couldn’t remember before he went out very well. His mind felt foggy, unclear. His body felt heavy, moving his arms felt like moving hundred pound sandbags. He found himself expecting the pain that had been in his leg for weeks now. The aching pain that had slowly worsened over the last few weeks had been there to greet him every morning, showing up as soon as he was awake at all. Now he felt nothing, nothing at all from that leg. The unexpected sensation of nothingness shocked him and pulled him out of his sleep a little faster.

A glance down told him that regardless of what his brain was detecting, he still had a leg there. Well bandaged and immobilized, it didn’t much look like his leg just then. Over the last three years Roman had become accustomed to his scar, what that part of his leg looked like. Seeing it bandaged like that again caused him to look around, alarmed, checking his surroundings.

No, the room looked nothing like the Ardent’s sickbay. Nor did it look like the sickbay he had spent an additional two months recovering and doing PT in three years ago after the rescue. And this felt too real to be another dream. But his mind was telling him that’s where he was. It was all too similar, save for the lack of pain. There was one person who hadn’t been there three years ago. “Rand? Rand! Miranda!” He called for her. His voice didn’t come out as loudly as he meant it to. It was quiet and slurred. The recovery room’s biobed would betray his momentary panic, showing the sudden increase in heart rate as his mind tried to tell him he was still aboard the Ardent, or in recovery in the year 2247.

~ Lt Cmdr Alden, XO/CSO