milliways_bar | (no subject)

[OOM: Gabriel Tam gives a speech to a cheerful crowd, and to a few surprise guests.

And things really, really don't go as planned.]

The door slams open, and Regan Tam runs through. For once, she's neither composed nor immaculate, though she was a short while ago; her hair is straggling, her face white and eyes wild. She grabs the door, holding it open.

The reason becomes clear an instant later, from the cavalcade that follows: Galadan, bearing an unconscious and blood-drenched Gabriel Tam in his arms. Gabriel's face and chest are laid open, deep awful wounds seared black at the edges. Beside him hurries Simon Tam, taut and intent; taking up the rear comes River, her skirt soaked with red and her hands streaked with it. She scans the room with a bodyguard's sharp paranoia, as the group hurries towards the infirmary.

[OOC: They're going to be heading straight for the infirmary and not likely to change course, but this is not at all plot-locked! Feel free to notice, to try to interact if you don't mind your character getting a very distracted response, or to have your character stop by to help or stare.

Also, warnings for a fair bit of gore in the above OOM.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Simon's already got a particular drawer open, reaching for one of the medical devices from Dr. McCoy's world -- one of the handful whose function he fully understands, and which he will use in an emergency.

"Take pressure off the wound on my mark," he says, stepping close on the other side. His thumb finds the switch, brings the protoplaser to humming life; his other hand touches the control pad once, twice, setting it to venous repair.

She can't watch.

She's always had a strong stomach, been proud of it even, but this is Gabriel, this is her husband bleeding and gasping in horrible choking wheezes on the table, and she can't watch.

Regan turns away convulsively, one hand pressed hard to her mouth.

I will be as stone, she thinks. I will be as stone and as cool water.

She cannot afford to fall apart yet.

"River," she whispers, reaching out -- her daughter's face she can look at, and the look on it is tearing her apart -- and somehow she finds words. "It'll be all right, River."

Is she lying to her child again?

Whether she is or not, River comes to her; Regan holds her close, smooths her daughter's tangled hair while River stares beyond her shoulder, and prays.

She's not sure who all these people are, but that this is a tense and private situation, she understands. And what little she can do here, she can pass on. At only a small personal cost.

"Simon," she says. She slips something out of the wide yellow sash around her waist; it's a thin leather satchel he's seen before. First she takes a potion from it, a narrow vial filled with pale blue liquid.

"This should heal him completely. I understand why it's not a good idea, but, if it's necessary. And if he--if you start to lose him--"

"This is phoenix down." It's a tiny scrap of feather-shaped flame in a small glass jar. "If you start to, lose him, break it under his nose. It'll pull him back--stabilize him--and do a small amount of healing."

Hawkeye moved out of the way at Simon's nod, and -- he paused there, just for a moment, to watch the (impossible) device do its (impossible) work.

Wonder or not, though, Hawkeye Pierce is a doctor, and he does his job. He turns away, rolling up his sleeves with hands spattered with still-warm blood, and he goes on the hunt for an IV and a couple of units of blood.

The protoplaser isn't impossible; no more than artificial gravity, or the printing press. It's just ... very, very complicated. The theory behind it makes perfect sense.

The blue potion and the phoenix feather Yuna holds out to him, now -- those are impossible.

But so was the injury in the first place.

Simon nods at her. "Thank you. Could you -- there on the counter, please."

He'll use them if he needs to. Meanwhile, his hands are busy with stopping the bleeding, and next he'll need to do an internal scan --

"Yuna, you were able to tell there was poison in the wounds. Can you tell if there are any other internal injuries? Anything not immediately visible?"

She shakes her head. "No--only how badly injured he is. It's, a scale, of brightness. He's still very fragile, but I think--"

"Yuna." Kimahri stands--or rather, looms--in the doorway. "Time."

Yuna has a lot of practice understanding Kimahri. "Time is moving." It's happened before, when more than one of them was here.

"Door open." She nods. "I'm sorry I have to--the feather, and the potion, should do everything I could. I'm sorry!"

There is a large, blue, grunty catman. No one else seems to notice this, though, or think it strange, so Hawkeye keeps his thoughts to himself and focuses on the task at hand.

That task involves assisting Simon, for the most part; the other doctor assumed the lead role without a word, and Hawkeye doesn't question him. Not with the vibe that he's getting out of this room.

With the two of them working together, the gashes (they look, Hawkeye registers, like they were made by something very big and very angry) in the patient's face, shoulder, and deep into the muscle of the chest, are sutured. He is hooked up to an IV and given several units of blood.

Hawkeye's mental catalogue of the man's injuries just keeps getting longer and longer.

The broken ribs--marked by bruising, already beginning to turn sour colors--are handled with a supportive bandage, while a salve is applied to the second-degree burns on the shoulder and the side.

The worst of it is the internal damage. Simon's the man with the future knowledge, though, and the future equipment, and Hawkeye is more than happy to let him be the one to find a medication that will ease the patient's breathing.

Bruises, contusions, exhaustion, and some lower-level burns -- but the man's alive.

He's alive.

And, eventually, awake -- enough to squeeze Regan's hand, and smile with drugged grogginess at them all.

He looks like hell, worse than Regan's ever seen, and she's never been happier to see it.

Looking around the room, she whispers "It's going to be all right, River," and this time she really believes it.

Gabriel Tam has to be seen again back on Londinium; Galadan is adamant about that. And, even Simon has to reluctantly concede, he's right -- a concession Simon will make only once he's certain Gabriel is stable enough to be moved safely.

There's a particular hospital. Bajian Li and his people will get them there.

The wheelchair procession from the infirmary to the front door stops once, as Simon veers aside to where Zoe's sitting at the bar for a quick, quiet word. She glances toward the group in concern, and nods.

He rejoins the group as Regan opens the front door.

He's aware of River staying close by his side, of everyone's worry, and dazedly Gabriel thinks that he should find some way to reassure them all. He can't quite come up with anything well-thought-out, not much more than a smile and a squeeze of River's hand, or Regan's, but it'll have to do. He hopes it's enough.

As his chair is pushed toward the door, however, Gabriel catches his son's eye, and smiles with something very like pride.

"Jīngcăi," he manages, quietly. "A brilliant doctor."

And then they're through the door, which closes behind them, and heading down the corridor.

Anita Horst bursts into tears when she sees Regan, and Bajian Li's first lieutenant looks visibly disconcerted as he pats her awkwardly on the back. Li himself is gritting his teeth almost hard enough to crack them, but that doesn't stop him from looking relieved.

Minutes later, they're whisked away to the hospital-- location undisclosed, of course.

After all, things have changed.