[Sickbay]: Round Four Scans and Vaccines

[ten_fwd_npcs]

There has been quite a lot of activity in Sickbay over the last couple of days. In addition to new guests arriving on the Enterprise, all of whom need to be cleared and vaccinated when necessary, there are the wounded who have come back from Alemar III and those looking in on them. Dr. Crusher has never been more glad that she isn't short-staffed.

While Lieutenant Worf and his security detail bring in the new passengers, Beverly ensures those recuperating have enough space and privacy. Beds may be limited, but nobody will be on the floor in her sickbay. For those who haven't been here before, Sickbay is fairly ordinary for a ship's hospital. There are no terrifying devices or humming machines you might see in a sci-fi thriller. The biobeds along the walls are equipped with biofunction monitors, but look fairly standard. Instead of silver trays filled with metal tools and sawblades, there are an array of small devices that look as harmless as cell phones.

As for the staff, they're all well-groomed and friendly. As a matter of fact, all personnel look harmless. Well, perhaps excluding the sun avatar, but Trance Gemini is as skilled as the Starfleet officers.

"All right, come in," one of them calls out as you enter. "Don't be shy. It's just a scan and a hypospray, nothing to worry about."


[ooc: Open log! For new characters (August and September apps), tagging isn't mandatory but ICly going to sickbay is. So if you'd prefer to skip threading with one of our doctors, you can handwave that your character got a clean bill of health and a shot and were sent on their merry way. For those who are tagging, we have Julian Bashir, Trance Gemini, and Simon Tam on deck, with Beverly Crusher by request only. So please specify in the subject line of your tag who you would like. For those returned from the Alemar III plot, if you are not requesting a thread with a doctor but would like your character open for visitors, put "Visiting Post" in your subject line, or specify if it's locked to specific visitors. If you would like more details about sickbay, here's the wiki page. If you haven't made your intro yet, you can assume the doctors will want to see your character shortly after they arrive, and backtagging is love!]

Comments

[deus_ex_harper]

Well here's someone to make Dylan feel better.

Though that is pretty questionable. But hey, Harper's turned up. He looks no worse than usual from the adventure on the planet. He's also kinda concerned for Dylan after everything that's happened and what's gone before. They needed to talk face to face.

"Hey boss." He smiled, at least he hoped it was a smile at Dylan. "Trance keeping you here?" Why yes, he does know about the Captain's bad habits.

[dreams_dont_die]

He hasn't actually spoken to Harper face to face in days. Not since he found out what Harper and Trance had been up to before he arrived on the Enterprise. They've spoken over the comms, the night when he'd told Harper exactly what he thought of that, and again, after the earthquake, when he'd just been so glad to hear Harper's voice and know he was alive that everything else had been pushed aside for the moment.

Right now?

It's just good to see his engineer again, looking very little the worse for the three days they'd all spent stuck on Alemar III.

"Harper," he says, in greeting, setting down the PADD. "I wouldn't be here otherwise."

To someone who knows him as well as Harper does, the fact that he actually needs to be in sickbay would be apparent. The injuries he'd picked up in the rockfall and fighting are healing, leaving just the remnants of a gash on his temple, but his face is thinner, more hollowed, than his crew are used to seeing it.

"You got off the planet okay, then."

That's more of a relief than he's about to admit out loud.

He'd been worried those three days, as much as he'd tried not to be.

[deus_ex_harper]

"Yeah, I got off that rock fine." He tried and failed to keep the little bit of anger or just plain frustration out of his voice, failing at it and falling flat. It reminded him of so many things and just one look into those caves had been enough for him to go hurrying away from them. Which had worked out in his favor in the end.

Harper smiled a little. "That's because you clearly need this time, boss. I suppose you'd want to leave it to me, your brilliant genius engineer to come up with a plan to spring you?" The engineer went from shuffling awkwardly at the bedside to picking up the PADD the captain had put down and sitting on the end of the bed. Immediately starting to play with it as a distraction from having a proper conversation with Dylan about the things they should be talking about.

[dreams_dont_die]

He hadn't had a chance to check up on his crew after everything went down that day. He'd wanted to; even after he'd spoken to Harper on the comms, he still wanted to really know Harper was okay, but the combination of the fight and the weakness that had left him barely able to move and Trance's overprotective fussing over him had left him without any chance to go looking for anyone, not even Harper.

"Better than me, then."

The bitterness isn't lost on Dylan. He well remembers the last time Harper had been stuck in caves; it had cost him a broken leg and telling Beka to kill him if he wasn't back in time to spring Tyr and Harper from the World Ship, and that was ... more recent for Harper than it was for him.

"Harper," he says, "you are not making any friends telling me I need to be here. But if you can come up with a way to spring me, you really are a genius."

Trance and Julian have been keeping an annoyingly close eye on him.

[deus_ex_harper]

"Well according to some people I don't make friends anyway." He poked at the PADD some more before he looked up.

"Nice try boss."

He made a face at Dylan. If he wanted to get into trouble with Trance, he'd give her some new plants, let her get to know them and then accidentally find a way of destroying them by accident in the name of science. He wasn't going to cross Trance. Even when she was purple he knew she was more than just the cute purple pixie. There was something there. Now she was golden and the way she dressed, which was totally hot though she was his best friend and he doubted that she saw him as more, which he wished sometimes.

"You didn't want me causing trouble."

[dreams_dont_die]

"It was worth trying."

Even if Harper is right that he'd warned him to keep out of trouble, to behave himself aboard the Enterprise. If Dylan were less bored with being stuck here, less annoyed with the whole situation, he'd appreciate that Harper at least is still remembering that.

Of course, that's really no the point of what Harper's saying. Dylan knows that tone too well to believe that Harper's just reminding him of what they'd said to each other before they went down to the planet.

Petulant is probably a good word.

"Yeah, I'd rather you avoid it."

[deus_ex_harper]

"What would you rather me be doing?"

A couple more taps at the PADD and he set it back down where he'd picked it up from, back in reach of Dylan.

He looked up at the captain. It still hurt. He'd felt terrible when he'd been told off. Sure, he'd been shouted at countless times before for this and that. Marched to then confined to quarters as well. But that time had been the worst yet. Including the countless times Beka had shouted at him.

[dreams_dont_die]

"Preferably something that won't call security down on you."

Sure. He knows Harper, along with the rest of the crew, has sometimes got problems with authority. Still, it shouldn't be that hard. Yes, here Harper isn't the engineer, any more than Dylan is the captain. They're not traveling the Known Worlds trying to find the remaining members for the Commonwealth. That doesn't mean that either of them can revert to doing whatever the hell they want.

Dylan just hasn't worked out what is is they should be doing yet, and that makes him as uncomfortable as any of the rest of this situation. It doesn't say much for his leadership, and that leaves him feeling edgy.

That, among other things, not least of which is knowing just how wrong things are between him and Harper, still.

Apparently the relief Harper had expressed at hearing from him down on the planet has run its course.

[deus_ex_harper]

That was part of the problem. Harper didn't have things to distract him. He didn't have a machine shop to go hide in. A problem to solve for Dylan in his great quest. Even his best friend had changed on him.

He's glad Dylan isn't dead. How mad would Rommie be at him, when it would have no doubt been the Captain's own good fault that he had got himself dead. Not Harper's. Even Rommie knew how stubborn the man could be.

"So you are still mad at me for that." He frowned at him, there was nothing in his hands any more to try and hide behind with his actions. "As if you didn't make me feel bad enough already with that. Going to do it again?"

[dreams_dont_die]

"That wasn't my plan."

Of course, it hadn't exactly been his plan the first time, either. He hadn't set out to upset Harper. Yes, he'd been furious, angrier than he's been with Harper in a long time. It hadn't been his plan, but ... as much as he leads his crew through respect, even friendship, rather than through any sort of imposed discipline, that has never meant that his crew can go without a talking-to when they need it, and Harper had needed it.

Anger fades. Dylan's never held anger with his friends or his crew for long. Anger, though, isn't entirely the point here and never was.

Usually, after he's had to tell Harper off, they stay out of each other's way, Harper in the machine shop, Dylan in command, and they come to an unspoken sort of understanding.

That hasn't happened here. Harper's still holding it against him, bitter, unhappy.

He lets out a long breath.

"I'm not still mad at you, Harper. I'm still disappointed."

He shakes his head.

"But I've said everything I have to say."

[deus_ex_harper]

Disappointed.

That word is worse.

It hurts.

Harper wants to hide, find a really small space and just hide.

Sat at the end of the bed as he was he looks like the kid being told off by his dad for something he did without thinking. It wasn't meant to be a callous action just something not thought through fully to keep one step ahead.

"Do you want me to leave?" He didn't quite look up to meet Dylan's eye.

[dreams_dont_die]

The disappointment isn't going away so easily. That needs time, time to prove that Harper really has listened to him, really understands what he'd said and just what had been wrong about what he'd done. But instead of that understanding, what he's getting from Harper is sniping and needling.

"No, Harper. I'm glad you came to see me."

But the conversation is awkward, forced, and it's clear that's down to their discussion before they'd gone to Alemar III. He just doesn't know what to do about it.

Or what Harper expects him to do. He's tired, he's sick, and he's not taking back what he'd said.

It had to be said.

[deus_ex_harper]

If Harper would tell Dylan about what had happened and what he'd done Alemar III to help Steve it probably would have gone a way to helping with everything but he was too busy not wanting to for him to actually do that.

"I'm glad you're not dead." It was some admission even if his reasoning behind it was a little flawed. He wasn't going to mention the reason.

[dreams_dont_die]

"I've made it this far. No earthquake's going to get me," he says, with the self-assurance he can summon so easily, even if he's never really as certain as he sounds.

It had been too close, he'd been too foolish, going down there without any preparation or supplies, either of which would have made the days they'd been stuck in there much easier. And stopped him winding up being sedated and hauled into sickbay by Trance.

One corner of his mouth tightens.

"I'm glad you're not, too. Smart of you to stay out of the caves."

Not surprising, given the world ship thing, but smart.

[deus_ex_harper]

Harper for a moment forgets everything about how upset he is with Dylan at the mention of staying out of the caves. The memory of the world ship is still a little too vivid for his liking.

He looked at Dylan, he wanted to explain why he didn't go down there but that was more demons that he had to battle still. He wished Rev was there then. "Smart? Try afraid."

[dreams_dont_die]

"Yeah."

He'd been on the Magog World Ship, too. He'd gone down there to pull his crew off that hellish thing. He'd searched those endless labyrinthine caves for Harper and Tyr, had fought off Magog to try to protect them. Had pulled their asses out of there in one piece. But Dylan suffered no worse damage down there than a broken leg that was healed in a few days.

Harper had come out of it the worst, carrying the legacy of the Magog attack. They hadn't been good weeks or months that followed for him, and for Harper, that nightmare's only just ended. Of course caves had a bad association for him.

He'd hoped that Harper would have kept out of the caves when he was stuck down on the planet, and ... it hadn't taken much to guess why when he'd found out he had.

"I know."

Harper's perched on the edge of the bed, but Dylan sits a little straighter, leans forward, presses one hand, just for a couple of moments, to Harper's shoulder.

Nothing that's happened here changes the fact that Harper's on his crew and his crew, for Dylan, are the closest he has to family.

[deus_ex_harper]

Harper looked at Dylan's hand on his shoulder then at Dylan directly for the first time in a good chunk of the conversation. Making a face he then moved suddenly forwards and wrapped his arms around Dylan in a hug. Or the best attempt at one given that they were both sat down.

He didn't say anything, well he would have been very muffled if he had tried to speak hugging Dylan awkwardly like that.

[dreams_dont_die]

Dylan's eyebrows raise for a surprised moment, but then he hugs Harper, too, his arms around the engineer's skinny shoulders.

This place is hard on them. It's hard on Harper, it's hard on Dylan, and whatever's happened between them, Dylan's still Harper's captain, and he's always valued his responsibility for the welfare of his crew very highly.

"It's okay," he says, softly, glancing upwards through the hair that's flopping to one side of his forehead.

For now, it is. And the parts of it that aren't ... they're Dylan's to deal with. That's what being the captain means.

[deus_ex_harper]

Harper moved to sit back up.

There would be some point that Harper would have to deal properly with what had happened to him on the world ship and happened with the Magog larvae when he'd arrived on the Enterprise but this time wasn't it. He'd admitted something to Dylan which was more than enough.

"Trance'll let you out soon enough, if you behave well enough."

[dreams_dont_die]

He's not surprised that Harper changes the subject. Or that he pulls, fairly quickly, out of the hug. It's been ... hard for any of them to try to help Harper deal with the world ship and the Magog infestation. Even after the larvae were removed.

If Harper will let him help, he will, but Dylan knows better than to try to push it, especially since Harper is still annoyed with him.

Even if the hug is an unexpected step forward.

"I don't think you could call it 'soon enough'," he says, tapping his fingers on the bed. "That would be right now."

Dylan doesn't realize just how haggard his face still looks, or how weak he'd still be if Trance or the other medical staff let him out of bed.

"I think there are too many doctors around here for me to try to escape, so maybe she'll get what she wants."

[deus_ex_harper]

"You really mean yesterday." As if it wasn't obvious that Dylan really wanted to get out of there. Harper may at least be safe in the knowledge he is free to escape without being fussed over. Three days not eating, that's nothing.

He stood up to go. "One last thing boss, you look like crap." Because it needed to be said. He'd wanted to say it since he saw him but he couldn't just retreat again as soon as he said hello.

[dreams_dont_die]

Yeah. Yesterday probably is what he means. He gives Harper a wry look.

"Pretty much."

Not that there's really all that much he could be doing if he weren't stuck in bed, but too long under medical supervision makes him restless, and too long is pretty much any time other than quick stop by med deck to get patched up for something.

With the medical technology available on the Andromeda, it usually doesn't take more than that.

Harper's parting shot makes him purse his lips.

"Thank you, Mr Harper. I knew I could rely on your support."

The sarcasm is mostly because he's annoyed at the fact it's probably true. But still. It's not exactly the kindest thing Harper's ever said to him.

[deus_ex_harper]

It wasn't just the medical tech that was more advanced on the Andromeda so Dylan could have been out of there. Harper missed everything about that ship. Mostly a certain creation of his. He'd even go so far to say he missed the chaos that following Dylan around brought because they had that gorgeous ship to take care of them and she had pulled them though a lot so far.

Oh yeah, he missed Rommie.

"You're welcome boss." Harper grinned. It may not have been exactly the nicest thing Harper had said to him but it wasn't the worst and it was true.