Life Onboard Serenity: #42 - Of Jobs, Vaults and Things Gone Wrong
POSTED BY: EnglishIvy
UPDATED: Tuesday, June 23, 2009 22:19
VIEWED: 30582
PAGE 7 of 14
John had learned long ago not to ask questions when getting Simon was involved. He rushed to the infirmary and found the man standing there.
"Simon," he said
"Oh," Simon said turning, "I guess we're lucky no one got shot out there. Are we leaving now?"
"Not quite so lucky, someone's hurt." Without replying Simon grabbed his bag and went up to the cargo bay. John followed but stopped when they entered and he noticed Doc standing still in a corner. As Simon made his way to the hatch, John approached her.
"Guess we're on the same boat again."
"I don't like it."
"Soesn't change the facts."
johnttf
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
"Kao!" shouted Pain as another hail of lead rained in his and Tommy's direction. "We certainly could use some backup right about now, don't you think?"
He fired again at the guys from ship, sending them ducking behind cover. Another round from the remaining gunman on the stairs whizzed past Pain's head. He turned and fired in the man's direction, hitting him in the gut and causing him to stagger. Pain aimed lower and shot the man in the groin, causing him to fall down the stairs.
He wondered why Tommy wasn't firing back and asked, "Babe? How come I ain't hearin' anythin' comin' from your end?" When he didn't get a response from her, he made his way over to her crate, firing his gun behind him. When he got to her all the color drained from his face. The next words that came out of his mouth were just barely above a whisper, "Lao tyen boo."
Tommy laid on the ground motionless. He saw three bullet wounds and quite an amount of blood pouring out of them and starting to pool around her. Bullet #1 had punctured her lower right lung. Bullet #2 had nicked her aorta, which was where most of the blood was coming from. It wasn't major, but it looked that way to Pain. Finally bullet #3 had drilled its way through her left shoulder. His heart sank lower into his body as he dropped his gun and went to work on trying to stop the bleeding. He checked for a pulse and found one, albeit very weak.
Bullets struck the crates around Pain, distracting him from what he was doing. He growled and picked up his gun, aiming it in the direction the bullets had come from and emptied the magazine in a fury of rage and anger. Ejecting the spent magazine, Pain dropped down beside Tommy and loaded another into the gun as best he could. He wished he had some help right now. Either to stop Tommy's bleeding, shoot those shooting at him, or both.
"Wuh de tyen ah." he whispered, as he jackeded a round into the chamber. "Please don't let my baobei die."
There were more gunshots now, but coming from the other direction. Pain looked up and saw 13 wielding his dual submachine guns. He acknowledged Pain and made his way over after spraying a full auto burst in the direction of the other ship.
"She's hurt, man. She's badly hurt. I.. I don't know how long she's got. We need to stop the blood loss and get her to Serenity's infirmary quick." replied Pain as he talked about Tommy.
"I see that." replied 13 in almost a deadpan tone. He looked down at her and raised an eyebrow at Pain as he asked, "And I suppose she wants a medal for that?" 13 checked his pockets and shrugged as he said, "Drat. I'm out of medals."
Pain looked up at 13, his eyes filled with anger, rage, and sadness. He pointed his gun at him and seethed, "She needs medical attention now. Get her to the infirmary. Now!"
"No." 13 simply said, looking straight into the mercenary's eyes. There was another hail of gunfire and 13 fired a burst in its direction, hitting the person who fired it in the arm.
"No?" Pain repeated though clenched teeth, anger in his breath as his blood started to boil. He tightened his grip on his pistol and continued, "She could die any second and you're refusin' to help save her life? What the rutt is wrong with you, Bot Boy?"
"Nothing that can't be repaired with a little self diagnostic work." 13 calmly said. "And yes, I'm not taking her to the infirmary right now because there's still the threat comin' from the other ship."
"Well do somethin' about it and THEN help me or so help me God, I'll blow your ruttin' circuit board to motherruttin' pieces with a grenade!" shouted a furious Pain.
13 rolled his eyes and feigned a sigh as he said, "Fine, you big bawling baby. I'll go take care of the big scary bad men." As he headed in the direction of the other ship's cargo bay, 13 muttered, "Whiner."
13 moved towards the other ship as the last of the other crew opened fire on him. The bullets punctured his clothing, but did nothing to harm him. As they kept firing on 13, he ejected the spent magazines from his SMGs and slapped in new ones. As the
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Pain got up to follow 13 as he carried Tommy back to the ship. He looked down at the pool of blood where Tommy had been laying. There was a lot of blood there. A lot. He picked up her gun and sprinted to the cargo bay door where Mal was standing guard, as Pain ran by, he slammed the door shut.
"River! We're all on!" Mal yelled into the comm. "Get us into the black!"
13 came out of the infirmary and started up the stairs. Bright red covered his shirt. God, that was a lot of blood. Pain fought the urge to rip 13’s circuitry from his robotic body with his bare hands, but it was the blood on 13’s shirt that jerked him back into reality.
“You owe me a shirt, Pain,” 13 yelled down to him.
Again, the want to blow 13 to bits with a grenade entered into his mind. Instead, Pain rushed into the infirmary, where Simon was working frantically on her. The monitor showed no heartbeat.
“Simon?” Pain asked hopefully. He hoped that what he was seeing on the monitor was wrong.
Please, don’t let her die. Please, don’t let her die. Please, don’t let her die. he prayed to himself.
“Her heart’s stopped,” Simon simply said and he kept working.
“Fix her then!” Pain urged him.
“Pain, I might not be able to.”
The stress of the past few moments caught up with Pain: Ivy getting shot, his not being able to help her and 13’s refusal to help. He snapped.
“FIX HER!” he demanded forcefully. Simon glanced up at Pain only to find himself looking down the business end of Pain’s gun. Pain’s voice got eerily calm. “Or I will end you.”
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
He was interuptted by Tommy, Pain, and 13's sudden enterance. The fact that he hadn't felt her coming worried him. She wasn't feeling anything. He pushed in to her consciousness and managed to feel her there, clinging to life. He hoped she would live.
"She'll be fine, get over it." Doc said from behind him.
"See this is the problem with you! You have no feeling toward others. SHE GOT SHOT! and you just stand there all put out. Get over yourself."
"Whoa, we got a problem here," the captain said approaching.
"No, captain, we'll be fine." John shook as the ship took off.
johnttf
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Infirmary
Quote:
Originally posted by EnglishIvy:
“Or I will end you.”
"Ending me won't reverse her condition, Pain." replied Simon. "In fact it would make it quite worse."
"Well do somethin' then!" Pain demanded, his gun still trained on the doctor, finger hovering over the trigger. "Anythin' to get her breathin' again!"
His eyes began to tear up at the sight of seeing her near lifeless body laying in the tilted back exam chair. She wasn't that far off from fading completely away. He had failed at protecting her. Broken his promise that she would be safe with him nearby. One minute she was helping him dispatch some people shooting at them and the next she was lying in a pool of her own blood with three bullet holes in her body. It was his fault she was this way. He should've done a better job of making sure she was safe. He should've let her stay back on the ship instead of tag along with him.
Pain's emotions got the best of him and he felt his gun start to shake in his hand. He quickly took his finger off the trigger and lowered the gun. He walked over to Tommy's right side and collapsed to his knees. He dropped his gun on the floor and took her hand in his. He gave it a squeeze and a kiss before nuzzling it with his cheek. Her skin felt like ice next to his.
He looked at her as a tear rolled down his cheek and splashed on her hand. His voice wavered as he whispered to her, "I love you, baobei. With all my heart." He sniffled and placed another kiss on her hand. Turning his head to look up at Simon, Pain pleaded, "Please, doc. Save her. For me."
Seeing the big mercenary go from dangerous to a pleading crying mess in mere seconds must've touched a nerve in Simon as he walked over to the man, placed a hand on his left shoulder and said, "I'll see what I can do, but I've got to get her heart beating first before I can assess the damage."
"Thank you." Pain managed to eke out, as he continued to hold onto Tommy's hand.
"It's what I do, Pain. I'm a doctor." replied Simon as he took out a pair of cardiac infusers.
He proceeded to hook her up to the machines in the infirmary and then moved onto unbuttoning her shirt. He noticed that she didn't wear a bra, but that didn't matter to him none as he was in doctor mode now. He placed the infusers on her chest and felt her body arch as the electrical charge ran through her body in an attempt to get her heart beating again. When the line and tone on the heart rate monitor stayed flat, Simon charged up the infusers again and shocked her once more. He did it over and over again until he got a heartbeat. It was faint and erratic, but it was a heartbeat and that was a start.
He gave her some drugs to stabilize it and then went to work on getting her patched up. However Pain was in the way and Simon calmly asked, "Pain? I need you to move so I can get to her wounds. You can have a seat on the counter."
"OK." Pain replied as he gave Tommy's hand a kiss once more and got up to move to the counter. As he sat up on it, he asked, "How is she?"
"She lost quite a lot of blood." replied Simon as he cleaned her wounds and started to fix the damage the bullets caused. As he removed bullet fragments from Tommy, he continued, "I've got a little bit of the artificial blood I used on you. I can start her off on that, but she's going to need a transfusion of the real stuff after. I'll run a scan through the crew records for a match to her blood type, but only after I get both her and you patched up."
"That's fine, doc." replied Pain, feeling a bit better now that there was some hope for Tommy, but still guilty for her getting shot. He winced as he tried to move his right arm and said, "Thanks again, doc. For everything."
"You're welcome." replied Simon, not looking up as he continued on with his work.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
The Infirmary
Ivy felt the jerking and the electricity course through her body, not once, not twice but many many times. But she wasn't feeling ay pain. It was odd.
She felt someone holding her hand. They were saying somethig, but she wasn't sure what it was. She could tell by the inflection in their voice that it was Pain.
Pain.
Her heart skipped a second, then she felt it start to beat again.
Huh, she thought.
She got up from the table only to look back and still see herself lying there. She looked into the cargo bay and where the doors should be was a bright light. She took a couple of steps forward, but stopped. She looked back at Pain, who was distraught and clinging to her hand, before moving back to the counter to let Simon work. He looked so sad...
"Tommy?" she asked, but she got no response. "Tommy?"
Again nothing. She got alarmed for a bit, but then she noticed something else. The pain from her experiences during the last couple of years was gone. She was whole again. She felt... good. She didn't need Tommy anymore.
She looked back at the bright light, only to see her Daddy standing there.
"Daddy?" she exclaimed as she went closer the light.
But then there was Pain. She looked at him again. He seemed broken and so sad. The big man had tears in his eyes.
As she stood in the middle of the cargo bay, she looked back and forth between the light and Pain. She didn't know where to go. So she ran. Ran so she might be able to think without distraction. Ran without even thinking where she was going.
She didn't even see John as she ran through him, but she felt him shudder because of it. She only stopped when she got to the bridge. Looking out into the black, she tried to think.
"You shouldn't be up here," she heard someone say to her.
"I know, River," Ivy said back to her. "But I don't know what I should do."
Ivy looked at River who stood next to her and River looked her back in the eye.
"You know you need to pick."
Ivy's eyes refocused onto the view outside the ship.
"I know," Ivy admitted. "But I can't. Not quite yet."
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Once John and the captain left the cargo bay, Evelyn glanced surreptitiously around for anyone else. Finding no one, she approached the only person around - her commanding officer.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, trying hard to make it sound like a simple question and not accusatory or anything.
-------------------------------------------------
"See, I've secretly been kind of a fan of me for some time now. I've seen everything I've ever done. I'd love to meet me, but I'd probably just stare and not be able to say anything witty or anything." -- Joss Whedon
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Infirmary
Simon took out the last of the bullet fragments of the bullet that had struck her shoulder and started to patch it up. Pain had insisted that he do the best he could in order to make the scaring minimal. He told Simon that the four scars on her back were all that he could handle at the moment. Simon assured Pain that he would do his best, but there would be a possibility of some slight and rather faint scaring.
As Simon closed up the wound and sanitized the tools, he looked at the bag of synthetic blood hooked up above Ivy. It was about a third of the way gone. Luckily the records indicated that Mal was a match for her blood type, so he would have to call him in for a transfusion. But right now that could wait as Pain's wound needed his attention right now. He removed the blood soaked piece of shirt Pain had used to bandage it and discarded it into the trash can.
He looked at it thoroughly from both sides and said to Pain, "Looks like it just went through the muscle and didn't hit bone. I should be able to patch it up with no problem, but you're going to be a little weak due to the blood loss. I suggest you stay here for a while for observation."
"That's fine by me, doc." replied Pain as he looked over at Ivy, a blanket covering her up to her neck. "I've got nowhere more important to be other than here."
His eyes looked over her covered body. She was hooked up to various machines, all keeping stats on her vitals. Simon even had her hooked up to a ventilator. Pain watched as it moved up and down in tune to her breathing.
Turning his attention to Simon, Pain winced as Simon worked on him and asked, "Ho..OW! How is she, doc?"
"Stable for now." replied Simon, deeply involved in his work. There weren't any bullet fragments to remove which was good. That meant it was just a straight patch and mend job.
As Simon resumed his work, he continued, "She'll be unconscious for some time and I'll need to monitor her." Putting his instruments aside, he examined his work and said, "There finished. Let me put a covering over that. Just take it easy for a few days and it should be fine."
"Thanks." replied Pain as Simon wrapped a dressing over Pain's wound.
"It's my job." replied Simon, giving the bandage a once over, before checking on Ivy again.
Once he saw that she was doing OK, Simon left the infirmary to go tell Mal that his blood type matched Ivy's. Pain looked at her and walked over to her, taking a seat next to her. His right hand found hers' and gave it a squeeze. He winced at the pain that emanated from his patched up wound. He should've asked for something to numb it, but he refused, seeing that the pain would remind him of what he got Ivy into. Pain looked at her laying there until he heard footsteps enter the infirmary. Looking up, he saw that it was River.
"You need to call him." she said to him from the doorway.
"Call who?" Pain asked.
"Grayson." River replied back, stepping closer to Pain. Sticking out her hand she held Ivy's CorPad. "You can reach him on this. He needs to know."
"But won't Mal be a little on the fence about me callin' a Fed? Especially if'n it's to come aboard his ship?" Pain asked, an eyebrow raised at the mind reader. "He ain't exactly keen on havin' Feds traipsin' about on his boat."
"He'll get over it." she replied, placing the device next to Pain and Ivy's hand. Looking into Pain's eyes, River tilted her head a little and said, "You should call him now. Not much time before Captain Daddy comes in."
She started to leave before pausing in the doorway and saying to the big mercenary, "She loves you too."
After Pain watched River leave, he turned his attention to the CorPad next to Ivy. Picking it up in his left hand, Pain turned it on and searched for Grayson's contact info. Finding it, he took a few breaths and cleared his throat.
Gnawing at his lower lip, Pain pressed a button and said as the screen lit up and Grayson's face appeared, "Hello, Grayson, I need to talk to you."
http://i499.photobucket.com/albums/rr360/shan_i_a
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
"What's wrong?" Grayson asked. He knew there was no other reason that this man. This man named Pain would be calling. "Did she have an episode because you convinced her that she'd be OK where she wasn't professionally monitored?"
The disdain for Pain dripped from Grayson's words. He hated Pain. He knew Ivy wasn't safe with Pain. He had no idea.
Pain closed his eyes ad took a deep breath before opening them. This was going to be hard.
"I just want you to know I love her. With all my being," Pain started.
"It's more than that isn't it?" Grayson asked, guessing that Ivy's situation was worse than he expected.
"She's been hurt... badly," Pain whispered.
"How bad?" Grayson asked as his eyes narrowed.
Pain felt a lump form in his throat. He couldn't quite form the words.
"HOW bad?" Grayson asked very firmly.
"Her heart had stopped, but we have a good doc here. It took a while, but he got her back. She seems stable now, but it's not good. She could still... she could still..." he couldn't finish it.
The color drained from Grayson's face as he sat there silent for a bit.
"How?" Grayson finally asked.
Pain swallowed again and closed his eyes. It was all his fault. She was this way because he couldn't protect her. She was in his world and she shouldn't have been. She didn't belong there with the guns, grenades and people shooting at her. It was all his fault.
"She was... shot," Pain told him, wiping unshed tears from his eyes. "Three times. I'm sorry-"
Grayson's features changed from shock to utter rage. He flipped a couple of switches on his console.
"I've tagged your current position and pulse beacon," he stated flatly. "I'll be there in... *caculating distance* 6 hours."
Pain nodded. Grayson looked at him like he wanted to reach through the screen and throttle him.
"She dies and I will end you, dong ma?"
"Dang ran," Pain answered as the wave was cut off on Grayson's end.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
"Really?" John had walked to the infirmary to make sure everything was ok, and had found
Pain waving Grayson. "Of all the things to do while waiting for your lady love to wake up, you call him? In what twisted reality was that a good idea?" John was furious. The last time he had seen this man he had almost been shot. And now, if John had heard correctly, he was coming here. "Also, I hope your ready to say goodbye to her, because he'll ask the captain for her, and he'll give her to him."
johnttf
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME