| Cigars and Scotch |
| Summary: | Tais and Melia discuss life, love and cigars. |
| Date: | 3/8/09 |
| Related Logs: | None |
| Players: |
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Sickbay Genesis - Deck 13
115 ACH 23777 Souls
The medical facility is large enough to hold a few dozen beds. Each bed is set with a curtain for privacy, a chair near the bed and any monitoring or medical aids needed. A nurses desk sits at the front near the hatch and a surgery area, Medical Officers area and supplies are on the far wall behind the desk. Nurses, doctors and medics man this area at any time day or night. Visiting hours are usually kept to the day and evening schedules, unless stated otherwise by medical staff.
----< Condition Three - Duty Area >----—-
Contents: Tais Melia Medical Charts Memorial Board Wireless 1492
Exits: [CMO] CMOs Office [O] Corridor
[PO] Psychiatry Office [RW] Recovery Ward
Special: +lhelp - Local Help Available
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Sickbay is bustling, but efficiently. With the Lost Boys coming home, things were hopping for a bit, but now they've settled back down. A small Ensign is over in one of the bays, stripping the linens off of a gurney.
Tais glances at the Ensign and then at the bed she makes. "I hope the last patient didn't leave any remains behind. You'd tell me if he did."
Melia looks up, head tilting to the side, and offers the Doctor a bit of a smile. "You'd have heard when the remains were left, most likely, Sir," she replies, eyes twinkling. "Otherwise, just the bedpan."
Tais murmurs, "Lucky you." She seats herself at the communal desk to catch up on the patient charts, adjusting her glasses with a brief upward press of a finger to the bridge of her nose. "Any idea where the Major went?"
Melia nods to the CMO's office. "He came through a little bit ago and went straight to his office," she calls quietly, keeping her voice at least somewhat low, so as not to bother the others. "Seemed to have something on his mind."
Tais looks over the tops of her glasses at the Ensign briefly, "He always does. The big news will be when he doesn't, I suppose. Then again, we'd never know." She trades one chart for another, flipping through papers until she reaches the correctly dated entry, "Any good dirt for the dishing from the outside world?" Outside meaning outside these walls.
Karan comes in from Recovery Ward.
Karan has arrived.
Karan slips through from the recovery ward, headed out.
Tais nods as Karan is disgorged from the room before continuing on with her paperwork.
Melia is over in one of the bays, changing the bed linens on a gurney. "Not that I'm aware of, Sir," she tells Tais quietly, going about her work. "I've been in here most of the night and morning. Going down to Carina this afternoon."
Karan leaves for Corridor 13B [O].
Karan has left.
Novella comes in from Recovery Ward.
Novella has arrived.
Tais says, "Bring me back a treat, will you? A carrot or something from the hydroponic garden? Maybe a tomato. Or a little souvenir maybe."
Novella exits the Recovery Ward, pain still on her facce with every step. She looks very intent on that, hatch, though. Baby-steps to the exit.. Cav is a woman on a mission.
Novella leaves for Corridor 13B [O].
Novella has left.
Melia starts to say something to Tais when she catches sight of Novella. Lips thin and the Ensign looks like she'd like to turn Cav right back around, but she picks up a pillow and fluffs it. "If I can find one down there, sure," she says quietly. "Garden's not really producing right now, what with us being on quarter rations."
Tais glances at the effort the Lieutenant makes on her way to the hatch. "I give her to the aft corridor before someone hauls her ass back here." At Melia's response she lifts a hand to brush away the refute, "Then I little souvie of one of the gods. Or something. Certainly they've figured out a way to make coin from them, hasn't someone?"
"No, she won't be back. Her folks are hurt," Mellie says, shaking her head in mild exasperation. "She's going to be with them until she bleeds out. I'm surprised she lasted this long in here today. I caught her trying to escape last night and had to dress her down in front of Major Zim." Mellie's nose crinkles up. "It looks worse than it is, I think. She took a lot of shrapnel to the legs. Should have sent her out with a wheelchair." The blanket gets smoothed and she gathers up the dirty linens for deposit. "And sure, I'll see what the Sister has down there."
Tais says, "I wish patients would realize that acting inscrutable in order to return to duty makes them anything other than just plain annoying when they come back here with worse wounds." She takes another chart, slipping the discarded one back in its holder, "And thanks. I feel like all I see are these unpainted walls."
Melia chuckles quietly and drops the linens off before picking up a new set for the next bed. "Could always go down to Carina. Plenty of sick folk down there right now what need tending. I go down to spell the Sister and Dane - Ensign Ramiro - whenever I can. Someone's got to change the bedpans."
Tais peers over her glasses at the Ensign, pausing briefly in her chase for the charts before Zaharis makes another appearance, "I guess finding a bottle of scotch is out of the question, then, huh?"
Melia pauses and just blinks at Tais. "If you can find a bottle of scotch, Lieutenant," she says solemnly. "I dare say you'd be the most popular person in the Fleet. I don't think anyone's had anything but watered down swill for months now."
Tais says, "Which is why it's out of the question. We've got a hydroponic lab, the ability to grow meat in vitro…how in the gods name haven't we perfect distilling alcohol. Isn't it one of the food groups or something?"
Melia laughs quietly. "Afraid not," she replies, shaking her head. "At least, not until we get some fruits or grains to get it started. I'm afraid we're all out." At the mention of food, she licks her lips, then sighs quietly. "Meat. What I wouldn't give for a good, juicy steak."
Tais grumbles, "And being around more sick people is not a change of scenery. It's just the same thing in a different venue." Her altruism only extends so far. "Certainly the cells for the in vitro didn't get blown to hell. All we'd need are a few thousand as a start, I'd think…" And she looks outwards, perhaps to the time when steak is once again on the menu.
"I dare say," Mellie says mildly. "That if the hydroponics and in vitro were working as they should, command would be allocating more resources there rather than having us on quarter rations. Though, I could be wrong. Been wrong before." She quirks a wry smile.
Tais flips her pen back and forth between thumb and forefinger in thought, "I suppose ours is not to reason why. Ours is just to suck it up, right? Thinking about it just pisses me off, so….I won't. How's your day making out? Enough bedpans to fill your quota?"
"Mmmm. More than enough," the Medic says with a grin. "But I can help the nurses out, so it all works in the end. I'm exchanging bedpan duty for practical lessons to help augment my classes with the Major. Keeps me busy and mostly out of trouble. How about your day?"
Tais's reaction about classes with the Major is brief and questioning, though she moves on quickly enough, "Sending still wounded patients out the door is the highlight of my day."
Mellie goes about fixing the next bed. "I'm studying for my MD," she explains, smiling. "Just started. Well, a couple months ago. I had to finish the pre-reqs up."
Tais's eyes narrow skeptically, "He doesn't make you genuflect whenever you come into his office does he?"
She just blinks at Tais for a long minute. "Ahhh, no," she says quietly, head tilting to the side. "Does he make you?"
Tais responds ruefully, "Only once."
Mellie's eyes go a little wide at that. Ok, a lot wide. "Hmmm," she says quietly. "Normally he just tells me not to kill the officers."
"Six of one, half a dozen of another. Maybe he doesn't think himself one of the gods after all." If noted closely, a conspiratory wink can be discerned behind Tais' glasses.
The poor Gemenese woman doesn't know whether to laugh or not, so she settles for a grin and a shake of her head. "Not that I've seen, no," she replies. It's clear that Mellie's fond of the CMO.
Tais warns good naturedly, "Should the urge strike for him to set himself upon a pedestal, tell him you won't buy into his illusions of grandeur. Then kick his chair out from beneath him. That'll bring him down to earth."
Mellie stops dead, just blinking. "I…no, thanks," she says quietly. "Dr. Pike would likely kick my tail from Destiny to Carina and back if I did. I LIKE him on his pedastal."
Tais sets down her pen, resting her chin in her hands, her lashes fluttering behind her glasses, "It's his eyes isn't it? So dark, so soulful? So..come hither? It makes all the women get protective of him." Her teasing may be inscrutable.
Her head cocks to the side slightly, then she shakes her head. "Nope," she says after a moment, it's his cigar." And then she turns back to her bed, simply smiling.
This elicits a most unexpected response from her as she lowers her hands, leaning across the desk towards you, "I swear to the gods, if he has a stash of premium tobacco, I'll tear his office apart."
"Just his cigarettes," Mellie calls, lips tilted upward in a soft, fond smile. "Just the cigarettes."
Tais seats herself with a dashed, "Damn."
Melia glances over her shoulder and chuckles quietly. "He might share, if you ask nicely," she says, head cocked to the side. "He found out I smoke cigars and managed to find one for me. I got to smoke it after my commissioning."
Tais waves the cigarettes away dismissively, "They can put anything between rolled papers and call it smokeable, but a cigar is like…like amazing sex. Something you hold out for."
Melia mmms softly at that and nods, once. "Oh, I quite agree," she murmurs, voice low. "QUITE agree."
Tais says, "Something you savor. Look forward to, dream about. Hell, take a shower and get dressed up for. A cigarette's like…a guy who honks his horn for you on a date. Doesn't even make the effort to come to the door to get you."
There's quiet for a moment or two before offering, "I'd have to get dressed up for a cigar, I think. Maybe even find some make-up and pretty underthings."
Tais sits back in her chair, the imagery palpable, "Not much I wouldn't do for a good cigar. Lacy things included."
Melia finishes up the bed and goes back for more linens. "Maybe there'll be some at the next supply station we find," she says quietly. If they find one.
Tais retracts her body into its usual hunched over position, the pleasurable thought all but stricken from her mind, "Maybe. Sad, isn't it what we'd do for an inanimate object that we'd hardly do for a human?" There is a rueful lift of her lips.
Melia flaps a blanket, airing it out. "Well, depends on the human, honestly," she says, laughing softly. "Definitely depends on the human."
Tais says, "For now, I'll take the cigar over the human. A cigar is straight up. No hidden agenda. You get what you pay for. And they don't talk back. You know the repercussions with a cigar. And they respect you in the morning."
"Again," Mellie replies softly. "Depends on the human. I know a couple humans I'd take over cigars any day. Cigar doesn't have a heartbeat to lull you to sleep."
Tais murmurs, "I had that once. The result was…less than satisfying. Cigar still trumps."
Melia mmms. "Milage varies, I guess," she says with a small shrug.
Tais appears to be drawing marks on the chart as she speaks, "No, I simply came to depend too much on the warmth and the heartbeat and then it was gone." Realizing she probably said far too much, she straightens and tries to focus on the task before her.
"That's what I'm afraid of," Mellie offers after a bit. "Every day it seems more and more likely."
Tais pauses, sensing a kindred spirit, "The effort to forget is…worse than never having it. This BS of having loved and lost is just that."
Melia finally leans slightly against the bed she's working on. "I don't know that I can stand to lose too many more people. Not so soon. Not again."
Tais says, "That's why I refuse to. I'll wait for my cigar."
"I'm not the type of person who can wait. Maybe later, when I've gotten harder," she IS rather young. "But now? Now so much."
Tais closes the chart with a metallic snap, "When you have found your one…there is no seeking another."
Melia considers that for a moment, then nods and lets out a quiet sigh. "I was afraid of that."
Tais stands, stuffing the charts into their hold. "Oh, there can be tantalizing moments. But…" She falls silent, a clouded expression darkening her face.
"Dane just lost his wife and he's closing himself off," she says finally. "I'm worried about him."
Tais's smile is bittersweet. "I can empathize with him. He will."
"He's not the type of man who can survive closed off," Mellie says after a moment, shaking her head. "I'll just have to keep sitting at his door to make sure he's ok." Then she's turning back to the bed.
Tais says, "Snap him out of it. Force him to return to life. He'll either come to hate or love you for it. There won't be any gray area."
Melia chuckles softly, though it's without humor. "I've a few tricks for dealing with recalcitrant Marines. On the plus side, I know of at least one other person who's trying to drag him out. So, between us, we should be able to kick his ass up between his ears."
Tais straightens, her eyes falling on the Ensign's back. It's something in her voice that rings truthfully, "Don't let him wait too long, Melia."
"I've already had to shine my boots once," she says with a soft laugh. "I'm going to track him down later tonight or tomorrow, when things settle, if he's not on shift."
Tais moves to where she stands, a hand coming to rest on her shoulder, "I'm serious. Please don't let his pain linger longer than it needs to."
Melia looks up at the Lieutenant, a little surprised, then offers a small smile. "I won't," she says quietly. "Nic only died a couple weeks ago. On their honeymoon. He's had his space."
Tais steps back, unused to the commiseration ideal, nodding once. "Then I've no doubt he's in good hands." She pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose and makes her way back to the desk. In another existence it would be considered 'puttering'.
Mellie watches the doctor for a moment, then goes back to her own work, finishing up quickly. Once she does, it's a simple matter of calling, "I'm off, Lieutenant. Likely headed down to Carina for a little bit, though I may get side tracked on the way. Need anything else while I'm down there?"
Tais says, "A good scotch and a cigar."
Melia laughs softly and nods. "I'll see what I can find, Sir." And with that, Terrier takes her leave, top speed a little slower than usual, likely due to rationing.
