The People You Meet

[Coratanni Cartel]

Coruscant
[member="Farah"]

Blooed stained the side of his white shirt, his hand half covering the wound on his abdomen, a small smile still touching his face.

Nikolas wandered into the hospital on the 125th Level of Coruscant in the Senate District. From the look of him most would have called him a business man, his clothing was expensive, his hair slicked back, and his posture alone set him apart from most of the refuse that walked the streets of Coruscant. He walked into the lobby of the building with a certain swagger, moving across the bright white tile and ignoring half a dozen people that sat in comfortable waiting room chairs.

A few looked up to glance at him, a certain curiosity in their eyes.

For him though they weren't even there, little less than decorations to an interior he didn't particularly care for.

The most sinful of the Thawne children stepped up to the counter, ignoring a woman who was clearly standing there and attempting to gain the nurses attention. The woman sat in her chair, typing away on her computer. Nikolas looked down at her for a moment, then towards the woman who was desperately trying to talk to the nurse. He blinked once, twice, and then slowly walked towards the left.

Without a moment of hesitation he stepped into the nurses station, crossing a small barrier and walking up to the woman in her chair. "Excuse me."

Nikolas spoke to the woman, taking his bloody hand and tapping her on the shoulder.

In an instant the Nurse's head shot up, her eyes sparking with anger until she noticed the blood pooling in the white of his shirt and dripping from his hand onto her clothes. Her mouth gaped open, and it appeared as though she were about to scream, though Nik figured it was nothing that she hadn't seen before.

"I would like to see a doctor." His tone was more annoyed than pained. "Immediately."

 

[Farah]

She could have stayed on Panatha. There were labs there, facilities of the highest caliber staffed with some of the most talented scientists and medical professionals the galaxy had seen. Quite a few of them had undergone alterations of the mind and body in rabid pursuit of whatever hypothesis they were chasing.

Farah wanted to start from the beginning. Though flash trained in the basics and brought up to speed by the doctors and surgeons of her home, she had little of her own experience to fall back on. She knew all of the steps to replacing a mitral valve and could perform the operation with laser precision but that wasn’t enough. She needed to do things over and over until the books and words and images from her training were replaced with solid memories.

She’d come to Coruscant to do just that. Though it was under Alliance control, the city-planet was massive and there were dozens, hundreds of medical facilities. Coruscant was no stranger to crime and neither was the emergency room she was working in.

The nurse who’d been engaged by a bleeding man went slack jawed for a moment, unprepared to be approached so boldly. Then her mouth closed, lips pursed and she rose from her chair, motioning for a younger nurse to escort him onto the floor. Said younger nurse looked hesitant.

“Doctor Navarro, are you free? I’ve got what looks to be an abdominal laceration.” The nurse approached a young Zeltron woman in scrubs and a labcoat, waves of red hair clipped up.

“Bay six.” She responded briskly, reflexively scanning the patient as the nurse would urge him to lay down on the cot that served as bay six.

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

Felix cocked an eyebrow, his gaze settling on the younger nurse for a moment before it slowly swept over that of the doctor. His lips pursed in amusement for a few seconds, slipping into a seamless smirk as his eyes drifted up her legs and over the curve of her form.

The bloody hand had returned to his side to stem the flow of blood, though Nikolas didn't seem at all bothered about the state of the wound. In truth he probably could have had one of his siblings on Coruscant take care of it, but Felix was useless when it came to getting his hands dirty and Matthias...well he really wasn't in a state of mind to deal with that fool. Thus the hospital had seemed the best option, even if it did mean he'd probably have to answer some annoying questions.

"Really?" He asked as he inspected the cot that the nurse urged him towards. "I'd expect something better from a place like this."

Nik gazed around. "At least more private."

He wasn't a germaphobe like Felix was, but if he did have standards. They were in the Senate District for heavens sake, one would expect something a little bit...more. Eventually the Nurse's terrified nerf like gaze pushed him along, mostly because he really wanted her to stop staring at him like that.

It made him want to snap her neck.

 

[Farah]

Had she not already had a busy day, Farah would have snorted. The look he was giving her though, that lit a spark of irritation in her already.

“Private rooms are for critical trauma cases only.” And given that he was walking and talking as if he weren’t bleeding from the abdomen, Farah determined that he was not critical. “Now get onto the bed.”

She gave the nurse a look before re-gloving. “And remove his shirt.”

Turning back to the patient, her eyes fell to the blood stained white shirt. She figured it must have happened quickly for him to be this…well.

“Tell me how this happened.”

She didn’t sound particularly interested but it was necessary to know.

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

Felix looked at the timid mouse like Nurse as the doctor ordered her to remove his shirt. He smiled at her for a moment, though his attention was immediately drawn to the redhead instead. He found her to be far more interesting than the other one. "Usually I do that myself."

Nikolas made the comment, though he made absolutely no move to follow up. His hand still remained at his side, pressing on the cut there. His eyes were fixed on the redhead, and that apparently gave mousey nurse enough courage to actually approach him. He felt the small slip of something against his skin, likely a pair of scissors or something of the sort. The tearing of fabric rung in his hear, and he felt the cold air strike his skin just a few seconds later.

"Does the hospital reimburse me for that?" Nikolas asked no one in particular. "The shirt was very expensive."

The nurse peeled away the rest of the white bloodied cloth, his hand still pressing against his wound to cover it.

"I was cooking dinner, and I accidentally dropped my knife." Nik explained, his smirk never even twitching.

 

[Farah]

Pressing a hand to his shoulder, Farah attempted to guide her strange patient down. “Lay down please.” The wound would be easier to assess and treat that way.

“I’m sure you’ll find something suitable in the lost and found box.” She rested one hand above and the other below the wound. A stab wound. This time she actually rolled her eyes—she’s heard a thousand different excuses including ‘I fell and tripped onto the knife’ for this sort of thing.

“This certainly looks like a cooking injury.” She agreed. “Betadine.” The nurse handed her a bottle of brownish red liquid which she squirted onto the wound. The bleeding had already slowed and her priority was to sterilize the area, throw a few stitches in and ship him off to xray and let them deal with this man.

If he needed surgery, at least the next time they’d meet would be under anesthesia.

“I know it might be hard, but try not to jam the knife into your stomach next time.”

The nurse was quiet throughout this exchange. Dr. Navarro was not known for her pleasant bedside manner.

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

Nikolas didn't budge when she pushed him.

"I didn't jam it." He insisted, the amused smirk still remaining on his face. "It was very sharp, easier to slice things with."

The wound of course had not at all come to him through a cooking accident, but rather as a result of his work. There had been a man here on the Coruscant hired to kill Felix, a problem that Nik had been forced to take care of. Felix was hardly his favorite among the other Thawne's, but he liked the little guy well enough not to want him dead.

Of course the Assassin had been slightly more skilled than he'd anticipated, thus leading to the little cut in his stomach. "Actually, you may want to check in there for a piece of Carrot. That's what I was cutting at the time."

Nik made a slicing motion with his bloody hand, flicking some of the crimson liquid into mousey nurse.

"I don't want to have vegetables growing inside me." With every word he spoke it became more clear that he was full of shit.

 

[Farah]

The nurse, while no stranger to blood, seemed to be off kilter given the strange man’s cavalier attitude about being stabbed in the stomach. She did grimace when he flicked the blood onto her with a casual gesture, staring down at her scrubs for a moment before Farah cleared her throat.

The nurse handed over another pad of gauzed, which the Zeltron doctor placed over the wound to stem the bleeding. She ignored his story for now.

“Lay down. It will make things easier for the both of us.” Her tone implied that it was not a suggestion and that she did not share in his amusement over the situation.

“Amelia,” She addressed the nurse sharply who seemed to snap to attention. “Order an abdominal CT on Mr.…” She trailed, waving her hand as she realized that she did not know his name “…and get him over to radiology.” She turned back to the dark haired man.

“The scan will tell us if the knife pierced any of your organs.” The way she spoke was as if the line were delivered from a classroom lecture. “And alert us to the presence of any vegetable gardens.”

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

"Can't lay down I'm afraid." Not because he was just being difficult, but rather because he was weary of getting shot.

Getting on your feet and protecting yourself was much harder when you were laying down. Sure he didn't exactly expect to get shot at here in the middle of the hospital, but with as many enemies as the Coratanni Cartel had...it was better to be paranoid.

"I can lean back a bit." Nik told her with a smile. "Though if we're going somewhere I'd prefer to walk."

Again, getting rolled around while sitting in bed sounded like a good way to get killed. It was better to keep your wits about you. Briefly he wondered what his parents would think when they found out he went to a public hospital. He imagined his mother would be amused, though his father would likely be displeased. In truth all of this was far more of a show than it needed to be, and briefly he thought about simply kidnapping the young doctor in front of him.

It certainly would have made things easier just to hold a blaster to her head and make her fix him. "We can hold hands."

He offered, deciding he wouldn't resort to kidnapping just yet.

 

[Farah]

Crimson brows knit together in mild frustration. She’d dealt with noncompliant patients but she usually shut them up with either biting comments or the administration of anesthesia.

Which was…questionable.

“Then lean.” She grunted, face line with concentration as she applied pressure to the wound. This was the difficulty when it came to working with actual, day-to-day patients. They weren’t mindlessly obedient and she didn’t have the authority to subjugate them as if they were experiments in the lab. Ethical boundaries could be crossed in the name of medicine, but Farah was aware enough to know that something like that wouldn’t fly here.

“We will get you in a wheel chair.” She affirmed. “The scan is non-invasive. It will not hurt.”

She paused.

“But you will need to be laying down for it.”

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

"Pain isn't really the problem." Nikolas stated plainly.

It hardly ever was for him. There was a reason that the wound in his side didn't make him flinch, that her touch barely registered as anything at all. The cut was deeper, the bleeding was bad, but for Nikolas it barely registered at all.

That was something he had his parents to thank for, or perhaps the people who had created them. Nikolas wasn't quite sure about that, though in truth he had never really cared. Teslyn had always been the more curious one when it came to that sort of thing. He just accepted it for what it was, no point in being nosey. Especially when the questions one asked could very well lead to answers that would be better left unheard. That was his opinion anyway.

"Hmm." He considered for a moment. "I'll consider it."

Nik told her, his hand reaching towards something in his pocket.

 

[Farah]

“I can see that.” She observed flatly. All things considered, it was odd that he wasn’t hunched over and groaning in pain. Though she wasn’t the best when it came to emotionally caring for her patients, Farah was observant of their symptoms.

It wasn’t remarkably strange. There were species with far better pain tolerance than that of baseline humans. He looked human, though. It made her want to dissect his ancestry.

Not with words, of course. With a vial of blood and a machine.

“You’d be wise to.” She insisted, lifting the gauze up gently to peer at the wound. The bleeding had nearly stopped and she grunted in approval, eyes still on the cut as she reached for a stick of betadine. "It can make the difference between simple sutures and an invasive surgery."

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

Nikolas fished around in his pocket for a second, frowning, and then finally smiling as he fished out a small piece of wrapped gum. He pulled back the silvery dressing on the treat, unwrapping it and popping the mint flavored gum into his mouth.

"I won't need surgery." He was pretty sure of that.

There had been a few times when someone had really injured him. When that happened he usually got thrown into a pod of bacta or was given Aspha Serum, but this wasnt one of those cases. He usually felt a lot more pain when that happened. He guessed that stitches would be enough for this, though there wasn't really a way to be sure unless he relented and allowed the scan.

"Tell you what." Nik began. "I'll go to your little scan."

He glanced at the nurse for a moment, then back to the doctor. "If you let me take you out."

 

[Farah]

“You don’t know that.” She murmured, focus going to cleaning the area. Now that the blood was beginning to leave his skin, she could get a better visual on the cut itself.

Farah paused as he tried to cut a deal with her. Out of all the things she’d expected, him asking her out was not one of them. Maybe it should have been, given his cheeky demeanor and how he’d checked her out when they first met.

“Tell you what,” She mirrored his speech before turning to Amelia. “Nurse, go and get the portable scanner.”

She turned to face her patient once more, lips thinning. “We can do the scan here. The wound doesn’t look that deep so the portable machine should work just fine.” It was the type used mostly by field medics, but the one they had here in the emergency room was a bit larger and stronger. Typically it was only used on critical victims who were bleeding out right then and there.

Farah would probably get written up for improper protocol, but oh well.

“We can do the scan right here, suture you up and send you on your way.”

Quick and easy.

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

If Nikolas was at all disappointment by the complete and total ignoring of his advance then he didn't show it.

For him this was all part of the little game he was playing.

After all, it was a game. He didn't have to come here, he never did. It was a way to amuse himself, to waste time and see what would happen. Of course eventually like every petulant child he would tire of this game, but for now he was more than content to poke and prod at the nice doctor. "Oh good."

Nik commented with a smirk.

His eyes wandered to the Nurse for a moment, noting the slight bit of disapproval in her eye. It clear that the order the doctor had given was not the proper way of doing things, one could infer that simply from the hesitation that the other woman displayed. Eventually however the Nurse turned and walked away from them, heading off to go fetch the machine.

"I'm glad you got rid of her." Nik said with a smile. "She was a little bit of a Debby downer."

 

[Farah]

Good?

Farah lifted her head from the wound to see him smirking and didn’t even try to hold back the roll of her eyes.

Then she glanced back at the nurse—who hadn’t moved—with a face that inspired Amelia to shuffle away with her task.

“Don’t worry,” Farah placed the gauze back over his wound. “She’ll be back soon.” She grabbed the chart that was hanging from the side of the bed and scanned over his information quickly.

Honestly, what was taking that nurse so long? The quicker she was, the quicker she could deal with this patient and discharge him.

“I’m sure you’ve got your cooking to get back to.”

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

He shrugged. "I think I've given up on that for now."

Nikolas sounded almost as though he were lamenting the fact. The truth of it was that he had never actually cooked anything in a day of his life, but the good doctor didn't need to know that fact. He smiled at her, and then slowly leaned forward, noting that her hands were still pressing against his wound.

The Coratanni Executioner smirked,

"Besides." He began. "I think I'd have a much better time eating out."

No one had ever called him subtle.

 

[Farah]

Farah blinked as she looked up, realizing that their faces were closer now. There was something almost sinister in the way the smirk curled his lips and she paused.

“There’s a McYoda’s a block away. After we’re done here, you can treat yourself to a nice meal.” She responded flatly.

Amelia returned, wheeling a strange looking device that didn’t look quite like anything to those without specific training on how to use it.

“Finally.” She grunted, grabbing the scanning wand from the machine and turning back to the young man who she wanted to eject from this hospital very much. “I’ll advise you to lay down but in the event you cannot, lean back as far as you can. I need to get a clear read.”

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]

 

[Coratanni Cartel]

[member="Farah"]

"I hate doing things alone." Nikolas said as he slowly began to lean back.

He glanced up at Debby Downer as she returned, wondering if the nurse had brought more than the machine with her. His eyes briefly traced over the blood that he had flicked on the woman, then towards the grimace that was on her face.

She certainly was a grumpy one.

Nikolas reached back and placed his hands behind himself, letting the doctor move the wand over his wound so that she could get an effective read. He doubted very much that she would find any significant damage, the knife had been buried deep, but he would have felt any serious wound. He shifted slightly, wiggling in place and looking up at Farah. "Go ahead, Doc. Take a look."

He told her with that same, confident smirk.

 

[Farah]

Farah elected to ignore the patient’s smart mouth for the time being. Once the scan was completed, she’d hopefully be able to stitch him up and send him on his way.

She held the wand over his wound, moving it back and forth as an image appeared on the screen that the nurse had wheeled over. Her face fell into an automatic frown of concentration as the image flickered and changed with her hand’s motion.

“You’re lucky. The knife didn’t pierce any organs.” She switched the machine off and placed the wand back onto the cart, tilting her head at the nurse who began to wheel the machine away.

“I’m going to suture the wound and you should be fine.” She reached towards the table beside the bed and retrieved a vial of something clear and a syringe. “I’ll give you some anesthetic to numb the area beforehand.” She stuck the needle into the top of the vial and pulled the liquid through via the plunger.

[member="Coratanni Cartel"]