Another Explosion? How much more?

Posted on 17 Sep 2024 @ 6:34pm by Lieutenant JG Dylan McConnor & Lieutenant JG Thalla zh'Ennev MD & Chief Warrant Officer Rommie Rath RN & Lieutenant Commander Raviran Dattek-Winters & Lieutenant JG Delenna Morak & Lieutenant JG Benjamen Kensington MD

1,747 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Stranded
Location: Main Sickay
Timeline: Current
Tags: Delenna

ON:

Struggling back to her feet again, Ravi grabbed her medkit and began to rush to help attempt to rescue folk from the Pharmacy, but as she began to run, Ravi realised that Delenna was still down. Stopping abruptly, she looked all round to try to see what was more urgent. Looking across at Thalla, Ravi asked her to please take a look at Delenna and see how badly hurt she was and what she would need.

Thalla groaned and slowly turned her head from side to side, testing the muscles in her neck. There was a stiffness, to be sure. She pressed her hand to the deck and tried to push herself up and felt a dull but unignorable pain in her shoulder. But as she approached a near-vertical position, a wave of nausea and dizziness washed over her, and she felt as though her head had been cleaved open. Her clinical mind made the diagnosis of severely bruised antennae. Not a fatal injury for an Andorian, but one that would require treatment and physical therapy.

Her mind registered Ravi's request, and she nodded as she slowly got to her feet. She braced herself against the nurses' desk, and in the near-total darkness, reached in one of the drawers to grab a light source.

Delenna started regaining consciousness, her entire body ached. She felt something sharp in her body. Delenna ran her hands down her body, felt for protuding bones, metal shards, and any muscle tears. She found what was causing the sharp pain in her body and tried to stand but screamed in agony as a extreme sharp pain shot through her leg. It felt like the bone in her leg was protruding but the pain was that much that Delenna passed out again.

Thanking Thalla briefly, in too much of a hurry to do so properly she made a split second mental note to do it later and went back towards the Pharmacy, to start pushing debris aside and struggling to get to the wounded in there. Ravi looked around to try to do some kind of mental Triage of those she could see, fallen all around, and in what state of injury they appeared to be. It was protocol to help the most hurt first but then again, everyone was in need to some degree already.

Anyone with less experience and training might have felt very pressured right now but this was where a kind of mental 'fire curtain' descended on Ravi's emotions and provided her with heightened instincts and clarity during the initial crisis.

She left the crumpled doorway behind her and stepped like a gazelle over the first couple of wounded staff who appeared to be struggling up to their knees so far. Beyond those who were able to rise by their own strengths, were some more who were prone and not seeming to be moving. These were Ravi's first targets. If Delenna was okay, Thalla would bring up Ravi's rear and if not then Thalla could be trusted to help her, they were first class and Ravi had every confidence, which helped enormously in this kind of situation. Trusted colleagues were gold at critical times and Ravi was internally thankful for these.

Thalla finally managed to grab a hold of a portable light source, and cast it around the room. Equipment and debris littered the deck. Her mind registered the shards of shattered consoles, from which sparks were starting to fly. Instinctively she turned to the patients on the biobeds. Normally these would have switched over to their independent power supplies, and would have cut off from the ship's main power before overloading fro any power surge. But there was no display on any of them. Had the power surge been too great?

A few feet away, she heard Delenna's moans and turned to the fallen Counselor. Her hand, still in the supply drawer, wrapped itself around a medical tricorder and she ran to her friend's side, flipping the device open. She scanned her patient. There was no major internal injury, but several fractures, including an open tibial fracture, and several rib fractures, one of which was pressing against the liver, but hadn't punctured it, thank the Gods. The blood loss was important, but nowhere near fatal.

She reached inside the pocket of her labcoat and produced a hypospray. Linked to the tricorder, she programmed it to administer a powerful painkiller. She pressed it to Delenna's neck, and looked around for any supporting staff who might be regaining consciousness.

"Ugh! What's the actual damage?" mumbled Delenna with a groan. She looked towards the Pharmacy and sighed.

"I have no idea," replied Thalla, as Nurse Rath finally arrived at her side, her Tellarite features smudged with purplish blood dripping from her snout. She took over Thalla's ministrations over the Counselor, allowing the medical officer to move on to check on the others.

"I'll be back," she told Delenna, just before moving away.

Nurse Rath could see the protruding bone and her own tricorder told her of the fractures within the Counsellor. "I'm going to try to stabilise that leg" she began, looking around for something she could use as a splint. There was so much debris around that it wasn't hard to find and commandeer something long, strong and easy to repurpose to strap to the wounded leg. She knew not to make any attempt to re-site the pieces of the leg bone but she also knew she had to support it so it didn't make itself any worse if it had to be touched at all in getting the patient moved.

Right now, it wasn't practical to move Delenna anyway and there wasn't any safe place to move her to even if she could be carried and/or gurneyed. Rath was careful not to move her patient any more than she could help, well aware of the rib that was threatening her liver.

"Try to lie still Ma'am" she soothed. "I know that sounds impossible, perhaps even crazy but you have a lot of injuries that I don't want to escalate."

"It is impossible as I am a on the go person. Generally it's a screw my injuries, everyone else matters more, BUT I feel I am in too serious a shape to move. Ravi can come back with those pain killers again. They are good." replied Delenna. She carefully stretched her neck because it was a bit achy." is there anywhere flat to lie coz being this contorted is starting to ache?"

Delenna could sense everyone's fear, sadness, determination, and concern. It is not just people in Sickbay, Delenna could sense the whole crew. Admittedly, Delenna was struggling to hold her mind walls due to the pain she was in.

Ravi discovered their Head Nurse, Kireth th'Shylis, right at the end of the remains of the lab. He was well known to her and she could see his still form in an increasing pool of his own blue blood. She put him at the top of her triage list and stepped over to get to him, reassuring those who were getting themselves up as she passed, looking each one over very briefly for signs of more problems as she did so.

One of those who were getting up was Ben Kensington - her ACMO - "Hey!" she said, stepping over his legs and almost getting tripped for her trouble. "How are you doing, Ben?" she asked.

"Oh, Hi Ravi.... I THINK I'm okay. I was out for a few minutes but I've been checking myself as I'm getting up and I don't seem to have done much harm, thank the Prophets!"

"Cool, see if you can help some of the others who are just trying to get up then if you could please?" She had just arrived at the fallen Andorian and could see how badly wounded he was. She immediately put a regenerator over his surface wounds to stop him bleeding out but it was the internal bleeding that was the main danger.

"Will do" Ben acknowledged behind her, unheard as she raced to attempt to staunch the worst bleeds that she could get to.

"Kireth?" she responded to a deep groan from th'Shylis. Rummaging in her kit for more pain killer she shot some into the Andorian's neck but then returned to the frenetic battle to stop his wounds somehow.

In the end it was an in vain struggle and Kireth breathed out that last rasping breath, his damaged lungs burbling their last attempts to keep going. A tear rolled down Ravi's cheek and she closed the Head Nurse's eyes gently.

-----------------------------

McConnor rounded the last corner on Deck 12 before finally reaching the doors to Sickbay. He pressed his portable power emitter to the doors, producing a five centimeter gap between the doors, enough for him to slip his fingers and push the doors apart. When the gap was wide enough, he stepped through.

"We need a doctor on the Bridge right away!" he called out.

Ravi looked around the lab and Ben seemed to have the technicians under supervision. She looked back towards Delenna and Rath - she wanted to go back to them definitely but she knew Rath and she also knew if there was anything to be done, short of surgery, she could do it.

~surgery?~ her mind protested with a flash thought. ~fat chance we even have medical theatres left in one piece, judging by the state of the rest of this mess!~

Thalla was visible, in the far end of the bays, tending to the in-patients. Another good member of staff, that one. She could definitely be trusted to cope with this.

"I have to get to the Bridge" she told them all, raising her voice to include them all. "You are the pick of the crop, Starfleet's finest and the best medical crew I've ever had the privilege to work with. Keep doing your best, I have faith in you all and I will be back to help you as soon as I find out what is going on Bridge-wise. Okay?"

Looking from one to the other, Ravi was warmed to see each of them smile (albeit a little bit of a gritted toothed grimace in some cases) and nod or show thumbs up, across the way to her.

Following McConnor, who the frantic messenger said he was, she got into the Turboshaft behind him and started the long climb.

tbc

 

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