41 Shots (And We'll Take That Ride)

[Chaz de Coventina]

If there was one constancy in the field of medicine it was this: that at the tail end of a twelve hour shift, when muscles were aching and the brain was struggling just to keep up with monosyllabic conversation, when all that stood between one and a stiff drink in a hot bath were chart updates and signing out, a new intake never failed to show up and it was almost always messy.

Chaz de Coventina pressed at her eyelids with a trembling hand as she keyed up a file from the personnel database, one Carston Antares, a tech who'd gone into anaphylactic shock after ingesting the shellfish special for dinner. He was fine--passed out and covered in hives but breathing, at least--and as she keyed in the procedural rundown into his chart, she couldn't help but let out a beleaguered sigh. She was exhausted, bone-weary in a way that made her skin crawl, residual adrenaline tingling in her extremities.

She was barely aware of the voice addressing her until a rising insistence in inflection cut through the building fuzziness that cluttered her mind. "Dr. de Coventina?"

"Sorry. What, Magda?" Chaz frowned and looked askance at the infirmary assistant, a small girl with silver-coloured skin that looked luminescent even under the dull clinic lighting. Magda grinned.

"I just wanted to know if you wanted some caf?"

"No. My shift's done in twenty, I'll be fine."

"Oh. Okay," Magda nodded and turned to go, then paused and squinted at the screen. "You gave him H4b?"

No, of course she hadn't. It was an antiquated sedative and hardly the ideal choice, sending patients into a deep hole that they had to claw out of; mostly they stocked it because it was easy to obtain and, in an emergency, better than nothing.

"Yes," Chaz answered, resolutely inputing data. "Antares has an infirmary phobia, and an unfortunate allergy to the local. It made things easier on everyone."

Magda accepted that with a sympathetic smile and turned to leave. Chaz glanced over her shoulder. "Magda?"

"Mm?"

"Unless it's an emergency, I'm not here anymore. Let's be generous and leave Dr. Henning something to do."

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

The double doors to the infirmary slid open, and Cirr stomped in, a feeble, but still somewhat-protesting fighre slouched over his shoulder. The felinoid looked like he'd had a long day, and was eager to drop off this human cargo in the medical ward and be done with it all.

"Anyone arround to help patch up thjis jidjiot?"

The idiot stirred on his shoulder, and Cirr responded by unsheathing claws, in a subtle but certain message for him to stay the fuck where he was.

Cirr sighed, dark rings under his eyes from a day he wished he could mulligan.

"Barr fjight. Nose jis brroken, along wjith whateverr else."

[Chaz de Coventina]

"Um," Magda's mouth twisted uncertainly as she stared at the Cizerack and his flailing rucksack. While the view wasn't a bad one by any means, it didn't afford her the opportunity to look at the injured areas and assess whether or not it could wait. "I... don't know."

She smiled apologetically and disappeared down a corridor, head poking around the corner. "Just a sec'," Magda chirped, teeth glinting as she graciously waved toward a curtained-off area. "You can set him down, if you like."

The tiny girl vanished again and moments later, hushed voices echoed from somewhere down the hall, one apologetic yet insistently countering the clearly irritated cadence of the other. When Magda returned she was followed by a thin-lipped Chaz, arms up as she retied her auburn hair back. It took all her self-control not to roll her eyes upon catching sight of what the cat had, literally, dragged in. The equally long-suffering expression on the felinoid's face stopped her; familiarity bred empathy in this case, and she managed to dredge up enough energy to shoot Cirr a wry smile as she arched a brow at his companion.

"Right, let me guess," Chaz breezed, planting her hands on her hips. "The other guy had it coming?"

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr did as directed, easing Sanis across a clinic bed, eliciting a groan from the pilot. Cirr stood next to him, arms crossed and looked as a woman who he assumed to be a doctor entered the infirmary.

"Not my handjiworrk. My frrjiend has a habjit of gettjing jinto the wrrong fjights. jI'm just arround to pjick up the pjieces when he gets busted up."

He stifled a yawn, looking a little tired. He certainly wasn't surprised or concerned. This was telegraphed a mile away.

[Chaz de Coventina]

"I see," Chaz nodded, leaning over the limp form and tugging back on his shirt collar to get a better view of the bruises blooming there. "You're a good friend." Probably better than this ruffian deserves.

There was nothing gentle about the way she prodded at Sanis's ribs, slender fingers jabbing insistently at the thin skin. "Hello," Chaz said, voice rising as she watched the man's face for any signs of his having heard her. She poked him again, "Can you tell me your name?"

[Sanis Prent]

I groaned under the forceful prodding, cracking my lids open as I scowled.

"Luke Skywalker."

I looked to Cirr, and back to the Doc, and tried to sit up, only to give up midway and lay back down.

[Chaz de Coventina]

"Well, it's not everyday we get celebrities in here, Mr. Skywalker," Chaz countered dryly as she placed a restraining hand on the idiot's chest. Magda slipped in quietly with a coldpac, slipping it beneath his neck and handing Chaz a scanner. "I must say, death's been very kind to you."

As she held the scanner up and ran it down his face, watching the screen intently as the palely glowing outline of his bones, her hand began to shake, fine tremors that radiated up her arm. The woman switched grip and shook the offending appendage slightly, face undisturbed.

It was a clean break over the bridge, something the knitter would fix in no time. Magda was no doubt preparing it this very minute.

Chaz patted his stubbled cheek and pulled back his eyelids, shining her penlight at each pupil. Their reaction was slight but there; minor concussion, probably the least of his worries and not an unfamiliar injury by the sounds of things. Smiling cheerily, Chaz braced her fingers on either side of his face.

"Luke," She said, twisting her hands sharply. There was an audible pop. "Can you tell me where you are?"

[Sanis Prent]

"Shit! Agh!"

My legs contorted a little bit in response to the sharp stabbing of bone being set in my face. I felt Cirr keep me restrained, a bit roughly, and relented.

I looked at the doc, blinked, and looked around me.

"Infirmary."

I moved to get up again, and Cirr's hand once again pushed me down flat on the table.

[Chaz de Coventina]

"Very good - you're not completely out of it, bravo," Quickly grabbing some sterile pads from the drawer to her immediate left, Chaz mopped up the fresh stream of blood that had poured from Luke's nose and then rolled a pair of fresh strips to gingerly insert into his nostrils.

"We're going to need to get you out of this so I can take a look at you," She gestured at his shirt, damp with blood and sweat and bar grease and who-knew-what-else. Of course he wasn't in any condition to sit up just yet, not without a severe case of vertigo, at least. Right then. There was more than one way to skin a scallywag.

The surgery shears in the deep pocket of her clinic jacket hadn't gone through a wash since that morning but it wasn't a concern here, with just the thin material of his shirt to cut through. Chaz grasped them, fingers folding around the familiar shape, and grabbed the hem of his shirt and brought it to the gleaming blades. She made to move the first cut but stopped when her hand trembled again, enough to caution her to bring the sharp tool back. The last thing 'Mr. Skywalker' needed was a hole in his abdomen.

Pressing the heel of one hand to her right eye, Chaz glanced at Cirr. She motioned vaguely to his paws and then to the offending garment. "Would you mind? It's been a long day."

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Getting the gist of what she wanted to do, Cirr was only too happy. Sanis liked this shirt, but that was the price he paid for acting like a very predictable asshole this evening.

"Surre thjing."

He nodded, the claws on his right hand pushing out from their fingertips. Holding the neck of Sanis's shirt with one hand, he hooked his right index finger's claw along the fabric's edge and gave a tug. The fabric resisted before cleaving audibly, ripping more or less cleanly down his middle as Cirr pulled it up and sheared it away. It seemed like a small vindication for the ruined first night.

[Chaz de Coventina]

With the shirt out of the way, Chaz was afforded a good look at the mess of discoloured skin that was masquerading as the man's chest and abdomen. She winced - some things were just instinctual and the phantom pain that blossomed across her own ribs was one of them.

The scanner didn't show any fractures, much less breaks, but it was no doubt uncomfortable. He was going to be sporting some magnificent black and blue marks for awhile. "Must've been a hell of a fight," Chaz muttered, prodding roughly at the sinews of the man's unmarked shoulder when she saw his eyes closed. "Hey, Champ, look alive. If I have to stay up, so do you."

Eying Cirr's less-than-thrilled countenance with something resembling sympathy, Chaz nodded at him. "Listen, you look like you could use a break - I bet every now and then his cherished presence gets old and it's my opinion that he ought to stay here for a few hours anyway, just in case. You can come collect him later or I can send him staggering back. Either way."

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr looked to Sanis, a conflicted expression written on his face as his ears cocked at uneven angles.

"No, jI'll stay wjith hjim."

A sigh and he looked at her, shaking his head.

"He's my frrjiend, even jif he's sometjimes an jidjiot."

Feeling that perhaps introductions were in order, he extended a big hand to her.

"Cirrsseeto Raurrssatta. Call me Cirr."

He gestured to Sanis.

"Thjis one herre's Sanjis Prrent. jI'm surre thjis won't be the fjirrst tjime you see hjim herre."

[Chaz de Coventina]

Yes, she would most definitely call him Cirr because the rest of that had sounded like a bunch of rolling syllables all whipped up in a blender. Chaz placed her own, much smaller, hand in his and shook it firmly. "Chaz de Coventina. Cirr, you're a much better friend than I am."

"Mr. Prent, I'm disappointed. Do you know how much a post-mortem autograph from the Luke Skywalker would have fetched me on the black market?" Chaz clucked and shook her head before giving him an appraising stare. "You still with us? Know what year it is and all of that complicated stuff?"

[Sanis Prent]

"I'm fine."

I attempted a non-chalant deadpan response, but I winced, an iron monster tap-dancing on my brain apparently from the size of my headache.

"Just had a fight, that's all."

[Chaz de Coventina]

Chaz grinned. "That's very convincing. You might take up acting when bar brawling gets stale."

"How many?" She waved four fingers in front of his eyes. "You get it right, I might even fix that nose of yours up, keep that pretty profile in mint condition."

[Sanis Prent]

I closed my eyes momentarily to help clear my head and let me focus, and tracked her fingers, a little slow for her movements.

"Four..." I grumbled, looking past the fingers to the person waving them.

"So Doc, fancy meeting a girl like you in a place like this."

I smiled weakly, which turned into a grimace on account of the split in my lip.

[Chaz de Coventina]

"It's very strange to meet a female physician in a medbay," Chaz agreed, sliding one of the sleek cabinet doors open and withdrawing a palm-sized bottle of plasto-cast out. "Stick around long enough and you might meet a tech down at the docking bay. Shocking."

A glance at the wall chrono showed she was twenty minutes over her shift but Dr. Henning hadn't shown up yet, or else was occupied already. It didn't matter, really, they didn't have the luxury of strict schedules in an operation like this but she could feel the throb of need swelling in her bones, making it harder to concentrate through the anxious buzz humming at her temples. The fact that she was worn out was a blessing, providing an honest camouflage for the bastard trying to rip out of her skin.

Chaz winked at Sanis as she lifted herself to perch on the edge of his bed, spritzing a bit of plasto-cast onto the bridge of his nose. She worked at the slick liquid as gently as she could, firming it gradually and molding it into a thin strip that would adjust itself as the swelling went down. "So what was the fight about? A girl? Someone insult your mother?"

[Sanis Prent]

"Just some yokels being jealous."

I sighed at the thought, watching her as she went to work with the plasto-cast.

"How long's this thing gotta be on me?"

[Chaz de Coventina]

"A couple of days," Chaz murmured, tongue creeping out between her teeth as she concentrated on evening out the flexible webbing of the nose brace. "Magda will run the knitter over it before you leave. It's a clean break; there shouldn't be any problems but it'll need a bit of support. And at the very least," She pulled back and arched an elegant brow at him. "It might dissuade others from clocking you in the face for the next little while."

Or encourage them, if they were assholes. Chaz glanced at the mottled bruises littering his torso and shook her head. "I'd offer you something for the pain but I'm not very charitable and I don't want to offend your masculinity."

[Sanis Prent]

"...right."

I looked at Cirr, whose hand still hovered at my shoulder, and back at the doc.

"I'm not offended. It fucking hurts, so..."

[Chaz de Coventina]

"Mm, it looks like it does," Chaz nodded and made a sympathetic noise in the back of her throat, reaching into her pocket for one of the prewrapped bacta pads. She placed the damp towelette into his hand and guided it to his lip before bracing an elbow on her knee and resting her chin on a fist.

"So, Mr. Prent," Chaz watched him dab at the cut with bright copper eyes. "What do you do here?"

[Sanis Prent]

The bacta felt great against my split lip. Small mercies. I could feel its cooling effect immediately, and looked up to regard the Doc as she made small talk.

"Just signed on as a pilot for this outfit. By the looks of things, the best one you've got."

[Chaz de Coventina]

She should've guessed. Sanis certainly had the nonchalant confidence of a pilot, that level certainty that was as deeply planted as muscle and sinew.

"And Cirr, you came with him?" Chaz asked. The Wheel was hardly a barrel of fun and excitement and she couldn't imagine volunteering just for the hell of it. Where there was a hard place, there was almost always a rock. "What made you boys sign on the dotted line?"

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr looked at the Doc as if he was still searching for the answer she wanted as well. He looked to Sanis, then back to her, and shook his head.

"We've helped the Jedji forr so long now, guess jit makes sense to sjign on the ljine and go all jin."

He was sure the reasons were more, uh spiteful for Sanis. He'd pretty much taken s'Il's bait and made the choice to thumb his nose at her, because she'd insinuated he didn't have what it took.

[Chaz de Coventina]

"Huh." Chaz bobbed her head, expression thoughtful, and then hoisted herself off the bed. It was too quick and her field of vision see-sawed violently. The doctor put a hand out to steady herself and then drew a slow breath as her equilibrium settled.

What was she doing? Chaz paused, brain circling a scent, and then snapped her fingers. Right. Patient. Injured.

It took a moment of digging to unearth the slender tube of ointment that she was looking for. Someone had organized the sleek storage units and now everything had an appointed place. It made things bloody difficult.

"Let's have you sit up - slowly," Chaz cautioned, slipping an arm under Sanis's bicep and helping to ease him up. It would have been a tricky task without Cirr's help; the felinoid's ability to heft his pal like a ragdoll was invaluable.

She gave Sanis an assessing look once he was settled, stooping to peer up at his eyes. "Hey. Okay?"

[Sanis Prent]

I removed the bacta pad from my lip, which was now a bit itchy and hemmed up with shiny skin from where the bacta had accelerated the healing process. Cirr jostled me a bit, which caused a grunt, but I nodded in the affirmative to the doctor's question.

"I'll live, sure."

[Chaz de Coventina]

"Of course you will; I'm an excellent physician," Chaz said as she worked the ointment into his discoloured skin, fingers deftly rubbing in a gentle circular motion. There was some nasty swelling over his rhomboids and a rather spectacular display of purples and blues rising to conquer the angry red of the offended muscle.


"If you piss blood for more than a day, you haul your ass up here pronto, alright?" Chaz lifted his arm to get at the thin skin , smirking when he twitched a bit. Well, a bit of tickling served him right for keeping her late and --

"Shit," Her hand jerked suddenly, stabbing into the vulnerable spot just under his ribcage, arrowing right into the middle of a contusion as surely as if it were a bullseye. "Sorry."

[Sanis Prent]

A sharp intake of breath as I stiffened. I didn't say anything, but gave her a quick Oh you are, are you? look.

Exhaling slowly, a smiled tautly.

"This gonna affect my blood pissin' schedule, doc?"

[Chaz de Coventina]

"You'll live," Chaz parroted back at him, lips quirking sheepishly. "I promise I don't normally abuse my patients like this - you're a special case."

There was an obvious shift in her attention, fingers moving with more precision and care. As ridiculous as a cantina dustup was, Prent was here under legitimate circumstances and she really did prefer to reduce physical discomfort as opposed to adding to it.

"I'm going to authorize a scrip for you, for the pain," Chaz murmured, capping the ointment and rubbing her palms together to absorb the residue on her skin. "With a strong advisement not to imbibe while you're on it."

[Sanis Prent]

Strong advisement? That just meant you'd end up getting really hammered on it.

"Whatever you say, doc."

I attempted an easy smile, cutting short due to the fact that my lip was still a little tender.

"So, what do you do around here when you aren't patching guys like me up?"

[Chaz de Coventina]

The question caught her off-guard. What did she do?

"I... read," Chaz supplied, nodding. "And sleep. You know, shore up those energy reserves for guys like you."

She winced. "That came out wrong."

[Sanis Prent]

It took everything I had not to push that smile wider. One hell of a slip of the tongue.

"Well, maybe I'll get another chance or two to wear you down. You do house calls?"

That elicited a light smack to the back of my head from Cirr, which considering that it was Cirr, wasn't terribly light, and I bobbed forward a bit.

"Hey! I'm recuperating man!"

[Chaz de Coventina]

"I prefer my follow-ups come to me," It was hard to keep a straight face, and she felt her expression slip before she turned her back to Sanis, under the pretense of entering something into the datapad resting at the foot of the bed. Chaz shrugged, hoped it was casual enough. "Perk of the job."

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

Cirr ran a hand down his face in exasperation. The last thing he needed was somebody else encouraging Sanis to act like...Sanis.

"jI'll keep hjim to hjis scrrjips, doc."

The felinoid crossed his arms as he leaned against the wall.

"He's an overrgrrown chjild and needs superrvjisjion."

[Chaz de Coventina]

Chaz grinned, flash of teeth and a sparkle in her eye, over a shoulder at Cirr and chuckled lowly at the resigned tone of his voice.

"That's not hard to believe," The edges of her lips kept quirking, fatigue bolstering her amusement at the apt description of the firecracker currently residing on the bed. Horrified at the sudden bubbling mirth that was growing in her belly and clawing it's way up her windpipe, Chaz very pointedly looked down at Sanis's file again.

"Maybe I ought to make a, ha," Chaz cleared her throat, eyes fixed firmly on the datapad. Her shoulders were beginning to shake. "note of it."

[Sanis Prent]

I sat up from the exam table, still a bit sore, but making a good show of it.

"You got a comm frequency? You know, in case I fall down and need a bacta swab?"

[Chaz de Coventina]

A quick, silent nod was all that Chaz could manage. Oh gods, she was not going to lose it like some uncured resident running on too-much caf and stimtabs.

"I'm," Her voice was jerking like a plucked tension wire and clearing it only made it more obvious that she was fighting hysterics. The small vial in her jacket pocket seemed heavy as she stood up, hoping the change in posture would allow her to retain a sense of professionalism. "I'm here, most of the time."

Psych ward rotation. The Vanoorian Epidemic. Rectal exams.

Grasping at any and every unpleasant thought she could, Chaz managed to compose herself enough to turn around and meet Sanis's gaze. "On the off chance that I'm not, you can find me in the personnel directory."

[Sanis Prent]

I smiled. Heh, she was into me for sure. I knew it. With a little wincing, I eased off the table completely.

"I get this scrip filled with you, or...?"

It was all good fortune that I had a doc that looked like she did. Between her and half the trim I'd spotted on this convoy, I could certainly be travelling in more squalid conditions.

I fished a stim out of a crushed pack in my jacket, letting one hand by my bottom lip as I looked to her for her response.

[Chaz de Coventina]

"No, I've patched it through, Magda should be taking care of it," Her eyes lingered on the stim for a brief moment. It wouldn't be enough to even scratch the surface, not by a long shot but...

"This is probably wildly inappropriate, but may I bum one?" Chaz gestured at his stim. "It's been a long day."

[Sanis Prent]

"It's ryll, you fancy?"

I half smiled, eager to find a fixer in need.

"I was beginning to think nobody else in this convoy had an itch to scratch."

I shook the packet until one of the stims edged its way out of the box.

"Careful, these things will kill you, so they say."

[Chaz de Coventina]

Chaz nodded and tried to stay her hand from snatching the stim like a half-starved inmate would a bowl of mealie. With deliberate ease she accepted the offering and shrugged.

"There are worse ways to go," Chaz said, twirling the stim between her slender fingers. "life's too short to waste feeling guilty over vices."

A beat, two, and then:

"I don't suppose you ever come across anything more serious, do you."

[Sanis Prent]

A gleam caught my eye.

"I might, Doc. Don't suppose the Alliance would be so high and mighty as to narc someone from the VRT, huh?"

Old habits died hard, and I gave a once-over to make sure no one was watching before I pulled an opaque vial from my pocket.

"Collafa. Don't use more than half a dram at once."

I held onto the vial, expecting compensation.

"Normally I'd go for 100 creds, but for you, I'll take 75."

[Chaz de Coventina]

This was a bad idea. It was one thing to have a little secret, a monster you kept back in the closet and away from the general public; it was another thing entirely to ask someone else to feed it. She'd always been cautious, going down to the most remote districts on Coruscant when she needed something a little rougher, a little less stable than the glossy vials and injectors at the hospital with their extensive dosing instructions and warnings. There had been others during residency who'd taken the odd trip, whispering about a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend who could get the good stuff. That particular avenue had never appealed to her, too public, too risky.

And yet, here she was fumbling in her pocket for payment. To give to a patient, for frell's sake.

Chaz flicked a glance at Cirr before she held out her hand, credchit resting on her open palm.

"That concussion, Mr. Prent, is going to give you headaches. I'd like to schedule a follow-up, make sure you're doing all right."

[Sanis Prent]

"I'm available for follow-ups."

I met her hand in a shake, pumping twice and taking the pre-loaded chit.

"Whenever you need to, you know, schedule me."

I looked to Cirr, who shrugged very slightly. We were both pretty familiar with this sort of thing. It sometimes wasn't honest, but we both knew it paid the bills.

[Chaz de Coventina]

The same easy confidence oozing from Sanis that vaguely irritated her was also what made it possible for de Coventina to nod and, with as much casual grace as she could rouse through her fatigue and the pounding needneedneed thrumming through her, slip the small vial into the pocket of her coat.

"I'm sure this hardly needs to be said but I'm the sort who likes to beat dead banthas," Chaz's gaze flicked from Sanis to Cirr and back again. "That doctor-patient confidentiality arrangement works both ways; may I assume that discretion is one of your stronger suits?"

[Sanis Prent]

I laughed a little.

"Relax, doc. It's the Navy, remember? What's that term? Loose lips sink ships."

I pocketed the chit effortlessly.

"Just don't forget the follow-ups. Maybe think about house calls while you're at it."

With a grimace, I eased off the exam table to my feet.