2022-05-19 - Held for Observation

It's just another boring night in Gray Harbor.

By night, we mean it is the awful small hours of the morning, Thursday having taken over from Wednesday though they're still fighting over the blanket of night, the sky greyish in the east. It's a little late for drunks to be coming in, and a little early for the hangovers, but it also may not be that unusual when an ambulance calls into the ER with a double ride: one patient, thready vitals, concussion and headwound, one mobile patient with a lacerated leg who wouldn't be left behind. They really are quite a pair, too. Whatever happened left them a bloody mess. He's on a stretcher, carted off whatever spot has been reserved for him.

Nicasia can walk and so she follows, the dazed expression on her face probably not at all feigned to the consternation of the police officer who naturally was summoned to find out of this is some kind of domestic dispute gone badly because there's an awful lot of blood on her shirt. And on her flannel pajama pants. Some from the slash on her leg, where it's gone and bled through, but more from contact with the guy on the stretcher, like she tried to wipe him down or mop him up or...

...let's just say it was a good idea to seek medical attention here and call it a day.

Myles is fighting on the brink of consciousness the whole ride over. Though on the stretcher, he's able to get one message over to his ex-wife. One last statement before he's not likely to talk again for a good while. Reaching for Nicasia desperately, he finally finds her. And he issues his most heartfelt plea,

"Get someone to stay with Lady."

Blood all over, head wound. In the emergency room. And what little brainpower he can muster is focused on the dog.

Zara moves quickly to the patient. Not in a panic, never in a panic, but certainly not taking her time. Head wounds you never take your time with. At least the patient is conscious. "What are his vitals?" she asks the paramedics as she takes a quick look over Myles, shining her torch in his eyes for a moment. "Sir, can you tell me your name" she states firmly to the man. "Try and stay awake for me, okay?" Zara doesn't need to know his name as much as Myles needs to know it, so no prompting from the audience. "Get him into Room Three." Once Myles is on her way she gestures to Nicasia. "Can you tell me what happened? Walk with me." A glance down at the injured leg. "Someone get this woman a wheelchair."

Barely conscious and hovered over; if the cop wasn't still trying to ask her question Nicasia would probably be right up there with the stretcher, part vigilant guardian and part desperate worrier. "Lady will be fine," she promises Myles, which probably rules her out as the lady in question.

Then there's Zara, and she falters for a step, blinking once or twice before the first real flicker of relief appears. For about a second. Then it's quenched under a look of slightly wild wariness. "I'm fine," she announces. "Most of this is... isn't mine." At least one of the paramedics made a point of getting her something to clean her hands off with. All the same she looks very much like one of the walking wounded, unwilling to let Myles out of her sight, which means she's headed for the door of Room Three, at least. There's a half glance at her escort, and then a half-glance at Zara, which makes it a long, long moment before she offers up, "A really fucked up Dream."

That. That's what happened. There is of course technical information supplied by the medics. Vitals, the treatment provided along the way, et cetera. They're not sure what happened because neither of their patients is making any sense (and thus the wild-eyed woman maybe should be checked for head trauma TOO) but he clearly got brained by something hard and sharp.

There's a bleary look up to Zara, blinking once. What's your name. His eyes flick around. He lets out a low groan. "Nico." His name? But his eyes are searching when he says it. Eventually he hears Nicasia's voice. What's your name. "Walking Thuh..." He lets out a low grunt. That's not right. "Myles." He finally gets out, looking rather exhausted after getting that word off.

Then he's off being rolled away, which is just as well, he's not in the most conversational mood. The big man sags to the side, head lolling off.

A Dream. There is no concern from Zara that Nicasia may be mad but rather a subtle nod of understanding - don't want the hospital staff to think Zara is crazy too. "Can you tell me what caused his injury."

Myles is pushed into Room Three and transferred, carefully, to the bed in the room. What she has learned from the paramedics suggests it should be safe to do that. And it gets the paramedics out of the room while the patient is being hooked up to a drip and sensors. Zara is soon by his side once more. "Myles, can you tell me where you are?" Now is the time for her to have a closer look at the damage. Head wounds do have a habit of looking worse than they are, lots of blood, but it does look quite nasty. At least Myles isn't wearing much clothes to cut away - just boxers. Easier to check for other wounds. "Do you know if he has any further injuries?" she asks Nicasia as a wheelchair arrives for the woman.

Well, he remembers Nicasia's name. That has to count for something, right? Something in his expression has her frowning even more intensely though, er mouth pressed into a thin, worried line that isn't helped when the first name he comes up with definitely is not his own. And then he's out of sight and she slumps a bit.

"Birds," she answers, concerning what did it to him. "I mean they probably weren't just birds, even in the Dream. They were big and sometimes they were part wooden and they banged a couple of us up pretty good. He took a couple of hits. Beaks, claws. I'm not exactly sure I was..." Distracted? That part isn't owned up to, just yet. She's right there behind, however, out of the way but definitely not going away, even when the wheelchair comes and she's encouraged to sit. "I don't know if he lost consciousness. I mean. He was asleep when it happened but kind of awake when I found him."

Myles is foggy, when Zara is at his side he's blinking up at her. The man actually is wearing precious little clothes. Boxers that barely manage to cover the most important bits. His muscular frame still covered in splatters of blood. He's blinking up to Zara. Blearily. "Hospital." He rumbles low. He can hear Nicasia's voice. "Nico?" One hand lifts as if searching.

"That's correct" Zara smiles down at her patient. He knows his name and where he is, this is a good sign. "Nurse, could you get some more swabs." She has used quite a few to clear off blood and see the state of Myles' flesh but she also needs the nurse out of the room for a moment. Which she does with a "Yes, doctor." As soon as the woman is gone, Zara places a hand on each side of her patient's head.

"Stay still, Myles, everything will be okay." Soon the warmth of her healing power is flowing into the man. The nasty gash on his head slowly disappearing, flesh knitting back together. "The 'good thing' about head wounds" Zara explains to the pair, "Is that they are very bloody regardless of the extent of the actual wound. Our story is that it looked worse than it was. Understand?"

The chair is problematic because Nicasia doesn't have the first clue how to wheel around in it while seated, so when Myles mumbles her name again she gets up and moves over to take his reaching hand. "Hey," she murmurs. "I told you, you're going to be okay. This doctor glows." Short sentences. Small words. Important information distilled as much as she can. She's going to hover, yes, but she's going to stay out of the way as much as possible, even if being close up to the blood makes what little color she had regained drain away again.

"It was worse than it looked," she repeats as Zara gives this story. That, and, "It looked pretty fucking bad." But it looks better rapidly and that is some relief, the whole process watched with stark, morbid fascination.

There's a quiet groan that breaks from Myles' lips as the healing power courses through his head. There's a stiffening of his body, back arching slightly before his back thuds back against the hospital bed. "Fuck." Is let out in a rush of his breath. Nicasia's hand finds his. There's a blink as he looks down, large hand folding up in around Nicasia's. "Worse than it looked." Myles repeats, with a somewhat dopey quality. He looks up to Zara, slowly. Letting out a quiet grunt. "You're one of us." He murmurs, low. His eyes flicking over to Nicasia as if to check and see if she had already realized this.

"There are more of us than many of us are aware" Zara replies with a warm smile, though her efforts have also made her a little tired. "Just keep as still as you can, Myles. Don't want to make things bad again." She is content with her work but you never know how things go in this place. "Were you both dragged into the Dream or did you go looking for it?" Though the arrival of the nurse gets a 'don't say anything' look from the doctor. "Thank you" Zara says for the swabs and bandaging the nurse brought. "Thankfully, it's not as bad as it looked once the blood was cleaned away. I'm going to sew him up and put him under observation overnight..." Head wounds require that kind of thing. "But he should be able to leave in the morning. You can go back to your station, nurse. I'll look after Nicasia's wound too." The nurse nods in acknowledgement before heading off.

"Let's have a look at your leg." Zara crouches alongside the wheelchair to clean Nicasia's injury. "You'll have to strip so we can check you for other wounds. Are you up to that?"

"Way worse than it looked. It looked like a goddamned crime scene." Maybe Nicasia is marginally less worried, now; she's recovered the tiniest bit of her sense of humor, a sliver of sharpness that can't possibly cut. She's the lucid one. She can answer questions. "It just dragged us in. Like a real dream, sucked out of sleep. There were some other people there, too, but I'm not real sure who. We sort of got different bodies." When the nurse comes in she turns slightly, guarded, and just watches - stares really - until the poor woman has departed again. The idea of keeping him overnight for observation twists her frown back into existence, but this time she bites at her lip. "He is going to be okay, right?"

The notion that it might be her turn gets Zara a blink that is ever so slightly baffled. "This isn't my blood. Well. Most of it. I... I'm okay." On the other hand she is covered in blood, so it may be a toss-up. "I don't suppose you can commandeer me a set of scrubs?"

"I'm Myles." After Zara's healing on his head, he's a little bit clearer so maybe he feels he needs to introduce himself again. Able to put thoughts together, at least. He gives a dip of his chin. "Yeah. Alright." Were they dragged in? He starts to speak, though falls silent when the nurse enters. Is quiet until departure. "I was asleep." He grunts with a deep frown. There's a quiet frown, looking over to Nicasia. "Nico's hurt too?" Myles starts to sit up, frowning deeply. "Nico you--" He's frowning lightly at the mention of him having to stay overnight. His eyes flit back to Zara. "Did we get your name?"

"Myles will be fine" Zara assures Nicasia as she looks at the other woman's wound. "You have been injured. Maybe a scratch but we have no idea what infections could come from those claws. Or do you? So, you'll both be getting a tetanus shot if nothing else. All head wounds have to stay in overnight." She states that last as if that is non-negotiable. "I'll find you something to change into, Nico. You're welcome to stay here and watch over him if you wish."

"Oh, how rude of me" Zara laughs as she stands to introduce herself. "Doctor Zara Thule. I wish we could have met in better circumstances. Do you know if anyone else was injured in your Dream?" A beat. "No one was killed, were they?"

"It's just a scratch," Nic assures Myles again, perhaps a little more vehemently than she needs to . The idea that she's not going to escape without at least a cursory exam isn't lost on her though, even if it contributes to her general sense of frowning. When he tries to sit up, she moves her hand to her shoulder. "Nuh uh, you stay put or I'll request restraints. They can strap your ass down."

But if he has to be a good patient then she needs to be a model patient, right about the time they're introducing each other. "Nicasia Aldrich," she offers. "And I wouldn't have thought you'd get an infection from a Dream. But I guess if you can come back bleeding, why not?" Her pajama pants, the bloody flannel, will be peeled off and set on the seat of the wheelchair. As advertised, she does have a pretty solid scratch across her left thigh, but the blood is already clotting. Another instance of a thing that might look worse than it is. "There were six of us. Assuming all of us were real people, then... two others were pretty seriously injured. Nobody died."

It may not have occurred to her, before, that this was even possible. She sits back down in the chair, breathing out a quiet, "Fuck."

There's a knit of his brow, slowly tilting his head at Nicasia. He frowns deeply. He slowly settles back down, scowling lightly over at Nicasia. There's a deep frown as Nicasia gets undressed, his eyes going to that cut. "Fuck, Nico." His brows knit, scowling. "Ruiz was in there." Myles rumbles low. "The chief of police." Beat. "Ava--" Myles' eyes widen. "Fuck. Ava was hurt." He slowly brings his hand up to his head, scrubbing at his features.

Zara introduces herself, which prompts Myles to drop his hand, blinking up at her. "Zara?" He grunts, quirking one brow. "Ava's talked to me about you. She wanted--" He doesn't finish that sentence, letting out a quiet grunt instead.

"Ava?" Zara looks quite alarmed that her best friend was in the Dream. And injured. Of course she was, it's Ava. At least she wasn't killed so that means Zara can kill her instead. "Ava will be fine. She always is." Trying to put on a confident face since doctors aren't allowed to worry in front of patients. "Ava talked about me? Oh...oh! You're that Myles." A little blush to her cheeks before she laughs. "Not exactly the way I would have liked our first meeting." And he seems to be very close to Nicasia. "I'll get you some clothes, Nico." Zara turns on her heels to quickly grab something from a storeroom down the corridor. She won't be long but it gives them a chance to talk.

"We called Ava first," Nicasia supplies quietly. "She didn't answer, but she was mobile, at least, when the Dream faded. Everyone was. That's a good sign, right?" Of course Myles was mobile when the Dream faded and he's on a bed in the emergency room, so. The idea that Ava mentioned them to each other maybe noted but with barely more than a glance between them, one brow lifting just a touch at Zara's blush, but it doesn't prompt any commentary. She might well be too tired, too burnt out, too worried in general. Then the doctor is off and she sinks a little further, tugging at the hem of her bloody t-shirt like it'll cover something.

"Yeahhh... That Myles." He rumbles, eyes flicking down at his nearly naked body. He slowly reaches down for the blanket of the hospital bed to pull them up just a touch. There's a glance over to Nicasia when Zara speaks to her before he glances back to Zara. "Most people call her Nicki." He supplies, helpfully. "I force her to listen to me call her Nico." A flicker of a smile though he's glancing over to Nicasia before slowly leaning back into the bed, letting out a quiet sigh. Zara is gone after a moment and Myles is flicking his eyes over to Nicasia. He's quiet for a few moments.

"You okay?"

Now that the excitement has passed another measure of the tension runs out of Nicasia. A little like the blood, maybe, leaving her sapped, pale in the too-bright lights. "Nicasia is fine. Nicki is fine." Nico, maybe not so much, but there's no sense of argument, no defensiveness. Then the doctor is gone and she's maybe content to sit there in silence for a bit, at least until the question comes. And is, at least initially, dismissed. "I'm fine. It really is just a scratch. Look; I didn't even get a bandaid."

Myles frowns over at her. "Not just that, Nico." He rumbles low. "That was fucked up." He watches the woman for a few moments before ultimately he frowns, looking over to the door. He's quiet for a few breaths until finally, "Did you put Lady out back? Maybe have that Robin kid check in on her?"

No such luck, Nicasia. When Zara returns she not only has clothes, but also bandages for the leg wound, and a Tetanus shot for both of them. Is it a bit chilly in here? "Let me get this done" she means the shots and bandage, "And I'll leave you two alone." That's what they want...right? "I'll track Ava down once my shift is done."

There's a particular willful ignorance here that suggests Nicasia knows exactly what he's talking about, which is why she's looking someplace else. And why not? The room is full of all kinds of interesting things that are very shiny, very distractingly so.

"Lady's fine," she promises. "I'll let her out when I go back. I need to get you some clothes, and..." Clean up. She needs to clean up, but he doesn't need to know that. Yet there's that evasiveness, that way she absolutely avoids looking at him, that probably gives the whole plan away, balanced out only by the fact that he did just have a concussion. "I'd like to find out who else was in the dream, you know? Make sure they're okay too."

And there's Zara, who is something like a distractin even if she does have a bandage for the scrape. And needles. "It's alright," she assures. "Better he sits here and is a grouch than he doesn't sit at home and is insufferable."

Myles lets out a low groan, staring over at the two women, when Zara returns. "You're gonna leave?" He asks Nicasia, frowning lightly. He props himself up with one elbow, attention going over to Zara. "You made it way better, Zara. Can't you.. I dunno fuckin' stamp me out or some shit? You for real I have to stay?"

Maybe things aren't perfect between these two. Though it could be the stress of the Dream of course. Zara bandages up Nicasia's leg before letting the other woman get dressed. "Yes, Myles, for real you have to stay overnight. Any head injury requires overnight observation. Even though we all know that you're probably okay to go home, the hospital admin would give me hell for letting you go. They don't know you're okay." Though she does think on the problem for a moment before looking to Nicasia. "Unless you agree to watch him overnight. I might be able to send you both home." Though that would mean Myles would be back home and insufferable.

"Overnight," Nicasia repeats. "You mean the rest of tonight?" It's probably near 4 AM at this point. Not really night by any plausible definition. "Or does he have to stay 24 hours, or whatever?" Clarification is important.

Once her leg is bandaged she stands up and pulls on the scrubs, ends up cleaner than she'd been when she came in. It gives her time to formulate an answer for Myles, which is, "I'm gonna leave. And you're gonna stay here where they can watch you, just in case. I'm just going to go let Lady out, and get you some clothes. Unless you want to go back in your boxers, in which case..." There's a loft of an eyebrow, here. A bit of a challenge, but she tilts her head in Zara's direction. "I'm not going to argue with the doctor, anyway."

There's a slow knit of his brows at Nicasia at that challenge. "You think I wouldn't?" He starts to sit up, pushing the blanket back like he'll stomp out of here right now. His eyes roll somewhat before he lets out a grunt, eyes flicking between Zara and Nicasia. "Fine." Begrudgingly he slowly lays back, folding his huge arms over his chest like a giant muscular petulant child, glowering at the rest of the room. Remembering himself, his eyes go over to Zara. "Thanks. Zara. 'ppreciate it."

"Twelve hours should do it" Zara informs Nicasia. "Oh, you're leaving?" Though that may be the best to reduce the stress for both of them. "Okay, maybe get some rest yourself before coming back to pick Myles up. If you feel any pain, numbness or nausea, I want you to come back here immediately, okay." Again, this is non-negotiable.

As for Myles, there was a glare starting when he tried to get up but he comes to his senses and returns to bed. Zara smiles for his wisdom. "Thanks, Myles. Hey, that's why I'm here. Get some rest now and we can talk about what happened in this Dream of yours later. I have to get back to work. An Emergency Doctor's work is never done."

And that might be exactly why Nicasia didn't want him to go home.

Maybe.

She does nod, just a little, at Zara, but offers neither confirmation nor denial about how long she might intend to be gone. "Is he going to be held here, or transferred to another room? Or should I just ask for him at reception? Hit the gift shop, get him a little teddy bear?" Like he's not even there. She takes a breath then and gets up out of the wheelchair again, and collects her pants. They're studied, like this might be the first time she's really looked at them, looked hard enough that whatever she sees makes her take a breath and hold it for a moment. Then. "Thank you, Zara. And do look in on Ava. Just in case."

A middle finger is raised to the mention of the teddy bear. They swing so hard. It was only a couple hours ago that she was cradling his head and they were clinging to each other desperately. Myles gives Zara a little nod and a grunt. "Thanks." He adds again as he slowly settles back into his bed, sighing quietly as he closes his eyes. Might as well get comfortable.