forbidden (illicitus) wrote in the_colony, @ 2011-04-10 21:18:00 |
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Entry tags: | ^ week 35, halcyon days, louisa may smith, thomas galloway |
Week 35 - Monday
Characters:Tom Galloway, Louisa May Smith, Halcyon Days
Location: The new surgery
Summary: Tom takes Halcyon to see the doctor about her amnesia.
Rating: PG
Louisa May was slowly settling into her new exam room space. It was much roomier than her former space -- the front part of her trailer left little room for maneuvering, and most of the room was taken up by the exam bed. This was much better. One corner was her “consulting area,” where she had a couch, a small folding chair, and her usual stool on wheels. In another corner was a “recovery” bed that had curtains to block it off. An exam bed was in the middle of the room, allowing for the possibility of it turning into a surgery bed. A few choice pieces of equipment -- the ultrasound machine, a dentist’s drill, a portable defibrillator, and some heavy duty lights -- were standing in the third corner. She had several cabinets’ worth of storage (the ones with drugs were padlocked) and a sink/decontamination/sterilization station against the last wall, along with a little work-station -- a small microscope, some glass slides, even a centrifuge. Thanks to Mike, there was a port on the wall leading to the outside generators, meaning that if she needed it (and there was enough gas to spare), she would be able to fire up the equipment located around the room. These familiar pieces of technology made her feel a bit less like Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, and a little more like she could start the laborious process of converting modern medicine to a working reality given the materials she had on hand. The room was bright and new, and although there weren’t any lights on at the moment, natural light came streaming through the windows. She was still in the process of moving her records, material, and other odds and ends from her trailer to the storage cabinets, so there were various boxes scattered around the consultation area and on the curtained-off recovery area, making the space feel a bit cramped, but Louisa May was sure that once things were properly organized, she’d have all the space she needed.
At the moment, she was sitting at the counter, transcribing her latest patient notes from shorthand to longhand -- collecting personal history files from the Travelers wouldn’t be worth a hill of beans if she didn’t keep everything organized so she could reference them again in a few months when they returned -- and humming to herself a little as she squinted at her cramped, hurried writing. “Gonna have to get me some reading glasses,” she said to herself, sighing.
Tom had let the younger members of the group handle moving and setting up Louisa May’s medical equipment and furniture. He may have been in excellent shape for his age but he was no spring chicken and didn’t want to mess up his back, which was one reasons he’d made a point to do work on the construction projects that wouldn’t lend itself to that happening.
So with those factors in play and the general frenzy of activity since the traders had arrived, Tom hadn’t actually seen Louisa May’s new office since it had been bare studs awaiting insulation and drywall. The veteran looked around, noting the space and general organization of the room and nodded in approval. He gestured toward Halcyon and indicated she should come in with him.
“Hey Doc, got a few minutes?”
Doctors made her uneasy. Or rather, the idea she had come to build of doctors wasn’t precisely a good one. After all, doctors hadn’t managed to make her remember, if they had even tried to in the first place. And while she knew little of what a doctor could actually do to her, she knew this doctor person was going to ask questions, and most likely want to examine her.
What if she found something was wrong with her? Shaking her head, Halcyon casted the thought away and followed Tom inside. “Uh, hi?”
Louisa May looked up when Tom entered the room, smiling. Upon seeing the strange woman next to him, however, she raised an eyebrow, and stood. The woman didn’t appear to be in urgent medical need -- so she relaxed a bit from her initial jolt of adrenaline. It was hard to break the habits of a fast-paced ER. “Tom, hey there. Come on in.” She directed her gaze to the other woman. “I’m Doc Smith. Pleased to meet you...” She extended a hand to the stranger as she walked over.
Extending her own hand, Halcyon gave Louisa a weak handshake that didn’t last half the time an actual one is supposed to. She couldn’t manage more, unfortunately. “Ha-Halcyon”, said a moment later, manners lost for a moment. “But that’s not my name, I t-think, because I don’t really remember it...” And she shut up at that point, because Tom might be better at explaining stuff, perhaps?
Tom looked at her sympathetically and turned back to Louisa May. “Apparently she has amnesia, can’t remember anything from her past. I thought it might be a good idea for you to give her a once over.”
He spared Halcyon another glance. “She’s not going to bite, Halcyon. You’ll be fine.”
“I know! I’m not five years old.” Yet she realized she was reacting like one, getting all defensive and even pouting a little. What, she wasn’t going to shake her hand again though. “I woke up on a hospital a couple of states away. No name, no age, no nothing. I have scars all over me, but besides that...nothing.” She had managed to keep a straight face all the way, but couldn’t help to feel a little defeated as she repeated the same thing she had been telling herself out loud.
Louisa May nodded. “Okay, then,” she said, mostly to let her brain catch up a little. Brain injuries were usually in the realm of surgeons and psychiatrists -- but she did have a few basic things she could assess right away. “Well, let’s sit down and chat for a bit, see what we can work out.” She made her way over to the couch and chairs, gesturing for Halycon and Tom to follow. The girl seemed a bit more at ease with Tom in the room, and Louisa May didn’t see the harm in having him stay for the interview.
Questions. Halcyon sighed, actually feeling like a five years old about to take a test she knew she hadn’t studied for. Actually, she was sure she had; she had just forgotten the answers. “Oooookay then,” said as she followed and sat. Tom was still there, good. She knew he didn’t really have to be there, but at least she wasn’t alone there. That had to count for something. “Shoot away.”
Louisa May settled on her usual stool, getting out a pad of paper and a pen. “I’m just gonna take some notes as we go. The whole idea of this interview is that I’ll ask some questions to see what the extent of your amnesia is, as well as what type you’re dealing with. I won’t be able to snap my fingers and make your memories come back, but at the very least, we can both understand a little more about what has happened and where to go from here. Deal?”
That was actually news to Halcyon. “So you mean...you could actually...I mean- with some help- me, eh...remember?” It had been a while now, and she had partially given up to the idea, but if Louisa May thought otherwise... “Well, there is nothing to lose, right? I already did that anyway.”
Her last intention was to promise something she couldn’t follow up on, or raise false hope before she knew what she was getting into. Louisa May knew full well that she was very limited in terms of what she could do -- both in terms of equipment, and training. She could stitch up a bleeding artery, set a bone, crack open someone’s chest and massage his heart back to life, but this? Was out of her comfort zone. “I just want to be absolutely clear that I’m no miracle worker, but I will try my hardest to figure out what can be done to help you, and the first step to that is to figure out what we’re workin’ with.”
“Alright, no false hopes coming from me.” She didn’t have much hopes to begin with, anyway. Straightening on her seat, she readied her mind to answer as good as she could.
“So let’s get some background first. You woke up in the hospital. Which wing were you in?”
Halcyon blinked. Where did she wake up? She was confused, hungry, and wearing nothing but that white coat. “It was a room...a third floor, I think.” She closed her eyes, focusing on the first things she remembered, but opened them soon after. “I- I don’t know. The place was deserted, and I left as fast as I could, sorry.”
“That’s okay,” Louisa May replied. “So were you in a bed wearing a hospital gown with an IV in your arm?” She paused to clarify. “A needle and a tube?”
Halcyon nodded, and then nodded again. “I was alone,” said as she made another effort to recall what had happened. “But the room was messy, and there were clothes that fit me there, so someone was taking care of me, I guess. Bu y-yeah, the needle thingy was there.” Removing it had been the first thing she did once she was thinking clearly.
“I guess you probably didn’t see a chart anywhere, lying around, huh?” Louisa May replied. That would be far too easy.
“No; I instinctively knew there should be something with my name around, but I didn’t find anything.” Because apparently life wasn’t hard enough as it was.
“Right. Not a big surprise... most hospitals went into meltdown with the influx of patients and the breakdown of support systems.” A brief pained look washed across her face before her usual composed look returned. “Paperwork most likely wasn’t a priority, and you were probably moved from your original room, for any number of reasons.”
Louisa May tapped her pen on her notebook thoughtfully. “So when you say ‘no nothing...’ you had no memories at all of your own personal past, I’m assuming. What about other things? Skills? Tasks? Names for objects? Personal tastes? All those require previous exposure, a previous history, even if you can’t remember where you learned it.”
Haclyon thought about it; since she had woken up, she had acted based on pure impulse, not really considering how much she still remembered. She could breathe, walk, and keep her balance, among other things. “There are...things I can do. I can fix machinery, and with the right instruments I can build things up, although I’m not exactly sure of how I do it. More than a memory is like something my hands are already used to do. I’m having trouble remembering the names of the tools I use though, or the procedures or anything too technical, so in that sense is like learning again.”
“Well, that’s a start,” Louisa May replied, sitting back. “The more you work on things you’re comfortable with, like tools, the better -- it might help other things come back too. And at the very least, if you’ve already learned something, it should be easier for you to pick back up.” Maybe the other woman’s lack of memory was a blessing -- she had no-one to mourn. She turned to Tom with a small smile. “Maybe Mike might show her around the shop he’s got set up, let her help on some projects?”
Tom nodded, a smile on his face as well. “That sounds like it would work just fine.” He turned to Halcyon to explain. “Mike’s our resident electrical engineer and general tinkerer, I’m sure he’ll have something the two of you can put your heads together and work on.”
Halcyon nodded, smiling as well, although she wasn’t completely enthusiastic about the whole thing. Still, it was better than nothing. “Yeah, sounds like a good idea.”
“It’ll be fine, Mike’s easy to get along with.” Tom reassured her before looking back at Louisa May to see if the doctor had anything else she wanted to add.
“Well, let’s meet up again in a week or so, see how you’re settling in, and if anything changes with your memories, you let me know. We’ll keep workin’ on it.”