Spin Recovery, Part Twenty-Seven (PG)
Feb. 25th, 2008 10:57 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jeriendhalNote: Probably PG for gross medical details.
Help me!
Rufus snapped awake, momentarily disoriented before he realized he was still in the recovery ward and not in his bed at Aunt Dottie's flat.
For the love of the Goddess someone help me!
He looked over towards the door, where the medtech was looking out into the hallway with curiosity but no particular alarm.
“What’s going on out there?” Rufus asked him, clenching his fist as pins and needles went up and down his arm and legs.
The medtech shrugged. “Some patient is having a freak fit. They’ll sedate her in a minute.”
The vixen cried out again, sounding terrified. With a start Rufus recognized the voice. He quickly pushed himself up and swung his legs out over the bed, swaying as he dropped down to his feet and tried to regain his balance.
The medtech looked over towards him with alarm. “Hey, you can’t get out of bed for another twenty minutes!”
“I need to see what's going on.” He took a step forward, wavered, then found his footing again as the medtech reached out for him.
“Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to get back into bed please.”
Rufus batted his hand away. “Let me by.”
“You have to get back into...”
“Get out of my way,” he growled, baring his teeth. The medtech took a step backward in surprise as Rufus brushed past him and stepped into the hallway
The scene he found was chaotic. A knot of four orderlies had surrounded a vixen, dressed in a hospital gown, who had evidentially managed to flop out of her stretcher and onto the floor. Three had a hold of both her arms and her left leg, while the other was attempting to take hold of the right leg without damaging it further. The dark furred vixen let out a cry as the fourth orderly grabbed her broken leg, then another as her face turned towards Rufus and recognized him.
“Rufus, help me!” Hazel cried out. “They want to cut off my leg!”
“What's going on here?” Rufus demanded, keeping his hand against the wall for support as he walked up.
“Nothing to concern you,” the orderly who appeared to be in charge said to him. To the fellow beside him he snapped, “Where the hell is that nurse with the bloody restraints?”
“Get them off me!” Hazel screamed. “Da brought me in here because my leg was hurting and now they want to cut it off!”
Two nurses appeared at the hallway junction and headed towards them, one carrying a set of nylon restraint belts and the other a loaded auto-injector syringe. Behind them followed Hazel's father, looking drawn and worried.
“Get her back onto the stretcher,” the lead orderly ordered.
“I don't want my leg amputated! I don't want to be cripple!” Hazel screamed as they tried to lift her up off the floor. She slipped out their grip and flopped down again, her broken leg bouncing off the floor.
“Stop this!” Rufus ordered.
“This isn't any of your business! Who do you think you are?””
Rufus took a deep breath. From somewhere at the bottom of his gut something came boiling up. A wave of righteous anger that he hadn't felt for a long while, since the first time he had come to the defense of a freighter menaced by a pirate. “I am the Viscount Ru Ofanius Brushtail! You will unhand Ms. Swiftfoot and explain to me why you are attempting to amputate her leg against her will!”
The orderly looked taken aback, but he insisted, “That's between her and her doctor.”
“No, that's between her, her doctor and me.” Rufus smiled with all of his teeth. “Get him, now. Then you may gently place Ms. Swiftfoot back on her stretcher and take her back to her room while I sort this out.”
“You can't just stand there in a hospital gown and give us orders!”
“Actually, yes I can. This hospital is in the Brushtail domain, which means its operations officers must answer to my mother, which means as I am her son and representative you must answer to me. You have exactly five minutes to get Ms. Swiftfoot back on that stretcher, get her to her room and fetch her doctor. Now move!”
The orderly blanched and backed off. In a moment Hazel was back on her stretcher and she was pushed back to her room in the critical care ward. While Rufus waited for the doctor to appear, he sat down on a chair and took the moment to ask her and her father, “Can either of you explain exactly what's going here?”
“About a few days ago her leg started hurting, milord,” Artie said, gripping his daughters hand as she panted for breath, eyes closed in pain. “I mean, it always hurts her nowadays, but it was really bad this time. She didn't want to go to hospital, but it got so she couldn't even move around on her crutches. The doctor here at the ward took one look at her and said she needed to be loaded up on antibiotics and gotten ready for an amputation. It's all been happening so fast I'm not sure what to do.”
“I don't want to be a cripple. I don't want them to take my leg,” Hazel said, eyes still shut tight. Rufus decided to take a liberty and touched her forehead briefly. It was burning with a fever.
“Would someone tell me what the hell is going on here?” a vixen dressed in surgical scrubs said, entering the room. “This patient is supposed to be in surgery by now.”
“Funny, I was about to ask you the same question,” Rufus said. “I take it you are Ms. Swiftfoot's doctor?”
“I'm Doctor Blackpaw, her surgeon. Why are you interfering with this operation, Lord Ru Ofanius?”
“Because Ms. Swiftfoot doesn't want this operation. Would you mind telling me why you are so hellbent on removing her leg against her wishes?”
Blackpaw glanced at Hazel, who was lying back on her bed making low keening sounds of distress while her father laid a damp washcloth on her forehead. “May I speak to you outside, milord?” she asked.
“Certainly,” Rufus agreed. “Hazel, I'm going to sort this out for you, all right?”
“Okay,” she gulped, then gritted her teeth as another wave of pain washed over her.
Rufus stepped out into the hallway with the surgeon, shutting the door to Hazel's room softly. “All right, Dr. Blackpaw, explain yourself.”
“Ms. Swiftfoot’s leg suffered a severe compound fracture nearly six months ago,” she began. “The accident broke her femur , fibula and tibula into literally dozens of pieces. Sharp, nasty shards that tore through the leg muscles and vascular system of her thigh and foreleg. That was bad enough, but it was compounded when the myoelectric ‘muscles’ of her spacesuit automatically tightened to prevent blood loss, creating even more damage.”
“All right, but that was six months ago. What makes removing her leg such an urgent matter now?”
“The problem is that her vascular system was so damaged that it’s unable to get enough blood oxygen to the tissues of her leg to keep it alive. Most of the cells of her leg are now in a state of necrosis, what we call ‘dry gangrene’, from this lack of oxygen.”
“Fine, so she needs her blood vessels replaced. Why haven’t you done that?”
“What do you think we’ve been doing for the past six months?” Doctor Blackpaw demanded. “She’s had a half dozen operations to try and restructure the remaining blood vessels or replaced the damaged ones with veins from her other leg or from cloning. We’ve even placed her in a hyperbaric chamber and done direct transfusions to her leg in order to feed her tissues the oxygen they needed. It simply wasn’t enough.”
Rufus bit his lip. The doctor sounded sincere. More importantly she sounded angry, at his own interference but also at her failure to keep her patient from suffering. “So what are the consequences if you don’t remove the leg?”
“The infection moves out of her leg, goes systemic, destroys all of her vital organs and she dies,” Doctor Blackpaw said flatly.
“Is there nothing else to be done?”
“We could place her in a stasis unit, but that wouldn’t repair the damage, only delay the inevitable. Her leg must be removed if the rest of her is to survive.”
Rufus sighed. “I see. Thank you, Doctor. Give me a moment with her if you would.”
Doctor Blackpaw nodded, her hackles visibly lowering. “Of course, milord.”
Rufus slipped back inside Hazel’s room. Her facial fur was dark and matted from tears and she was breathing in sharp gasps. Beside her, Hazel’s father looked up as he entered, reading the dark look of Rufus’ face almost at once. “Hazel luv, Lord Rufus is back,” he said to her gently.
“Did you… did you tell her… not to… take it off?” she gasped opening her eyes to look at him.
“I spoke with her,” Rufus said gravely. He pulled up another chair and sat next to her bed. “Hazel, she says your leg has gangrene.”
“So?” she cried out. “They said… it was an infection. You get… antibiotics… for an infection. You don’t cut off somebody’s… somebody’s fragging leg!”
“Hazel, it has to be done. I spoke to the doctor about other options and it seems there aren’t any. I’m sorry.”
“No!” she shouted. “I don’t want to lose my leg! I’d rather be dead!”
Rufus gently touched the Mother’s Amulet that still hung around her throat. The metal burned with the heat of her fever. “And would you leave your father alone in the world then?”
She looked up at him, despair mixed with anger. “You bastard!” But even as she said it, Rufus knew his words had hit their mark. She closed her eyes and slumped back against her pillows, clutching her father’s hand tightly.
“I want your word that you will do what the doctor and nurses tell you, and not try anything foolish like throwing yourself out of the stretcher again.”
“I’m no farmer lord. My word isn’t worth anything.”
“It is to me,” he said quietly.
“Bastard,” she repeated, but there was no strength behind the curse. “All right. My word.”
“Thank you, Haz Elin,” he said. “For my part, I promise I will see this through with you. I’ll be here when you come out of surgery, right here along with your father.”
She said nothing. He stepped out into the hallway again and motioned for Doctor Blackpaw to come in. Then he watched as the orderlies entered and wheeled her out and down the hallway, disappearing through a set of doors that led to the surgery. A moment later her father came out of her room, looking drained, Hazel’s amulet in his hand.
“Thank you, milord,” he said. “I knew it had to be done, but I didn’t know what words to say.”
“Yes, well, it was…” He paused, trying to find the right words to say himself now. It was nothing sounded too flippant. …my pleasure was positively sadistic. “It was my duty. You’re both subjects of my House, y’know,” he finally said.
Sgt. Swiftfoot smiled weakly. “Can’t imagine the Lady Brushtail talking down those orderlies wearing nothing but a hospital gown, milord.”
“Yes, well…” Rufus cleared his throat. “I probably should find my doctor. They’re likely wondering where in the world I’ve gotten off to. That and I should be decently dressed for Hazel when she comes out of surgery.”
“You’re really staying, milord?”
“Of course I am.”
TBC
Help me!
Rufus snapped awake, momentarily disoriented before he realized he was still in the recovery ward and not in his bed at Aunt Dottie's flat.
For the love of the Goddess someone help me!
He looked over towards the door, where the medtech was looking out into the hallway with curiosity but no particular alarm.
“What’s going on out there?” Rufus asked him, clenching his fist as pins and needles went up and down his arm and legs.
The medtech shrugged. “Some patient is having a freak fit. They’ll sedate her in a minute.”
The vixen cried out again, sounding terrified. With a start Rufus recognized the voice. He quickly pushed himself up and swung his legs out over the bed, swaying as he dropped down to his feet and tried to regain his balance.
The medtech looked over towards him with alarm. “Hey, you can’t get out of bed for another twenty minutes!”
“I need to see what's going on.” He took a step forward, wavered, then found his footing again as the medtech reached out for him.
“Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to get back into bed please.”
Rufus batted his hand away. “Let me by.”
“You have to get back into...”
“Get out of my way,” he growled, baring his teeth. The medtech took a step backward in surprise as Rufus brushed past him and stepped into the hallway
The scene he found was chaotic. A knot of four orderlies had surrounded a vixen, dressed in a hospital gown, who had evidentially managed to flop out of her stretcher and onto the floor. Three had a hold of both her arms and her left leg, while the other was attempting to take hold of the right leg without damaging it further. The dark furred vixen let out a cry as the fourth orderly grabbed her broken leg, then another as her face turned towards Rufus and recognized him.
“Rufus, help me!” Hazel cried out. “They want to cut off my leg!”
“What's going on here?” Rufus demanded, keeping his hand against the wall for support as he walked up.
“Nothing to concern you,” the orderly who appeared to be in charge said to him. To the fellow beside him he snapped, “Where the hell is that nurse with the bloody restraints?”
“Get them off me!” Hazel screamed. “Da brought me in here because my leg was hurting and now they want to cut it off!”
Two nurses appeared at the hallway junction and headed towards them, one carrying a set of nylon restraint belts and the other a loaded auto-injector syringe. Behind them followed Hazel's father, looking drawn and worried.
“Get her back onto the stretcher,” the lead orderly ordered.
“I don't want my leg amputated! I don't want to be cripple!” Hazel screamed as they tried to lift her up off the floor. She slipped out their grip and flopped down again, her broken leg bouncing off the floor.
“Stop this!” Rufus ordered.
“This isn't any of your business! Who do you think you are?””
Rufus took a deep breath. From somewhere at the bottom of his gut something came boiling up. A wave of righteous anger that he hadn't felt for a long while, since the first time he had come to the defense of a freighter menaced by a pirate. “I am the Viscount Ru Ofanius Brushtail! You will unhand Ms. Swiftfoot and explain to me why you are attempting to amputate her leg against her will!”
The orderly looked taken aback, but he insisted, “That's between her and her doctor.”
“No, that's between her, her doctor and me.” Rufus smiled with all of his teeth. “Get him, now. Then you may gently place Ms. Swiftfoot back on her stretcher and take her back to her room while I sort this out.”
“You can't just stand there in a hospital gown and give us orders!”
“Actually, yes I can. This hospital is in the Brushtail domain, which means its operations officers must answer to my mother, which means as I am her son and representative you must answer to me. You have exactly five minutes to get Ms. Swiftfoot back on that stretcher, get her to her room and fetch her doctor. Now move!”
The orderly blanched and backed off. In a moment Hazel was back on her stretcher and she was pushed back to her room in the critical care ward. While Rufus waited for the doctor to appear, he sat down on a chair and took the moment to ask her and her father, “Can either of you explain exactly what's going here?”
“About a few days ago her leg started hurting, milord,” Artie said, gripping his daughters hand as she panted for breath, eyes closed in pain. “I mean, it always hurts her nowadays, but it was really bad this time. She didn't want to go to hospital, but it got so she couldn't even move around on her crutches. The doctor here at the ward took one look at her and said she needed to be loaded up on antibiotics and gotten ready for an amputation. It's all been happening so fast I'm not sure what to do.”
“I don't want to be a cripple. I don't want them to take my leg,” Hazel said, eyes still shut tight. Rufus decided to take a liberty and touched her forehead briefly. It was burning with a fever.
“Would someone tell me what the hell is going on here?” a vixen dressed in surgical scrubs said, entering the room. “This patient is supposed to be in surgery by now.”
“Funny, I was about to ask you the same question,” Rufus said. “I take it you are Ms. Swiftfoot's doctor?”
“I'm Doctor Blackpaw, her surgeon. Why are you interfering with this operation, Lord Ru Ofanius?”
“Because Ms. Swiftfoot doesn't want this operation. Would you mind telling me why you are so hellbent on removing her leg against her wishes?”
Blackpaw glanced at Hazel, who was lying back on her bed making low keening sounds of distress while her father laid a damp washcloth on her forehead. “May I speak to you outside, milord?” she asked.
“Certainly,” Rufus agreed. “Hazel, I'm going to sort this out for you, all right?”
“Okay,” she gulped, then gritted her teeth as another wave of pain washed over her.
Rufus stepped out into the hallway with the surgeon, shutting the door to Hazel's room softly. “All right, Dr. Blackpaw, explain yourself.”
“Ms. Swiftfoot’s leg suffered a severe compound fracture nearly six months ago,” she began. “The accident broke her femur , fibula and tibula into literally dozens of pieces. Sharp, nasty shards that tore through the leg muscles and vascular system of her thigh and foreleg. That was bad enough, but it was compounded when the myoelectric ‘muscles’ of her spacesuit automatically tightened to prevent blood loss, creating even more damage.”
“All right, but that was six months ago. What makes removing her leg such an urgent matter now?”
“The problem is that her vascular system was so damaged that it’s unable to get enough blood oxygen to the tissues of her leg to keep it alive. Most of the cells of her leg are now in a state of necrosis, what we call ‘dry gangrene’, from this lack of oxygen.”
“Fine, so she needs her blood vessels replaced. Why haven’t you done that?”
“What do you think we’ve been doing for the past six months?” Doctor Blackpaw demanded. “She’s had a half dozen operations to try and restructure the remaining blood vessels or replaced the damaged ones with veins from her other leg or from cloning. We’ve even placed her in a hyperbaric chamber and done direct transfusions to her leg in order to feed her tissues the oxygen they needed. It simply wasn’t enough.”
Rufus bit his lip. The doctor sounded sincere. More importantly she sounded angry, at his own interference but also at her failure to keep her patient from suffering. “So what are the consequences if you don’t remove the leg?”
“The infection moves out of her leg, goes systemic, destroys all of her vital organs and she dies,” Doctor Blackpaw said flatly.
“Is there nothing else to be done?”
“We could place her in a stasis unit, but that wouldn’t repair the damage, only delay the inevitable. Her leg must be removed if the rest of her is to survive.”
Rufus sighed. “I see. Thank you, Doctor. Give me a moment with her if you would.”
Doctor Blackpaw nodded, her hackles visibly lowering. “Of course, milord.”
Rufus slipped back inside Hazel’s room. Her facial fur was dark and matted from tears and she was breathing in sharp gasps. Beside her, Hazel’s father looked up as he entered, reading the dark look of Rufus’ face almost at once. “Hazel luv, Lord Rufus is back,” he said to her gently.
“Did you… did you tell her… not to… take it off?” she gasped opening her eyes to look at him.
“I spoke with her,” Rufus said gravely. He pulled up another chair and sat next to her bed. “Hazel, she says your leg has gangrene.”
“So?” she cried out. “They said… it was an infection. You get… antibiotics… for an infection. You don’t cut off somebody’s… somebody’s fragging leg!”
“Hazel, it has to be done. I spoke to the doctor about other options and it seems there aren’t any. I’m sorry.”
“No!” she shouted. “I don’t want to lose my leg! I’d rather be dead!”
Rufus gently touched the Mother’s Amulet that still hung around her throat. The metal burned with the heat of her fever. “And would you leave your father alone in the world then?”
She looked up at him, despair mixed with anger. “You bastard!” But even as she said it, Rufus knew his words had hit their mark. She closed her eyes and slumped back against her pillows, clutching her father’s hand tightly.
“I want your word that you will do what the doctor and nurses tell you, and not try anything foolish like throwing yourself out of the stretcher again.”
“I’m no farmer lord. My word isn’t worth anything.”
“It is to me,” he said quietly.
“Bastard,” she repeated, but there was no strength behind the curse. “All right. My word.”
“Thank you, Haz Elin,” he said. “For my part, I promise I will see this through with you. I’ll be here when you come out of surgery, right here along with your father.”
She said nothing. He stepped out into the hallway again and motioned for Doctor Blackpaw to come in. Then he watched as the orderlies entered and wheeled her out and down the hallway, disappearing through a set of doors that led to the surgery. A moment later her father came out of her room, looking drained, Hazel’s amulet in his hand.
“Thank you, milord,” he said. “I knew it had to be done, but I didn’t know what words to say.”
“Yes, well, it was…” He paused, trying to find the right words to say himself now. It was nothing sounded too flippant. …my pleasure was positively sadistic. “It was my duty. You’re both subjects of my House, y’know,” he finally said.
Sgt. Swiftfoot smiled weakly. “Can’t imagine the Lady Brushtail talking down those orderlies wearing nothing but a hospital gown, milord.”
“Yes, well…” Rufus cleared his throat. “I probably should find my doctor. They’re likely wondering where in the world I’ve gotten off to. That and I should be decently dressed for Hazel when she comes out of surgery.”
“You’re really staying, milord?”
“Of course I am.”
TBC
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-02-25 05:21 pm (UTC)I think I'm falling in love with Rufus. Damn you, Royce, and your all too human characters!
Woah
Poor Hazel, poor Rufus, just waking up and now this...
At first I thought that maybe Rue was there needing help his prostetics malfunctioning...
...but that is more like it - Rufus getting noble for his love *grins*
And that is always a hard decision to cut off ones member.
And even with the advanced medicine they are not able to get it restored - it must be in a really bad shape, that leg. =S
I guess it did not help that Hazel did not go easy on that leg either...
I just wonder what Rufus' mother will say to the incident *grins*
She surely will hear of it in like no time...
Yeah, what to say in a situation like that? But it seems she still likes him somehow - otherwise she would not have agreed in the end.
Keep up the great work. =D
mjkj
PS: Any chance of seeing Rue anytime soon?
no subject
Date: 2008-02-26 01:13 am (UTC)Re: Woah
Date: 2008-02-26 01:20 am (UTC)Of course you're right. Hazel didn't exactly treat her leg very carefully. :)
And Rufus' mother is going to have bigger things to get angry about than her son screwing around with a hospital's medical staff. Hehehe...
PS I don't think Rue is going to show up in this universe in person. Remember, this is the place where everyone is twisted into a distorted version of how they appear in the primary universe. Would you really want to see Gunny being genuinely unpleasant?
Re: Woah
Hm, no, not really, but who says Rue really is that unpleasant? - Well, he could be a pig, a prig or a snob as well or being all depressed =S but that is not any better...
Oh, I am looking forward to what is next - especially what is up with Rufus' mother and the upcoming uproar... =D
mjkj