Author's note: This is my first Flying doctors fan fic, and I should probably mention that English isn't my first language so bear with me. This is also a work in progress so any feedback is greatly, greatly appreciated. And I am a slow writer so it may take a while for it to be finished.

An old, black, beaten and rusty car pulled up at the curb by The Royal Flying Doctors base. A young man opened the door, reached for a cane at the passenger's seat and began to gently make his way out of the car. As he was standing up, he leaned heavily on the cane, and was limping hard in the direction of the base.

Inside the base, Dr Chris Randall had just finished the afternoon's radio clinic. Kate was busy, bent over searching for a certain journal in the filing cabinet. Just as Chris rose from her seat to get a cup of coffee, the door to the base was opened carefully as if the person didn't want to make a sound and in came a man perhaps in his early twenties. The man closed the door without so much as a sound, and looked up and met Chris' eyes. What struck her first was that his eyes were of different colour. The right one was brown and the left one green. This fascinated her so much that she didn't say anything to greet the stranger. He smiled, and put his finger over his lips as a sign that she should remain silent. As he rounded the corner Geoff came out of his office. Geoff opened his mouth to say something to the newcomer, but he repeated his previous sign of silence and then looked over at Kate, who was still rummaging through the lower drawer of the filing cabinet, and his smile got wider.

"Is it just me or do the nurses around here get prettier with age?" he said which startled Kate out of her searching. She quickly rose and turned around. When she saw the stranger, her face lit up with joy and she rushed over and fell into his arms.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in! From where did you blow back this time?"

"Oh, you know me, I've been around. But last place was Brisbane."

"When did you get here?"

"Just now actually. I came to see my favourite big sister first thing."

A discreet cough from Geoff snapped Kate back to the others in the room.

"Oh, sorry, this is my brother Daniel. And Daniel, this is Dr Geoff Standish and Dr Chris Randall. And over there , talking on the radio, is DJ.

Daniel shook hands with the doctors and DJ waved from his spot without stopping his stream of words.

"We also call him 'motor mouth'," Kate teased.

"It's a pleasure to meet you. In fact, I could use a doctor to take a look at my leg," Daniel said. It was at that moment that Kate noticed the cane.

"What has happened to you leg?"

"It's a long story," Daniel said shortly. Kate gave him an odd look but turned to the other two.

"I'm swamped, sorry," Geoff said.

"I can take a look at it, if you want?" Chris said a nanosecond too soon. She was intrigued by this young man in a way she'd never felt before. Maybe it was his eyes, maybe it was his fair features, or the air of mystery surrounding him.

"Thank you. When are you ready?

"We can do it now if you want, in my office?"

"Ok, great, lead the way. And it was nice meeting you two," Daniel said to Geoff and DJ. Kate looked concerned as Daniel limped after Chris into her office.

"What's the problem with your leg?"

"I, uh... Have a wound. In my thigh."

Chris sensed that Daniel was feeling uncomfortable.

"Ok, take off your pants and I'll have a look."

Daniel slowly pulled down his jeans and revealed a bandaged right thigh. Chris could see that the bandage was yellow with pus. She carefully started to take off the bandage.

"Want to tell me what happened?"

"Uh... It was an accident."

As Chris got rid of the last piece of bandage, Daniel sucked air through his teeth because of the pain. And the doctor was shocked at what she saw.

"This is a bullet wound!"

"Yeah, uh... Like I said, it was an accident."

"I need to report this to the police."

"It's already been reported."

"Then, why won't you tell me what happened?"

Daniel gave crooked, insecure smile.

"Because it was just stupid. I was drunk, like really drunk, and my room mate had a gun that I played around with and accidentally shot myself in the leg. Pretty stupid, huh?"

"How long ago was it?"

"Two weeks."

"Well, you haven't been very careful with it, it's infected and your leg is overstrained."

"I know," Daniel said quietly

"Did they get the bullet out?"

"Yes."

"Then it shouldn't be too serious as long as you keep off your leg for a while. I'll prescribe some antibiotics for you, and we'll get you some crutches."

"Thank you."

Chris put on a fresh bandage, and told Daniel that he could put on his jeans again.

"Where are you staying?" Chris asked.

"I don't know, I guess I'll sleep at Kate's."

"Kate lives with me now," Chris smiled.

"Oh... Well, I guess I will find some other place."

"Nonsense, you can stay with us, I have a cot that we can put in my office. How does that sound?" Chris said softly.

"Great!" Daniel gave a wide smile, that almost, almost gave Chris the sensation of feeling weak in the knee section.

Later that night everyone was gathered at the pub. Drinks were poured, and laughter was heard as Daniel told a little bit of his life. He was some kind of a vagabond, traveling the world, getting jobs where he could to pay for the next trip and so on.

"How long are you staying this time?" Kate asked.

"Ah, you know me, five minutes or five months," Daniel shrugged.

"But I still want to know what happened to your leg."

Chris noticed that Daniel hesitated, and took a sip from his orange juice before he spoke.

"Well, I was working on a fishing boat, outside of the coast of Norway, when one night when all of us were asleep and suddenly, we all woke up by a huge bang on the starboard side of the boat. We ran up to the deck and I leaned over to see what it was that hit us. Then another hit came and I fell overboard. The water was freezing cold, but before I knew it something huge with too many teeth grabbed a hold of my leg and pulled me down under the water."

Chris thought of how good a storyteller he was. Charismatic, made everyone listen intently, thought they probably all knew he was lying. Hardly a sound was heard except for Daniel's melodic voice.

"It dragged me further and further down in the pitch black water and I thought I was done for! Eaten by some sea monster that I couldn't even see what it looked like! My lungs screamed for air, and just when I thought I couldn't take it anymore, the creature let me go! I swam as quickly up to the surface as I could and not a second too soon I could breathe again. Fortunately I wasn't far from the boat and the crew helped me up. You should see the bite marks from this creature!"

"Yeah, let's see them," Sam Patterson laughed

"No, I'm to shy," Daniel smiled coyly.

"You're so full of it," Kate said with a smile

"Yeah... But you love me anyway."

"It's getting late," Kate said. "We should be heading home. Just let me go to the bathroom."

"That was some story." Chris said when Kate had left.

"Yeah..." Daniel looked a little guilty. "Please don't tell anyone. Especially not Kate."

Chris nodded.