Hope Comes to Brockton Bay
Part 4
The four-wheel-drive moved slowly down the street, its occupants scanning the buildings on either side, where they weren't sulking or glaring at one another. Puddles still lay in the dips and hollows where asphalt had been eroded away, or subsided, in the aftermath of the Leviathan attack. Hope leaned on the side of the vehicle and let her eyes slip into their wide-range scanning mode. At the same time, her senses expanded, feeling the life-sparks of her teammates – and more besides.
People in that building up ahead, one coming out fast.
"Clockblocker, stop!" she said urgently.
"What? Why?' said Clockblocker, but he was already reflexively standing on the brakes. The jeep squealed to a halt, just as a large, mustachioed man burst from a doorway just off to the side and ran in front of them. He waved his arms frantically and babbled in a language none of them understood.
Even as he appeared, Shadow Stalker stood bolt upright in the back of the jeep, both crossbows pointed straight at the man's face. "Don't move!" she screamed.
"Christ, Shadow Stalker, ease up!" exclaimed Clockblocker. "It's just a civilian! He's not even armed!" This was not entirely true; there was a knife large enough to skin a small elephant in a sheath at his belt, but this was not being used to threaten them.
As he spoke, Weld was climbing from the vehicle and approaching the man. Not entirely by mistake, he placed himself between the man and any 'accidental' shots that Shadow Stalker might make.
"Calm down, sir," he said soothingly. "What's the problem?"
The man, obviously upset about something, tried to slow his torrent of speech, but it was hard going. Weld caught the word 'leg' a couple of times, but could make no headway.
And then Hope climbed out of the jeep and walked around to where Weld was talking to the man.
"Извинете ме, сър," she said fluently, in whatever language he was speaking, "Какъв е проблемът?"
"О, слава Богу!" he exclaimed, clutching at her shoulders. "Някой, който говори цивилизован език. Жена ми стоеше на остър стик и отиде в крака, а сега тя е заразен. Тя има треска."
"Oh, that's not good," she said. "Weld, do we have a medical kit? His wife's got an infected wound in her leg. We should look at it."
"You speak that language?" asked Weld, dumbfounded. "What is it?"
"I have no idea," she replied absently. "Sounds Eastern European. Medical kit, yes, no?"
"Right, right," said Weld. "Everyone out of the car. Kid Win, under the back seat, should be the medical kit. Bring it." He turned, but Hope was already following the man into the building. "Clockblocker, watch the car. Let us know if anything happens. Shadow Stalker, with me."
He followed Hope into the building, through a series of rooms where children with wary eyes watched them pass, into a dark bedroom where a middle-aged woman lay with a filthy bandage around her left ankle. The limb was badly swollen, and even in this dim light, Weld could see the streak of red up toward the lymph glands in her groin.
Hope was bending over the woman, smoothing her brow with one cool, glowing hand. She looked up as they entered. "She's in a bad way. There's three or four pieces of wood in her ankle and foot, and it's infected badly. If they don't come out, right now, she's going to lose her foot at least, and maybe die from blood poisoning." Her glow intensified, and he could see the room more clearly now. "Right now, Weld."
"Ah ... right," he said. "Ah ... I don't know if my first aid training covered this, exactly," he hedged. He damn well knew that it didn't.
"It's all good," said Hope briskly. "I've done this sort of thing before. I'll need a bucket, a scalpel, and a lot of sterile water. Also, alcohol and swabs, if the medical kit has any." She turned to the man – obviously the woman's husband. "Ще трябва една кофа."
He hustled off, and quickly found a bright red plastic bucket. At the same time, Kid Win was rifling through the medical kit, and came up with a scalpel, its blade wrapped in sterile paper. He handed this to Hope, followed by an alcohol bottle and swabs. Weld stood by, indecisive, unable to touch anything metal for fear it would stick to his skin. I hope she knows more than first aid, he thought. All it said on her file is that she knew how to do the kiss of life.
"Help me move her," Hope said to Weld. "But first we have to deal with the pain."
"I can do that, at least," said Shadow Stalker, stepping forward from where she'd been glowering with folded arms. She flipped a tranquilizing quarrel from her quiver, reversed it, and jabbed its point down toward the woman's leg –
- only to have her wrist slap into Hope's hand.
"Not that way, I think," murmured Hope. "We do not know how she will react to the sedative. I have a better way."
"Let go of me," snarled Shadow Stalker, turning insubstantial and pulling away.
"Shadow Stalker, back off," said Weld. "Hope seems to know what she's doing." At least, I hope so.At the time, he didn't even notice the accidental pun.
With another poisonous glare at Hope, Shadow Stalker stepped back out of the way.
"Thank you, Shadow Stalker," said Hope, apparently sincerely, and then carefully laid her hands on the swollen reddish flesh. A pulse of silver-blue energy, accompanied by a soft crystal chime, passed from her hands into the woman's leg, and immediately the patient's harsh breathing eased.
"Is she out?" asked Weld, his voice unnaturally loud in the small room.
"Nah," said Hope, watching the woman carefully, "but she won't be feeling any pain at all for the next few minutes. So let's get this done."
With Weld's help, she moved the woman so her leg was off the bed, the heel supported by a chair that Kid Win moved into position. With a pair of scissors from the medical kit, she snipped off the bandage. Weld drew in his breath sharply at the red and yellow raw flesh under it. On the floor directly under the infected area of the leg, Hope carefully placed the bucket. "I still need that water," she said.
"I'll sterilise some," said Kid Win. "Come on, Shadow Stalker, let's give them some room." They exited to find the kitchen, leaving Hope and Weld with the husband and wife.
"Remind me to hug Kid Win sometime," murmured Hope to Weld, then took an alcohol swab and wiped down the infected area. The woman looked on with interest, as if the swollen limb belonged to someone else. Then Hope took up the scalpel and stripped the paper from it.
"Аз отивам да се изрежат на инфекцията сега," she told the woman. "моля да ми кажете, ако се чувствате никаква болка на всички."
The woman nodded doubtfully, and the man took her hand, squeezing tightly.
Hope laid one hand on the leg, placed the scalpel, and cut deeply. The woman made no demur, even as blood and other horrid fluids spurted from the wound. Weld's gorge rose at the sight, but he made shift to hold the bucket under the flow. Hope cut farther, then stopped and pried into the wound with her fingers.
"Shouldn't – shouldn't you be using gloves?" Weld said, trying to keep his voice steady.
"Wouldn't matter," Hope said cheerfully. "My skin is always sterile. It's a power thing." She pulled her fingers out of the wound, and placed a three-inch piece of blackened wood on the chair. "Number one." She cut again, probed again, pulled out another piece, smaller. "Number two." Another cut, a ghastly rush of rotting material. "And ... number three." A third piece of wood joined the other two.
The woman gasped something, and Hope immediately pumped another burst of silver-blue light into her leg. "Well," she announced, "that's the worst of it. I've exposed all the infected areas; all we need now is the water."
Weld could not help but notice, as she massaged the woman's leg to get as much pus and corruption from it as possible, that any fluids that contacted her fingers slid straight off again. Sterile skin, he thought to distract himself. Nothing sticks. How does that even work?
Kid Win re-entered the room; he immediately slapped his faceplate shut and apparently went on to internal air supply. "God," he exclaimed. "Smells like something died in her leg!"
"It very nearly did," Hope replied primly. "Do me a favour, please, and pour the water into the wound. Flush it out properly."
With Hope holding the wound open, and Weld making sure the bucket caught the flow, the woman's leg was soon flushed out to Hope's satisfaction. Then she pressed the edges of the wound together and concentrated for a moment.
Her wings chimed softly, and silver-blue light built around the pair of them.
And when she pulled her hands back ... the wound was gone. All that was left was a faint pink line. Lying along this line were a few tiny pieces of blackened wood, and just a faint ooze of pus.
"You're ... you're a healer?" said Weld disbelievingly. "And a doctor too?"
"Not a doctor," said Hope hastily. "But I can fake it, with my powers." She used a swab to clean off the newly healed leg. "Не използвайте крака за два дни.," she told the woman firmly, "и отидете в болница, ако тя се заразява отново."
The man and woman both agreed fervently, clutching at her hands. She smiled, and reassured them, as Kid Win packed away the bits and pieces from the medical kit, and Weld took the bucket to empty out somewhere.
"So she's a healer as well as a regenerator," said Piggot flatly. "And she can perform some sort of anesthetic mumbo-jumbo as well. And perform surgery." Her voice was the very epitome of sarcasm. "Oh joy of joys. I wonder where she got her degree from. Or if she even has a degree. That's going to go down well – one of our probationary Wards performing life-saving surgery in a broken-down hovel, without any sort of formal medical training. I wonder if we'll survive the lawsuits."
"That's ... not all there is to it, Director," said Miss Militia carefully. "The report clearly states that, had they not acted, the woman would have been far worse off. The waiting list even on critical cases is far longer than it should be, and medical stocks are running out faster than we can ship them in. Plus, there's more in the report about this."
"Oh, do tell," Piggot gushed, savagely sarcastic. "I can't wait for this bit."
Outside, as Kid Win stowed the medical kit, Hope stood enjoying the sunlight as she stretched her arms and wings out to the side. "Well, that feels good," she said. "I know it was a bit rough and ready, but all the infected areas were gone when we were done ..."
She was somewhat unprepared for Shadow Stalker slamming her against the wall of the building. Her wings tensed, ready to shove her back against Shadow Stalker's push, but she quelled the impulse. Better to let her get it out of her system.
"Don't you ever goddamn well do that to me again!" hissed the girl. "You're nothing! Just a probationary recruit! I'm a Ward! I've got seniority! If you ever –"
"Shadow Stalker," said Weld, from right behind the girl, "how about you go help Kid Win with the medical kit. I'd like to have a close and personal chat with our newest recruit."
His voice brooked no argument. Shadow Stalker went, but not without a backward glare full of anger and spite.
"Okay," he said to Hope, quietly enough that the others could not hear, "spill. All of it. What the hell was that in there?"
"What part?" asked Hope innocently. "I looked at her leg, found the wood splinters, and we got them out."
Weld drew a long breath, then let it out. "Okay, from the start. How is it that you speak their language?"
"I don't," said Hope simply.
"She doesn't?" asked Piggot skeptically.
"Apparently not," said Miss Militia. "I thought it was a bit of a coincidence too, but apparently it's no coincidence at all. She apparently has the ability to absorb language from someone speaking to her. According to what Weld says here, she was speaking the man's language fluently in just seconds."
"Is that even possible?" asked the Director blankly.
Miss Militia shrugged. "I've since spoken with her. She showed no sign of knowing Farsi before I met her, and within moments, she was speaking it with no more of an accent than I have." She raised a finger. "And, apparently, she also picks up the cultural mores of the people she's talking to; she was addressing me as younger female family member to respected older female."
"You have got to be kidding me," said Piggot flatly.
Miss Militia shrugged. "Well, it explains her story of why the United Nations was willing to offer her exorbitant amounts just to work for them, back on her Earth," she said. She picked up the report. "In any case ..."
"So you're telling me that you can 'see' what's wrong with a person's body just by touching them?" Weld said, trying to keep his tone level.
"Yes," said Hope patiently. "Wounds, poisons, infections, foreign bodies, general state of health. Essentially, anything my healing can fix."
"Which same healing is just a straight fix. You don't ... uh, modify the body in any way?" he pressed.
"Of course not," she said. "I wouldn't even know how to do something like that. Or want to, for that matter. I'm happy just healing them."
"So you touched her leg, 'saw' the infected area and the bits of wood in there, so you knew where to cut," Weld concluded.
"Exactly," Hope agreed.
"So why – why – didn't you tell us you could do this before?" asked Weld, trying hard not to let frustration overwhelm him.
Hope paused, uncomfortably. "I'd ... rather not say."
"Well," said Weld quite firmly, "I would rather you did say."
"Okay ..." said Hope. "It's a long story. I'd rather not go into it right now. But at least part of it was misunderstanding and miscommunication." She shrugged; her wings tinkled musically. "When they asked me, I told them I was a healer. They saw my bruises healing, and they said, all wise and knowing, that the term was 'regenerator'. So I figured, they knew best. I don't know the terms you use. As far as I am concerned, my pain blocker ability is part and parcel of my healing and my regeneration. As well as my poison stopper."
"Your what?" asked Weld, trying to keep on top of the conversation.
"It's part of my healing ability," explained Hope. "If someone's been poisoned, I hit them with it. If it's ingested poison, they throw up everything from the toenails on upward. If it's not, they don't. In both cases, they become immune to the effects of the poison for as long as it takes to metabolise it."
"Wow," said Weld. "That's ... useful."
Hope nodded. "I've found it so." She grimaced. "And that's the other thing. I like you people, I really do," she said. "But you don't know me. I'm not new at this," she said. "But your people insist on treating me as though I am. Every time I try to tell them something about myself, they smile and tuck it into the box of their own preconceptions."
Weld blinked, somewhat taken aback by the frustration that accompanied her words. "Okay ..." he said slowly. "Suppose you tell me what powers you have that you have not already told us about, or demonstrated?"
"Sure," she said readily. "Okay, for starters, I can tune my eyes to a wider spectrum," her eyes began to glow a deep blue, "which takes in the higher ultraviolet all the way through to the lower infrared. But it makes normal colours look weird." She paused, and the glow faded. "I don't sleep much – maybe three or four hours a night. But I don't even know if that's a real power. I don't need to eat or drink much ... maybe one good meal a week. And I don't sweat, or if I do, it doesn't smell bad. I can wear the same clothes for weeks, if I don't get them dirty."
"Go on," said Weld encouragingly. "This is good so far."
"Ah, this next one, I don't much like to advertise," said Hope. She grimaced. "It draws way too much attention, and I really don't like having to demonstrate it."
More than having crystal wings and glowing skin? Weld silently asked himself.
"Okay," he said. "Let's have it."
"Well, it goes like this," she started reluctantly. "I can –"
And that's when the gunfire shattered the silence, from just down the street and around the corner.
[Author's Note: the foreign language sections are Bulgarian, and translate as follows:
(1) "Excuse me sir," she said fluently, in whatever language he was speaking, "What is the problem?"
"Oh, thank God!" he exclaimed, clutching at her shoulders. "Someone who speaks a civilized language. My wife stood on a sharp stick and it went into her leg and now she is infected. She has a fever."
(2) She turned to the man – obviously the woman's husband. "We'll need a bucket."
(3) "I am going to cut out the infection now," she told the woman. "Please tell me if you feel any pain at all."
(4) She used a swab to clean off the newly healed leg. "Do not use the leg for two days," she told the woman firmly, "and go to the hospital if it becomes infected again."
Just so you know.]
To be continued ...