A.N. Happy New Year, everyone! Well, this story took quite a turn. After major writer's block (seriously, three years…) I've found my way back to this story and am determined to complete it. I am so, so sorry for the horrendous delay. I cannot apologize enough.
The direction of the story has changed rather significantly, however. If you first started this story in 2018, you might notice that the summary now no longer mentions a mission where Cassian goes MIA. It was originally going to be the third arc, but we hadn't gotten to that arc in anything that is posted so far, so I've pulled that part out of the story, which you'll see reflected in the summary change. That's the only place you will see any difference, I've not changed anything about what's been written so far. I've done this so that I can bring this long-abandoned story to a proper (and hopefully satisfying) close. This story therefore only deals with the two rescue missions on Ord Mantell and Andelm IV, and the serious fallout. If my muse decides to continue to cooperate, I may tackle what was supposed to be the third part of this story, the MIA mission part, in a sequel. No promises on that, though, but I do promise to bring to a close all of the threads I have left dangling in this story thus far.
And the good news is that I am only posting now because I have written the rest of the story. Yes, after three years, this story will be finished. No story left behind! To quote my series title...
There are about 7 more chapters to go, all of which are written. They require minor tweaks and revisions which I am working through, but they're all there, so I promise there will be no horrendously long waits.
Thank you for sticking with me! Happy reading!
Also note, I am not a medical professional. Nope. Not at all. I tried to do some research of modern medicine for this, plus there's the whole Star Wars side of medicine, so this is a crazy combination of my understanding of the two perfectly combined to suite my needs in all its no doubt unrealistic glory.
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"No no no. No! VORIN!" she yells, her desperate cry rising above the background chatter and moans of other patients. "VORIN!"
"What in the blazes has that selfless idiot gotten himself into this time?!" an answering roar echoes across the room.
Half twisting, she sees the tall, blond medic storming towards her, face thunderous. The medic she'd sent to find him trails timidly behind, K2 following. Yevez's stride is stiff with anger, and yet he practically flies across the room he's moving so fast.
Until he freezes when he arrives beside Jyn. His expression starts as one of exasperation and anger that his friend has once again gotten himself hurt, but as his eyes rove over the pair of them, taking in the way Jyn's supporting Cassian, the closed eyes, all of it, he realizes just how bad it is, and his expression changes. He swallows, quickly looking down in order to fish out some sort of medical device from his pockets, but not before Jyn sees the fear flare up in his eyes, and it nearly takes Jyn's breath away. If Yevez is scared…
She doesn't have much time to dwell on it, however, because suddenly, the womp rat of a medic breaks the momentary silence by declaring mulishly, "I don't see what all of the fuss is about, you have other patients that are just as bad as Ando—," he quickly realizes his mistake and corrects himself, "—Captain Andor. You shouldn't allow preferential treatment just because you know him."
The tall blond whirls on the other man. "Medic Cantto! I am not giving Captain Andor preferential treatment!" he hisses angrily. "Yes, those 'other patients' you're so concerned about are just as badly wounded, but they are either stable or are currently being treated by our medics and medical droids. I could see from halfway across the room that this man here," he gestures at Cassian, "is not! He's about ten minutes away from irreparable damage and you stand here wasting my time accusing me of favoritism?!"
"Captain Andor brought this on himself with his selfish, unnecessary actions that put the entire base at risk in an effort to—"
Before Yevez can say anything, Jyn seizes the blond's hand and places it on Cassian's back, forcing him to replace her in supporting Cassian. Trusting the blond will look after him, she steps forward before Yevez has a chance to protest, balls her hand into a fist and punches Cantto in the jaw. Hard.
The other man falls to the ground with a shout of pain, clutching his face.
Standing over him, a foot on either side, she grabs the man's shirt-front in her other fist and pulls him to within inches of her face. "If I hear one more word out of you, you miserable excuse for a rebel, you'll have more to cry over than a bruised jaw. If there are other patients that need help, get to it instead of spouting off poison here where no one wants you!"
He stares at her in shock as she steps back, then his eyes flick over her shoulder, no doubt checking with Yevez to see if he's actually supposed to follow her order.
"Now!" she yells, stepping forward threateningly.
Cantto scrambles to his feet and takes off without a backward glance.
Turning back to Yevez and Cassian, she sees the medic has already gone to work.
"Damn damn damn damn DAMN!" he mutters, hands flitting here and there, assessing. "Shoulder laceration, moderate dislocation, multiple rib fractures, not to mention impalement, internal bleeding, suspected liver laceration, possible lung puncture," he lists the injuries his exploration discovers under his breath. "For the love of the Force, Cassian, you can't do anything by half-measures, can you?" he demands of his unresponsive friend, voice a mixture of concerned despair and frustration.
He pulls out a medisensor, quickly scans Cassian's torso, and grimaces. "Make that definite liver laceration and hemothorax, but at least your lung isn't punctured, it's only a pulmonary contusion." He pauses. "I can't believe I just said it's only a pulmonary contusion!" he growls in dismay. "You are screwing up my medical standards!"
Suddenly falling silent, he stares off into space for several seconds. Despite his appearance of inactivity, Jyn can tell his brain is going a parsec a minute. When the silence stretches to thirty seconds—the blink of an eye, except when her partner is sitting before her, bleeding out—she prompts, "Vorin?"
He snaps back into action. "Right. Cassian needs surgery, now, and all of the surgery bays are in use at the moment." Glancing to the left, he points to a steel table a few feet away, full of medical supplies. "Clear that off, pull it away from the wall, and sterilize the sarlacc out of it," he orders no one in particular, but both Jyn and K2 leap to respond. "It's closer to the right height and that's going to be easier to clean than a cot; we need all of the cots we can get right now, and he's going to bleed—a lot."
It sounds harsh and clinical, but Jyn can see the medic's eyes, and they are anything but cold and removed. There's worry raging in them, but also steely resolve.
"I'd like it if one of our medical droids could assist, but they're all occupied," Yevez murmurs, low enough Jyn barely hears it as she dumps the contents of the table onto the floor. "I guess you're stuck with me, old friend."
K2 unceremoniously yanks the table away from the wall, its legs screeching across the floor, and she sterilizes it, while Yevez calls out to the room for various other supplies.
He turns back and meets eyes with both K2 and Jyn. "Before we move him, I need to try to set his shoulder. If it doesn't work inside of thirty seconds, forget about it, we'll leave it until after he isn't dying, but if it does, he's gonna be a hell of a lot easier to work with."
He positions Jyn so that she supports Cassian, then ever so gently picks up his injured friend's left hand and pulls the arm straight. Bending it at the elbow and supporting it with his shoulder, he grasps Cassian's upper arm with both hands. Slowly, he raises Cassian's arm, making careful adjustments and minor rotations in response to the limb's movement. Jyn doesn't see the shoulder slip back in, so when Yevez slowly lowers Cassian's arm again and sets it back in his lap, she thinks he's given up, but the medic's smile of grim satisfaction makes her take a second look. Upon closer inspection, the shoulder looks almost normal once more.
"Kay," Yevez gestures to the droid, "please transfer Cassian to the table. Put him on his left side and hold him. Jyn," he meets her eyes, "you're assisting me."
She gapes at him. "Me!? Yevez, I haven't the first clue about surgery! You need someone else! Someone who bloody well knows what she's doing!"
He grimaces, "I couldn't agree with you more, but there is no one else, unless you want to call Cantto back here, and frankly I wouldn't trust him not to 'accidentally' mess something up." He moves to the makeshift surgery bed, where K2 is gently placing Cassian, and douses his own hands in sterilizer.
He beckons her forwards and numbly, she obeys, holding out her hands for him to disinfect.
"You'll do fine," he assures her quietly, snatching the supplies he needs from the surgery set that's appeared miraculously. "I'll do the hard part; you just have to do as I say and everything will be all right."
He makes it sound so simple, as if she's not about to assist in cutting open the man she loves when she's never touched surgery equipment in her life, let alone been in the same room when it's occurred. But she trusts Yevez. He's never minced words with her before, never coddled or told her anything but the truth, and though she honestly doesn't think that he knows with one hundred percent certainty that what he just told her is the truth, she knows that he desperately wants it to be.
Taking a deep breath, she joins him at Cassian's side. "Tell me what to do."
"First thing's first, he needs fluid and blood. If I get a line in him, can you hook up him up to those?" he gestures at the fluid kit at her elbow.
At her nod of confirmation, he continues, "Right, then while I do that, I need you to get his shirt and jacket off." He tosses a tool to her, a laser that slices through material like a blade through water.
K2 carefully shifts Cassian in order to allow her to cut the cloth, and she immediately feels better with her hands moving, with something to do that is actually useful. But that momentary relief vanishes the moment Cassian's torso is fully exposed. His back is a tapestry of deep purple bruising and abrasions, a surface more similar to a planet battered by an asteroid field than to smooth human skin. Blasts of color streak out from the wound on the right side of his back: dark, angry webs like oil leaking onto stone. The veins of internal bleeding are mirrored on his chest, but thankfully the bruising and abrasions are not. Whatever happened to him, his back took the brunt of it.
Yevez breaks her from her thoughts by placing two lines in her hand and gesturing to the two ports he'd just finished placing in Cassian's arm. Dutifully, she steps forward and takes over attaching the lines to the fluid kit. When she's finished, she returns her attention to Yevez, who's muttering to himself as he delicately cuts into Cassian's side, between two of his ribs, and she watches as he inserts a tube and flips a valve. Immediately, the tube fills with dark red liquid that makes its sluggish way along the length of the tube and back to the fluid kit, where it disappears somewhere into the kit's mechanical depths. Job finished, he steps around the table to join Jyn at Cassian's back and grabs several needles, which he quickly injects into the lines.
"That will buy us a few minutes," he explains hurriedly, "but we need to get the bleeding stopped, which means we need to get that metal out of him now. I need you to take this," he hands her an object she doesn't immediately recognize, "and hold it over the wound once you've removed the metal."
"What?" she demands. "You want me to remove the metal? Yevez, I can't. My hands are shaking, I'll only make it worse. You need to remove it!"
He places a hand over her shaking one and she looks up to meet his gaze. It's full of reassurance and quiet confidence. There's no trace of the fear she glimpsed there earlier, only determination. "You can and you will."
"No, no I really think you need to—"
"Jyn," he interrupts, voice sharpening and donning a commanding tone, like the one he'd adopted earlier in the hangar, "you're going to do this and you're going to be fine. I can't because while you remove the metal, I'm going to be slicing into my best friend and spreading his ribs apart so I can access the point where that metal has pierced his liver. So, unless you want to be responsible for that, I suggest you take a breath and trust yourself as much as I trust you."
Gritting her teeth and steeling her nerves, she steps forward and gently grabs the end of the metal.
"Good, in a moment, I want you to pull it out and the moment it's clear you will need to insert that device," he gestured to the one he'd given her earlier, "an inch into the wound. It's a pressor generator; it'll stop the worst of the bleeding long enough for me to gain access and hopefully reach a more permanent solution. In theory," he mutters under his breath, before turning his attention to K2. "Kay, once Jyn's removed the metal, please shift Cassian onto his front so that we have better access to his back. This is going to need to happen quickly and smoothly because that infernal thing struck his liver and right now it's the only thing keeping him alive. The moment you remove it, the dam is going to break and that generator will only work so well."
He meets eyes with both of them, then grabs a scalpel and a monstrous device Jyn doesn't want to think about. She doesn't want to think about the fact that in a moment, she's going to pull a piece of metal out of Cassian, and hope to all the gods, the Force, anyone who will listen, that he doesn't die in her hands.
"On my count. One, two, three."