Chapter Nineteen

"FIVE??!!"

Steve's roar made the blood pressure monitor whistle shrilly, and Mark gestured firmly for him to settle down. He smiled reassuringly at the nurse who bustled in, then turned back to his son, checking the other monitors and shaking his head. "You are NOT supposed to be getting excited."

"Good." Steve retreated sullenly to his pillows, watching him warily. "Then tell me it isn't necessary, and I'll be perfectly calm."

Mark smiled placatingly. "Now, Steve - "

"No." Steve was unmoved. "No 'now, Steve'. Just 'you're right, Steve - we'll wait and see'."

Mark threw up his hands. "We can't wait and see! Timing is very crucial! I wouldn't want to wait a day longer!"

"Dad - " Steve ground the heel of his hand in his eyes then dropped it, his expression pleading. "It wasn't rabid. I leaned on it is all - it was just defending itself."

"Well, unless you can produce the raccoon to prove that, I'm afraid you still need the vaccine."

"But - "

"Steve," Amanda tried her most measured and reasonable voice. "Small carnivores like skunks and raccoons and foxes along with bats are the most common carriers of rabies. Any bite from one of them is treated with a rabies vaccine series - just as a matter of course. Especially a bite on the hand or face."

Steve hesitated. "Couldn't we just wait and see? If I develop rabies, I'll get the shot."

Mark looked horrified. "By then it would be too late! You have to have it now, as a prophylactic."

Steve seemed to be trying to disappear into his pillows. "Maybe we could find the raccoon. Check it out."

Jesse scoffed. "You think you'd recognize it?"

"Yes," Steve retorted crossly. "It'd be the one without rabies." He fixed his eyes on the small, kidney shaped basin the nurse handed Jesse with a sort of horrified fascination. "Wait a minute, wait a minute - can't we talk about this? What if I did get rabies? How bad could it be?"

Jesse stared at him. "Well, you'd die. Think that's bad enough?"

"Come on…" Amanda patted his arm soothingly. "It would be a shame to survive Bambi Sue only to die from a rabid raccoon, wouldn't it?"

Steve frowned at his hands. "I don't know. I think it's about the same thing."

Amanda shook her head. "Honestly, how can you barely blink when they pull a knife out of you or dig out a bullet and make such a fuss over a little needle?"

"Knives and bullets are just occupational hazards." Steve glanced at the basin again, looked hastily away. "Needles are…creepy."

Amanda perched on the bed with a chuckle. "Well, how would it be if I held your hand the whole time."

"Don't be ridiculous," Steve mumbled, but looked a little as though he didn't think it was such a bad idea.

"Okay, big guy," Jesse cheerfully lifted a syringe out of the basin. "Just close your eyes and you won't feel a thing. I'm going to put about half of this right in the wound…"

Steve turned a little green. "You mean right in the…? Wait a minute - what do you mean 'half'?"

"I mean - " Jesse readied the syringe and studied Steve's hand, where the nurse was carefully removing the dressing. "I put about half in and around the wound and then the other half - um - elsewhere."

Steve watched him approach like a mouse hypnotized by a snake. "So that'll be two anyway? Only three to go?"

"Oh." Jesse paused, looking surprised. "Oh, no. There are five injections of the rabies vaccine - today, then on days three, seven, fourteen and twenty-eight. This is the HRIG. That's a different shot."

Steve snatched his hand back. "SEVEN??!! I'm getting seven shots????!!!!"

"Well, it's the same syringe, so technically it's - Steve - " Mark huffed in exasperation, pushing him gently back into the pillows. "You have severe bruising in the thoracic and abdominal areas and a hairline fracture that stretches across four ribs! Now, if you don't settle down, you're going to crack or break something or start some bleeding."

Amanda tried a different tact. "You know, CJ just got his first booster and I think he took it much better than this."

"Yeah. Well. He's too young to know better."

"I could give you a nice alcohol bath if you like, Lt. Sloan - very relaxing," the nurse looked up suddenly, pinning him with intent, doe-like eyes.

Steve switched his fixed stare from the syringe to the nurse. "Um…no. Thanks," he muttered faintly.

"Then how about a nice, cool drink? I know we're trying to get that dehydration in check." She smiled a slow smile.

Steve smiled back self-consciously. "Um - "

Her smile widened. "Really. It would be my pleasure." She tossed a last smile over her shoulder as she glided from the room, hips undulating languidly.

"What on earth was that all about?" Mark laughed, watching her progress as she disappeared toward the nurse's station.

Steve shook his head, eyes also following her. "I don't know, but that kind of thing's been happening all morning. The early morning nurse told me it was an honor to nurse me. I thought she meant because you were my Dad until the candy striper that brought my breakfast asked me for my autograph. I thought you'd put them up to it."

Mark shook his head. "Not me."

"Jesse, then," Steve decided, turning a glare on his friend just as he straightened, brandishing a half-empty syringe.

"Got it!" he crowed triumphantly. "And you didn't feel a thing. It's all in your head." He paused, playing the conversation back in his mind. "Jesse what?"

"Put the nurses up to gushing all over me." Steve looked down at his hand, suddenly catching on. "Hey, you mean it's over? You're right - I didn't feel a thing."

"Actually, that's probably because you're drugged within an inch of your life," Mark chuckled.

"Not me." Jesse shook his head. "Why would I put the nurses up to gushing over you? There's nothing funny about that. Now, I need to give you the rest of the syringe."

Steve's face fell. "Can't it wait until later?"

"No, it has to be given in one dose." Jesse carefully lowered the syringe back into the kidney-shaped dish. "The nurses are really gushing all over you? You sure they don't have you confused with somebody else?"

"Very funny. Not unless it's somebody else named Lt. Sloan. Are you going to give me that thing and get it over with, or are you just going to stand there waving it around?"

Jesse cleared his throat. "You have to - um - turn over for part two."

"Turn…?" Steve groaned in realization. "You said I could take the shots in my arm!"

"The rabies shots," Jesse agreed patiently. "This is the HRIG, remember? One half in and around the wound, the other half in the gluteus."

"That was a heck of a thing to leave out, Jess!"

"Now, come on…" Amanda soothed. "I'll distract you the whole time. I could walk out of the room like your nurse friend if that would keep your attention."

Steve brightened. "You'd do that?"

"I was joking! But I will sit with you."

"Great." Steve slunk down in the bed. "Just what I need - an audience." He started to roll over, was stopped again by Mark's hand.

"Let me lower the bed first, then I'll help you. You're going to damage something yet if you don't try and remember where you're hurt."

"Well, it doesn't help that I can't feel anything." He let out an involuntary grunt as Mark tried to help shift him first onto his side, then his stomach. "Okay, maybe I felt that." He turned his head and closed his eyes. "And Amanda keeps toying with my emotions." He smiled into the pillow.

Amanda's lips twisted into a playful smile. "Now, maybe I won't walk out of the room for you, but I did dive into very cold water to fish you out and I had a bad hair day all day because of it too, so you could be a little grateful."

Steve opened his eyes and tried to push himself up. "You fished me out of the lake?"

Amanda hastily pressed the middle of his back. "Don't - move at this exact moment." She glanced over at Jesse to watch his progress. "I forgot you wouldn't know that. But I DO think that, since I went to all that trouble to save your life, you can go to the little trouble of a couple of tiny shots so that all my frizzy hair wasn't in vain."

"Hm." Steve closed his eyes again, burying his face a little deeper in the pillow. "You play hard ball."

"And don't you forget it."

"Hey, Amanda?" Steve's voice was sounding a little blurry now.

Amanda smiled and kept her hand on his back, in case he decided to try and move again. "Yes?"

"Is the shot over yet?"

"The shot!" Amanda slapped his back playfully, avoiding any obvious bruises. "That's the thanks I get!" She smiled a little as she watched the dimple deepen in the cheek that wasn't buried in the pillow.

"You know what I want to say."

"And what would that be?"

"I want to say - so is it? Done?"

Amanda harumphed. "Steve Sloan, if you weren't so battered already, I'd add a few bruises of my own."

"All set!" Jesse folded Steve's hospital gown back over the exposed area and replaced the blankets.

"Hey." Steve grabbed for Amanda's wrist as she lifted her hand from his back. He tried to catch her eye and hold it. "Thanks."

Amanda's smile broadened. "It was my pleasure. Because now you owe me."

"Anything but…babysitting…" There was an unmistakable shift in his breathing, and Mark shook his shoulder lightly.

"No, Steve, you can't go to sleep on your stomach - too much pressure on your ribs. Let me help you turn back over, and then I think Jesse isn't quite done. DON'T try to push yourself up - " Mark positioned himself to ease Steve over onto his back, and Amanda got ready on the other side.

"Here - let me - " She used the sheet to help her give him a deft flip without jarring his injured knee, and Mark lowered him carefully onto his back again.

"You're very good at that," he remarked in surprise. "Did you have nursing training?"

"No - I have to do it a lot with cadavers."

Steve opened one eye at her. "I know you guys think you're funny - "

"Which never complain, by the way," Amanda continued smoothly. "You can't imagine how much I appreciate that."

Steve tried not to smile and failed. He closed his eyes and yawned. "Did you really jump into that lake and pull me out?"

"Of course. Who do you think did it?"

One side of Steve's mouth slanted upward. "I miss…all the good stuff…" he complained drowsily.

Mark shot a sideways glance at Jesse to see what was taking him so long. Jesse sent him an apologetic shrug, his needle hovering over Steve's right deltoid, looking for an unmarked place to thrust it in among the thin scabbing ribbons smudged with bruising. Mark's face darkened, his stomach hit with a jolt of nausea. Somehow, those small cut wounds disturbed him most of all. Between contact sports and police work he was somewhat accustomed - as much as he could be, anyway - to seeing his son bruised, but those marks were a reminder of soulless, systematic torture, and how close it had all come to ending very differently. He looked over at Amanda, his eyes awash in gratitude. She smiled and touched his hand in understanding.

Jesse finally found a spot that he liked high on the shoulder and slid the needle in. "See?" He tossed the empty syringe back into the basin. "Didn't even know I did it."

"Did too." Steve didn't open his eyes. "That was the last spot on that shoulder that didn't hurt."

"Well, that's the last of them for a couple of days. And here's your nurse with your drink. You look like you're ready for a nap."

Steve opened his eyes and skimmed the nurse warily. He glanced back at Mark a little anxiously. "You don't have to go," he suggested.

Mark's eyes twinkled. "Oh, now, Nurse - " he glanced at her name badge, "Hummer," he gave her a pleasant nod, "Will give you a nice drink and rebandage your hand and tuck you in. I'll be back to check on you. Maybe I'll join you for lunch."

"But…" Steve watched uncertainly as Nurse Hummer lifted his hand and held it with not-quite-professional gentleness. "Um - can you at least order me something good? I had wallpaper paste for breakfast. What happened to my meal card anyway? I never even saw it."

Mark's laugh was a little forced. "Oh, well, you were out like a light, so I filled it out. I thought porridge would be nice and nourishing but easy on your system. I'll - find something better for lunch. How about macaroni and cheese?"

"That would be - ouch - " Steve jerked before he could stop himself as the nurse smilingly began to apply antiseptic to the bite on his hand.

Nurse Hummer gave him a soulful look. "I'm so sorry - does it hurt? I'll be very, very careful."

"It just - surprised me - " Steve tried to pull his hand back, but Nurse Hummer kept a firm grip. He gave Jesse an urgent look. "Jess, you can stay, can't you?"

Jesse shook his head, not even trying to suppress a grin. "Sorry, big guy, but I've got rounds. I can see you're in good hands, though. Catch you later."

Steve switched his gaze to Amanda. "Amanda…?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, Steve - but I have autopsies piling up. You know how impatient my cadavers get if I'm delayed."

Steve gave her a sour smile. "Funny."

She patted his head lightly. "I'll be back. You get some rest."

She moved briskly to the door, mostly so he couldn't see her grin as Nurse Hummer drawled, "Now, you just relax, Lt. Sloan, and I'm going to make you feel a whoooole lot better…"