Author's Note: You're right Gate Nerd, Janet was on Thor's ship in Scion. Good catch!
OOOOOOO
"How's the hand, doc?" Jack asked as Andrew brought in a bowl of warm water and set it on the floor by Janet.
"I just started looking, Colonel. Give me a few minutes, okay?" She glanced at Ian's shirt, which was smeared with blood and ripped, and frowned. "Did she get you there, too?"
He shook his head.
"She missed. Mostly."
"Mostly?"
Janet reached over and used her free hand to pull up the front of Ian's shirt, revealing a perfect set of four parallel claw marks, each about four inches long and already starting to scab over, running across the cadet's chest. There was dried blood smeared there as well, but she knew those scratches weren't serious enough to be the source of all the blood on his shirt. Which meant he'd wiped his hand on the shirt at some point.
"That's not serious," Janet told him, dropping his shirt and turning her full attention to his hand once more.
"You're really going to have to start honing those self preservation skills," Jack said, coming over and draping a blanket over Ian's shoulders. The cadet was pale – even for him – and Jack didn't want to risk him going into shock if he could avoid it. So far things looked to be fairly well in hand and he wanted to keep them that way.
"I'll work on that."
Ian winced as Janet tried to clean the wounded hand once more and jerked it away from her – purely by reflex.
"Sorry," Janet said, again, meaning it. It didn't look terribly bad from what she'd managed to see so far, but it was definitely going to need cleaned and stitched. She reached into her bag, moving past the phone and pulling out a syringe.
"What's that?" Andrew asked, already looking green.
"A local painkiller."
"I don't-"
"A local one," Janet repeated, taking Ian's hand and stabbing the needle into the fleshy part of his palm, right below the thumb. "It's not going to knock you out – just make it so I can work on you without having to tie you down."
"Oh."
Janet wasn't offended or even annoyed with him. She'd long since understood his reason for hating the side effects of potent painkillers, and while she wasn't above using them when necessary, this wasn't one of those times.
The hand went numb almost immediately, she could tell. Simply by the way he was holding it, and the sudden loss of pain lurking in those expressive dark eyes of his.
"Better?"
He nodded.
"Thanks."
She gave him a rare smile, and started cleaning the hand, using more force, now that he wouldn't feel it and pulling out alcohol swabs to dig out any dirt that the bigger towel might miss. Ian watched with detachment now that his hand didn't hurt, frowning as the blood was wiped away to reveal the extent of the injuries.
"Doesn't look too bad…"
"No… it doesn't."
There was one deep puncture wound in almost the center of his palm – the bear had gotten her claw stuck in his hand – and two slashes on either side, but Janet couldn't see any bones showing, knew that none of the injuries were near vital blood paths, and was fairly certain there weren't any tendons in danger, either.
"Is it going to need stitched?" Jack asked, looking over with interest. He'd never seen a bear attack victim before, after all.
"Oh yes."
Ian scowled, and Janet met his gaze with her own.
"It could have been much worse," she told him. "I don't have to take you anywhere to put stitches in."
"You don't?"
She smiled again, and shook her head, reaching for a suture kit.
"Did you think I was going to keep you in my infirmary for this?"
While it was plain from his expression that he'd thought exactly that, Ian shrugged, trying to act nonchalant.
"Of course not."
Andrew snorted.
Yeah, he was definitely a bad liar. Janet had already known that, though. She shook her head, amused, and started stitching the deep puncture wound.
"We'll have to get a better look inside this big one, here," she said not looking up from her work. "As far as I can tell, though, she didn't hit anything important, but we'll keep a close eye on how it heals, and take measures to prevent any loss of motor skills in the hand."
"But he should be okay?" Jack asked.
"He'll have limited use of it for a few days, but it should be fine. We already know he heals fast."
Didn't they just?
"Good. When you're done stitching him up I'll have Thor send Ian and Andrew off to Ian's, and then-"
"No way," Ian said. "I'm not leaving."
Jack frowned.
"Hoping for round two?"
"I'm not leaving my car up here. It'll get-"
"You should probably go home, Ian." Janet told him. "A good night's sleep will-"
"I'm not going to leave my car." He repeated stubbornly. "Something bad will happen to it."
"It's just a car, Ian," Jack said.
"It's not just a car, Jack," Ian told him. "It's… my car."
Andrew wondered why Ian didn't mention that Sam had given it to him like he had earlier, but didn't say anything.
"You can't shift with your hand like it is," Janet told him, starting to stitch the bigger of the two slashes beside the deep puncture wound. "How do you expect to drive it out of here?"
Ian scowled.
"I'll figure out something."
"Ian-"
"Jack. It'll get ruined if I leave it alone up here…"
"I'm not going to let you try to drive down the mountain with a bum hand," Jack told him. "If Andrew had his license he could drive the two of you home, but-"
"I'll drive them, Colonel." Janet said, not looking up. She already knew that there wasn't much point in arguing with Ian over his car – she knew why he refused to leave it, even though he hadn't mentioned just why he loved that car so much. Cassie knew, of course, and that meant Janet knew as well. "You'll have to let Cassie know, though, so she doesn't worry."
"You're sure you want to stay?" Jack asked, surprised.
Fraiser shrugged. Better to stay and drive them than to risk Ian crashing the car on the way home.
"I don't mind."
"We have a phone here, Doctor Fraiser," Andrew offered. "You could call Cassie…"
She shook her head, snipping the final stitch.
"I could, if I hadn't brought my phone here with me…"
