Disclaimer
I do not own Fullmetal Alchemist or related characters. No suing, please.
Death on a Silver Platter
Written by - Stripe
Chapter 2 - September
"I've torn the place apart for my good luck charm, but I still can't find it!" Mei declared, throwing her hands up into the air in frustration. "How can I be expected to work under these conditions?"
Winry raised an eyebrow as her friend continued to shift through the nurse's station, searching in vain for her supposed "good luck charm." A quick glance to her watch told the doctor that she only had about five minutes before she was on call - and she was wasting those last five minutes of general freedom on this?
"Do you really need your good luck charm?" Winry asked the frantic nurse, who very nearly knocked over a poorly-placed urine sample cup. Mei paused and looked up at her with what seemed to be tears at the corner of her eyes.
"Yes!" she declared, actually sounding upset. "Xiao Mei helped me through all of my toughest patients! I need her." Winry paused for a moment, her mind taking a while to connect "Xiao Mei" to "good luck charm," and then further tieing it in "Xiao Mei" to Mei's favorite little toy.
"Your good luck charm is that stupid little rubber ducky you have?" she asked in a minor state of disbelief. It shouldn't have surprised her, but Mei never ceased to amaze her with her utter child-like innocence.
"She's not stupid!" Mei insisted. "She helps keep me calm and mature while at work!"
"Yes, playing with rubber duckies is so mature."
The dark-haired nurse simply stuck out her tongue, and continued to look through the nurse's station for her misplaced rubber ducky. Winry sighed and glanced at the clock again. Three minutes.
"Why do you need that ducky now anyways? You don't carry it with you everywhere, and don't even try to convince me that you do. What's so special about right now?" she asked, finally determining that she wouldn't be able to do much else productive within the three minutes she had left anyway.
"Well," Mei started, checking under a single sheet of paper, as if the duck had flattened itself to be paper thin. No such luck. "You know that one guy they wheeled in with those bad injuries about four days ago? On the 31st?" Winry thought about it for a moment, then finally nodded. "He hasn't been doing so well. His wounds are healing alright, but he's still in a lot of pain, and he's got a persistent fever. I figure he needs all the luck he can get." Quite suddenly, Winry shifted from teasing friend mode to professional doctor mode. Fevers with intense injuries weren't uncommon, necessarily, but they weren't good signs. Especially not when they lasted this long.
"Did all of the wounds get sewn up correctly? Is there any chance of infection? Why is he still in so much pain? Do they have him on the right dosage of morphine?" She rattled the questions off at the top of her head, trying to solve the problem without even seeing the patient. Mei blocked out what Winry said. It wasn't because she didn't care or because she didn't understand what the doctor was saying - more that something else had caught her attention. She glanced past Winry's shoulder.
There were a few orderlies pushing a gurney with a now-familiar blonde on it. She stepped out from behind the nursing station and stood next to Winry, who they were heading towards. Winry's head turned as well, and she looked at them curiously. Speak of the devil and he will come, as they say.
"What's this patient doing here?" she asked in an authorative tone.
"We're transferring this patient out of the ICU," one of the orderlies explained simply. "His condition is almost stable, but we need him to be seen by the doctor on call. There's a few other circumstances..." Winry glanced to the clock. It seemed her three minutes had just passed.
"Hand me his file."
Winry yawned as she stumbled into her apartment, exhausted. It had been another long night. She hated getting the midnight shift at work. Recently, she'd been able to avoid it, but enough conflicting schedules at once left her on call from 12 o' clock to 10 o' clock in the morning with only about two fifteen minute breaks with which to sustain herself. She'd caught an hour of sleep on the cots in the on call room, but she'd finally been kicked out by two particular doctors who seemingly didn't like abiding by the "no sexual intercourse at work" rule.
As she set her bag down on the counter, she contemplated for a moment whether she really cared to go the distance required to reach her bed. Her room was on the other side of the apartment. Given, her apartment was not the largest place in the world, but she still didn't feel like mustering up the energy.
So instead, she collapsed onto the couch, letting out a sigh of relief as her body hit the soft cushions. She let her mind drift off for a few moments, and it seemed she would finally get to catch the winks of sleep she had been missing out on when the door opened, signaling the return of Alfons.
"Hey, Winry. What do you want to want to do for lun..." she cracked open an eye to see her boyfriend eyeing her from across the living room with a curious expression. For a moment, he seemed concerned, until it hit him. "Oh, right," he said, lowering his voice a bit. "I forgot you had the midnight shift. I'll just make my own lunch, then. Is there anything you want?"
"Chicken biscuits are good," Winry suggested with a tired groan, watching him cross the living room to the kitchen. She noted as he paused to set a tennis racket by the entrance. That wasn't a surprise. He liked to play his friends at tennis on Saturdays with varying levels of success each week. She considered asking him whether he'd managed to beat Alphonse Elric this time, but couldn't muster up the strength to do so. She was too tired to care, quite frankly.
"Chicken biscuits?" Alfons questioned as he pulled a mixing bowl out from the kitchen. "I didn't even know you liked chicken biscuits."
"Pediatrics got a chicken biscuit breakfast day today. When you see a toddler get a better breakfast than you do, you begin to crave whatever they're eating," she explained, closing her eyes for a moment. She doubted that she'd be able to actually fall asleep while Alfons was making himself something in the kitchen - she didn't sleep well with noise. But at least she would be able to let her eyes rest...
"Well, I think we're running a bit low on chicken biscuit makings at the moment. Want anything else?" he asked. She could hear him rifling through the fridge, likely trying to make whatever he was planning on eating himself.
"What do we having makings of?" she asked, mind beginning to drift off.
"Let's see... we still have some left over pasta, a couple of lunchables..." Winry listened as her boyfriend continued to list off a series of items - string cheese, spread cheese, margarine, cookie cake. She had stopped listening to him, however. She wasn't particularly hungry - even if chicken biscuits did sound pretty good. In a way, she almost envied their mystery patient. He still hadn't been able to maintain consciousness for more than a few seconds - they still didn't know anything about his medical history.
This was problematic for her, of course, because she didn't know of any potential allergies to medication. This was part of the reason she was so exhausted - she'd needed to eye his reactions to various treatments closely. It was horribly draining for her.
But she figured that he was at least getting a decent night's rest out of the deal...
"Winry?" Alfons asked, taking a peek back into the living room when she didn't respond to his list of food items. She was still lying on the couch with her eyes closed. He smiled slightly, but he couldn't help but be worried. Falling asleep was a logical reaction to working the graveyard shift.
But sometimes, he simply wished she wouldn't work herself so hard.
The next morning, Winry came into work cheerful and well-refreshed. This was partly because she had slept for about 14 hours the night before, and partly because Alfons had bought her a wonderful new face wash for her birthday. It managed to wake her up gently, and thus put her in an excellent mood. For some reason, she was simply optimistic that today was going to be a wonderful day.
Mei, on the other hand, had already had her day ruined.
As usual, the two friends met in the main lobby of the hospital. Mei was already half-way through her shift, but she still took a quick break to come and greet Winry at the door. Simultaneously, the two began to speak.
"Good Morning, Mei."
"Winry, it's horrible!"
The two stared at each other for a moment, not sure of how to respond. Finally, Winry gave in, worried about whatever Mei could possibly be talking about. "What's horrible?"
"The son of that guy who donated the Elric wing! He's coming to visit!" Mei declared, looking worried. The blonde doctor stared at her friend for a moment before finally bursting out laughing. Mei pouted. "What? You know how those stuffy investor-types are!"
"Care to elaborate?" Winry asked, failing to fully contain the humor she saw in this dilemma of Mei's.
"Well, they come to 'visit' the hospital. And they view us all like... like... pieces of meat! Or the appendix! Or the tonsils! He'll try and find the weakest link in the hospital and then get them fired because he feels like it and he has money. And he'll probably try to hit on the nurses too. This is horrible!" Mei declared, visibly worried. Winry pondered over this mental image of Mei's for a moment.
"You're scared that Alphonse Elric is going to hit on you?" she repeated. The nurse nodded rapidly. Winry pondered this thought for a moment longer. This just seemed too easy. "Well, you should be," she assured her friend. "He's a scum bag. All the money and power has corrupted him. I'd stay as far away from him as possible." Mei looked slightly horrified, but also somewhat pleased to know that her disgust was well-founded.
These traits were, of course, about as far from the true personality of Alphonse Elric as one could get. But Al deserved it for that prank he'd played on Winry last time he'd visited.
Mei was about to walk off to gossip to the other nurses about the horrible man that was about to visit their hospital, but she stopped herself.
"By the way, Mystery Man's woken up. I think there's somebody in there getting his information now," she said quickly before returning to her previous objective. Winry wasted no time in going up the stairs that lead to the second floor, where his room was. Usually, she wasn't so excited over a single patient, but this was Mystery Man. No one had known his name, where he came from, or why he had sustained such massive injuries. She happened to have a natural curiosity.
She had to know.
Sure enough, when Winry reached the room, there was already a nurse asking the typical patient history questions. She paused for a moment, considering whether she really wanted to go through the boring questions just to learn something about him. Plus, it would be rude to interrupt the nurse... But curiosity got the better of her.
"Nurse Thomas," Winry said with a kind smile, walking in. "I can take the questions from here." The dark-haired nurse glanced up to Winry for a moment, and for a moment, she thought she saw some form of jealousy. However, she smiled after that and handed Winry the file.
"I didn't get very far," Nurse Thomas said as she walked out. "Only to question 6." Winry nodded, and glanced through what had already been written down.
"So," she started, pulling up a chair as she walked to the patients bed. She knew patient histories could take a while. "Mr... Eaton, is it?" she glanced up at him, finally getting a good view of his face. Staring back at her was a pair of beautiful golden eyes - she'd only ever seen them on one other person before. It was all she could do from blurting out and complimenting him - that wasn't advisable with male patients when it came from a female doctor. They'd all gone through a long, detailed seminar on patient-doctor relationships - namely, do not sleep with the patients.
Not that there was a direct correlation between complimenting eye color and romantic relationships, but it was best to take precautions.
She was so wrapped up in this train of thought, that she almost missed his nod in response to her question.
"Just call me Ed, though," he said giving her a somewhat distrustful look. "Who are you anyways?" Winry blinked, as if surprised. She hadn't exactly introduced herself, but she still felt it should be obvious.
"I'm Dr. Rockbell," she said finally. "I've been taking care of you while you've been unconscious. You've sustained massive injuries-"
"Yeah, yeah. The nurse already told me that. Serious injuries, mysterious fever. Probably will have issues walking for a few days after I'm let out of bed. May have sustained brain damage, though it's too early to tell. That really made my day," he said with a sour expression. It was all too clear that he was unhappy with his current situation.
"Well, we'll do our best to be sure that you get out of here-"
"So you're my doctor, right?" Ed interrupted Winry very quickly, not caring about what she may have had to say. "And not some incompetent nurse? I think one of them put in my IV wrong."
"Yes, I'm your doctor," Winry stated blandly, beginning to become annoyed with him. She was trying to push off his bad behavior on the morphine, but she was starting to wish he had simply stayed unconscious. "And I put in your IV." Ed looked at the IV for a moment, contemplating something.
"Can I request a change in doctor, then?" he asked.
"No. And I put your IV in right, so it wouldn't do you much good anyways. Now, I need to finish this questionnaire. Question 7..."
Some mornings when Winry went in, it seemed that nothing good had happened while she was gone. Mei was usually the one to fill her in, since she preferred the early morning shifts. When they met each other in the morning, she knew when it was coming. It was The Look. That tireder-than-usual, dead look in Mei's eyes that indicated it had been a rough shift so far. Winry took in a deep breath of air when she saw it on the morning of the 28th. She knew she'd need to brace herself.
Good news was not coming.
"Mrs. Miller passed away last night," Mei started, her tone heavy. Winry nodded - Mrs. Miller was old. They all knew she wasn't going out of the hospital alive. The family had been well informed already, and they didn't anticipate any lawsuits. It was a shame to see the woman go, but what was done was done.
However, Mei continued.
"Also, Mr. Miles went into cardiac arrest. We managed to stabilize him, but he's still not out of the woods yet. Mr. Eaton's fever also spiked over night. He's still conscious, but we can't break the fever, and it's still climbing. Also..." and here, Mei paused. Winry knew that she had saved the worst news for last. "Nina's disease took a sudden turn for the worse. She's unresponsive."
Winry let out a deep sigh and brushed her bangs back, trying to sort through these things in her head. Nina's issue was the most concerning to her, but that didn't make it the most urgent. Comas were a horrible thing, but they were slow, and with the girl's disease, Winry wasn't sure she had much she could do to help the situation. The case with Mr. Miles was also alarming, but he was suffering from an infection which attacked the heart. She was sure he had already been perscribed more antibiotics, and that the nurses would keep him alive. Mrs. Miller was no longer a concern.
This left Mr. Eaton. A rising fever needed to be stopped as soon as possible, especially considering he was still recovering from injuries.
Mind clear, Winry set off for the blonde man's room, all the while trying to think of reason's why his fever would linger, and actually get worse. The obvious reason would be infection, perhaps something he picked up at the hospital. With the bad wounds he had coming in, it wouldn't be a surprise. But the fact that it was hitting him now was somewhat troubling. It had been nearly a month since he'd been brought in. His wounds were beginning to heal; he was conscious. What reason did the fever have to suddenly spike?
"Am I going to die?" Winry snapped out of her diagnostic thoughts as she realized she was already in Mr. Eaton's room. She tried to remember how long she had been standing there, pondering his condition, but she couldn't remember her actual journey to the room. She had been here too long - getting to patient rooms was an automatic process for her anymore. Mr. Eaton stared at her for a moment before repeating the question.
"Am I going to die?"
Winry found the way he asked the question curious. He didn't ask it with any hint of worry, like many people did when in a hospital. He didn't even seem to be asking it in hope of relief from his pain. He was simply asking it for the knowledge. She opened her mouth, but no good words came to mind for a response. He sighed, and rolled his eyes.
"Nevermind," he muttered. Winry continued to try thinking of an answer for a moment, but she quickly determined it didn't matter. She couldn't exactly be wasting much time, here.
"I'm going to put you on a broad-spectrum antibiotic," she stated simply. "In my opinion, the fever is likely caused by an infection you picked up at the hospital - the antibiotic should eliminate most of the possible suspects." Her gave her a dead expression.
"Most?" he repeated, unimpressed.
"Well, we don't know for sure what you've got yet. I'm going to take some blood to test it for some more common bacteria - once we know what it is, we can treat it more effectively. Now, hold out your right arm, please," she stated simply, pulling out an empty needle. The blood sample would hopefully also allow them to check for fever-causing-circumstances outside of infection, but it was best not to tell him that. Mr. Eaton didn't trust her enough as it was - she might as well seem at least somewhat certain of a diagnosis. He looked at the needle, and then down at his outstretched right arm.
"Must you insist upon putting that there?" he asked, looking almost disgusted. Winry raised an eyebrow.
"Scared of needles?" she asked, beginning to feel the inside of his arm for a vein. He continued to stare at her with the piercing gold eyes.
"I'm not scared of them," he clarified. "I just don't find the idea of a small piece of metal in my arm extracting my blood a very appealing one." Winry shrugged, continuing to look for a strong enough pulse. Technically, she didn't have to take the blood herself - the nurses would do it for her - but she was also looking for other symptoms which might give her an
idea of where to start seeking out the exact diagnosis. Finally, she found the strongest pulse in his right arm, and eased the needle in as gently as possible.
"That didn't hurt too much, did it?" she asked as she began to draw blood. He gave her a strange look.
"What didn't hurt?" he asked. Though she was focusing on the blood filling the needle, she could feel his gaze piercing the top of her head. She glanced up.
"The needle? You didn't feel it?" she asked tearing her attention away from the needle for a moment to face him. She supposed it could have been the morphine, but this was still a bit strange. He shook his head and glanced down. He jumped slightly, but luckily didn't dislodge the needle.
"What...? When did you... I didn't even feel..." he began muttering, and shook his head. Winry glanced down and saw the needle was full. She slid it out, then glanced up to him. Judging by his reaction, he hadn't felt that either. She carefully set a gloved hand on his forearm, watching for his reaction. His frown deepened, and he reached up with his left arm and felt along his right shoulder, somewhat frantic.
"I can't feel anything along my entire right arm..." he growled, looking troubled. Winry bit her lip. This couldn't be good.
But at least she had another symptom to go off of.
A/N:
I cut this one a bit too close... This is still basically the rough draft - I couldn't find anyone to do a thorough editing job in, like, three days, so I said "I'll go ahead and post it." So here we are!
I don't like this chapter nearly as much as the first. But it at least introduces us to a few more characters, and sets us up for the next chapter. Also, the scene in there with Alfons only exists because of the word list, really. This month, the challenge said to include these phrases into the story somehow:
1. Tennis racket
2. Mixing bowl
3. Spread cheese
4. Face wash
5. Toddler
6. "Chicken biscuits are good."
7. "Must you insist upon putting that there?"
8. "That really made my day."
9. "I've torn the place apart for my (blank), but I still can't find it!"
10. "Yes, playing with rubber duckies is so mature."
Can you find them?
Also, I apologize for mistakes in medical terminology and what-not. I'm getting most of this stuff from House and Scrubs - I do not cliam to be an expert in the medical field. So forgive me!
Well, until next month...
Enjoy!
