A/N: Dearest reviewers, I love reading your reactions on Mello's 'full name' from the last chapter XD Let's see what Valerie has to say about that.

And wow, apparently Mello and Valerie have got their very own ship name: Mellerie (Chiruka why u so creative lol)!

Disclaimer: I don't own Death Note or any of the characters except for the OCs.

CHAPTER 12

Mello

"May I ask how this happened?"

The gears in my mind were ticking as soon as the question escaped Dr. Davies' lips. What would be a believable story to make up?

I wasn't an idiot; I knew a few facts must stay or else it would be too weird of a story and would only bode to an uprising suspicion from the doctor. Meanwhile, the antique glasses, the stern face, complete with perfectly drawn eyebrows showed that the woman did have this whole "no-nonsense" aura surrounding her. And don't think I didn't see the way she had scolded the nurse from earlier or her snide comment about me (she had called me a 'poor fella'. NO ONE called me a 'poor fella' before).

By the way, Valerie said she had shadowed the doctor during her internship period, so I could say that she, at one point, had been Dr. Davies' some kind of protégé, right?

I snarled inwardly. Well, good job, doc. If only this fucking sprain doesn't prevent me from walking, I would've walked to you and congratulate you for successfully raising a Dr. Davies, Jr. complete with the same bossy attitude and the name-calling habit.

Meanwhile, the brunette girl was looking at me restlessly in the corner of her eyes, probably chanting silent prayers for me not to say something stupid. Heh. She didn't have to worry about that. I was too much of a genius for my own good.

So you want me to be cooperative? Well, you'll have to be a part of it.

I looked over at the doctor. "Me and my crew were filming this short movie for a college project, and I did the stunt jumping off 10 foot height when things went wrong," I lied smoothly, fingers crossed. "Valerie was visiting the set and accidentally hit her head when rushing to help me."

Dr. Davies raised both eyebrows. "Oh, you're a film student?" she affirmed.

"Yeah," I replied with a normal attitude.

"From what you told me, I take it that you're filming some kind of… what, an action movie?"

"Uh-huh. Cops, gangsters, criminal syndicates… that kind of stuff."

"Ok, that'll explain the... costume," Dr. Davies jotted the information down. I could only hope the doctor bought my words. Not that I wasn't ticked off when she mentioned my clothing preference as a costume, but oh well, I certainly couldn't protest at this moment. "But the burn scars; I know that's not make-up, is it?"

"No, it's my own scars. Apparently that's what made my crew think I'm perfect for the role of this… criminal character," I said, almost hesitating for a moment there. Little did the doctor know I was actually close to a real-life criminal, though…

"Alright. You didn't complain about the scars so I'll respect your privacy and I won't ask about that. But I do think you may want to sue your crew for your accident. And for their lack of compassion, as I don't see any of them kind enough to keep you company," the doctor continued.

"I asked them not to; the filming must keep going. Deadline's in two days. Besides," I nodded slightly at Valerie, "she's already keeping me company all day long," I drawled, sending her a significant look.

Valerie made a choked sound.

"I see." Dr. Davies cast an amused look towards the brunette. "I'm assuming you two are rather close?"

"No—"

"You can say that," I cut Valerie off and pretending not noticing how she shot me a quizzical look. "In fact, she never stopped nagging me to go to the hospital—"

"That's because you were being stubborn," Valerie hissed, eyes narrowed.

I looked at her slyly. "Hey, no need to be shy... Just tell the doctor here that you're worried about me just like what you told me earlier, hmm?"

She didn't say anything else and threw her hands in the air before folding her arms, looking away begrudgingly. A faint tint of pink appeared on her cheeks. I mentally grinned in satisfaction. Payback time. Well, it seemed like this hospital visit wouldn't be so boring after all...

"Ok, I get it," the unsuspecting doctor said with a half-smile. "When did it happen?"

"About 3 hours ago."

"No chest pains, difficulty breathing?" she asked and I shook my head. She told me to take off my jacket and vest and then began untying the tourniquet on my right arm. "You will need stitches for sure," the doctor said while inspecting the cuts over my arm carefully and moved to check my torso. "You have some cuts here as well... luckily nothing like your arm but still need to be cleaned up." She moved over to inspect the back of my head. "A single bruise, a bit swollen but no external bleeding... Looking fine on the outside but perhaps needs a scan just to make sure... Now, may I see your ankle?"

I let Dr. Davies undid the bandage. "Good thing at least you came in quite a good shape. You bandaged him, Rousseau?"

Valerie nodded, her eyes were now fixated back at the doctor keenly, observing every movement, obviously avoiding my eyes. "Yes, I cut small pieces from a blanket for the tourniquet and I performed RICE(1) as soon as I had a look on his sprain."

"Very good."

"But I didn't know of his injuries until half an hour later. Mel—Michael hid it well."

"Hmm. You're a lucky man, Mr. Keith." The doctor leaned in to get a better look at the sprain. "If it wasn't for your friend here, your sprain would've been worsened by now. Although it isn't so surprising since she was one of the most dedicated pre-med in her time here."

"You were?" I looked over at Valerie, who was shaking her head and looking obviously embarrassed for whatever reason.

"You don't know? She never told you about Twiggy?"

"I've only got to know her, uh, recently."

"Oh, you should know. That day the ER was extremely busier than usual, and this patient came in with twigs sticking out of his scalp, bleeding everywhere—we called him Twiggy—and Rousseau was the first to respond to help assisting us doctors removing the twigs out of the poor lad."

"Dr. Davies, I only held the tray," Valerie said timidly.

"Still better compared to the other pre-meds who were cowering at the corner of the room like lost puppies," the doctor spoke bitterly, now carefully feeling the skin around the sprain. "ER is simply not a place for the weakhearted. And I wouldn't have a weakhearted pre-med shadow me as it would've been troublesome. ER is enough trouble."

I elevated my brows, impressed. No wonder this girl didn't lose her head when she saw Jack's dead body earlier.

Dr. Davies then urged me to try moving my ankle to certain directions and asked me about the level of the pain. After several examinations, including on Valerie ("Just a minor bump and light bruises, just keep in mind to apply the ice pack every 3 to 4 hours and you'll be fine," she told her), she then cleaned my wounds and patched me up for stitches while communicating with the observing brunette about the whole procedures.

Valerie

"The ankle joint is not stiff," Dr. Davies told me, "but he feels sore when trying to stress the lateral ankle ligament."

"Which means he injured the anterior talofibular?" I confirmed.

"Most likely, yes. He has significant ligament laxity and a likely grade two tear of this ligament, but I guess you already know that."

"I suspected a grade two... but I couldn't be sure on which ligament is torn since I didn't dare to examine the ankle like you did, only the first aid," I told her the truth.

"And that's a wise decision. Without the RICE, it could've escalated quickly into grade three. You already did well."

I smiled. It relieved me to know that Dr. Davies approved my decision. "Thank you, doctor. So, no lateral malleolus or bimalleolar fracture? And how about his head, do you suspect any MTBI(2)?"

"From the examination I would say no to both, but I order x-rays and a CT just to be sure."

"Oh, ok."

"Now watch closely—this is how you do a neat continuous stitch on this kind of wound..."

I observed the procedure keenly and memorizing everything that Dr. Davies explained to me. She offered me to perform the stitches, jokingly of course, but I would've refused as well even if she had been serious. Sure, I had learned how to do stitches in school, but not on actual wounds; mainly on suturing kits and banana skins.

And certainly I wouldn't dare practicing my surgical suturing skill on Mello, whose eyes might have burned the cabinet in front of him into ashes if he had the ability. I get that he's still annoyed, but come on, he had unleashed them at me just a moment ago and in a very embarrassing way! I should be the one annoyed, not him!

So after the stitching procedure was over and Dr. Davies told me that she would prep Mello for x-rays and then disappearing behind the door, I couldn't keep silent anymore.

"What was that?" I asked Mello tersely.

"What was what?" he asked back with a straight face.

"That. When Dr. Davies questioned you."

"Which one? You have to be more specific."

You KNOW which one. I clicked my tongue and glanced away, trying to hide my flushed cheeks. There was no use talking to this person. "Forget it."

"You told me to be cooperative through every session. I was simply obeying the command, Miss Rousseau," he drew out every syllable of the last two words, watching in amusement as my face getting hotter at the way he had called me.

"Cut it off. Did you really have to mention me many times?"

"Hey missy, you're the one who didn't think of a backstory in the first place. Show me some gratitude."

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever. And tell me; is 'Michael Keith' your real name?"

"What do you think?"

I stared at him momentarily, squinting my eyes, scrutinizing every inch of Mello's figure from head to toe. "… No. Absolutely not."

"Why not?"

Do I really have to answer that? "It doesn't fit your image."

He snorted loudly. "You say that. Not me."

"I bet that 'Mello' isn't your real name either, is it?"

"Nice try, Sherlock."

I exhaled sharply and shook my head. "What the hell are you thinking, giving away false name like that?"

"Who said it's a false name?" Mello asked cooly.

I shot him a glare. "I know it's a false name. You could get arrested! We could get arrested!"

"Oh, is 'Valerie Rousseau' a false name?"

"Of course not, that's my REAL name!" I shrieked, struggling to keep my hands from pulling my hair. "But you can get us into more trouble!"

Mello was still putting on the poker face, though I swore he was actually enjoying the moment and really close to burst out laughing. "Well then, even if that's a false name, it's my name, not yours. No need to get so worked up."

I took a deep, deep breath and releasing it slowly. Very slowly. "Tu me cours sur le haricot…(3)"

"Hey." Mello frowned. "I heard that."

Mello

A while later Dr. Davies came back and told us the preparation for the x-ray is complete. Valerie (finally seeping back into calm mode) accompanied us moving to where the x-ray room located. "By the way," I said to her out of curiosity just outside of the x-ray room, "watching them pulling bloody twigs out of a human head in a close range like that, how did that feel?"

Biting her lip and peering over her shoulder as if to make sure Dr. Davies couldn't hear us, she leaned over. "I had not been a pre-med for too long at that time; you know," she whispered. "Still getting the hang around things I had only learnt or seen from textbooks. I also had never seen any kind of trauma injuries with my own eyes before. I only knew that they were quite sickening to see."

"Then why did you do your internship in the ER anyway?" I cocked an eyebrow at her. I couldn't agree more with the doctor about ER not being a place for the weakhearted. "And why are we whispering?"

She ignored the last question. "Well, they were sickening, but that's the thrill, you know? Like, how would it be to see them right under your nose? So I'd asked around and most people told me that ER is the best department if I wanted to get as much clinical experience as possible. You get to watch interesting things happening there."

Oh. I get it now. "So, for a curious rookie like you, ER served as the best place to pump up your adrenaline with severely injured patients everywhere." I snarled. "Wow, never have I ever thought you're secretly a psycho."

Valerie deadpanned. "Excuse me? Look who's talking."

"Jeez, can't even take a joke, huh?" I sneered. She only rolled her eyes.

"Anyway, Twiggy case happened on one morning, on my very first week of internship. The previous few days were only the scut work: cleaning beds, changing sheets, escorting patients in and out, asking the patients if there's anything they need, bringing water—"

"And 'Twiggy' came to the rescue in the middle of your one hell of a boring week."

"I never said it was boring—ugh, ok. At first I thought so too, so when one of the doctors called for any available pre-med to bring the tray over and hold it through the process, I stepped in before I knew it. And the next thing came into my sight was... blood. Blood everywhere, and there were those twigs sticking out of his scalp, wet with dripping blood..."

I wrinkled my nose. "Yeah, yeah, I get the image. Stop describing."

"I thought disturbing images don't even bother you one bit?" Valerie looked at me bemusedly.

"They don't. But I never saw a man with bloody twigs sticking out of his head before."

"Alright. So, when the whole thing was over, it was almost lunch hour. Twiggy was transported to the OR, and they told me that he had gone past the critical condition. But I was still standing in the same spot as before. I was overwhelmed. I couldn't believe that was my first real ER patient experience ever."

I resisted the urge to yawn. "Uh-huh..."

"And then Dr. Davies approached me that time, and then we talked about a few more things, and the next thing she offered me an opportunity to shadow her for the next few months of my internship."

"Congratulations... though I suppose it's far too late to say that now."

A small smile appeared on her lips. "It is, but thanks anyway. Next, my fellow pre-meds asked me to join lunch and tell them everything that had happened with Twiggy in the ER."

"So that was it. Everybody lived happily ever after. The end."

"No, actually, I missed my lunch that day."

I raised an eyebrow. "Why? Oh, I know—the promising pre-med Valerie Rousseau was in no place to abide alongside the commoners..."

She flashed me a look. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

I rolled my eyes. "It's a joke, missy."

"Sounds more like a sarcasm. And stop calling me that."

"No with that 'little miss bossy' attitude of yours. So why didn't you have lunch?"

Valerie sighed. "I went to the bathroom for a moment, thought I would just clean up before having lunch. But then I looked at my reflection on the mirror and... the images of twigs sticking out of Twiggy's scalp with blood dripping everywhere just came back to me."

I tilted my head. "It was that horrible, wasn't it."

"It was. And that's why we're whispering," she lowered her volume even more. A grimace was now plastered on her face. "Dr. Davies told you how she despises weak pre-med interns. And she certainly wouldn't want to find out that the pre-med she had permitted to shadow her, in reality," her expression turned into a guilty look, "threw up in her very first ER case."

1. RICE: A mnemonic for 4 elements used to treat soft tissue injuries: Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation

2. MTBI: Mild Traumatic Brain Injury

3. You're really getting on my nerves...

A/N: Even the brightest med students had to start from something.

Now, I know these past few chapters have been quiet, but the next chapter will start to pick up where we left off.

Coming up next...

"I'm sorry if this sounds harsh, but tell me," the doctor began, "is your friend over there currently under influence of certain drugs, to your knowing?"