#7 The First Patient
A minute later, Goose skidded into the medbay. She could still hear the turbolasers firing almost constantly, so the battle had to still have been going on, but you would not think so just by looking around. All the clones she'd encountered in the hallways were totally calm, and acting normally, not the least bit concerned. Had Goose not heard the laser fire, she would never have known there was a battle on.
The med droids had begun setting up to receive wounded, and already an injured clone had come in with a burn. The clone looked to be part of the bridge crew because he wore a gray cloth uniform, rather than the plastoid armor she'd seen on the infantry men. The 2-1B attending him was perfectly capable of taking care of this man, but Goose preferred to do it herself. She checked the droid's name tag before she addressed it.
"I've got this one, Leonard," Goose waved the droid away. "Go roll bandages or something."
Leonard gave a somewhat disappointed nod and shuffled off somewhere, though Goose did not watch long enough to see if it had actually taken her literally. She smiled at her new patient, and motioned for him to sit down on a pre-op biobed.
"Hi, I'm Goose. I'll be your doctor this morning." she said with her best impression of a waitress.
The clone looked surprised at seeing her, which Goose had been expecting, but she could tell from his strained look of pain that what he was focused on wasn't her. She snapped on some gloves and examined him more closely, finding that he had a few second-degree electrical burns over parts of both his hands. The damage wouldn't be permanent, because he would have immediate treatment, but it would take a while to heal. They looked very painful, though he barely showed it. Goose whistled in amazement.
"Those are quite some burns you've got there. What'd you do, have a disagreement with a live wire?" she quipped.
"Console short-circuited. Blew up." he gasped out.
"Tough break."
He was managing the pain exceptionally well, but the façade was still beginning to crack. Goose reached for a hypospray of morphine and held it up.
"For the pain?" she asked for confirmation.
The clone quickly nodded his assent, and Goose gave him the shot in the neck. A look of utter relief flooded his face as she did so.
"Now let's see what I can do about those burns."
She pulled a burn kit off a supply cart, and sat down in a chair in front of him.
"So what's your name?" Goose asked conversationally, hoping to divert his attention from his injuries. "Don't bother telling me a number, either."
"I'm called Quin." he answered guardedly.
Goose nodded, as she used a damp cotton swab to clean out the burns as gently as possible. Pain meds or no, they were still sure to hurt him, but he may not notice it as much if he was talking.
"What do you do, Quin?" she continued.
"I work on the bridge. I manage long-distance communications."
Goose had quickly finished debriding the burns, and had moved on to applying an anti-bacterial gel. Fortunately, her distraction was working, and he was starting to relax a bit.
"You like it?"
"It's good enough." Quin replied noncommittally.
By then, Goose had already sprayed the burns with bacta and was covering them with synthflesh to help them heal.
"Would you rather do anything else?" she kept probing.
"Of course not, it's what I was trained to do." he said matter-of-factly.
Goose finished wrapping his hands with gauze, and was using surgical tape to hold it down.
"I'm afraid that you'll have to miss some work, then."
Quin looked down, and seemed surprised that she was already done. Goose had a lot of experience with these types of injuries, and they took her no time at all. Had this been a normal hospital, he'd probably still be filling out some sort of form.
"How long?" he asked with slight dismay.
His hands were now neatly bandaged up, which meant that he couldn't do much of anything with them.
"Don't worry, you'll be right as rain in a week or so. Shouldn't be any scarring, either."
Goose tugged off her gloves and threw them away, then reached for one of the medbay's datapads to update his chart. She pressed a couple of buttons, but found that she had no idea how to access the patient records.
"I'm afraid I've never seen this software before," Goose sighed. "Do you know how to use it?"
"Just scan my microchip." Quin said plainly.
Goose stared at him, utterly bewildered. She could not understand what he was talking about.
"What microchip?" she asked, puzzled.
In response, he held out his right wrist and said, "Right here. Press that button on the side."
Goose pressed the button he'd indicated, and the 'pad automatically scanned the microchip embedded in his wrist. His complete medical history instantly popped up on the screen.
"Uh…Thanks." she muttered uncomfortably.
Despite how he clearly though it was normal, Goose couldn't help but feel that something was just…wrong. He had a microchip, like some sort of animal. Could it be that everyone treated them like this, like a bunch of nerfs?
"Well, I suppose I should let you go now. Come back at least once every twelve hours to get those bandages changed, all right?" she smiled gently.
"Thank you, ma'am."
He turned crisply and left the medbay, apparently none the wiser to her unease. Goose shook her head. An army of cloned men all fighting for the sake of the Republic, which claimed to be the pinnacle of freedom, were microchipped like livestock. It was absolutely mad.
Not long later, while Goose was cleaning up the supplies she'd used, she felt the deck dip down to the left a bit, meaning that the ship was probably turning around. The ship shuddered one last time, then all the turbolasers fell quiet, the enemy ones as well. The only sound to be heard was the humming of the engine. That must have meant that the ship was retreating, or at the very least, regrouping. When she'd been working on helping Quin, Goose had merely tuned out all the noise so she could concentrate. Now the silence was deafening.
Not long later, another clone wandered in with a small laceration from falling against a bulkhead during the fighting. This one was an infantry soldier, and was more than eager to leave. He made it perfectly clear that he was only in the medbay because he'd been ordered to go, and had no intention of staying any more than absolutely necessary. Goose only laughed at his impatience, then took longer than she had to just to mess with him.
The cut was mostly superficial, however, and she was finished with it quickly, and just as quickly he was gone. No more casualties were likely to show up, so Goose sat down at a computer terminal to try and find out more about the recent scuffle in space. Unfortunately, the report had not been posted yet. Having nothing left to do, Goose kicked her feet up and leaned back in her chair to take a nap.
Much to her dismay, Rex came in looking for her before she could properly fall asleep.
"Captain Gosling, if I am not interrupting-" Rex began politely.
"But you are interrupting," Goose cut him off crankily, "And don't call me 'captain' again, even if it is my rank. It's weird."
He was probably shooting her an irritated glare, but she couldn't tell because he still had his helmet on. Goose had hoped they'd come to some sort of understanding that morning, but it was more than likely that he had an even lower opinion of her than yesterday. That was also acceptable to her, because this was going to be a long war, and tormenting him might help pass the time.
"General Skywalker requests your attendance on a mercy mission to aid Republic troops on Christophsis," he continued stiffly. "The shuttle to the Negotiator will leave in ten minutes."
Goose stared at him for a long moment. He had to be kidding.
"How is a mercy mission supposed to get to the surface if there's a blockade around the planet?" she laughed. "You're not serious, are you?"
"I didn't give the order, I'm only following it." Rex ground out, "You have nine minutes. I suggest you hurry."
He was dead serious, and Goose wasn't sure what to do. This was nuts! How could she expected to be ready to go into a warzone in nine minutes?
"Kark me!" Goose swore. "I haven't got anything packed! I'm going to need some surgical supplies, sterile instruments, bacta…"
Having delivered his message, Rex strode out of the medbay, apparently not interested in her predicament. Goose stumbled around, not sure what to grab first or what to put it in, then remembered the pre-packed medkits in the supply room. She rushed in and snagged one off the shelf, then hurried out of the medbay and toward her quarters, muttering curses all the while.
When Goose burst into her room, she crammed a spare uniform and a toothbrush into an extra pocket of the medkit. Then she checked the chrono, and saw she had only five minutes left.
"Drok it, Skywalker! I haven't even met you yet, and I'm already starting to hate you." Goose groused as she hightailed it to the hanger.
When she got to the hanger, only two minutes late, the shuttle was thankfully still there. Walking up the gangplank was an older-looking officer who was not a clone. This was the first non-clone she'd seen onboard, so naturally Goose's curiosity was piqued. By the time she got inside the shuttle, he'd already sat down on one of a row of seats backed up against the wall, so Goose took a seat opposite him. Obviously the shuttle pilot was in a hurry, because the small craft lifted off before either of them could say anything.
"Good morning, Captain." he said pleasantly, "What business do you have on the Negotiator?"
Again, it felt strange for Goose to be called 'captain'. Of course, this man was Regular Army, so he couldn't be blamed. Goose had no idea what his rank was, because she'd never paid any attention to that kind of thing before anyway. She could only guess that he had a high rank because of how old he was, and the way he carried himself. He possessed a stern face with a well-groomed moustache, and spoke with a refined Anaxes accent that suggested a military upbringing. Overall, he didn't seem to be someone she'd like very much.
"I'm going on the relief mission." She replied casually, "I'm General Skywalker's new cutter."
"I beg your pardon…?"
Goose could only tell he was confused by the way his eyebrows scrunched together. Otherwise, his expression had hardly changed.
"Oh, right…'cutter' is doctor slang for a surgeon." she laughed inwardly.
"Ah, I see." he nodded politely, "I suppose I owe you an introduction. I am Admiral Yularen, commander of the Resolute."
Goose coughed lightly, and her eyes widened. He was an Admiral? Even though she had very little regard for military customs, Goose knew that she should have treated him with a little more respect. What rankled her, however, was that he seemed to have enjoyed catching her off guard, if the slight twitch of his lips was anything to go by. Goose briefly considered saluting, but quickly dismissed the idea. She saluted for nobody.
"Um…well I guess you already know what I do," Goose struggled to control the pitch of her voice. "I'm Doctor Gosling."
She'd given her formal name only because it would feel odd for the army brass to call her by a nickname.
"It is a pleasure, Doctor Gosling," the Admiral said tactfully. "I am going on the same mission as you are. As a consultant, I suppose."
Goose knew next to nothing about the actual mission, and had no idea what he could be consulting about. Rather than betray her ignorance, she changed the subject.
"What is the Negotiator, anyway?" Goose asked.
"Why, the Negotiator is a Venator-class star destroyer, just like the Resolute. It is also General Kenobi's flagship," he answered patiently. "As a matter of fact, we're landing right now."
The Admiral was right, of course. The trip between ships had been short, and they'd arrived in no time at all.
"We should hurry now," he continued. "We've already delayed the General's departure, and I do not want to keep him waiting."
He clearly was in a rush, because he was walking down the gangplank before it had completely finished lowering. Goose followed at a slower pace because she was struck with awe at what she saw. A long, tube-like ship filled most of the rest of the hanger, which was near identical to the Resolute's. It must have been close to a hundred meters long, with a pointed cockpit and flared out engine compartment. What really drew her attention, however, were the large bronze-colored panels along the ship's length. What else could they be but cloaking emitters?
Suddenly, it all made sense. This ship had a cloaking device, which meant that they could easily slip through the blockade while under cloak to deliver supplies to Christophsis. Goose had never been on a cloaked ship before, so this was experience she was not about to miss out on. She internally cheered with delight, then followed after the Admiral.
When she walked aboard the stealth ship, Admiral Yularen was conferring with a young man in dark robes, who actually didn't look as old as Goose was. At first she thought he was just another passenger, but one look at the lightsaber hilt clipped to his belt told her otherwise.