"Next..."

[Avery Tynte 0]

War, such a…unclean thing, Avery stood in full scrubs, a young nurse at his side. They stood amidst the dead and the dieing. Moans, cries, and the other noises of the fight between death and life swirled in the room. Avery knew that the medical staff was the only thing standing between these people and death.

He turned to the nurse beside him, she was young and this was obviously her first posting. Her hands were steady but her face behind her surgical mask told the true story. “Are you ok?” Avery asked quietly, as she removed the bloody gloves from his hand.

 

“Yes, I am fine doctor.” She replied as she slid a fresh pair of sterile gloves onto his hands.

 

He nodded as he turned back to his table, a fresh body being moved onto by two other nurses, replacing the last one. Avery expected that patient to live, though it had gotten sketching for a few minutes when his left kidney had ruptured and had to be replaced.

 

The nurse spoke again, he voice shaking ever so slightly. “Multiple internals, left lung ruptured by shrapnel.”

 

Avery cursed under his breath as he opened the patient under him. As predicted the man had multiple points of internal bleeding due to shrapnel, and his left lung had completely collapsed. Avery moved quickly, beginning to clamp off the points of bleeding. “This lung is going to have to be replaced.”

 

The nurse nodded and moved off. Avery clamped off another vein, but not before blood covered his right hand, the red liquid warm against his skin, even through the glove he wore. That was the last of the free bleeding points, and Avery looked up just as the nurse returned. She brought with her a synthesized lung, and the two began the tedious affair of replacing the damaged organ. With the man on support to keep him alive, Avery clamed off the major arteries and veins going to the lung. Then gently, using a laser scalpel, he removed the lung itself. He then moved to the new lung, sliding it into place. He held out a hand and the nurse laid a small silver device in it. Using the blue glow from the device Avery attached the fresh lung to the major arteries and veins and other connections to the body. As he pulled his hands out he watched for any signs of major bleeding or other complications. Seeing none he looked up. “He will live, next.”

 

The nurse nodded and the man was moved off the table. Such was the way of triage, no time for anything fancy, anything aesthetic; one merely stabilized the patient and moved on. The nurse wiped his brow and changed his gloves again as the next patient was being moved. Avery looked out across main sickbay, seeing Aaron bent over a Bolian patient at his table. He worked with a skill and grace Avery could only hope to attain one day far in the future.

 

Avery moved his eyes slightly to the left and saw Miranda working on a human patient. Again he saw the same elegance in her movements that only time and practice could bring. The two of them had been her far longer then Avery, and had no doubt done this multiple times. He watched them work for a moment, before his attention was taken by the next patient sliding onto his table.

 

He looked down to find something unexpected, but not terribly surprising. He was starring into the face of another Bajoran, a staff member of the Federation Embassy on Elasia. The nurse spoke. “His vertebral column has been fractured, multiple broken ribs. A piece of the buildings framework fell on him during the bombardment, his internal injuries are many and varied.”

 

Avery took this all in, looking over the tangled mess below his hands. Beginning work, the problems started immediately. Blood was everywhere as they opened the man. Avery worked madly attempting to seal off all the points of bleeding, but he was fighting a losing battle. Every time he closed off one vein or artery, another ruptured, spewing blood, pouring it over the mans insides, complicating the already difficult task. Avery did not even have time to look at the broken bones or fractured vertebras, he felt the sweat build on his forehead, stinging his eyes as it ran done his face.

 

“Sponge,” Avert yelled for the ancient tool to soak up some of the blood, but it was too late. The monitor beside the bed began to whine as the man’s body failed him. “It’s too late…” The nurse spoke. “He is gone, we have to move on doctor.”

 

For a moment, Avery hesitated, looking up at the man’s face, into his cold eyes. Those eyes, he realized, no longer held life. He closed his eyes as he laid his hand on the man’s face, closing those dead eyes. He spoke, in their native tongue. ”Go with the Prophets, my brother. Find your peace.” Opening his eyes he looked at the nurse beside him, her eyes glistening in the harsh light of Sickbay. Such is the way of triage… He opened his mouth, his voice steady, though mournful and hushed.

 

“Next…”