SC - Fugitives

[rivaan]

The work on Nick's injuries was especially delicate given the nature of the shrapnel... What bad luck had struck for this to happen, granted without the armor it would have been way worse in other words he'd be dead, judging by hte damage, but the way the injuries had formed was an especially tricky and dangerous. Even with nanites, Miranda's abilities to deal with his wounds was limited because she didn't have proper advanced medical theatre form one of the core worlds or the academy. Sure the BC had a lot of tech, but it was from the Guild Wars... or in other words a bit behind the times. Still she had a constant scan running and a holographic screen was projecting his insides in real time as they worked. Ava's help with the blood and Trish's aid in keeping them perfectly supplied with the right tools without having to pull too far from the injured man were invaluable.

Despite everything, his blood pressure was dropping fast and the blood wasn't stopping. Miranda's direct realization was that there was a shrapnel INSIDE a blood vessel somewhere, hidden amonghts the other metal bits that weren't inside blood vessels, making it hard to spot on the sensor. Sadly his body was filled with metal bits, most in places that weren't critical, but there were those at dangerous spots and it seemed at least one was in a critical juncture. Miranda was about to give it a Hail Mary attempt and just inject him full with all blood vessel repair nanites that she had avaible and hope they keep him alive until she was able to find and remove any external materials from the wounds, when Ava came to the rescue. The doctor sensed the psionics at play and looked at Ava who spoke of what she was doing moments later. Huh... those were rather high level of psionics at work. Technically by the academy standards what Ava was doing would be considered as Biokinesis, though it was hardly observed in any real fashion, though the QUeen of Blades had been observed to be able to rapidly regenerate and nearby ghosts would report psionics at work... Not confirmedthough. In any case, she wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth, they'd deal with it later, including testing and c lassification.

She gave a nod to Ava and got to work while they had time. Biokinesis was likely an extremely taxing ability even when not accounting this was her first time really using it as far as Miranda knew, so they were operating on barrowed time. Now that it was secure and she knew exactly where it was, she in haste readjusted the scanners to show it in detail, finding the thing and seeing the damage surrounding it. She took her new set of tools she requested from Trish and deftly extracted the foreign object from Nick's body before using a injector to get some nanites to repair the artery. Controlled use of small dose of nanites was enough to close that injury, now it was time to deal with the rest, thougn not before she got him hooked on some IV to start injecting him with blood to ramp up that blood pressure and recover lost blood. Luckily they had some blood avaible, since she ran a semi mandatory donation pool while they were preparing hte last few weeks while they got their supply in order." You can ease on the psionics, I've closed that injury, now it's time to deal with the rest... Trish, tools 5 and 11. Ava, back to the gauze and blood clearing..." She called out before returning to work.

In the end it had been a grueling 5 hours of surgery done to Nick. his heart stopped twice during the procedure, but he was over the danger in the end. Miranda was covered in sweat and she had to switch Trish to sweat wiping duty at one point when she needed it cleaned and she couldn't remove her hands from the surgery. While there weren't other pieces of metal that nearly insta killed him like the one Ava secued, there were other injuries that they were lucky to be caught in time. In fact the worst one was neatly lodged into his spine and that by itself was a nightmare and a half to deal with. Now 5 hours and 46 minutes later, she pulled her hands away entirely, having finished the final stitch and took a deep breath." He's... out of danger... well out of danger of dying anymore." She clarified, since hi's hearth did stop twice during the entire process. Still Nick was a fighter and pulled through. The doctor was tired and her shoulder was killing her since the painkillers from earlier had worn off, but she didn't dare take more during the procedure, it hurt yes, but she could easily work through it." We can now move him to a bed in the medical quarters, the ones reserved for heavily injured patients. Good work, you two. He will live because of you." She smiled and tiredly pulled the surgery gloves off, tossing them into a bin nearby and turning for the door." Stay here to observe him while I arrange for the move and see what's the situation in general... I got more patients out there, I dont forsee issues now, but better be safe until we can move him. Because of the medication, he won't be waking up for a few days at least... can't risk it."

With that she nearly staggered to the door, but caught her step and proceeded to walk out properly, grunting as she finally pulled another syringe and stabbed hersefl with it to ease the pain again." Alright people, talk to me! Status!" She barked immediately once back in the medbay proper. There were a LOT of patients that ahd arrived since the surgery began. The light cases were being processed as possibel and send away, but there were heavier injuries too. Seems Nick had been teh worst injury this time around... well besides the ones that had been killed outright or hadn't survived to be brought to the medbay. There were a total of 3 deaths and 2 turned out to be from the fighter pilots. 1 had been a hangar crew that had gotten hit by a fighter that had a crash landing. The sad deaths aside, there were a total of 15 heavy injuries that would require medical bay stay and Nick hadn't been the only one send or knocked unconcsious. They really needed to up the number of at least first aid capable crewmates in the near future. It was going to be one of those shifts, Miranda realized, the ones that would require stims to get through since there were too many injuries and too little number of medics or doctors. They had their work cut out for them. After she ahd moved to deal with another heavier injury that would require a bit of a lesser surgical intervention, she ordered some of her new underlings to go and proceed with Nick's move from the surgery to a proper bed. He was getting a room in the other medical bay since they had too many injuries for this one to house everybody. This was a big BC with a number of medical facilities, she just hadn't expected for the irregulars to have to bring all of the minto operational status right away. Stable or dealt with injuries that require observation were moved to the one Nick was being moved at.

[Keira Kelly]

Ava was giving it her all, holding together the walls of Nick's artery. She could feel herself tiring more quickly than almost anything else she had yet done with her abilities... but she had to keep going. There was no alternative. She was determined to push herself to any extreme to keep doing what she was doing to keep Nick alive. The concept of time seemed to break down as she pushed on; it could have been seconds or hours, she didn't know. Everything disappeared around her except what she was concentrating so intently on. What she was slowly coming to realize though was that she wasn't only holding the blood vessel together. She could almost feel the edges around the jagged metal shrapnel slowly pulling and knitting themselves together. But the metal was in the way and the energy it was taking was... extreme. But perhaps it would be something to explore in the future. Right now all she cared about was Nick.

Eventually, Miranda's voice broke through to her. Ava glanced up sharply, a slight look of confusion on her face until the words registered. She could stop what she was doing. Not without a hint of anxiety, she eased up, letting her power dissipate. A full wave of fatigue hit her then, the adrenaline she had been running on to keep going now spent. She collapsed down to one knee beside the bed and it was only through force of will that she didn't pass out. Taking a big, deep breath, Ava pushed herself back onto her feet, moving to do as Miranda had asked. A big threat to Nick's life was gone but they weren't even close to being out of the woods yet.

The rest of the surgery was just as trepidatious. Twice Ava was sure Nick was lost, and the pain of thinking that hurt on a level she had never experienced before, but both times, somehow, Miranda managed to get Nick's heart going again. Finally though came Miranda's statement that Nick was now out of danger. Ava, afraid of being hopeful, yet yearning for the hope, looked over at her friend. "You're sure?" she asked, even though she could sense that Miranda was as sure as she could be. She could feel her own muscles cramping and shivering with the fatigue and tension as she moved up closer to Nick's head, grabbing hold of his uninjured hand in a near death-grip, just wanting to hold him and not let go.

She barely even registered Miranda's complimenting of her and Trish's assistance. Instead, before Miranda could move off, Ava reached out a hand to the doctor's shoulder, looking at her friend in the eyes. Words of thanks would not have been enough for how she felt right then, but she knew Miranda would be able to, very easily, sense the level of gratitude she felt. She nodded in reply to Miranda telling her to stay there and watch him while she saw to what would be needed next, as she drew her hand back to hold onto Nick's again.

As Miranda left, Ava started registering the damage to Nick's face. The burns were pretty bad... and his eye... Swallowing back emotion, she turned to grab some of the gauze again, placing one thick wad over his eye and began wrapping it all to protect it and the burns from anything that might be in the air. Those wounds would have to be dealt with too but that would come later. His body needed to rest a bit from the last surgery first and the gauze at least would be temporary protection. Doing something, anything, was probably the only reason Ava wasn't crouched against the wall, crying right now, though her vision was slightly blurry from tears wanting out.

She she finished up, the fatigue really hit. Ava stumbled back into the wall, sinking to the ground. She felt hands helping to keep her from outright collapsing. She forced herself to blink a few times, keeping herself conscious. All of the psionics plus standing there for nearly six hours, plus the sheer roller coaster of emotion had drained her entirely. Show vowed though that she wouldn't take a rest until Nick was situated where he would be.

"Are you all right?" came Trish's voice . She was the one helping Ava to at least stay upright.

Ava nodded, still forcing herself to take deep breaths and stay conscious. "Just exhausted."

"I understand it now." Trish suddenly after a long moment, her tone soft.

Ava glanced over. "What?" she asked in confusion.

"You and him." Trish answered. "I get it. I can see how much you feel for him. Me and him, we never had anything like that. Not that I wouldn't have wanted it... but.. I get the impression that you and him are a perfect match. I still do care about him in my own way, but I get it now." she explained sincerely. She was quiet for a moment, looking down at Nick, before she looked over at Ava again. "There are rumours about you, you know, amongst the crew. And the doctor just confirmed it. You're a psionic, huh? How strong of one?" she asked.

Ava's mind scrambled to decide how to answer. It wasn't really a secret, per sey, but they were not exactly advertising it either in case word got back to the Dominion that there was a rogue ghost operating in the sector. Still, Trish was a high level officer in this unit and probably could find out anyways. "High level." she answered. "One of the highest, though not THE highest, the academy has seen."

Trish's eyes widened as she pulled back a bit. "Academy? Ghost.... academy?" She made a small sound of surprised awe when Ava nodded that it was so. "Makes sense though... Whatever you were doing with your power, helping him, that's what exhausted you?" she asked. When Ava nodded again, Trish continued. "Yeah, you two are a perfect match. If it had been you on the table, I bet he would have been right there beside you the whole time as well, doing anything he could to help."

Ava smiled tiredly. "He was. I've been hurt pretty bad a couple of times in operations and he was there with me the whole time." she replied. "The last time, I got sucked out into space without a helmet.. that one was particularly dicey..."

Trish barked a laugh at that, but then realized that it wasn't a joke. "Wait, seriously?!"

Ava couldn't help but laugh a little. "Yeah, seriously... It was the only way to get away from the Queen of Blades..." The look on Trish's face at that amused Ava enough to forget all the worry for a small moment at least. She held out a hand to Trish. "Help me up though, would you? We need to keep an eye on Nick." Back on her feet, though shaky, Ava and Trish waited for Miranda's return, Trish helping Ava to stand more stably, an arm around the ghost's waist and the other on her arm in a friendly way, something that would never have happened even a matter of hours ago. "Anything else you need help with?" she asked Miranda, when the doctor did come back.

[rivaan]

Miranda closed her eyes for a brief moment, poulling an injector from one of the code locked boxes. She hated this... always did even before the academy debacle, but it was something that all proper trained Medical personel was taught to accept and do in the cases of emergency, though she had added a few personal conditions and rules to the system here. In this case, people being allowed only singular dose. Risk of addiction would be too high otherwise. With a single dose, the type of stimulant she had secured for the medical personel wouldn't affect them too much and after the initial rush of energy worse off and a good deal of rest, they'd be as good as new. With a light cringe she injected the stim into her neck and took a deep breath, feeling the fatigue from the 5 hour surgery wash away as a new wave of energy replace it.

The number of heavy injuries that required serious interventions was still mostly hanging on her. The other true medics weren't bad, but at the end of it, none were actual surgeons for such heavy injuries. She'd get them there, but there was still time. It was the sad truth about mercenary groups. They rarely could hire specialists and had to make do with less qualified alternatives. In their case, the Irregulars had hired a number of regular doctors with a quick guidance course on surgary and combat medicine plus a number of first aid personel. Only real experts that worked in the mercenary field when it came to medics, doctors and surgeons were usually forced into it by happenstance *cough* fleeeing Mengsk *cough* or were lunatics that were kicked from the official medical world. Which on second thought sounded a lot like a good number of the combat medic personnel that Mengsk was fielding... resocialization at it's finest...

Being brought back to reality, she accompanied 2 of her... orderlies...? Stooges. yes... underlings... She was way too much busy to think on what their official titles would be. They arrived at the room where Nick was at. They needed the place emptied because there was another heavy case to be processed as soon as possible. If they act fast enough, they might even save the guy's legs." Honestly you'd be best served heading back to rest after that feat with the injury you pulled off." Miranda stated and gestured to the people she brought to begin moving Nick's bed out." We are moving him to the Medical bay on Deck 5. It's one for heavier injuries so it has a number of separete rooms for the injured to rest and be under better observation. I'm going to be performing another surgery right away so we need this theatre emptied." Miranda explained and looked at Trish." You did great for your first time as medical assistant. Go get some rest for now too." It was actually nice to see them get along now. She supposed dangers and survival had a way of bringing people together." Well if you both really want to help still, there's a number of lighter trauman injuries that are still being processed. There is more than enough work to be done there in helping with putting on casts, running scans for head traumas or just bringing about supplies." She took a deep breath, steadying her breathing and pulse as Nick was rolled out of the room and another heavy injury was brought in. It was time to get working, she really hoped to save the man's ability to walk, he had gotten a crushed underneath a few crates, before he was put under sedation, he reported barely feeling his legs anymore... Normally he would have been brough to surgery right away, but since they didn't have another surgeon to deal with nerves and she was working on Nick, he had been put on the waiting list, with them doing anythign htey can to stabilize him and keep it from deteriorating. She just hoped it wasn't too late.

This was going to be a long shift, but one she wasn't going to miss... or half ass.

( Can just have Ava do some helping around for a fbit before resting and time skipping say a day or two forward, or directly skip forward to the point Nick is getting awake again.)

[Keira Kelly]

Ava frowned, forcing herself more upright, forcing herself to not rely so much on Trish's steadying grasp. She took a deep breath, trying to will away the fatigue. "I'm all right. I've been through worse. I can still help." she said adamantly. Truth be told, she wanted something to do. Ava had never been very good at sitting around and just waiting, and especially with this, it would be waiting around and feeling just helpless; something she very much wanted to avoid. At least, then, she could focus her mind on something else. She'd go be with Nick when fatigue forced her to the point of no other choice but rest, or when he woke up, whichever came first, but right now, with the adrenaline and worry already at full levels, she wanted work to dive into.

She managed, somehow, to help with the lighter injuries that came into the medbay for the next couple of hours. Forcing herself, at times with the use of her psionic powers, to keep up with the steady stream of work, eventually the repeated use of her powers on top of how she had used it with Nick, just got to be too much. As the influx of patients petered out, so did her energy levels and she finally allowed herself to be talked into going to get some rest. For her, though, rest was going to find out where Nick had been put up in the, what was essentially, intensive care unit. There, she had pulled up a chair beside his bed, curled up in it, holding onto one of his hands, and had fallen asleep.

The next several days were basically repeats. Heading up to the medbay when sitting around got too much, helping out as much as she could with whatever she could, and then heading back to sit with Nick. When medbay stopped needed as much help, she began to volunteer in other areas around the ship, for any repair duties or the like that she was able to lend a hand, more often than not more as a labourer since she lacked more technical skills for repairs. With her psionics and the skin suit, she often was stronger than even some of the biggest guys on the crew and they came to appreciate her help, even if they couldn't figure it out, as she was cautious with showing how she did it.

---------------------
Several days later, Ava was in the chair beside Nick's bed, lightly dozing. She had been pushing herself to the point of exhaustion again but she didn't care. It was all she could do to avoid the worry. Suddenly, she woke with a jolt. It took her tired brain a long moment to remember where she was. With Nick, right... Something had woken her though. Not a sound though.. The only sounds at that moment were the light hum of medical equipment and normal sounds of the monitors that were keeping an eye on Nick's vitals. She was about to dismiss it as something she had dreamt maybe but then a grip tightened on her hand and Nick moaned slightly.

Ava stood up in a rush, gripping his hand more tightly as she leaned towards him, forcing her psi screen off. Damn, she hadn't even realized she had left it on before falling asleep; that had been stupid and dangerous. She pushed that to the side for the moment though as she reached towards Nick's mind, feeling it still mostly asleep, struggling its way through the syrup of the unconsciousness the drugs had kept him in for days. She ran a hand through the hair on one side of his head. "Shh.. It's all right, Nick. Just relax." she said in what she hoped was a calming tone. "Rest. You're all right. I'm here with you." She could feel him respond to her voice, both as his body relaxed and mind settled. He wasn't exactly unconscious anymore but not totally awake either. She guessed it would only be a short matter of time before he did awaken fully though. She went to reach for her comm unit but then thought better of it, reaching instead for Miranda' mind, checking to make sure it wasn't an inopportune time to contact her friend. 'Nick's almost awake.' she sent psionically. She really wanted her friend there when Nick did wake up and they had to explain his injuries and treatments for them.'I think... I think it might be a good idea if you were here too when he does wake up.'

( So Im not sure how much info there is out there on the level of medical tech in SC.. see if you know.. I'm considering having had him lose the one eye but.. I have no clue what they might have for replacements.. Might need to figure some of that out. Also, guessing his burns still need to finish being treated at this point? )

[rivaan]

Well all things considered the UED ambush could have turned way worse than it did. They managed to hold their own despite being outnumbered and outgunned for the most part. They survived and the casualties numbered less than the fingers on one hand in this case the grand total of casualties summed up to 4. Aside the ones that died immediately in the battle another 2 died in the time after when despite their best attempts the wounds proved to be too greivous to handle. One's heart gave out mid surgery and another well... they never woke up. They had nanites of course and those did help, but it wasn't a perfect solution. Nanites couldn't heal everything outright and needed to be programmed properly least they instead tear the patient from the inside out in the end some things were just beyond them to deal with and Nick's survival was already quite the miracle.

Deaths aside, the news coming in after the attack weren't encouraging, the UED was stepping up it's attacks on all fronts, Dominion was in retreat, protoss weren't seen as of late and the zerg were apparently fighting amongst themselves, the dominion and the UED, but more and more zerg broods seem to ahve been gathering, Miranda's guess was that after the Overmind's death Kerrigan was finally recovering the swarm in her control... As a whole the sector was a smoking pile of explosives waiting to go off any moment now. She had no idea where the UED was pulling the resources to fight like this... well aside hte men and tech they brought along from Earth, they had taken a number of shipyards and manufacturing centers, pumping out gear at rapid paces, or at least that was teh word on the grapevine. Apparently they were using the local infrastucture to manufacture more ships some of their own design like those Valkyries that popped up out of nowhere and some just upgraded via their tech. Worst was that she was hearing about settlements going dark without warning and nobody left in their wake. That by itself left a few grim possibilities: Zerg devouring everything, but the lack of hives was not classical zerg behavior and of course UED and Doiminion... Both might well have been using Resocialization to bolster their forces...

A mental presence appearance signaled that Ava was reaching out so she just refocused on her, signaling that she was free and that she was listening. Ahh there was the other thing in her mind that concerned her. Nick's state. He was stable and while not healthy per say, but he was going to live, minor some... cosmetics.'Going to be over in a bit.' She replied and stood up from her dest in her office where she had just finished filling out requisition orders for medication, gear and replacements for some of the folks. There was going to be a need for some cybernetics to go around, some people had lost limbs to varying degrees. In Nick's case he had lost his eye... Miranda tried, she really DID, but it was beyond saving. There wasn't anything to save really. As part of her requisitions, she had reached out to Alexander on Kalisti to craft one. Well it wasn't his specialty, but he'd get a commercial one and fiddle iwth that one to bring it to bear or recreate it later by the time they pass by Kalistic to grab it once Nick was stable enough, the eye would be ready to install. For his skin, luckily they had enough medication and chemicals to speed up recovery and some plastic surgery was going to fix what didn't recover quite naturally. There were a lot of things for a doctor to be busy with in this day.

She arrived in Nick's room not too long after, pushing a cart of tools and medication. if he was waking up, then that was a prime time to run some tests to check the damages. Miranda briefly wondered what would happen if next time she was the one on the bed, given her two main companions had taken their turns, but she just mentally chuckled at that image and realized she'd just likely try to fix it herself she'd make for a terrible patient.

"It's alright, he is going ot be a bit out of it, confused and probably in a daze becase of the medications, but he's going to be alright in the end." Miranda reassured as she pulled the other chair and waitied for him to wake up completely too." His sides would itch because of the damaged burned away skin we had to strip off layers off. The fresh new one will growl it's just going to take some time even with the medication to speed it up. His internals are good and I've already asked Alexander to get a cyber eye for him, but he might be in recovery for a bit..."

[Keira Kelly]

After having contacted Miranda, Ava began to pace the small room. She kept her psi-screen off, taking in continuous feeling of Nick's mental status, feeling hints of him coming to the surface as he got closer and closer to consciousness, all the worries and fears she had been harbouring for the past few days welling upside her. Had he suffered any mental damage? How would news of the physical damage affect him? Could this change the finally stable spot they had gotten to right before the UED attack? Would he become depressed or resentful because of his injuries? She glanced over at him, noticing that for the first time, his fingers were twitching a little bit. Immediately she nearly dove for the chair beside his bed, sitting in it and grabbing onto his hand with both of hers. "Come on, Nick." she said softly. "Come back to me..."

She quietly talked to him, urging him to wake up, telling him it was going to be all right, until Miranda arrived. She easily caught the doctor's musings and turned to Miranda with a furrowed brow and frown. "I'll do everything in my power to make sure that that doesn't happen." she said flatly in reply to Miranda's thoughts. "I'd rather none of us ending up like.. this again." The second part there contained hint of regret, knowing that what she could do in any given situation was only so much and there was a lot out there that could easily hurt any one of them. Still, she knew she would try to prevent it with all her might, no matter the cost to herself.

At hearing the prognosis, Ava gave a grateful smile at Miranda. "I guess we will have to make sure he doesn't scratch at his sides, right?" she asked about the burned areas of flesh. She winced when Miranda brought up the issue of Nick's eye. That was going to be the biggest thing that he was going to have to accept. It was hard for even Ava herself to think that he would no longer have his own left eye, but she couldn't imagine how much more difficult that would be for him. Cybernetic replacements were good at least, but.. it just wasn't the same. She could get used to it, she knew, but she felt bad about him having to learn to accept that. She nodded at the end. "At least he will recover though." she answered.

Just as she spoke, Nick's hand gripped hers tightly. She could feel him fighting with sleep and the medications, trying to pull himself back into the waking world, using her hand as a lifeline to it. She stood up, putting a hand to the unbandaged side of his face. "Come on, Nick. You can wake up. We are here, waiting for you." She kept talking for a few minutes until Nick's one uncovered eye fluttered open. He began to struggle, unsure of where he was, what was going on or why half of him felt almost restrained. "Shh... Nick. Just lie still." Ava urged. "You're safe. You're in a recovery room. You're going to be all right..."

Nick's eye finally focused on her, but he kept blinking, his vision was as blurry as his mind was clouded. He had heard her voice, urging him out of the blackness, and now, hearing it closer, more clearly, it had a calming effect, He didn't need to fight. He was safe. He could feel there was someone on the other side, across from Ava, but when he tried to glance over there, he couldn't see, until he turned his head far more than he knew he should need to. His vision was still blurry but even so, he could tell it was Miranda. He relaxed more, knowing it was the two people he trusted most with his life beside him. "Wha...." he began to say but his mouth was so dry. Almost instantly, he felt a straw at the corner of his mouth and greedily began to suck on it, drawing in sweet, clear water. After a long moment, he spat the straw out. "What... happened?" he asked in a voice so quiet and straining that it surprised him. His lack of any sort of energy was also worrisome.

Ava ran her fingers over the hair on the one side of his head. "We were attacked by the UED. Something blew up near where you were. I'm not sure what or where... I wasn't there, but some others... including Trish, carried you up to the med bay." she answered, reliving a lot of the emotion of when she had seen him brought in again. She almost let out a sigh of relief when she felt him squeeze her hand in reassurance. "You had some shrapnel and some bad burns..." she began but trailed off, fear of explaining the rest of it taking over. He reached up with his left hand, beginning to touch at the bandages on his face. Ava pulled his hand down. "It's best to leave those alone for now." she told him in a soft voice. She glanced over at Miranda with a worried look.

"Why...."

"Why? Because you need to let it heal..." she began until he started to shake his head in negative as best he could.

"Why... can't I see... on that.... side?" he asked. "Can't... open... my eye..."

Ava looked up and over to Miranda again, with a pained, pleading expression. She didn't know if she could even find words right at that moment to try to explain.

[rivaan]

Miranda was honestly surprised to see Nick wake up at that precise point of time, it was very coincidental. One might say even too coincidental and it made her wonder if Ava hadn't subconsciously pulled him out of his temporary induced coma, but that wasn't really that important. She began taking some notes of his vitals and after hearing him talk and the growing emotions, fueld by a haze of the painkillers and sedatives, she figured it was time to inject something to keep him from doing something stupid in a moment of drugged haze so she quickly also added some mild calming medications in his systems. Nothing too strong or serious, but it should help him regain and keep some calm without interfering with his other medicines.

"Your head is bandaged, Nick." Miranda said soothingly and took a seat on a chair nearby." You took an explusion from quite close, had a lot of burns and injuries, that whole side of your body was heavily burned. You held on and pulled through though, you won't get many if any scars when I'm done with you by the end." She calmly and slowly explained in caring fashion. And looked at his eye for a brief moment." The eye's a different thing however. I'm sorry Nick, but that explosion was too close and the damage too severe. Managed to safe the most of the optic nerves however. Once you've recovered enough, we've got the option to replace it. Alexander's already making a new one and I'm told that getting a cloned replacement might not be out of the question if we get access to the core worlds along the way. It's not the end, it's just a small hurdle that you will blitz through with no issues." She reassured and noted the new drugs were starting to get into him.

"I got to go now, but if either of you need something just push that green button by the bed, alright?" She asked with a smile." Need to pull Ava for a bit, to talk. Will be back in a bit, just to the doorway." The doctor added and gestured to Ava to follow her to the doorway, giving NIck a bit of time and space.

'Ava, I will be honest with you, he's not going to have an easy time for the time being. Even with replacement, we cannot do it until his body heals enough to stand another intervention, especially in the head.' Miranda told her via their psychic link.' He will suffer from the trauma for a while, things like this stick and he will need your help for his recovery to go the smoothest. So keep him company and keep an eye on him for the time being. Bring stuff he likes, talk to him and try to keep his mind occupied for the moment, alright?'

[Keira Kelly]

Ava quietly urged Nick to lie back and save his energy. He would need everything he had to heal... and she damned wanted him to heal and feel better, just as much as she had been waiting and hoping for him to wake up. While he was awake, the drugs were still pulling at him. At this point, it was his own will keeping him awake. While Ava was focused highly on Nick's thoughts, she was very tuned into Miranda's as well, trying to 'hear' and evaluate everything that the doctor was thinking about Nick's prognosis.

She felt instant shock at Miranda's thoughts that the ghost might have somehow psionically pulled Nick out of his medically-induced sleep. Her gaze shot over to look at Miranda, worry in her eyes despite Miranda's calm demeanour. [color=#FFFFFF]'Did I.. do this?'[/color] she sent hesitantly. 'I didn't mean to! I didn't know I was doing anything, that I could do anything like that....' she added, tinged with worry and fear. While she had.. bordered on the medical once with her psionics, that had been intentional. This though, if she was doing things sub-consciously, brought back the fear of the old days at the Academy when she had had no real control of her powers.

Hearing Miranda begin to explain to Nick what was going on brought Ava out of that dark pit of self-doubt, at least for now. She had to be strong and present right now. She could bring her concerns to her friend later, maybe when Nick went back to sleep. Instead, she began to stroke part of his hair not covered over with bandages lightly, trying to comfort him a bit from the news. Most of the news was... well, as good as it could have been really, considering the circumstances. There were a lot.. A LOT of other people who had been killed. "It's going to be all right." she said in a quiet voice to Nick. "It can all be fixed. We are here with you and you have one of the best doctors in the whole sector." she added with a bit of a smile. Her heart nearly soared when Nick responded with an attempt at a smile of his own and a small nod, the most he could manage as he tried began to flag in the fight against the drugs that he already had in his system and those extras that Miranda had administered a few minutes ago.

When Miranda said she needed to pull Ava away from the bedside, Ava almost objected for a second but then thought better of it. She stood, kissing Nick's forehead as his eyelids began to droop again. "I'll be right back." she whispered before moving over to the doorway where Miranda was waiting for her. She wrapped her arms around herself, as if trying to comfort herself, feeling quite small and helpless right at that moment. And guilty. She nodded slowly at what Miranda was saying. 'The psychological stuff... I think... I'm pretty sure, that I can... deal with that with him.' she answered back over the link. She managed a crooked half-smile. 'Probably will help that I can read everything he is feeling and can't lie to me.' What she didn't say was that, with the emotional bond being so close to Nick, Ava was fairly confident that she could help him deal with issues that might come up... from inside his own head. Nothing big, but she had a feeling she could help steer him when he might need steering a bit. If he did. 'The biggest hurdle that I know he is going to have though is the time to heal.' she added with a grimace. 'He isn't going to like having to rest and restrict his activities, but you know I will do whatever I can.' she assured her friend.

She frowned as she brought up her earlier worry. 'Do you.. think I really did wake him up?' she asked psionically. 'It didn't... affect him negatively, did it? If I did, I didn't even realize I was doing it. What if.. what if more comes up, more psionic abilities, without me controlling them?' She breathed out heavily, a physical sign of her fear of herself. 'If I can affect things on a biologic.. medical level, without even realizing it I could cause more harm rather than just good... After what I did at the Academy... it worries me what I might be capable of, Miranda.'

[rivaan]

'His like or dislike on the subject's not really up for debate... He nearly died... a number of time on that table.' Miranda replied with a sigh knowing full well how some patients were just a right pain in the ass. She would know, she worked in the bloody ghost academy and ironically the worst patients back there were the doctors. That rather unpleasant tangeat down memory lane aside she looked back at the door leading into the room where NIck was.' We need him in bed for at least a few more days until his wounds stabilize, no arguments. Those were very deep injuries and even the hhead ones, I saved the optic nerves, but it could easily worsen if he does something stupid. And that's without getting into the whole his side is littered with barely holding together holes that while rapidly healing are still days away from being save for any kind of stressing. If you have to, show him one of hte xrays and show him how any kind of stress could kill him...'

'Yes, it's entirely possible you pulled him out of it.' Miranda admitted after some consideration.' You are a level 10 psionic and that's more than enough to affect fine biological functions and even alter them. Accelerated healing, purging of drugs or even outright causing boddies to be ripped assunder. Those are all things possible with high enough psionic powers, which you have in spades. You are right to be concerned, but as long as you exercise caution it's nothign to fear about. As for NIck's condition, I was checking his readings when it happened, aside for a sudden brief spike in brain activity that forced him to wake up, he's completely alright. Though he should get back to sleeping until the drugs are flushed out naturally by his body rather than forced awake. So try to get him to calm down and fall asleep again."

With that final bit of advice, Miranda patted Ava on teh shoulder and walked away, stretching her arms and rubbing her neck afterwards because of how stiff she felt. Her mind steeled itself as she ventuered further away from Ava and NIck, leaving them to their peace while her trainign kicked in to mask her thoughts. The crystal earrings she had long since stopped being a simple earring as the crystal grew outwards overtaking part of her ear which she conveniently nowdays kept under hew new hairdo and brand new ear decoration that hid it. It was the source of her own worries for the future as she had no idea how athe khaydarin would react from now on, but it wasn't something to worry Ava and Nick with... for now. She sighed.

THe irregulars were... injured and the whole group had suffered a heavy moral blow because of the UED attack. People had died that didn't need to and while the group survived they were in the end forced to retreat after suffering losses, injuries and damages. Both BCs were in need of new repairs. This one of big ones, because the ship went into battle without time for proper test for all systems, the stress and teh compat test revealed a lot of oversights or quirks or simply damages that hadn't been noticed before that, meaning... it was time for more repairs. On that note the news form the sector weren't nice, UED had launched a massive attack throughout the sector and it seemed as if they are absolutely bloody everywhere. There were scattered and unconfirmed reports of zerg, terrans and protoss allying themselves to combat them which was madness and something she didn't wish to deal with at the moment. As it stood Cid had given the order, the Irregulars were heading to the one place they knew they could lay low and ennact repairs... She wasn't quite in agreement, but no other chocie for the moment. Deadman's Port it was....