Thirty minutes ago, Aragonian Sector, Battleship Singularity
Doctor Macintosh had blood all over his white coat and the black uniform underneath. His ears had gone deaf to the screaming. Life as a medical officer on a battleship had rendered him insensitive to such things, even as they surrounded him.
He had lost six patients already, this one made seven, and another eight corpses had been taken directly to the morgue. He pulled down his surgical mask with a sigh, letting it hang on his neck as tears began pricking at his eyes. He blinked them furiously away. He did not have enough tears to shed for all the patients he lost. That was the reality of a trauma surgeon.
He tussled the young woman’s hair gently, “Sorry, Yeoman.” She couldn’t have been any more than twenty-two. No, according to the medical file, she was twenty-one years and eleven months old. Two weeks from now, she would have celebrated a birthday. That birthday would never be had. He picked up her hand from where it limply hung, and squeezed it comfortingly before laying it across her still chest.
He turned away from the blank stare of the Marine that had dragged this patient in. “Where’s the next one?” Macintosh asked the nurse, stripping off his sterile gloves.
“Out in the bay,” she answered, voice unhindered by the tears on her cheeks. “Third degree burns, legs, torso, chest and face. Another mercy case, Doctor. And then Sanchez has a crushed arm in the other operating room.”
Another mercy case. Another crewman who was dead before they had even arrived in the medical bay. They would breathe and maybe speak for several more minutes, but they would still die. Sometimes it took that long for death to set in. His job with them was to ensure they were not in pain for the duration.
“Clean this up. Prep for another patient,” he told the nurse. I’m going to go watch another young kid die. Children, that’s all they were. Most of the crew was well below the age of twenty-eight. They were only children who had possessed no way of knowing the tragedies that would befall them today. They had never suspected this on what had been a quiet patrol. Not even Macintosh had expected this. If he had, he would have started drinking sooner, in some vain attempt to dull the pain.
“Yes, Doctor.” Nurse June took a white sheet from the pile and draped it over the body. There was no need for anyone else to see the mutilated corpse. Someone, somewhere, during the cleanup and repair efforts would find the remains of the yeoman’s crushed legs, and have to wipe up the mess. Hopefully, they would not be able to recognize the bones and muscles as the lost half of the pretty young woman who had just died on the table.
Structural damage rendered ugly wounds. It crushed limbs, crushed people and crushed hope when victims became trapped. The ship’s structural supports were hundreds of times bigger than any crewman. When they gave, they smashed anyone in the way like bugs – just red smears on the shell of a massive machine. Those victims lucky enough to live often lost limbs or became paralyzed.
The cleanup after such events inflicted psychological damage almost as crippling. Finding half-crushed friends put many in a state of shock. Being forced to cut off limbs to free victims from the wreckage was scarring to both sides. Cleaning up those pulverized remains of limbs and bodies gave nightmares to the teams responsible.
Hull breaches were better. The vacuum was quick when it killed. Even the radiation was better than structural damage. It was painful for the victim, but it was easier to clean. It traumatized fewer people overall.
But the burns, those were the worst of all.
This latest patient did not prove him wrong as he stepped past the curtain that had been drawn around the living corpse. The skin, blood and remains of the clothing were all virtually indistinguishable: black and red, wet and crunchy. Externally, this patient had been baked to a crisp. Internally, they had been boiled alive. Unfortunately, it took the human body time to catch up with those facts.
It took time to die.
The rotten stench of it was escapable. All of the victim’s hair had been burned away. Their face was charred, mouth stuck open in whatever painful scream they had been caught in. The burns were so severe, Macintosh couldn’t even tell if it was a man or woman. They were unrecognizable. He could see where someone, likely whichever nurse had seen to this patient, had pried the dog tags out of their scorched chest. That would have been the only way to ID the victim.
Macintosh grabbed the clipboard hung on the foot of the bed. A man. Ensign Li. It didn’t matter though. He was still going to die. Painkillers were the only treatment he could give, even as the patient let out a low moan.
That raised the cries of the woman on the other side of the bed. She was weeping, rocking back and forth with her knees against her chest. Judging by the flakes of blackened skin and blood stains on her orange jumpsuit, she was the one who had brought in Li.
“Ensign Frasier, you shouldn’t be in here,” Macintosh told her. She would only be further traumatized by the state of her friend.
She screeched loudly, an unearthly howl. Rocking harder against the wall where she’d curled up. Without further question, Macintosh pulled a syringe from the pocket of his lab coat. He poked it into her shoulder and injected the contents without any attention to precision. He had already done this four other times so far today.
A moment later, her shoulders dropped and she slid to the floor, her ragged breaths starting to even out. She still grabbed at Macintosh’s coat as the sedative took her under, “It’s all my fault,” she wept, “he pushed me out of the way… but h-he got caught in the spray.” Frasier tugged on his coat again, “You can save h-him… right… Doc?” She went limp against his leg.
Macintosh pushed her carefully off, leaving her on the floor. Li would be dead before she woke. It was cruel maybe, but also necessary. He didn’t have time to deal with mental panic until the physical trauma cases were stitched up. It was better to knock them out then let them scream and run around in a frenzy. They would only hurt themselves.
The patient moaned again, low and guttural. It was probably the only sound he was capable of making. Macintosh pulled another syringe from his pocket, but he paused before injecting it. There was no way to inject it without cracking the scab that was the man’s body.
It was momentary pain against minutes of agony. Macintosh was not sure why he hesitated. He inserted it steadily as he could, but the flesh still cracked around the injection site. Fresh blood splattered onto his white coat. It soaked into the sterile sheets as he pushed the syringe down.
Li screamed in momentary agony, but that soon shifted to a softer noise – one that could have been gratitude or a dying whimper.
The doctor disposed of the used syringes. “Sorry, Ensign.” Today, it seemed he was not a very good doctor. He could not do anything to help these children.
The spray Frasier had mentioned had probably been fuel. The ship’s liquid fuel burned hot and burned fast. It was likely the cause of Li’s deep, uniform burns. He must have been coated in head to toe when the line broke. Once it ignited, it would have taken mere seconds to burn through his clothes and into his skin. Now, drugged into oblivion, the kid would die painlessly. There was nothing else to be done.
Macintosh slipped out past the curtain and headed back to the operating rooms. Pulling his mask back up, he slapped on the gloves Nurse Sanchez offered him. It seemed the tide of wounded had stilled for now. Another wave would come, but it left him to work on cases that he could do some good for.
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This crewman’s arm had been partially crushed, mangled, but he was not bleeding out. Macintosh could save this one. This one would live. The patient was knocked out under anesthesia as the medical officer began his work. This was less of a trauma surgery to stop internal bleeding, and more of an attempt to repair his arm before it was too late. It was a good change. The limb might prove salvageable.
Macintosh managed to stitch up most of the tendons and mend the bones in the few minutes he had before the door to the surgery room flew open, “Doctor! Another one just came in.”
“Not now,” Macintosh snapped. He was going to save this crewman’s arm, since it was the only thing he seemed capable of saving today.
“It’s an emergency-!”
“Not now!” He could watch whoever it was die later.
Nurse June took a step back, cowering from his anger, but she could not back down. “It’s Admiral Gives, sir. The Admiral’s down.”
“Fucking son of a bitch!” Macintosh slammed his gory scalpel onto the tray, “Tell that asshole to go die somewhere else!” It was about time for that bastard to get a different doctor to stitch him up.
June cowered even further away. “He’s comatose, sir.”
“That figures.” Naturally, the man would find some way to rob Macintosh of any small joy. “Fine. I’ll heal him and then curse him out myself. It’s his fault I’ve got this shit job anyway.” Macintosh would never forgive him for that.
“I can finish up here,” Sanchez said. She wasn’t a surgeon, but she’d been working in the fleet long enough to have every bit of the necessary knowledge and experience.
Macintosh nodded and peeled off his bloody gloves, tossing them into the waste bin as he stormed out in the room. June hurried after him, listing off the patient’s condition, “He had third degree burns to his leg and hand. The leg wound looked to be infected. Severe blood poisoning, likely Stage Four. He was comatose when they found him, no sign of head trauma. The amount of blood loss is unknown, and he’s completely unresponsive.”
“Fetch a blood bag from storage and ready one of the x-ray machines. We’ll need to check for internal bleeding and fluid in the lungs.” Of all the soldiers Macintosh had met and subsequently operated on, Admiral Gives was one of the toughest. He prioritized his job far above his health, so if he was comatose with his ship in this condition, he was probably on death’s door.
“I’ll check the records for a blood type and get that right away.”
“Just grab the type we have the most of,” the doctor told her, “He’s AB+. Universal recipient.” Granted how many times the Admiral had been shot over the years, that blood type had proved more than useful. It was probably the only reason he had lived this long.
June ran off with those instructions and Macintosh lumbered towards the officers hovering over the bed in the corner of the bay. Zarrey’s massive size and Jazmine’s perfectly parted hair were instantly recognizable as they stood over the bed in the corner of the bay. Every conscious person in the medical bay was also looking in that direction, shocked.
“Great,” Macintosh muttered grumpily. All of his hard work to keep everyone calm, by knocking out those who were not, had just been effectively wasted.
Even on his own ship, the Admiral remained near legend. It was a common assumption that the man did not even sleep, because sleep was for the weak, but that was bullshit. Macintosh knew it was bullshit. Admiral Gives was as tough as they came, but he was not immortal. When they realized that fact, the crew would be devastated. It was a fact that seeing Admiral Gives wounded and comatose scared them.
“Get out.” Macintosh shoved the two bridge officers away and yanked the gray curtain closed, concealing the Admiral from view. It was obvious that Jazmine and Zarrey were rattled. The crew would not be able to cope with seeing their commanding officer like this. They would panic and lose all hope.
The doctor could not let that happen. Hope was particularly important in a situation like this. It would keep them going, even if they were not going to get very far without the Admiral.
It took Doctor Macintosh less than a minute to confirm all of June’s observations, including the severe blood poisoning. Admiral Gives was not the first patient to come in with Stage Four blood poisoning today. Unfortunately, the rest had all evolved into Stage Five: death.
“You stupid bastard,” Macintosh cursed bitterly, “What could you possibly have been doing that you deemed worth your life?” Only an idiot would not have realized the radiation’s effects on his body, and while the Admiral was a lot of things, an idiot was not one of them.
Knowing the Admiral, he would have deemed almost anything worth his life. The man hid something akin to a death wish. It made the life of his medical officer exceptionally difficult.
Starting to hook up the life support and monitoring machines, Macintosh abruptly started to realize how dire this patient’s condition really was. The man very well could die. He sighed, “As much as I hate stitching you up, I’d really hate for this to be the last time.”
Outside the curtain, Zarrey could feel the uncertain gazes of the crew. They were wide-eyed and scared. Zarrey made an effort to laugh, “You all look so worried.” For a crew that repeatedly contemplated mutiny, they seemed particularly concerned about their commanding officer. “He’s Admiral Gives. He’ll walk it off.” He’d better.
The crew seemed to accept that for now, returning to where they had been resting and working. The excuse wouldn’t hold forever, but for now, it would do just fine. Zarrey sent Jazz back to the bridge and watched a nurse dart in and out, bringing supplies and equipment, growing impatient as he waited for the doctor’s diagnosis.
When the curtain finally parted, Doctor Macintosh stepped out with a sour look on his face. “Congratulations on your promotion,” he said, shoving the Admiral’s uniform jacket into the XO’s empty hands.
The silver rank pins on the collar glittered as Zarrey stared at the jacket in surprise. “What?”
“He’s dead.” Macintosh shoved his hands into the pockets of his white coat and walked away.
Zarrey grabbed his arm and dragged him close, struggling to keep his voice down, “You inconsolable little prick! He was alive when I brought him in!”
Doctor Macintosh had an easy time swatting Zarrey’s hands away. He was just as tall and just as strong as the XO. “He was dead when you found him.”
Remembering the crew in the medical bay, Zarrey pulled the doctor back behind the curtain before his anger obviously reddened his face. “He was breathing!”
“I might be able to physically heal him, but that doesn’t change anything.” There was absolutely nothing to be done. “He’s in a coma, Dennis. Brain dead.” There was no way to treat that, even if Macintosh managed to cure the blood poisoning. “His brain activity is almost nothing.”
“That doesn’t mean he’s dead!”
“More than 90% of coma patients with such low brain activity never wake up.” The active part of his brain was breathing and beating his heart, nothing else, and the doctor knew that could stop at any time. It would probably stop very soon.
“So, you’re going to give up on him, just because the odds are against him?” Unbelievable. “I thought you were his friend!”
“The Steel Prince did not have friends.” Macintosh might have known the Admiral far longer than the rest of the crew, but it did not make them friends. “He had a battleship, but she’s your responsibility now.”
“Fuck you.” Zarrey snarled, shoving the Admiral’s jacket back at Macintosh. “This is Admiral Gives’ ship, and he will wake up.” He had promised to explain things, and Admiral Gives was a man of his word.
The man on that bed was yet another living corpse that had made it to the medical bay. To Macintosh, this was another mercy case, just as pointless as the rest. “It would take a miracle for him to come back to life, especially since he didn’t even want to be alive in the first place.”
“Say that again!” Instinctively, Zarrey decked Macintosh hard in the face, but his fist was stopped just a few inches away from his target.
Macintosh nonchalantly dropped Zarrey’s hand. He had come to expect that reaction from the overly irrational XO. “I think you’ve seen enough of him to know that.” It was obvious to anyone who paid attention that Admiral Gives gave very little value to his own life. “After everything that he’s been through, would you want to live if you were in his place?”
Zarrey was left completely speechless. Admiral Gives did not speak of his past. In fact, he spoke very little about anything besides his job. He had ended up as one of the most hated members of the human race for a reason, and that had proved to be an exceptionally painful position.
The Admiral had been tortured and shot repeatedly, and as a result developed an absolute aversion to being touched. When Zarrey had grabbed Admiral Gives on the bridge, he had revived every one of those memories and been lucky the Admiral had not attacked him in self-defense.
“He passed Command’s psych evaluations every year by technicality,” Macintosh explained. “He simply showed no emotion at all, so they couldn’t fail him.” That did not mean that Admiral Gives had not suffered the long-term effects of severe depression. He showed every red flag for self-harm: risky behavior, lack of interest and was withdrawn from everyone. To this day, the doctor was not exactly sure what kept the man from killing himself.
Macintosh knew it was difficult news to comprehend. “I made him promise that if he ever decided to take his own life, he would not take the ship down with him.” It seemed this situation had been the perfect out. Attempting to revive the Admiral would be pointless, and most likely, an unwelcome effort. “There’s nothing I can do.” It would be better to move onto a patient that not only wanted to live, but actually stood some chance of doing so.
“You’re full of shit.” Zarrey refused to believe any of that. “You’re pissed off because people keep dying and you can’t do a damn thing about it.” They were all stressed, emotionally and physically. “I understand that, but don’t take it out on the man who just saved the entire ship. Even if you can’t save him, at least make an effort to try.”