Monday, June 1, 2015

Skewed Slightly to the Left: The frightened doctor

[Originally posted at Slacktivist, though this post is the one that actually covers the relevant passage.]
[In canon the doctor is bored, in spite of the excessive need for him outside on the tarmac.  I thought he could use a different motivation for not helping those outside.]

Cameron felt a tap on the shoulder and turned to see a man in his twenties or so who looked shaken and nervous. "Your wound needs to be dressed. I'm a doctor."
"I'm ok," Cameron said. "A lot of people have it worse."
"I-- I know," the doctor said with shame in his voice. "I should be outside helping but when I saw," it looked to Cameron like he swallowed to keep from vomiting. "I can't be out there. I tried. I-- I tried to to do the right thing, but I ended up running away and hiding.
"I just can't face the scene out there. But dressing your head wound, that's something I can do," he sighed. "Please. Please let me do something to help someone."
Cameron looked at the man for a moment.
"It won't make up for not being out there where I'm most needed," the doctor said, looking at the ground, "But at least I won't be completely useless if I can keep you from getting an infection."
Cameron thought about it. "Ok," he said.
"I had my bag with me, but I gave it to someone who could face what was going on out there."
"Good thinking," Cameron said.
"So if you'll come with me to the drinking fountain, we can clean the wound, then we'll have to look for whiskey, grain alcohol, or honey to get it disinfected."
"Honey?" Cameron asked. He'd heard about alcohol of sufficiently high proof, but never honey.
"It works wonders, but it's a sticky mess," the doctor said. "Fountain's this way."

-

1 comment:

  1. Or alternatively…

    "Actually I'm a doctor of philosophy. I offered to carry bandages and things but they've got enough people for that. I always wanted to be a medical doctor. How hard can it be? Let's have a look at that cut…"

    ReplyDelete