The Trouble With Sick Bay

Posted on Mon Feb 20th, 2023 @ 11:56pm by Lieutenant Jayla Kij MD & Lieutenant Commander Javiylah MacArthur

2,073 words; about a 10 minute read

Mission: The Icarus Files
Location: Main Sickbay

Bhéara's ears perked up as the doors slid open, revealing a tall officer in yellow carrying a kit in one hand, leaping up as the woman offered an arm.

"Are you bothering the Medical staff, Bhéara?" Javi asked, one eyebrow raised as the FELINE balanced on her arm, giving the black cat a skeptical look as the perked ears went flat and her tail flicked in dismissal. "Operations," she directed a remark to a medical officer who was staring at them both with a confused expression.

Noticing that the FELINES and Silver were no longer chasing one another around Sick Bay, Jayla went to see what was happening. Usually, sudden quiet was not a good sign. But, she found a black-haired woman in a gold uniform with the unknown FELINE balanced on her arm. “Hello,” she said cheerfully. “I’m Doctor Kij. Can I help you?”

"Greetings, Lieutenant Commander MacArthur with Operations," Javi replied as Bhéara neatly walked up her arm to sit facing the doctor on her shoulder. "One of your examination rooms has a problem with a junction according to Bhéara here. I hope she wasn't interrupting your department."

Bhéara just flicked her ears again and made a disagreeing sound, her tail curling around her person's neck to tap her other arm.

“Not at all,” replied Jayla with a grin. “She kept Silver occupied for awhile. That’s the little fox over there,” she added, nodding to the bright blue and white horned creature now standing with his head cocked to one side, staring at the newcomer as of trying to decide if she was a potential friend. “A problem?” she asked, finally registering what she had said. “I hope it’s not too serious.”

"At least you behaved," Javi remarked to Bhéara in Gaelic, who butted her head against the side of Javi's neck in response before she replied to the CMO, "Anything in Sickbay is serious enough to warrant an immediate look if we can. Bhéara flagged the issue so I received a notification," she explained how she had appeared so quickly. "If the room is currently unoccupied?" Bhéara chirped which prompted a dry, "You didn't introduce yourself? You know better. Doctor, meet Bhéara, my assigned FELINE."

Bhéara walked down Javi's arm to stare at the other woman, her eyes glowing green, giving her a friendly chirp.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Bhéara,” Jayla replied with a grin. “Yes, I don’t think any of the exam rooms are occupied right now,” she answered MacArthur. A quick glance at the indicators by the doors told her she was correct. “Which one was it?”

"Room 2, according to Bhéara's alert," Javi moved further into Sickbay, Bhéara easily reclaiming the spot under her ear, her eyes turning dark purple. "In the back."

“Yes, right over here,” agreed Jayla, leading MacArthur to the room in question. “I can’t imagine what could be wrong. I haven’t noticed anything out of the ordinary.”

“At least it hasn’t affected things yet,” Javi commented as she made her way to the back of the examination room, locating the correct panel near the deck and setting it aside. Bhéara jumped down to inspect the panel. “It appears to be minor fluctuations, likely occurring when you wouldn’t notice any symptoms.” She explained as she scanned the junction in question before turning the power off nearby. Javi knelt and leaned into the space, using a small light to focus on the area in question. “Simple fix,” came the slightly muffled comment, along with the sounds of rearranged parts.

“Well,” replied Jayla, vaguely aware of Silver sitting at her feet. “That’s a mercy anyway.”

Bhéara wandered over and gave the smaller animal a friendly nudge on the shoulder, letting out a quiet purr before sitting neatly.

After several more noises, Javi backed out of the space, resetting the power and scanning the area. “Fixed,” she commented as she put the panel back, looking up at the doctor from her kneeling position on the deck,”If you do notice anything odd, let us know and we’ll take another look.”

“Of course,” replied Jayla. “What was the issue? Or, more accurately, what should I watch for?”

Javi sat back on her heels, absently stroking Bhéara's head, who had moved over next to her and chirped at her. "Extremely short fluctuations in both power and data transmission were occurring." She frowned as Bhéara chirped even louder and interrupted her explanation, "Manners. If the fox wishes to make my acquaintance, it will." Returning to her response, Javi gave the other woman an apologetic look, "Keep an eye out for that, a sign might be malfunctioning equipment or an odd readout."

“I will,” she said, glancing down at Silver. “This is really unlike him. He usually wants to say hello to everybody. What’s wrong, Silver? Go say hello.”

Silver gazed back up at her and gave a questioning yip-yip.

“Go on,” she encouraged.

Cautiously, the little creature approached the newcomer. He was afraid he may be in trouble for running around Sick Bay with the FELINES. This person has shown up in the midst of it, after all. What if she had come to scold him?

“Perhaps my size?” Noticing how cautiously the uniquely-coloured fox was acting, Javi shifted so she sat cross-legged on the deck with her back against the bulkhead. Bhéara made an encouraging sound at Silver, her eyes flashing silver as she did so. Javi scratched the FELINE behind her ears, not paying attention to the fox, treating him a bit like she would a shy equine or true cat. “How has the day been so far, Doc? Other than this one interrupting Sickbay…” Bhéara flicked her tail and flattened her ears slightly at the comment.

Jayla grinned. “Ah, she was no bother,” she said. “She kept Silver occupied, as I said. He’s been a bit bored lately. He’s a licensed therapy animal,” she explained. “And without patients to comfort, he’s just sort of wandering around looking for someone to give him some attention.”

Bhéara produced a pleased-sounding purr as she wiggled her ears at the praise from the doctor. She understood what Bhéara had been doing, unlike her assigned person.

“Ah, boredom…I’m glad Bhéara helped distract him for a bit then,” Javi smiled as the FELINE curled her tail around the hand that was still stroking her head.

Well, the FELINE wasn’t in trouble. And she seemed to enjoy the attention. Maybe this person was okay. He sniffed at her knee and gave a tentative yip-yip.

“Hello,” Javi spoke to the fox sniffing at her knee and offered her free hand, contemplating the intriguing sound he was making.

Bhéara’s purr increased in volume and she slow-blinked her eyes at Silver, contentment showing as she draped herself across Javi’s right thigh, wiggling as her person rubbed her belly area.

No, Silver thought. I am definitely not in trouble. And he yip-yipped again, this time cheerfully.

“That’s better,” said Jayla, relaxing a little. “I wonder if you smell like someone he doesn’t like. Or something. Maybe the smugglers were Betezoid,” she mused. “He was trapped by smugglers who injured him, probably out of carelessness. He can’t survive in the wild, so I adopted him.”

“I would hope not, Doc,” Javi noted the difference in the sound the fox made and gave him a friendly smile as she held her free hand out for him to sniff. “He’s quite handsome, aren’t you?”

Bhéara continued to wiggle and drape herself across her person’s thighs, giving Silver an encouraging sound as she did so.

Silver responded with the sort of growling purr sound that indicated extreme happiness as he sniffed her hand, then pressed his head into it, obviously asking for skritches. Yes, he was definitely not in trouble.

“And friendly, too,” agreed Jayla. “It’s part of the reason I registered him. On my last assignment, he liked to get onto the biobeds to comfort patients. I had to have little steps made because he can’t jump like he should.”

"Did he? Friendly," Javi tried scratching behind the fox's horns, hoping he liked it as cats did. Bhéara moved up to drape herself around Javi's neck to give her new friend a chance at her person's lap.

And Sulver did like it, of course. He arched his neck and pressed his head into her hand.

“He’s the friendliest little creature I’ve ever known,” agreed Jayla. “And that’s including me. And I’m pretty friendly, in case you hadn’t noticed already.”

“So you do like that, lad” Javi scratched then rubbed the fox’s head, pleased at the positive interaction since the little creature had been so hesitant before. “I did notice, Doc,” She gave the other woman a nod from her current seat on the floor.

Jayla grinned again. “When I was a baby, apparently I cried a lot,” she said. “More than most babies. I just cried and cried and cried. While I was eating, in my sleep, everything. So my parents named me Jayla, which means cheerful.” She grinned even wider. “I suppose it worked.”

"I suppose so," Javi replied while Bhéara mrrted her amusement, reaching a hand up to scratch behind the FELINE's ears.

“Once we have patients, he’ll actually have something to do and maybe he’ll quit wandering around and trying to play with the FELINES,” Jayla added as Silver skip-hopped back to her. “Not that we want people to be hurt, but it’s something to do anyway, right Silver?” she added, kneeling to give his fur a ruffle. Silver replied by yip-yipping happily.

Bhéara made a huffy sound before resuming her purring, still draped around Javi's neck. She patted one of her person's cheeks with a paw.

"Hopefully, there won't be too many patients. Bhéara doesn't seem to mind playing with him as long as you don't mind," Javi commented, one of her hands covering the paw on her cheek.

“Not at all,” answered Jayla. “Otherwise he wants us to play all day long. He gets bored.”

"Well, I'm sure Bhéara will help with that..." Javi looked over at her FELINE as Bhéara made a sound of agreement," She likes to wander sometimes as I don't exactly need her assistance." Bhéara grumbled in response, an ongoing argument between the two of them.

“It’s okay Bhéara, you came in very useful today. Both with silver and with my faulty Sick Bay.”

Bhéara made an extremely pleased sound, twitching her ears at Javi while she sat very tall on her shoulder and flicked her whiskers. At least the doctor appreciated her contributions.

"Fair," Javi gave Silver another scratch behind the ears before she tried to get up, giving her FELINE a reproving look as Bhéara dug her claws in, "Must you? My schedule is not as free as yours." She finished getting to her feet before she reached up and nudged her FELINE's paws, a silent command to retract her claws. "Anything else you need, Doc?"

“I don’t believe so,” replied Jayla. “Although I didn’t even know that issue was there, so who knows. If you’d like to have a poke around just in case, feel free.”

"A good idea," Javi gestured toward the door and Bhéara easily hopped down and led the way out of the exam room. They split up, the FELINE trotted towards the other exam rooms to check them while Javi took a circuit around the main area to check for hidden problems.

Silver trotted off after Bhéara, making soft happy yipping sounds. Jayla only sighed and shook her head. As long s he didn’t disturb the FELINE, she supposed it didn’t matter.

Bhéara looked over her shoulder and made a pleased noise in response, happy to have the little fox accompanying her as she checked for problems. The two trotted around the area, making happy noises while inspecting.

 

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