A rift beginning to close (Vash x Parah)

[X-Vash00]

Vashiller Arok ((middle of the pic)) was lying on a med bay cot, screaming in pain. He was a Spectre returning from a successful mission. He found it funny, the mission was a success and yet he was here, writhing in lain on a med bay table trying to maintin consciousness while he and his squad race back to the citadel to get him to the medical facilities there. How did be end up in this predicament? Well the council had sent out this small team of Specteres: two Asari, a Salarians, him, and another Turian, to take care of a gang of Blood Pack mercenaries that were holding an Alliance cargo ship hostage. They sent the Spectres in as a small insertion team posing as negotiators to try and resolve the situation. The plan was to go in, take out the number of Vorcha on there and send the ship on its merry way. Only problem was that Alliance intel was off, there were a number of Krogan with them and when those Krogan saw Vash and the other Turian, they went nuts. They forgot about everything and started shooting and charging right at them trying to eliminate the bringers of the Genophage even though he nor the other Turian had no ties to that operation. Vash ended up taking a Krogan shotgun shell to his chest. Medigel helped close the wound so blood would stop seeping out but it didn't heal most of the internal damage and so he had to wait while the others took out the Blood Pack. Now here he was, waiting for the team to get to the Citadel.

When they did finally arrive on the Citadel the two Asari Spectres took Vash to the medical facilities while the Turian and Salarians went to go give the council their report. Vash's mandibles were flexing in pain and anger as the two Asari wheeled him to the med bay. His red face paint had now gone from being nice and neat to smudged and faded, he was going to need to fix that later... if he lived to. His visor was now shot to hell so he needed to go buy a new one, all and all, he was pretty fucked up. "Damn Krogans," He muttered, the dual flanged tone in his voice was growing weak. He needed a doctor now or else he was as good as dead.

The Asari got him there and handed him off to a few nurses while shouting for a doctor. The nurses started to wheel him towards an private medical room for a doctor to take care of him. Looking to ease his lain they immediately slapped a gas mask on his mouth and started pumping an anesthetic into him. After the gas started flowing he felt himself slip off into sleep, all he could do was hope that he was going to be able to wake up in a few hours.

 

[Parah]

Kim had been working in the Citadel's medical facility for a few months now; medical professions ran in her family, and she was the latest in a long line of nurses. Fresh out of nurse's school, she had so far avoided caring for what she considered "alien" races. She viewed most of them with considerable distaste, a trait that also ran in her family. Salarians were the only race that Kim truly had any respect for, since so many of them were so accomplished in her field, but even then she found the idea of touching them distasteful.

So, imagine her chagrin when she was handed a clipboard for a turian in post-op care. She knew that the situation was bound to happen eventually, but had hoped that it would take a bit longer. If there was a race she disliked more than any other, it was turians. Her family had heavy losses during the First Contact war and had harbored ill feelings ever since.

She gripped the chart, small hands turning white with frustration as she tried to contain herself. She would have to be as professional as possible of course, or she could lose her job, but that didn't mean she had to be nice to the damn cuttlefish.

She made her way down to the private rooms, and stopped to rap loudly on the door. She looked at the chart as she walked into the room, to avoid looking at the turian in the bed.

“Vashiller Arok..” She mumbled to herself. He ought to be waking soon. She clipped the chart to the end of his bed and began her work, she hoped she would be done cleaning and dressing the wound before he awoke...

 

[X-Vash00]

Vash didn't know how long he was out, days, hours, minutes? It all seemed blurred together with the anesthetic. All he knew was that he was starting to come out of it. He could began to feel the tenderness in his flesh and the pain from the surgery. He groaned as he started to move around in his hospti bed. He groaned louder and his two toned flanged voice filled the room. "Ugh, I think this is the worst I felt since that sniper slug through my shoulder." He wasn't aware that anyone was in the room, he had yet to open his eyes. He tried to fall asleep again but the pain was starting to overcome the anesthetic and he could feel it slowly spread from his chest to his other limbs as the wear and tear from the firefight was starting to take its toll.

He finally found the strength to opens his eyes and he was greeted by the mute colors of a medical room. He turned his head one way and he saw out his window to the vast superstructure that was the Asari's pride, The Citadel. A place that was a sort of cultural and species melting pot. You could turn the corner and find a group containing Asari, Quarian, Humans, Salarians, Volus, Hanar, Turians, Elcor and just about every other species outside of Batarians, Vorcha, and Krogans (though he had seen the occasional straggler Krogan on the Zakara Ward) they aren't big fans of The Council so they tend to stay in the Terminus Systems and the Traverse. It was all metal and glass, only the occasional dot of green foliage on one of the upper levels of the Presidium.

When be turned his head be saw a doctor looking at his vitals and other reading s that his machines were giving her. From his research into various species and their diverse cultures he could tell she was an Asian, an area somewhere on earth that was no for a large population and technological advancement. Also commonly known for their short stature and yet high intellect. Most Asians have become predominant people in the fields of medicine, technology, engineering, and programming. She seemed a bit stressed, or was it anger? He had yet to master the art of human emotion reading, but her body language was showing sins of anger and aggression. He didn't know why so he kept that to himself, but he had his suspicions that it was because he was Turian. He understood their reasons for resentment but he assumed that the rift between Turians and Humans were starting to close. They built an advanced ship , The Normandy, together and he had heard of various squads of Alliance and Turian soldiers working together. He himself had begun to show respect and kindness to humans. "So doc?" He asked, "How bad is it?"

 

[Parah]

Kim cursed inwardly as the turian (she refused to call him by name in her mind) began stirring. She had only just begun to ready the fresh bandages and other supplies for treating him on a small rolling cart. He began mumbling and groaning, hen finally opened his eyes and peered about the room. Studiously ignoring him for now, she examined the beeping machines attached to him and scribbled the results down on a clipboard.

It wasn't until his strange, dual-toned voice spoke directly to her that she looked at him fully. He really was quite beat up. "I'm not your doctor." She said in a crisp, clipped tone. "I am your assigned nurse. And you will make a full recovery in a few weeks, the surgery was textbook." She moved the cart next to his bed, and slowly adjusted the incline so that he was in a more upright position.

She cringed inwardly as she realized that he would likely be unable to remove his own hospital gown; she'd have to do even more touching. She motioned for him to raise his arms as much as possible, which likely wasn't much, thanks to the wound.

 

[X-Vash00]

The way she talks to him ony confirmed his suspicions. She talked to him perfessionaly, no concern for his injuries, no niceties that made him feel comfortable in his hospital bed, no friendly hellos or good mornings. She deffinetly did not want to be around him. He gave a sigh, the pain suddenly erupted from his chest. "Ah, damn that hurts!" He switched to small, shallow, breaths to try and ease the pain, "Alright,nurse." He put emphasis on the word nurse to make sure she knew he observed the corrected title. He didn't see why she cared about that correct title, from what he observed from the chances he's had with humans they seemed to become flattered when they were given a title above what they were, he had also seen it done with ages.

Anyway he was glad to hear that everything was all hunky dory with his body, or at least what was still left of the unbroken and unscathed parts. Another sharp inhale of breath came when she wheeled next to him and pulled his bed up to an incline. "Oh that's going to take some getting used to." He quieted again after that. He simply looked at her from here on out, and saw the utter look of discontent on her face. He was about to say something when she motioned for him to raise his arms.

He knew this was going to be tough. "You know," He said beginning the raise of his arms, "You don't have to-Ah son of rachni!" He met the point where be felt jolts of pain shoot through his upper body. His arms were three quarters of the way up. "You don't have to be here. You can just switch out with someone else, I wouldn't be offended by it."

 

[Parah]

Kim sighed; perhaps the turian wasn't a total brute, if he could tell how badly she didn't want this assignment. She had thought of doing exactly as he had suggested, asking another nurse to trade with her. But she knew it would be a bad career move; if the higher ups found out her...dislike of the turian race, she would likely be passed over for raises and promotions, in favor of more..tolerant workers. Besides, this was her job. She did have something of a personal code; she would not shirk her duties simply because she found them unpleasant. And she told the turian exactly that.

"If you must know, I am not one to shy away from my duties just because I don't like them." She said quietly, leveling a stare at him. She leaned in to untie the back of his hospital gown and pulled it off of his outstretched arms, signaling that he could drop them again, and began removing the bandages, swabbing and cleaning the area of his wound with cleaning solution. It really was healing nicely, though there would be quite a scar when healed completely. She could not help but notice, over the smell of the solution, that he smelled absolutely foreign; nothing like a human, he smelled faintly of perhaps leather or gunmetal.

After she finished cleaning the wound, she re-bandaged it, the whole time taking care not to make eye contact or to touch him beyond what was necessary; even the feeling of his skin and plates was strange to her, and it made her shudder a bit.

Nodding in satisfaction when she was done, she addressed him. "I'll be back with your meal and medication. Don't go anywhere." The last part she said with what might have been called a faint smile, barely, as she left the room. It might have been a slightly cruel jest, seeing as obviously he was in no condition to do much of anything.

 

[X-Vash00]

Vash continued to feel the pain jolt through him while the nurse took her sweet time in untieing the damn gown, hell she was probably even enjoying it. When the gown dropped down his chest, his pale grey metallic skin now bare, he quickly put his arms down and felt the pain slowly ebb away. Though it came back when he couldn't help but chuckle a little when the nurse revealed her dislike of him. "Heheh, admission of guilt." He hadn't said anything about her not likin Turians, all he did was make the assumption that she didnt want to treat him. It wasn't specific to him being Turian, anyone else could have taken it that he was being nice about his wound and how it would make someone uncomfortable, or even possibly that he was a Slectre and no one wanted to mess with a Spectre. She was the one that put words in his mouth.

He kept his stare level with hers, his eyes remaining light and uncaring while hers seemed to have a fire in them. She was the first to break eye contact by looking at the tender flesh that stretched across his chest, the scar tissue was forming in a light grey hue that stood out amongst the sea of reflective dark grey of the rest of his body. As she wrapped the bandages around his chest he could feel his plates shift and tingle at the feeling of the first human to ever touch his skin. Sure Salarians, Turians, and Asari had touched it before from other surgeries and medical procedures, but no humans; she was the first. The touch was surprisingly warm and the five fingers that touched it were foreign from the three bulky tigers of Turians and Salarians. Even the Asari had a different feeling when they touched him.

He was yanked from his thoughts with the nurse smiling saying that she would be back with his food and meds and told him to not go anywhere. The last part was said with a bit of an edge to it. "And here I thought nurses were all gumdrops and ice cream."