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For Bones McCoy
He'd made a decision to abandon his plan of heading for the Yukon after talking with McCoy one night in Milliways about the possibility of returning to medical school - choosing Oregon as a place to make an attempt at becoming a legitimate physician - and it seemed as if the door back to the bar had made itself particularly absent ever since he'd stepped through it with the intent on enrolling.
The first year was straightforward enough; it was mostly things that he had studied while at Tulane. Days and weeks without passage to the Bar turned into a month, then three months, then eight. It wasn't uncommon for the door to play tricks on him, but after awhile, Doc stopping looking around corners and listening for the sounds of a crowded late-night barroom every time he passed a doorway.
Maybe this was what he was supposed to do with his life; maybe since he no longer needed the 'escape' from his world that Milliways provided, he would no longer find his way to the bar at the end of the universe. He wasn't sure of the reason why the door stayed gone for so long.
The second year was tougher. He hadn't done this before. He stayed up for many nights studying diagrams and memorizing anatomy, thinking back to the advanced textbooks he kept in his room upstairs at the Bar. The surgical labs were difficult for him, but more for the fact that the lecture hall smelled like the hospital in the chaotic 'Old Kingdom' and the scent of anesthetic seemed to make the scars on his chest burn a little beneath his coat.
And then there were the cadavers. That's what they used for practice. Rarely was it a live patient on the table, but a body of some homeless or penniless soul, no kin to lay claim to them or provide a proper burial. After the first day of digging his hands through a dead man's chest, he'd gone back to the small room he rented and burrowed himself beneath the worn blankets on the bed to try and warm his hands and arms. This wasn't what he wanted to do.
He looked for the bar again that night. It didn't show up.
But instead of running, like he always had, he went back to class the next morning. And the day after. And the day after that.
Two years and three months after arriving in Oregon, he found himself sitting in a stuffy lecture hall dressed in the best suit he could afford, listening to a man rattle on about service to the community and how the men in front of him had been chosen by God to heal the sick and treat the poor. The rolled diploma felt lighter than it should have when the Dean handed it to him, but he shook the man's hand with the confidence he'd always posessed - his handshake firm and steady, grip strong.
The hand of a gunfighter.
And now, the hand of a Doctor of Medicine.
+++
It wasn't hard to make the choice to move from the city at his first opportunity; he didn't want to do a surgical residency, and he felt his education could be put best to use in a more rural community. So he gathered up supplies (it felt strange to carry a legitimate doctor's bag on his person, but it wasn't as if he could afford to be wandering the countryside in a fancy buggy like those in his class who were better off) and his horse, and left town.
This was familiar. Comforting.
Just him and the mount, and a stretch of lightly traveled road to follow.
This was what he wanted to do.
+++
He wasn't even sure the settlement he ended up outside had a name; all he knew is that the man who ran the store told him of a cabin up the trail a few miles had been empty since the owner had died two years prior. No kin to lay claim to the land or the property, it had fallen back into some disrepair but if the young doctor was interested in setting up, the people of the settlement - mostly traders, with some folks passing through on their way north or south via the one road that snaked through the mountains - would be more than willing to see him in it.
That had been three weeks ago.
Now that the property had been lived in for two weeks, and he'd done some basic repairs (boarded up a window that had been shattered at some point; cleaned out the dust and cobwebs and the dead squirrel that was under the pile of leaves in the stone hearth, he found that the occasional housecall was enough to get by; most folks were willing to trade him some provisions or to lend a hand in fixing his cabin in exchange for his work as a doctor.
Things had been going well.
Until he decided one day that he was going to repair the spot on the roof of the cabin that leaked during heavy rain (which in Oregon, was not uncommon), without asking anyone that lived in the small community for help.
Moss-covered cedar was slick when damp. And the ground beside the cabin particularly firm, in the place where he impacted the earth at the end of the fall.
(Hitting the woodpile on the way down didn't help either.)
Once he was able to drag himself to his knees (without use of his right arm, which hung awkwardly and dead at his side) and catch his breath, Doc stumbled through the front door of his cabin and reached for his bag. He needed something to dull the shockwaves rippling through his body before he tried to go for help. The two mile walk to the cabin down the road was going to be hell.
With his bag on his good shoulder, he shoved the door open --
And found himself in Milliways.
It had been over two years. But that didn't matter. All that mattered was making it to the infirmary before he blacked out. Which at the rate he was going, wasn't a guarantee.
With his good hand tightly wrapped around the elbow of his right arm to stabilize the injury, he uses his head (ignoring the bright flash of pain that sears behind his eyes) to hit the call button, then manages to slide himself down along the wall into a curled, sitting position.
Every breath hurts. A lot. That much is evident by the strained breaths he's managing to force himself to take, and the scream he's holding back behind his teeth that threatens to escape with each of those labored breaths.
He can't remember if he hit the call button.
It's been forever since he slid down the wall and sat himself on the floor.
(In reality, it's only been forty-seven seconds.)
At least down here, if he blacks out, he won't fall as far as falling off the roof.
(Fifty-eight seconds.)
The first year was straightforward enough; it was mostly things that he had studied while at Tulane. Days and weeks without passage to the Bar turned into a month, then three months, then eight. It wasn't uncommon for the door to play tricks on him, but after awhile, Doc stopping looking around corners and listening for the sounds of a crowded late-night barroom every time he passed a doorway.
Maybe this was what he was supposed to do with his life; maybe since he no longer needed the 'escape' from his world that Milliways provided, he would no longer find his way to the bar at the end of the universe. He wasn't sure of the reason why the door stayed gone for so long.
The second year was tougher. He hadn't done this before. He stayed up for many nights studying diagrams and memorizing anatomy, thinking back to the advanced textbooks he kept in his room upstairs at the Bar. The surgical labs were difficult for him, but more for the fact that the lecture hall smelled like the hospital in the chaotic 'Old Kingdom' and the scent of anesthetic seemed to make the scars on his chest burn a little beneath his coat.
And then there were the cadavers. That's what they used for practice. Rarely was it a live patient on the table, but a body of some homeless or penniless soul, no kin to lay claim to them or provide a proper burial. After the first day of digging his hands through a dead man's chest, he'd gone back to the small room he rented and burrowed himself beneath the worn blankets on the bed to try and warm his hands and arms. This wasn't what he wanted to do.
He looked for the bar again that night. It didn't show up.
But instead of running, like he always had, he went back to class the next morning. And the day after. And the day after that.
Two years and three months after arriving in Oregon, he found himself sitting in a stuffy lecture hall dressed in the best suit he could afford, listening to a man rattle on about service to the community and how the men in front of him had been chosen by God to heal the sick and treat the poor. The rolled diploma felt lighter than it should have when the Dean handed it to him, but he shook the man's hand with the confidence he'd always posessed - his handshake firm and steady, grip strong.
The hand of a gunfighter.
And now, the hand of a Doctor of Medicine.
+++
It wasn't hard to make the choice to move from the city at his first opportunity; he didn't want to do a surgical residency, and he felt his education could be put best to use in a more rural community. So he gathered up supplies (it felt strange to carry a legitimate doctor's bag on his person, but it wasn't as if he could afford to be wandering the countryside in a fancy buggy like those in his class who were better off) and his horse, and left town.
This was familiar. Comforting.
Just him and the mount, and a stretch of lightly traveled road to follow.
This was what he wanted to do.
+++
He wasn't even sure the settlement he ended up outside had a name; all he knew is that the man who ran the store told him of a cabin up the trail a few miles had been empty since the owner had died two years prior. No kin to lay claim to the land or the property, it had fallen back into some disrepair but if the young doctor was interested in setting up, the people of the settlement - mostly traders, with some folks passing through on their way north or south via the one road that snaked through the mountains - would be more than willing to see him in it.
That had been three weeks ago.
Now that the property had been lived in for two weeks, and he'd done some basic repairs (boarded up a window that had been shattered at some point; cleaned out the dust and cobwebs and the dead squirrel that was under the pile of leaves in the stone hearth, he found that the occasional housecall was enough to get by; most folks were willing to trade him some provisions or to lend a hand in fixing his cabin in exchange for his work as a doctor.
Things had been going well.
Until he decided one day that he was going to repair the spot on the roof of the cabin that leaked during heavy rain (which in Oregon, was not uncommon), without asking anyone that lived in the small community for help.
Moss-covered cedar was slick when damp. And the ground beside the cabin particularly firm, in the place where he impacted the earth at the end of the fall.
(Hitting the woodpile on the way down didn't help either.)
Once he was able to drag himself to his knees (without use of his right arm, which hung awkwardly and dead at his side) and catch his breath, Doc stumbled through the front door of his cabin and reached for his bag. He needed something to dull the shockwaves rippling through his body before he tried to go for help. The two mile walk to the cabin down the road was going to be hell.
With his bag on his good shoulder, he shoved the door open --
And found himself in Milliways.
It had been over two years. But that didn't matter. All that mattered was making it to the infirmary before he blacked out. Which at the rate he was going, wasn't a guarantee.
With his good hand tightly wrapped around the elbow of his right arm to stabilize the injury, he uses his head (ignoring the bright flash of pain that sears behind his eyes) to hit the call button, then manages to slide himself down along the wall into a curled, sitting position.
Every breath hurts. A lot. That much is evident by the strained breaths he's managing to force himself to take, and the scream he's holding back behind his teeth that threatens to escape with each of those labored breaths.
He can't remember if he hit the call button.
It's been forever since he slid down the wall and sat himself on the floor.
(In reality, it's only been forty-seven seconds.)
At least down here, if he blacks out, he won't fall as far as falling off the roof.
(Fifty-eight seconds.)
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Sometimes, however, there just isn't a rostered doctor in the bar. At those times, if he's around, Bar somehow finds a way to get him a napkin with a request.
He's never yet failed to answer.
So that's why Doc gets a somewhat abrasive Georgian accent overhead to accompany the steady tread of the military-style boots.
"Well hell, son." Bones heads for the pharmacy first, because it doesn't take a genius or any great amount of time to realize when someone's in pain. "I see you're trying a new variation on physical trauma, must be my lucky day."
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"Least...least I ain't bleedin'..." he's slurring a little, and also lying, since the cut on the side of his head is bleeding pretty nicely - though he hasn't noticed yet. "S'good...t'see y'McCoy--"
The man's name turns from a slur to a strained shout from between clenched teeth. Doc's been shot and stabbed and beat to hell so many times he can't remember them all, but this really, really hurts. Almost as much as when he came in half-dead.
A galaxy's worth of stars explodes behind his eyes when he tries to straighten up a little; it only leads to him curling up tighter into a ball.
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Evidently Josiah passes the tests (including a gentle hand feeling pulses and checking the pupil that isn't shortly about to be covered in blood), because the next thing is the bite of the hypospray.
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And Doc stays silent, eyes closed (it's too damn bright in here and the room keeps wanting to spin) except for when Bones peels his eyelids open to check his pupils.
His ability to remain sitting upright wavers as the room spins, and trying to lean into the wall is difficult when the wall keeps moving away from him.
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"Right, you want to tell me what you've gone and done to yourself this time?"
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He's tired. Exhausted, really. The adrenaline is still running rampant through his system, but the pain is eating away at his nerves.
"Slipped...landed bad..." he brings his left palm up over his right collarbone. "Felt somethin' n'my shoulder snap, ain't sure wha..."
His eyes flutter open and the disorientation he's suffering is evident in the way his gaze flicks around the room. He's trying to get his bearings under him - but it's obvious from the struggle in his eyes that he's not managing well at all.
"M'chest kinda...kinda hurts. Not s'bad as m'arm. Can't...can't feel my hand, my arm, s'all...it ain't right."
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He uses his good hand to touch the place where he's gashed his scalp, and appears confused when he pulls his fingertips back bloody.
"...guess I did."
With McCoy's assistance (the other doctor has to do almost all of the work, since Josiah's legs don't want to seem to cooperate with the rest of his body, the soles of his boots sliding against the wet floor. He's only wearing a long-sleeved cotton undershirt and a lighter coat - both have seen much better days - and once he's sitting somewhat upright on the nearest bed, Doc motions at the bandage scissors on a nearby tray.
"Jus' go on n'cut all this off...I promise not t'go wild on you this time."
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...
Well, he decides as he cuts open the right sleeve, thats not a natural joint.
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"Least I didn't fall off'a m'horse, that'd just be downright embarassin'," he mutters. The vertazine has done a good job at reducing the feeling of the room spinning and rolling beneath him, and the painkillers have taken a good deal of the edge off - but contact still hurts like hell. Doc turns his head in an effort to look at the damage to his shoulder and arm, and merely blinks at the unnatural angle he sees.
It's disgusting, but also kind of fascinating.
"...well shit, that ain't right."
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Thankfully, Bones is quick to notice that Doc is about to vomit - though in reality, the signs are pretty unmistakeable given years of medical training and expectation; the nearby wastebasket is procured without hesitation and sacrificed to the cause.
"...that really fuckin' hurts," he grunts, pressing his free hand against his ribcage once he's through.
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Doc has had to reset a few shoulders in his day.
Without numbing agents. It's practically impossible until the patient blacks out.
"This'll be great," he slurs. "It be better if I lie down? Can't...can't remember."
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"Just let m'know what you need me t'do," he says. With the pressure off his midsection, he makes an effort to relax and slow his breathing down some, knowing it will make Bones' job easier. (Maybe. The fracture is a nasty one, after all.)
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"There ain't nothin' nicer in the spring than that," he comments, completely unaware of the work Bones is performing on his broken arm. "Miss it like hell, you know. It ain't the same up n'the territory as it is back home."
He furrows his brow, a thought from earlier re-entering his brain. Turning his head, he looks up at Bones (but makes a deliberate effort to avoid letting his arm fall into his line of sight). "I listened t'you, y'know."
He's unaware of how fast he switched topics of conversation, but a head injury will do that to a man.
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With his good hand, he reaches over to his coat and digs out what Bones would classify as an antique - a thin 'folder' of leather that he uses to carry the few important papers he keeps on his person - and pulls out a folded piece of paper. It's obvious that despite being folded, it's high quality paper stock.
The text is primarily in Latin, though it's obvious what it is. His diploma, from the University of Oregon Medical School, conferring upon one Josiah Gordon Scurlock the degree of Doctor Of Medicine.
"I know it ain't Ole Miss, but you were right...I could hack it."
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"Though I will admit, I am lookin' forward to showin' you what I'm carryin' in my bag these days," he adds. "Given that we ain't got nothin' like your little whirrin' talky-box for at least another fifteen-hundred years or so..."
Doc knows that McCoy is going to be just horrified by some of the tools in his arsenal. A small part of him is looking forward to the man's reactions.
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Bones would never, not in a million years, be able to be satisfied with setting a bone with pins and wires and plates when he has his usual tools at his disposal. It'd drive him absolutely batty.
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"If it wouldn't get me strung up and hung for possessing an 'instrument of the Devil' I'd be all for getting one of my own," Doc replies. "But I've had a rope cinched up on my neck once already and I ain't keen to try and survive it a second time."
Not to mention his skin still has the faded scars from the rope digging into his throat and wrists. He'd rather avoid fresh ones.
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He mentally checks himself over.
"Probably gonna have a hell of a bruise on my right hip, and m'still pretty disoriented...s'like I can't remember which direction I'm lookin', and the one I think usually ain't right."
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The exhaustion is doing its best to take hold of him and drag him to sleep - but he's doing his damndest to stay awake and relatively coherent. Though he can't help but lie back and rest his eyes for just a moment...