Pamella

army medic on an alien planet

To be honest Pamella didn’t care much how badly she got hurt if it meant helping someone. Not in the emotional sense, in fact she couldn’t bare the thought of heartbreak, but in the sense that she didn’t care if she lived or died. She wanted to volunteer to follow the soldiers she served as a medic into war zones because it would mean a better chance of saving their lives. She wanted to take her leave time to go to third world countries because it meant those poor people might finally have a trained doctor to help them, and she wanted to stay up all night every night studying and improving her skills so that she could help everyone she met. But the fact of the matter remained that if she got sick or died along the way so would her brother David, and he was the one she wanted to help most of all.

It wasn’t that he was too young to fend for himself. They were twins, and as he was a twentyeight year old man, he was perfectly capable of taking care of himself. Rather he needed her to stay alive and healthy because she was the only person who loved him enough to voluntarily have a picc line surgically inserted into a vein in their arm and hook themselves up to a machine every night to have half a pint of blood removed while they slept. David hated having to ask that of her but it had to be done.

When the twins were born it was terribly obvious that there was something wrong with David. After extensive testing and several trips to the ER the doctors finally concluded that by some unfortunate fault in his genes David’s body simply couldn’t make new blood as fast as the cells were dying. In fact he only produced blood at half the rate of a normal human and then those cells didn’t last long. This lack of blood of course lead to several life threatening conditions for David. The only solution it seemed was to give him new blood. However waiting around for enough O negative blood to be donated to the hospital proved impossible. Therefore his father and two uncles collectively took on the task of long term blood donor throughout his childhood.

Then, after a car accident that killed their mother and seriously injured Pamella, it was discovered that Pamella’s body replaced lost blood almost within an hour of it leaving her body. That fact not only saved Pamella’s life that day, but it showed that by a medical miracle, what David lacked in blood production Pamella could make up for.

So when the twins turned sixteen doctors gave them both picc lines tapping into veins near their hearts and outleting on Pamella’s right arm and David’s left. This allowed David to receive as much blood as he needed but meant that Pamella couldn’t leave him for more then a few days. Which wasn’t a problem for a long time.

When it came time to pick something to study they both agreed that they wanted to be doctors. David because he knew the pain of having a condition so rare that no one put time into treatment or research, vowing to cure first himself and then any other rare conditions he could find. And Pamella because she wanted to help people and just as few people loved David enough to act as his permanent blood donor, few people had the stomach to watch soldiers carry in their dying friend with his arm literally hanging on by a thread, or in this case artery, and knowing that she only had thirty seconds before the man passed out and simply didn’t have time to administer any ainthstedic, jump in and start reconnecting tissue while the poor screaming soldier was held down by his friends.

In fact that was what she was doing now. She sat on the ground of a medical tent next to a soldier in his mid twenties desperately praying that she was going to be able to reattach the muscles in his upper arm where a rather large, sharp piece of shrapnel had lodged itself. Four more soldiers held him down as she sewed a vein back together. Two of which were in shock, one, a bit older, kept his cool for the sake of his friends, and the other a young nineteen year old boy who looked about to faint.  

“There’s a few IV bags marked morphine on the table.” Pamella said coolly looking up at the boy for a second. “Get one!” The boy noded glad to tear himself away from the sight of the pool of his friend’s blood he was kneeling in. As he got up Pamella got back to work. The tendons were fine, thank god, and she could fix the cut bone and severed vein, it was the muscle she was worried about. The shrapnel had cut cleanly through half of his bicep. It was sickening to look at but she’d seen worse and the more she worked the more confident she became that he was going to live, he just might not be able use his left arm for awhile.

“Got it.” The boy said coming back with the IV bag a few seconds later.

“Great,” Pamella said without looking up. “Now hook the bag to that stand, and you see the clear little camber just below the bag?”

“Yeah.” The boy said shakily.

“Okay, squeeze that twice and the liquid will run into it. You don’t want to fill the whole chamber, just get it a little more then half way.” The boy did as she told him as she  continued to switch the bicep together. “Okay now once you do that find the clamp and roll it back slowly and watch the morphine go down the tube so that you don’t get and bubbles. Then once it gets to the end of the tube clamp it again.” She didn’t look up, but said to the soldier holding down the right arm “Do you know how to put on a torquiet?”

“Yes.” He said calmly.

“Good, there is a box of them next to you.” She nodded briefly to a box of small rubble like straps. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him grab one and wrap it around his friend’s upper arm. Then Pamella waited until the boy sighed “Got it!” then relayed the rest of her instructions. “Now there is a needle under the blue cap at the end of the tube. I need one of you to gently slide the needle just under the skin inside his elbow into the vein. Make sure you stay parallel to his arm.”

The soldiers didn’t move. The boy looked panicked at the needle in his hand down to his friend on the floor then back to the needle. Now Pamella thought he really was going to be sick. She couldn’t blame him, it was a terrifying task but she couldn’t let go of the left arm with letting him bleed to death. She sighed, everyone thought soldiers were so iron willed. But pulling a trigger and watching a stranger fall over was one thing, slowly pushing a needle into your screaming friend was another.

The boy bent down and held down the arm, but could go any farther. Then suddenly David apeared, snacthed the capped needle out of the boy’s hand, then quickly uncapped it and slipped it into the soldier's vein. The boy let out a sigh of relief as David retracted the needle itself leaving behind a small tube in the vein and taped the IV in place.

“Thanks.” Pamella smiled up a David.

“No problem.” He smiled back. Then he looked over the soldier. “What’s his blood type?” He asked the soldier closest to his head. The solder quickly checked his friend's dog tags.

“O negative.” David noded and went over to a table to get an IV bag of blood as Pamella finally finished with the muscle and began stitching up the skin. By now the morphine had kicked in and the soldier was calming down, lazily staring up at his friends, making her job much easier. She finished closing up the wound as David came back with the blood. He hung the bag on the IV stand and, using a port already in the tubing of the morphine line, hooked up the blood transfusion. Pamella watched  to see that the clear and red liquids mixed at the port and both ran down the IV line properly.

“What happened?” David asked the soldiers seeing that the huge gash on his upper arm was just the worst of multiple cuts all the way up his left side.

“IED.” The oldest sighed. “We all got out of the way in time but he wasn’t so lucky.”

“Anyone else hurt?” David asked. The other three glanced over at one of their friends.

“I’m fine!” He said shrugging it off.

“What happened?” David asked more sternly as Pamella cleaned up her patient's upper arm and moved on to a smaller cut with what looked like a blown up coin logged into it.

“I just cut myself carrying him in.” He said cooly. “It’s just a cut I can take care of it latter.”

“Did you cut yourself on a piece of shrapnel already in him?” Pamella asked worried.

“Well yeah but...”

“Let David take a look!” Pamella shot the soldier a warning look. He sighed, stood, and showed David a cut on his wrist.

“It’s not that bad really!” He complained as David cleaned the cut with alcohol.

“The cut no.” David glared at him. “The fact that your friend’s blood got into your bloodstream, yes!” Pamella instinctively checked her patient's dog tags for any blood illnesses then said to David.

“He should be fine. O negative with no abnormalities.”

“Good.” David sighed. “Just let me clean it up for you then.” He said addressing the soldier in front of him. The solder submitted and David patched him up.

“So is Taylor going to be alright?” The boy asked nodding the the soldier Pamella was still picking bits of metal out of.

“He’ll live.” She said without looking up. “But we’ll have to wait and see if the cut on his arm did any permanent damage.”

“Do you need us to stay for anything else?” The oldest soldier asked Pamella.

“Well someone needs to keep him awake.” Pamella explained. “The morphine could cause him to have some trouble breathing and I would feel better if I knew he was capable of staying conscious before I let him sleep. But I can do that if you have other things to do.”

“Alright.” The soldier got up and started making his way to the flap in the tent that served as a door. “Let’s get back to work boys.”

“But sir!” The boy protested looking down at Taylor as the two other soldiers got up to leave.

“The doc will take care of him.” The older soldier glared at the boy. The boy obediently  started to move toward the exit. As he went he glanced back at his friend on the floor who was doing better then when they had carried him in, but was still dazed from the blood loss and didn’t seem very responsive.

“He’ll be fine.” Pamella smile up at him as comfortingly as she could knowing she was covered in Taylor’s blood. The boy nodded and followed his friends out. Just before he left the oldest soldier stopped and looking back at Pamella.

“If he gets worse let me know.” He said seriously. “Ask for sergeant Goodman.” Pamella noded and the sergeant left with his two remaining soldiers. Then she was left alone with David and Taylor.

“So is he going to be able to used that arm again?” David asked once the sound of the soldiers’ footsteps died away.

“I honestly don’t know.” She sighed looking down at Taylor who was apparently fighting to focus. “If it gets infected probably not.”

“We can’t keep this up you know.” David shook his head. “These boys are getting blown up everyday and the last time we got a good shipment of medical supplies was, what? Four months ago!”

“I know.” Pamella sighed matter of factly. “But we can make due.”

“How do you it?” David laughed amazed.

“What?” She asked still working on patching up Taylor.

“Just let it go and keep going!” David sighed. “Nothing seems to get to you.”

“Well when I find something worth getting upset about you’ll know.” She said without looking up.

“I’d say the fact that a man in his twenties could possibly lose and arm from an injury that we wouldn’t care much about on earth is a pretty good reason to pitch a fit.” David sighed getting up and straightening up the medical tent.

“Well things are going to get worse before they get better.” Pamella reasoned. “So might as well just take a deep breath and deal with it.”

“You’re too much.” David shook his head. “What is it going to take to upset you?”

“Bad things.” Pamella answered simply.

“Like what?” David asked locking the rest of the morphine in a metal locker.

“Well I really don’t know David” Pamella sighed getting sick of the conversation. “I find that nothing is really hopeless and if you’re doing all you can then your isn’t much of a point in getting yourself upset.”

“You are too much Pamella.” David smiled fondly.

“Maybe.” She laughed lightly.

She tied off the last stitch on a cut on Taylor’s side. Then she looked down at him. He was out of it, dazed and gazing dreamily at the roof of the tent. Concerned she asked David to clamp off the morphine and gently reached over and looked at Taylor’s dog tags again “Corporal Taylor Dalton.”

“Corporal?” She asked lightly tapping him on his good shoulder. She didn’t like to used the soldiers first names until she’d been given permission. Some of them didn’t like it and technically she wasn’t supposed to use first names. But no one had enforced that rule for a long time and she liked recognizing that the men were humans instead of just a rank. But she wasn’t sure where Taylor stood, so she just taped him again and called to him simply “Corporal? Corporal Dalton can you hear me?”

Taylor blinked and slowly turned his head to look at Pamella. It took him a moment to focus then he smiled weakly.

“Yeah, I can hear you Doc.” He said faintly as if he could barely gather the breath to speak.

“How do you feel?” She smiled back.

“I’ve been better.” He tried to laugh. She smiled down at him comfortingly. He clearly wasn’t doing well. He could barely talk and she could tell just smiling was taking a lot out of him. But he was trying to laugh it off anyway.

“Are you in much pain?” She asked quickly checking over the wounds along his side and reaching for some gauze and tape to start covering them.

“Not really.” Taylor said watching her work. “I feel pretty weak though.”  

“Well you lost a lot of blood.” She explained bandaging up his side. “Do you remember what happened to you?”

“Kinda.” He winced as she pressed down on a cut. “I just remember throwing Danny behind a door and trying to take cover. Guess I was a little late huh?”

“Danny?” Pamella stopped working and looked down at him curiously.

“Yeah,” Taylor said concerned. “He’s okay right? He’s a blond kid, only nineteen.”

“He was here.” She said comfortingly. “He’s fine. He was really worried about you.”

“Yeah well he would be.” He sighed in relief. “I’ve kinda become his big brother. He’s a good kid.”

“He didn’t want to leave.” She added. Taylor smiled fondly.

“Hope Goodmen didn’t give him a hard time.”

“It wasn’t too bad.” She assured him gently. Taylor noded and sighed.

“So what’s the damage Doc?” He asked casually.

“I’ll have to wait and see for sure but I think you are going to be fine.” Pamella comforted him. In all honesty his chances of losing use of his arm where  pretty high. But she didn’t want to tell him that just yet. Attitude could kill, quite literally in cases like this.

Taylor just nodded uncomforted. She guessed he was used to medics lying to him. What was she supposed to say though? Tell him that she had no idea what was going to happen to him? She was thick skinned, but she didn’t have the heart to doom him like that.

“You should get some rest.” She said softly to him. He nodded. “I’ll come check on you in a bit.” She said getting up and walking to the exit as Taylor closed his eyes and tried desperately to relax.

“Can you keep an eye on him for me?” Pamella whispered to David as she passed him. He looked up from the medical supplies he had been counting and glanced over at Taylor.

“Sure.” He shrugged. “Where you off to?”

“I want to see if I can find Danny.” She said swapping the blood covered medic coat she had been wearing for a fresh one. Her tanktop only had a few red stains on it, so she just buttoned up the coat to hide it.

“You going to be able to find the kid?” David asked. “They could be half way across the base by now.”

“He’s the only teenager I’ve seen in a year.” She sighed. “And he’s shaken up. He should stand out.”

“Well happy hunting.” David called as she lifted the flap in the tent and went out.

Pamella scanned the base as she came out into the yard between the HQ and medical tent. She’d always liked living in interesting places, but this was by far the strangest. Like every other US infantry base there were countless tents and a few rough buildings. Men scrambled back and forth, some responding to a call for back up in the field, some just moving huge crates of supplies to their rightful homes. There were army trucks everywhere and if there had been grass here before it was all long dead. All in all, at first glance it looked like every other base she had ever served at. But then she looked up, into the green sky.

It was green because the oceans on Selkie were green. Or so she had been told upon arriving there. And Selkie’s oceans were green because it orbited the planet Kirin in such a way that it was always facing one it’s two stars. Thus leading to an explosion of plant like life. Other then that Selkie was very Earth like. It had plants that seemed to be able to live anywhere humans hadn’t banished them from, and animals that more often then not resembled some kind of Earth animal.

But Pamella wasn’t there because the adorable purple cat creatures that lived here were worth millions to a rich little girl. She was there because the US government was at war with the intelligent life of Kirin. No one really knew for sure why. It was a perfect storm of factors really. That didn’t matter to her though. Human men were dying here and she had the skills to help them, end of story.

She stepped out into the yard and looked around for Danny. He was no where to be found but she saw that most of the enlisted men were rushing to meet a spacecraft at the launch pad farther out in the jungle. She followed them and scanned the crowd for any sign of Danny.

There wasn’t any and, knowing that she wasn’t supposed to get in the way while a spacecraft was being on loaded, Pamella turned and headed back to the medical tent. She’s have to find Danny latter. She didn’t want to get him in trouble for talking to her while on duty anyway.

Author's Note

this is just a start to a novel I might write. Tell me what you think