St. Luke's Hospital - Emergency Room
Bright, wide lights hang from the ceiling, casting the clean and sterile surroundings with brilliant light. Large, steel-topped tables take up most of areas behind the curtains, and each curtained area is edged by a stainless steel counter against the wall and trays of clean surgical tools. Several various monitors and cords take up most of one wall. This is where incoming patients are given emergency treatment.
Two large metal doors across from the entrance lead outside to the ambulance loading dock. The doors are marked 'EMERGENCY ONLY' in large red letters.
Characters
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| Kevin Curtis | Bryn Blackwell | Robert Knight |
Fifteen minutes turned into thirty. It isn't too far from Eclairant to St. Luke's Hospital, but traffic at this time of a Thursday night is thick and even with the best driver in the city it's difficult to work through it. Kayla's filled him in on the way; the details of the incident.
Same M.O. as before, same looks, same age. The only difference is that this one survived. Before Curtis and Ashcroft could make it to the scene the body was already on the way to the emergency room.
Thankfully one of the officers they trust thought to grab the phone with the video on it, and Kayla's sent him a copy.
Bryn rushes into the emergency room, looking like a distressed relative as he's not sure which cover they go with here. He's just hanging up the phone with Doris, asking her to come in the morning to sit with the victim and help her. Ensure whether she's part of the Pack or not.
-
"You can wake her up when we need to talk to her?" Kevin hasn't left the small curtained off area of the ER, even though he was given several dirty looks by the duty nurse assigned to the dirty and disheveled victim. He's not in the way, but he's hovering. He peeks around the curtain from time-to-time, looking for Bryn but otherwise is staying put. No need for more people than necessary to interact with the girl before Doris arrives.
"What's the saying, Detective?" Dr. Knight asks with lift of his brow. "This isn't my first rodeo." Beat. "Your people were lucky I hadn't left for the night. I was supposed to have dinner with my family." He's not complaining, just stating.
Kevin nods his agreement. He's not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. "Yeah, we are. Otherwise we'd have a lot more of a problem to handle." A peek out and then back to the sorcerer-surgeon. "Thank you." He knows that 'baby-sitting' isn't the doctor's forte, but he's grateful that there is a supe on hand to keep this under control.
"Go check for your contact, Detective. I won't leave the poor girl unattended."
With a nod, Kevin slips out, and heads to the main area of the ER. He sees Bryn and waves the man over, already turning to lead him back to the treatment area as the sorcerer falls into step beside him.
-
Spotting the wave, Bryn relaxes a little and makes his way to Kevin. "Kayla filled me in," he lets the other man know, brow knitting together as he frowns. "Doris will not be in until the morning, but I can keep watch." Mostly so he can question the girl. It does mean that he won't be getting back to Serafine's book signing, and he does hope she'll forgive him for that. He's already got plans on sending her an apology due to leaving early.
"We have more issues than just this," he murmurs to Kevin as they walk toward the treatment area. "Kostas appears to be keeping an eye on Serafine." At least in so far as he could tell, that was Kostas' reason for being at the signing earlier.
"So what has been happening since she arrived here?"
-
"Not much since her initial attempt to bite the hand off of one of the duty nurses. There was something of a huge scuffle, and the Head Nurse was ready to call down pscyh. Fortunately, we got lucky."
Looking around, Kevin lowers his voice. Being Priory, he knows a lot of the goings on with supernaturals, but the dodgy politics and etiquette on the Dynasty are a pain in the ass sometimes, especially since he knows as far as the Big Men on Campus (ie, RINC) are concerned, Knight is a non-entity. "Dr. Knight was getting off duty tonight. He got her sedated and properly restrained."
Kevin really hopes that whole 'blacklisting' thing isn't something that Bryn ascribes to, or it's going to make this uncomfortable.
"I've been keeping an eye on her, and the only person left alone with her right now is Knight."
-
"At least she is alive enough to react in that manner." Bryn ponders this for a long moment. He has heard of certain vampires having an adverse reaction to werewolf blood, so it is a possibility that this is the case here. "Did she manage to bite the nurse?" That will wind up being another issue entirely for Doris if that's the case.
"Knight, hmm?"
Bryn doesn't ascribe to blacklisting. In fact he commends Knightley for taking a stance on things, and sticking with the woman he loved. He has the life Bryn might have had he stuck around instead of running off.
"Robert." A brief nod is given to the doctor, and then he frowns. "Her current status is stable? When you wake her up will we need to keep her sedated?"
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"Bryn," Robert gives a similar greeting, a professional nod of the head. "She's only sedated due to her agitated state." A familiar gesture is made in the air, one of a privacy spell, and the Australian ex-pat continues. "I can adjust the drugs in the IV and bring her out slowly. I just believed it was best to get her calm as quickly as possible for herself and for others."
Kevin shakes his head, "She bit, but didn't break skin. I think she was already running out of steam. But she's healing, right, doc?"
Robert rolls his eyes at the 'doc' diminuitive, but continues. "She is healing. It's probably her healing that kept her alive." He looks between the two Priory men, "Not sure /how/ to write this one up, but I've been creative before."
-
"Quick thinking." Bryn is swift in giving credit where credit is due. Before he says anything else, he moves closer to the bed to examine their survivor. The bites at her neck are less than they have been on other victims; due either to her healing or the fact that the neophyte didn't feed long. Though he is curious as to why the Maker didn't just snap the girl's neck.
"No skin broken?" He nods at that, firing a quick text to Kayla before setting his phone on silent mode so that it doesn't go off while they're still in the ER.
"Any estimation as to when she will be taken up to a room, Robert, or will she need to stay down here a bit yet?"
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"Waiting for the preliminary tox screen," Robert scrubs a hand over his face. "It was chaos in here for a bit, mates. I'm lucky I was able to calm it down when I did. No excuse not to do the tox screen, though I have it coming directly to me. I took charge as her primary." Not exactly unusual, as Robert is known for having a soft spot for the 'unusual' cases and teens and young adults. "I'll have to transfer her to a true primary eventually, but I can stall that for a few days."
Robert shakes his head, "I'm trying to keep her out of psych, but I can't guarantee it. If she does go there, I'll see that she's not there for long." Beat. "Probably another hour or two before I can get her moved." Even he is a slave to the cogs of hospital bureaucracy.
Kevin nods. They've been through this once or twice. He knows Knight knows a few of the shrinks who won't ascribe immediately to the 'nutcase' label and will ease the patient through psych quickly and easily. So far, he's not met or worked with any of them directly, but Ashcroft has. "You don't think we can speed that up?" He asks. He knows that it's not the sort of magic the doctor can work, but he asks anyway.
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"It is fine, Robert. I really was just curious." Bryn considers, then pulls his phone back out and snaps a picture of the sedated girl so that he can send it to both Kayla and Doris.
"As far as the psych ward is concerned, they will likely need a parent or guardian to sign her into it." Beat. "Do we have her identification at least?" Turning to Kevin, he ruffles a hand through his hair. "Doris could easily pass as her guardian so far as the Pack is concerned. If the hospital has already contacted her parents, we should get her that information as well so that she can confer with them on what they would most like to do."
There are ways to speed such things along, but they could put Robert's career in jeopardy and Bryn won't ask him to do it. He claps a hand to the man's shoulder and nods. "It is an emergency room. If it was anything other than chaos, I would surprised."
-
Robert glances down at her chart. "Stiles, Georgia. She's a student over at NYU. Her belongings are in the locker there behind you, Detective Curtis." Robert indicates the locker with a short inclination of his head. "She's twenty." The age gives him pause as he thinks of his Shiv and her best friend Jenna. "Still trying to contact the family, but looks like her address is her apartment near campus. Roommate was contacted."
Looking up, Robert taps the chart and then presents it to Kevin and Bryn. Yeah, HIPAA could come calling, but in cases like this, the rules have to be bent a little. "Go on record what you need."
Kevin already has his camera out and is taking pictures of all the information. "What's your expert medical opinion, doc?"
"Vampire." Robert doesn't miss a beat. He leaves the chart with Kevin and approaches the girl, pointing to her neck with his pen light, but not touching the wound. "Very specific bite mark. It wasn't a light feeding. It was meant to kill her, but she's already healing from it." He's going to go home tonight, and once again remind Shiv and Chris to be careful at night in the city.
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Bryn allows Kevin to record the information, and looks at the young woman again. "Chances are that the vampire in question is not feeling the best at the moment." There's a slight smirk. Odd when one considers that he happens to be dating a vampire. "Shifter blood tends to be a poison to some of them, and if she is not dead…" He turns to Kevin, knowing the Detective will easily figure out that it means the Maker was preoccupied with an extremely, violently ill neophyte rather than just offing the girl.
"You should go home to your children, Robert. At least call them and apologize for being late for dinner."
Beat.
"Ashcroft said he would come by with Doris in the morning."
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Robert gives Bryn a small, bemused smile. "They are, unfortunately, used to it. Besides, it gives my son more time to go on raids with his guild and my daughter a chance to slip off and visit her new boyfriend that I'm not supposed to know about." It really is amusing how much the young woman thinks her parents don't know.
He does nod, however, "Let me go see where the red tape is held up as far as getting Georgia moved to a room. Then I'll leave her in the capable hands of her brother and a proper duty nurse." By proper duty nurse, he means a witch that is on staff. It took her a while to warm up to Robert, and she might not like Bryn, but she's best equipped to handle the supernatural end of things.
The sorcerer doctor slips from the room and Kevin turns to Bryn, "Which one of us is the brother?"
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Studying the young woman for a moment, Bryn shifts his gaze to Kevin. "You are. You have more factors in common with her." Hair color, for one. Skin tone for another. "You can pull off the gruff, agitated brother better and you and Doris already have a familial sort of relationship if she comes here posing as the grandmother."
Logically, it's what makes sense. It doesn't mean that Bryn is planning on leaving. He can easily play concerned friend of the family, or lawyer if need be.
"Besides, I do have the feeling that Robert's proper duty nurse would take issue to me being the young woman's brother." Because sorcerers do not tend to have sisters. Not even adoptive ones.
"Thank you, Robert. We do appreciate this."
-
Kevin turns to the locker and removes Georgia's personal possessions. A blood spattered purse, an iPhone with a cracked screen. Could she have been on the phone when she was attacked? One shoe. He carries the purse to the dining tray and begins to pull items out. He'd be careful of finger prints, but with all the transport and change of hands, he doubts anything useful is left to find. He is careful to not touch or smudge the blood spatters.
"You don't have any problems with Knight?" Kevin looks up briefly then returns to his perusal. "I know one time, one of the RINC clan - no one important a peon cousin or something - got a bit uppity about Knight doing surgery on his son or something. Well, at least until Big Man Randall stepped in." The elder sorcerer might not have approved of Knight whole heartedly but he made it clear that he'd rather have a sorcerer operating on one of theirs than a 'midling' human doctor.
Yeah, Dynasty politics. He doesn't get them.
"You know, this is going to have to come to Jessup's attention eventually. That's a mess I don't want to think about."
-
One shoe? Really? The cops couldn't be bothered to find the poor young woman's other shoe? Bryn frowns at that, and slides the Mardi Gras beads off his neck finally. Slipping those into his pocket, he pulls off the festive cuff links as well. At least he had the presence of mind to leave his mask in the car.
"Why would I have problems with Robert? Dynasty politics never sat well with my father, and for most of my teen years, I dated a Coven witch." In some ways, he feels for Robert. "Had things been different when I was younger I would be in the same place Robert is now."
Rubbing a hand over his face, he nods. "Doris is our best bet for handling that."
-
"Mmhuh," Kevin remarks. He didn't expect that answer. You learn something new …
"Good guy. Knight." He's never had any problems with the Priory and always helps out when needed. As far as Kevin is concerned it's good for them, bad for the Knightley Dynasty, that they've got him here.
Nodding his agreement, Kevin takes pictures of the various possessions of Georgia. "Doris is good at that. She's not Pack, but Blake likes her." Of course, Kevin has never met anyone who doesn't like Doris.
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"I have yet to meet anyone who does not like Doris." That being said, it's not as though Bryn knows a plethora of people in the city. The Priory, Serafine, a few people who have moved here since he knew them when they were all children.
"He is." As promised though, Bryn is keeping quiet on the help he gave to Robert in ensuring he had his trust fund intact.
"If we set Doris here to watch Miss Stiles, then he will have to come here to speak with her. Either that, or Doris can call from the room."
-
It doesn't take long for Robert to return with a nurse at his side. He introduces her as Josephina, and while she doesn't welcome Bryn with open arms, she doesn't scowl at him (too much) either. She peruses the chart, and then shoots Robert a glare. "You didn't give me the whole story, Knight."
Robert sighs and slides an apologetic glance to the two Priory men. "I had to get you on the case quickly, Nurse Patel. You see why now."
"I know what I see, and I don't like it. Priory involvement or not, you can't really expect me to ignore this? You aren't ignoring it, are you?" The woman obviously doesn't care that Bryn and Kevin are there, and she's more than willing to give her two cents on the matter.
"Patient confidentiality, Patel. Georgia is our patient. You can't bring Regina into this, and I think she has more than enough to occupy her right now?" Robert knows that he's playing a bit low with that one, but he's able to see the big picture. "This is beyond our ken to handle, and no one here wants the City to go up in a blood bath."
The pretty witch-nurse glares for another moment at the sorcerer, then snaps her attention back to Kevin and Bryn. "This girl comes first. She needs someone like her, who gets her, capiche? You're not her brother - " A pointed look is given to Kevin, " - but I'll play along. Only because I like the peace and I don't want to be caught in the middle of some turf vengeance war."
Kevin has been watching the interplay quietly, noting it all in his head. When he gets the witch's attention, he actually takes an involuntary step backward. "Yes … Nurse Patel. We have someone who will come sit with her. Her grandmother."
-
Stepping forward to greet the nurse, Bryn suddenly stops. He's well aware of the animosity that exists between their kind, and he's not going to play into that. He waits until the interplay between the nurse and Robert is done, and then clears his throat.
"Nurse Patel, I do appreciate your aid in this manner. You are correct. Kevin is not Miss Stiles' brother, but with your permission I would like to keep him here at the hospital with the girl until her grandmother can arrive."
Turning toward Robert, he nods. "Yes, Regina is preoccupied by the return of one who was banished from the Coven twelve years ago." Glancing back at Nurse Patel, he dips his head. "If you feel it necessary to contact Regina, by all means. The name is Bryn Blackwell. I am on good terms with the Bishops, and Regina currently owes me a favor. If I need to call it in for you to feel comfortable about Priory involvement, so be it."
Beat.
"You are also absolutely correct on the fact that the young woman needs someone like her when she awakes. Are you aware of anyone on staff that might be willing to help you until our contact arrives?" Beat. "We will defer to you and Doctor Knight for her care."
-
"I have a few nurses I can trust to not ask questions," Nurse Patel nods. "Of those, there's one I can trust implicitly to keep her mouth shut about everything." Patel is blunt, clearly a native New Yorker, and not afraid of sorcerers or anything else. She sighs and shakes her head, giving Robert an unreadable look before turning back to Bryn. "No, he's right. If I mention vamps attacking and wolves in the same sentence, it's going to start up questions and everyone will rub everyone the wrong way."
Beat
"I'm not saying that I approve of this being kept quiet, but until there's a way to handle it civily, it's probably best."
"Thank you," Kevin says sincerely. He doesn't get all the politics, but he knows she understands what's going on. That's the reason for the Priory's involvement. To keeps supes safe, sometimes from one another.
"I'll be leaving her in Patel's charge," Robert says, making a quick notation in the patient chart. "When she's moved to a room, you can start scaling back the medication so that she may communicate, Nurse Patel." He turns to Bryn and Kevin, "It's an IV drip. It's not dangerous to her to scale it back, however, she may recover a lot faster than we anticipate."
-
Attention returning to the patient, Bryn nods. "It will need to be done slowly, and kept up once she recovers. Not to the point it is now, but enough to keep her sedate and from attacking anyone."
Once Doris arrives, the girl will be in good hands. Even if she has an episode, the familiar smell of another wolf should be enough to keep her calm. At least until she can ask for someone from the Pack.
"I do appreciate this, Nurse Patel. If there is ever anything I can assist you with, please let me know." It's not as though he's not done favors for witches in the past. He just usually avoids them unless it's extremely dire circumstances.
"Detective Curtis, are you certain you are alright to stay with the young woman until her grandmother arrives? She will likely be at least another four hours or so."
-
"Just fix this," Josephina waves her hand around to indicate the room and the girl. "That's what you guys are supposed to do."
"I'll be fine," Kevin assures Bryn. "So long as the lovely Nurse Patel can show me to a coffee vending machine, I'll be perfectly all right."
The nurse nods, "We'll keep the coffee coming." Then she leaves, promising to return before Georgia is moved to a room.
-
Bryn could fix this. He's got a few witch spells up his sleeves thanks to the lovely Miss Bishop. However, the girl is already healing faster than normal, and Robert's going to have a hard enough time explaining that as it is.
"We will do our best, Nurse Patel. I do appreciate your help in this matter." It may be the second, or even third time he's reiterated it but he wants the witch to understand that he's not here to work against her, or argue with her. The hospital is her domain and any help she can give them is definitely very appreciated.
Once she leaves, he glances back at Georgia. "Fits the M.O., but we will not know for certain until she is awake. I can stay if you would prefer, in fact I will likely stay in the waiting room. If you need a break, or to sleep, just let me know and we can switch places."
Then he slips his phone out to send a quick text to Serafine to let her know that he is at the hospital, likely will be until morning, and promises to make it up to her on their next date night.
