Negative Space Ch. 13

"Okay then, Mr....?"

"Palo. Aurelius Palo." He was grinning now, thinking he was about to get his way.

"Ok, Aurelius. Well, I can give you a check up, but it'll cost you $140. And you'll need to make an appointment through my secretary. She'll probably be able to fit you in sometime in the next couple months. I'm pretty busy though, so I can't promise anything."

Aurelius rolled off the table, sending my papers everywhere, but he didn't seem too put off. "Don't you worry, Doctor Crane, I'll be there. I understand—it'll be much more secluded at your office," he said, eyes gleaming with mischief and pleasure. I couldn't help be annoyed with him, and just packed my stuff back up and put it in a neat pile.

"I've got to go check on a patient. Watch my stuff." I had to check on Alma, but I knew that if I told him NOT to look at my stuff he definitely would. This way he'd make sure no one else did.

Alma was still doing great, so I came back down stairs to write all her vitals down in my notebook. The family room was empty now, except for Aurelius, who was diligently reading on the other side of the room. He glanced up when I came back in, and checked the room before he came back over. There was no one here anymore, and I was a little nervous to see what he would do now. I didn't want to actually have to put him down—he was arrogant but cute, not a bad kid. I was relieved though, when I saw the seriousness in his eyes.

"Hey doc. Um, sorry about before. I've got a reputation, you know?" I snorted, but kept listening. "Anyway, I just was wondering if you'd help me out. I've been having really horrible stomach aches, and um, really bad diarrhea." He finally stopped fidgeting and blushed deeply. "It's making me exhausted. I can't do the work I used to be able to do."

"Of course. Come here with me." I took him into the private room I had seen patients in the last time I was at the compound. I sat him down on the couch there and started a physical. I placed my hands gently on his temples, checking for pulse, and was shocked at his heat.

"Do you have a fever, Aurelius?"

"No, no. I'm always hot like that. We run even hotter than the wolves do."

"We? What are you?"

"Oh, I forgot you're human. I'm a Jaguar. A Werecat."

"Oh. Okay, well this is a normal jaguar temperature then?"

Aurelius nodded. I swept my fingertips along the back of his skull, checking for unusual bumps, lesions, bald spots. I touched down the back of his neck and up and down either side of it checking his lymph nodes. He closed his eyes when I began touching his collar bone and I could almost hear him purring. His lymph nodes where fine, though, so I moved on, pulling out an otoscope and checking his ears, eyes, mouth and nose. All looked good. I listened to his lungs and heart, finding that he was indeed purring. It made listening for dysrhythmias quite difficult. A couple times I asked him to stop it, or warned that I would quite all together if he couldn't hold himself back, but the purring would start up again once I moved to a new spot. Eventually I had him lie down and began to listen to his stomach. The normal clicks and gurgles had been replaced by high pitched whining and groaning, and I knew that wasn't a good sign. I lifted his shirt and began palpating his stomach and he winced.

"I'm sorry, but please don't push so hard!"

"You know that I've got to if I'm going to feel what's going on in there." As I was speaking, though, I noticed that he had completely tensed up in a way that he hadn't the whole time I'd been touching him. His color had faded, and he forehead glistened with sweat.

"Okay, Aurelius. Now you need to talk to me honestly. When did this start?"

I got a quick history from him and realized that he definitely had acute appendicitis. I needed to do something about it right away. Last time I had done surgery here at the compound, but I wanted him back at the clinic where I could watch over him more closely. He could easily die from septic shock within the next couple days if I didn't operate immediately. I was amazed he had seemed so normal before, but he had completely lost his composure the minute I touched his abdomen, so it had to be bad. I called Elliott immediately, and within 30 minutes a car was there to pick us up. I had no way to transport him out, so I apologized and told him to get up and walk. About halfway down the drive he lost steam and I pulled him onto my back and carried him the rest of the way. He was moaning and groaning, and it sounded like it had just gotten worse. I hoped that my palpation of his abdomen hadn't caused his appendix to rupture, but the difference in his pain level was huge. The driver was waiting at the gate and helped me to pull Aurelius into the car. I called Elke and alerted her as we were driving away, and gave her instructions for keeping an eye on Alma until I was able to get back. I called Theo then too and warned him that I wouldn't be back for probably another day.

~~~~~~~~

It was getting to be late in the afternoon as I set up the makeshift operating room. I pulled one of my medical text books from a high shelf—I hadn't done this surgery since medical school and I wanted to make sure I wouldn't totally screw it up. I read the chapter through twice and went out to check on Aurelius again. The sweet boy had been moaning and groaning so much that I gave him a nice hefty dose of morphine and knocked him out since I couldn't start until my nurse got there anyway. Elliott told me he was awake and ready, and would try to get over as soon as he could, maybe even heading out in the evening with many layers of clothing in between him and the last rays of the sun. I didn't want him to be burned, but I needed him to get there as soon as possible, so I just called a driver with special tinted windows for him.

The next few hours had me pacing in the lobby, nervous and sweaty. What would happen if I messed up? What if I had waited too long? I'd head back up to the office and check on Aurelius who was completely unconscious, check the IV I'd given him, administer his next dose of antibiotics and morphine, check on my operating room, make sure I'd put out all the supplies I'd need, and then head back down to the first floor lobby to wait for Elliott.

Around 4:30pm I saw woman in a full burqa get out of the car I'd sent for Elliott. She walked up to me and spoke in a deep familiar voice, "Hey Lana. Shall we head up?"

I laughed for a moment when I realized that it was Elliott in his sun protection get up. "Come on," I chuckled, "We've got work to do."

Aurelius' arm hung at an unnatural angle off the side of the table and I used my knee to push it back up. It could be seriously injured if it hung like that for long, and I couldn't use my hands to touch outside of the sterile field. Elliott came back in to the room and held a cup of water up to my mouth.

"You're doing great, Lana. I think we just need to rinse the retroperitoneal cavity, and then we can stitch him up. You're really close."

Although I had originally been sure I could manage the surgery, it had really been Elliott who coached me through each step. His usual snarkiness had faded away to a calm, soothing presence. He caught the mistakes I was about to make, and reminded me respectfully to keep the sterile field. I vacuumed the rest of the saline out of Aurelius' abdominal cavity and turned to see that Elliott had already set up the suture kit. A few small stitches, some tape to make sure they held him together, a bandage and a last round of vitals, and I collapsed, exhaustedly on the floor. Elliott laughed at me and began cleaning up the make shift operating room. After a moment of rest I began to help him, and we worked in silence, moving in tandem. Quickly the room began to look like the exam room it had been earlier in the day, so I took a break to check on Aurelius again. He was starting to come up from his sedation, so I pulled the ventilator out from his throat so he could begin to breathe on his own. His chest began heaving and jerking, his diaphragm struggling to shake off the anesthetic and pull in air. Two long deep breaths, and I relaxed, knowing that he could breath on his own now.

Sandy poked her head into the room.

"All done? You've got patients." It was about midnight, and I hadn't slept in 30 hours.

"Oh, Sandy, I don't think I can do it. I'll tell them, but I have GOT to go home and go to bed."

I was gathering my stuff when I realized that I couldn't leave Aurelius without someone to keep an eye on him. There was no way I was leaving him alone at the clinic, and Elliott had already done enough. I was packing Aurelius up to come home with me when Sandy came back into my office with a stiffness to her neck that I knew to be the only indication she gave when she was seriously disturbed.

"There's a man demanding to see you."

"What's up, Sandy? I know you'd be able to fend someone off normally."

Sandy's mouth twitched and she shook her head quickly. "He's...there's a knife. And he says he's in danger. You HAVE to see him."

"Absolutely. Send him back."

I could feel the exhaustion in every bone in my body, but the day wasn't over yet. I pulled in a big breath and tried to push the sleep out of my head, but it didn't do much. The metal clanked too loudly as I put tools in a stainless steel tray, echoing through the room and jarring me back to reality. I could feel someone watching me and I spun around. At first all I could see was the handle of a knife, but as my eyes focused I realized that there was, in fact, a severely bruised and bloodied face as well. The knife handle was sticking straight out of what should have been an eyeball, and the man to whom the eye belonged was slightly swaying in the doorway. I swallowed compulsively, holding back my disgust.

"Come here, come, sit down." I led him to the chair and was just reaching for my tray of tools when he grabbed my arm.

"Please, you have to protect me. Please, I'll do anything!" His words came out slightly garbled—it looked like he had lost a number of teeth in this fight and his lips were so swollen he could barely use them, but his grip was tight and strong around my wrist.

"What do you mean?"

"Promise me, please, promise me that you won't tell anyone. Promise me!" He pulled harder on my wrist and I felt the particular slickness of blood between his hand and my skin as a wound on his forearm dripped down onto mine.

"Sir, I'll have to tell someone if you are in danger, but I can make sure that you are protected. I work closely with the prince and his Cabinet, and I'm sure we can work out a way to keep you safe."

"NO! You can't tell anyone!"

"Sir, the longer you have this knife in your eye, the more likely it is that permanent damage will occur. The person who did this obviously knew you were a vampire, and came very close to making it entirely through your skull. You know that would have made it very likely you would have died the True Death. Let me take it out now, and you can tell me what happened as I do it."

The man was quiet for a moment and nodded curtly. My stomach lurched slightly as I watched the knife handle swoop through the air. He leaned back in the chair obediently, but I could see his fingers clenching and flexing with anxiety. I pulled my stool up close to him and began cleaning the outside of the wound and trying to figure out what might be the least damaging way to pull it out. With a human I would have worried about the punctured brain tissue swelling and causing a coma, but with a vampire I was pretty sure that it would just immediately begin knitting back together and healing itself. Once everything was cleaned up I decided to just go for it and pull the knife out slowly. I warned my patient and instructed him to hold tight to the arms of the chair. He clenched his teeth and hissed as I touched the handle, crying out and knocking my hand away as I began to move it. He apologized immediately, but I knew that wouldn't work, so I set up an IV with straight morphine. Not much will take a vampire down, but enough morphine straight to the vein would slow him down long enough for me to pull the knife out. About forty five seconds after I started the morphine he relaxed and I took my moment to grab and yank. It came out with a squelching noise and I almost retched at the sight of what should have been his eyeball. I grabbed my vampire cure-all and just poured it over the bleeding, oozing hole. Within moments it was healed over with a thick, grey cloud. He wouldn't be able to see for a while yet, but at least he wasn't going to bleed out.

I took the morphine IV out of his arm and waited next to him as it wore off. He moved one arm over to me and grasped my wrist again.

"I have something important to tell you. You must promise to protect me though."

"Friend, I would be happy to protect you, but I have been awake for far too long now, and it is time for me to pass out for at least 24 hours. I will give orders for you to be protected but you must come with me, obey me, and not try to kill me or anyone I care about. Okay?"

"Yes. I will tell you—"

"We can talk about everything else later. I NEED to sleep."

Elliott helped me, Aurelius, and the stranger down to the car. I barked at the driver to tell Theo to protect the stranger, watch over Aurelius and let me sleep. Sleep came over me before I could buckle my seatbelt, my head awkwardly crammed between the window and the plastic buckle holding the seatbelt in place. It was possibly the most comfortable place I had ever slept.

My body was heavy, big, rubbery, almost as if it weren't my own. The air around me felt thick and each breath I took was full of it—I felt like I was suffocating. Drifting back to sleep was easier than fighting though, and the steady gravity of sleep pressed me back into the mattress. Again, maybe hours or minutes later I understood myself as existing in a space other than my mind, and tried to push back against the unconsciousness. I was trapped, drowning. With a sudden bloom of fright in my core, strength blossomed down my arms and I pushed myself away from the mattress. A distant rumble sounded familiar, swirling around me and holding me up. Slowly things in the distance began to make sense. That wasn't a glowing silver rectangle, it was the moon's light pouring in a window by what I now recognized was the bed I shared with Theo. The rumbling organized itself into distinct sounds that fitted themselves into words I could barely make out. Theo's voice.

I pressed my palms into my eye sockets and rubbed vigorously. Moving my body around to find the door I saw dim light filtering through the open doorway. A pair of yellow eyes focused on me. They blinked, disappearing entirely in the darkness, and then opened again, low to the ground at the end of my bed. The dipping and swaying as they came closer was an unusual, lilting motion, and I scrambled backward, grabbing at the lamp by the bed. Light flickered and filled the room and showed me a beautiful black and yellow jaguar at my side. A low growling emanated from his tensed body, his muscles rippling and rolling as he landed silently on my bed. I gasped and scrambled backward, but before I could get away he put one massive paw on my chest, pushing me back down onto the bed. I could feel my blood pulsing frantically through my veins, my heart thudding valiantly against the gentle pressure of his paw. His head dipped down so close to my face that I could have kissed him, but instead of biting my face off, he licked my cheek. I just stared as he nuzzled my face and lay down next to me, purring happily. I stayed perfectly still, terrified that this crazy animal would change his mind again. After a moment he huffed, almost as if in annoyance, and hopped off the bed, graceful as ever. He stalked over to the long curtains that hung on either side of the window by my bed and slipped behind them. The curtains moved and the shape that had been the jaguar shrank and lengthened and all of a sudden Aurelius' head popped out.

"Oh my god, Aurelius, you almost gave me a fucking heart attack!" I shouted.

"Well I couldn't very well shift back in all my naked glory right in front of you. Not that I wouldn't love to, but Theo is right outside." Aurelius had wrapped the curtains around his waist and was perched lightly on the window sill.

I shook my head. My heart was still pounding furiously and I imagined how satisfying it would be to throttle Aurelius.

"Okay okay. But what are you doing up anyway? Shouldn't you still be in bed? You've just had a major abdominal surgery!"

"Weres heal fast. Not to mention that you've been out for almost a day and a half."

"Really? Oh god. I'm going to be so behind when I get back to work." I started to try to get dressed, looking for something I could wrap myself in.

"Wait a second though, Dr. Crane. Um, there's something going on in Theo's office. You might, uh, find it interesting." Aurelius looked away from me, studying the floor.

"What do you mean?" I tossed him a pair of shorts I found on the floor, and he grabbed them out of the air without even looking.

"I just...I don't know what's going on. They were talking about you and I thought maybe you should listen a while before you let them know you're awake."

I studied Aurelius for a moment and decided he was telling the truth. There was no reason he would have to lie to me right now. I pulled a robe on and walked as quietly as I could out of my bedroom and down the hall to Theo's cracked open office door. My toes sunk into the thick carpet as I lay my head against the cool stone wall so that I could hear as much as possible. I shivered. Aurelius was right. They were definitely talking about me.

"I'm just saying, Marked or not, she's living with you," a man insisted, "so I thought I'd pay you the courtesy of checking with you first."

"And again, I have to respond to that by asking if you are threatening me somehow, Mr. Eaton. I'm not sure how else to take it." Theo's voice was unusually chilly, and I thought of the times his eyes turned hard, his face rigid. I was glad not to be at the other end of that stare right now.

A woman began to chuckle. Softly, exquisitely femininely, but with a very clear cruelty behind it. "Theo, darling. I don't think I've ever seen you so riled up about a human before. Have you, Miles?" Mr. Eaton agreed, and the woman went on. "Think about it this way. We're not here to take away your perfectly good toys. We're just working in your best interest, cleaning up after you. She's making too much of a mess, and it's time for you to let us do our job and take care of her."

My stomach flipped. 'Take care' of me? That could only mean one thing.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Reemes, but I disagree completely. The doctor is my find, and works within my territory, and I have a very close eye on her. Do not consider me 'done' with her simply because I removed my mark."

"Oh but that's the thing, Your Majesty, it doesn't even matter what you'd like. Our orders came from the Top."

Theo was silent then, and even though it had sounded innocuous enough, I could tell by his tense response that it was a very serious situation. Whoever was at "the top" were far and above more powerful than Theo, someone I had thought was almost at the top of the food chain himself.

"Thank you for your visit, Mr. Eaton, Ms. Reemes. I always delight in the comfort you bring me. Please let your boss know that I will have an answer for him by the end of the week."

"You're not being given a choice, Theo." The man said gruffly.

"Excuse me, Mr. Eaton?" Theo's voice became not only cold but loud and cruel as well. "How did you want to address me?"

Mr. Eaton sputtered and apologized. "I'm so sorry Your Majesty. Please excuse me."