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She could only imagine how furious he would be when he discovered her here—if he hadn’t already been advised. Goosebumps prickled over her skin at the mere thought.
But there was no time to think about that now. She’d been in the middle of her orientation tour with her new medical team when the medical call had come in, and now she had Jaleel to concentrate on.
Talk about being thrown in at the deep end.
‘His colleague said that he stood up when there was an open machine door above him and it cut his face,’ the security guard continued.
‘My report said that he’s unconscious,’ Isla stated, adrenalin pumping through her body.
‘Yeah, apparently he fell back, and they heard him cry out, and then he hit his head and fell unconscious.’
‘Understood. And it’s Jaleel?’
‘Jaleel, yeah.’
She’d barely stepped on board—she had only just met the first of her colleagues, a stunning American nurse by the name of Jordanna—when the call had come in.
The senior doctor—a Dr Turner, according to her email—had been in his consultation room with a patient when she’d arrived. And though he could probably have taken the emergency call, Isla knew that his priority would be passengers, whilst hers, as junior doctor, would be crew and staff. There would be some crossover, of course, but in broad terms that was how this ship worked, and the sooner she jumped into that, the better she would be likely to fit in.
Finally arriving at the laundry room, Isla ducked inside and quickly took in the scene. The patient, Jaleel, was now conscious and clutching a blood-soaked towel to his face. Even from here, it looked like he was a mess, not helped by the sapping heat of the loud, airless room.
‘Hi, Jaleel—’ she flashed her brightest, most confident smile ‘—I’m Isla, the new doctor. Let’s have a look at the damage, shall we?’
‘He no speak English,’ the woman offered, before appearing to translate.
‘Thank you.’ Isla flashed her a smile as she crouched down beside Jaleel. She carefully helped him to peel the towel away and peered at the wound, then stood up.
‘Which machine?’
‘This...’ A young woman stepped forward. ‘This machine.’
Isla inspected it carefully, looking for the likely metal culprit.
‘Is this where you caught it, Jaleel?’
She didn’t really need to hear them say it; the blood was evidence enough. Still there was a quick exchange between the two colleagues before the woman issued a confirmation.
‘Okay, good.’ She crouched back down to check his vitals, shining a light into his eyes to check pupil responses.
Ideally a CT would check that he hadn’t hit his head when he’d fallen backwards, but that wasn’t possible on board. Still, nothing jumped out at her as a cause for alarm, save for the one long, ugly gash running down his cheek.
‘It’s too deep to simply glue the sides together, so let’s get him back to the med centre, where I can stitch him back up,’ she told the security guard, before turning back to Jaleel’s colleague. ‘How long was he out, do you know?’
‘Out?’
‘Sorry, unconscious.’
‘Oh...maybe one minute? Maybe two?’
So, not long. That was good. Nonetheless, it would be safer to transport him on the emergency gurney that they’d brought. Quickly, she set it up next to Jaleel and popped a collar around his neck for stability. She didn’t think he’d injured it in the fall, but until they got him back to the medical centre it wouldn’t hurt to take precautions.
‘Okay, gentlemen—’ she lifted her head to the security guys, who were also around the stretcher ‘—one, two, three, lift. Good. Now, let’s get him to the medical centre.’
* * *
Jordanna was bustling around quickly and efficiently as Isla arrived in the medical centre, its location in the passenger area of the ship evident as they left behind the cold grey metal and vinyl floor of the crew de
cks and stepped into the pristine white-walled and plushly carpeted passenger areas.
