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“Extra hands help,” Roadkill said as she began setting up the surgical tray.
Amber moved to strip Mountain down fully.
The heavy boots thudded as she pulled them off and tossed them to the side. Roadkill’s sympathetic eyes peering over her mask weren’t helping ease the doubt coursing through Amber’s veins. They fully stripped him down as Red removed his gloves and did a full surgical scrub down. The room wasn’t sterile, less than an hour ago they’d been vaccinating a six month old in there. Then again in the ER, rooms turned over and over with little more than a bed stripped and sprayed down, they’d done that here.
Bloodied gauze covered Mountain’s belly, as this time Roadkill and she could roll him enough for her put down pads underneath him, as he lay naked on the bed. Going back to her nursing school rotations, she and Roadkill set up a make shift surgical field.
Red adjusted the overhead light and placed magnifying glasses on before opening Mountain’s belly more, so he could try to fish out the bullet lodged inside. “You’re on vent and monitors,” Red said. “Keep the fluids flowing, he’s lost so much we need to restock and until I can tie off whatever is leaking, we might as well treat the supply like a black Friday sale.”
While Red and Roadkill worked in tandem to save Mountain’s life, she stripped off her bloodied gloves and did her own surgical scrub before putting on a fresh set. The heartbeat steady on the monitor as she pulled out a couple disposable surgical bonnets. One for his hair and then she fashioned one over his beard. The distraction necessary as a vent made sure his lungs were filling and emptying of air.
“There you are you nasty son-of-a-bitch,” Red said.
Amber realized she was numb. Completely numb and in the place of a nurse, was her floating through a trauma on pure instinct and training. Making sure what she could do was being done, but not going any further for the man laying prone on a damn gurney in front of her.
His eyelids would flutter at times and she wondered if she should tape them closed, but decided against it. Red would call out drugs for her to administer and she was impressed by the supply of paralytics, pain and antibiotics in the locked box of drugs. Having only moved around to get what she needed in the moment she hadn’t taken stock of the high level, considering the small town, but maybe the chances of this happening where high.
A ting echoed in the room from the bullet that had not only penetrated multiple layers of shirts, a leather coat, but also the layers of subcutaneous tissue to lodge in Mountain’s gut.
“Well, he’s going on a diet whether he wants to or not,” Red said. “Fifty pounds lighter and this asshole would have gone all the way through and made my job easier.”
“How far did it get?” she asked.
“Sadly, to the stomach,” Red said.
Amber glanced up to see a long string coming from Mountain’s gut and she had to hold in her want to vomit.
“Not to the point I’m gonna need to review bariatric surgery thankfully,” Red went on. “Just nicked it and made a small leak. You’re going on a liquid diet Mountain and I’m not talking about beer.”
Amber said a silent prayer of thanks.
“Nightingale, I need to you pull a tube for a quick blood count, need to see where his levels are, that bag is near empty.”
Shifting around, she moved to pull from her IV since Roadkill’s side had Red stitching and had blood flowing in there. Mountain’s hand was warm and she could feel a tear rolling down her cheek. The sensation better than the steady beep from the monitor she’s been watching for the past hour.
“Closed,” Red announced. “I’m going to clean up, then we’ll extubate and make sure he can breathe on his own.”
Roadkill was cleaning up the now shaved spot on the man’s? Amber wanted to call hers, but now questioned? belly. Blood loss had caused him to crash.
“Hey,” Roadkill said.
Amber glanced up from the stool where she was sitting, vial in hand to look at her.
“This is just a moment.”
Amber nodded her head and let out a long sigh. “I’m not sure if I can handle moments like this.”
* * *
Sharp stabsof pain followed every breath Mountain took. Sadly, they were in so many places he wasn’t sure, if he could find the one he hated the most. His throat burned as if he’d smoked seven Cubanos in an hour at a shitty bachelor party. When he tried to swallow what little moisture he could in his mouth, he wondered if his tonsils had grown back and needed to be removed again.
Then there was his right side where a fireplace poker must be red hot and currently stuck because there was no other reason to have a burning sensation with a heartbeat. Blinking away blurry vision, he searched for objects that weren’t blobs and finally saw Red standing over the top of him, doing something. Shifting to the side and glancing down at his arm that was currently shifting from warm to cold as something ran through his vein, he saw Roadkill depressing a syringe connected to an IV in his hand. He moaned and tried to move.
“Don’t move Mountain.” Red touched his shoulder. “You’re just waking from surgery. You took a bullet to the gut. I just fixed you up and you know how I get when people pop my perfect stitches.”
“You stitch Cass’ arm?” he asked wishing he hadn’t because the words stung his throat and Red disappeared from his line of vision as a hard scrape to his foot made his toes curl.
“In my defense, I told him we could wait until I sobered,” Red’s disembodied voice floated through the air as his other foot got the same treatment. “Babinski’s good.”
