Strange Accords: Bar side drama
13 Jun 2023Silvia Sharpe
Man does this galaxy have a way of showing you a wild ride. It all started in the bar where I had spent the last several days working the long shift while the regular bartender Creamy Goodness III(Creamy), was off doing lord knows what. We had quite the crowd that night. There was Strangecassowary(Cass), SUTTORAD(Adam), Vasil Vasilescu(Vasil), Meowers(Ina), Kira Goto(Kira), and some regulars who I never got the names of. We were having a pretty good conversation when things took quite the turn for me.****
Ina put her card into the slot on the terminal to make the payment, she seemed to be staring at my facial expression.
"Hm. Well. Besides the Thargoids grabbing humanity by the arse, everything's fine. I'm here just for that", she nodded towards the cigarettes and matches before taking putting them into her pocket.
"I just wanted to...", she sipped a bit of fresh coffee. "Ow. Thank you. This is great! So. Yeah, usually, I take one pack of those smokes with me, but, this one is also going to be a treat to another person. Like the honey."
"...and yeah, sorry to interrupt...", I couldn't help but comment on what I overheard, "Totally agreed. You can't overestimate the skill of knowing when to stop and cut the losses if things are getting rough."
'A gift eh? for whom? Sorry that's weird. We only just met and like why would you tell a not stranger, stranger.'
"Ow. Yeah, that's for... Khm. My..."
I looked down suddenly feeling a strange sense of vertigo. I stumbled slightly as my knees went weak. I attempted to hide my weakness by supporting myself with my arms while trying to get my bearings about me.
'Y..ya... I guess......*collapses on the floor*'
The moment I fell on the floor, Adam reacted almost immediately. He jumped over bar counter and leaned over me, to check my pulse and breathing.
Vasil watched as I hit the floor and unsure of what just happened looked around
'What the?!'
Melli let out a distressed chattering as I hit the ground. Unsure of what to do, she began to panic and determine if she should continue watching over Kira, who was asleep on a booth, or rush to my side. She made a split second decision that could have ended up causing a bit of distrust but was in her mind necessary. She looked down and bit Kira's hand in an attempt to wake her up then rushed to my side vaulting over the bar top. She laid on my chest and began licking my face in an attempt to wake me up.
The sting in her right hand was enough to wake Kira and make her jolt upright, its source being evident when she saw the bite marks on the glove covering it in its entirety. She was mildly annoyed at the damage and being woken up when she was still sleepy, that is, until she saw Melli near an unconscious body. That immediately discarded any tiredness she was feeling, and she walked over to me.
Ina looked at Adam and told him loudly:
"Ambulance! ASAP!"
He looked at Ina and in a rushed and urgent tone said "Please stay here with her, I'm going for medics."
Trying not to land either on myself or on Melli, Ina got on her knees behind the bar and turned me on my side. She bent my knees slightly and unbuttoned the top two buttons on my shirt. After that, making sure that nothing else could interfere with my breathing, she pressed her fingertips slightly against the right side of my neck, right over the collarbone, to keep controlling the pulse.
"Get the medics here!"
Kira pulled out a small pen and looked down at Melli.
“What do you think, little guy? Worth a try?”, she asked the animal, not expecting a response, and pushed in.
Cass was pulled away from typing up a message on her data pad when she heard all the commotion and made her way over to see what was going on.
Melli sat chattering uncontrollably and was quite understandably distressed. She let out little shrieks and growls. When everyone approached and pushed her out of the way. She watched carefully ensuring they were not attempting to harm me. She began to tremble as she was unable to wake me or help in any way that was useful.
"Everybody around Silvia, please move away. Medics are right behind me" Adam shouted as he returned to the bar. He showed medics where I was and let the professionals provide aid.
Cass ran through a basic triage routine, her thoughts very similar to the following.-symptoms; fell over, seemed dizzy based on few seconds before the fall. According to that lady just now, breathing fine, pulse rate is lower but still beating. Right. That didn’t give much. Stumbled before fall instead of, actually just dropping immediately. Right. Vertigo, that has the signs of. And yet, from what they saw, at least at this angle, that was it. No reason why. Could have been the zero-g gravity. But, it was fairly warm in here. Could be that too- or, all manner of things. Reasons wer unclear, they concluded.
“That’s. That’s vertigo. I think, anyways” They stepped back and sat down.
"She's breathing. Pulse is present, rate lower than normal, about 40-45", Ina said loudly to the medics before standing up and moving closer to the wall.
Looking at the coffee stain on her trousers, she quietly muttered, "ah, shit, here goes my fresh uniform".
Kira decided to make space for anyone more qualified than her at assisting in the matter, beyond poking an injector into someone’s neck to stimulate the body with its contents, and instead began to comfort Melli.
“Hey, come on. Help’s coming for her, don’t worry. No use being in the way.” Try as Kira might Melli refused to leave my side.
She wasn’t exactly sure how to proceed from there, as helping a pet in distress wasn’t her area of expertise either, but she also had little intentions of leaving it unguarded, given how some evidently sought to steal it for the chip in its head.
“So uh, what do we do with the little guy?”, She openly asked into the room.
"I doubt the space weasel would let anyone take it away judging by how close it seems to be to her." Vasil said looking to Melli who was obviously agitated and concerned while motioning over to me.
As everyone rushed to my aid, I slipped in and out of consciousness, unable to comprehend what exactly was going on. The medics checked me over and found my internal temperature to be 105F. They loaded me onto a stretcher to escort me out of the bar. The medics responded to the questions about Melli.
'As long as it isn't aggressive it may go with her to the hospital. Anyone have any information on what happened here? Signs, symptoms, anything at all? Strange behavior?'
"I saw her struggling to keep standing, a few seconds before she passed out. Then, she collapsed. Behavior... I don't know her well, but seemed to be okay", Ina replied to the medics, darting her eyes left and right trying to locate a water tap.
'Ok thank you.'
'All symptoms are pointing to a heat stroke of sorts. We will be taking her to the hospital for further evaluations. Thank you all for your quick responses you may have just saved this woman's life.'
They pushed me out of the bar and Melli jumped up onto the stretcher and curled into a ball on my lap. As we exited the bar, Vodan walked past and entered where a full blown western stand off went down.
****
After the collapse in the bar I woke up in the hospital. I looked around at my surroundings and found Melli curled up next to me in the bed. IVs and heart rate monitors were hooked up to me. The medical staff also had a cooling blanket on me to help regulate my body temps.
The resident nurse walked in and noticed I was awake.
'Hey there how are you feeling?'
'What?....ugh.... I feel like I was hit by a sidewinder.'
'You are lucky Mrs. Duval. If you hadn't been brought in when you were there is a chance we would not be having this conversation.'
'It's Sharpe now. This is the second time I have been told I am lucky to be alive in the last 2 weeks.... What was it this time? Did my implant cause this or?'
The nurse looked over my charts a look of concern appeared on her face.
'No, the implant had nothing to do with it but..... It says here that you had a heat stroke induced from a TBI and overworking yourself. You should be ok to leave in a couple of hours. But you must be cautious and allow your body time to recover from your..... accident..'
The nurse placed the chart back and left the room. I looked around a feeling of sadness washed over me as I thought back on the recent events. Melli remained curled up on the bed sleeping and I decided to do the same. The nurse was right I had overworked myself and my body needed to recover. I closed my eyes and fell asleep.
I woke up a few hours after having been told I needed to rest, freezing. The cooling blanket they had placed on me had dropped my body temps dramatically and it felt as though I had been dunked into an ice bath. Melli on the other hand was very much so enjoying the cold. She had moved from being curled up to sprawled out on my chest, laying flat on her belly, absorbing as much cold as she could. I reached up and pet her head gently. She perked her head up and seemingly smiled, well attempted to smile as best a fox can. The nurse walked in and picked up my chart while taking a look at my vitals.
'Ok. Looks to me like you are stable enough now to leave. Your body temp is perfect and your pulse is strong. Please Ms. Sharpe do take care. Dealing with what you are can be hard I know but please do yourself a favor and take it easy. You are still healing.'
I smiled and nodded politely, knowing full well that wasn't going to happen.
'I will try my best. Besides who would watch over this little fluff ball if I died?'
The nurse nodded accepting the lie, though I suspected she knew it was a lie and just let it slide. She left the room and I got changed into the clothes they had provided for me since they had to cut my previous attire off in order to ensure I wasn't secretly injured. I made my way out of the hospital after paying the medical bill and made my way to a clothing shop to buy some nice new clothes.
I settled on a gray t-shirt, brown armored jacket, some black armored pants and brown mid calf boots. I decided I was in need of a hair cut and made my way to a hair salon and asked for a shorter hair style. While I enjoyed my longer hair it did require having to put it up in order to be compliant with the pilots federations regulations for flight. After I got my hair cut in a sort of longer pixie style hair cut I made my way back to the bar where things were pretty damn heated.