03.24.3014: Khourni Poetry
Summary: Devon checks on Victor's concussion symptoms while on her rounds.
Date: 11 December 2013
Related: Tomb Raiders
Victor Devon 


Infirmary, Volkan, Crescent
The Infirmary of the Volkan Barracks is bright, clean, and sterile; the complete antithesis of the world above. There is a general care ward, with moveable beds in small alcoves, only granted privacy by curtains on cuved metal rods. Equipment sits in each unit for emergency treatment, and some long care treatment.

There is a surgical unit down the western hall, with three bays, for handling urgent care of soldiers severely wounded. A recovery area is at the end of the hall. Down the eastern hallway are several doors, each leading to one of a dozen long-term care rooms. Every room is furnished with two beds and a few chairs, a bathroom, nightstands, and connections for specific equipment depending on the needs of the patient.

24 March, 3014

Victor is mobile now, but that doesn't mean that looking at bright lights — or even having them around — doesn't give him a splitting headache. And so his room is darkened, and he has a pressure bandage wound around his head and pulled down low over his eyes. The room is lit, however, by the glow of his comm, projecting a holographic image of helmet cams, sharp angles of armor and bright colors amidst the dimness of a necropolis. Grimacing broadly, the Khourni pauses the replay, setting the comm aside and reaching over with a grimace to try and trigger another round of painkillers through his IV. Sadly, he's already reached his maximum dosage for the moment, and so even thumbing the button repeatedly with a building grimace doesn't do anything. Well, it doesn't do anything but alert the staff on duty.

"You are most annoying patient," Devon announces as she steps — or waddles, as it were — into the room. She is on hour six of her twelve hour shift, though she is still all smiles — an expression that neatly masks her concern for her bed-ridden husband. She is a right ray of sunshine in her ducky yellow scrubs and long braid of orange sherbet hair. She has one hand resting on the swell of her belly while the other holds her tablet aloft. Her pale, glass-colored eyes sweep up his battered frame to alight on his shadowed eyes. She draws up a padded stool so that she can sit beside him easily.

Victor knows he shouldn't look up as the door opens, but he still does it, one hand rising quickly to further shade his eyes as he flinches away from the light, "Gods-damn it… feels like fuckin' ice-picks in the eyes." He's not angry, just… grouchy, at being cooped up and in pain. And yearning for a hit of nicotine. Once the door closes, he lowers his hand, offering up a bit of a smile, "Thanks for your scientific diagnosis." He snorts softly in amusement, leaning back in his bed and reaching up to rub at his unwounded temple, "Sorry, pain's just buildin' again. How you hangin' in there, Dee?"

"I know," Devon says softly as she syncs her tablet with his monitor, gathering data on his vitals. She scans through the information, a light frown replacing her smile. "I'm not comfortable in upping your dosage," she says quietly as she swipes through various statistics. She settles her gaze on him as she sets down her tablet on his bedside table. "I'm hanging," she admits, adjusting on the stool as she relieves a bit of pressure on her back. She offers a slight smile now. "Worrying about you," she confesses behind that closed door.

Victor snorts again, "Stupid-ass high tolerance." It's nice when you're drinking beer after beer, but not so good when you need the narcotics to stop your head feeling like it's going to split. He doesn't protest the decision, however, shifting around a little bit to rest his hand over his eyes — and then prying up a few fingers so he can look at the little spot of sunlight seated alongside his bed, "I've had worse. And I gave better'n I got." And at least he's convinced the doctors and nurses to let him wear actual pants, since it's just his head that's messed up. That's a big positive compared to a hospital gown. "You wanna hop up and lean back? And is that worry doctor-worry that I should be worryin' about, or wifey-worry that I should grin and bear?"

"You always do," Devon says with a quirk of her lips at her husband giving better than he got. She shakes her head a bit as she slowly pulls herself up to her feet once more, wincing a bit at the discomfort in her ankles. But then she is settling down beside him, scooching up against him. She rests her head back against his shoulder as she does. "Wifey-worry," she reassures him as she gently smiles his way. "So, grin and bear it." She tilts her head as she breathes in his familiar scent, tainted by the sterility of the infirmary. She is quiet for a moment, before adding quietly. "I don't like worrying about you like that…"

Victor nods his head carefully at the first response, shifting over slightly to provide a little more room on the hospital bed. His other hand tosses his comm lightly onto the bedside table, and then he's focusing back on the usually-little woman beside him. Very carefully, he strips his lips back from his teeth to do exactly what he's directed. He's silent for a long moment after her last statement, finally rumbling, "And I don't like worryin' that my two favorite women left in my life," that last bit, the nod to Reena being gone, hurts a bit, but he powers through, "are gonna go for each others' throats."

Devon crosses her arms over the grand shelf of her belly, and she looks away. Her shoulders rise and fall what is perhaps a childish shrug, and then she casts him a look. "We both know that I have no desire to rip out the Young Lady's throat." Her tone is polite, almost proper, but edged all the same. "If she goes for mine, however… I am completely within my rights to defend myself." She looks away again, her expression easily brooding. She continues to rub at her belly, this time in slow circles.

Victor eyes his Lady Wife from beneath the wrap of his bandage, his eyes narrowing just a little, "She goes after your throat, I pick you both up by the scruff of your necks until you talk it out." That would be quite a feat at the moment with Devon rather solidly pregnant and Anabethe a good inch taller than him, but he doesn't sound exactly earnest anyhow. "Do I get to know why she might go for your throat, or should I butt the fuck out?"

Devon is quiet in the wake of his threat and question, letting both hang there in silence. Then she shrugs her shoulders a bit. "I went to go see Flint after his surgery. I told him he should stop… seeing Anabethe, that I was worried he was going to get hurt." She rolls her shoulders a bit. "Anabethe walked in about at that point, and it has been all downhill from there." She purses her lips a bit. "I told her she was being selfish, and that Flint will be the one left heart broken when Jevon finally finds Bethe her next husband."

Victor rolls his eyes upwards — and then winces at the response from his temples, "Ow, fuck…" His arm curls around her bright-orange head to press his fingers to the side of his head not currently regrowing skin from an axe wound, and then he grunts, "I didn't know they were makin' it a recurring thing. I thought they'd just fucked a couple of times." He lifts his head and then drops it against the pillow again, the concussion-friendly method of banging his head against something solid, "What the fuck is wrong with her and 'Trim? What's wrong with just finding some Cit when you're looking to get lucky?"

Devon accepts the affectionate gesture from her husband, pressing her temple against his. Her eyes flutter closed, and she heaves a deep sigh. "Because he makes her a better person," the Ash Witch supplies, though it isn't said mockingly — just tiredly. She offers him a bemused smile. "You can't tell me that there was never a noble girl that you were fond of…" She shakes her head. "I don't know, Vic… I said my peace, and she told me that it wasn't my place… as if she knew Flint first." She shrugs. "She made it sound like I was jealous…"

Victor shakes his head slowly, "He can do that without fucking her. Unless he's got a magic dick or something." Grunting to himself, he shrugs his broad shoulders, "Not really. Sure, there are hotties, but the way Carron raised me, you don't look at other nobles like that until there are banns in place." Rubbing at his face wearily, he grumbles under his breath a moment, then tilts his head away enough to study his wife's face from more than an inch or so away, "And are you?" There's no accusation in the question, just curiosity.

The Khournas wife can't help but roll her eyes a bit at her husband's description of how he was raised. "You can't possibly be telling me there wasn't a girl or woman in your entire life that didn't strike your fancy." She gives him a speculative look, but it doesn't last when he poses that curious question. She lapses into silence, looking away as she continues to nervously rub at her pregnant belly. "No." She finally says, glancing back at him. "I'm not jealous. I would very much like Flint to find himself someone to care for… and in any other circumstances, I would say that they would make a good match… but Marah isn't going to give up Flint to another House, and Anabethe won't give up her position."

Victor nods his head, "Well yeah, but they were all Cits. I mean, you don't get the hots for your family, right? Carron just beat it into me that other nobles were fine to look at, but there wasn't any touchin'." Reaching over with his free hand to rest atop the protuberance that is their son or daughter, he nods slowly, "Not the best match. Bethe should really be marryin' someone from a vassal House. Or another Paramount." He shrugs slightly, grinding through a though process that rear its ugly head in his mind. "Plus, there's already a match between Grantham and Khournas, sorta. You an' me. Maybe that's why she's bitin' your head off. She's seein' you as the reason they can't get hitched."

Her hands still when Victor's settles on top of the swollen bump. Devon arches up her brows a bit at her husband's input on the matter, and she grimaces. "Great… our loveless match will be forever remembered as the one that caused two lovers to never find their happiness." She doesn't quite realize the implications of the word loveless, and she doesn't seem to backtrack to it either. "I have no desire to cause strife in this House… I do my duties, make sure that she knows I'm not going to ruin her happiness, and just wait to see what happens."

Victor grunts a little sourly, although it appears that he didn't really catch the implications of that statement himself. "Fuck it. If she does anything right, no one'll remember it like that 'cause no one'll know that there are two people pining after each other." Turning his head, he presses a kiss to Devon's temple, "Besides, there shouldn't be any gods-damned pining except for those the Hosties've taken from us. This ain't a time to go out lookin' for love."

Devon frowns. "No one else might, but she will." Then she rolls her shoulders a bit, relaxing under the press of lips to her temple. Her eyes flutter shut. "You don't seem like the pining type," she murmurs. "Would you even pine for a girl you adored?" She arches her brows meaningfully as she lifts her gaze to meet his. "You know, one of those Cits you kept around?" She smirks then, and for a moment, there's a hint of jealousy in her eyes. Just a hint, though.

Victor snorts, "What's the point of pining? I mean, really… sure, you miss someone, you wish they were around, but pining's just a waste of time, energy, and dignity." His arm tightens around her shoulders and neck a moment, then looses again, "And hell, I miss you when I'm out there, or you're workin' a twelve, or whatever." Shifting around a little more onto his side so that he can keep his hand resting on her rather prominent baby belly and lie more comfortably, he shrugs, "But really, why would I want to be some sort of flowery pining peacock, writing soppy poetry and sniffling into a scented handkerchief? What good does that do?"

Devon actually smiles — a soft kind of smile that warms her pale, glass-colored eyes. She twists a bit toward him on the hospital bed, but not so much that she forces him to scoot away from her. She stares at him, pale eyes trying to meet his beneath the bandage. She tilts her head a bit. "Some women enjoy a little flowery, pining, soppy, scented handkerchiefing… but I know that is far too much to ask out of my simple husband." Her smile turns toward a challgning grin before she gently touches his hand on her belly.

Victor lifts his head just a little so that he can peer out from under the bandage wound around his head, "Roses are red, violets are blue, beer is good, and I wanna fuck you." His lips peel back into a grin, and a chuckle rises from low in his barrel chest, "Poor you. No soppy, flowery, scented-handkerchief-sniffing pining. You had to get stuck with a meat-head Khourni."

Devon laughs lightly, though it is punctuated by a gentle rolling of her eyes. "How inspiring of you," she says dryly before she shakes her head. "Well, since you are so terrible at poetry, I suppose it is safer that you remain a meathead." She at least leans in close enough to press a kiss against his temple, and then to his cheek. She reaches across him now for her tablet so that she can look over his vitals again, which is what she is actually here to do.

Victor turns his grin into a beaming smile for a moment, "Hey, at least it rhymed." He lets out a breath as she reaches over for the tablet, his free hand scooping it up to help her get hold of it. To his credit, he only make a bit of a grunting sound as she rolls her preggo-belly onto him, and it's a teasing one at that. "At least that way I can keep blocking axes with my head, since there ain't nothin' important up there."

"Yes, it at least rhymed," Devon chimes back once she as settled beside him once more. She starts the sync, watching as his numbers roll across the screen. She grimaces a bit at his comment, and she glances his way. "I wish you would be more careful… another hit like the ones you've taken will have you on a permanent IV drip." She frowns. "I would like to have a chance to come home to you rather than visit you while I'm at work."

Victor shifts a little uncomfortably at the complaint, his heavy shoulders rising and falling a little helplessly, "I only know one way to fight, Dee. All out. Your job's here, and my job's out there. I can't do it if I'm worryin' about whther or not I'm gonna make it home." Snorting softly, he adds, "Don't get me wrong. It ain't like I'm goin' out tryin' to get my ass killed. Nothin' like that. It's just, when I'm out there, I gotta be all out there." His left hand comes up to gesture across his body toward her, "You've been out there, you know what it's like."

That doesn't sit well with Devon. She stares at her husband with those pale blue eyes — and deep within them is a touch of pain and a touch of anger. "I was out there, Victor…" She shakes her head. Her thoughts stew for a few moments before she turns her gaze aside. "And I get it, but there has to be some part of you when you're out there that thinks about… about…" She ducks her chin a bit, crossing her arms along her belly. "About me."

Victor is quiet for a moment, then he nods, "Well, when I'm not fighting, yeah." He reaches up to… well, he was going to run his hand back across his shaven scalp, but the bandages are in the way of that, so he just shrugs again, dropping his hand to his side, "When I'm fightin', I don't even think about me, Dee. I'm just makin' sure the other guy dies, and not me or one of the people with me. All that jokin' around and teasin' and shit, that's like… totally subconscious when I'm fightin'."

Devon lapses into silence once more, staring down at the tablet that now rests on her thighs. She shrugs her shoulders a bit. "Our son or daughter will want their father to come home…" She then decides to drop it, sighing heavily as she makes to stand once more. It is a slow process that only seems to make her back and feet ache.

Victor nods his head slowly, "Well yeah. And I'll want to come home to them. And to you. But…" And then he drops it too, shifting his right hand around to her back to help brace the pregnant woman as she rises to her feet. "So lemme guess, I'm gonna live, but I'm bein' a dumbass, so you got other patients to look after?"

Devon rubs her hand down across her belly once she's on her feet, and she heaves out a deep sigh. "You aren't being a dumbass," she murmurs softly. She turns to smile at him, though it is a bit strained. Maybe she'll get better at smiling at him with his head all bandaged and his body attached to an IV. For now, she just looks worried by it. "I do have other patients to look after though… and if you'll stop trying to break the button to the pain meds, I can leave you to rest."

Victor assays a smile in return, a bit of apology there whatever she may say. "Hey, if it put out enough for a guy my size in the first place, I wouldn't have to hit it so much." At least that's joking. "But I'm just goin' over the vids from the fight. Tryin' to figure out how that fucker slipped his shot through." Picking up his comm again, he hefts it a little, "This, this is what I do to make sure I come home again. To all the family I got left."

"Don't stay up too late," is all Devon says as she adjusts her scrubs over her swollen belly. She is already half way to the door before she turns a bit to look at him over her shoulder. "I'll check on you in the morning before I go to the Old Man's study, okay?"

Victor snorts softly in amusement, "Yeah, okay Mom." The promise/question draws a nod of his head, "You'll let me know when I can head home? I haven't puked in like a day, and I kinda miss not havin' a nice warm body alongside me." The words are quiet, and there's a sense of bashfulness to them, as if he might be shuffling his feet if he were standing up.

Devon actually smiles now — soft and gentle around the edges. She offers him a gentle nod before she checks down at her tablet. "I'll ask your assigned physician if he thinks you can go home." She quirks her brows a bit. "I'm just your attending…" She then opens the door. "Get some sleep, Vic."

Victor waves a hand, "Bah. You're the doc, Doc." One dark eye offers up a wink from under his dressings, but he nods, "Will do, Dee. Come on by before you get off, and I'll give your feet a rub." Apparently, he did listen to a bit of the advice given just before and just after their wedding.

Devon brightens a touch more, and she nods her head. Then she slips out to head down the hall to see her next patient, waddling all the way.

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