"I really wouldn't," Zanna huffed at Kal's statement. She wouldn't make a good commander, there's a reason she's in tech and not in the battalions. She tried to keep the pace slow in order to help Kal with his movements, "Come on Kal you'll be fine."
Kal laugh-cries again, grimacing with pain as he took another step toward the med bay. "You're… pretty damn good at g-getting people to.. do… stuff…" The woman presses a button on her wrist, the doors hissing open as she drags Kal like a ragdoll to one of the beds. She grumbles as Kal cries in pain, then holds her wrist to her face. "Command, tell med to do their jobs. Some stupid kid shot himself if the leg." She rolls her eyes, turning to leave, then looks back at Zanna. "You staying, girlie?"
"I think he'll hurt himself more if I don't," Zanna let out a little chuckle finding some morbid humor in the situation. In other words, yes she was going to stay with this idiot who got himself into the military. She looks back at Kal as she takes a seat before crossing her arms, "The only reason I'm good at getting people to do shit is that I've had to wrangle idiots most of my life. You get good at things if you keep having to do them."
The woman laughs, shutting the doors behind her as she leaves.
Kal continues laughing in his state of shock. "I-I am an idiot, aren't I?" He chuckles, sniffing. He looks up slowly, a mischievous look in his tear streaked eyes. "Why did you stay, Zanna? I thought you'd love the idea of me getting hurt again." He sits up, resting his bloodied leg on the synthetic mattress.
"Yes, yes you are an idiot. And as amusing as that would be," Zanna started keeping her hands firmly in their crossed position. She attempted to ignore the mischievous look in his eyes and instead focused on the situation trying not to give in to his baits, "I know how bad this is about to get and that will be ten times better than leaving and possibly having you injure yourself further."
Kal smirks, gritting his teeth in some sort of pained smile. "Alright, I guess I can agree with that."
Minutes later, a frantic young nurse enters the room. "So sorry I'm late. So, who is the patient?" She asks, looking between Kal and Zanna. Kal laughs again, leaning back as he wipes his eyes. "I am gonna die!!"
Zanna really didn't see how the nurse could screw this up. She wasn't even on a patient bed! Hopefully, she would end up stepping in. Zanna lazily pointed her metal thumb towards Kal, "This idiot. He shot himself clean through the leg. I'm just here to make sure he didn't do anything stupid."
The nurse shakes her head, laughing nervously. "Of-of course. Silly me." She slowly makes her way over to Kal, and a grim expression crosses over her face. "Oh… oh dear…" She looks as if she's going to be sick. Kal laughs again, "Just fix it please!!" The nurse takes some things out of her bag, laying them neatly on the bed, face ghostly pale.
"Listen if you're about to pass out, please go get someone else that will be able to handle this," Zanna cut in after seeing the nurse go completely pale. If she couldn't handle a gunshot wound, this nurse would never make it in this field. Zanna started mentally preparing herself to get ready to jump in.
The nurse nods, setting her things down. "s-sorry, I was just recruited and…" She presses something on her wrist. "Can we get an experienced nurse, down in med bay… uhh…" She walks away, continuing to explain to the other Nurses. Kal sighs shakily. "so, uh, so i'll just bleed out here, huh." He laughs. "Thats nice. Love the quality of this place."
Zanna glanced down at the hole in his leg. She saw that because of the tourniquet that there was a lot less bleeding than before. After letting out a hum and glancing at the nurses talking to each other, "You won't bleed out. You're bleeding out a lot less than before anyways. Besides, the experienced nurse should be here soon."
Kal nodded, looking momentarily at his leg before looking back at the ceiling. He sighed, closing his eyes as he rocked back and forth. “O-okay. Okay.” He glances at Zanna’s leg, then turns away, not knowing if that was something he should go into.
Zanna caught his glance and let out a little sigh. She looked down at her prosthetic hand before curling in each finger one by one and then looked back up Kal. She let out another sigh, "What? Wanna know the story of how this happened?"
Kal looks at the ground, rubbing his other leg. He stays quiet, then finally glances at Zanna, something in his eyes like he wanted to know. He sighs. “I-I mean, I don’t wanna make you bring that up again…” he trails off, noticing the scars on his wrist and then pulling his sleeves down.
"It's fine," Zanna waved him off as she looked back down at her prosthetics, "Besides, I'm over it for the most part. PTSD can be a bitch though. Long story short I, uh, was testing out one of my inventions and it went a little wrong. What was supposed to be an upgraded plasma blaster with renewable energy, ended up being a ticking time bomb and blew up in my face. Literally. I'm lucky I managed to get out of there alive, much less only having lost two of my limbs."
Kal listens intently, a nervous expression on his face for the most part, then smiles. “But you still work with guns? And build them??” He shakes his head, laughing softly, running a hand through his hair. “I could never do that.” He smiles. “You’re pretty cool, Zanna.”
"Not really," Zanna shrugged slightly as she looked back up at him. She didn't think of herself all that much for continuing her work after the accident, inventing was her passion after all, and getting hurt was just one of the risks that came with it, "And you could do that, you did just shoot yourself in the leg."
Kal laughs, half smiling, almost forgetting his injury as his mind is preoccupied. “Yes, Really!! You’re pretty much the coolest person I know.” His smile drops a little once she mentions him. He resumes rubbing his other leg as he tenses. “No. I can’t do that.” He chuckles weakly, continuing to grit his teeth. “I run away from everything I don’t want to deal with. I’m not like you.” A much older, much more capable doctor enters the room, quickly getting to work on Kal’s leg. He winces, taking quick sharp breaths as she wipes the blood from his skin, the only thing he can do is look to Zanna helplessly
Zanna opened her mouth to counter him saying that just cause he's run in the past doesn't mean he can't face his problems now. Besides if she did say anything she would be a hypocrite giving the facade she keeps in order to please her parents and everyone around her. However, a doctor came in and like hell is she going to spill in front of a stranger. She leaned back and crossed her arms giving him a bit a sly gin at seeing his pleading eyes. She shrugged a little before sighing, "What? Want me to entertain you while your hole gets fixed?"
Kal eagerly waited for what she was about to say, then sighed when the nurse entered and cut her off. God dammit. But when Zanna spoke, Kal suddenly burst out laughing, occasionally groaning in pain. "Holy shit!! M-my what??" He can barely pause to take breaths as he slugs the nurse on her arm. "Are you gonna be messing around with my hole, sweetheart?!" The nurse pins him by he chest, making him lie down again as he continues to cackle hysterically. She rolls her eyes, then starts applying disinfectants to his wound as his laughs turn to gasps of pain. The nurse almost smiles a bit and shakes her head.
Zanna felt her face go red as she finally realized the implications of her words. She put her head in her hands to try and hide her blush while releasing a groan. She got immense satisfaction when he started to gasp in pain after laughing for so long, "I didn't mean it like that. Don't make the poor ladies work any harder than it needs to be. She is the one who can fuck your leg up after all."
Kal held his breath and scrunches his nose is some form of a smile. "Sure you didn't." He said, noticing her blush. He glanced down at his leg, then quickly looked away, clawing at the table. "God dammit… Zan, I think she is fucking it up!" He shook his head at the nurse. "Im sorry! My mind is just a terrible dirty place and I couldn't possibly think of anything else!" The nurse sighed, then took out a syringe, rolling up Kal's sleeve. He looks away as she stares, confused at the scars and circular burns decorating his arm. She shakes her head, then sticks the needle into his vein as he sighs in relief, slumping down on the table. "You couldn't have done that first, huh?"
"To be fair you were laughing a lot when she would have done it," Zanna argued in the defence of the nurse. She was holding in her laughter just ever so slightly and looked up after she was certain her blush was gone. She paid no mind to his scars as everyone has things they don't want to tell, "But please, get your mind out of the dirt."
Kal half smiles, laying back. "Thats true. Im not really a huge fan of needles." He grins as she tries to suppress her laughter and scoffs. "My head is always in the dirt. I dunno if it can ever get out of there." He winces as the nurse touches his arm. "Jesus, don't do that!" He says angrily, pulling away. His face turns red as he relaxes. "S-sorry."
"Hey," Zanna stood up and moved closer to Kal. She knew he needed to stay as still and calm as possible in order to let the nurse do her work. Never mind the dirt comments, they can address that later… Or never. Never would be preferred. But she couldn't guarantee that especially given all that has happened so far, "Calm down. As much as I hate to say this, but is there anything I can do to help you out?"
Kal presses his lips together, eyes wild with fear. The nurse rolls her eyes and starts working on his leg again, trying to piece together broken ligaments. Kal takes shallow breaths as he puts a hand to his forehead. "Um…" He starts, voice breaking with tears. "Im okay. Just… just wasn't expecting that I guess." He rolls down his sleeve, sighing as the scars are covered up again. "Thanks, though." He chuckles softly, wiping his eyes. "You really don't have to stay. I'm sure they're still doing training, and you're probably missing out."
"It's nothing I haven't done before," Zanna waved him off as she kept standing on the other side of the bed from the nurse. She wasn't about to get in the way of Kal's leg getting fixed up. She hummed a little looking at him trying to figure out what best would distract him at this moment, "Wanna hear how many times I fucked up making my prosthetics?"
Kal tenses as the nurse sprays something on his leg, so he turns his attention over to Zanna. She's trying to distract me. He thinks, smiling a bit. "I mean, sure. I love hearing stories about people fucking up." He half smiles, gripping the edges of the bed as the nurse starts to prod at his leg.
"Ah yes, the fuck ups," Zanna nodded before trying to figure out which tale to tell first, "You know I started making my leg prosthetic first? And it was absolute hell cause I only really had one arm to work with and thought it would be a breeze, cause ya know, leg. It doesn't require the mechanical perfection that an arm with hands and fingers does. But God looking back do I see how stupid I was because if I had done the arm first, even a stupidly basic one, I could've worked with two hands! And it would've been twice as fast! But nooo, I was stubborn and made a leg with one arm in like, what was it? Half a year to a year?"
Kal listens, his smile growing wider as he imagines the story. He laughs as he pictures Zanna trying to make a leg with just one arm, and the look on her face once she realized she could have made an arm first. He grins, chuckling a bit. "That's a really long time! How did you get around?" He asks, gripping the edge of the table a bit softer.