Sickbay -- Day 10, evening [backdated & private/finished]

[my_god_man]

It was on the late side for the CMO to be working away in Sickbay. Even better, it was supposed to be Leonard's day off. But leave it to an underling -- Anderson, specifically, again -- to royally fuck up something as simple as a growth culture. Except this culture -- synthflesh for grafting purposes -- was anything but simple. And his

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[my_god_man]

His scowl deepened at the sass Scott had the audacity to throw him. In his own fucking medbay, while Leonard had been doing him a favor. He wanted so badly to give the man a sizable chunk of mind, but he had to be a professional even on off hours. Still, he didn't move or say anything more for a moment. He wasn't gonna heel for some fuzzy little engineer, no matter how cute he'd been earlier. More importantly, he wasn't gonna do anything that might endanger a patient, despite that whole supposed allergy thing. His hands weren't gonna touch his patient until they could do so with sensitivity

[transwarp_beam]

Scotty just grinned. He quite frankly lacked the emotional attention span to stay angry for long, and from an objective standpoint this was pretty amusing.

"I don't know details," Scotty said with a very cautious one-shouldered shrug, "Doctor said it was an allergy and I took him at his word. First founf out about it..." He tapped his chin thoughtfully. "Oh christ, that. Aye. Seven years old, strapped into the dentist's chair. Was getting some teeth out. She gives me the hypo right in the gum, waits a few minutes - taps my jaw and asks if I can feel it. I say 'aye'. She says 'don't be daft' and starts in anyway. Haven't been near a dentist of my own free will since. What kind of person can ignore a child screaming in pain?"

"Next time they tried to give me a local hypo was about three months later, and I freaked out so badly they couldn't get near me. Gave me some sorta sedative. It didn't work out like it was probably meant to - I was bouncing off the walls for days after. Never had any sorta drugs just work like they're meant to."

[my_god_man]

That brow was back up the more Scott went on about his experiences. Goddamn, this man was gonna be tricky to figure out. He made some notation, when back to the tricorder and programmed in a new scan. Carefully made to lean in, so as not to spook the medically-shy -- despite that sudden, nearly-bipolar smile -- engineer. And with good reason too, from his stories. McCoy's face made it clear what he thought about that. It was one thing to under-medicate a reduction. Those things hurt like a bitch under most any situation. But at least it was brief and you were on your way to healing. But to have continued a procedure under obvious discomfort? Well, that wasn't right

[transwarp_beam]

"Nope," Scotty replied, "Never been under. Really don't fancy it. I've heard horror stories - y'know, some people react to general, awake but paralysed...things like that. Don't wanna find out the hard way if I'm one of them." He tried not to tense under the tricorder, but it was a hell of an effort of will. "You'll have to forgive my paranoia, doctor. My experiences with your profession have been...pretty unpleasant, for the most part."

And wasn't that the understatement of the century. The triptacederine worked, so he'd stuck with it, but nothing else he'd ever taken had done what it was supposed to. On more than one occasion he'd ended up telling his attending not to bother dosing him. In some strange - probably psychological - way, it was easier to deal with the pain when he didn't have some doctor looking down their nose it him like he was imagining it.

[my_god_man]

A snort issued from behind Scott. McCoy rolled his eyes at the engineer's manic imaginings. True that each person's reactions were different from the next. In the hands of a gifted and dedicated physician, though, you could work around that. "No.... I don't suspect they have been, even if a fourth of what you said was true. Just remember, though, I'm the CMO. I'm not some underfunded, understaffed, patient-swamped poor cuss who wasn't trained for the stress he finds himself in. I have 13 years of training and experience as a doctor, and Starfleet's stress enough to fly any ship right. Hell, I've been a doctor longer than I've been a father."

And just to keep that snarky Scottish mouth in check, he inspected the area of the former subluxation. His fingers weren't ungentle, just lightly probing and testing the tissues. Yep, scan and fingers confirmed that at least this medication was working well enough. He reached around Scott for the hypo of booster, then paused and checked that damn medfile again to be safe. Nope, wasn't

[transwarp_beam]

He shifted his shoulder a little experimentally - now that the initial pain was past, he was beginning to appreciate the novelty of being able to move his arm again. At the very least his shoulder had stopped making those unpleasant gristly crunching noises every time he moved it. That was a definite improvement. He figured that qualified the good doctor for a little trust.

"Go ahead, doc," he said, grinning at him.

[my_god_man]

Scott got another snort, but also a grudging little grin. McCoy made the injection as quick and easy as possible. Followed the progress with the tricorder for a moment, found himself reasonably pleased. Like he said, the tissues began to tingle, feel a little warm, but there was no pain. More data was entered on the PADD while he thought over a few things.

"Well, I don't have to tell ya, Chief, how unsafe working on a starship can be. I'm not comfortable waiting for something to happen, and trying to figure what to do then. God forbid it ever happen, but someday you might need to be put under. I'd like to try some clinical tests to see if we can find something that'll work. Now, don't get yer fancy little boxers in a twist." He cast an amused glance down, then back up to his face. "I'm not gonna do anything painful or gory to ya. These will be controlled sensory tests, designed with your comfort in mind. And only so we won't be up a shit creek later. For now though, it's gettin' late and we still have to finish this

[transwarp_beam]

"Sure," Scotty replied with another carefully one-shouldered shrug. He chose not to dignify the comment about his boxers with a response: that had been one of his university coursemates' idea of a a joke, after that ill-conceived roadtrip to Inverness they'd all agreed they were never going to speak of again. "Sure, if you think it'll help. Better to take the time now that have to wing it later, right?"

[my_god_man]

"Exactly. Good. I'll let ya know when I have the lab time for it." And Anderson wouldn't be around to fuck things up again. "So let's get on with this. First, how's the shoulder so far?" He looked over the medfile, this time less to confer and more to verify information. "It says in here that you're also allergic to asinolyathin and metorapan. Are these actual allergies, or more of the non-reaction sorta thing?" Thankfully, the muscle relaxant he'd used wasn't asinolyathin. And he tended to favor bicaridine over metorapan as an analgesic because the latter was more common for allergies.

[transwarp_beam]

"'S a lot better," Scotty replied, giving an experimental shrug. He took the lack of screaming agony as a promising sign. "I missed being able to do that. The asinolyathin was another non-reaction. The metorapan caused..." How had the doctor put it? "...localised swelling and loss of fine motor control."

[my_god_man]

Well, it'd be ungentlemanly to be outright smug about a thing, so Leonard settled for smirking more at Scott's admission. Sometimes patients squawked the loudest before the best healing. He edited the medfile further about the drugs, raising his brows at the tolerance-like quality of his reaction to asinolyathin. Damn good thing he'd used something else. But now he had another mystery on his hands. Why tolerance to a muscle relaxant, and preference for another? The chemical properties were different enough that the answer could lie in that. He'd have to look into that more after tomorrow's assignment. It would certainly be more interesting than studying some sex pollen. He was a doctor, not a damn male escort.

"Alright, I think that covers the old stuff in your file. I still need to scan your spine for MS indicators. And while yer back there, just go ahead and drop the nessies." McCoy was already reaching for a pair of surgical gloves when the words sunk in with the engineer.

[transwarp_beam]

"I'll thank you not to malign my underwear," Scotty said with an entirely feigned air of dignity.

He didn't know why he was being asked to get naked. He wasn't sure - especially given the slightly ominous presence of the rubber gloves - that he wanted to know why he was being asked to get naked. But as many of his old drinking buddies from university would attest, he had never been shy about stripping off when the occasion called for it. And apparently the occasion called for it. With a shrug - damn it felt good to be able to do that again! - he wriggled out of his boxers and hopped back up onto the biobed, entirely unselfconscious.

[my_god_man]

Leonard actually chuckled this time at Scott's joke as he slipped on the gloves. He was finding it easy to fall back into ease with the man, as charming as he was. Picking up the tricorder again, he turned back around with some sass on his tongue.

And then on the floor, with his damn jaw. And the tricorder.

Holy shit, he hadn't thought things had gotten that easy!

He... just stood there, blinking like a damn confused traffic light. Certainly had the brains of one for a minute there. Not that expecting to see the man's backside would have been all that different. But... well, hell, he'd been expecting some ass!

Bad wording. Bad, bad wording

[transwarp_beam]

It took every ounce of self control he had not to crack up at the expression on McCoy's face: as it was, he suspected he wasn't doing a very good job of hiding his internal hysterics. His grin felt like it might split his face.

"You could just've said," Scotty said mildly, swinging his legs over the biobed and grinning at the doctor over his shoulder.

[my_god_man]

He had himself another of those painful, nasal-distressing noises of amusement over Scott's glibness. Then just plain ol' cut loose with a loud, belly-deep bark of a laugh at the man's.... heh, cheeky grin over the cheeks. Oh, sass like that deserved a spanking.

... He didn't just have that Very Unprofessional thought.

"Goddamn, man," Leonard muttered with a simultaneous eye roll and head-shake, he was that amusingly exasperated. The place got hotter and smaller as he came up... eh, behind, Scott. Rolled his eyes again as that impossible grin got impossibly wider and those mismatched eyes twinkled like binary stars. "Yanno, I think there's actually a law against havin' this much fun durin' a physical. Quit it. It ain't natural." He fiddled with the tricorder a little clumsily, think he may have given Scott some sort of wrong-headed idea as the hand scanner kinda slipped. Put his hand on the man's good shoulder and definitely gave one of them something wrong-headed. Leaned in with a chuckle and

[transwarp_beam]

He was actually shaking with supressed laughter. Surely that would interfere with the scan? He tried to get a grip of himself...oh, and that so wasn't the best way to phrase it. He tried to control himself - that was better - but with limited success.

...whoa, where was that tricorder going? "Come on, doc. A classy fella like yourself should at least buy me a drink first."