| License to Ill |
| Summary: | Trask is admitted to the Sickbay, and Cidra seeks answers from DeMaratus. |
| Date: | 25 Mar 2042 AE |
| Related Logs: | Ill Communication directly precedes this log; Contagious Party, Finding a Trail, Free Man, and Aches, Pains, and Rashes all involve sickness among the deckhands |
| Players: |
    |
| Sickbay - Deck 10 - Battlestar Cerberus |
|---|
| Post-Holocaust Day: #392 |
| Being able to accommodate combat casualties requires room, and the Sickbay has it. Beds line each side of the room with privacy curtains strung up and readily available. Large vaulted lockers hold access to the supplies at the far end of the area. Nearer the front, a Petty Officer sits ready to dispense simple items like ibuprofen and aspirin. Further to the rear is an area prepped twenty-four hours a day for emergency surgery. To the side are a set of double doors that lead to the Recovery Ward where patients can recuperate. |
| Condition Level: 3 - All Clear |
Not long after a yeoman placed a call to Medical for a stretcher to be sent to the naval offices, the dispatched medics and their quarry return. Dressed in his duty greens, Trask is hauled in, looking quite crap and rather out of it, to put it in layman's terms. To the attending orderly, one of the medics relays, "He's burning up. One-oh-three point two. Suffering from chills and obvious weakness. Also has some kind of rash along his neck and jaw. Might go further down."
Cidra enters Sickbay well behind the medics hauling Trask, a look of taut concern on her features. She stays out of the way as they get him settled but she lingers in Sickbay proper.
"Another one," DeMaratus murmurs to himself, frowning as he moves swiftly alongside the stretcher and indicates a spare rack for them to lay the stricken Trask up in, "How long has he been like this?" Rather than reach for the thermometer, the doctor goes for testing temperature the old fashioned way and presses the back of his hand against the man's forehead. He frowns once more and continues to look over the patient carefully.
Moved to the designated area and hoisted up, Trask's protests come out as little more than a groan that is part irritation and part overall body aching.
"According to Pee-Oh Two Lopez, the yeoman who made the call," the medic continues, "the rash wasn't visible 20 minutes ago. She noticed it maybe 5. Said he'd been coughing for a few days and seemed a bit tired, but that he was performing his duties just fine. Shortly after he came on shift today, though, he sent her to the quartermaster's office to get a portable space heater. When she returned, she said he seemed kind of drowsy and that she assumed it was a side-effect of some cold syrup. Major Hahn arrived not long after that, found him unresponsive, and ordered a stretcher."
"He has not complained of any medical difficulty over the past days, but then, I doubt he would," Cidra adds, for her part, after the medic gives DeMaratus the gist of it. "He has been showing up for his shifts and the office personnel said he had something resembling a 'cold' for the past few days. Doctor, have you any idea what might be wrong with him?"
"We're working on what it is," DeMaratus answers Cidra, still looking Trask over critically, "If you ask for my professional opinion, I'd say they're reacting to something - possibly something in the flight pods. All the patients spend time there. But I can't be certain yet." He glances down at Trask, leaning close to try and make eye contact once again, "Are you hearing me alright, Captain?" He looks up to a nearby orderly, "Don't worry about the fever just yet, it'll likely break on its own. Major?" A glance to Cidra, "I'm likely going to have to quarantine him as well. I've got to control the spread of whatever this is as tightly as possible."
Another groan is the reply, equally as testy as the other one was. If that isn't enough indication that he's hearing okay, Bootstrap quasi-mutters, "Frak… that…" In regard to being quarantined. "Jus' gimme suhthin'." A vexed exhale and, "'s jus' the frakkin' flu." As if he's gonna sit idle and have his ass handed to him for something less than pneumonia, meningitis, or some other infection that can result in death if left untreated.
Except, well, here he is /laying/ idle, at least.
A nod from Cidra, as to the quarantine. "Do what you must, Doctor. The flight pods?" This makes the already-concerned frown on her face deepen. "Do you think this might spread among the rest of the flight crew? I have noted no other cases among the pilots but, with all coming off the strain of the Swarms, there is much fatigue. It may have gone unnoticed."
"If I tell you it's hemorrhagic smallpox will you promise to stay?" DeMaratus asks of the grouchy ECO, frowning as he gestures for the orderlies to help him roll Trask over onto his side so he can listen to him breathe through his stethoscope. Once he's done that, he looks up to Cidra, "Every patient that's been admitted so far works there. It's the most logical conclusion. And if that's not it, it's the best place to start looking."
"No," is the reply, spoken like a cranky child who wants to be left alone. Not that it's really his call. Outspoken, blunt pain-in-the-ass that he is, Trask still won't disobey an order — especially one of Cidra's — that he doesn't find morally repugnant. And, annoying as all of this is, being pissed off isn't at all the same thing as an affront to his conscience.