taxonomites | [ location: castle summers ] [ accidental visual ]

Mirrors haven't been high on Dawn's list of priorities since they brought her back from Wolfram and Hart. Her arm is in a cast courtesy of Dr. McCoy, and every single part of her aches. It's pretty obvious whatever stares back from the mirror is going to be a refugee from the latest Lifetime movie, not the face she's used to seeing. There's no point, right?

...But that's not it, either. She's scared, doesn't want to see. So in the five seconds of alone time she's given today (and she feels a little bad about snapping at everyone about wanting three stupid seconds to herself, but this isn't a group activity) Dawn heads to the bathroom and flips on all the lights, takes a deep breath.

And looks.

It's not as bad as it could be, she thinks critically, setting her tablet behind her on the shelf thing Xander built (she's aware that she hated the tablets like three weeks ago, and clutching the stupid thing like security blanket isn't making her look any less unaffected, but if she had it more available when Angelus... anyway. Maybe this wouldn't have happened at all.) and turning back to the mirror. She's kind of pale, but that's not that much worse than normal. The bruise on her cheek is going down, and the black eye fading to a sickly yellow green.

But it's not the face that was the worst, so after a deep breath and some frustrated muttering-- taking clothes off while in a cast kind of sucks forever, thanks for asking-- she surveys the damage that way. The bruises on her abdomen still look gross, and the imprint of Angelus' hand is still on her forearm. (And her shoulders and turning around, wrapping around her waist and lower back from where he picked her up and squeezed, like a really sick parody of a father lifting up his daughter and twirling her around. Angelus is big on irony.) There are scrapes all along her back and shoulders, from trying to get away. If she lifted the leg of her sweatpants, she already knows all she'll see is the same red, painful abrasions that circle her wrists.

Standing at the mirror for a moment, Dawn just tries to breathe. She's alive, she's fine, she's as home as anyone can get while simultaneously being kidnapped by aliens/robots/hamsters. She's okay. Everything's okay, everything's okay, everything's not okay.

"Crap." The word is more of a sob, and anyone watching their tablets will catch it; along with a bruised and scraped bare lower back, and the owner of the back hunched forward, breathing deeply.

[ ooc: rumi here you go. now come with me to hell. we will go to hell, go straight to hell. we will not pass go or collect two hundred dollars.

ON ANOTHER NOTE lj is sucking, so if i owe you a tag and seem to be lagging i would be SO GRATEFUL if you could pm/im/email me because i probably have no idea that tag is even there. B| ]

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McCoy is unaware of the visual feed accidentally broadcast over the tablets and thus is unable to give Ruby a good tongue lashing at what the blonde said to her. His cantankerousness at anyone giving her a hard time would have to wait though; but thanks to those old fashioned southern gentleman traits drilled into his head as he was growing up in Georgia, he does not just barge into her room. Her reply was a good start though.

"Can I come in?" He asks, somewhat uncertainly, from behind the door. He refrains from mentioning the futurific technology that some people – cough Kirk cough – would find horrifying and rebuff his medical expertise.

Right now, McCoy is Dawn's favorite person. She loves her family, but the concept of personal space can be a little lacking sometimes. (And she's guilty of the same exact thing, but that's another story.) His waiting at the door earns definite bonus points.

"Hold on." With one last look, Dawn leaves the bathroom and shuts the door behind her, moving to sit on the bed. "Okay, I'm both clothed and not an emo mess." Both of those are debatable, pj broody girl, but fine.

McCoy raises an eyebrow before his hand moves to the handle and pushes the door open with a low creek. Just what the hell was an emo supposed to be? Perhaps that terminology was still raging on in the future somewhere, but it was lost on this country doctor. He doesn't voice this confusion as he walks into the room because of Cordelia's wicked tongue in the past about this subject and he has other things to concentrate at the moment; the welfare of this girl who seemed like a shadow of herself after what happened.

And so he began with an obvious cliché that seemed to cling to doctors when they approached their patients: "How are you feeling?" Perhaps he would bring up that emo comment later and try to get her laugh.

"Like Angelus beat me up a lot." It's honest, in a way; it's also a gigantic lie, because the physical injuries are the least awful thing right now. She would try another round of 'I'm fine' but that isn't even working on Levi, and he's not in her bedroom, wasn't there when they first found her.

"When can the cast come off?"

The otherwise lacklustre expression on his face turns into a grimace at her honest reply. Most patients tended to lie when he asked that question, but he admires her bravery... even if he is tempted to disregard his orders from Jim and the oath he swore to uphold when he became a doctor and do some serious hurt to Angelus. Or Angel. Whatever.

"Today, if you don't mind a bit of bone knitting." McCoy grumbles distractedly, placing his medical kit adorned with a silver caduceus next to the girl, opening it with an audible click and taking out the laser that will presumably be the item that will do most of the knitting.

"...I really hope that doesn't involve the things it sounds like it involves. Like turning my arm into a scarf." But she's already nodding and sitting up more so she can watch McCoy grab things. "Do I need to do anything?"

If she concentrates on her arm, on the details of healing, she can hold herself back from crying. This is the plan.

He pulls a face at that imagery Dawn suggests and the laser whirls to life between his fingers. "God no." McCoy had something of a phobia of twentieth century medicine; he regarded the surgeons back in that time as madmen waving their butcher knives, sewing people up like garments, doing more harm than they did good.

"You don't have to do anything except sit still." He watches her closely and then adds: "... Unless you want your ulna grafted to your humerus." It's a joke! McCoy is on fire. Or at least he will be when he is roasting on the flames of hell for that terrible gag only other surgeons would find funny.

"...I have no idea what that means." But she can't help looking concerned, and then: "Is that actually a danger, bones getting glued to other bones? Because I can just wait for it to heal, really."

Dawn cradles her arm close protectively, looking more suspicious of than interested in McCoy's doohickey than she did a second ago.

"No, it's not in danger of gluing your bones together." His 'doohickey' as she described it whirls again as he switches it on. He adores his medical equipment and makes no attempt to conceal that. "You'll feel a tingling sensation and it'll be stiff at first, but otherwise your arm will be healed."

Edited 2010-04-08 00:19 (UTC)

"No weird side effects?" But she holds her arm out now, albeit with slightly more trepidation than before. She still can't slot McCoy into a single, easy to understand box, but right now he's being nothing but comforting.

"No weird side effects." He promises Dawn. Angelus might have been this demonic superman, but he was a damn good doctor and it would do his best to rectify the damage that undead bastard caused. "You ready?"

[ location: castle summers ] [ accidental visual ] | o i'm going to be wounded

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]

[ location: castle summers ]