#someone docit

[chimivx]

Need someone to edit Chandler holding the MAXIDENT album pls.

[vaciena]

Controversial opinion but uh,,,,,, school shootings aren’t your new fun fic trope to play around in stop acting like it is

[doctorlaelia-ffxiv]

Proving Grounds

“Don’t you think it’s weird that a Tribunus’ daughter would reach this position at her age? Obviously she had her father pull some strings.”

 “Women don’t have the head needed for surgery. They get too emotional!” 

 “Have you seen the body on her? And the face? There’s no way she didn’t lay a few professors to get here. I heard that her and Professor Manius were a little too close... Lots of late nights spent in his office and lab together... Hah!” 

 “Are they serious-- I’m going to go break up their little rumor mill.”

 I turned turned my head to see the tall young doctor beside me starting to turn and make his way towards the group that we’d just passed. Half-smiling, I reached out and grabbed his arm, pulling him back to my side. He looked at me and frowned, thick blond brows furrowed over sea green eyes.

 “I’ve heard all of it,” I told him. “Don’t worry, Quintus. They’ll say what they say. I just have to prove that I’ve earned my place here.”

 “You don’t have to prove anything,” he said, frustrated, as he fell back into step with me. “You did everything by yourself - everything. I even offered to take notes to share with you when you were so sick you couldn’t get out of bed back in school, and you said no, and dragged yourself to the lecture hall anyway. They don’t know a thing about you, or how hard you work, or--” 

 “They don’t,” I agree, turning the corner and glancing down at the chart in my arm. “Starting a fight with them about it while you’re on duty won’t teach them anything about me. They’ll probably think you’re just another doctor that I’m sleeping with. I have to go change the dressings of a patient in the ICU.” 

 Before he could open his mouth and argue again, I was already halfway down the hall, my heels clicking against the floor. In truth, the rumors that circulated around me had stopped giving me a headache a long time ago. They were like a callous. I was aware of them, of course, but they didn’t sting or burn like they did when they were blisters. They’d chased me since I first entered medical school two years earlier than one was meant to. It didn’t make sense that a sixteen year old would graduate and instantly enter pre-med, but there I was, doing just that.

 Now I had reached fellow status at the hospital, and somehow, the rumors didn’t stop coming. I assisted in and conducted successful surgeries, had written a brilliant thesis, even helped the research of a rare disease that had come under my care by suggesting the doctor in charge try a non-standard form of surgery. Regardless, I would always be the ‘hot doctor,’ the one that surely used her body or her connections to get where she was. You never heard them whispering, ‘she has an IQ of 161.’ That was irrelevant. 

 “Doctor Caelius!” someone cried from behind me, just as I was about to step in through the doors of the ICU. I turned, looking to the frantic nurse that was chasing after me. “There’s an emergency. I can’t get a hold of Doctor Pullus and he’s the surgeon on call, we need you--” 

 “What’s going on?” I asked, turning away from the ICU and running after the nurse as we made our way to the emergency room, taking the stairs two at a time and weaving past other personnel. Patients in wheelchairs and walking with their IVs blinked as we rushed past.

 “There’s a pilus primus in the emergency room with apparent head trauma,” is all the nurse said. That’s all it took for me to start sprinting faster, regretting the high heeled boots I’d opted for to wear during my rounds as my heels started to ache with the impact of each foot fall. 

When we reached the emergency room, it was chaos. There were armed guards surrounding a man slumped over in a chair, and all of the doctors and nurses that were there were apparently not being allowed access to him. One of the guards was shouting for a doctor, ignoring the nurse at his elbow as she tried to force her way through the crowd and to the injured pilus primus. 

 “We’re not letting a woman treat the pilus!” the guard shouted. “Get a man, immediately!” 

 I slowed, eyes zeroing in on the pilus in question. His face was completely drained of color, and his head was lolling against his chest, eyes half open but entirely unfocused. Blood was seeping out from beneath his thick white hair, and his lip was fat and bruised, the guards around him looking nervous. Even still, they didn’t exactly look like Garlean military material; they looked more like a gang that had lied their way into the hospital. 

 I watched Quintus starting forward, but I was faster than him. As the guard that had been shouting was distracted by my surgeon friend, I ducked beneath his arm and made my way to bleeding man, pulling the little pen-flashlight from the pocket of my coat. There was a roar of outrage by the other guards, but security had, thankfully, finally shown up. Just as I felt a hand on my shoulder to pull me back, it was gone, the burly security guards holding the rowdy group at bay. 

 “Are you able to speak?” I asked as I examined the man’s pupils and checked his pulse. He looked like hell. We didn’t have a lot of time to waste.

 “Don’t wanna womandor... women docit... doto-...” He tried to glare up at me, but the effect was lost when it was clear that he couldn’t clearly articulate. 

 “Get a CT scan immediately and prepare an operating room,” I said, straightening up and turning only to feel the man grab the back of my coat.

 “No,” he managed to snap as I turned my head back to him. “Notyu--... Not YOU... Man!” 

 “You’re experiencing something called dysphasia,” I said, pulling my coat out of his bloodied hand. “Which is why you aren’t able to speak properly. There’s a lesion on your brain from blunt force trauma, by the looks of it. Apart from that, my professional opinion is that you’re suffering from an epidural hematoma. Basically, your brain is bleeding. Eventually, it could start to move around in your skull and cause brain damage, or it could very well kill you. We won’t know that for sure until we get a scan, but I have a pretty good feeling.” 

 Turning fully, I braced my hands on the arms of the chair on either side of him and leaned in close to his face again while security was attempting to escort the armed guards out of the hospital. I was acutely aware that I was being watched by the whole room, as well as the bleeding man. He was young, probably only in his late twenties or early thirties. 

 “I’m your best bet at the moment,” I told him in a low voice, meeting his gaze. “I’m a very good surgeon. And I’m willing to bet I’m the only surgeon that wouldn’t be really angry that a group of gangsters came in and lied to the staff that they were part of the Garlean military. You know it’s illegal to impersonate law enforcement and military, right? They’d all treat you, of course - it’s in our oath - but you don’t want an annoyed surgeon. It decreases the success rate.” 

 Straightening up, I was able to turn without being grabbed again and nodded to Quintus as I passed. His mouth was half open. 

 “I’ll be leading the surgery. This one is my new patient,” I said, gesturing behind me with a thumb. “CT scan. Stat!” 

I exhaled as I removed my surgical mask and gloves, rubbing my hand against my cheek. It had been exactly as I predicted: an epidural hematoma. Fortunately, the surgery had been a success - if a long process - and I felt like I could breathe again. Talking a big game was one thing. Making good on it was another subject entirely. The patient would be moved to the ICU, and we’d figure out his actual identity from either his bodyguards or him, when he woke up. 

 “Laelia!” Quintus called out as he quickly followed me out of the operating theater. I smiled tiredly at him and reached up, patting his arm.

 “Good work today,” I told him, continuing to walk. He kept pace with me as he removed his own mask and gloves, disposing of them as he moved.

 “That was amazing. All of it! In the emergency room, and the surgery-- you do it everything so quickly and neatly, you knew his diagnosis right away-- You’re incredible. Really. I don’t think there’s anything that brain of yours can’t do.”

 “You’re going to make me blush if you keep that up,” I joked, nudging him with my elbow. 

 “Let’s go out for tea sometime,” he blurted out. “Like, um... As a man and a woman. Not as colleagues. There’s a cafe that opened up with a ton of new kinds that our traders got from Kugane, so--”

 “I don’t like tea,” I replied breezily. “And I need to look over the surgical reports before I call it a night. Doctor Pullus will be looking for me when he finds out what happened to probably question my methods. Tell him I went home.” 

 I kept walking but Quintus didn’t. I didn’t mind the sudden silence at my side, too satisfied with myself to care.

“Don’t you think it’s weird that a Tribunus’ daughter would reach this position at her age? Obviously she had her father pull some strings.”

“Women don’t have the head needed for surgery. They get too emotional!”

“Have you seen the body on her? And the face? There’s no way she didn’t lay a few professors to get here. I heard that her and Professor Manius were a little too close... Lots of late nights spent in his office and lab together... Hah!”

"Fuck you guys,” I muttered, making my way to the locker room to change.