Marvelled at a first date (Part 1)

Posted on Friday, 20 November 2020 - 4:24pm by Lieutenant JG Adrianna Eberhardt

Mission: Operation: Ouroboros

By lunch the next day Ryan was feeling much more like himself. He’d stepped down to a pain killer that didn’t leave him loopy, and thought within 48 hours he wouldn’t even need that. He knew the key to walking into the hospital without his name on a patient list was more attitude than anything else. He put on his full uniform, and lab coat, then asked the front desk which OR a Scarlet Rogers was working in, all official like.

Scarlet was in the process of firing up the OR bed. It flashed up code and she was mending little bits of it to fine tune it. She was completely focused and was talking to herself, ticking off things in her mental list.

Once Ryan was informed where she was, he made his way to find Scarlet. He paused in the doorway, just watching her work for a moment, a smile on his face. He cleared his throat though after a bit.

Scarlet finished up and shut down the back end system, leaving a 'dummy' on the table ready for testing, "sorry doctor, its ready for you to test now- oh, Ryan." A smile graced her lips, seeing him. Was he here to apologise or because he actually remembered her kindness?

“Hello.” He smiled in return. “As much as I’d actually love to test it, I don’t think they would appreciate me mucking about in their OR without permission. But does this mean you are free for lunch?”

"It's only an upgrade for speed of hand change," she replied, "the head surgeon here is right handed but the CMO is left. They often complain that the change lags far too much for emergencies." She looked back to Ryan, "but yes, I'm free for lunch."

“Great. How about the gardens?” He offered. They weren’t far and were nice this time of year.

Scarlet nodded and gestured for him to lead the way, "you look a bit less foggy than last night."

Ryan grinned. “Yes, sorry about that. I have vague memories, Hopefully I didn’t do anything terribly embarrassing?”


"I could lie to you and tell you how mean you were and how awful it was, but we really didn't speak a lot and you were out for count quickly," Scarlet answered honestly with a grin.

“Well that’s good. Thank you for putting up with me.” He replied, smiling again. “So, about that upgrade.” He couldn’t help but to talk ‘shop’ just a bit. “I’m the only surgeon on my ship, and if needed the EMH, but he’s ambidextrous. It’s not a bad idea though. If the one other doctor ever needs to perform surgery.

"It only takes two minutes to install, and it doesn't even need to be done by an engineer, technically," she reemed off some stats and figures finishing with, "so yes, lag time is reduced to 0.02 seconds."

“I’ll get the specs from you.” He smiled.

"I'm like your EMH, but for the negative: useless with both hands," she teased at her own expense before saying, "a lot of the doctors here call me 'Q' because I have all new gadgets and stuff. I'd prefer to be more an Iron Man since he was an inventor, but less explosive."

“Iron man is definitely cooler.”

"Right?" her eyes widened at his appreciation for Marvel, "he's rich, famous and just all round cool where as Q gets walked all over, and is such a nerd."

Ryan chuckled. As they reached the gardens he smiled. “Wow, this place hasn’t changed since my academy days.” He spotted the same kabob stand, knowing what he was going to get for lunch.

Scarlet smiled at him reminiscing before ordering something simple from the cart, "so, is this an apology lunch because you really didn't do anything wrong and I'm not expecting anything."

Ryan raised a brow. “No. I just wanted to get to know you better. You’re nice to be around.” He added with a slight blush.

Scarlet couldn't help but blush a little," you spent maybe 5 minutes with me, on painkillers."

He chuckled. “This is true, but I’m not loopy now.” They made their way to a table, being shaded by some nearby trees. “It was enough for me to want to know more.” He responded. “Worse comes to worse, we get a decent lunch out of it.”

That made her giggle. To be fair, it had been a while since someone had taken an interest in her. It was nice to not eat alone too. She had to tease him though, "you just want the other upgrades."

He grinned, playing along. “Oh, absolutely. I’m actually an undercover agent here for advanced tech. Seriously though, how did you get into medical engineering slash inventing. It’s got to be a niche field.”

"I knew it!" She exclaimed, teasing him before answering his question, "I wanted to be a doctor. I just had one huge problem that meant I only lasted one week in med school--" she leant in a little and whispered, "I faint at the sight of blood."

He smiled. “That’s actually fairly common. I’d say it was just the universes way of pushing you in another direction.”

Scarlet nodded, "I still wanted to be in medical but didn't know how. My dad always said I was an inventor. I used to help him restore classic vehicles and help him round his little engineering shop. So, I specialised. Since there's an anti gore function on the dummies, I was good to go. You like the other doctors here- being in medical is in the family?"

“ummm.” Ryan was momentarily caught off guard. “No actually. Dad’s a lawyer, and Mom’s a history professor.” He smiled. It wasn’t often that he called Jack and Bev Mom and Dad, and it still felt odd, but not in a bad way.

"Oh wow," she looked impressed, "so I know who to come to for pub quizzes."

Ryan chuckled. “And who to call if you get arrested.” He took a bite before continuing. “Do you still help him work on old cars?” He could picture it, Scarlet with car oil and grime on her hands.

"No, he passed some years ago," she waved off any sympathy coming, "the shop is still there though. I pop back once in a while for a holiday. Nice to go back to your roots. Last time I was there, they were fixing this thing - some car from the early twenty-first or second century. I swear it looked like the batmobile from the 1980's."

Ryan’s eyes lit up. He could tell she didn’t want the canned “I’m sorry for your loss’ So he just nodded and let it go. “That’s awesome. That car is cool. We won’t discuss my adolescent desire to be Robin. The original Robin of course.”

"Not sure I want to imagine you in tights," she giggled.

Ryan blushed and burst into giggles as well.

"I mean I'm sure you have nice legs, but tights aren't for us all," she chuckled, "and DC really did like their skin tight stuff. Marvel had way better costumes."

“What?” Ryan was mock outraged. “Wolverine, ‘nuff said.” Things escalated from there, but only playfully. Food was finished, but the afternoon drug on quite a bit past lunch.

Scarlet's badge soon interrupted requesting her presence. "I'm sorry, I have to go, I didn't realise the time. We should do this again sometime, even if you are a DC guy."

Ryan realized the time as well. “I’m sorry for keeping you.” He quickly stood up, gathering the remnants of their meal. “I’ll take care of this.” He smiled. “Dinner?”

Scarlet blinked," that soon? Wow. I won't say no. Shall I meet you here?"

He wanted to take her some place different, but she was in a hurry, and here would work “Sure.”

"I get off at 1800," she replied as she hastily walked back into the main hospital.