Without Anesthesia - A Parish of Hellebores

“Let me have a look at it,” Marinette said, leaning across his body to get a better view of the ugly, garish wound that spread itself across his lower abdomen like a wilting Hellebore.
“W-what are you doing?” he asked, stiffening. It had been months since he had physical contact this intimate, and lifetimes since he’d been in such an innocently compromising position.
“Hmm?” she asked, pretending not to hear the question as she gently probed the wound. It had an interesting quality to it—not quite wet, and not quite dry—although she was relieved to find it blanched quickly and normally. She suspected the presence of the cut may have created a full thickness burn, while the surrounding area suffered only superficially. “I’m assessing the severity of your injury,” she answered, as though from a textbook.  She straightened up and continued: “From what I can see, some parts of the wound are going to be healing faster than others. The bruising should clear up within a few days at most, and the outer layer of the burn should be gone by the end of the month. I’m not sure about the innermost ring, though…” she frowned, “We’ll need to see how it responds to treatment to determine whether or not you’ll need grafting.”
“O-oh…” he responded, utterly embarrassed that he had dared to consider the act one of intimacy. The response had been more than thorough, but she had not answered the question he had asked. Maybe she hadn’t understood his meaning.
“Sit tight,” she said with a smile that seemed too bright to accurately fit the situation.
She retreated into the secondary room in the far left corner of the tent, carrying her medical tray of tools to sanitize. To call this room by any name would seem inaccurate, for, despite being hardly a room at all, it served an array of functions. To the doctors, it was the operating room, where the major surgeries took place. To the nurses, it was a respite, away from the groping, grasping, pleading arms of the sick and injured. To all the staff, though, it was a storage room for every odd and end the hospital kept in its stock. It was here, Marinette took her first deep breath, as she carefully set the tray down on one of the makeshift counters that lined the side nearest to the cots.
“Flustered is a good look for you, Mari,” came a voice from behind. Marinette jumped, slamming down the tray with full force.
“Alya!” she began, in an attempt to reprimand her friend’s intrusion.
“Cool down, will you? You’re looking a little flushed,” Alya laughed, “or is that just a blush I see?”
“Shhh!” Marinette hissed, somehow implying there was anyone nearby who would be even remotely interested in what the two nurses had to say.
Alya raised an eyebrow, but she played along. “So, who’s the dreamboat?” she asked, a sly smile on her face.
“Ahhhh, uhhh….” Marinette stuttered, “Well, he had an arm injury and Chloe didn’t treat it properly, so after I finished remove—“
“No, dummy, I mean what’s his name?”
“His….”
Alya’s arched brow rose higher and higher as her lips pursed and her arms crossed.
“I mean….”
She sank into her hip and narrowed her eyes. ‘Typical Marinette.’
“You didn’t ask his name, did you?” Alya asked, finally.
“It… It wasn’t relevant!” Marinette responded defensively.
“Relevant to his injuries, or your love life?” she quipped.
“To his injuries, of course!” Marinette proclaimed, “I am a professional, after all.”
“Sure you are,” Alya laughed, relaxing out of her judgmental pose.
“I am, really!” She cried, turning her attention to her tray and picking up the thing with the tweezers once more. “See? Chloe bandaged his arm with this still inside. I got it out without issue.”
Alya examined the thing closely, squinting at it from behind her spectacles. “Another buckshot round. I pulled two of those out of a soldier’s leg about an hour ago.”
“Just two?” Marinette asked, puzzled.
“Well, yeah,” Alya responded. ‘Had she been unclear?’ “Is there a problem with that? It’s one more than you’ve got….”
“I mean…” Marinette began, “I didn’t have a chance to look at it when I first removed it. I didn’t realize what it was….”
“And…?”
“And, I mean… There’s only one… One and two…”
“One and two. I can count….”
“It’s… buckshot.”
“Yes, buck—Oh.”
Alya realized it too.
“If it’s buckshot… then where’s the rest?”

They stood in silence for a minute, exploring their options from best to worst. Buckshot is a volatile creation—a round filled with tiny pellets that spew through the air like black pepper. ‘Bam! Bam!’ and the marks it leaves behind are small and stinging, if not deadly. A direct spray is enough to leave any target riddled with holes.
“Which solider was it you treated?” Marinette asked, finally.
“Row 5, cot 12,” Alya replied. “I believe his name was—“

“Nino!”
“Hey, Knucklehead. Fancy meeting you here!” Nino laughed.
“What are the odds, right?” Seeing his best friend snapped him out of his daze in an instant. Somehow, despite there being nearly a hundred soldiers in the tent, their cots had wound up being back to back.
“What are the odds you’d end up with such a cookie?” Nino smirked, referencing both Marinette and Chloe.
“You… Oh, how long have you been watching?” he groaned. He was in for it now. Nino had to be the best wingman in the regiment, and that wasn’t just because he had dreams of joining the air force. Nino liked to brag that he could hook a couple up in 10 minutes or less—provided the band could play it hot. Nightclubs were his playground, and pretty girls were his favorite type of doll.
“Long enough, my friend,” Nino started in, “Now, you just need to tell me which one of them you liked better—“
“Please don’t say anything to her,” he pleaded, cutting Nino off before he could hatch his grand plan.
“What? Are you nuts? Neither one of them?“
“Please.”
“Fine.” Nino pouted, mad that his services weren’t currently required. He turned back around in his bed, and crossed his arms in a huff—checking in ever few seconds to make sure his displacement was being noted.

Marinette returned with a handful of antibacterial solutions and salves. She placed them back on the folding table she’d left at the head of the cot, and sat back down on her little stool. When she finally turned to face him, she found him oddly flushed.
She tried to question it, but her mouth wouldn’t form words, so she set her lips and got to work, dipping a piece of cotton in iodine and leaning all the way across to the far side of his torso to dab at the outskirts of the wound.
A sharp hiss escaped his lips as the liquid hit his skin. She’d been careful to stay away from the center of the affected area, which was still very raw, but it seems she hadn’t been careful enough. The iodine solution was alcohol based, and as such stung like a thousand burning needles to the skin. He was in pain once again.
“Talk to me,” she commanded, but she had nothing to say.
He stuttered, grasping for topics of conversation—his mind clouded with discomfort. Finally, he managed to spit out, “W-why are you leaning so close?”
It took her a second to register what he was asking. It was barely a question at all, much less one that made sense.
“Well, so I can see better, of course,” she replied, finally.
“No… I meant… I meant ‘Why…’ ‘Wouldn’t it be easier if you sat on the other side?’ So that you don’t have to lean across my legs, I mean….” He was blushing harder now.
“Oh.”  she said, dabbing on the last of the iodine. She sat up and turned away from him, realizing how odd her positioning must have seemed. She’d been working with soldiers of all shapes and sizes, with wounds of all sorts, in all manners of undress for month. Proximity had never been her concern before, and it had only grown less so as her time in the army went on. She supposed the real answer was that she simply hadn’t noticed how intimate a position she had chosen.
“My supplies are on this side,” she shrugged, forcing the color in her cheeks to return to normal before she turned back to him. “It’s easier than moving them.”
She picked up the Sulfanilamide powder and sprinkled an even coat over the central portion of the Hellebore—forcing herself to resume her favored lean, as though she hadn’t just come to the realization of it’s awkwardness.
“Are you done?” he asked, peering down at her through one eye. He was incredibly tense. His hands grasped at the blankets of the cot, balling into fists and holding on so tightly his knuckles were turning white. On his face he wore what appeared to be a prolonged wince, which he was only barely able to force himself out of in order to glance down at her to ask his question.
“Almost,” she apologized, “Just one last thing.”
As quickly as she could, she applied a generous coat of tannic acid to the entire area, wiped her hands on her apron, and stood up.
“Wait!” he cried, attempting to follow. Then, realizing the volume of his outburst he sat back down and nearly whispered, “Don’t I need a bandage?”
“With that much iodine?” she laughed, and then realized he almost assuredly had no idea, “No, you don’t need a bandage,” she concluded. “Now let me just check another chart, and I’ll be back to pick up my supplies in a second.”
Marinette walked around to the cot at the back of his. Row 5, Cot 12, just as Alya had said. She picked up the chart and looked it over.
“And your name is…?” she began.
“The name’s Nino, but you can call me whatever you like, sugar.”
“Nino!” he hissed from the cot across.
“I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” Nino chuckled, respecting his best friend’s plea for non-intervention.
Marinette scanned the chart. Name, age, tent assignment, division—not to mention a quick report of his injuries, scrawled in Alya’s impatient hand—there it was. His number: 50318.
She set the chart down and considered what she’d heard of the battle that day—The formation, the location, the plan of attack. As she mulled this over, she walked back around to the other cot and gathered her supplies. Both soldiers were still watching her, but she faked aloofness as she picked up the second chart to edit. She scanned it quickly and found what she was looking for: Number 50320, Adrien Agreste.