The Great Below

The Doctor - Part 1

Octavia had imagined a doctor's office: boring white walls, linoleum floor. Ominous posters of the human anatomy or, worse, the plastic replicas of things never meant to be seen because they belonged in you – unnerving reminders of the fragile human condition on full display. She'd seen her share of offices like that. But the room Alex led her to looked more like a restaurant kitchen.

For one, it was big enough to be its own operating theater. The floor was a tile that continued halfway up the walls in a shade that used to be white but had faded to yellow. Most of the room's furniture was stainless steel: rows of cabinets like lockers against the long walls, tables and rolling carts and trays of surgical tools. Floor drains gaped like mouths under the tables. She supposed it would make cleaning as simple as spraying with a hose, but then she didn't want to imagine what would happen to a table that would warrant spraying it with a hose.

In the far corner, two ceiling-high bookcases crammed with medical texts dwarfed a desk between them. A pale blonde man sat there, taking notes, wearing a lab coat covered in old stains. The whole room was dirty like that, a patchwork of its own sordid history. Octavia had seen cleaner gas station bathrooms.

"We're closed," the man said, without looking at them.

"I know it's late, Brian," Alex began.

"I'm serious. If you're not dying and your friend there, if he's not dying, then it can wait until morning."

"She."

"Oh, I'm sorry. If she's not dying..." The man looked up, clacking his pen on the desk. "She?"

"Octavia, this is Dr. Brian Townsend. He's our resident doctor."

Townsend sent his office chair wheeling backward and came to see her more closely. His reluctance was apparent, up close. "I, uh, I may have said some things to Dominic about his stress level – I may have made some suggestions – but I can assure you that I never intended—"

"It's okay," Alex said. "She just needs a bed for the night."

"Oh." The doctor's face was already so pale that his eyebrows all but vanished against his skin and talking to her was gradually turning him pink. "It's nice to meet you."

Octavia hesitated, looking down at her blistering palm.

"Oh. Can I take a look?" Townsend asked. He inspected her hands without touching them. She'd expected a note of disgust, but the doctor couldn't have been more fascinated if she'd shown him an eleventh finger. "Somebody gave you the business. How bad is the pain?"

"It's bad. It's starting to itch."

"That's a stage of healing. Try not to scratch or it could get infected." He retreated to open one of the stainless-steel cabinets, returning with a small tube of ointment. Townsend squeezed a dollop of clear gel into her palm, encouraging her to coat both hands evenly.

"There are some bruises," Alex said. "On her torso."

Octavia glared at him.

"Let's see," the doctor replied.

She had been embarrassed enough when Dominic had yanked her shirt up to the bra line and paraded her in front of Alex; she didn't need to do the same in front of a doctor who, she knew damn well, didn't have an ointment in his cabinet that erased bruises. "It's nothing," she told him.

Townsend followed her glare over to Alex. "Why don't you wait outside?" he asked him. "This'll just be a minute."

Alex opened his mouth to protest; then, seeing that he was outnumbered, turned to leave.

"All right," Townsend said, and Octavia lifted her shirt and waited. The doctor was, thankfully, all business. Most doctors had the uncanny ability to look a person over with the same level of interest they might give a cadaver, or a textbook. Townsend pressed his fingers over a few spots, checking for tenderness. "There's nothing too serious. These should heal up on their own. I can get you some pain killers in the meantime."

"Thank you." She pulled her sweater back into place.

"He seems worried about you," he said. Townsend returned to his cabinets in search of another remedy.

It was true. Alex did seem worried. She'd known him for approximately two hours: a time in which he'd broken into an apartment, hauled her forcibly off a balcony, kidnapped her, shot what he'd believed to be her fiance and hand-delivered her to a man who had, thankfully, failed to assault her when he'd been sickened by the sight of her bruises. He wasn't winning any points for good intentions, but there was some genuine-looking concern there. "Is it possible," she ventured, "that you could let me out of here?"

The sound the doctor made in return was somewhere between a cough and a laugh. "Only one man makes that decision around here, and that's Dominic." He filled a disposable cup with water from a prep sink and returned with a pair of oblong white pills, offering them to her. "If the boss wants you to sleep here, I'd take him up on it. Everyone's in for the night and I don't expect you'll be interrupted."

Octavia hesitated a moment before taking the pills. "What is this place?" she asked.

"Uh...I'm sure Alex will tell you all about it." He led her to the back half of the room, where a handful of military-style cots lined the wall.

Octavia wasn't about to go to sleep in a new place with Victor dead and, at the same time, without her freedom. She had been linking the two for so long. There was also the problem of Dominic's threat; the unsubtle suggestion that she'd only been brought to their bunker for one thing – one thing she would absolutely not do, under any circumstances. Dr. Townsend went to the last cot and selected from a pile of folded blankets, tossing one down on the cot closest to where she was standing.

"Settle in while I get Alex," Townsend said. "Yell if you need something."

But she'd done that before, and with no result. Octavia didn't see what good it was going to do now.

#

Alex glanced at his watch, whose numbers blurred and ran together. It was well after midnight. He stifled a yawn as the Infirmary doors swung apart.

"She'll be all right," Doctor Townsend said. "Not that I've treated a lot of women down here."

Alex courtesy-smiled. "You remember what they look like, though."

"Who is she?" Townsend had never been great with jokes, his or Nick's. Alex couldn't decide if it was because their jokes were stupid and he was ignoring them, or if his social awkwardness had surpassed the spectrum that included autism and went straight on 'til morning.

"Victor's girlfriend," he replied.

"I thought the rule was new guys only get to bring one suitcase. Are you keeping an eye on her or is she okay alone in there?"

"I'll stay," Alex said.

There was, technically, a single suitcase rule. It kept guys from bringing entertainment systems, furniture, making a big hassle out of moving in or out. If their contracts were short and they didn't have anyone to watch their things, they took out storage units for six months or a year. At the boxing club, Victor hadn't brought so much as a gym bag. Alex hadn't questioned it at the time. No clothes, no toothbrush. All he'd wanted – and he'd wanted it enough to try and strangle Nick to death – was his girl.