The doctor was working feverishly, trying to stop to get a good look at the damage as he controlled the bleeding. Eventually he looked up at Juan, 'Hm what happened?'
'He got into a fight with a super zombie and the thing bum rushed him into a car. The zombie hit him hard enough to break the car windows.'
'Hard enough to break his ribs! He is damn lucky he didn't get his back broken in the process. I don't see any bubbles, but there is no way to know if his diaphragm was ruptured, the wound is pretty low so I am betting there is damage, at least a tear.'
'So what does that mean? Is he gonna make it?' Juan asked nervously.
'Hm, should. He should, if his wounds don't get infected. He should be up and running around in couple of days, if it is just his ribs anyway, he is gonna be sore for a long while until they heal up. That is a best case scenario though, he might be down for months. This place has a pharmacy, but you know, I am not a pharmacist. Me mixing up antibiotics might not be such a good idea.' The doc paused in his bloody work, holding one gloved hand up against the gauze on Hank's back he gestured for Juan to pull the pen out of his breast pocket, 'Get the pad too. Beth write this down.' He then listed off several medicines and told the nurse to hand the list to Juan, 'You get into the pharmacy and see if there are any pills with those exact names already made up, I have been here a few times and they had the meds in white plastic bags hung with magnets near the 'pay here' sign, on the inside of the pharmacy above the counter. If there are any pre-made medicines with these names on the bottles and you bring them to me, okay?'
Juan nodded, said, 'si.' And took off through the door where he ran into a crowd of people looking anxiously on. He rapid fired a few words at them and two younger men ran off back into the warehouse store and one accompanied Juan over to the pharmacy, which was still locked up.
A metal grate was pulled down over the front of the entire store front, next to the open 'cafeteria' style service counter was a metal door, which was locked. The two younger men Juan had sent out had returned, one hefting an acetylene torch, the other had a pair of bolt cutters. Juan took the bolt cutters and broke the pad locks holding the metal grate to the floor. The grate came up. The man with the torch set it down and scrambled into the pharmacy over the counter, he then unlocked the door and let them all in. The four of them looked at the white plastic bags arrayed on a metal strip and held up with magnets, right where the doctor said they would be. Juan put the list of names up on the 'upper' counter top so everyone could read the four drugs the doctor had written there and the three of them started sorting through the bags. They ended up with seven bottles of medication that matched what the doctor needed.
Rushing back to the garage Juan pushed his way through to the door, quite a few of the men were still there, however enough were gone to make Juan think that the building would be well watched.
Inside the shop Kevin had taken his place by Hank's head. Juan held out the bag to the nurse who rifled through it and said, 'Yeah one of these will do just fine, probably no worry of infection if he takes these.'
Juan watched in fascination while the doctor stitched up Hank's back, nothing like how he thought stitches would be applied. After he put in a half dozen he looked up and said, 'I think that will do Beth, six should hold him together until he heals up, even given that I bet he will be moving around more than a normal patient.' Looking at Juan he said, 'Think we can convince him he needs to sit around for a few days?'
'Only if he can drink a few beers and watch television.' Juan joked.
The doc laughed, 'Hm, normally I would say 'no' to that, but you know we might not have many ways to manage the pain, alcohol and some time in one of those high end lazy boys out there might be all he gets!' Turning more serious he continued, 'We have to get these ribs wrapped though, not much else for it, Juan and, excuse me, what is your name son?' asked the doctor towards Kevin.
'Kevin.'
'Kevin, okay, you and Juan are going to have to help me with that, Hank weighs too much for me to handle by myself. Let me get him bandaged up first then we wrap him like a mummy. Almost.'
Another half hour and Hank was wrapped up from his nipples down to his belly button. The doctor had Juan call through the door for someone to get some orange juice out of the cooler, one of the gallons, which he had them set by one of the recliners, then he called in a few men to move Hank gently to a blanket. Three men lined up on each side of the blanket and gently lifted Hank up to carry him over to the chair, where they sat him down. Turning the chair towards a nearby television they pretty much formed a circle around Hank, watching him and waiting.
Juan started to ask the doc a question, the doctor spoke up first, 'I don't know Juan, he probably passed out from a combination of pain and blood loss. Not to mention I bet he has not been sleeping all that well the last few days, I know I haven't. His body, like yours, needs a break. We need to get some juice into him, plus one of each of these pills, this one for pain, this one for infection. I would start an IV, or rather have Beth start one, but we don't have the equipment, unless you boys want to head to a hospital and scrounge some supplies up? I don't know if we need to yet, time will tell. I will say this, I have been practicing a long time and I have seen a lot of wounds from my time in the various emergency rooms I worked in, I think he will be fine. A good sleep and he will wake up screaming in pain, give him some pain killers and let him sleep another day and I bet he will be up moving around, that is what my gut is telling me. Meanwhile, you and a…Kevin, is it? Yeah, Kevin, should probably sit down in chairs on either side of Hank and take a load off for awhile, okay? Let me take a look at the two of you first, make sure you aren't hurt or anything.'
The doc looked both of them over, applied hydrogen peroxide to their scrapes and looked at all their bruises. Finally he said, 'You'll survive, probably you just need some rest, so, rest!'
Reluctantly Juan slide into the chair next to Hank, he immediately had two of the smaller children crawl into his lap, Kevin sat down in the seat next to Juan, one away from Hank. He didn't get the benefit of a kid, but they didn't know him as well as they knew Juan. The last thing Juan thought was, 'I am not that tired.' Then he was asleep.
A few hours later he woke with a start at Hank's coughing and moaning. Moaning because he was coughing, most likely. One of the little abuelitas, a grandmotherly matron from the neighborhood, approached him and made comforting sounds to him and tried to get him to drink some orange juice, after the first sip Hank drank from the jug greedily, the old lady stopped him and gave him a couple of the pills to take, which Hank did without protest, his face having a pained expression, then he drank some more juice before trying to sit up. He stopped that pretty quickly as a sharp stab of pain hit him in the back. Looking over he saw Juan and the two kids on the chair next to him, with Nanci sitting on the floor leaning up against Juan's chair. 'Juan you look like shit.' Hank croaked out.
'Si.' Juan replied. 'Y tu tambien. I look better than you though, always have.'
Settling back reluctantly Hank said in Spanish, 'Man I gotta wee. Anyway to get me up from here? So I can walk to the bathroom?'
One of the old ladies went off to find the doctor, while Juan tried to get up without disturbing the children who were still sleeping on him. He was unsuccessful in that respect and one of the kids started to cry, grumpy at being woken up from his nap. The kid's mother was there pretty quick to comfort the toddler and Nanci helped settle the other one. Juan went over to stand by Hank and pushed the foot of the chair down slowly, which sat Hank up slowly. They then grabbed each other's wrists and Hank grimaced, but pulled himself up.
'So am I gonna live buddy?'
'Si. I think so. You hurting?'
'Pretty painful yeah. Well if my bladder doesn't get drained soon I am gonna be in pain and all wet, help me to the bathroom? You don't have to hold my wang, just get me pointed in the right direction.'
Laughing Juan said, yes and walked Hank across half the store to the bathrooms. They were intercepted by the doctor, who had a Tupperware bowl in his hand.
'Ah Hank you need to take it easy, no moving around for a couple days.' said Doc.
'Let me guess, you want me to piss in the bowl?'
The doctor nodded his head, 'Yeah, even if it is in the bathroom, I want to see if there is any blood in your urine.'
The journey to the bathroom was unpleasant with Hank handling his hardware while Juan steadied him from behind and the doctor held the bowl in front of him. 'God this is embarrassing.'
'Get over it Hank, you are an asset to the group and any little humiliation you might suffer is for the good of everyone, if it improves your chances of recovery.' The doctor looked at Hank's urine in the white Tupperware
