We Can Rebuild Her...

[Tess Ryder]

Alpha Section Sickbay -

Tess was sitting in the locker room changing out of her 'professional office uniform', which of late had consisted of smartly tailored black and navy blue two piece business dresses and pumps, given that it was review time for most of her staff at the Naval Medical hospital and she hadn't seen the inside of an OR or the ER in weeks, but she couldn't complain, her nights were usually spent with Roger May. Either spending time at Leo's or going to some of the other restaurants around Capitol City. Slipping into a set of scrubs she glanced at the PADD sitting on the bench. Her younger counterpart had stabilized Victoria Underwood, she was out of the woods in terms of dying from her injuries, but now she had to have the physical damage taken care of, which was where she outclassed Teri. Ever since she had to reconstruct her grand daughter's broken face and body after she fell out of a tree, she had taken a keen interest in reconstructive surgery, reducing the time it took to heal, while at the same time making the alterations to account for major muscle and bone damage look natural. Although this time it was a bit different.

"Do no harm..." she whispered to herself, even though this was the same woman that was behind what happened to her late husband. A few dark thoughts crossed her mind, she was an Ajem'dasis and had mistreated her family horribly. She could make the reconstruction look horrible so she'd live with the ugliness of her actions for the rest of her life, she could make her feel pain every single day. And yet... that wasn't her way. She would have mercy on her enemy. Leo was dead, no amount of pain would bring him back. And all it would do is poison her own soul. No... she would make Victoria look better than she ever had, it would have the upside of making her realize that the mother of someone they once tried to hurt, had healed her. Brought back her beauty. It would 'heap burning coals atop her head'. And maybe... it would change her heart. Heaven knew they needed more allies these days.

Pinning her long red hair back into a bun, she slipped her glasses on and walked into the room she was being prepped for the procedures. To make the process easier, the dead skin had to be removed, which was painful when air hit it, but she was kept in a special force field that would protect the raw and bare skin. It wasn't until she had laid eyes on her, the bright pink, freshly debrided skin that the full extent of what her attacker had done was really visible.

"Hello Victoria... I trust you're resting comfortably, the drugs we gave you should keep you in a pain free state, but if you need more, just let us know." Tess said in her usual sweet voice as she nodded to the nurses who were assisting. "Now, before I begin... have you decided what you want?"

"Yes..." Victoria nodded her head. "It's on the PADD. I think... I need to look not like how I looked. May I ask... how long will the recovery take?" she asked as she winced slightly.

"If you behave yourself on the operating bed, no more than a week, if that and only because you are missing a lot of 'meat' as it were, that takes a bit of time to let the grafts repair and work, plus you'll need some PT afterwards, the bolt on stims only do so much." Tess looked at the PADD. "Looks like I'll be shaving a few years off eh? Although really Victoria... D cups on that thin body of yours? You'll look too top heavy. Besides, you don't want them... they get in the way." she pointed to her own chest.

"Was worth a thought. Never had anything larger than a C." Victoria chuckled. "Was an A or B most of my life."

"I'll see what I can do. Now... I do have a steep price for all this. And I know you have no money." Tess said and leaned down next to her face. "Say you're sorry for what you did and you'll repent and not be an evil witch. That's the price. I need to hear you say it."

Victoria nodded her head. "That is a steep price. I had a feeling all this came at a cost. But, if that's what it is. Then I am very sorry for what I did to your family and I will repent of my numerous sins and not be an evil witch."

"Almost sounds sincere." Tess said with a smirk. "But thank you. You do realize that the Ajem'dasis have taken your assets, you'll need to set yourself up somewhere."

"I do have some... dark money laying around, I should be fine. Besides, I have some avenging to do, for Ashley and especially for my Abbygale." Victoria said and sighed heavily. "But that was the price of being Ajem'dasis.. it gave me power, it gave me command and yet it took everything that I cared away."

"Well, when you wake up, you will be a new woman, what you do with your new lease on life, is entirely on you." Tess said as she gave her an injection and the last thing Victoria saw was Tess smiling at her.

[Young Aimee]

"Sorry I'm late doctor," Aimee said entering as she fumbled with the surgical mask around her neck. "I had a final briefing with some Captain Arnold at HQ about our aborted first contact mission."

[Tess Ryder]

"Oh it's quite alright... Second Contacts are more interesting anyway, that's when you really learn about a people." Tess replied as she gave her young protégé a smile before putting her mask up. "Although remind me when we're done to have a little chat with him, he shouldn't have been expecting a briefing from you. Of course, I think I intimidate him." she glanced at the master display monitor. "So Aimee, our first step is to complete the muscular regeneration and reconstruction. That's why we had to sedate her, it's extremely painful since you're knitting subdermal tissue back together or replacing some of it entirely. Then once that's complete, we begin the process of rebuilding her epidermis. All told, this should take us about two hours." she gave her a wink. "I'll teach you some of my suturing techniques that leave almost no lasting scarring. Sure the devices will take away the scarring, but when you're grafting there's always going to be some trace unless you have a very tightly confined pattern."

Tess enjoyed teaching, it was one of the many things she loved about her position in Naval medicine, she could pass on all her decades of knowledge and skill to the next generation and this time, she was the one that setting policy and curriculum not some one else that was more interested in quick fix drugs that did more harm in the long run.

"When we're done, she'll look like a completely new person. These skills will be useful to you if you're ever tasked with doing cosmetic alterations for covert missions or simply rebuilding someone who was injured very badly." Tess took a small device and began to open up the blood vessels and then put a pack of what looked like raw meat onto a part of her leg that had a chunk missing. "So once the numuscle is applied, you go around the graft like so... keeping your confinement beam to .30. That's very important, too high and it'll look like you slapped a burger on her leg, too low and it won't take and it'll die off." she handed the tool to her. "Here, keep going, I'll work on her face, that's going to take longer."

[Young Aimee]

Aimee fumbled the tool with unfamiliarity, buy soon found a comfortable hold and started healing the wound as she was instructed, only pausing for reassurance from Tess.

After a few moments she settled down into the the repetitive nature of the job. "Don't go hard on the captain. He was debriefing all of the team leaders. I was leading the team that went into a college. It makes me wonder if I should have not taken the Academy quite so seriously and went out and partied at least a little bit."

[Tess Ryder]

"I took it seriously like you did up until my last year or so and then I had a bit more fun. Look at Dr. Teri... she's very much me at that age. Although I don't remember being quite so ready to go out. But I was always dressed and made up just so. Still do that to this day honestly, Leo teased me if he saw me in 'casual' clothes. My casual and his casual were two entirely different things. His would be a pair of jeans and a cotton shirt he'd wear until it was nearly threadbare." Tess chuckled lightly. "You know you're not exactly old, you can still go out and have some fun, you don't HAVE to be a party girl, but meet others your age. Plenty of time to hang out with old people like me." she whispered. "Teri did try to request you, I think she sees what I see in you, but you're MY protégé. Feel like we haven't spent nearly as much time together in an OR as we should." she hummed as she cocked her head and looked at the graft she finished. "If only it was so easy, I had one of Nick's old Section 31 friends who could never gain a pound of muscle, if I could just graft on some muscle, make him 'big like Ah-nold" That's what electrical stimulators are for..." she winked her eye. "Only way I got back on my feet after having twins." she traced her finger across Victoria's belly button and noted the scar patterns. "She was nearly disemboweled, I'm still shocked she survived. See this suture pattern? This is what it will heal like in a day or so, after that it'll be mostly gone. When we work on her face, do that pattern. Of course, how the face she sort of wants will actually look once we give it to her, that'll be up to her body, you'll notice swelling almost immediately, we can treat that, but the muscles in her face and neck will take time to adjust. I'm sure you remember that one Marine you fixed up, with the face full of shrapnel?"

[Young Aimee]

"How could I," she said her face turning a shade lightwr. "Not something you easily forget. Anyway, last semester I could have sluffed off, but that was pre-med, now I'm in medical school. No time for that now. No one wants a doctor that barely passed med school, and I'd like to be able to request where I do my residency, and not get everyone's leftovers."

[Tess Ryder]

"A very wise old doctor once told me, that the Doctor that finishes at the top of the class and the one at the bottom of the class that barely made it out... are both called Doctor in the end. So I entirely agree, don't blow off your studies but don't blow off being a young woman either. You do know that Leo was really the only man I really dated before I married him? Sure I went on a couple of dates with other guys, but it wasn't serious and were either more favors for well meaning friends or were simply people I worked with that I thought were interesting, but would rather have as friends." Tess said and picked up a bone restructuring tool and started working on Victoria's face. "Leo was my first and only lover. And not really for lack of trying, I was a little bit of a flirt in med school, but I think everyone thought I was 'off limits' because of the 'tall hunky security' guy I was with. So no one really took it seriously. But still... you should enjoy your downtime more, you have the smarts to be an excellent doctor and you've more than got the skill. You're doing what some third year medical school students are doing right now. You learn quickly and you retain what you learn, which is important." she cocked her head slightly. "This is going to restructure her facial bones slightly to take the new facial features and give the muscle damage she sustained a way to heal properly. You could always inject a synthetic filler, but it doesn't last and really is only for undercover type missions or when you're trying to make say a Terran look Klingon or some other race for the short term, like for a pre-first contact situation. Also useful for repairing and correcting more congenital issues, deviated septum, crooked jawlines, ocular damage."

"I'm still amused that you're using Victoria Underwood as a teaching model." Arisu said as she watched from the side of the room.

"Teaching happens all the time, but this is an excellent case for teaching a variety of reconstruction techniques. After all, who had to repair that botched job some hack doctor did on you?" Tess said while not looking up from her work.

"Still, she doesn't deserve the kind of care you're giving her, but... I suppose all the more reason to give her that kind of care." Arisu said and crossed her arms. "Although if she tries anything..."

"She won't. You aren't the only one who can sense emotions and intents, besides... I'll let you both in on a little secret of why I'm such a good doctor... I always give a little extra positive healing energy to my patients. Tends to make whatever I do work better and... for people like Ms. Underwood, makes allies out of enemies. Still their choice, but I would say enough of the dark has been literally purged and cut away."

[Young Aimee]

"I hope you are right Doctor," Aimee without looking up from her task. "Mama says once you let the darkness is it's really hard to keep the lantern burning that expels it. I fear we could end up wasting our time on this one. I bet she was the power behind Fred's throne. Hell, he probably even thought he was the one in charge."

[Tess Ryder]

"Would not surprise me. Strong women are typically the true power behind the throne as it were." Tess said as she worked. "Although if you take away one lesson from me Aimee... mercy. Always mercy. They may not 'deserve' it, but that's all the more reason why they need it."

[Young Aimee]

"Of course doctor. Obviously her fate is above my pay grade, so I suppose that is none of my concern. My focus should be in learning, and this I suppose is a very good opportunity. One I wouldn't miss for the world."