[PRP] Better Late than Never

[TawnyAngel]

"Well I do care," Dith replied with a smile, "and in future, involve me? Helping one another out of their own silly messes is what friends are for." Did she really feel so isolated? Unable, or unwilling to confide in others? He did not, Dith realised, know all that much about Ty. He would have to do some digging, only not just now.

"Anyway," the huge man's smile changed to a lopsided grin and he shrugged. "Technically I'm off work at the moment because I hadn't yet been scheduled back in after returning to Kodo. Nothing to do with what went on out in the desert." Though he did imagine he was going to get some interesting looks from now on and getting patients to trust him might be tricky; in their position he wasn't exactly sure what he would think of a one-eyed surgeon. Still, he could cross that bridge when he came to it.

At Ty's question about the pair of pokemon in the picture Dith paused in the middle of the office and turned to look at it. "Ah!" he smiled and gestured towards it. "These two? They are my parents' companions. The Ninetails is named Nachthexen and she is my mother's; the Gardevoir is my father's and his name is Rytsar, that's 'Knight' in Russian." Turning then to his desk Dith chuckled and shrugged. "Well I like it to feel like home! I spend a good few hours in here a day when I'm working, three or four maybe. The rest of the time is checking up on patients on in theatre."  

[Tymiko]

"I'll...try," Ty answered, fidgeting with her hands behind her back as she avoided Dith's gaze. "It really means a lot that you care, Dith, but...if that's what friends are for, I just...I don't know why anyone would want to be friends with someone who makes messes on purpose. Unless they were masochists, but I really doubt you're one of those," she added, rubbing her unhurt arm with a frown.

"A friend like that would be stuck cleaning up messes they know the mess-maker knowingly created. Wouldn't that be frustrating?" she asked, looking back at him. "Especially for someone like you - a doctor who helps people and does their best to fix them. What would you do with someone who intentionally kept on breaking themselves and other things again and again?" She chuckled bitterly as she examined a Transformon figure close up. "I doubt you'd want to stay friends with them for long. Who would?"

"Mmm...if you say so," the girl answered dubiously in regards to his explanation about scheduling. But her attention was quickly re-captured by Dith's answer to her question about the unfamiliar pokemon pictures. "Whoa, really?" Ty beamed at the mention of their names, studying the figures in the photo. "Rytsar and...Nachthexen," she repeated, sounding them out carefully. "If 'Rytsar' means 'Knight', what does Nachthexen mean? Or is that name not Russian?" She nodded in response to the information about how Dith spent his time. He must have been busy indeed; not only checking up on the trainers he was most familiar with, but other patients as well.  

[TawnyAngel]

Dith thought for a while, lining up what he wanted to say before he said it. "It's okay," he said eventually. "All of us sabotage ourselves sometimes, and some more often than others. I care about you though and so I don't mind why you're in trouble if you need help. You came out to help the whole of Kodo when it wasn't your mess really, when others wouldn't and didn't. That's somebody who's worth helping when they're in trouble no matter how they got into it."

Turning back to the picture and letting the subject go there, if that was what Ty wanted, Dith gave a small nod. "You're right, it's not Russian. It's German actually, it mean's 'Night Witch'. It was a term given to female Russian bombers who were greatly feared. They had terrible equipment, they stalled their wooden and canvas planes in mid air to swoop soundlessly - like a witch in the night - over their target and drop their payloads before starting back up again to escape. My mother's mother was one of them, and she named her Ninetales in her honour. I've known that pokemon all my life, I still remember the nights she and I and my mother crept out and night setting fire to things and... ah," Dith grinned and shook his head, "but that was a long time ago now. I was scared at the time but looking back I'm glad we did it, it was for good reasons. In a way a lot like what we're all doing now I suppose; difficult and dangerous, but right."  

[Tymiko]

Why? She didn't question that he meant it - that he cared. But why? She was just one person in the world, and no different from the other trainers. They all tried to help Kodo too, more often and more passionately than herself. Then again, Dith was a doctor. It was kind of a part of his job to care. He was also a very caring person in general, so that made him an excellent fit for his job. That still didn't give the girl reason to believe she deserved it from him, however.

Perhaps, unlike Ty, the Russian man was referring specifically to the incident involving Team Rocket. Perhaps it was best to leave it at that. She nodded in gratitude and offered a small smile before happily listening to the explanation regarding the Ninetails' name. "Wow...that's awfully daring," Tymiko murmured in awe, referring to the acts of the Night Witch pilots. The comment about Dith's mother caused her brows to knit in consternation, though.

"They...set fire to things? For fun?" From the way he spoke of it, she felt like they had had a reason that she must have missed. "That's nice that you have fond memories with your mother." It seemed so few remembered the years when they were young. Especially when so much was going on in the present that there was hardly time or memory left to recall the past.  

[TawnyAngel]

Dith gave a little 'heh' of laughter and gestured towards a chair in front of his desk for Ty to sit down. "Not so much for fun," he explained, "it was more of uh... well there was a lot of unfortunate Soviet stuff going on, my mother - after my father was arrested - decided that direct action was the way to go. It didn't change anything but at least we felt we were doing something. You have to try, don't you? I mean, this isn't the same thing what we're doing but in some ways it is, standing up for what you think is right? I think it's important." There were risks, and some people paid the price. Luke....

"Ah, but you didn't come here to listen to me ramble," Dith said, abruptly remembering why they had come. "Let me take a look?" he requested, gesturing at Ty's arm.  

[Tymiko]

"Oh," she said, suddenly realizing what he meant. "Oh, oh, sorry, I didn't know that's what you were referring to." Sounded like a great deal of action and adventure, but those things usually involved much danger as well. "No, I agree. You have to stand for something or you'll fall for anything," she answered, looking serious. "Especially if you're passionate about what you believe in. I think that was really admirable." At least being arrested didn't sound so bad compared to other fates. It was costly to make a stand, but if everyone was too afraid to, who would?

"...It would have been nice," she sighed, wishing he hadn't remembered. And it had been so interesting to listen to his stories, too. Maybe he could tell her more later. Removing her scarf from her arm, she glanced away, not really wanting to look at it. Perhaps she should have attempted to wash it off in the bathroom before showing him, but it was a little late now.  

[TawnyAngel]

"Tch, no don't apologise," Dith replied with a small smile and a shake of his head. "I brought it up, da? If I had wanted to avoid talking about it I could easily have done so. At the time it was hard, scary, but we got through and I even got my father back in the end. A lot of families didn't." Annnd that was enough with the saying sobering things to the probably already traumatized girl. She seemed okay though, seemed to get it. "And thank you," he added after a moment, smile turning into a half grin. "I did what I could, and even if we didn't make much difference that we tried matters I think.... Now though."

The arm.

A pair of surgical gloves appeared from a box in his desk draw and, sliding them on, Dith pulled the bandanna away from Ty's arm as gently as he could. What he saw made him hiss between his teeth and then look up at Ty with a grimace. "You do know that people used to die from wounds like this? From within living memory? The pus? That'd debris from your white blood cells trying to fight off the bacteria. They are not winning for you. If you leave this too long the ah... the poison gets into your blood. That is a bad prognosis even today." He didn't want to scare her... well okay maybe he did, just a little, just so that she understood how serious this was! "You will be find though," he continued after only a short pause. "You will need some antibiotics, and this cleaning regularly until it heals, but you will be fine." Why had she stayed away so long? She knew she's said but why?  

[Tymiko]

Nodding solemnly, Tymiko pondered the impact of said events on the families caught up in them. It must have been very difficult. Perhaps that was one reason Dith had become a doctor to help people. "I'm sure you made a difference to someone. Ever heard the story of the starfish?"

Mm, no such luck distracting him from her arm, though. Figured. She looked away idly as he pulled away her makeshift bandage and hissed, which caused her to cringe a bit. "Oh..." she answered, looking back at him slowly, gultily. "Sorry." She seemed ashamed for having let it get that bad and then needing his help to treat it, but oddly enough, the prospect of death didn't seem to bother the girl. Either she was too young to really grasp what he was saying or she was purposefully ignoring what could have been.

At the mention of antibiotics, Ty made a face. "Is it like...medicine to swallow? Or a shot? Or something else, like pokemon heal sprays?"  

[TawnyAngel]

"The starfish?" Dith cocked his head. "No, I can't say that I have?..." She seemed remarkably calm about his warning but then she was a teenager, they all thought they were immortal. Well, most of them did. "And it's okay," he continued, flashing a brief smile, "no long term harm done, right? And it will be a course of pills for you to take, and you must take all of them even if it seems to be better before you get to the end! People not finishing their course of antibiotics is contributing to resistance and that's how you get 'super bugs' and that's bad, heh, as I'm sure you can guess."

But why hadn't she come, why had she just vanished? He still couldn't wrap his head around it, or help being rather worried by it. If something like this happened again would she ask for help or would she just go off on her own again?  

[Tymiko]

"Well, once there was a boy who was walking with his grandfather on the beach. It had just become low tide, so the shore was littered with starfish," she explained. "The boy picked up each starfish they passed and threw it back into the sea because he knew they would dry up and die if they were left out in the sun."

"His grandfather said, 'The beach goes on for miles and there are millions of starfish. You're not making any difference.' The boy picked up a starfish, looked at it, and gently threw it into the ocean. 'It made a difference to that one', he answered." The story finished, Ty nodded solemnly at Dith's instructions.

"Okay. I will," she told him. "Thank you, Dith. Not just for the advice and the medicine and all, but I mean...for caring. Like about if I live or die." She smiled up at him softly. "Sometimes it's easy to forget that there are people out there who care, I think. At least for me." Digging into her pockets, she tried to find the remainder of the pokedollars she had won from her last few battles on the road. "Antibiotics must be expensive. How much would that and your seeing me cost? I can save up more if I don't have enough now. Promise I'll pay you back."  

[TawnyAngel]

"Hu," Dith smiled, "I like that story... and you're welcome." Did she really feel so unloved? He would have to keep a closer eye on her, as much as he could with everything else on his plate. "Don't worry about the cost," he continued with a shake of his head, "I will sort it out, is not important." He didn't know where her family was, the people who were responsible for her, but in their absence somebody should step in. She was just a girl.

"Are you okay for me to clean your arm up? It will hurt a bit but it should feel better once I'm done."  

[Tymiko]

Frowning slightly, the girl seemed to feel she was being pitied or belittled. "But I have to pay you something," she insisted. "I may be a kid, but kids can take care of themselves too, Dith. Uh - when they want to," Ty added quickly, remembering what had brought her to his office in the first place. "Please take it. It's not much, but I'll earn more."

Placing the small wad of somewhat crumpled currency on the corner of his glass desk amid the various Transformons figures, she turned back to the doctor with a proud grin. "I'm not afraid! And I trust you." It was a great deal preferable to being treated by some stranger, that was for sure. "But I don't trust just anyone, so no telling, okay?" She put a playful finger to her lips with a secretive smile.  

[TawnyAngel]

The gesture was touching, somehow heartbreaking too. A girl this age shouldn't have to think about things like this. Where were her parents, or guardians? Didn't they care? If he'd ever had children... well, that was a moot point really wasn't it?

Dith carefully smoothed out the bills and tucked them underneath Optimus Prime before looking back at Ty with a small smile. "Thank you, and I promise! Your secret is safe with me."

After quickly gathering the supplies he needed Dith returned to his desk and set about gently cleaning Ty's arm. "I don't think you should have to pay for healthcare," he added, mind drifting back to the money as he worked. It was probably good to talk anyway, give Ty something to think about besides being prodded. "I mean, I think it should be paid for from taxes. Everyone deserves to be able to get help without worrying about the bill, you know? And for some taking the time off work for an operation is hard enough already. It was one of the hardest things to adjust to when I moved here and started work here, that some of the people who needed help either were not getting it or were crippled by the cost afterwards. I know there is health insurance, all that, but not everyone can afford it and it doesn't always cover things and.... Mmmh, I just don't think it's right. Heh, so many things in the world I think should be changed!" Dith glanced up for a moment and flashed another smile. "A lot of starfish on the beach, but I will just have to keep walking won't I?"