Absit Omen RPG

Her husband was busy greeting the two strangers with his usual jolly enthusiasm while the dachshunds danced around them, their excitement reaching levels that managed to rouse the curiosity of the third household canine.  When Hanna heard the lazy clicking of the spaniel's toe nails against the hallway's hard floor, she recruited Amanda's help to shoo the three dogs into the living room and shut the door behind them. 

"Oh yes, please, make yourselves at home.  Lorenz and this is my wife Hanna.  Seems you've already met our daughter, Amanda."  Amanda glanced up from her phone and waved, with a grin, before turning back to the screen.  'We weren't expecting company but it's a beautiful evening, should we sit in the garden?  Lorenz Schäfer was offering the guests.  Hanna's husband made a gesture towards the back doors, leading out to the walled courtyard. 

"I have a suspicion Professors Malfoy and -" Hanna interrupted, easily remember the last name she'd heard but faltering briefly on the first.  "Grayfaire may prefer to talk somewhere a little more private."  Hanna glanced at the younger, and thus far silent, professor before looking back towards the more senior of the pair for confirmation. 

"I was also hoping that we might speak, first, before bringing Micha into the conversation.  I think it would be best if-"

But, before she could finish the sentence, the youngest of the Schäfer family jumped down the last few steps and offered Amanda a high five before slipping in amongst the adults.  Hanna sighed in defeat as Amanda slipped her phone back into her pocket. 

"Ah. the best laid plans, no?" Lorenz offered.  [/i]"This is Micha.  Where would you prefer to sit?"[/i]

"You haven't?" Surprise and a moment of uncertainty flickered across Hanna's expression.  Given their mutual acquaintance, Hanna had assumed Healer Storm would have heard something.  Unless the stories Hanna had heard were entirely true and not augmented by exaggeration, which was seeming more and more to be the case.  "Given our mutual acquaintance, I would have-"

Hanna caught herself and shook her head, slightly.  "Never mind that.  I apologize."  That was a matter which was only tangentially Hanna's business.  She shook her head, again, and stepped into the Healer's office, casting a curious glance around the space while the other woman asked for refreshments. 

"Parchment?" Hanna repeated with a slight grin, settling into one of the armchairs and folding her hands into her lap.  Sending an actual letter through the post office had felt archaic enough, especially since her first choice would have been email.  Hearing the letter compared to parchment seemed amusingly fanciful.  "I'm afraid we gave up on goat's hide quite some time ago.  Tri-folding them squarely was just near impossible and they have a terrible habit of jamming printers."  She offered a smile, just in case her tone didn't sufficiently convey the previous had been a joke. 

Despite the potential amusement, it was a similar disparity to the problem that had brought Hanna to this office.  "As I mentioned, I've been trying to develop a system to recognize when individuals from your world are dropped off on our doorstep.  Most of the time, I understand they can find their way to ... here."  Which was fortunate; Hanna rather liked diagnostics that generally made sense at the end of the day. 

"But, the incident last month demonstrates a significant loophole when it comes to unconscious patients.  A witch would have found her way into our surgery suites if she didn't happen to have an acquaintance with a mobile phone number - which is not a common enough occurrence, from what I understand.  And, her laboratory results would have found their way into the British Medical Journal by spring."

More than three decades had passed since Hanna had last stepped into the magical hospital in Vienna and that now seemed like someone else's life.  She was filled with fascination as she stood in the corridor of St. Mungo's hospital and watched as the daily hustle and bustle past in front of her. 

Hospital receptions and waiting rooms all held many universals including the odd assortment of those with serious, though not urgent, injuries waiting about watching in alternating shifts of envy and morbid curiosity as other patients scuttled past, either for routine appointments or in need of urgent treatment.  The quiet, determined demeanor of those charged with their care also appeared completely analogous to the staff at University College Hospital, though Hanna was quite grateful that her day to day uniform consisted of scrubs and not robes.  The later seemed like it would be a constant source of annoyance, constantly flapping and falling into the way, open wounds or any assortment of bodily fluids. 

The woman she was scheduled to meet with, Hanna had been warned, was not as likely to acknowledge the analogies between their worlds.  She'd already been told Miranda Storm had likely never set foot in a medical facility and was unlikely to ever elect to do so; Storm did not see her non-magical counterparts as equals. 

Hanna was no stranger to the inflated egos of medicine; the field had a tendency to attract that type.  Even within her own hospital, the surgeons and orthopedics were always talking smack about the ER docs and everyone thought ophthalmologists were nutters for wanting to poke eyes all day.  She just hoped that a mutual desire to achieve better care for both of their patients would help bridge any gap between their world views. 

The office door behind her clicked open and Hanna turned to greet the woman behind the preformed reputation.  "Healer Storm, I presume?" she offered, extending the witch a hand.  "I'm Dr. Hanna Schäfer, attending physician from University College Hospital.  I've been looking forward to meet you; I've heard a lot about you."

With a gentle rotation of the shoulder, Tamzin's humerus eased back into place.  Aside from an entirely reasonable level of squirming, the unavoidable side effect of feeling a joint moving in wholly unnatural ways, Tamzin took the whole thing in stride.  Keeping the elbow bent and tucked against Tamzin's torso, Hanna turned to retrieve a nylon sling from a nearby drawer. 

"To answer your question, I'm not entirely sure," Hanna admitted as she gentle rested Tamzin's arm in the sling and set to adjusting the straps.  "Belief in magic is not exactly a common water cooler topic in the hospital.  To be honest, between kids swallowing screwdrivers, inhaled earrings and soy sauce overdoses, it also wouldn't be the strangest.  Besides, I was always under the impression we weren't supposed to know - so I'd mostly forgotten about it."  She assumed, if there were any others in a similar situation at the hospital, they'd be doing much the same. 

Hanna picked up Tamzin's chart, scribbled a few notes before scrawling a few signatures.  "You're welcome to contact me about it," she extended to Jonas, along with a business card with her cell phone number on back, before ripping off a prescription and reaching out to tuck it gently in Tamzin's uninjured hand. 

"In the meantime, that's a prescription for pain medications, should you need them.  I have a suspicion you won't, but it would raise eyebrows if I didn't provide one.  Your shoulder muscles will be loose and prone to becoming dislocated again, so best to keep it in the sling and rest it until it's fully healed.  Beyond that, rest and ... whatever else you do ... will have you back to normal.  Just, no more playing chicken with cars, alright?"

She tore of the discharge papers and handed them to Jonas.  "Even though your leg is healed, I just ask you use the wheelchair until you are clear of the hospital; I don't want to have to explain why a patient with a fractured femur walked out of the hospital.  Other than that, you are free to go."

With only a touch of reluctance, Hanna accepted the extended card and put it into the pocket of her lab coat just as a quiet knock behind them signaled the nurse's return.  With a few whispered words exchanged between them, Hanna traded the papers in her hand for the syringe's in the nurse's before turning back to the patient's.   

"I'm sure it's just like that ... skele-grow?" she repeated, arching an eyebrow as she glanced towards Jonas for any indication the comment was a joke.  It sounded very much like type of joke an adolescent boy would make after just a touch of opioids.  'You know what baby skeleton's drink instead of milk to grow big and strong...' sounded exactly like something Micha would come up with.  But, from what little Hanna knew of the other woman, that didn't seem to be her type.  "Alright, you'll feel a slight pinch in your left shoulder and then a little numb." 

She nodded at Jonas' comments as she carefully injected the contents of the syringe into Tamzin's shoulder.  "If there's anything I can do to help put something in place, please let me know.  It would certainly make our jobs easier."  And, made one wonder how often 'anomalous reactions to drugs and treatments' were a result of genetic variation - as they always tended to assume - or if those were influenced by magic. 

"The nurse is putting together your discharge paperwork as we speak.  On your request, Tamzin, you are being transferred independently to a private medical facility for follow up care of the rib fractures.  Once we get the shoulder back in place, you'll be considered stable and can be discharged.  I do recommend you follow up with someone about your electrolyte levels - just in case they are abnormal by your standards, as well." 

"You're going to feel pressure, but let me know if you feel particularly painful," Hanna offered as she placed on hand on Tamzin's elbow and the other on her shoulder and began rotating her shoulder.

Doubt and uncertainty creased Hanna's brow, followed by just a moment of grief, as she glanced up from her work and regarded Tamzin Ollivander.  "Getting a wand?" she repeated, before picking up a pen and starting to scribble a few comments and notes down on a scrap of paper.  But as her thoughts shifted back to the medical dilemma in front of her, her features softened back to their normal state of studious, focused but relaxed. 

"No.  I'm afraid I don't know about getting to Diagon Alley.  We haven't, yet, given all of that much thought." 

Which wasn't at all accurate.  She had given it thought a lot of thought.  But, all of that thought tended to come back to the same conclusion: she wasn't sure she was ready for this transition.  She wasn't ready to lose her son to a world she did not, and could not, belong to. 

"All of that is a rather big step and I'm not sure Micha is quite ready for it."

In reality, he was probably more prepared for it than she was.  But, she had the privilege of being the adult and she got to call the shots.  At least, when it came to her kids.  With patients, it was not as simple.

"Your ribs are frac-"  Hanna started to explain but then remembered the flash and grating of bone and instantly-healed leg.  "We don't have anyway of instantly healing fractures.  Luckily, with ribs, it's usually only a couple of weeks before they heal on their own.  I'd rather give you a little more muscle relaxant and pain relief before setting your shoulder.  Is that alright?"

She finished working up her calculations and stuck her head out the door to flag down a passing nurse.  As the nurse ventured off towards the pharmacy, returned to the other two.  "Mind your sticks; he'll be coming back with the meds shortly." 

"Luckily, patient confidentiality is taken very seriously," Hanna offered Jonas.  "Which could work in our favor.  Getting people referred to a specific individual would the simplest approach - claiming they're part of a pharmaceutical trial would be the fastest way to get physicians to contact someone."  She shrugged as she slid a stool up next to the examination table.  "No one wants to risk mixing a drug with an unknown, experimental drug, so they'd contact whoever is linked to that trial in the system.  But, I don't know how you'd go about letting your people know, though."

Soundlessly and immensely grateful her patient was unable to see her expression, Hanna Schäfer's eyes widened and she slowly shook her head in dismay as the woman ... witch ... pressed the ice pack to her healed leg.  With a gentle but firm hand, she reached out and grasped the other woman's hand and repositioned it, and the ice pack, over her still-swollen shoulder. 

"At the very least, we can keep the inflammation at bay until ..."  Until what?  The woman was transferred to another hospital?  "It would take but a few moments to replace your shoulder.  Unless your planning on handling that, yourself.  All of this would have been much easier, if I knew what I was working with." 

Hanna felt the need to point out the obvious, despite her appreciation of the complement.  Her limitations had been incredibly frustrating.  "I am surprised you don't have a better system in place for this type of situation.  A liaison or on-call point of contact at hospitals that can direct you to better help."  It was uncommon, though not unheard of, that a patient was transferred to a different hospital after they'd been stabilized.  There wasn't any reason the same process couldn't have been applied in Tamzin's situation, if Hanna had known. 

"Micha turned eleven in October," Hanna offered, a trace of a smile settling on her features when conversation turned to family.  "He started showing signs of magic about a year ago, but I'm afraid I'm not that familiar with Hogwarts.  I've heard the name but Durmstrang was the school all my relatives went to."  If the fates had offered her a different fortune, she, too, might have gone there. 

Despite her recent advancement to full time clinician, Hanna Schäfer had just enough training to know that outwardly expressing frustration was counterproductive to treating a patient.  Even if every fiber of the doctor's being wanted to sigh loudly in frustration and massage the headache that was budding just underneath the bridge of her nose. 

“Ahhh.  We're all really just part of the same kind, aren't we?  It’s not like we’re two completely different species  just because some of us learned how to wiggle a stick about when we—“

After all, the middle of the night in the midst of a double shift was probably the least convenient time to dredge up memories of the past and explanations for choice of wording.  Especially with a patient and a stranger, both of whom she'd likely never see again. 

"I'm sorry if that came across as offensive.  I'm afraid, that hasn't been my experience.  I've found the line between the stick wigglers and non-stick wigglers to be rather distinct." 

But, regardless of wands and histories and memories, Hanna was still a doctor.  As the cat on the bed morphed back into her patient, concern quickly replaced the exhaustion and frustration in Hanna's features and she crossed quickly to the side of the bed. 

"Will you please stop moving around," she scolded as Tamzin fidgeted in the bed.  "You are still my patient and I am trying to-" Her words were cut off by the woman's flood of apologies to Jonas with a few stray course exchanges between the two whose meaning Hanna couldn't quite grasp.  This time, despite her best intentions, Hanna couldn't help the quiet sigh and rolled eyes as she slowly shook her head.   

"Wait.  What are you-"  Of course, after raising three children, Hanna was well aware that don't look meant better look, I'm about to do something stupid, but, before she had a chance to intervene, the blind woman had cast a spell at her own injured leg.  She winced, sympathetically, at the familiar sound of bone grating bone and could do little more than hope some of the earlier opioid-benzos cocktail persisted, despite the woman's brief stint as a cat.  "For mercy's sake!" she breathed, looking at Jonas in exacerbation.  "At the very least, here -" she crossed to the small supply room adjacent to the exam room and returned with an ice pack, which she pressed into the woman's hand.  "I'll tell you when you can take it off," she instructed. 

Keeping one eye on her patient, she accepted Jonas' hand and shook it, the doctorly facade relaxing slightly as she grinned and shook her head.  "I don't know what half of that meant but it is good to meet you.  I'm Dr. Hanna Schäfer, ER and critical care physician.  I was on shift when the medics brought Tamzin in."  For a brief moment, she hesitated on the last question but, finally, she offered another slight grin.

"Family trait, I suppose; I grew up around it as a little girl.  Most of my distant relatives could do magic but I haven't had anything to do with that world for decades."  Distant in terms or familiarity and geography, if not along the family tree.  "And, it seems my son has inherited the trait."

After spending the better part of the night chasing after that one, small missing piece of the puzzle that would make all of this come together, Hanna had a strong suspicion that she'd found it.  Everything about how that ragged looking cat and the non-family member visitor (who had arrived with no sign of feline companionship) supported that presumptive diagnosis. 

It had been over three decades since she'd last seen proper, real magic.  Those early experiences with wands and spells and potions and people who could become other animals had almost completely faded into the recesses of distant memory.  They had almost been completely forgotten until that china teacup Micha had dropped nearly a year ago had managed to land on the soft cushions of the sofa in the next room. 

And, as unlikely and fantastical an explanation as it might be, it was the only one that fit all the separate pieces.  Unfortunately, there were no serology tests or diagnostic procedures that would confirm her suspicion and no recommended protocols for handling things, if her suspicions were correct.  And still no way to explain to hospital admins why a blind, multi-fractured hit-by-car managed to disappear amidst the mysterious cat invasion. 

This time, Hanna closed the exam room door behind her as she followed the man and the cat inside.  "That is her, yes?" she asked, as she retrieved the cat's ... woman's chart from the end of the hospital bed and flipped it open, glancing over the test results for the twentieth time. 

"What happens now?  I don't recall that we've ever treated your kind here and, given how excited we get when a Lyme disease rash walks through the door, I imagine such a case would make for a memorable grand rounds." 

"Friend of the family, most of Tam's family lives outside of the city, though, which might be why she had me down as a contact.  Is she alright?"

Hanna nodded and let out a long, slow sigh.  Well, luckily, she hadn't divulged too much personal information to a friend of the family.  And, Tamzin had requested they contact this man.  Hopefully, one of the nurses had ... or would ... remember to get her to sign a disclosure authorization and no one would care what had been said before or after said paperwork. 

Except ... as she neared the end of the wing, the quiet, peaceful hospital room she'd left not moments ago had turned into utter mayhem.  A very confused and slightly nervous nurse was standing outside the woman's hospital door with a shrug that could be interpreted one of several different ways.  None of which were good. 

Nurses, PAs, other physicians and custodial staff were all gathered around the open area outside the nurse's station, all staring at the scraggly feline that was limping across the floor. 

"Oh my god, there's a cat!"

"It looks sickly!"

"Did it come in with Danny?"

"Don't let it get away!  We need to start checking patients for bites."

"You can't think it's rabid, can you?  When's the last time the UK has had a rabid cat?"

"Look at the state of it!  Maybe someone sneaked it in."

Hanna had remained quiet amidst the mayhem, narrowed, critical eyes sliding from the staggering cat to the remarkably non-plussed visitor who was simply - albeit awkwardly - calling the cat towards him.  He wasn't sharing in the general surprise and alarm.  The cat, as well, seemed remarkably less fractious than she'd anticipate most cats being in this position.  Damn, their own house cat threw a full out tantrum if they tried to hold it still to trim its nails and this one seemed ...

Blind.  Injured, not sick.  Broken leg ... in fact ... two broken legs.  A rear and a front, on the right side, if Hanna weren't mistaken.  Exactly like ...

Hanna's gaze flickered, again, from the man crouching next to her to the nurse standing by the open door to the hospital room and back to the cat.  Taking a deep breath, she made a split-moment decision - one that could very well cost her her job, and maybe her license, if she had guessed wrong. 

She raised her hands, trying to signal for the growing din to calm somewhat as she turned towards this Jonas.  "Mr. Trevelyan, I understand your intentions, but you really should have checked with hospital policy.  Patients' pets can not be brought to the hospital to visit, for ... obvious reasons."  She gestured towards the mayhem-imbedded cat.  "It's too much of a risk to both patients and the animal.  If you would please pick up the cat; we'll need to get vaccination records in the morning but, for now, please let's just get her back into the exam room before there's more chaos."  She glanced pointedly at the cat before looking towards Trevelyan.  "Patients are trying to sleep." 

Most people were nervous their first time getting an MRI - it was a loud and nerve-wrecking experience.  She could only imagine what it would be like for someone who had a visual impairment and couldn't tell where they were going or what was happening.  Or, with so little in the way of familial support.  Hanna had tried to offer words of comfort, explanations or encouragement but she had a strong suspicion that it hadn't made much difference. 

Especially since the process had taken longer than it should have on account of the radiology technician struggling to get images free from feedback.  Despite multiple attempts, they never managed to get a full, decent image though they were at least able to rule out spinal injuries between the scattered attempts. 

"We've already sent the images up to surgery, so they'll be ready for you in the morning.  We'll have you patched up and heading home in no time," Hanna offered.  She was hoping the geriatric medicine team could do a cognitive evaluation on the woman before they dismissed her but she could hear them now, insisting that such a thing was just as easily done during an outpatient visit.

They'd been able to free Tamzin from the neck brace and backboard before returning her to the ECU and settling her into a proper hospital bed as the bustle of shift change descended upon the hospital.  Despite the usual end-shift exhaustion, Hanna had long since texted an apology home and submitted a request to stay on for a few more hours - at least until the woman had been transferred to the surgical team in the morning.  Despite several fractures and a blood panel that suggested the woman should be in some sort of blood gas imbalance, Hanna had a suspicion the woman would try to leave if she were given half the chance.  The morphine, alone, should have prevented that but the last thing Hanna wanted was to explain to her supervisors how an old, blind, multi-fractured patient - possible with early stage dementia and metabolic acidosis - managed to walk out of the hospital unseen. 

"I know it's difficult here, but you really ought to try and get some sleep," Hanna encouraged Tamzin.  "We could get you something, if it would help."  With a mostly silent burring sound, the phone in her pocket vibrated, paging her to the front desk.  "That might be your emergency contact," she offered Tamzin.  "No trying to run off, now."  She tried to phrase it as a joke, though she'd meant it just as much as a legitimate request. 

Leaving instructions with a passing nurse to keep an eye on her, for good measure, Hanna wound her way up to the waiting room and to the young man the front desk indicated.  "Mr. Travilin, Dr. Hanna Schäfer," she offered as she extended her hand.  "I'm glad we were able to connect with you.  If you'll follow me, I'll bring you back to visit.  Are you family or friend of the family?"  She asked, buying time to avoid divulging any personal information about Tamzin until they'd moved beyond the waiting room. 

"Tamzin was brought in late last night after a motor vehicle accident.  She's stable and doesn't appear to have any life-threatening injuries but we are monitoring for any complications.  Do you know how we might contact her primary physician?"

Even as the woman on the table began to ask about her cane, Hanna tucked the medical record into the holder at the foot of the bed and released the break on the bed's wheels.  "As soon as we get you situated, I'll contact the medics that brought you in and see if they can go take a look around for your cane.  I'm sure it didn't go far and I'm sure you'd prefer to get it back." 

That, after all, was a simple problem and one she could readily solve. 

"I'll see her up to radiology, Henry," she offered the nurse as she rolled the bed towards the lift.  "Tell admissions to page me, if they need me, but I'd like to see this one through." 

She couldn't explain it - and she wasn't about to try to - but something was off.  The most logical explanation for the woman's behavior was that she'd suffered head trauma during the accident and had a space-occupying hemorrhage.  Or, perhaps, a brain tumor that had gone unnoticed because the woman lived alone. 

"Oh, I don't blame you for not following politics," Hanna offered brightly as, with a ding the lift doors slid open and she pushed the bed into the small space.  Once she was inside and the doors had closed, Hanna leaned briefly against the wall.  "Though, despite our best efforts, some of it's almost impossible to avoid.  Like that headache over the summer with President Reagan trying to preside over the Olympics in Los Angeles." 

It was easy to explain the technicalities of an MRI to a fellow physician.  It was always a little more complex to explain it to someone who was going to experience it for the first time, sightless.  "An MRI is like a really big x-ray, but we'll be able to see the inside of your body with a lot of detail.  We'll be able to see if you have any injuries to your spine or if you have any bleeding internally.  But, it can be a strange experience - you'll be in a big tube - which can be claustrophobic for some.  And, it will be very loud.  Do you have any metal in your body?  Implants?" 

Hanna smiled as the lift doors slid open again and she pushed the bed out into the much-less-hectic corridors of radiology.  "I'm Austrian," she offered, brightly, in response to the woman's question.  "Born in Innsbruck, but I grew up in a little town called Feldkirch.  But, I've only been an official doctor for little over a year.  I took a break from schooling when my son was born - though I completed my residency here; it's familiar stomping grounds." 

Medical mysteries came and went.  Hanna was no stranger to them, of course, but she couldn't quite remember the last time she felt this totally stumped.  Nothing about the woman lying on the backboard made sense - from her test results to her demeanor to her clothes to her mannerisms. 

It was her experience that, typically, these type of cases had some hidden, underlying factor or detail that just somehow connected all of the seemingly unrelated factors - like the underground network of fungus that connected the seemingly unrelated mushrooms you say scattered across the ground.  Some underlying explanation, that remained concealed from her, somehow connected all of these oddities about this woman.  Until then, the blind woman remained a complete enigma.

"I was ... I was walking."

At first, Hanna just nodded her head, finding nothing out of place with the comment.  Pubs.  Plays.  A few drinks.  Nothing at all abnormal about any of that.  Until... "Dr. Schäfer, do you know where my things are? I had a bag."

"Yes, we have it," Hanna offered, scowling in confusion that may have stretched to the tone of her voice.  "It's in your belongings bag underneath the bed."  The woman was visually-impaired and she'd been out walking.  But, there was no sign of an assistive device or guide animal and Tamzin wasn't worrying about either such item.  "We'll make sure it goes home with you.  Is there anything else you think you might have misplaced?  What do you use for Orientation and Mobility?"  she asked. 

"And, this may come across as a strange question, but do you remember who the current Prime Minister is?"  The woman was young for, even for early onset Alzheimer's or Parkinson's, but neither were out of the question. 

"That's just a catheter; we want to make sure your hydrated," she offered as Henry knocked on the wall to let her know radiology was ready. 

"I'm sure you're more than ready to get off of that backboard, yes?"  Hanna offered, stepping up to the side of the hospital bed and looking down at the woman.  "We're going to head upstairs so we can rule that out.  Have you ever had an MRI before?  They can be a little unsettling."  Especially for the visually impaired, Hanna thought to herself. 

The woman's explanation of her first name was met with mild interest, as it mostly confirmed Hanna's guess.  Her surname, however, did tickle something in the back of Hanna's mind.  More of that indescribable sense of déjà vu that struck you without any warning or explanation than an actual memory.  For a few seconds, Hanna regarded the woman with slightly suspicious curiosity which, of course, was likely completely lost on the visually-impaired woman.

But, it hadn't been lost on Henry.

"Dr. Schäfer?  Is everything alright?" she heard the nurse ask as he paused in his work. 

With a nod of her head, Hanna gathered her thoughts and offered a well-practiced reassuring smile to Henry.  "Yes, of course.  Just got lost there for a moment."  It was likely just some homonym of some sort.  Or it just sounded similar to some story or game the kids had been playing. 

"We will see if we can locate this friend of yours.  How do you spell the last name?" she asked, glancing pointedly across the table at Henry who was already standing at the ready with a pen and a pad of paper. 

There was a light tapping on the door frame and Hanna looked up to see Maggie walking back in with four pages of laboratory results in her hand. 

"Before you ask, Dr. Schäfer, I already asked them to rerun the sample," Maggie offered preemptively, in a low tone as she handed the papers to her.  "Both sets of results are identical.  And, the technician ran a control sample to make sure calibrations aren't off.  It's not a technical error."

There was, Hanna had quickly decided, a benefit to having a visually-impaired patient; she did not have to waste energy on maintaining a professionally neutral expression while reviewing the results.  However, she did force herself to maintain the casual chitchat with as much interest as she could, in between consultations with Maggie. 

"I haven't heard of Carstairs operas.  Are they contemporary?" she offered as she arched an eyebrow in Maggie's direction.  "Low BUN but no sign of icterus in the plasma and normal bilirubin?" she asked, under her breath.    "And ... electrolyte levels ...  how old are you, Tamzin?" she asked as she glanced from the results to the woman and back.

"Do you want me to call down Internal Medicine."

Wordlessly, Hanna shook her head as she sat back and assessed the situation. 

"Henry, can you- oh good."  Bless the nurses, really.  He was already standing at the ready with a fresh chart and pen. 

"No, definitely not the smartest," she offered with a grin to Tamzin.  "But, you can lie still for now.  We have enough information to know where to go."

An absolute and completely utter lie, but that was what one did in these circumstances.  No one wanted to hear their doctor admit they hadn't the slightest idea what was going on, even if they were thinking that half the time.  And none of this was making sense; it was time to go back to basics.

"Alright.  MPL: Axillary subluxation.  Potential complete fracture of the humerus.  Potential concussion.  Potential fracture of the tibia or fibula.  Possible fracture of right seventh rib.  No indication of spinal injury but need to rule out vertebral fractures.  Hypouremia, hypernaturemia, hyperkalemia and leukocytosis but reticulocytopenia." 

As far as differential diagnoses, Hanna had no idea where to begin. 

"Alright.  Maggie.  Go ahead and call radiology and cancel radiographs but see when they can get her in for an MRI.  At the very least, we can try to rule out any internal bleeding and identify the location of any fractures."  And, get her off the backboard, if there are none to her spine.  "Henry.  Go ahead and set up a morphine drip and then see if you can hunt down a phone number for the point of contact.  I'll stay with her while you do." 

Her potassium levels, alone, should be giving Tamzin heart palpitations and, yet, that hadn't even registered in the complaints.

"Tamzin, do you recall what you were doing prior to the accident?  I know this is a sensitive question, but we do need to know.  It might help explain some things."  Maybe.  If miracles existed.  "Were you taking anything?  Drinking or are you on any drugs?  Could you have come across anything toxic?"

"What?  It's my name."

Despite herself, Hanna snorted a half-chuckle as she nodded her head.  "I was curious about it's origin.  It's not a name I've heard before."  Especially in emergency medicine, Hanna had come across quite a few names.  "It sounds like it could be Middle Eastern.  Or, even, Russian.  What's your family name?  Is there any family we can contact for you?"

Tamzin's confusion and worry was evident, but not entirely out of place.  Few arrived on their backs by ambulance feeling comfortable and calm. 

Creating a sense of normalcy through casual, calm conversation was something one of her consulting physicians had taught her during her first year of residency.  Keeping the patient focused on the conversation also helped keep them from worrying about what was happening to them.   Quite often, her patients' conversation topic of choice was one that was well beyond Hanna's experience and comfort zone, like sports or fishing or motorcycles and learning to keep them engaged in a conversation she had little interest in had taken practice. 

Luckily, a childhood in Austria left one well-prepared for this woman's interests.

"Oh, you're a fan of opera?" she offered, brightly.  "It's a bit stereotypical, I know, but I am fond of a good, dramatic Wagnerian opera.  Which one did you see?" 

Hanna lowered the pen light, nodding and shifting out of the way so that Henry could place the adhesive leads on Tamzin's chest. 

"You've been blind since birth?" Hanna repeated, looking for confirmation.  "Do you happen to recall if your primary physician has mentioned a nystagmus related to your visual impairment?"  The left-tracking nystagmus the woman was exhibiting could have been the result of head trauma or could have always been there; unfortunately, to complicate things, both could be the case. 

"From what the medics told us, you were hit by a car," Hanna offered as the woman started searching for an explanation.  "Your right arm appears to be dislocated and, quite possibly, fractured.  We will be taking x-rays, but we need to rule out any spinal injuries first.  Are you feeling pain anywhere else?  Can you try flexing your left foot and then your right foot for me?"