Modern Medicine
A/N: Disclaimers in first part of story. Basically, I don't own anyone but Lauren and other original characters. As I mentioned in the disclaimers, there were many song lyrics in the first version of this story. While the song lyrics are no longer a part of the story, I do discuss, paraphrase and otherwise use songs as part of the story. This chapter includes a discussion of a song by Sarah McLachlan 'Drifting'. I don't have any rights to the song.
Chapter Fifteen - Modern Medicine
When Aragorn and Legolas appeared, they found themselves surrounded by trees with the mountains rising high around them. Legolas turned to Aragorn with hope in his eyes.
"Do you think we will be able to fly again tonight? I did so enjoy that." Legolas gestured with his arms to indicate the height of the mountain, giving the impression that if he could, he would fly with just his arms.
Aragorn gave him a wry smile. "Yes, I did rather get that impression last night, and today, when you could not stop talking about the experience." Crossing his arms, Aragorn raised his eyebrow at his friend.
Legolas looked indignant for a moment. "It was truly enjoyable. Should I not tell those who know about our excursions here?"
"I do not mind you telling Arwen and Gimli, but I would wish you to refrain from saying anything about flying within Eldarion's hearing." Aragorn shook his head at the thought of what that might lead to.
"Why?"
Aragorn saw the confusion on Legolas' face and gave him an exasperated look. "What do you think Eldarion will do if he hears you talk about humans and elves being able to fly?"
Understanding spread across Legolas' face, and he nodded his head briefly to Aragorn. "Try to fly; without wings."
"Exactly," Aragorn exclaimed, gesturing as he spoke. "And I would rather not pick up the pieces of my son after that disastrous attempt."
Legolas gave him a wry grin. "Very well, I shall say nothing to suggest that flight is possible near Eldarion." He looked around at their surroundings. "Should we try to find Lauren?"
After listening for a moment, Aragorn smiled. "Somehow, I do not think that will be a difficult task."
Smiling, Legolas nodded to Aragorn and swept an arm out in the direction of the music, indicating that Aragorn should lead the way. He had been too focused on the thoughts of flight earlier to hear the music drifting toward them on the wind.
As they followed the sound, they could hear the words that Lauren sang. The music was soft, and her voice seemed haunted, sad, for some reason. She sang of drifting along and not wanting to return, but having people who loved her and who were asking her to come home. ('Drifting' by Sarah McLachlan)
Coming out of a clearing of trees, they saw Lauren standing at the edge of a cliff, gazing off into the distance. The view from the cliff edge was breathtaking. The cliff dropped off steeply, falling into a lush green valley. At one end of the valley was a great waterfall ending in a river that wound through the trees. Off in the distance, more mountains capped in white could be seen.
Aragorn and Legolas came to a stop beside Lauren, taking in the view for a long moment in silence. Glancing sideways at Lauren, Aragorn noticed that her eyes were slightly glazed over, as if she were not seeing the scene in front of her. After glancing questioningly at Legolas and getting a puzzled glance in return, Aragorn reached out and rested his hand gently on Lauren's shoulder. "Lauren?"
Her eyes cleared as she turned to face him, giving him a wan smile. "Hi," she said softly.
"What is wrong?" Aragorn queried as the healer in him came to the fore. She was rather pale, and there were lines of pain evident on her face. She seemed subdued compared to her normal manner. Unfortunately, he knew she was as stubborn about admitting pain and troubles as he and Legolas could be, and he expected no answer. Therefore, he was surprised when she did not evade his question.
"I think our time is growing short," she answered. "I have not been feeling well since shortly before you left last time. Pain seems to come and go in my head, legs, and ribcage, and at times I have felt dizzy and nauseous." Her voice was soft, and Aragorn could tell that even now, she was in some pain.
Aragorn reached out and placed the back of his hand against her forehead to see if she was running a fever. She let him check, then brushed his hand gently away.
"There is nothing you can do about it, I'm sure. With this merely being a dream world, I have no physical body for you to treat. Only one thing explains these symptoms. The line between reality and this world is growing thinner. It probably won't be long before I wake up."
"You do not sound excited at the prospect," Legolas noted, staring at her face.
She sighed softly before answering. "Yes, I do want to wake up. I want to see my family and friends again. But with the pain that I'm feeling, I have to wonder what it is I will be waking up to. Do you really think I'll be able to just go back to living my life like it was before? I'll admit, my life wasn't perfect, but I don't want to think about not being able to go back to it." She gave them both a lopsided grin. "And then there's the fact that once I wake up, I'll likely never see either of you again. I kind of like our time together, and don't want it to end, either."
Placing his hand back on her shoulder, Aragorn looked into her eyes. "We will also miss our time together, but you do not belong here. You belong in your world, with your family. Though we will miss you, we will be satisfied knowing you are continuing to live your life as it was meant to be."
Lauren looked away without answering, and Legolas knew she did not want to discuss this any longer at the moment. She still hesitated to discuss her innermost feelings with them, even after all she had shared with them about her life. Taking pity on her, he decided to change the subject. "Did you have anything planned for this night? I would not argue if you wished to fly again."
A slow grin spread across her face. "Well, I have to admit that that's how I spent most of the time you were gone. I loved hang-gliding so much, I went back and had a nice long flight. It was really great." The tension eased from her posture and expression as she spoke, and the lines of pain smoothed out as she turned her attention away from her physical condition.
"I am rather surprised you did not try to turn yourself into a hawk or an eagle and fly as a bird," Aragorn commented, looking at her face and going along with the change in subject.
Color suffused her face as she looked back at Aragorn. "Well, actually I did try that. But it didn't work too well. My mind is apparently rooted too much in reality. All the places we've visited have come from my mind. I've actually been to these places. I know how things look, how they smell, what the weather feels like, so I can re-create them very accurately. But I know full well that people can't turn into birds, so my mind wouldn't let me do it. I bet that if I were to step off this cliff, I'd plummet to the ground because my mind tells me that that is what would happen in reality. I’m not about to try it," she hastened to reassure them as she saw the sudden concern in their faces. "I'm just trying to explain how things work here. Do you think your mind is fanciful enough to allow you to fly?" She looked back and forth between the two of them.
Aragorn thought about it for a moment before shaking his head. "No, I do not believe humans can change form and fly as an eagle, either."
Personally, Legolas thought it might be interesting to try, but knew that Lauren would have come up with some plans for their time together, and did not wish to interrupt those plans. He shook his head in the negative as well.
"So what will we see this evening?" Aragorn asked her. "More distant and far-away lands?"
Shaking her head, Lauren commented, "Not tonight, though there is still so much in my world to see. There are cities and villages in Italy and France that I've loved and haven't been able to show you. I've been to London and Stonehenge, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, and many other places that would fascinate you. The cultures that I've seen are so far removed from yours and even mine that I feel you would be amazed with even a small glimpse. There are Great Pyramids created thousands of years ago, a Great Wall in China that stretches for thousands of miles and the Taj Mahal in India, a majestic building built as a mausoleum to house the body of an Empress. These are all things I would love to show you." She paused a moment in thought. "Though since I've never seen the last three places myself, the experience would probably be quite flat in comparison to our other visits. I've only seen pictures and images on TV of them, you see." A smirk crossed her face. "I had thought of taking you to Disney Land, but I'm not that much of a sadist. I can't imagine you enjoying that at all."
"What is this Disney Land?" Aragorn asked cautiously. He wasn't sure he wanted to know from the comments she had made.
"It's a place called an amusement park, but I don't think you'd find it amusing at all. There are huge, exciting rides called roller-coasters as well as many other types of rides, games to play, lots of junk food to eat, places to shop, and hundreds of screaming and laughing kids." Her lips quirked upward as she saw the two of them beginning to form a mental picture of the place she described. "I doubt you've seen so much noise and chaos away from a battlefield, so I decided that it would be better not to show you such a place."
"I thank you for that," Legolas said with a sincere, heartfelt expression of gratitude on his face.
A smile crossed her face, then faded as a soft sigh escaped her. "There is too much to see and not nearly enough time. But one thing I promised myself was that I would show Aragorn the state of modern medicine before our time was ended. As a healer, I felt he would be as fascinated by that as by anything else."
Aragorn's eyes lit up as he heard the plans for tonight. "I would indeed love to see what your healers know."
She held up a cautionary hand. "Keep in mind that my own knowledge of medicine is rather rudimentary. All I know is what I've experienced in person, what I learned in school a long time ago, and what I read in the news. I have never studied medicine. I just want to make that clear."
Nodding in understanding, Aragorn waited for her to continue.
"Good. Now, Legolas, I don't know how interested you are in this subject, but I hope you won't be too bored following along with us." Her expression was uncertain as she glanced at the elf.
"I may not have the skills and knowledge that Aragorn and other healers have, but I have had to help out many times in the aftermath of battles. I have no small interest in the subject myself." Legolas nodded at Lauren to reassure her that he had not protests against her plans for night.
"Good," Lauren repeated, sounding more satisfied. "I debated with myself for a long time about whether or not to teach you this first subject. It is something I learned a long time ago, in school, and think it is something everyone should know. But then I wondered if I would be altering history irrevocably by teaching you something that was not known so long ago."
Aragorn frowned and crossed his arms. "You have shown us so many things that are not known in my time. Why would this be any different?"
Holding his gaze, Lauren asked a question of her own. "What I show you can save lives. Having this knowledge, would you be able to not use it?"
It was not long before Aragorn dropped his gaze. "No, if I am fighting to save a life, I will use all knowledge at my disposal."
Nodding to herself as he confirmed her opinion of him, Lauren continued. "As I thought. Most of what I've shown you so far, you either do not have the technology to re-create, or I trust that you will hold to your promise and let the knowledge go no further. With lives hanging in the balance, I felt sure that you would do anything, even break a promise to me, to save someone."
"And yet you still intend to show us?" Aragorn asked, not denying that he would break his promise in such circumstances.
"Well, I won't ask you to make such a promise with this knowledge," Lauren said. "I've thought about this long and hard, and I don't think I can withhold such a simple method of saving a life. Who is to say that the whole purpose of our coming into contact wasn't to show you this very thing? I don't know if you will use it to save the life of someone who was supposed to die, or to prevent a life from ending too soon that was not meant to end." She waved a hand dismissively as the sentence came out sounding not quite right. "All I can do is teach you and leave the rest in the hands of Ilúvatar. You can use the knowledge as you see fit. I only ask that you do not teach it to other healers. The knowledge must end with you." Lauren held his gaze firmly, impressing upon him the importance of her request.
Aragorn thought about that for a long moment. He would be given free permission to use anything she showed him, but how could he not pass that knowledge on? Would it be better not to have the knowledge and resist the temptation to break his word to her? But how could he pass up on the chance to know more about how to save lives? Finally, he nodded slowly, having made up his mind. "I agree to your terms. You have my vow that though I use your knowledge freely, I will not instruct others in what you show me." A thought came to him, and he had to ask. "But what will happen if I am seen using your knowledge? If others see me using it, and thus learn what it is you will show us?"
Lauren shrugged helplessly. "I don't know. Come up with something. Say it made sense to try, but don't teach them."
Aragorn shot Legolas a helpless confused look. What was she about to show them, and was it really worth this entire debate? He finally asked the question. "What is it that you keep referring to?"
"The methods I am about to show you go by the names CPR and the Heimlich maneuver. They can be used in some circumstances to keep someone breathing, to restart a heart, or to save someone who is choking to death. And the good thing about them is that you need nothing beyond your own body to use them."
Aragorn's eyebrows rose in amazement and curiosity. These methods did sound like something he wanted to learn. "I would be honored if you would show us these methods."
Lauren gestured around them, and the mountaintop they stood on disappeared to be replaced by a small room with small desks and chairs scattered around. A woman with a large case stood in the middle of the room. "I don't feel that I'm qualified to teach you myself, but I'll go through the training with you again." She turned to face the woman in the middle of the room, and gave her a nod to start.
"Hi, I'm Mrs. Visconti. I'm here today to teach you CPR, which stands for cardiopulmonary resuscitation and the Heimlich maneuver, which can be used to save a choking victim." She leaned down and opened the case at her feet. Aragorn and Legolas watched with no little surprise as she pulled out a life-size doll and placed it on the floor at their feet.
Lauren leaned over and explained to them. "That's the practice dummy. When you use CPR, you have to press pretty forcefully on someone's chest. You can't do that with a real person, or you could cause their heart to stop beating or cause problems with the rhythm of the heart. So, these dummies were made to practice on."
Aragorn nodded like he understood, but he couldn't seem to take his eyes off the pseudo human at their feet. He looked up when he heard the instructor clear her throat disapprovingly. He suddenly felt like he was back in his lessons as a child in Rivendell and gave her his full attention.
She gestured for them to sit at the desks and proceeded to teach them the full method of what was called CPR. Lauren leaned over at one point and whispered to Aragorn. "I think you can forgo calling 911. First off, you don't have phones, and second, I highly doubt anyone would come." Lauren looked up guiltily when the instructor stopped speaking and glared at her. "Sorry." After that, Lauren kept quiet for the rest of the lesson.
Finally, after going over all of the details, which Aragorn actually thought made a lot of sense, it was time to practice on the 'dummy'. Since this was largely done for Aragorn's benefit, he was the first to try it. He knelt down beside the dummy and ran through the 'A-B-C's' of CPR in his mind before attempting the method. 'A' stood for airway and consisted of placing the victim flat on a hard surface, asking them if they were OK, calling 911, which he still did not understand, and then tilting the person's head back to fully open their airway, after checking that there were no foreign bodies. He started by doing these steps, finally placing one hand on the dummy's head and the other under his chin and tilting his head back. 'B' stood for breathing. The main steps here were taking several seconds to look, listen and feel for signs of breath from the victim. If the victim was not breathing, the next step was to pinch the victim's nose closed, place his mouth over the victim's mouth, and give him two full breaths from his own body. The next stage of this method involved 'C', circulation. First, he checked for a pulse by checking at the throat. Aragorn was very practiced at this particular step. As expected, the dummy had no pulse, so he began the chest compressions as he had been instructed. It was this step that could cause harm to a living victim and necessitated the practice dummy. He had been instructed that he was to perform fifteen compressions to every two breaths and continue until advanced life support was available.
Aragorn made it through the steps flawlessly the first time. Knowing that this would be the only training he ever had, though, he made sure to go over it many times, practicing until it came naturally. He wanted this method at hand and to come as second nature when he needed it. When he was satisfied, and only then, did he allow Legolas to try his hand at it. Though not a healer, Legolas also easily picked up on the method, and Aragorn watched until he was sure Legolas would also be able to use the method naturally in the middle of a battlefield if necessary. Lauren passed up her turn, knowing she had just gotten re-certified a few months prior to her accident.
The instructor then pulled out a child-sized dummy, and Aragorn and Legolas both went through the practice with the few changes that a child required. When Aragorn felt that they had learned the alterations enough and would be competent to tend to either an adult or a child, he allowed them to move on to the other method, the one for choking.
As they were shown, the Heimlich maneuver was only to be used when the victim was choking and could not breathe or speak. If the person was breathing, this method was not to be used. But if their throat was completely blocked, this could save their lives. They were instructed to stand behind the choking person, make a fist and place their fist, thumb side inward, against the victim's upper abdomen, below the ribcage and above the navel. Once they were positioned correctly, they then grasped their fist with their other hand and pressed into the abdomen with a quick upward thrust. This could be repeated until the object was expelled. Aragorn and Legolas were instructed to practice on each other, just not actually pressing very hard. They used the dummy to use the method for an unconscious person. This same method was used to expel water from a drowning victim's lungs, making sure the victim's head was turned to the side to allow the water to escape.
When they finally finished their lessons, Aragorn felt that he had indeed learned something that he would find very handy in his future. He only wished he would be able to teach others. Such small simple things as what they had learned here could save many lives. But he could understand Lauren's fear. If these methods became common usage long before they were invented, the world could be drastically changed. As they exited the building, Aragorn came to appreciate just how much trust Lauren had placed in him by showing him these things. "What else do you have planned for us?" he asked lightly, thinking that she had shown them all she would of medicine.
"I thought a visit to a hospital might be a treat for you," she said lightly. "Though I don't usually think of them that way. Most of the time, I only visit a hospital if someone is sick or injured, though there are happy times too, like the birth of a baby. I think we'll start at the nursery."
Aragorn's eyebrows rose in surprise. Apparently, they were to see a great deal more tonight. The world seemed to shimmer around them as a large building sprang into existence in front of them. 'That was unusual', Aragorn thought to himself. That was not an effect they often saw when the scenery changed around them.
Lauren led them up to the automatic double doors, and stopped an inch in front of the doors when they refused to open. She stepped back a couple of paces then stepped forward again, and still the doors did not open. Stepping to the side, Lauren looked up at the sensors that told the mechanism when to open the door. "Maybe it's not working or something," Lauren commented softly. Aragorn and Legolas stood beside her, out of the way of the doors. "But why would they be out of order in my dreams?"
Aragorn had no answer to that. He turned as he saw a couple, the woman obviously with child, walk toward them. "Pardon me," he began, "you should know that the door does not seem to be working."
The couple continued as if they had not heard them, and approached the door. It opened as they approached, and they walked into the building as if nothing odd had happened.
"What was that?" Lauren asked, shaking her head in confusion. "It was as if they didn’t hear you, and the door worked for them." She walked into the middle of the doorway again, and the doors did not move. Even when she jumped up and down waving her arms in front of the sensors, the doors remained stubbornly closed. "Well this is odd," Lauren commented under her breath. After staring at the doors for a moment more, she slowly reached a hand out to touch the glass. Inhaling sharply, she watched as her hand passed through the door. A sharp jerk brought her hand back to her side of the door, and she spun to gaze at Aragorn and Legolas with wide eyes. "What is going on here?"
Walking forward, Aragorn did as Lauren had just done, and extended his hand toward the door. His hand also went through, and he took a step forward to see what would happen. He easily passed through the doors and stood on the other side. Turning back, he saw Lauren and Legolas looking at him in amazement. He held out a hand to Lauren, extending his hand back through the glass. She cautiously took his hand and he drew her through the door to stand beside him. Her eyes were wide with confusion. Aragorn raised an eyebrow at Legolas, who then took a breath and walked through the doors to join them on the other side.
"This is new," Lauren breathed softly. She looked around and saw someone sitting at the receptionist's desk. Glancing sideways at Aragorn and Legolas, she strode forward and tried to get the person's attention. "Excuse me, miss? Can you help me?" The woman made no sign that she even heard Lauren. Lauren raised her eyebrow in a manner reminiscent of Aragorn and Elrond. "Can you hear me? Excuse me?" When waving her hand in front of the woman's face garnered no reaction, she placed her hand on the counter to lean forward and peer into the woman's eyes. Her hand went through the desk, and Lauren stumbled forward, thrown off balance. Looking down, she noticed that she was now standing in the middle of the desk.
Aragorn and Legolas stared at the odd sight of Lauren's upper body protruding from the top of the desk. The rest of her body was lost within the desk. She looked back at them in panic, then lurched backwards a couple of steps, throwing her body away from the desk. After a quick pat down to reassure her that she hadn't lost any body parts, she slowly walked back to where Aragorn and Legolas stood.
"OK," she said faintly. "I have no idea what is going on here. I certainly would not have had us appear in the hospital as some kind of ghosts or some bodiless beings." She reached out and touched Aragorn's hand to double-check that they could at least still touch each other. A soft sigh of relief escaped her as she felt his hand solidly under hers. "So, we need to figure this out." A jerk of her head indicated a quiet place with many chairs gathered around. The three of them crossed to the waiting area she had indicated.
Lauren paced back and forth as she tried to reason through things. "OK, for some reason I haven't quite figured out, we can't physically interact with anything here. This is different from anything else I have encountered in this dream world. So why is it different? I just wanted to show you what a hospital is like in today's world. This is the hospital closest to my house, and I've visited a friend or two here. One of my co-workers had a baby, so I know what the nursery and that area looks like. My doctor has privileges here, though his actual office is across the street, and I've been here for various tests over the past few years. I could wander the halls easily, but there are areas that the casual observer isn't allowed to go. I suppose maybe I've watched too much 'Quantum Leap' in the past and decided subconsciously that the only way we could observe what I wanted to show you is by being insubstantial, invisible holograms." She paused a moment to let that thought sink in. "That has to be it. I created the scene, not by the rules I consciously thought about, but by rules that would allow us to see more of the hospital."
"A hologram?" Aragorn asked curiously. "What is that?"
"It's a three-dimensional representation of an object," Lauren tried to explain. "In the TV show I mentioned, the hologram could only be seen by the lead of the show. All you really need to understand is that nobody here can see us, and we can't interact with anything. We may have to figure out the rules along the way as we go, but this will work better. We could hardly have walked into patient's rooms or an operating room or anything without being questioned if people could see us." She gestured for them to follow her. "We're near the nursery, so we might as well start there."
Aragorn was not quite sure her reasoning made sense, but it was the only explanation they had at the moment. Shrugging slightly, he allowed Lauren to lead them down a long hallway to a set of swinging double doors. She hesitated for a minute before stepping forward through the doors. Aragorn and Legolas glanced at each other before following her. Walking through solid objects was a new experience for all of them and would take some getting used to. After going through the doors, she turned left into another hallway and led them to another door.
Beyond this door, they found themselves in a room with several clear, freestanding bassinets scattered around. A baby occupied each bassinet. Aragorn smiled at the look on Lauren's face as she walked over and looked down at the nearest baby. She reached down as if to touch his hand, then hesitated and pulled her hand away. Aragorn and Legolas moved over to stand beside her and look at the baby.
The baby they were looking at was wearing a small blue cap on his head and was covered by a soft blanket. He was sleeping peacefully. Watching the child sleep, Aragorn was reminded of when Eldarion was this age. "I can remember watching Eldarion sleep like this," Aragorn commented. "It seems so long ago now."
Smiling softly, Lauren agreed. "I used to watch both my niece and nephew like this. I was at the hospital when both of them were born."
"Would you like to have children of your own?" Aragorn questioned in curiosity, tilting his head sideways to look at her.
Lauren gave a noncommittal shrug. "Maybe someday." Her voice gave away nothing to indicate how she felt on the subject.
Legolas had been looking around the very sterile room. "Why are these children here? Would they not be better off with their parents? I cannot imagine a child thriving in this atmosphere."
"They aren't usually here for long," Lauren explained. "After a child is born, he or she and the mother are kept here for a pre-determined length of time until it is determined that they are both healthy enough to go home. The mothers often keep the babies in their room for most of the time. They are returned to the nursery when the mother needs to sleep or bathe, though, and I think at other times, while the nurses keep watch over them."
"I would hope they have a system for noting which child belongs with which mother," Aragorn commented.
Moving to another bassinet, Lauren pointed at the band circling the exposed ankle of the infant. "Each child and mother are given bands which have their information on it. And each bassinet has a tag with their name and birth date on it as well. Though there have been cases of mix-ups, they are extremely rare."
"Mix-ups?" Aragorn asked in horror. "You mean that parents have been given the wrong child?"
Shrugging helplessly, Lauren wasn’t quite sure how to answer that. "Well, I don't know of any cases personally, but I have heard of such things happening. I have to admit though, it seems to happen much more in fictional stories than reality. Writers seem to think it is a good dramatic effect to have children switched at birth." She didn't think her explanation reassured them, but she didn't have any solid facts at hand on this subject. All she knew was what she had heard from the news and media.
"Do people not use midwives and have children in their homes?" Aragorn asked. To his mind, that would avoid the possibility of any 'mix-ups' and would be much more comfortable.
"Not many people choose to do that, though I'm sure some still do," Lauren mused. "Most women would prefer to be in a hospital, though. It may be sterile and not the best atmosphere, but if anything goes wrong, they can be rushed into surgery for an emergency cesarean section." Seeing the blank looks on their faces, she hastened to explain the term. "The child can be surgically cut out of the mother. It's a last resort, as any surgery has the possibility of complications due to infection, reaction to anesthetic, or other unexpected problems. But many women have had their lives and the lives of their children saved by having the capabilities of a state of the art hospital handy. Women can still die in childbirth here, but it's not very common. I feel confident in saying that the incidence of women or children dying during childbirth in hospitals is much lower than it was in your time."
A small smile crossed her lips. "There's another part of the nursery you should see." She looked around as if getting her bearings then gestured to a wall to her left. Walking through it, they found themselves in another room with clear freestanding bassinets. Unlike in the previous room, most of these bassinets were not open to the air. Some of them were covered with a tent of clear material and had tubes and canisters connected to them. Moving closer, Aragorn looked into one of these bassinets. The child inside was smaller than any living child he had ever seen. She lay still, sleeping, but there were tubes connected to her feet and arms. There were circular openings in the clear tent surrounding the child, but they were closed at the moment.
"How can a child be born so small and still survive?" Aragorn asked. He would almost be able to hold this child completely in his two cupped hands.
"All the equipment you see here is meant to support the lives of children born prematurely or those who have health problems when they are born. The tents around them are incubators to provide warmth and to protect them from germs that might cause illness or infection. Most of them will have a tube in their nose or mouth that runs to their stomach and feeds them. A lot of preemies have underdeveloped lungs, so they have monitors attached to them to make sure they are breathing properly and warn the nurses if there is a problem. The babies here are very closely monitored to help them have the best chance of surviving and having a healthy life. Now, I won't say that babies born very early have an easy time of things. Often, there are health problems later in life, but more premature babies can survive now than ever could before."
It was a long time before Aragorn and Legolas could take their eyes off of the tiny infant. It amazed the both of them that this child would have a chance to live. Modern medicine had truly come a long way to allow such a thing. Aragorn finally asked a question that had occurred to him during Lauren's explanation. "You said something about germs causing infection or illness? What are germs?"
Lauren's eyebrows rose abruptly. She forgot that Aragorn came from a time before germs had been discovered. She didn't have much medical knowledge at all. How could she explain this? "Well, germs are organisms so small that they cannot be seen. They can be airborne or passed through touch. You've surely noticed that if one person has a cold, those near that person usually end up with a cold?" Aragorn nodded. "Well, the germs of the first person are passed to other people when he sneezes or coughs near others. There are germs all over the place, so it is very important to wash your hands frequently, especially in hospitals."
"Ada always insisted on washing before and after treating anyone in the healing rooms," Aragorn commented, looking with more respect at the tents surrounding the infants.
"He sounds wise," Lauren said. "Even if he didn't know about microscopic organisms, he knew the link between cleanliness and avoiding infection."
"Yes," Aragorn said. "So the tents covering them also act to keep out these airborne organisms?"
"Yes," Lauren said, happy to see how quickly Aragorn was picking up on the concept. It occurred to her for a moment to worry that she was telling them far too much about medical concepts they had never heard of before. But most healers of his time would probably not believe in some invisible organisms causing infection and illness. Besides, he had sworn to her that he would not teach others what he learned here.
"This is truly fascinating, Lauren. Though I would not be able to duplicate much of the 'equipment' here, I am learning much that could be of use. May we observe a surgery so that I may compare the methods that I have already seen to those used by your doctors?" Aragorn was fascinated by all that they had seen here, and wanted to learn more. There was so much that Lauren took for granted that seemed quite amazing to him.
Legolas, not being the healer in the group, had not had much to contribute to the conversation. He was wandering the room, looking at the few infants in their incubators and marveling at the idea that medicine had come so far as to be able to save the lives of these tiny children. He looked up when he heard Aragorn ask Lauren if they would be able to observe the doctors performing surgery. The thought did not especially excite him. Though he had participated in treating many battle injuries in the past, he did not enjoy watching surgeries.
Lauren paled slightly at the thought. "Well, I don't know that I'll be able to come up with a realistic surgery for you to watch. I've seen some stuff on TV, but I don't know how realistic it is. And truthfully, I can't stand the sight of blood."
That comment prompted Aragorn to raise an eyebrow at her. A descendant of Elrond, one of the greatest healers in Middle-earth, and she could not stand the sight of blood?
She shrugged at his look. "I know what you're thinking, Aragorn, and just remember that a lot of years and generations have passed between you and me. I went into computer programming rather than medicine for a reason." When Aragorn's look of disbelief turned to disappointment, she relented. "OK, fine, I'll see what I can find." Leading them through the walls of the neo-natal intensive care unit, she found a hallway with signs on the walls. After following the signs through the hallway, she found that they had to go up to the second floor. Walking over to the elevator, she tried to push the button to summon the elevator, with no success. "Oh, yeah," she said as her finger went through the button. She stared at the button for a moment, stumped, before turning back to Aragorn and Legolas. "OK, we seem to have a problem. Since we can't touch anything, we will may have to wait for someone else to come along, and push the button for us to hitch a ride. At that point, we will have to hope they're heading to where we are. Our other option is to find the stairs."
"I believe we should find the stairs," Legolas said. "I do not know how large this hospital is, but how long do you believe it will be before we find someone going to the same place we are?"
"You're right," Lauren agreed. "It could be awhile. The stairs are usually close to the elevators, so it should be around here somewhere." After a moment of looking, Aragorn found a door with the word STAIRS next to it. They walked through the door and Lauren started to lead the way up the stairs. Her foot sank through the first step and she stumbled forward a little, not expecting that. "Well, that's great," she exclaimed, getting frustrated with the laws of this new world. "Now what?" She turned to face Aragorn and Legolas, hoping they might have an idea about how to proceed.
For a long moment, they just stared at each other, trying to figure out how to climb stairs that they couldn't touch. Finally, Aragorn gestured for Lauren to join him and Legolas, and stop standing in the stairs. "This world seems to operate with different rules than we are used to," Aragorn started.
"Yeah," Lauren said slowly. They had already established that fact.
"But previously, if we wanted to climb a set of stairs, we only had to believe that they were there. Perhaps we must try to bridge the chasm between the world that we see and the world that we can feel."
"OK, I'm with you in principle, but I don't see what you're actually proposing we try." Lauren frowned as she tried to follow his train of thought.
"Believe that there are stairs where we see them," Aragorn said simply.
"So by our belief, we'll be able to touch it?" Lauren asked skeptically. "I'm not sure that will do it."
"We can only try," Legolas pointed out. "If it does not work, we will be in no different position than we are now."
"True," Lauren conceded the point, shrugging one shoulder.
They all stood back and stared at the stairs, concentrating on believing that there was a flight of stairs there. Aragorn was the first to step forward and place his foot on a step. It did not fall through. As he climbed several steps, he looked back toward Legolas and Lauren and encouraged them to try it.
With some hesitation, Lauren took a step forward and placed her foot on the first step. When she felt the step beneath her foot, she looked up at Aragorn in surprise. "It worked!"
"Did I not tell you?" Aragorn asked smugly. They climbed the stairs to the second floor quickly. Each was secretly afraid the stairs would disappear beneath their feet, but would not admit it. Only after they walked through the door onto the second floor did Lauren allow a soft breath of relief.
Following the signs to the surgery wing, they found themselves standing in front of a door that read 'Authorized Admittance Only'. Lauren walked through the door, trailed by Aragorn and Legolas. She picked a door at random and walked through. Seeing surgeons surrounding a table and nurses scurrying around handling various instruments, she looked back through the door and gestured for Aragorn and Legolas to join her. "I found an ongoing surgery. Come on in." After they walked through the door, they stood in a small room with a sink where people would wash up and don sterile garb before entering the clean room where the actual surgery took place. She took a moment to explain the purpose of this room, then walked through the door into the surgical room. Lauren had no desire to venture near enough to see anything. She gestured to the television monitors that showed a view of the inside of the patient's body. This was apparently an endoscopic surgery. Unfortunately, with Lauren's limited medical knowledge, she could not tell them what they were seeing. She and Legolas stood back and watched the monitor while Aragorn drifted closer to better hear what the doctors were saying.
When Aragorn got close enough to see the patient, he saw that the doctors had not cut the patient open to the air, but had made a few small incisions in his side, and had tubes inserted into these incisions. The doctors did not seem to be looking at the patient, but rather at the television screens. Aragorn walked up to stand next to the doctor and watched him operating some controls as he looked at the screen.
"There it is," the doctor said in satisfaction. "I see the occlusion." Aragorn watched as the doctor manipulated the controls, and the image on the screen changed. Not knowing exactly what he was watching, but being fascinated nevertheless, he continued to watch the screen. As he continued to watch and listen, he slowly figured out that he was watching the doctors graft a blood vessel into place to enable the blood flow to go around a blockage in an artery. He stood there and watched in amazement as the surgery proceeded without difficulty. Once the surgeons were satisfied and began to pull the tubes out, Aragorn moved back to join Legolas and Lauren. He told them what he had witnessed.
Lauren nodded. "They must have been doing an endoscopic coronary bypass surgery. I've never seen one before. I'm actually surprised that you saw so many details. I only know of the procedure. They use cameras and small instruments inside the body without having to cut the person open. It allows for a quicker recovery." Her forehead furrowed in thought as she pondered the fact that Aragorn had just witnessed details of a surgery she had never seen before. This could not be coming completely from her mind, then. There was something else going on here. She was silent as she led the way out of the surgery wing.
Deciding that it would be easier to catch an elevator to the lobby from here than to try to catch an elevator to a specific floor, they stood in the hallway in front of the bank of elevators. The doors to an elevator opened, and a woman with blonde hair and brown eyes stepped out of the elevator. Aragorn thought she looked familiar, and had his thoughts confirmed when he heard Lauren whisper a word.
"Mom?"
Chapter Fifteen - Modern Medicine
When Aragorn and Legolas appeared, they found themselves surrounded by trees with the mountains rising high around them. Legolas turned to Aragorn with hope in his eyes.
"Do you think we will be able to fly again tonight? I did so enjoy that." Legolas gestured with his arms to indicate the height of the mountain, giving the impression that if he could, he would fly with just his arms.
Aragorn gave him a wry smile. "Yes, I did rather get that impression last night, and today, when you could not stop talking about the experience." Crossing his arms, Aragorn raised his eyebrow at his friend.
Legolas looked indignant for a moment. "It was truly enjoyable. Should I not tell those who know about our excursions here?"
"I do not mind you telling Arwen and Gimli, but I would wish you to refrain from saying anything about flying within Eldarion's hearing." Aragorn shook his head at the thought of what that might lead to.
"Why?"
Aragorn saw the confusion on Legolas' face and gave him an exasperated look. "What do you think Eldarion will do if he hears you talk about humans and elves being able to fly?"
Understanding spread across Legolas' face, and he nodded his head briefly to Aragorn. "Try to fly; without wings."
"Exactly," Aragorn exclaimed, gesturing as he spoke. "And I would rather not pick up the pieces of my son after that disastrous attempt."
Legolas gave him a wry grin. "Very well, I shall say nothing to suggest that flight is possible near Eldarion." He looked around at their surroundings. "Should we try to find Lauren?"
After listening for a moment, Aragorn smiled. "Somehow, I do not think that will be a difficult task."
Smiling, Legolas nodded to Aragorn and swept an arm out in the direction of the music, indicating that Aragorn should lead the way. He had been too focused on the thoughts of flight earlier to hear the music drifting toward them on the wind.
As they followed the sound, they could hear the words that Lauren sang. The music was soft, and her voice seemed haunted, sad, for some reason. She sang of drifting along and not wanting to return, but having people who loved her and who were asking her to come home. ('Drifting' by Sarah McLachlan)
Coming out of a clearing of trees, they saw Lauren standing at the edge of a cliff, gazing off into the distance. The view from the cliff edge was breathtaking. The cliff dropped off steeply, falling into a lush green valley. At one end of the valley was a great waterfall ending in a river that wound through the trees. Off in the distance, more mountains capped in white could be seen.
Aragorn and Legolas came to a stop beside Lauren, taking in the view for a long moment in silence. Glancing sideways at Lauren, Aragorn noticed that her eyes were slightly glazed over, as if she were not seeing the scene in front of her. After glancing questioningly at Legolas and getting a puzzled glance in return, Aragorn reached out and rested his hand gently on Lauren's shoulder. "Lauren?"
Her eyes cleared as she turned to face him, giving him a wan smile. "Hi," she said softly.
"What is wrong?" Aragorn queried as the healer in him came to the fore. She was rather pale, and there were lines of pain evident on her face. She seemed subdued compared to her normal manner. Unfortunately, he knew she was as stubborn about admitting pain and troubles as he and Legolas could be, and he expected no answer. Therefore, he was surprised when she did not evade his question.
"I think our time is growing short," she answered. "I have not been feeling well since shortly before you left last time. Pain seems to come and go in my head, legs, and ribcage, and at times I have felt dizzy and nauseous." Her voice was soft, and Aragorn could tell that even now, she was in some pain.
Aragorn reached out and placed the back of his hand against her forehead to see if she was running a fever. She let him check, then brushed his hand gently away.
"There is nothing you can do about it, I'm sure. With this merely being a dream world, I have no physical body for you to treat. Only one thing explains these symptoms. The line between reality and this world is growing thinner. It probably won't be long before I wake up."
"You do not sound excited at the prospect," Legolas noted, staring at her face.
She sighed softly before answering. "Yes, I do want to wake up. I want to see my family and friends again. But with the pain that I'm feeling, I have to wonder what it is I will be waking up to. Do you really think I'll be able to just go back to living my life like it was before? I'll admit, my life wasn't perfect, but I don't want to think about not being able to go back to it." She gave them both a lopsided grin. "And then there's the fact that once I wake up, I'll likely never see either of you again. I kind of like our time together, and don't want it to end, either."
Placing his hand back on her shoulder, Aragorn looked into her eyes. "We will also miss our time together, but you do not belong here. You belong in your world, with your family. Though we will miss you, we will be satisfied knowing you are continuing to live your life as it was meant to be."
Lauren looked away without answering, and Legolas knew she did not want to discuss this any longer at the moment. She still hesitated to discuss her innermost feelings with them, even after all she had shared with them about her life. Taking pity on her, he decided to change the subject. "Did you have anything planned for this night? I would not argue if you wished to fly again."
A slow grin spread across her face. "Well, I have to admit that that's how I spent most of the time you were gone. I loved hang-gliding so much, I went back and had a nice long flight. It was really great." The tension eased from her posture and expression as she spoke, and the lines of pain smoothed out as she turned her attention away from her physical condition.
"I am rather surprised you did not try to turn yourself into a hawk or an eagle and fly as a bird," Aragorn commented, looking at her face and going along with the change in subject.
Color suffused her face as she looked back at Aragorn. "Well, actually I did try that. But it didn't work too well. My mind is apparently rooted too much in reality. All the places we've visited have come from my mind. I've actually been to these places. I know how things look, how they smell, what the weather feels like, so I can re-create them very accurately. But I know full well that people can't turn into birds, so my mind wouldn't let me do it. I bet that if I were to step off this cliff, I'd plummet to the ground because my mind tells me that that is what would happen in reality. I’m not about to try it," she hastened to reassure them as she saw the sudden concern in their faces. "I'm just trying to explain how things work here. Do you think your mind is fanciful enough to allow you to fly?" She looked back and forth between the two of them.
Aragorn thought about it for a moment before shaking his head. "No, I do not believe humans can change form and fly as an eagle, either."
Personally, Legolas thought it might be interesting to try, but knew that Lauren would have come up with some plans for their time together, and did not wish to interrupt those plans. He shook his head in the negative as well.
"So what will we see this evening?" Aragorn asked her. "More distant and far-away lands?"
Shaking her head, Lauren commented, "Not tonight, though there is still so much in my world to see. There are cities and villages in Italy and France that I've loved and haven't been able to show you. I've been to London and Stonehenge, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, and many other places that would fascinate you. The cultures that I've seen are so far removed from yours and even mine that I feel you would be amazed with even a small glimpse. There are Great Pyramids created thousands of years ago, a Great Wall in China that stretches for thousands of miles and the Taj Mahal in India, a majestic building built as a mausoleum to house the body of an Empress. These are all things I would love to show you." She paused a moment in thought. "Though since I've never seen the last three places myself, the experience would probably be quite flat in comparison to our other visits. I've only seen pictures and images on TV of them, you see." A smirk crossed her face. "I had thought of taking you to Disney Land, but I'm not that much of a sadist. I can't imagine you enjoying that at all."
"What is this Disney Land?" Aragorn asked cautiously. He wasn't sure he wanted to know from the comments she had made.
"It's a place called an amusement park, but I don't think you'd find it amusing at all. There are huge, exciting rides called roller-coasters as well as many other types of rides, games to play, lots of junk food to eat, places to shop, and hundreds of screaming and laughing kids." Her lips quirked upward as she saw the two of them beginning to form a mental picture of the place she described. "I doubt you've seen so much noise and chaos away from a battlefield, so I decided that it would be better not to show you such a place."
"I thank you for that," Legolas said with a sincere, heartfelt expression of gratitude on his face.
A smile crossed her face, then faded as a soft sigh escaped her. "There is too much to see and not nearly enough time. But one thing I promised myself was that I would show Aragorn the state of modern medicine before our time was ended. As a healer, I felt he would be as fascinated by that as by anything else."
Aragorn's eyes lit up as he heard the plans for tonight. "I would indeed love to see what your healers know."
She held up a cautionary hand. "Keep in mind that my own knowledge of medicine is rather rudimentary. All I know is what I've experienced in person, what I learned in school a long time ago, and what I read in the news. I have never studied medicine. I just want to make that clear."
Nodding in understanding, Aragorn waited for her to continue.
"Good. Now, Legolas, I don't know how interested you are in this subject, but I hope you won't be too bored following along with us." Her expression was uncertain as she glanced at the elf.
"I may not have the skills and knowledge that Aragorn and other healers have, but I have had to help out many times in the aftermath of battles. I have no small interest in the subject myself." Legolas nodded at Lauren to reassure her that he had not protests against her plans for night.
"Good," Lauren repeated, sounding more satisfied. "I debated with myself for a long time about whether or not to teach you this first subject. It is something I learned a long time ago, in school, and think it is something everyone should know. But then I wondered if I would be altering history irrevocably by teaching you something that was not known so long ago."
Aragorn frowned and crossed his arms. "You have shown us so many things that are not known in my time. Why would this be any different?"
Holding his gaze, Lauren asked a question of her own. "What I show you can save lives. Having this knowledge, would you be able to not use it?"
It was not long before Aragorn dropped his gaze. "No, if I am fighting to save a life, I will use all knowledge at my disposal."
Nodding to herself as he confirmed her opinion of him, Lauren continued. "As I thought. Most of what I've shown you so far, you either do not have the technology to re-create, or I trust that you will hold to your promise and let the knowledge go no further. With lives hanging in the balance, I felt sure that you would do anything, even break a promise to me, to save someone."
"And yet you still intend to show us?" Aragorn asked, not denying that he would break his promise in such circumstances.
"Well, I won't ask you to make such a promise with this knowledge," Lauren said. "I've thought about this long and hard, and I don't think I can withhold such a simple method of saving a life. Who is to say that the whole purpose of our coming into contact wasn't to show you this very thing? I don't know if you will use it to save the life of someone who was supposed to die, or to prevent a life from ending too soon that was not meant to end." She waved a hand dismissively as the sentence came out sounding not quite right. "All I can do is teach you and leave the rest in the hands of Ilúvatar. You can use the knowledge as you see fit. I only ask that you do not teach it to other healers. The knowledge must end with you." Lauren held his gaze firmly, impressing upon him the importance of her request.
Aragorn thought about that for a long moment. He would be given free permission to use anything she showed him, but how could he not pass that knowledge on? Would it be better not to have the knowledge and resist the temptation to break his word to her? But how could he pass up on the chance to know more about how to save lives? Finally, he nodded slowly, having made up his mind. "I agree to your terms. You have my vow that though I use your knowledge freely, I will not instruct others in what you show me." A thought came to him, and he had to ask. "But what will happen if I am seen using your knowledge? If others see me using it, and thus learn what it is you will show us?"
Lauren shrugged helplessly. "I don't know. Come up with something. Say it made sense to try, but don't teach them."
Aragorn shot Legolas a helpless confused look. What was she about to show them, and was it really worth this entire debate? He finally asked the question. "What is it that you keep referring to?"
"The methods I am about to show you go by the names CPR and the Heimlich maneuver. They can be used in some circumstances to keep someone breathing, to restart a heart, or to save someone who is choking to death. And the good thing about them is that you need nothing beyond your own body to use them."
Aragorn's eyebrows rose in amazement and curiosity. These methods did sound like something he wanted to learn. "I would be honored if you would show us these methods."
Lauren gestured around them, and the mountaintop they stood on disappeared to be replaced by a small room with small desks and chairs scattered around. A woman with a large case stood in the middle of the room. "I don't feel that I'm qualified to teach you myself, but I'll go through the training with you again." She turned to face the woman in the middle of the room, and gave her a nod to start.
"Hi, I'm Mrs. Visconti. I'm here today to teach you CPR, which stands for cardiopulmonary resuscitation and the Heimlich maneuver, which can be used to save a choking victim." She leaned down and opened the case at her feet. Aragorn and Legolas watched with no little surprise as she pulled out a life-size doll and placed it on the floor at their feet.
Lauren leaned over and explained to them. "That's the practice dummy. When you use CPR, you have to press pretty forcefully on someone's chest. You can't do that with a real person, or you could cause their heart to stop beating or cause problems with the rhythm of the heart. So, these dummies were made to practice on."
Aragorn nodded like he understood, but he couldn't seem to take his eyes off the pseudo human at their feet. He looked up when he heard the instructor clear her throat disapprovingly. He suddenly felt like he was back in his lessons as a child in Rivendell and gave her his full attention.
She gestured for them to sit at the desks and proceeded to teach them the full method of what was called CPR. Lauren leaned over at one point and whispered to Aragorn. "I think you can forgo calling 911. First off, you don't have phones, and second, I highly doubt anyone would come." Lauren looked up guiltily when the instructor stopped speaking and glared at her. "Sorry." After that, Lauren kept quiet for the rest of the lesson.
Finally, after going over all of the details, which Aragorn actually thought made a lot of sense, it was time to practice on the 'dummy'. Since this was largely done for Aragorn's benefit, he was the first to try it. He knelt down beside the dummy and ran through the 'A-B-C's' of CPR in his mind before attempting the method. 'A' stood for airway and consisted of placing the victim flat on a hard surface, asking them if they were OK, calling 911, which he still did not understand, and then tilting the person's head back to fully open their airway, after checking that there were no foreign bodies. He started by doing these steps, finally placing one hand on the dummy's head and the other under his chin and tilting his head back. 'B' stood for breathing. The main steps here were taking several seconds to look, listen and feel for signs of breath from the victim. If the victim was not breathing, the next step was to pinch the victim's nose closed, place his mouth over the victim's mouth, and give him two full breaths from his own body. The next stage of this method involved 'C', circulation. First, he checked for a pulse by checking at the throat. Aragorn was very practiced at this particular step. As expected, the dummy had no pulse, so he began the chest compressions as he had been instructed. It was this step that could cause harm to a living victim and necessitated the practice dummy. He had been instructed that he was to perform fifteen compressions to every two breaths and continue until advanced life support was available.
Aragorn made it through the steps flawlessly the first time. Knowing that this would be the only training he ever had, though, he made sure to go over it many times, practicing until it came naturally. He wanted this method at hand and to come as second nature when he needed it. When he was satisfied, and only then, did he allow Legolas to try his hand at it. Though not a healer, Legolas also easily picked up on the method, and Aragorn watched until he was sure Legolas would also be able to use the method naturally in the middle of a battlefield if necessary. Lauren passed up her turn, knowing she had just gotten re-certified a few months prior to her accident.
The instructor then pulled out a child-sized dummy, and Aragorn and Legolas both went through the practice with the few changes that a child required. When Aragorn felt that they had learned the alterations enough and would be competent to tend to either an adult or a child, he allowed them to move on to the other method, the one for choking.
As they were shown, the Heimlich maneuver was only to be used when the victim was choking and could not breathe or speak. If the person was breathing, this method was not to be used. But if their throat was completely blocked, this could save their lives. They were instructed to stand behind the choking person, make a fist and place their fist, thumb side inward, against the victim's upper abdomen, below the ribcage and above the navel. Once they were positioned correctly, they then grasped their fist with their other hand and pressed into the abdomen with a quick upward thrust. This could be repeated until the object was expelled. Aragorn and Legolas were instructed to practice on each other, just not actually pressing very hard. They used the dummy to use the method for an unconscious person. This same method was used to expel water from a drowning victim's lungs, making sure the victim's head was turned to the side to allow the water to escape.
When they finally finished their lessons, Aragorn felt that he had indeed learned something that he would find very handy in his future. He only wished he would be able to teach others. Such small simple things as what they had learned here could save many lives. But he could understand Lauren's fear. If these methods became common usage long before they were invented, the world could be drastically changed. As they exited the building, Aragorn came to appreciate just how much trust Lauren had placed in him by showing him these things. "What else do you have planned for us?" he asked lightly, thinking that she had shown them all she would of medicine.
"I thought a visit to a hospital might be a treat for you," she said lightly. "Though I don't usually think of them that way. Most of the time, I only visit a hospital if someone is sick or injured, though there are happy times too, like the birth of a baby. I think we'll start at the nursery."
Aragorn's eyebrows rose in surprise. Apparently, they were to see a great deal more tonight. The world seemed to shimmer around them as a large building sprang into existence in front of them. 'That was unusual', Aragorn thought to himself. That was not an effect they often saw when the scenery changed around them.
Lauren led them up to the automatic double doors, and stopped an inch in front of the doors when they refused to open. She stepped back a couple of paces then stepped forward again, and still the doors did not open. Stepping to the side, Lauren looked up at the sensors that told the mechanism when to open the door. "Maybe it's not working or something," Lauren commented softly. Aragorn and Legolas stood beside her, out of the way of the doors. "But why would they be out of order in my dreams?"
Aragorn had no answer to that. He turned as he saw a couple, the woman obviously with child, walk toward them. "Pardon me," he began, "you should know that the door does not seem to be working."
The couple continued as if they had not heard them, and approached the door. It opened as they approached, and they walked into the building as if nothing odd had happened.
"What was that?" Lauren asked, shaking her head in confusion. "It was as if they didn’t hear you, and the door worked for them." She walked into the middle of the doorway again, and the doors did not move. Even when she jumped up and down waving her arms in front of the sensors, the doors remained stubbornly closed. "Well this is odd," Lauren commented under her breath. After staring at the doors for a moment more, she slowly reached a hand out to touch the glass. Inhaling sharply, she watched as her hand passed through the door. A sharp jerk brought her hand back to her side of the door, and she spun to gaze at Aragorn and Legolas with wide eyes. "What is going on here?"
Walking forward, Aragorn did as Lauren had just done, and extended his hand toward the door. His hand also went through, and he took a step forward to see what would happen. He easily passed through the doors and stood on the other side. Turning back, he saw Lauren and Legolas looking at him in amazement. He held out a hand to Lauren, extending his hand back through the glass. She cautiously took his hand and he drew her through the door to stand beside him. Her eyes were wide with confusion. Aragorn raised an eyebrow at Legolas, who then took a breath and walked through the doors to join them on the other side.
"This is new," Lauren breathed softly. She looked around and saw someone sitting at the receptionist's desk. Glancing sideways at Aragorn and Legolas, she strode forward and tried to get the person's attention. "Excuse me, miss? Can you help me?" The woman made no sign that she even heard Lauren. Lauren raised her eyebrow in a manner reminiscent of Aragorn and Elrond. "Can you hear me? Excuse me?" When waving her hand in front of the woman's face garnered no reaction, she placed her hand on the counter to lean forward and peer into the woman's eyes. Her hand went through the desk, and Lauren stumbled forward, thrown off balance. Looking down, she noticed that she was now standing in the middle of the desk.
Aragorn and Legolas stared at the odd sight of Lauren's upper body protruding from the top of the desk. The rest of her body was lost within the desk. She looked back at them in panic, then lurched backwards a couple of steps, throwing her body away from the desk. After a quick pat down to reassure her that she hadn't lost any body parts, she slowly walked back to where Aragorn and Legolas stood.
"OK," she said faintly. "I have no idea what is going on here. I certainly would not have had us appear in the hospital as some kind of ghosts or some bodiless beings." She reached out and touched Aragorn's hand to double-check that they could at least still touch each other. A soft sigh of relief escaped her as she felt his hand solidly under hers. "So, we need to figure this out." A jerk of her head indicated a quiet place with many chairs gathered around. The three of them crossed to the waiting area she had indicated.
Lauren paced back and forth as she tried to reason through things. "OK, for some reason I haven't quite figured out, we can't physically interact with anything here. This is different from anything else I have encountered in this dream world. So why is it different? I just wanted to show you what a hospital is like in today's world. This is the hospital closest to my house, and I've visited a friend or two here. One of my co-workers had a baby, so I know what the nursery and that area looks like. My doctor has privileges here, though his actual office is across the street, and I've been here for various tests over the past few years. I could wander the halls easily, but there are areas that the casual observer isn't allowed to go. I suppose maybe I've watched too much 'Quantum Leap' in the past and decided subconsciously that the only way we could observe what I wanted to show you is by being insubstantial, invisible holograms." She paused a moment to let that thought sink in. "That has to be it. I created the scene, not by the rules I consciously thought about, but by rules that would allow us to see more of the hospital."
"A hologram?" Aragorn asked curiously. "What is that?"
"It's a three-dimensional representation of an object," Lauren tried to explain. "In the TV show I mentioned, the hologram could only be seen by the lead of the show. All you really need to understand is that nobody here can see us, and we can't interact with anything. We may have to figure out the rules along the way as we go, but this will work better. We could hardly have walked into patient's rooms or an operating room or anything without being questioned if people could see us." She gestured for them to follow her. "We're near the nursery, so we might as well start there."
Aragorn was not quite sure her reasoning made sense, but it was the only explanation they had at the moment. Shrugging slightly, he allowed Lauren to lead them down a long hallway to a set of swinging double doors. She hesitated for a minute before stepping forward through the doors. Aragorn and Legolas glanced at each other before following her. Walking through solid objects was a new experience for all of them and would take some getting used to. After going through the doors, she turned left into another hallway and led them to another door.
Beyond this door, they found themselves in a room with several clear, freestanding bassinets scattered around. A baby occupied each bassinet. Aragorn smiled at the look on Lauren's face as she walked over and looked down at the nearest baby. She reached down as if to touch his hand, then hesitated and pulled her hand away. Aragorn and Legolas moved over to stand beside her and look at the baby.
The baby they were looking at was wearing a small blue cap on his head and was covered by a soft blanket. He was sleeping peacefully. Watching the child sleep, Aragorn was reminded of when Eldarion was this age. "I can remember watching Eldarion sleep like this," Aragorn commented. "It seems so long ago now."
Smiling softly, Lauren agreed. "I used to watch both my niece and nephew like this. I was at the hospital when both of them were born."
"Would you like to have children of your own?" Aragorn questioned in curiosity, tilting his head sideways to look at her.
Lauren gave a noncommittal shrug. "Maybe someday." Her voice gave away nothing to indicate how she felt on the subject.
Legolas had been looking around the very sterile room. "Why are these children here? Would they not be better off with their parents? I cannot imagine a child thriving in this atmosphere."
"They aren't usually here for long," Lauren explained. "After a child is born, he or she and the mother are kept here for a pre-determined length of time until it is determined that they are both healthy enough to go home. The mothers often keep the babies in their room for most of the time. They are returned to the nursery when the mother needs to sleep or bathe, though, and I think at other times, while the nurses keep watch over them."
"I would hope they have a system for noting which child belongs with which mother," Aragorn commented.
Moving to another bassinet, Lauren pointed at the band circling the exposed ankle of the infant. "Each child and mother are given bands which have their information on it. And each bassinet has a tag with their name and birth date on it as well. Though there have been cases of mix-ups, they are extremely rare."
"Mix-ups?" Aragorn asked in horror. "You mean that parents have been given the wrong child?"
Shrugging helplessly, Lauren wasn’t quite sure how to answer that. "Well, I don't know of any cases personally, but I have heard of such things happening. I have to admit though, it seems to happen much more in fictional stories than reality. Writers seem to think it is a good dramatic effect to have children switched at birth." She didn't think her explanation reassured them, but she didn't have any solid facts at hand on this subject. All she knew was what she had heard from the news and media.
"Do people not use midwives and have children in their homes?" Aragorn asked. To his mind, that would avoid the possibility of any 'mix-ups' and would be much more comfortable.
"Not many people choose to do that, though I'm sure some still do," Lauren mused. "Most women would prefer to be in a hospital, though. It may be sterile and not the best atmosphere, but if anything goes wrong, they can be rushed into surgery for an emergency cesarean section." Seeing the blank looks on their faces, she hastened to explain the term. "The child can be surgically cut out of the mother. It's a last resort, as any surgery has the possibility of complications due to infection, reaction to anesthetic, or other unexpected problems. But many women have had their lives and the lives of their children saved by having the capabilities of a state of the art hospital handy. Women can still die in childbirth here, but it's not very common. I feel confident in saying that the incidence of women or children dying during childbirth in hospitals is much lower than it was in your time."
A small smile crossed her lips. "There's another part of the nursery you should see." She looked around as if getting her bearings then gestured to a wall to her left. Walking through it, they found themselves in another room with clear freestanding bassinets. Unlike in the previous room, most of these bassinets were not open to the air. Some of them were covered with a tent of clear material and had tubes and canisters connected to them. Moving closer, Aragorn looked into one of these bassinets. The child inside was smaller than any living child he had ever seen. She lay still, sleeping, but there were tubes connected to her feet and arms. There were circular openings in the clear tent surrounding the child, but they were closed at the moment.
"How can a child be born so small and still survive?" Aragorn asked. He would almost be able to hold this child completely in his two cupped hands.
"All the equipment you see here is meant to support the lives of children born prematurely or those who have health problems when they are born. The tents around them are incubators to provide warmth and to protect them from germs that might cause illness or infection. Most of them will have a tube in their nose or mouth that runs to their stomach and feeds them. A lot of preemies have underdeveloped lungs, so they have monitors attached to them to make sure they are breathing properly and warn the nurses if there is a problem. The babies here are very closely monitored to help them have the best chance of surviving and having a healthy life. Now, I won't say that babies born very early have an easy time of things. Often, there are health problems later in life, but more premature babies can survive now than ever could before."
It was a long time before Aragorn and Legolas could take their eyes off of the tiny infant. It amazed the both of them that this child would have a chance to live. Modern medicine had truly come a long way to allow such a thing. Aragorn finally asked a question that had occurred to him during Lauren's explanation. "You said something about germs causing infection or illness? What are germs?"
Lauren's eyebrows rose abruptly. She forgot that Aragorn came from a time before germs had been discovered. She didn't have much medical knowledge at all. How could she explain this? "Well, germs are organisms so small that they cannot be seen. They can be airborne or passed through touch. You've surely noticed that if one person has a cold, those near that person usually end up with a cold?" Aragorn nodded. "Well, the germs of the first person are passed to other people when he sneezes or coughs near others. There are germs all over the place, so it is very important to wash your hands frequently, especially in hospitals."
"Ada always insisted on washing before and after treating anyone in the healing rooms," Aragorn commented, looking with more respect at the tents surrounding the infants.
"He sounds wise," Lauren said. "Even if he didn't know about microscopic organisms, he knew the link between cleanliness and avoiding infection."
"Yes," Aragorn said. "So the tents covering them also act to keep out these airborne organisms?"
"Yes," Lauren said, happy to see how quickly Aragorn was picking up on the concept. It occurred to her for a moment to worry that she was telling them far too much about medical concepts they had never heard of before. But most healers of his time would probably not believe in some invisible organisms causing infection and illness. Besides, he had sworn to her that he would not teach others what he learned here.
"This is truly fascinating, Lauren. Though I would not be able to duplicate much of the 'equipment' here, I am learning much that could be of use. May we observe a surgery so that I may compare the methods that I have already seen to those used by your doctors?" Aragorn was fascinated by all that they had seen here, and wanted to learn more. There was so much that Lauren took for granted that seemed quite amazing to him.
Legolas, not being the healer in the group, had not had much to contribute to the conversation. He was wandering the room, looking at the few infants in their incubators and marveling at the idea that medicine had come so far as to be able to save the lives of these tiny children. He looked up when he heard Aragorn ask Lauren if they would be able to observe the doctors performing surgery. The thought did not especially excite him. Though he had participated in treating many battle injuries in the past, he did not enjoy watching surgeries.
Lauren paled slightly at the thought. "Well, I don't know that I'll be able to come up with a realistic surgery for you to watch. I've seen some stuff on TV, but I don't know how realistic it is. And truthfully, I can't stand the sight of blood."
That comment prompted Aragorn to raise an eyebrow at her. A descendant of Elrond, one of the greatest healers in Middle-earth, and she could not stand the sight of blood?
She shrugged at his look. "I know what you're thinking, Aragorn, and just remember that a lot of years and generations have passed between you and me. I went into computer programming rather than medicine for a reason." When Aragorn's look of disbelief turned to disappointment, she relented. "OK, fine, I'll see what I can find." Leading them through the walls of the neo-natal intensive care unit, she found a hallway with signs on the walls. After following the signs through the hallway, she found that they had to go up to the second floor. Walking over to the elevator, she tried to push the button to summon the elevator, with no success. "Oh, yeah," she said as her finger went through the button. She stared at the button for a moment, stumped, before turning back to Aragorn and Legolas. "OK, we seem to have a problem. Since we can't touch anything, we will may have to wait for someone else to come along, and push the button for us to hitch a ride. At that point, we will have to hope they're heading to where we are. Our other option is to find the stairs."
"I believe we should find the stairs," Legolas said. "I do not know how large this hospital is, but how long do you believe it will be before we find someone going to the same place we are?"
"You're right," Lauren agreed. "It could be awhile. The stairs are usually close to the elevators, so it should be around here somewhere." After a moment of looking, Aragorn found a door with the word STAIRS next to it. They walked through the door and Lauren started to lead the way up the stairs. Her foot sank through the first step and she stumbled forward a little, not expecting that. "Well, that's great," she exclaimed, getting frustrated with the laws of this new world. "Now what?" She turned to face Aragorn and Legolas, hoping they might have an idea about how to proceed.
For a long moment, they just stared at each other, trying to figure out how to climb stairs that they couldn't touch. Finally, Aragorn gestured for Lauren to join him and Legolas, and stop standing in the stairs. "This world seems to operate with different rules than we are used to," Aragorn started.
"Yeah," Lauren said slowly. They had already established that fact.
"But previously, if we wanted to climb a set of stairs, we only had to believe that they were there. Perhaps we must try to bridge the chasm between the world that we see and the world that we can feel."
"OK, I'm with you in principle, but I don't see what you're actually proposing we try." Lauren frowned as she tried to follow his train of thought.
"Believe that there are stairs where we see them," Aragorn said simply.
"So by our belief, we'll be able to touch it?" Lauren asked skeptically. "I'm not sure that will do it."
"We can only try," Legolas pointed out. "If it does not work, we will be in no different position than we are now."
"True," Lauren conceded the point, shrugging one shoulder.
They all stood back and stared at the stairs, concentrating on believing that there was a flight of stairs there. Aragorn was the first to step forward and place his foot on a step. It did not fall through. As he climbed several steps, he looked back toward Legolas and Lauren and encouraged them to try it.
With some hesitation, Lauren took a step forward and placed her foot on the first step. When she felt the step beneath her foot, she looked up at Aragorn in surprise. "It worked!"
"Did I not tell you?" Aragorn asked smugly. They climbed the stairs to the second floor quickly. Each was secretly afraid the stairs would disappear beneath their feet, but would not admit it. Only after they walked through the door onto the second floor did Lauren allow a soft breath of relief.
Following the signs to the surgery wing, they found themselves standing in front of a door that read 'Authorized Admittance Only'. Lauren walked through the door, trailed by Aragorn and Legolas. She picked a door at random and walked through. Seeing surgeons surrounding a table and nurses scurrying around handling various instruments, she looked back through the door and gestured for Aragorn and Legolas to join her. "I found an ongoing surgery. Come on in." After they walked through the door, they stood in a small room with a sink where people would wash up and don sterile garb before entering the clean room where the actual surgery took place. She took a moment to explain the purpose of this room, then walked through the door into the surgical room. Lauren had no desire to venture near enough to see anything. She gestured to the television monitors that showed a view of the inside of the patient's body. This was apparently an endoscopic surgery. Unfortunately, with Lauren's limited medical knowledge, she could not tell them what they were seeing. She and Legolas stood back and watched the monitor while Aragorn drifted closer to better hear what the doctors were saying.
When Aragorn got close enough to see the patient, he saw that the doctors had not cut the patient open to the air, but had made a few small incisions in his side, and had tubes inserted into these incisions. The doctors did not seem to be looking at the patient, but rather at the television screens. Aragorn walked up to stand next to the doctor and watched him operating some controls as he looked at the screen.
"There it is," the doctor said in satisfaction. "I see the occlusion." Aragorn watched as the doctor manipulated the controls, and the image on the screen changed. Not knowing exactly what he was watching, but being fascinated nevertheless, he continued to watch the screen. As he continued to watch and listen, he slowly figured out that he was watching the doctors graft a blood vessel into place to enable the blood flow to go around a blockage in an artery. He stood there and watched in amazement as the surgery proceeded without difficulty. Once the surgeons were satisfied and began to pull the tubes out, Aragorn moved back to join Legolas and Lauren. He told them what he had witnessed.
Lauren nodded. "They must have been doing an endoscopic coronary bypass surgery. I've never seen one before. I'm actually surprised that you saw so many details. I only know of the procedure. They use cameras and small instruments inside the body without having to cut the person open. It allows for a quicker recovery." Her forehead furrowed in thought as she pondered the fact that Aragorn had just witnessed details of a surgery she had never seen before. This could not be coming completely from her mind, then. There was something else going on here. She was silent as she led the way out of the surgery wing.
Deciding that it would be easier to catch an elevator to the lobby from here than to try to catch an elevator to a specific floor, they stood in the hallway in front of the bank of elevators. The doors to an elevator opened, and a woman with blonde hair and brown eyes stepped out of the elevator. Aragorn thought she looked familiar, and had his thoughts confirmed when he heard Lauren whisper a word.
"Mom?"
Subtitles