Day 37, Season Fall, 513 AV
Later that day...
As it turned out, it took a lot longer for Nate to find the Opal clan tents than he'd initially thought. In the grand scheme of things it wasn't so much that he didn't have any ability to navigate so much that he had a very weak sense of direction, coupled with a tendency to get overly focused on a singular goal when he was concentrating. The end-result was that he tended to end up in places and then look about him wondering how the petch he managed to get himself there. And that was just when he was in town. It was truly a miracle he'd managed to survive hunting for as long as he had.
The River Flower, as he had found out the Opal Clan tents were apparently called, was busy as was usual for the place. Nate had never gone to any major medical center that was not teeming full of people rushing in and out, the sharp medicinal smell of herbs wafting through the air as Nate hobbled into the tent, hand still pressed firmly against his thigh where he'd sliced a nice long thin cut right through the fabric and into the flesh. The fabric was fine; he was sure he could get it fixed somehow, but the wound itself probably needed a bandage and a wrapping and perhaps a dressing.
Nate was no doctor. When he was in Syliras his specialty had been emergency medicine; the type that kept a hunter in the wild who'd been injured from getting any worse while working his or her way back to Syliras. And while his eight years experience doing just that, from his initial fumbling attempts to his more recent practiced movements, were certainly very effective stop-gap measures, he'd never really trusted himself to be an actual doctor. He was not certain he'd be capable of actually fixing any problems. All his solutions were too makeshift.
And that was why he'd always been intimidated walking into an actual medical center, even though his experience with Waisana, although rocky at first, had been so illuminating. According to the young but fiery healer, the Drykas were not nearly as rigid in their ways of practicing medicine as the Sylirans were. Back in the citadel city, Nate's experience with doctors was very different; while they were certainly conscientious to actual patients they treated field medics like Nate almost like nurses. Or worse.
It wasn't that they didn't understand that Nate had medical experience, but their own experience as medical professions were vastly different from his. They worked in hospitals where resources were rarely scarce, where beds were oftentimes plentiful, where the environment was clean and if they were very lucky, even sterile, and where they had a bountiful supply of helpers. Out in the wilds, Nate had none of those things yet still needed to find a way to save lives.
In any event, it seemed the medics of the Opal Clan were not nearly as... blind. Perhaps because as a tent city, Endrykas simply could not afford to have a true hospital, and could only really have what amounted to a large field center. And it was unfortunate, in a way, because despite what Nate thought of it, the major centers of healing in Syliras were definitely effective and could heal all but the most serious of injuries.
So it was with a strange combination of emotions: trepidation, annoyance, and even a bit of fear, that he stepped back into the tents. Truthfully, he might try to acquire gainful employment in this very place; after all as a medic he'd probably fit in. Well, maybe fit in. He couldn't be sure, but he figured any medical center was always happy to have experienced help. Nonetheless, none of that mattered right now. Lifting his voice, he tried asking in Common, "Hello? Can anyone help me?"
