xp_logs | Lockheed goes in for a check up with Hank (Reply)

Hank was swearing quietly, in several languages, at the computer. He didn't want to go to Jonothon with this line of thought until he was sure it at least had a good chance of working... draining a psi of energy on purpose was something he'd never done, and draining a psi who was currently an energy based being of energy was an even more unnerving prospect. And even if he decided to do it, he wasn't sure how. So until he could come up with some sort of plan, he wasn't going to get Jono's hopes up. And the energy readings were so hard to pin down....

He told the computer what he thought its mother had done with an anteater, and then heard a noise. He looked up, and blushed hard (invisibly, thank goodness) when he realized that Kitty had heard him. "Oh. Uh. My apologies, Kitty. I didn't know you were there." He glanced at her shoulder. "Hello, Lockheed."

"Evening, sir," Kitty said, smiling and filing the insult away in the corner of her mind that held on to such things. Who knew when it might come in handy. "I was wondering if you'd give Lockheed... well, a check up. You must have heard about the fire breathing incident, and I want to make sure he's ok. No internal damage. John and Nathan are helping me train him, in theory, but he can't produce a flame so..." She shrugged.

"Oh. Of course." He smiled. "A change of pace is just what I need, I think. And I certainly wouldn't want the little fellow to come to any harm." He rummaged around in his desk for a moment, and found two wrapped pieces of fudge. "Has Nathan been able to determine how much he understands when we speak to him?"

"Basically, um, everything," Kitty said. She reached up and lifted the dragon off her shoulder, setting him on one of the tables. "He apparently thinks in English, albeit confusing, Lockheed-logic English." Lockheed was snuffling the air, having scented the chocolate-substance. He knew that - The Boy occasionally gave it to Kitty to make her happy and they would both share with him.

"Good. That does make things much easier." He leaned down to look Lockheed in the eye. "This," he said, showing him one of the pieces of fudge, "is for Kitty. Not for you." He handed it solemnly to Kitty, the little dragon's eyes following it sadly. He held up the other piece. "If you are a good dragon, and behave while I examine you, you may have this piece all to yourself. Are we agreed?"

Ah, bargaining, excellent. The Boy had taught him all about that, and Lockheed was good at it. He tapped a claw on the table twice and smiled his dragon smile up at the doctor.

"Good." Hank put it in the pocket of his labcoat. "Now... stay there for a moment while I find those scans I did last time." He rummaged in the J-N filing cabinet. "This would be easier if I had any idea of what some of his organs do," he said ruefully. "Do you have any idea what triggered the fire-breathing incident? I know Remy was involved... did he startle Lockheed? Frighten him? Feed him chili?"

Alas. Maybe The Boy was the only one around here who really understood bargaining. Well, that was unfortunate on many levels, but Lockheed could live with just one piece of chocolate. He cocked his head at the mention of the crazy metal stick man.

Kitty scowled. "He threw a cigarette at Lockheed and Lockheed seems to have thought it was food and eaten it. At least, that's what we figure."

"Ah. Well, people put them in their mouths and they shrink, so I suppose I can see where he got that idea. Like a lollipop, right, Lockheed?" Hank found the scans and flipped through them. Hm. There was a lot going on inside that small, compact body. "I know he's seen people eat those."

Clearly a man who understood how food worked. And probably understood how dangerous it was for people and dragons to eat hothothot fire food sticks. Lockheed nodded, then craned his neck, trying to see what the blue fur man was looking at.

Kitty sighed, scratching Lockheed behind the wings. "That makes sense, I guess. Doesn't make me any happier about Remy throwing cigarette butts at Lockheed, though."

"He may not even have seen Lockheed. He throws the things around all over the place," Hank said disapprovingly. He showed Lockheed one of the scans, one showing his skeletal system with shadows of skin and organs, since the little dragon seemed to want to see. "See, Lockheed, this is what your bones look like, under your skin."

Lockheed blinked, head nodding closer to the page. Well, it was sort of dragon shaped... Tilting his head down to peer at his stomach, he reached down and hooked a claw lightly into the skin there, trying to peel it up to see.

"Lockheed! No, don't do that." Kitty tugged his claws free. "It's a... a magic sort of picture, Lockheed. We can't see your bones normally."

Oh, magic pictures. Yes, that made sense. Lockheed nodded, turning back to the doctor.

Hank blinked, and smiled. "Literal little fellow, isn't he?" He scratched under one of Lockheed's wings gently with a large finger. "Do you remember when I put you in the big box, Lockheed, and there were strange noises? That was a special machine that made pictures of your insides for me to see." He found the one that focused best on what he thought was probably Lockheed's digestive system. Given that it actually diverged in two places, he wasn't entirely sure, but it was the only arrangement that seemed to have an entrance and an exit, so to speak. Hm.

Craning his neck up to give the blue fur man a better angle to scritch him, he was almost bent over backwards when he tried to nod. Oh, that didn't work too well, did it...

Hank laughed, picking him up gently and putting him back on his feet. "Now, Lockheed, maybe you can help me," he said seriously. Treating Lockheed as if he were one of the smaller children was probably the best tack... understanding what was said to him, mostly, but very literal-minded and probably with a fairly simple vocabulary. "When you ate the cigarette, did it burn you somewhere in here?" He indicated Lockheed's chest and stomach.

Lockheed nodded vigorously, paws going to clasp his stomach. Oh yes, much burnhothothot. Firefoodsticks were definitely bad for dragons.

"Okay. Can you point to exactly where the pain was?" Hank asked, looking at the scan again. Diagnosing a problem was much easier when the patient could tell you where it had hurt. If he could work out which of these things the cigarette had encountered, maybe that would tell him something.

Well that was a silly question, Lockheed thought. It hurt in his stomach. But his paws moved slightly, to settle over the left side of his body.

"That's interesting..." Hank murmured, adjusting the glasses he'd been wearing to work on the computer... he didn't need them all the time, but he was far-sighted, and too much close work without them made his head ache. "This, I think, is Lockheed's primary stomach," he told Kitty, pointing to the larger organ that sat squarely in the middle of his rounded tummy. "It seems to be where food goes. But you see here, is what I assumed was a vestigial second stomach... food doesn't seem to go into it, from what I could determine when I first checked him over." He grinned. "He was most cooperative about eating the food I gave him so I could see where it went. It all went to the primary, not to here. Nevertheless, the pain seems to have focused there."

Kitty peered down at the scan, nodding slightly. "That is odd..." she said. "Is it just me or is it hooked directly into the waste system instead of going through the... you know, the food processing stuff." Her brief flirtations with biology had given her a basic understanding of the whole thing, but almost no vocabulary. "Why on earth would it do that?"

"I assumed because it was a vestigial organ, at first, but... hm." Hank palpated Lockheed's stomach gently, grinning when the little dragon wiggled. "I'm sorry if this tickles." He looked at the scan again. "Now, Lockheed, I have some more questions. After you swallowed the cigarette, did you feel fire come up from here..." he touched the spot on the left, and drew his finger to the side along the connecting passage, then up towards Lockheed's throat, "or from here?" This time, the line was directly from Lockheed's primary stomach to his mouth.

Oh, now that was hard... Lockheed thought, peering down at his stomach again to get a better idea of the memory. There had been the hothothot and the cough and then no more hothot feeling. And it had all been over on the left, yes. His claw tapped the left side decisively, and he went, "Mer."

"Good. Now we're getting somewhere." Hank patted him, and rummaged in his pocket. "Since you're being so helpful, I think I have... yes, here you go." He opened the bag of fruit jellies he'd been eating earlier, and gave lockheed a red one. "In addition to the fudge, of course," he added, as he got a suspicious look. "That you may still have at the end."

Lockheed nodded and smiled, clearly this was his due, and the snack disappeared into his mouth to the sound of much lipsmacking and chewing. Kitty giggled, then looked at Dr. McCoy. "You may be getting somewhere, but I'm still confused."

"If he'd simply eaten something flammable, that then came into contact with the cigarette, the fire would have come from his primary stomach," Hank explained. "Which was certainly a possibility, given that he eats almost everything. However, he seems quite sure that the source of the flame was this... secondary stomach, or whatever it is." He sighed. "There's only so much I can learn about his anatomy without a dissection, I'm afraid, so this is all rather theoretical..."

"Definitely no dissection," Kitty said, frowning.

"Of course not. I would never suggest it." Hank patted Lockheed. "I would never dissect a patient." He rubbed his furry chin thoughtfully. "My best theory, at this point, is that this secondary stomach is actually part of a natural defensive system of some sort. Lockheed... when you breathed out the fire, did it hurt? I mean, was it pain like having your paw stepped on or your wing bent, or did it just feel hot?"

Well, hmm... He thought about this, turning the idea over in his mind. It hadn't been a pawstepping, that was definite. Pawstepping was bad and had happened once and he would not let it happen again. This really had just been a hothothot, but also kind of uncomfortable. But maybe not pain uncomfortable? He tapped a claw twice, although not quite so definitively.

"Just hot?" Hank nodded. "That fits... if he's designed by nature to be able to breath fire... although really, it's probably more akin to vomiting fire, technically... he'd have to be more or less fireproof on the inside." He patted Lockheed. "I wouldn't recommend feeding him coals, or anything, but should he eat something on fire by mistake, it shouldn't do him any real harm."

Kitty stared at Lockheed for a second, then up at Hank, then back at Lockheed. "You know," she mused, "I don't know what's more worrying; that you have described him as being able to vomit fire, or as being able to eat things which happen to be on fire."

"Well, it's coming out of his stomach.... a stomach... not his lungs, and being expelled orally, so technically 'vomit' would be the correct term." Hank grinned. "And he does seem to be fireproof, or he would have had probably fatal internal injuries after the cigarette incident. He is still a very young dragon, I believe?"

Kitty nodded. "Yeah. He only hatched, um, a couple months ago, and his father was... we think, a couple hundred years old. At least." It was one of the many things about having a dragon as a pet she didn't like to think about. Along with the size of said father.

"Ah." Hank nodded, thinking it over. "Then... and this is only a theory, mind you... I would suggest that rather than being vestigial, the second stomach is simply as yet undeveloped. Since he's shown no sign of it up until now, I would guess that he cannot yet generate a spark of his own accord, but has enough of.... whatever he fuels the fire with... for a small puff of it, if a spark is administered." He scratched Lockheed gently under the chin. "It must have come as quite a shock to have fire come out of your mouth all of a sudden, little fellow."

Lockheed leaned into the skritches, halfway purring, and nodded. He hadn't meant to do it, and he really hadn't meant to do it on the crazy metal stick man.

Kitty leaned on an elbow and considered this. "Yeah, I guess that makes sense," she said. "And I guess I'm glad to know he's still just a little guy. I won't worry too much about future sparking, as you put it, for a bit. Any guesses on when I should start worrying? Cause Mr. Marko will kill me if he flames in the house."

"He really doesn't seem to be able to generate enough fire yet to do any real harm, since I gather Remy was hit full in the face and still has all his skin, if not his hair." Hank smiled at her. "I'd suggest bringing him down for a routine checkup every couple of months, to see if the fire-stomach, for lack of a better name, has grown or enlarged. For now, even if he does have another little episode or two, he shouldn't do any serious damage unless he manages to do it directly on something extremely flammable."

"Well that's reassuring, hey Lockheed?" Kitty glanced down at the little dragon, who half way nodded at her before curling up in a ball on the table. There were all these skritches and it was late at night and a little nap'd be very nice, he thought.

Hank laughed. "Are you too tired for fudge?" he asked teasingly, withdrawing it from his pocket. "Oh, well, if you're too sleepy, perhaps Kitty would like it instead..."

Without even opening his eyes Lockheed opened his mouth. He was never too tired for food, although sometimes food made him sleepy.

Kitty couldn't help but laugh at the picture he presented. "Too bad," she said. "More fudge would have been good..."

And now there was the conundrum... Give Kitty a present or eat... What to do...

Hank laughed. "You already had a piece," he said firmly, unwrapping the fudge and handing it to Lockheed. "One each is fair. And another one each every time we have a checkup, how does that sound?"

"Works for me," Kitty said, grinning, as Lockheed munched on the chocolate. "Oh, hey," she added. "If you don't mind switching from your doctor hat to your professorly hat, did you see my results on that last lab? I think there's something off in the calibrations, because the numbers are coming out all strange."