Avatar: The New World

Prologue: A Bender is Born

Jeera

"Jeera, What are you doin here?" The grizzled old doctor said between long drags of his cigarette. "I thought they told you to take a night off, you're workin too much."

"I'm fine." Jeera rolled his eyes as he waved away the smoke. "Besides, it's a Saturday night, are you really gonna tell me you don't want my help?"

The doctor held his cigarette between his lips as he looked down at the clipboard in his hands. "You know I could always use more nurses but..."

"But nothin', I'm here, I'm ready, gimme something to do!"

"You should really be taking the night off."

"To do what? Sit at home alone eating ninety nine cent ramen and feeling sorry for myself? Would you wanna do that if you could be saving lives instead?"

The doctor grumbled and checked his clipboard again. "Fine, fine!" He looked out into the night and cocked his head. Jeera could hear it too, the sirens of an approaching ambulance. "But I don't wanna see your stupid face tomorrow, got it?"

Jeera watched the ambulance hover around the corner so quickly its rear end nearly toppled over. It came rushing towards them and they leapt out of the way as two paramedics climbed down to greet them.

"Whatta we got?" The doctor flicked away his cigarette as he moved to the back of the vehicle.

"A woman in her thirties." One of the paramedics recited as he opened the rear doors. "She was found in a hotel, people in the next room say she was attacked by her boyfriend. She's got a broken collar bone, and multiple lacerations to the neck and chest."

"I'll be the one to decide if anything's broken, thank you." The doctor and Jeera helped drag the hovering gurney down out of the ambulance. The woman had been sealed in a white vacuum sheet from chin to toes but her face was visible. It was bruised and splattered with blood. "Alright, Jeera, take her down to surgery and prep her, I'm gonna scrub in on this one, the hospital could really use some good press."

"Good press?" the paramedic cocked a brow.

"I'd say any day you save a battered woman is a good one." The doctor stared down at the woman's bloody face. "But when that woman happens to be Lula Lavender, the great doctor who saved her would surely get some recognition!"

"Lula--... no, the hotel clerk said her name was Seren."

"Rule number one of the holostar life, never use your real name." The doctor smiled down at the woman on the gurney and rubbed his hands together. "Nope, that's Lula Lavender, as I live and breathe and I'm gonna save her life tonight."

"A little respect, Chief?" Jeera said through tight teeth as he took the woman away. "She was almost killed!"

"Yeah? So? I'm gonna save her, aren't I! She'll be thankin me when this is all over, and probably thankin the hospital as well!"

The doctor continued on, but Jeera had left him behind as he rushed the woman through the halls. They came to the right place and Jeera explained the case to another nurse as he unsealed the vacuum sheet. What it revealed shocked him, there were so many bleeding wounds.

He turned to a tray of tools and collected a small basin of sterile water and a sponge. He bathed the wounds that littered the woman's body, dabbing them gently with his sponge as he prayed for her life. He wasn't sure when he closed his eyes, or why, but when he did he felt a sudden surge of energy filling him. As if taken by some ancient instinct, Jeera moved his hands over the woman's injuries and he felt warmth spreading from his touch.