Work Text:
Frank realizes there’s something off when he has to duck into the hub himself to get his own Red Bull. He can’t remember the last time he needed a sweet, tangy boost of caffeine and the universe didn’t simply provide.
The universe being Dana Evans, obviously.
“How’s it going?” he wheedles, falsely casual.
Dana gives him a withering look, and clears her throat. “King wants you. South 20.”
Her voice sounds rough. It’s after 2:00pm, seven hours in and five more to go, but he can’t remember her yelling very much in the morning. Actually, she barely told him off when he skipped over an asthma attack to go straight to a gnarly compound fracture. She just kind of raised her eyebrow at him and given him a meaningful “Mmhmm”.
He leans across right in front of her to grab a fresh face mask from its box. She shoves his arm out her way one-handed, corner of her mouth twitching downwards, but she doesn’t say anything, just buries her attention in computer work.
As far as Frank’s concerned, the case is solved.
“Might want to put this on,” he says, dangling the mask between Dana and her monitor.
She snatches it from his fingers, frowning. “I’m fine.”
“I wouldn’t dare say you weren’t,” Frank promises innocently, hands raised in a profession of cooperation.
Dana glares.
“King. South 20. On my way.”
–
Mel’s treatment plan for the patient in South 20 is elegant and relayed efficiently. Frank approves it easily, which gives him a spare five minutes to drop by his locker, the breakroom, and the vending machine on his way back to the hub.
He returns armed for battle, slipping in behind Dana and patting her shoulder to get her attention. She’s wearing the mask he gave her.
“I come in peace,” he pre-empts, “I brought supplies.”
One by one he unloads the items tucked against his chest under his left arm, sets them into the protected space under the counter behind Dana’s workstation. Tissues, hand sanitizer, Tylenol, and Cepacol throat lozenges, to start with. “I’ve got the good kind. Not the ones they tell you are supposed to taste like honey and lemon but they actually taste like Pinesol.”
“There’s a frog in my throat,” Dana croaks, “That don’t mean I need a thorn in my side, too.”
“No, it means you need orange juice,” Frank says, brightly, and offers her the final treasure from his hoard. “And a day off, but they don’t sell those in the vending machine.”
Dana clears her throat roughly, and then seems to think better of speaking. She takes the orange juice and shoves it under the counter with the lozenges.
Frank grins wide. “Did you know frogs don’t drink with their mouths? They just absorb water through their skin. We saw these Amazon milk frogs at the zoo last week. They’re supposed to, like, ooze milk from their skin when they’re scared that makes them taste bad to predators. But we didn’t see any, so I guess they were pretty chill.”
Dana scrubs a hand across her eyes and glares up at him.
“Anyway, you should drink that.” And Frank should probably get moving before Dana tries out one of those lozenges and can start telling him off again.
“I’ll take the kid with the headache in South 15.”