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halfamoonTitle: After
Fandom: OZ
Female Character: Gloria Nathan
Word Count: 409
Summary: After the riot, Gloria heads home after her shift
Gloria made her way out of the infirmary, still running on the adrenaline that had carried her through the last twelve- eighteen- twenty-two? hours. She didn't know how long it had been, the injured kept coming. She hadn't checked a clock since recording Anthony Nowakowski's time of death. Someone else, probably the Warden or Sister Peter Marie, had to notify his next of kin. Thank god that task hadn't fallen to her too. That would have required her to stop.
And she couldn't stop, not with so many bodies coming in. After a while, that's all they seemed to be- a body in a bed. She had to treat the men who started the aggression the same as the men that continued it. There was no rhyme nor reason to it. It didn't matter if they were a member of the staff or one of the prisoners. They all had to be given care- wounds cleaned and bandaged, bones re-set, hands held, just for a moment, never longer, there was no time. Six prisoners and two correctional officers had died, thirty-four others had been injured in the riot, and she saw it all through to the end.
But now her shift was over at last. She hung her doctor's coat in her locker, changed out of her work shoes, and retrieved her purse. She walked out of the locker room and onto the employee parking lot adjacent the prison. She made her way through the gates, past the news trucks that were there for the story- more people working late hours, just like her.
Two miles down the road from the prison, she pulled over to the side of the road. The lights from the prison no longer obscured her view and, as she stepped out of the car, she could see the moonlight filtering through the trees. There was a ring around the moon, a sign that rain was on the way. She leaned back against the hood of the car and gazed up at it. The moon was a constant. It shone on the damned and saved alike. It wasn't affected by good days or bad ones, by petty squabbles or full-blown riots. It just was. And tonight, of all nights, she bathed in the moonlight and let it wash away all the hurt, all the pain, all the regret, for the ones she couldn't save and allow her to start again for the ones she could.
Fandom: OZ
Female Character: Gloria Nathan
Word Count: 409
Summary: After the riot, Gloria heads home after her shift
Gloria made her way out of the infirmary, still running on the adrenaline that had carried her through the last twelve- eighteen- twenty-two? hours. She didn't know how long it had been, the injured kept coming. She hadn't checked a clock since recording Anthony Nowakowski's time of death. Someone else, probably the Warden or Sister Peter Marie, had to notify his next of kin. Thank god that task hadn't fallen to her too. That would have required her to stop.
And she couldn't stop, not with so many bodies coming in. After a while, that's all they seemed to be- a body in a bed. She had to treat the men who started the aggression the same as the men that continued it. There was no rhyme nor reason to it. It didn't matter if they were a member of the staff or one of the prisoners. They all had to be given care- wounds cleaned and bandaged, bones re-set, hands held, just for a moment, never longer, there was no time. Six prisoners and two correctional officers had died, thirty-four others had been injured in the riot, and she saw it all through to the end.
But now her shift was over at last. She hung her doctor's coat in her locker, changed out of her work shoes, and retrieved her purse. She walked out of the locker room and onto the employee parking lot adjacent the prison. She made her way through the gates, past the news trucks that were there for the story- more people working late hours, just like her.
Two miles down the road from the prison, she pulled over to the side of the road. The lights from the prison no longer obscured her view and, as she stepped out of the car, she could see the moonlight filtering through the trees. There was a ring around the moon, a sign that rain was on the way. She leaned back against the hood of the car and gazed up at it. The moon was a constant. It shone on the damned and saved alike. It wasn't affected by good days or bad ones, by petty squabbles or full-blown riots. It just was. And tonight, of all nights, she bathed in the moonlight and let it wash away all the hurt, all the pain, all the regret, for the ones she couldn't save and allow her to start again for the ones she could.
