"I was saving it.  Didn't want to knock it over."  It's a little bit awkward hugging someone sitting in an office chair, but it lets him press her cheek to his stomach.  And pet her hair, which is nice.  "Anyway, I'm - sorry.  I think you mentioned you didn't like it when I put myself down, and I did it again.  I'll get better about that."

She nods into his belly, "That's all I want, really. No one gets to be mean to my friends, even my friends." 

Oh man.  Well.  Now he feels like a shithead.  "Okay."  He sounds a little subdued.

She squeezes him around the waist. 

He pets her hair, thinking.  Just another thing to practice.  "Ready for the next one?  Or do I have to turn you around so I can see the board without making you let go?"

He can have another squeeze first, but she lets go of him.

"No, you can go on. Can I have my fruit back?" 

"Hmmm.  Most of it."  He pops an orange slice in his mouth, then a strawberry slice.  Then he puts the bowl in her lap, and holds a canteloupe chunk to her lips.

Monch! 

"Next up..."

Stress test vs giant crab?  How???  Feed it car??  Animal testing???  No.

"Well.  We kind of killed it already.  So next up is..."

My girl vs. my partner??

Why do I even bother thinking.  Mom, I want a refund on this brain, it's clearly defective.  "Um.  At one point, I uh.  I introduced you as my girl instead of my partner?  And it felt...kind of off?"

She giggles quietly, nodding, "I think that is a little, um, suggestive? In English introducing someone like that is for girlfriends, isn't it? There's that old song..." 

She hums a line of My Girl, by The Temptations. 

"Y-yeah.  Uh."  say something.  "Sorry.  You're not - I mean, you're your own person.  You don't - belong to me?  I mean, you're my partner, but that's not."  Pause.  Breathe.  "You're an esper, and you solo-sensored Arrakis to death, and mapped out the whole damn dungeon.  You shouldn't - I mean, you deserve a better introduction than that."

Tim is actually a little lucky that his immigrant upbringing doesn't lead him to recognize the song!

"I don't really mind except it will make people think things that aren't true, yes? I am your partner, you're allowed to be proud of me just like I'm allowed to be proud of you. At least, that's my guess of what you meant by it?" 

She is waving a forkful of strawberry around as she thinks this through aloud. 

"Yeah.  I mean, I am proud of you.  I heard they're upgrading it to S-rank, I don't know if you heard.  I - " wait shit don't self-deprecate.  "Uh.  Hang on, let me...Lemme think."

He reaches up to the top of the weightlifting cage, and sloowwwwlllyyyy grinds out a pull-up.  Another.  And while he goes through the motions, he talks.  "So.  You're great, and not just because you're an esper, right?  And you're wi-uh, you're partnered with me.  And I'm - it reflects well on me, that of all the people you could be hanging out with, it's me."  He drops down and shakes out his arms.  "Does that make sense?"

"Sure," she's blushing a little, a condition she hides behind a big chunk of honeydew. 

“So I want to tell everyone. ‘Hey!  That’s my partner!’  So I guess that kind of makes sense.”

It makes sense that she’s blushing, he gets that way about compliments too, sometimes.  Politest thing to do is ignore it.

"Mhm. So don't worry about it, I think? Just say my partner," she shrugs, forking a grape into her mouth. 

"Sure.  Okay."  Well, the next item has got to be less embarrassing, right?

Pain relief - default?  Allergies, though?  Preferences?

... well.  Less embarrassing, yes.  Less painful, probably not.

"I think I'm going to need to talk to Bill about this and get an expert consensus, but with allergies, I don't know how I feel about it being the default if it's not actually life-saving.  My power wouldn't help much with an allergic reaction, and it could be catastrophic in a dungeon."

"That's true. That might be something to ask Uisa about, again. She must have something worked out for that, since she treats so many espers. Or maybe Airmed, if Uisa isn't willing? She isn't the only esper medic in the world." Just the best. 

He sighs.  "Yeah."  Let's just...not.  "Next up..."

Backlash consent hell???  What the fuck?  Tradeoffs survival vs. consent.
Uisa - talk?  Explain time limits, decide further.  REALLY did not want to move her, femur in bad position.

"Yeah.  I think, let's just.  Move on for now.  They're not actionable right now, I can work on them later."

Bone specialist, medic?  Spend a day in bone injury ward.  Is there a bone injury ward???  Pay people with broken arms to come to the healing silo, practice on them.  Messed up, but better than alternative?  Probably?

"I don't really know that a bone specialist is the way to go here.  Like, what are the odds that I'll wind up with an outrageous break again?  And the odds...Ugh."

"Mhm, not a bone specialist, maybe, just a DRT general medic? Someone to check you, so you don't have to worry about making bad calls when backlashed." 

"One of the Dwarves is, but I don't always bring them into dungeons.  And that's where I'd be making most of my judgment calls.  The whole reason I rushed the job with...her...is because I was afraid that one of the breaks was going to come loose and nick her femoral artery.  Especially if she did something with her superstrength.  And it's time-sensitive, right?  So the longer I take to apply the power, the longer it takes to heal.  I don't get it, it should have been a twenty minute job.  I think she must've been reinjured during transport, the teleportation, maybe."  Or you missed something, you buffoon.  "I...I mean, I could have missed something.  And even medical training doesn't - uuugghhhh."

He's been doing a lot of arm work for a while.  He gets on the floor and starts doing crunches, talking whenever his back touches the floor.

"So.  The first rule of first response is that you don't become another victim.  But the second is that you leave whatever's wrong to the specialists, right?  But - " he gestures towards the board.  "I'm better than a specialist.  If you're hurt near me, you will recover.  And it's just pain, it doesn't - I mean, it matters, but what matters more - saving yourself months healing, or a lot of pain for twenty minutes?  You saw her legs, if she hadn't gotten a medical esper around, she might not have walked again.  She might not have lived.  And having a medic around wasn't enough.  You'd need an orthopedic surgeon, and that's just for her legs.  What about the next person, with a neck wound?  Or finger problems?"

She nods, slowly. 

"I see what you mean. I think- if you did make a mistake, you need to find out how to avoid it in the future. But maybe you didn't. Or maybe you made a mistake the way medics sometimes do, where they make the wrong call but the right call was hard to see." 

"Yeah.  And like, in a dungeon nobody would have looked twice at me.  Patient with fucked up legs, got them to the point where the legs weren't going to fall off or kill them, transported them to safety.  But I forgot I had the world's best healer just a phone call away.  I - it wasn't panic mode, I didn't panic, exactly.  But it definitely wasn't me sitting down, looking at all of my options, and picking the best one."

Nodnod. 

"Maybe you just need someone who is explicitly supposed to look at your decisions and call you out? Someone who really knows how your healing works, so they don't just go, 'oh that's just esper things'."

"Well, if you catch me acting like an id-shit."  No self-deprecation around Sara.  "Um.  I mean.  If you see me doing something unwise, please tell me.  I guess I need to ask Bill to get a DRT consultant or something to AAR my dungeons for a while."  Carol used to, but I don't know if Sara'd be willing.  "Maybe Airmed would be able to consult, if it's something medical.  I didn't get to talk to her much, but she seemed nice."  And she didn't accidentally torture any patients!  Great qualifications.