Carice Helstein

*"Never has someone saved so many lives knowing so little about medicine"*

-Cesar Olstein, doctor at the "Invalids" hospital in Ortus-

**Carice Helstein,** born in 2202 in Ortus , was a member of the Commonwealth's army medical staff and, since 2285, the director of the "Invalids", the largest hospital in the Commonwealth. While lacking in medical studies, her management and diplomatic skills have made it so nearly all hospitals she worked in worked without problems, taking care of all wounded even during battle.

Due to her need to attend the wounded as quickly as possible, Carice often had to work under fire, a fact which caused her many wounds, including the loss of an arm during the Commonwealth invasion of the Yadran planet of Fal'Kaboss. Still, thanks to the advancements in bionics and recovery of limbs, another arm was created for her. Taking part during the operation at the Biluan  planet of Voice, she lost that same arm again, also suffering so many wounds she nearly died as she was evacuated, alongside others survivors, just hours before the planet was flooded with magma from its pierced core.

## Biography

### Youth

Only daughter of Adam Helstein and Jasmine Dabone, both important factory owners in Ortus, Carice always had everything she might have wished. Rich and surrounded by servants, her first years were those of a spoiled child, more than happy to spend her parents' money in whatever thing caught her eye and attention. She never went out without first spending a few hours of having her hair dressed and choosing the best outfit.

As time went by, her parents began to worry about their daughter's tendencies. Carice's marks in school, both elementary high, were not the problem, as she always scored quite high on whatever exam and test was handed to her. Relationships with other students were great too as, while vain and a lover of all things expensive, Carice also loved to invite her friends and even those she did not know to meals and parties, the latter being so huge the marshals soon also got to know the daughter of the Helsteins.

Adam and Jasmine knew this spending nightmare was something which would only grow worse and worse as time went by. Therefore, to teach their daughter something about financial responsability, they began to gave her money in smaller, non-negotiable packs. If, by the end of the month, she spent all the money in the pack, she will get half of that for the next and so on.

While enraged at first, Carice, seeing that her parents would not back down from their choice, decided that, instead of just not spending any money, she would use it more wisely. Thanks to her huge circle of friends and contacts, she always knew someone who would give her a tip of where to spend her money and when to retire. The dresses and outfits she adored so much she bought almost in the black market, asking for some favours and giving others.

Soon enough, she was back to her old life, only now her parents could not scold her about how she used her money.

### Meeting someone and losing him

In college, Carice decided to focus on management and economics, two things she had already studied in the streets and back alleys of Ortus. In the campus, she met another student, this one from the military academy, by the name of Konrad Dorn. Falling deeply in love with him, Carice managed to find herself a job in the army's supply staff after finishing her studies, just to be close to Konrad.

The Aramathi liberation war saw them both moving with the rest of the army to the planet of New Sajar, then occupied by the phalanxes of the Zracon Union. Not someone who liked violence, or seeing people she knew be in danger, she tried several times to convince Konrad to leave his place as a captain in the 12th assault legion and join her instead on the supply units, where they would be far away from Zracon guns and bayonet charges. Many times Carice nearly managed to convince him, only for Konrad to refuse, the long military tradition of his family and the thought of those soldiers under his command he would leave behind making him stay at the front.

Lacking combat training, Carice could not follow Konrad to the front to keep an eye on him. Instead, after moving a few strings and cashing in a few favours, she was given a spot on one of the field hospitals closest to the front lines of the 12th assault legion. Trying to keep her mind from worrying further, Carice focused all her efforts on dealing with the issue of the increasingly-crowded rooms in the field hospitals. Vehicles damaged beyond repair by Zracon guns were turned by the engineers into makeshift rooms to shield patients from the gaze of the sun of New Sajar. Constantly traveling to headquarters, Carice managed to bring more resources and medicine to face the growing casualties, all the while wearing a fancy, black and white dress which made her look more like a rich lady lost in a warzone than the leader of an hospital.

Another chance, and one of the most effective during the campaign, was Carice's strict timetable and use of stimulants for the medical staff. While all doctors felt they could work for hours without pause, Carice made sure breaks and sleep hours were respected and a rotation system implanted so there would always be fresh doctors ready to attend incoming wounded soldiers. She also allowed for the medics, surgeons and nurses under her care to use stimulants she obtained thanks to her friends in the supply depots, to keep them focused even as more and more casualties continued to come from the front lines. Of course, she kept a close eye on that ingestion and made sure not one member in the medical staff overdosed him or herself.

Only two days after the official end of the war on the planet's surface did Carice finally get news of her lover's death. Wounded during one of the Zracon's last bayonet charge, he had bled to death before his squadmates could drag him back to safety. To stunned to speak, Carice remained in the hospital staff of the army. Convinced that Konrad would have lived if they had been closer, she began to make and present plans to the Commonwealth's high command about ways to lessen cassualties. Helped by friends from the engineer and tank corps, designs were made for mobile field hospitals able to take in wounded during big offensives and get out before the enemy could fire at them. Closer support between artillery and medic squads was also implemented, just so they would get more cover while dragging away wounded soldiers.

These changes, alongside many others she made during her career, soon became standard in the Commonwealth's army.

### From Yadrani to Voice

Taking part in nearly every war the Commonwealth took part on, Carice not only got used to the smell of blood and the cries of the wounded, but also the diverse kinds of wounds soldiers suffered when facing their foes. With the blessing of high command, and the money acquired from several fundraising campaigns, Carice created a medical division focused especially on wounds produced by alien foes and how to best counter them. The bite of a starving Biluan  drone could not be healed the same way as the blow of a Karthemas energy blade. Thanks to bodies and weapons brought by soldiers from the front, Carice and her crew managed to make new discoveries, some of which would later be used by other science groups in Ortus to produce new medicines and surgery techniques.

While her duties as an organizer often kept her back from the front lines, Carice still tried to spend as much time as possible near the front. There, she said, she learn the most about what the soldiers were going through and what were the best ways to help them out. This, added to how she often wore the most expensive and well-tailored clothes in the whole army, made her often the target of enemy fire and assaults. In Fal'Kaboss, a Karthemas knight severed one of her arms in one blow as she tried to protect a wounded soldier, her life only saved after the timely arrival of a squad of Kithri.

In Voice, she insisted to remain on the planet's surface with the field hospitals which had been built near the digging zones. Like all others, she did not expect the high number of casualties, to the point where she had to allow captains and officers to make makeshift groups of "walking wounded" to give cover fire while Carice and her staff tried to carry the wounded to a more, safe location. Nearly trapped several times, she nearly died during a swarm attack, only to be saved by a Banner of Karthemas auxiliaries. Delirious due to the many wounds suffered the surviving doctors could not heal due to the lack of resources, she was carried by a group of volunteers to the evacuating ships. Many of them had been previously wounded in past conflicts, or knew friends and family members who had nearly died only to be saved by Carice's plans and care. As a way to pay her back, they fought their way to the swarm and managed to get her into the ship just in time for her to leave Voice.

## The Invalids

After the massacre of Voice, Carice stood away from battlefields, the horrors of that battle haunting her for the rest of her life. Instead, using what money she had, she created what is currently the largest hospital in the Commonwealth, the "Invalids". Most of those members of her staff who survived the battle of Voice chose to join her in this project.