ofobedience: pllease do not take (pic#11048273)
Giovanni 'Sarcastic Little Shit' Rammsteiner ([personal profile] ofobedience) wrote in [community profile] nysalogs2017-08-01 02:11 pm

closed

Who: Giovanni ([personal profile] ofobedience) and Mercy ([personal profile] valcurie)
What: Reluctant medical check-up
When: Whatever the equivalent of 28th July is in game-time, ahah
Where: Thesa station
Warning(s): none probably? maybe some violent mental imagery from Giovanni



[Despite having agreed to this, he remains dubious. There's little point to it, after all, aside from assuaging whatever concerns the woman he'd rescued may have, allowing her to see that there is nothing physically wrong with him. At least, nothing that can be salvaged or fixed because all that is 'wrong' in him has been made that way through design. Something twisted and altered and strange, something lab-created and artificial and therefore never quite human.

But her concern had been there, and it's something so alien to him that he can't help but wonder at it. Can't help but be confused and vaguely (vaguely) drawn. Besides which, in the smallest of ways, he sees something familiar in her-- the shared language, the blonde hair, her self-identification as a doctor, very different from the one he's thinking of but similar enough for it to slide beneath his skin and stay there.

And with the trip to Thesa-- well. It gives him a moment to check up on things. To check up on them, lying cold and still and silent in their pods, waiting it out. After.

So he's here, and he makes his way towards their designated meeting place - one of the rooms supplied for visiting refugees such as themselves - knocks brightly, three times. Awaits the sound of her voice before stepping inside.]
valcurie: @ditzyicons (.o9)

whispers quietly i see those omom lyrics

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-01 08:34 pm (UTC)(link)
( She is a stubborn one, isn't she? Just ask any of those who've had the pleasure of being her patient: sometimes she's saved a life through sheer force of persistence. Whether that's because she can't handle disappointment well, or some other unpleasant personal flaw, it has usually been something that's worked out for the best. And if it hadn't, those are the times and the cases she might've learnt a lesson.

Now, she's herself in an unspeakably foreign situation. Caring for others is what she was bid to do, all that she really can do well, and she is a woman who both tries her best and keeps her promises. Despite whatever protests he make, she cannot let someone go without at least the most basic of care. Not when they give her a sense that good doctors dread having: that he is a person who, for whatever reason of his own, has little concern for himself. This is more lethal than a teenager convinced of their own invincibility.

The knock comes as she's filling up her idle moments with writing. She, dressed in her characterising pristine white, though sans the wings that are her presently unneeded means of flying, leaves her notebook, cramped up with musings in German, on the table, and goes over to open the door. He's welcomed with an unreserved smile and an outstretched, ink-stained hand. And her relief is genuine--lines around the eyes, hair nearly in her eyes, her head tilted somewhat, tells of a suffusive ease he offered her by alleviating her dread that he might not come after all. )


Hello, Giovanni. I'm glad to see you again. Come in and have a seat, and tell me how you've been.

( A touch of the personal, a glaze of élan added to her usual amicable grace. She steps aside to usher him in and her motion is towards two chairs sat orderly by the table. One is sat facing the window, with a view, of the nothingness that comprises space engulfing the luminescent globe that is their new home. )
valcurie: ? (.25)

ahh and that's just such a good album too i approve

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-03 06:33 am (UTC)(link)
( Now that Mercy's free of both concussion and an imminent duty to save the lives of those who made might her, it's easier to focus on what she wants to. Much easier, in fact, and now she sees him move through the world. All angles, all sharpness, like canines and incisors, with no molars to blunt out the jagged edges. There's nothing ragged about him--he's clean and cut like crystal glass, in that suit he strikes her as someone out of something considered a classic European scene. He could be, in another life, walking down centuried cobblestone, tailored clothing a susurrus as he moved, a newspaper or leather bag on hand, heading towards the scent of espresso wafting from a cafe.

This image is a fantasy for a lot of reasons. For one thing, such was just a memory of what once was, a classical ideal reminiscent of the idea of a renaissance man. In the modern world no-one had time to be a gentleman-scholar; no-one, in her world, could afford to live out such a luxurious fantasy. So much of the continent had been wrecked by the war, so much of so many cultures had changed. Safe, solitary walks locked in your own existential musings had become a gross indulgence by the time the world had ended.

So it's not just him with a hesitation. Her frisson of wonder at departed casual grace, of a world long gone, gives her a moment's hesitation as he promenades by in his well-fitted suit, a lithe and literal form out of a past that somehow feels like it should be hers.

But soon she follows after, smiling at him and her relief resumed. She sits down opposite him, her eyes snapping to him immediately. She has no interest in space and the emptiness it holds. Her time is here now. With him. )


Well, however you're doing, you certainly look put-together. ( A knowing smile as she says that. For a moment she shifts to shuffle some papers. )

How is your adjustment going? Have you had any problems? It's rather something that we can all breathe the same air, and so far it doesn't seem like we've avoided an epidemic of common cold, but still. You're able to quickly recover from wounds. Does that include every other ill?

( He may notice too that's she remarkably scent free--absolutely scrubbed and scoured like she prefers to be. There are scents coming from her belongings, but nothing that seems out of place. Paper, ink, glass, and metal, no ferrous tang of blood to taunt him. )
valcurie: @paw-leena (.31)

did you see the lyric video too? the twins in it are so adorable ;;

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-04 10:41 pm (UTC)(link)
There is a reason they say cleanliness is next to godliness. It's good to take care of yourself.

( There's some dryness to her statement, a knowing irony in what she's saying. She will have to strive to get him to show some of that same care to his physical well-being, even if, as he explains to her, he's been modeled to be above such banal concerns. Is that why he directs his effort to his dress? She herself takes care with it, knows that it takes effort, that always there's is some reason to inspire the patience it takes to make conveying poise and grace effortless.

There's something here, she senses, a slight telling bulge beneath the surface of the thin skin. If only she knew where to push. And how it would be most safely done.

For now, more practical matters. Maybe the solution will reveal itself in connection, because the human body is like that, always was even before people themselves started to modify them. They are organic systems of complicated chains of arising and persisting consequences. And each one has its own complications that create disparate circumstances presenting puzzles to solve.

What his is, she's going to find out. )


Like all good things. ( A slight pause if he wants to cringe or laugh at the cliché. One for one, though she's keenly aware he's telling her something with his. ) So you weren't born this way? Was it gene therapy and body modification? I am most familiar with prosthetics, but I have practical experience with both. If you'd like to tell me about what makes you special?
valcurie: someone made a thing (.26)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-07 01:55 pm (UTC)(link)
( Well, that's a surprise, isn't it? Not the genetic engineering, that's old news in her world at this point, something even an non-specialist like her can understand. But then there's everything else--aritifcal he says, a life form he says, and that followed by resonance rates and the Spine, whatever those are. She immediately imagines s talk skyscraper vaulting for the heavens: something like a world-tree from which he was created and to which he is attuned, but she quickly dismisses the image as the fantasy it is.

Taken together with the vague hint in his voice that her wording was touching upon things she might not expect, this all something for her to think about. At first her thumb rubs along the pads of her fingers. This is nervous distraction, more than it is a reaction, so she reaches over to take her notebook and pen in hand to give her restless limbs something efficient to do.

She holds her pen at a sharp angle, near ninety degree to the page its nub is pushing into. )


I'm afraid I don't quite understand what you're telling me. Were you gestated for any period? Or were you assembled in some fashioned?

( Hard to believe, that latter notion, and despite her professional demeanor she gives into the urge of one of her ticks. Her free hand comes to rest on her neck after brushing away some stray hairs near her ear. Then she drops it into her lap and her bak becomes ramrod straight as she continues to consider, the caduceus motif, unseen, following the elegant curvature this gives to the small of her back. )

When we worked together I noticed some body modifications around your neck and back--your spine, as it were. Does this have something to with 'the spine'? And, if you don't mind, I would like to have a proper look.
valcurie: (.33)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-09 08:06 am (UTC)(link)
That's all right if you don't know. By whatever means you came into the world, you're certainly alive now.

( As trite as that may seem, it is something that's true. He's living and breathing and responding to her questions, laughing at times, how awkward all that may be, and he has expressed to her preferences about his style and his substance, and the way he carries himself suggests an arrogance not found in lesser species.

So.

He may not be the most reliable source of information about himself, but what patient ever is? They lie and misdirection and sometimes ought try to steal from her. He, on the other hand, is polite, a truly ideal patient in every other way that doesn't involve the holes in his own autobiography.

She, like a proper professional, folds her hands in her lap and says, very gently. )
Only if you don't mind. I can assure you I have seen much worse than partial nudity.

( Her breath catches in her throat without it actually hitching, a taste like plastic permeates her mouth. Nerves? Something like that. She doesn't know what to expect, but she has seen it all before: body modification, cybernetics, prosthetics, bodies completely reformed by the toes up. She does not think she will be shocked.

Rather, she's worried that he might let her cross a line he will later regret. )
Is that the name of the company that produced it?
valcurie: (.33)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-10 01:42 am (UTC)(link)
( Of course, there isn't any reason for her to doubt that he meets the barest qualifications for alive: he thinks, he laughs, he makes decisions based on preferences, and displays volition. Maybe he's a bit immature, maybe he's a bit cocky, maybe he'll ruin some rather nice suits, these are all flaws of a person. This hardly registers as a possible source of existential confusion.

Then again, even if he thinks her keenness of physical observation, which is an essential skill in her trade, is worth noting, then he will be sorely let down by how meagre her psychological insights always turn out to be. She has a strength, and a clear weakness. And even with this supposed strength-- )


Oh.

( A stifled gasp as she puts her hand on her chin to force her mouth from gaping. It would have been easier on her to reveal it slowly, in slight turns and angles of his body, with some deliberation, though this is what she actually asked for: to see the real him. What was hidden, or lurking, beneath his pretty and self-assured exterior. The beautiful clothing removed, she sees him, and she is flummoxed by his cool insouciance to his own state, and has he just become used to this? It is the only existence he has known.

She's asked to see him and he has obliged her. It would be unkind, however much she aches for him, to show him anything less than professionalism to match his willingness to show this to her, and to match his presented indifference. So she stands, leaves her tools behind, and moves in for a better look at the bitter bite of the metal penetrating as deep as she feared it might go.

After the initial shock wears off, when she no longer has the urge to shove her hand in her mouth to prevent her reflexive personal response, there are chills and sparks along her skin, but that she can deal with, even when they tingle in sympathy for the pain she imagines must accompany every turn or nod of his head. Cool sweat has begun line the dip of her own spine.

Mercy observes the details which are lurid in her mind: 68, probably his number, the ugly scar which could have been rendered less stark with more care, and Kerberos, Greek for dog. Is that what he is called? Entity makes her think--doctors, he called them, but they are not such. Whoever could create life and then harm it such such a way are no colleagues of hers. If they can do this to their own children, she does not doubt they are capable of much, much worse. )


May I touch you, Giovanni? ( Such is her brilliant blast of hatred for these strangers, she makes a proud point of asking his permission. ) Does this ever bother you?
valcurie: (.o6)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-11 06:42 am (UTC)(link)
All right.

( He's not wrong to think it's horror which she is displaying, because it is. But he is wrong to think it's horror at him. It's at the fact that people are so cruel, so--what she knows that they can be. Hers is a professional eye trained by decades dedicated to her craft, and she's seen all manners of things, but never something quite like this: such blatant disregard for life, whether created or otherwise. And, to top it off, perpetrated by someone arrogant enough to call themselves a doctor.

How could she not be horrified? How could she not feel intense and urgent and impotent hatred at such a mock to her profession?

His smile is hidden to her, and that's just as well. His confusing indifference to his own state would only agitate her more.

Her focus is instead on this: the movement of her fingers, hesitating in the air, briefly, shaking, before she makes contact with his skin. Gently, gently, she places her rough--calloused and unmoisturised, she is a woman who works with her hands--palms on his back and just feels for awhile the ways in which his body moves: a heartbeat, contractions of swallowing, the eloquent articulation of muscles as he either speaks or twitches or moves his head to see her.

Then she swallows, and moves her fingers to the collar. Here her touch isn't even that--just a brush of her fingers over the number the metal bears, lest she risk agitating the ache of which he has told her must be bothering him at this very moment. It is, she imagines, exacerbated already by the awareness forced from the attention she is drawing towards it.

And, when she has touched it more than enough, she rests one hand on his shoulder. A steady, firm weight meant to comfort. Not that he needs any of her meagre strength )


Do you know what would happen to you if this were removed? Did they ever threaten you with its removal?
valcurie: (.o6)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-12 08:40 am (UTC)(link)
( Normally a clean bill of health would have her satisfied and ready to move on to things like piecing together his medical history and giving him tidbits of advice to chew over and digest in his own time. However, with him, it's not just a clean bill of health, is it? The collar, though not polished, catches enough light to, at least to her, emit a cold, cruel glow. She actually hadn't touched it enough to tell if the metal is cool, or warmed by his skin--she had not wanted to cause undue harm and she had taken his flinches as the cues of discomfort that they were. But just the sight of the bite of the collar is enough to make her make her head swim, her stomach churn, and her knees weaken, for the casual malice for life to which it attests; she cannot fathom how immoral one must be to have allowed themselves to actually go through with such a procedure. And it's not amorality, is it, when it's so clear to her that the design of this device was made with ownership in mind, beyond whatever functionality it was also made with?

Given how unmoved he seems, she doesn't know if it will help anymore, but she allows her hand to linger on his shoulder a bit longer as she carefully parses the simple sentences he's spoken. He's not said anything overly obtuse or elusive in meaning, but it is hard for her mind to get a firm grip on what he's saying. Her reflex is to jerk away from any reference someone makes to themselves as a tool, as a weapon, as something, a thing rather than a someone. )


Whatever kind of a tool this is, I pray that it wasn't thrust upon you without your consent. The choice of either life or death--that should be yours to make.

( Frowning, now the tightness in her brow and eyes would reveal webs of wrinkles if she did not treat her own self with certain advantages. Her skin is still young, but the expression which she gives belies her true age. She is an older woman--a woman who has seen so much, and is so weary, she has no energy left to be surprised or shocked by what new cruelties people can unleash upon others.

She looks at him, then, and speaks very slow, considered words. )


If you ever want this gone, come to me. We can look into potential treatments and options. I cannot guarantee anything, of course, but I promise you I will do my best. Here I am...severely limited in what facilities are available to me, but I have learnt how to make due with less.

( Then, a squeeze to his shoulder, a tiny nudge of sincerity, perhaps of hopeful comfort, in addition to a promise to become, once more, a miracle worker for a patient. )

I have helped people who've lost much more, to recover, and to live.
valcurie: (.33)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-15 07:14 pm (UTC)(link)
( Such a strange temperature differential, she's missed, then. An apparent lack of the basic laws of thermodynamics would have had her questioning him even more, so perhaps it's for the best that she doesn't linger. There's already enough to be concerned about, to press him about, without adding weird physics on top of it.

At the laugh she removes her hand--it's time. She doesn't need to see anymore of him, really, and the jolt of discomfort that rattles around her own spine makes her want to reserve some of herself, for herself. She is a woman who is used to being her own source of comfort.

So, her hands go to her lap, where she digs her nails into her skin through the nano-weave fibre of her leggings. The pain this causes her is a bright counterpoint to the coldness seeping into her skin from somewhere. Something, a thing which she cannot see, is stealing her heat, like a shade sucking away her energy, the colour has drained from her face and left only a pallor on her usually stately cheeks. )


Is that ( Here, the shortest of pauses, the shortest of stumblings. She can force her voice to be calm, though. ) what your mother told you?

I admit I don't know anything about this procedure, but, if you thought it would help you, I would do my best to--undo it. I would never cut out someone's heart, that's true. But I would replace it if they needed a new one.
valcurie: (.o6)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-17 12:46 pm (UTC)(link)
Please.

( All she can muster is that one word, still reeling from what he's unloaded, as an intended assault or otherwise, at her before that. Whether meant to have an effect upon her or not, it doesn't matter, because who couldn't react to such a set of statements as that? How could they not be floored and devastated? These things he says are odd, untrue, and evidence of such endemic and unfathomable abuse. She does not know how to react, not now.

The one thing she does know, is this: whoever this woman is, it is best that she not wake up. She's guaranteed to try and recreate the chaos and cruelty and corruption she was allowed to get away with in her own world. Such a capricious person is beyond caring, and so is unable to be convinced to change.

Angela, if she had the chance, would be a part the team to stop this woman. Whether it was a legal strike or not.

As for Giovanni, once he's clothed again, allowed to resume the dignity and protection that they give, she resists the urge to touch him and offers him this: )


Whatever you are, you are not a dog. You can clearly stand on two feet.
valcurie: @nez--art (.32)

ah, noted!

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-18 01:52 pm (UTC)(link)
( It's something of a blessing that she doesn't realise how he interrupted her quick, one-word answer as granting permission. Already she's upset on a visceral level, shaken to the core of herself when confronted by the depravity of a human she isn't exactly surprised by, but is affronted by on a personal level. Normally, she can maintain distance. Normally, she can find a goal, a purpose, something to achieve and focus on doing that instead of getting drawn into the messy and unproductive mire of weighing morals.

But what is there to do here? She cannot take his pain away, she cannot undo what this woman has done to him, and he doesn't want her to in the first place. There is a war raging within her, roiling her stomach and flaying her nerves, making her strain against her too-tight skin encased in her claustrophobic suit. Watching him resemble himself with so much deliberate care, she is reminded of her own ceremonious manner of donning her armour, and it is not a comforting sight.

Yet, outwardly, she is able to preserve a veneer of her professionalism cultivated over the course of all her years of service.

She meets his gaze when he gives it. No longer after she's learnt what's underneath, will she be unnerved by his teeth or remarkable eyes.

Unwavering, she does not ask him if he's literally saying he's from hell. )


Maybe I don't understand where you are from, but I have been a doctor long enough to be qualified to know a human when I see him. You can say what you like, but, in my professional opinion, I do not think there is any point in debating with you your species, Giovanni.

So. ( She turns, then, from him, and starts to write in her notebook, the movements of her pen able to disgusting the slight endemic tremors in her fingers. ) I will not be sending you to a vet. No matter how many times you may ask me for a referral.
valcurie: @naturalperms (.28)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-18 08:11 pm (UTC)(link)
( It's almost like he's sassing her, or fighting back, rather than slinking around what he doesn't want to face, and it's refreshing. Suddenly faced with this, it's almost like she perks up, back a fraction straighter and a quicksliver flash of a smirk crossing her lips. This quickening of amusement lingers, too, as she stops writing and turns to face him, pen poised halfway through the looping arc of a g.

Very carefully, she puts her pen down and observes him. She does not speak, and for this handful of seconds, if he cannot read her odd interest in his response, then perhaps it might seem up in the air whether her examination is truly over or not. Her concern of that is suspended however, for this moment, while she seeks his gaze and means to hold it.

And, when she is satisfied with that, primly shifting, she returns without a word to resume her work.

At least the cold sweats are gone. The threatened sluice down her spine felt like icicles raking the small of her back. )


And I hope you are satisfied with yourself. A clean bill of health. But with some caveats.

( She lapses into one more silence filled with the scratching of her pens, a possibly scathing sound with so little else to distract from it. Then, finally, she turns to face him fully with her hands clasped in her lap. )

Thank you for coming to see me, Givoanni, and allowing me to examine you.
valcurie: @yevon (pic#11603426)

[personal profile] valcurie 2017-08-21 05:49 pm (UTC)(link)
( His canine confusion and possible thrice of curious intrigue are both things she misses, as she actually does engage herself in a few concentrated couple of moments to write down what she needs to. It's important to recount things accurately, while it is still fresh, as she has not yet had time to bias her own observations with other impressions. First impressions, being what they are, are important as the salient bits of information that they are.

He also doesn't seem to have been lying to her about anything. That makes things easier for her, if not also refreshing and interesting. He has a vision of what he sees himself as, and he had tried so very hard to get her to see this version, too. To make her believe in it. )


Yes. What we've been over already..

( She finishes up and closes her book, and this time, his unnaturally sharp smile really doesn't unsettle her. It's just another quirk, and she wonders ideally if he did that himself. The darker side of the thought is that it's another thing done to him, but it quickly passes as she shakes her head and purses her lips. )

I'm not going to dismiss you since I am not in any way keeping you here against your will. But you are free to go, young man, if you don't need anything else from me.

( Her book is closes already, but she caps her pen now, and places both that and her hand on its cover. )