closed

[ofobedience]

Who: Giovanni (ofobedience) and Mercy (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.]

Comments

[ofobedience]

[How much she's able to discern from the mere laying on of hands is hard for him to say, but she'll find every part of him to appear as one would expect of a regular human. A heartbeat, yes, the correct number of ribs, muscles and flesh arranged in the expected way. All organs accounted for and in the usual places. There's the slow rise and fall of his breathing to indicate healthily working lungs, and as such, from the outside, it seems only the collar is different. The collar, the scar, his blood-red irises and the sharp little points of his teeth.

He remains close to motionless as her hands press lightly against him, and in that, too, he is surprised-- there's none of Mother's firm certainty, the causal way She would conduct such an examination, as though She has every right to do with him as She pleases. Which, of course, She does.

There's the vaguest hint of tension in him as her hand now moves to touch the collar, as he expected it eventually would-- the slight, instinctual jump of muscle beneath pale skin, the smallest of indications that it's not something he especially wants to be touched. But in this, too, her touch is light, so light in fact that it causes no discomfort, isn't something he even feels. That moment of tension in him, it passes quickly.

And then finally there's the slight pressure of her palm against his shoulder, and though he takes it as an indication that she's done looking him over, it's not quite something he recognises as comfort or reassurance-- these are things he's never known, and as such their meaning passes him by. Goes quite over his head. Just slightly, he turns to glance back over his shoulder at her, flashes his uneven smile. He seems calm, perfectly collected.]

I'd die.

[He says it simply, without hesitation or outward signs of concern.]

It's a part of the Spine, you see. It's removal is one of the very few things that can kill me. But luckily for me, most would have a hard time doing that.

[Slowly, he shrugs.]

And no, no one has ever threatened to remove it. It would be rather a waste of a functional tool. Hahah.

[He says that, but 'functional' isn't exactly a word that has ever been used to describe him. But right now, flickering thoughts of his own faults and flaws are something he tries to push back and hold in. To momentarily silence.]

[valcurie]

( 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.

[ofobedience]

[Had her fingers lingered a little longer, she'd have discerned that the collar is chill to the touch, a disconcerting kind of coolness that never goes away. Something he feels down to the centre of himself, at times, if he's properly attending to it-- a bonedeep glacial piercing, another sharp-edged reminder of all that he is and all he can never be. In comparison, his own skin is always slightly too warm, as though he's running a slight fever despite his apparent perfect health. Kerberos, the beast in him-- it asserts itself in a myriad different ways.

But as things stand, her hand lingers only on his shoulder, and for now Giovanni remains poised where he is, as though awaiting her permission to move or officially consider the examination over. It's so easy to fall into these expected habits, his ideas of what a doctor should be and do, despite her obvious differences from the kind of 'doctor' he's accustomed to.

But then her words come, and he's unable to hold back on a barked-out laugh, a sharp and jarring kind of sound that lances through the companionable quiet of their conversation.]

My consent.

[And his tone, it's a sardonic slide, a dry refutation of the very term. That level of autonomy-- it's never been for him. At the very least, he's good enough to elaborate.]

The implantation was made before I ever gained consciousness. From the first moment I opened my eyes, it was already a part of me. It's all I've ever known.

[Again, as if in response to the faint squeeze of her hand (the strange shock of warmth it elicits from him, some vague feeling he can't name), there's once again the dismissive rise and fall of his shoulders. All casual, easy grace.]

And whilst I'm sure you believe you're offering me something of value, I wouldn't want you to remove the Spine any more than a human would want you to cut out their heart. This is what I am. What I always will be.

One of Mother's dogs.

[valcurie]

( 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.

[ofobedience]

[he hears it though, the little misstep, that faltering moment before the return of calm. Again, turned away from her, it has him smiling a cold empty smile, the realisation that all of this horrifies her. It's to be expected, and he knows this. Is fully aware of what he is and of the take most would have of Mother's actions-- that what She's done to him is something monstrous and twisted and wrong.

He doesn't entirely disagree.

But her hand has fallen away from him, and so finally he turns to face her again, the livid scar now concealed, and only part of the cruel, stark collar left on show.]

That I'll always be Her dog? It never needed to be said, back there. I'm no stray. I know to whom I belong.

[Again, that casual easy shrug, all fluid motion, and whilst he retains that smooth and confident drawl, there's a steel beneath his words now. A certainty.][He lets the words hang there for just a moment, wanting them to sink down into her-- on this one point he's an immovable object, refuses to bend. But then he smiles that crooked smile of his, infinitesimally relaxes.]

If you're done looking, may I get dressed?

[valcurie]

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.

ack, words missing. he basically said removing the collar is the worst thing he can think of

[ofobedience]

[Having gained her permission, her assertion that her physical examination of him is over, he reaches for his shirt, begins to dress. His actions are smooth and fluid, meticulous in their precision, attending to his appearance with a quiet and obvious care. Shirt, tie, cufflinks, jacket-- he says nothing as he reorders himself, smooths down his freshly donned clothes until he looks as sharp and flawless as he had just a short while before. The cruel glint of the collar, the savagery of his one enduring scar-- it's all tucked out of sight now, neatly hidden, reducing his appearance to something that could almost (almost) pass for normal. If one were to ignore his too-sharp teeth, the blood red glint of his eyes.

He looks back at her, once he's done. Smiles his uneven smile, and there's something in his expression then, a quiet refutation. You are not a dog she says, but he knows that this is untrue. Knows it down to the loamy centre of himself-- perhaps if she were to see him in a moment of unbridled violence, see the beast in him come to the fore, maybe then she'd understand that he's no more a man than a wolf is.

Or perhaps she'd see something else, something he's incapable of seeing in himself. It's impossible to know.]

I don't expect you to understand. I doubt anyone could, unless they're from down there.

[It's why he always knew that to leave would be impossible, no matter what Heine had done, no matter what Mother did to him. He's a product of that twisted place and the world outside could never be for him...only now he's been thrust into it quite against his will, and the weight of that fact presses heavy on him. He still doesn't believe he can survive it, out here on his own, with no-one to hold the leash.]

But I'm a dog, all right. Just a different breed from the sort you're thinking of. Hahah.

ah, noted!

[valcurie]

( 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.

[ofobedience]

[And perhaps it is hell, or something close to it, so far below the city's surface that even those who dwell in the Underground are largely unaware of its existence, know it only through legends and horror stories, the monsters that creep from the depths and snatch up the Underground's denizens, never to be seen again. That facility at the city's rotten core, where beasts are made and creatures created only to fight and die and be taken apart and used to create something new, or worse, become fodder for the next generation of genetically engineered abominations.

His dreams are always whiteredblack, the screams that echo in his ears the floors and walls coated with blood as his 'siblings' tore each other apart, forced to, at Mother's command. It haunts him down to his very bones, probably always will. Literally hell-- it's not a bad discription.

But he gives no outward sign of it. Observes her with a detached kind of coolness as she makes her incorrect pronouncement. That she can mistake him for human only serves to confound him, to irritate in some minor way because surely it's clear that he's nothing of the sort, just a thing created in human shape. But he chooses not to belabour the point, knows himself even if she cannot, and when her final response comes he barks out a rapidfire laugh, seems at least genuinely amused by it.]

Suit yourself.

[He shrugs, loose-shouldered. Dismissive.]

But look, I'm quite all right. I hope you've satisfied yourself of that, now.

[Quite all right, he says. As if he's ever been any such thing.]

[valcurie]

( 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.

[ofobedience]

[Well. If it's sass and snark and a cutting tongue that assures her of his underlying personality, if it's something that she likes to see, she'll be glad to find - in time - that he has plenty more where that came from. That he doesn't always slink and slide around the shape of things he doesn't want to overtly attend to. That he has, despite everything that he's done and has had done to him, a sense of humour.

But for the moment there's her sudden perking up, her gaze that catches his, and Giovanni can't quite discern the meaning of it. Cants his head in that disconcertingly canine gesture of his, one brow slightly raised, lips curled into the hint of an uncertain smile. And then the moment breaks, she turns away, leaving Giovanni to mentally shrug it off, his awareness switching to her words instead.]

Some caveats.

[He says it a little dryly, his words a smooth sardonic drawl, but he asks for no further clarifications. Not today. And as she turns back towards him finally he graces her with the upward tilt of his chin, a widening of his serrated smile.]

You're quite welcome. Should you require anything further, I trust that you'll be in contact. But for now, am I dismissed? I suppose that, whilst I'm here on the station, I have some other business I ought to attend to.

[By business what he really means is slinking around and skulking about beside Mother's pod, by Heine's. Assuring himself that they are here and well, and willing them to wake up >.>]

[valcurie]

( 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. )

[ofobedience]

[The teeth, of course, are all part of his design, a deliberate tweak in his genetics, whilst the shape of his smiles themselves-- well. When one lives among wolves one must learn to become a wolf, or risk being torn apart. The mask he wears, it fits him like a second skin, and has now been a part of him for so long that it has, in part, become him. A necessary adornment in a world where weakness isn't tolerated.

The terrified, tearful child he'd once been has all but been crushed from existence.

And in response to her not-quite dismissal, he laughs, just a quiet ripple of sound.]

It's only polite to ask, isn't it? You did, after all, invite me to come here.

[Never mind that - as she seems to have devised on her own - his asking is at least in part a habit born from expecting to need permission.]

Whatever the case, it's been a pleasure to meet with you again, Dr. Ziegler. However unnecessary I might consider a medical check-up to be.

[And he lingers for only one fractional moment, seems caught on the precipice of saying something else, words hovering around him as though they can almost (almost) be discerned. But then finally, he shrugs. Smiles once more.]

Man sieht sich.

[And he turns, then, to show himself out.]