savetheearth | [Closed]

Entry tags:

[Closed]

Who: Aaron

elfstoned and Julien

espigeonage
Where: LSR clinic
When: Today-ish?
What: Shooting the breeze. At some point, explaining the birds and the... echoes... to Julien.

A few days back Julien had finally been able to leave the apartment and be around groups of people without just staring at everything and babbling. The world is so different now. But he's learning to try and see it as interesting and beautiful and not just... awful... and figure out what the various colors mean. Studying the daystars helps, oddly, even if that had given him another 'pulse'. Hard not to feel a bit of peace now, looking at them.

Today, he's finally actually come back to the clinic. Getting there had been a trip. Being able to see every impromptu urinal not cleaned up by heavy rain does that. Being back is also disorienting, especially with the discovery that when he's when he's in and the MRI machine turns on his vision streaks.

...no, he's not entirely used to this yet, but Julien wants to be useful and work off the sting of failure after having to leave his job in IT - he's called in 'sick' too often in the last few months. Right now, with hardly anyone else here, 'useful' means deep-cleaning whatever he can.

The off-brand cleanser gleams with the same sharp clear hue he's seen in a recent fifteen-colored rainbow, even diluted with water and drying in layers. Kneeling careless of the effects on the worn jeans he wears here, Julien goes over various surfaces, again, with a sponge. He's gotten out all of the awful half-smeared splotches on the floor and walls, and he's done his best on the cracks in the tile and so on that they've so often seeped into, but as the cleanser dries it does so in patterns he doesn't like, lower spots last. Surely he can get it perfect, like he got the kitchen back home. Eventually. The doctors perform surgery in here, sometimes.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Aaron's footsteps are quiet indeed as he walks up to the surgery room, stopping in the doorway to look at Julien. The boy's been at this for hours, and even to Aaron's critical eye, the room is spotless.

His face is thoughtful, as he leans against the doorframe and watches the boy. There's something new he knows about Julien now, about the changes he's going through. Aaron has to tell him, sooner or later. But when? And when he did, how would Julien react?

Was he even right? Was it possible?

Well, he certainly wasn't going to leave Julien cleaning a clean room all day.

"Lose track of time?"

Julien startles a little. When he started at this he'd been singing to himself, but he's been silent for a while now. Now he straightens up and stretches, putting a latex-gloved hand to the small of his back for a moment, trying not to stare. The colors on people change over the course of a day, especially people who bathe regularly.

"Sir? I'm almost done. Just, um... It keeps drying in streaks and spots. I think I can get it even." A baleful look at one of the cracks, grouted over and with cleaning fluid welled up in the rough grout. "Mostly even."

Oh, dear. So that's why he's been in here all day. I should have stepped in sooner, thinks Aaron.

"That won't be necessary," he says aloud, straightening up. "Leave it be, Julien. It's clean." Aaron pulls a breath. "I think it's time you took a break."

It was a slow day at the clinic, and though that stood to change at any moment, and there was always something that could be done, there was nothing pressing at the moment.

"I could argue, but I won't," Julien says with a sigh, surveying his handiwork. He gets to his feet a little too fast and stumbles, almost falling, though he does catch himself against the wall. The inner eyelids draw half over his eyes and retract, still showing in the corners, as he shakes off a wave of weakness and smiles. "I'm okay. Too long, um, down, I guess."

He skipped lunch. And hadn't had more than a few bites for breakfast. Dinner, his sister had made him eat, but whenever she's not there Julien has been tending to put it off and just drink water.

...Aaron frowns. There could be all kinds of reasons for the weakness -- low blood pressure, breathing in those cleaning fumes, or...

"Have you had lunch yet?"

"Uh..." Julien has to think back. He'd meant to eat something today, more than a couple bites of dry toast, he knows it's not healthy. "No, I didn't. I brought something, I just..." He'd looked at it and decided he wasn't that hungry. "Guess I lost track of time, like you said."

This would be a great moment for his stomach to make a sound, but it doesn't. He just becomes more aware of a dull ache. "I should probably get on that."

Aaron tilted his head and gave him a half-amused, half I told you so look.

"Come on." He'd already eaten himself, but unless someone came in, he didn't mind keeping Julien company. "To the office with you."

And besides, they did need to talk.

Aaron beckoned Julien along -- into the office that doubled as a breakroom. Desk, small table, chairs, computer, file cabinets, cold fridge, microwave. It was a smallish, windowless room, but not quite small enough to feel cramped.

It's harder to read facial expressions now when it's so easy to be sidetracked by little veins or traces of hair, or how saliva doesn't stay neatly in the mouth. Julien plays it safe and shrugs.

"Just a second." He has to get rid of the gloves and wash his hands first. Lately Julien washes more thoroughly and as far up as his elbows, moving slightly faster than is normal. And then stares at the paper towels as he dries with them, but he keeps talking, at least. "Pretty sure it's fluroride. In water, I mean, this color it has. I didn't want to touch it at first. Progress!"

It happens sometimes when he doesn't have to hide it, even when he's not upset, that Julien talks without moving his mouth, sometimes even when he has it closed. There's barely any difference in how he sounds.

He tries to move, and act, as easily as he used to, as if he's not constantly noticing new and often unsettling details. Mostly Julien pulls it off, though his head turns a lot more often and it's probably good that Aaron's there and leading. He does reach the fridge without mishap and retrieves the white paper bag - well, to humans it's white - he'd left inside.

Settling on a chair Julien starts to pick at an orange with his nails, holding it well away from his face and the spray of the peel. "Quieter days: you think those are more or less unusual since the numbers club started up, sir?"

"More," Aaron says without hesitation as he settles into a chair, stretching long legs in front of him and crossing them at the ankles. "And I don't just mean the number of patients. The clinic's been attacked by grues twice now." Aaron suspected that the creatures were either unable or unwilling to communicate with the police, since otherwise the clinic wouldn't still be operational. "Thank god we haven't been found by anything more sentient."

His tone is very casual as he discusses police discovery and the closure of the numbers club's main source of confidential health care.

"They say 'may you live in interesting times' is a curse," Julien says, his tone similar. When the rind is off he starts prying the segments apart and lining them up, and removing little white bits. Minus the white bits this is how he's always eaten oranges. Today there's a new deliberation to it and a tendency to keep the whole thing at a distance, as if he's defusing a bomb.

"I'd think there'd be fewer normie patients since the Dead District isn't as popular, but a lot of them are at Open Arms and so on, and they'd send them back here..." Julien names the homeless shelter a few blocks away; he's friends with an employee who showed up on the network recently. "Anyway. I'm guessing we have contingency plans?"

Aaron folds his arms, turning serious. "If we're discovered, we burn the paper records, relocate and continue our work." A breath. "I've discussed the possibility with Dr. Solus, and in the unfortunate event that the police do catch on to this place, we'll salvage all the equipment we can and start over somewhere else. And we keep the entire operation under the table."

He frowns. "Though I hope it doesn't come to that."

"Yeah, that sounds like it'd be pretty terrible," Julien says a little slowly, picturing it. "Well, you know you can count on me for whatever. I don't even have a job now, outside of this, and I don't know if I'm getting a new one. I'm pretty useless when the sun goes down these days, if there's no light, but if there is, I can be there."

Dimmer light wipes out all the colors and makes things look somewhat more normal, but a bit darker and he's unable to see details at all, and past then it just got worse. He can adjust to different light levels very fast but he just can't see nearly as well in the dark.

Losing a job wasn't fun but he's done it before, he'll get over it. Losing his night vision... he'll get over it.

Julien snorts. "Not to sound too sorry for myself. But, you should know your resources, sir."

He's prepped the orange as best he can, but his lip twists a little looking at the segments, and his inner eyelids close. He pokes at one, stalling.

Looking sideways at Julien, Aaron's face was hard to read. Poor nightvision...of course he can't see in the dark, he's a--

"You should finish that," Aaron gently reminds Julien, nodding at the orange, but otherwise not moving.

Julien isn't looking directly at Aaron. He sees the stillness on the man's face anyway - he sees just about anything in his field of view clearly - but he's never been good at reading Aaron, even before his eyes changed.

"I should start it," he retorts, making the assumption that this is the source of that look. "It's probably okay. Cece says I should just eat blind, but I'm not going to get used to it like that."

His pupils pin and he makes himself pop a segment into his mouth, wincing a little, and start chewing. He doesn't open his mouth but he does keep talking - Julien's voice can come out his nose these days, and sound just slightly muffled. "I haven't been hungry around this much nasty-looking food since I was a college sophomore. I guess you wouldn't know what that's like, sir, in your day you could just go hunt a mammoth and cook out the worms." He swallows, lips twitching, and selects another segment. "Way better than caf food or old ramen, I bet."

"At least it was fresh," Aaron agrees, shooting Julien a sideways grin. "Boil anything long enough and it just tastes like jerky."

He's going to let Julien wonder if he's talking from experience or not.

"I wonder if Aragorn has ever eaten mammoth. Knowing what I do of him, it wouldn't surprise me."

"Don't you have to dry it for jerky? Or am I being a sheltered millennial kid again, with no idea what I'm talking about?" Whatever they look like, the bits of orange taste fine, and he's hungry.

Pretending this is a serious issue, Julien tilts his head. "If there are any running around, probably. Maybe he and that ragtag group go on hunts. ...Or scavenge. Even regular elephants are huge and have that herd thing going."

"I imagine I'll be getting hunting skills sooner or later," Aaron says with a casual wave of his hand, "to go with all that holistic medicine. Did I mention that to you?"

He didn't think he had. After the rat attack on the clinic Aaron had found himself with a repository of new information -- for a given value of "new." It seemed like a medieval apothecary's knowledge to him.

"Uh... I don't think so. I know you have the magic plant? ...I want another look at that. Plants are weird." Everything is weird. But plants are a slightly more familiar, reassuring weird, for the most part.

"I know its name now," Aaron says, and a small smile ghosts across his face. "And how to use it. It's called 'kingsfoil' -- athelas or asëa aranion in Elvish -- and it is indeed most potent in water. But that's not all." He pauses, drawing in a breath, considering his next words.

"Aragorn, whoever he was, must have been some kind of healer, because I have enough herblore and knowledge of natural remedies to make an isolationist commune green with envy."

Julien repeats the unfamiliar words under his breath, twice, once using his lips and tongue like a normal person, once not.

Elvish is a strange thing, but he likes the sound of it, the way it feels in... well in his mouth sure, but moreso in that distressingly complicated voicebox in his chest, so that the syllables vibrate through his bones. Not for the first time Julien thinks, it's strange what he's gotten used to.

He raises his eyebrows. "Good sign? That he could be a healer, too, I mean."

"It speaks well of him," Aaron admits. "The knowledge of kingsfoil's virtues will be useful to me, at least, though I have no intention of using other plants or poultices in this clinic. And the healing songs are right out."

He laughs, and shakes his head.

"There's only so medieval I intend to get."

"Yeah, actual medicines seem like they'd be a little more effective than the plants they're made from..."

Julien leans forwards, eyes bright even if he keeps his face straight. "Healing songs, huh? You know, sir, I'm not sure I've ever really heard you sing."

"Would you like to?"

A mischievous look flashed in Aaron's eyes. "I know them as well as nursery rhymes. I could sing one for you, if you want."

"Here I thought I'd have to pull your leg first! I wonder if that's a bad sign..." He doesn't think Aaron can be too terrible a singer, but - well, he doesn't know. "All right, do it. I promise I won't tell."

The orange is done with. Julien peels open a little container of honey, unwraps a slice of hard-crusted bread, flicks at it a little, and starts tearing it into pieces.

"I knew you would, and knew I'd cave. I'm saving us both the trouble," Aaron says, all matter-of-fact practicality.

"All right, here goes." He sits up straight, hands resting on his knees, takes a breath, then breaks into a slow song in Elvish -- but a different dialect from what Julien's been taught. It's Quenya, high-Elvish, and beautiful. Aaron's voice isn't bad, not at all -- nothing spectacular, but pleasant enough. It's a short song, about thirty seconds long all told.

Julien almost-laughs and then fakes a low chuckle. "Yeah, you know when I'll win. Sir."

The song... He thinks it's more Elvish, it has a similar kind of sound, but Julien doesn't recognize any of the words. Still it seems to dance on the edge of comprehension, like a dream vanishing as he wakes up. He barely blinks while Aaron is singing, unaware that he's leaning in a bit, and that his pupils have dilated. It's... nice. He can't put a finger on why it strikes him the way it does, or just how it strikes him at all.

When it's done he straightens, but it's a moment before his pupils tighten again. Julien licks his lips, doesn't say sing more, doesn't say don't do that again that was weird, and finds something to ask instead. "What does it mean?"

Edited (animals and elvish, man) 2013-08-08 17:24 (UTC)

"It's a prayer," Aaron says, and equal parts of skepticism and reverence battle in his tone. "To Elbereth, a goddess of the stars, asking for healing and light."

Julien blinks and makes sure his voice is neutral. "Spooky. Did I tell... Um, I've been getting used to the stars. The day stars, I mean. It's hard to see them at night..." Noticing that he's trailed off he shakes his head. "Anyway I think I got something else doing that. Stars are..."

When he looks for words he doesn't find them. Not the ones he needs. But it is, he realizes, almost the same as listening to that prayer.

"...they're important. I just don't know how, or why."

Aaron doesn't know why stars might be important to -- to whatever Julien is turning into, but it's a piece of information he files away for later.

A deep, deep breath.

"Do you know," he says, slowly, "I might have a theory about what's been happening to you."

His tone, or something in his expression, or - something, makes Julien suddenly cautious. It shows in his eyes; his pupils dilate slightly and then contract to smaller than what they'd been before.

"Do you, sir? I'm guessing it's not the same as my theory." Which he hasn't discussed since. 'Angel' is kind of out there.

Aaron shakes his head. "I went through your records again, and the images that were taken of your lungs and heart. They're not human, that much is clear, but they are also not entirely alien." He takes a deep breath. How to put this? "Avian, actually, is how I'd describe them."

His tone is not casual, not exactly, but certainly calm. His eyes are on Julien's face, watching carefully to see how this theory is received.

"Avian," Julien echoes, his voice a little odd, pupils suddenly wide as he frowns. It takes just a moment - bird, that's what that means. Bird. That sort of makes sense-

-bird. Animal. If he's turning into a - He feels cold. What would- no. Julien's pupils contract to pinpricks fast enough that his irises seem to flash. No, he's not turning into a bird, that's ridiculous. Of course not. Of course not.

Before he speaks he checks that his voice is human, and measured. It is. His pupils stay as they are, though there's a rapid horizontal blink. "So the other me is kind of birdlike. Okay."

"Very birdlike. You have a bird's lungs, heart, eyes, and I would assume voice box as well. They're all human sized, of course, and integrated seamlessly into your original body." Aaron is almost eerily calm about this; how can he sound so impersonal?

"I cannot speak, of course, for how much further change you will undergo. From what you've told me, I doubt the 'other you' is a true bird as we know them. But...you did mention that he had wings, in that memory. It's safe to assume that if this goes on long enough, you will have them, too."

The evenness of Aaron's voice gives his statements an unreal tinge - not that, Julien thinks, this would ever not sound unreal. It's crazy. It should be impossible, people don't - he's not going to - no.

He doesn't almost ask which bird. No, it doesn't start forming down in his chest as he licks his lips. Asking that would be accepting it, making it legitimate, and it's obviously not going to happen.

Instead Julien strives to match Aaron's tone and manages, though his eyes are still pinned - animal eyes, focused and yet blank, or else hard to read.

"He also has hands." Wait. Blink. Julien has only had three memories. One was weird and hazy and lightheaded. One was more like knowledge than real memory. Only the last felt truly real.

Had he had wings in the first one? It was... he'd... there'd been a cape, right? Had he had hands in the last one? If he thought back enough- no. Julien preferred not to think too much about the King, who had rather dominated that memory. Of course he'd had hands. Unconsciously Julien flexes his, half raised at his sides.

"Well, time will tell, won't it?" says Aaron. "Either you will remember more, which will give you a better idea of who you are becoming, or you'll find out firsthand."

He gives a shrug. "There's nothing more to do right now, not with the information we have anyway." Wait and see. We can do little else.

Aaron's personal feelings on this matter are still nigh-impossible to read.

Julien tells himself, it's going to be okay. The worst isn't happening. Be calm. Be steady. Think of practical things. He's glad that Aaron said who and not what, but he isn't going to say it.

"Yeah. It's not - something that can be changed, so it's better not to worry much about it." He'd been so good at not worrying about things - still was in some ways, but these days... "You are right about wings, though, sir. They'll... make things difficult. Maybe they can hold off until cold weather, I've never liked big coats but I don't think you can hide something like that any other way."

He makes himself relax. His feet, drawn up as if he'd been about to stand, he stretches out in front again. Julien selects the least questionable looking scrap of bread and pokes it into the honey. "Cece won't kick me out, I think, but we don't really live somewhere isolated, so I'd be pretty penned in most of the time. Do you think it'd be better to look for places in the Dead District, or the countryside? For like... places to go."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Closed]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject