ataraxionlogs | MEDBAY CATCH-ALL

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MEDBAY CATCH-ALL | JANUARY

CHARACTERS: EVERYBODY. Are you working in the Medical department? Are you sick? Do you need shrapnel dug out of your arm? Are you going in for a check-up? Are you visiting someone? Are you grabbing some space tampons? Are you just here to bitch about how terrible the Medbay coffee is? Get in here.
LOCATION: the Medbay & its adjoining areas (gravity couches; locker room; morgue; SHOWERS? idk man whatever turns you on)
WARNINGS: Sick or injured people who may or may not be tripping off their medication? Also, whatever gross weirdos happen to be in Medbay at the time.
SUMMARY: It's a catchall Medbay post! For characters to interact within the setting of Medical and do whatever the hell they want, set during the entire span of vague, nebulous space January. That is really all there is to this.
NOTES: This is really just a general catchall post for things people might not want to set up separate logs for, plus an excuse for open log mingling shenanigans. If you want to specify when in the month things take place, feel free to put it in your subject line! The same goes for whether or not the thread is locked to certain characters.

Upon leaving stasis, just beyond the gravitation chamber, you'll find the open space of Medbay. This department is equipped to perform entirely independent of human involvement, but as time has passed you'll find that medical is now attended by your fellow passengers, operating on a series of shift rotations. Not unlike the other specialties, medical is equally susceptible to loss and appears consistently in need of volunteer assistance. Admittance to the bay at large is dependent upon security clearance. For example, all passengers will be able to access bandages, low level pain medication and the like, assistants will be able to access equipment to assess a patient's vitals, and doctors will have access to controlled substances and patient medical files.

Within medical there are numerous beds and consoles to monitor the status of patients who have been admitted. Due to advances in medical technology, passengers can expect that injuries and illness will heal at an accelerated rate. Breaks and fractures, for example, will recover within a fraction of the time that would typically be expected. Rows of cabinets contain all the necessities you would expect to find in a hospital facility. Alongside the basics there are also decontamination chambers, quarantine rooms, and surgical facilities. The entire area gives a distinct impression of cleanliness and sterilization, though on closer examination, given the handful of items that have gone missing, it looks as though someone left in a hurry...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

This nightmare just keeps getting weirder and weirder, doesn't it. This man just about looks like he's seen a ghost and is claiming to be Topher Brink. Which she can't believe, not really. She'd been working on her dissertation when Caroline put that stupid movie on, hadn't she? Yes. And working on that involved pouring herself over diagrams of Dr. Brink's discoveries since his work was so fascinating and she'd always wanted to meet his tech in person and--

No. This is still a dangerous situation and no matter who he says he is, she can't trust him. Even if that silly stupid girly part of her is just screaming and squealing with something akin to joy.

"Topher Brink," she repeats, "As in...Dr. Topher Brink. You developed the ah, the light," Coherency, what is that. Wow, she must sound stupid. "And, and you've heard about me. If you are, if you are who you say and are not lying to me about your identity, I find that incredibly difficult to believe."

She pushes herself back up to her feet and starts frantically looking for something she can wipe her face off with. Bleeding all over isn't exactly pleasant and it's, tending to the scrape is something normal. Something she can do that doesn't involve currently questioning the fabric of reality.

"Yeah," he says, still breathless and laughing a bit. She knows his name, at least. Of course, she knows his name. He's a big deal in the neuroscience world and on any other day, he'd be preening, but right now it's some glimmer of hope. Bennett Halverson knows his name and she's here. Those two words keep repeating in his head over and over like a record skipping: she's here. "The effervescent light technique," he corrects, good-naturedly. "And you're total legend... or you will be. What... what year was it? Before you left and came here? I swear it's not a dumb question."

He holds up a hand to indicate that she should wait and retrieves a sterile cloth from one of the drawers and rushes back to her side, giving her an awkward look to gain her permission before he starts dabbing at her bloodied hand, himself.

He can't help but stare at her like he's seen a ghost and he's still doing it, which doesn't help any. He knows he's probably scaring her, but... "You're Bennett Halverson." The words just tumble out and it's almost identical to the tone he used when he met her for the first time. He was the one on the fanboying end that time. Later, he might grasp the poetry of it all, but right now his stomach is doing somersaults and he wishes he could kiss her without it being really weird or having to explain why. 'Because the last time I saw you, I was picking your brain out of my hair' is not a good conversation starter.

"Right," she forces a smile. She knows that, she knows its effervescent she just. Words. Lacking with them. And he just keeps saying things that solidify her conclusion that this is one heck of a dream. Topher Brink is calling her a legend? Topher Brink is currently tending to her very stupidly acquired wounds? Yeah, no. There's no way this is real.

But it feels real and that scares her.

Bennett abruptly tries to grab the cloth he's holding and tug it away from him so she can clean herself up. She's uncomfortable with this on so many levels. Her brain just can't process that the scientist she probably admires most for a multitude of reasons was standing here, completely, entirely focused on her. She's not used to being the center of attention. The way he's looking at her, it doesn't help. It makes her try to analyze his features which really doesn't work because then it sends her brain on a weird tangent of 'I don't know if I think he's attractive because I admire his work or if this is just my head calculating his facial features in a way I'd find most desirable because this is a dream. And why was this suddenly a dream instead of a nightmare? All because he showed up in it? Wow, Bennett, you are so ridiculous.' All of that added on top of the rest of the weirdness of this was just making her a tiny bit twitchy. Okay, a whole lot twitchy. She was currently fighting off the urge to gnaw on her fingernails from the anxiety.

"It was, it was 2007," she answers tersely, "And I thought that we, I thought we already established that. I'm Bennett Halverson, you're Dr. Topher Brink."

"Yeah," he repeats vacantly before snapping himself out of it. "I mean... Yeah, I know you know who you are. Obviously. I'm just impressed that I'm finally getting to meet you... for the first time." Because he sounds completely and utterly balanced saying that. He gives her a slightly wider margin of space and crosses his arms over his chest.

"It was 2011. For me. So you've got a few years to get famous. I'm like the Ghost of Christmas Future or something." He runs a hand through his hair and puffs out his cheeks. Maybe he should just... avoid talking to her about her life and pussyfooting around that which he desperately doesn't want to explain and deal with the real problem here, which starts with 't' and ends with 'oh god why.'

"You're on thr Tranquility, BTW. It's your basic... pandimensional kidnapping vessel. I've been here for about a year now, so I can... show you the ropes, I guess. Since we know each other- know of each other. For lack of a familiar face, you can have a familiar name?"

He was so much better at this when he didn't have to try quite so hard. This is proving to be difficult.

"Basic pandimensional kidnapping vessel. I didn't know that was a thing," she replies, narrowing her eyes. Bennett is so incredibly skeptical of everything that's coming out of his mouth. It just doesn't add up in any sort of logical fashion. Not that she's the authority on logic at the present moment but that's really beside the point.

Her brain has recovered somewhat from that weird tangent about her attraction to him and is back to business with the extensively analyzing.

"The energy required for such technology would be incredibly immense. Even with a thorough understanding of quantum mechanics, this should not, it can't be possible. I can't deny the idea that there are multiple realities; that hypothesis is fairly sound when you examine the wavefunction collapse associated with measurement. Decoherence can explain the, the phenomena relating to the measurement which then produces entanglement. But these, it shouldn't--Unless you drag the Schwarzschild solution into this but still," she rambles on. And on. It's so hard to shut up when her mouth gets switched to science blabber mode. When her brain catches up to her mouth, she realizes that he probably knows all of this. Of course he knows all of this. So she switches gears a bit and focuses back on his...weird behavior.

"And if this is the first time you've ever met me, how did you know what I look like? It's not like I, it's not like I have my face plastered all over the papers I have published and I doubt that in the highly unlikely event that I do become famous within the neuroscience community, that will change. I still don't think I'd want my, want my face attached to much. Which leads me to believe that you're lying and that you have met me previously. That would explain why you look so, you look so shocked that I'm standing in front of you."

She falls quiet for a moment, wiping at her face with the cloth to get the drips and then hold it at her forehead to apply pressure on the scrape. Then she sighs.

"Did I get it all? The blood, I mean."

"It is now." He shrugs, laughing a bit to cover up the fact that... yeah, okay, maybe pandimensional kidnapping vessel was a bit much for the first five seconds. Not that he hadn't said much worse to other people, but those were other people. Not Bennett. After a year here, he can't really figure out how to sugarcoat any of it.

"We have a jump drive," he offers. "That no one is allowed to go look at it, but trust me, we have one. We have... literal visceral proof of what happens if you stay outside the pods when its engaged. I don't think it should exist either, but it's hard to argue with it after awhile. It just sort of... exists." He flails his hands desperately and then just drops the subject entirely when she does.

...But God how he'd rather talk about anything but that. "... Uh. I work for Rossum and they have files on you," he drawls it out slowly so it's clear he just made that up off on the top of his head. She's onto him, though, so he can't even try to prolong the lie and just murders it. "Okay, we've met. I didn't wanna weird you out or think there was some sort of freaky expectation thing... I think I failed at not weirding you out though. So..." He nods at her question, cutting himself off, lest he start blathering, himself, and swallows awkwardly. "Yeah. You got it."

Yeah, no. She's not going to dwell on this pseudo-science jump drive nonsense for the moment because if this is a dream, it really doesn't matter all that much and if it isn't, she'll have plenty of time to figure these things out. On her own. She really does much better when she has to discover things that way.

Bennett almost rolls her eyes and nearly starts ranting about how everyone seems to be reading her confidential files lately and what a breach of privacy that is and she though Topher was better than that but. Oh. He's fessing up to his lying so now that rant would be out of place and add to the awkward.

"A lot can happen in four years so. I suppose that makes sense," she says quietly, "And I, well. I'm flattered that you didn't...that you were trying to take precautions against...weirding me out. But I assure you, there's no way to not be. Weirded in this particular situation."

Wow. That went.. surprising better than he expected. He lets out a breath that he wasn't aware he was holding and folds his arms behind his back. "It's a lot to take in. Ship the size of an island that kidnaps people and... believe me, it gets even worse, but, uh, there's helpful information packets that go live on the network after every jump and they're way better at explaining the space horror than I am."

He shifts from one foot to another, trying to figure out where to go from here that isn't a 'okay I'm in love with you bye' or anything remotely similar and comes up short, so he ends up awkwardly fumbling for the first even vaguely lucid thought in his head. "I could, uh... Give you a tour, if you want. Answer some pressing questions- about the ship. Not about your future. If you were... curious at all about your future. It's probably for the best you don't know. Time-space continuum thing... and all. But I know a lot about the ship, itself- the actual good things, not the scary things. Like... where the rooms are and which floor has the best leftovers and oh! The holodecks. They've got real holodecks here."

"I'll be sure to ah, look it all over. When I have a chance," she smiles shyly, looking down at her feet and fidgeting with her sleeves. Just standing here with him, it makes her feel so incredibly incompetent and stupid. What is one supposed to say when they meet someone they greatly admire? Is she supposed to start lavishing him with praise or would he get annoyed with that? And that doesn't address the part where Bennett doesn't trust herself to say anything that wouldn't sound completely moronic and she'd rather not have him thinking she's an idiot.

"That's alright. You don't, you don't have to tell me anything about my future. It's...screwed up now anyhow so it doesn't really matter, does it? Besides, the only thing I think I'd be interested in knowing is the circumstances of which we met, or will meet. But again, it doesn't matter since now we're here. On a kidnapping spaceship that I'm still not entirely convinced isn't a screwed up dream I've concocted to deal with the anxiety surrounding presenting my dissertations," Oh wow. That all sort of got away from her. Good job, genius. Jeeze, he's going to think she's a dummy that can't ever shut her mouth.

"Holodecks," she repeats, focusing her attention on that now. Ship. Things about it. Far better conversation topic. "As in...Star Trek holodecks?"

"Mutual appreciation society," he blurts out, a bit too quickly. "It was through work." He rolls his shoulders in a shrug that almost reaches his ears. "And now we're meeting on a creepy spaceship. Slightly less conventional, but, hey, we're still us. We can make new memories."

.... He cringes. "That sounded way less weird in my head, but we're sort of redefining weird right now, so to hell with it." He giggles and it peters out awkwardly about when she mentions it being a dream. "You wouldn't be the first to think that..."

Ariadne had him convinced of it for awhile. He's glad he's over that theory, because it makes the fact that he keeps making a home on the ship so much more depressing.

He brightens almost too much, remembering her comments about the disruptor and how she gets him and even if he knows it's a terrible idea to try and get involved with her again (not to mention unfair to her), he can't help but be elated a little. The mantra continues. She's here. "Yeah. They're really cool and we also have a great science department. I mean, aside from the horrible things, it's actually a really nice place... once you get used to it, anyway."

Oh, be still her heart. Getting all fluttery because he's saying nice things that sound like they could have been ripped right out of the script of a romcom is counter-productive to everything.

Instead of speaking, she finds herself just. Staring at him. Trying to find something about him that makes it clear he's just part of her imagination. The biggest problem with that is she's always been terribly uncreative and she's never been a creature of elaborate fantasies like this. But nothing makes sense right now so. Its the best explanation she has.

"I, I can't help it. I just. Creepy kidnapping spaceship. I could maybe swallow that. Get used to it and, and get involved with this science department or medical and find something to do with myself but--but you," she pauses, laughing at herself.

"There is no way, there is no way you're real."

Topher makes a noise that sounds like a laugh and a choke. "In a... good way or a bad way?" He knows exactly what she means and it's probably a compliment in a sense, but it also makes him incredibly insecure- is he coming on too strong? Is this okay?

What is this exactly?

He's no real believer in true love. That's storybook crap, even if he's had to read his share of storybooks to get the nuance of a particular imprint right, but that's all it is- a fantasy. It's what people want to be real, but ultimately isn't. You don't just fall in love with a perfect stranger and people who find each other don't get second chances to do it all over again. Life's not like that. So if Bennett's here and Bennett doesn't remember him, it's selfish to take anything she gives him and run with it.

"Good way, definitely a good way," she says immediately, just to make it very clear she meant no disrespect or insult. She didn't have anything else planned out to say so then she falls quiet and she bites her lips together from the frustration of it.

He isn't coming on too strong, no. Even in her younger, more innocent college days, Bennett is a pessimistic sort of person. Always assuming the worst so she can't be disappointed.

"You're just...not what I expected. Which is bad, I shouldn't have been assuming things because that's, well, rude but like I said, like I said before, I mean it in a good way. Best way possible. I just thought that if, on the slim chance I actually got to meet you, you wouldn't be so, so nice. And you've been consistently so in the past...twenty minutes so..." Can she run away now, please? She could calm herself down, possibly come back and then maybe somehow convince him that she's not completely bonkers? Because that would be good.

Topher opens his mouth to say something about the fact that he's not always so nice, but that's a mistake numerous people have made around here and it's not that he doesn't want to be nice or doesn't try. He's just an egomaniac with some mild sociopathic tendencies and the average Joe doesn't get the opportunity to see those sides of him.

But rather than correcting her and crushing her hopes and dreams, he shrugs again. "I get that a lot, but it's a rough transition. You need to be led into it gently. I only wanna make everything as easy as possible." Says the guy who makes it a habit to tell everyone they're probably doomed during most jumps. Bennett is special. She gets special treatment.

"But, hey, anything you need? Just ask. Like I said, I'm pretty up on ship culture. I'm like the Will Robinson of this place."

She's over thinking all of this. Which is a typical Bennett thing to do but it's still frustrating and makes her wish she was Caroline. Caroline would know how to handle this with...grace wasn't the right word but. A far better way than Bennett was.

"Can we, can we clean this mess up? Because I feel bad that I knocked it all over and I'd have picked it up myself by now but I have no idea where anything goes so," Yes, let's focus on that. Yay neurosis.

"But then you can, I mean you could show me around. If you don't mind. I'd rather...not get lost."

Topher nods and bends down to start picking up the fallen tools. "Yeah, sure. And don't worry. This is probably not the most unfortunate thing to happen to the medical equipment. And, uh, if Simon happens to glance over here and give you this super disappointed look... don't worry about it. I think his face is just stuck like that."

Yes, let's make fun of Simon, Topher. That's a great idea. Little does he know if Simon were to look over hre, he'd probably be shellshocked by the girl who looks like his sister.

She kneels down and starts picking things up too, then handing the items off to him since she doesn't know where to put any of it. Though she definitely watches him carefully so that if this happens again, she will know how everything is organized.

Though if she sticks around long enough, she'll end up reorganizing the entire medbay.

"Is Simon another doctor?" she asks.

"Simon's sort of taken over the med bay- he won't admit it, but we all sort of defer to him, because medical's understaffed and in chaos. Too many specialists, not enough GPs- that sort of thing. Also I think he's been to space before. Or lived there or... something."

He shrugs, laying the tools out in what's probably an approximate location of where they actually go, but if Bennett weren't watching, he'd probably lay them in a drawer and be done with it. Organization isn't his strong suit and so long as he knows where they are, he's good.

"It doesn't look like its in chaos," she remarks, thinking its odd that he just sort of laid them out like that but OCD. Her's knows no bounds.

"It seems relatively...quiet here. Which is why I came, well. Poking around." And now she has to direct this conversation somewhere else because its getting far to close to her having to admit to hiding in corners like a frightened mouse. Or maybe she's just being really paranoid. Yeah, it's probably that one but still.

"So. Places. Other than the Medbay," she trails off awkwardly. Interaction with people. How does that work.

"You haven't seen it when there's an actual crisis." Topher pauses and then adds, hastily. "And you might never have to. They're not that common. Maybe every alternating jump, something whacky happens, but..."

Yeah, not helping. He waves the comment off and presses on, leading her out of medbay and towards the lift. "Right so, the passenger levels are where you'll probably spend most of your time, so we can start the tour there and if you wanna sleep off the dimensional jet lag, you can do that or I could show you the oxygen gardens."

He's very impressed with the oxygen gardens, which is saying something, considering he hates the outdoors.

Her eyes widen for a second because actual crisis. She is the worst at handling those but she realizes that making that obvious probably isn't a good thing so she shakes herself out of it and bites her lips together.

"I doubt I'll be sleeping off the dimensional jet lag anytime soon," she remarks, "So oxygen gardens are...fair game. I'll let you know if I start feeling like I do. Want to go sleep off the jet lag."

He brushes himself off, despite the floor being perfectly clean and there's not a trace of dirt on him from picking up tools and waves a hand towards the hall leading to the lift. "Or the head injury, which I guess is more of a big deal, but you seem fine. You are fine, right?" He's seen her with an actual head injury and the irony of this isn't lost on him. Technically two, but a bullet in someone's brain is less a head injury and more a... You know what, he's not going there.

He starts walking, sort of going sideways so he can gesticulate at her exuberantly. "You'll love the oxygen gardens. There's a whole hydroponics level and then if you go further up, it's like a real jungle."

"I don't think a scratch really qualifies as a head injury," she says, almost rolling her eyes before she catches herself. She doesn't want him to see her doing something like that and interpret it as disrespectful.

"I'm fine. I promise it probably looks worse that it is," Bennett adds, running her fingers through her hair and making an attempt to get it to swoop over her forehead. Maybe if he can't see the scratch he'll stop worrying about it.

"Like a real jungle. Minus the bugs and other dangerous creatures, I hope."

"Just making sure." If he notices or cares, he gives no indication of it and just continues to smile like a complete dope. Why her face- why.

He finally tears his eyes away from her and focuses on explaining the situation. "There's bugs, but nothing too bad. They're the only things that can survive during the jumps. There's this shapeshifter lady? She stayed out during a jump as a fly or something. It was wicked hardcore." He pauses, rolling his tongue along his teeth as he considers something else. "We also have a dinosaur and the Starks have wolves, but don't worry about them. They get twitchy when you imply the wolves might eat someone and they stick pretty close to their people."

Now it's becoming a jam session about the people on the ship. Well, it's important for Bennett to know these things. "The Starks aren't bad though. I'm sort of... like part of their court, I guess. I don't really know how it works, but their tiny king is totally chill with me."

"Wolves. And, and a dinosaur. I-I think that we just, we just crossed a line there," Bennett repeats, her eyes going wide with shock. She has issues with dogs. She doesn't care what anyone says about them but wolves are about ten times worse, okay. Anything that falls under the canis genus is terrible.

"A...tiny king. That's chill. With you," Repeating what he says seems to be her default right now. Then Bennett starts laughing because this is just. No. This is just too weird.

"You are doing a terrible job of convincing me this isn't a dream."

MEDBAY CATCH-ALL | JANUARY

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