[log] Blood Writing On the Wall [closed]

[rubikscomplex]

Characters: House, Kesara, Quark, Terezi (and anyone else in the shed on 115 and 116)
Location: The School and Sports Shed
Date: Day 115 - 116
Summary: House examines blood using a combination of Kesara's microscope and Quark's bioculars, teaches Kesara how to write Chinese, and plays the piano (possibly with more lessons for Quark).
Warnings: Blood, potential talk of suicidal ideations, and any of the weird creepiness that comes from the school, in general.

Comments

[heavensreader]

[It's a little hard to focus when she longs to see what he is doing, but he gave her an instruction and she knows how adults of Dr. House's type hate being hovered about. So that she only sneaks up minute gazes from her work, until she hears Quark's name.

Her ears are immediately pricked. What's this about Quark? What did he find? Kesara looks up from her notebook, gaze sharp as it lands on the binoculars. Her mouth pulls down and forehead crinkles tightly. Quark had those? A prime piece of surveying equipment. What would Quark do with them, anyway?

She doesn't need to ask what House is doing with the lenses. She isn't stupid. She does sound a bit nettled when she does talk, though.] Where did he find them?

[rubikscomplex]

[Someone's jealous. Interesting.]

Shelley Derricks' house. That's where he gave 'em to me, anyway. I'm sure you kids can talk all about it when he gets back.

[House extracts a lens as he speaks and carefully polishes it up before setting it down. He uses a little water to thoroughly clean his scalpel, then pulls out his hammer and olive oil. A bit of the oil goes on his fingers and he smears that across the edges of the lens before laying it flat on the floor and bowing over it to begin scoring the glass with his scalpel. It won't be enough on the first pass, but that's what the hammer is for.]

Is he the only one with you?

[heavensreader]

[Oh, they will talk, all right. She's heard the name Shelley Derricks before. What does Quark know about her? Why must Quark be in the way?]

At the school, yes. Terezi and Vriska travelled with me too... did he also make a deal? Are you teaching him too?

[She manages to sound flippant, because a respectable amount of her attention is also occupied by watching him work the lenses. She'd seen glass-workers before, but not lens-makers, and she follows him with the fascination of children the world over observing the new and strange.]

Where did you learn how to do that?

[rubikscomplex]

Nope. He's just an idiot who gives me things for free. [So you have that on Quark, Kesara. Or maybe not? Quark is a useful minion that House doesn't have to worry about paying back. Is that better or worse than the clever girl who charges?] Started teaching him piano, though. I was bored. [And he teaches Quark on a whim rather than demanding payment. What fun!'

With the initial lead line, House picks up the hammer and begins going back over the score with his scalpel, adding gentle little taps. He has to pause and honestly consider Kesara's question, though.]

We were making mosaics in class when I was seven or something like that. Teacher wouldn't let me cut my own glass, so I watched him and improvised. The asshole gave me detention. Apparently a lot of grown-ups get pissed when you're smarter than they are.

[Precocious child, meet former precocious child. You probably don't want to grow up to be him.]

[heavensreader]

[They are exactly the kind of circles that her mind is set to spinning at, though not without wondering - she is precocious - if House is deliberately leading her on them. He's like her. He's a liar and he gets what he wants in the ways he knows. What does he want? The microscope for the lessons was a fair trade, if he makes good on it. She doesn't mind if he teaches Quark something useless like piano - any old officer's wife in Simla can teach piano. She doesn't care.]

Oah, that annoys everyone. Children, too, [she notes dryly. This is hardly any kind of adult wisdom.

She takes a little time after that to complete her list of characters. He can work. She also needs to work. And brood - no - scheme.]

I'm done! [The announcement is cheerful. No brooding for him. It's none of his business what she's going to do about Quark.] Are you done? I'm curious too.

[rubikscomplex]

[He is done and presently just adjusting the focus on... well, now. That's interesting.]

Come look at this. [House motions to her, moving aside.] Tell me exactly what you see, everything. I'll tell you what I saw after.

[heavensreader]

[It's not quite the microscope she was interested in, but that too will do - it will definitely do since he seems to want her opinion, and she approves of that. She comes up, a little excited, and peers in.]

I see... there are these little specks? Is that normal? I've only seen blood through a microscope once before.

[rubikscomplex]

[Excellent. House doesn't let on quite yet that he's pleased. He's also pulling off his band aid as he sets up another pair of slides for use.]

Nope. Not normal at all. Could be a fluke. We'll get some additional samples from me. [There's a pause before he looks at her.] Wanna see your own blood under the scope? [It would help to have more than one subject to check.]

[heavensreader]

So there is something! [She is immediately alert and pleased, forgetting, for the moment, the issue of Quark and the part of others in the discovery. Discovery itself is the important part, in the end - she may not always remember that, but these moments remind her. Like a little breath of fresh air.

She nods at once and holds out her hand without even hesitating. He can prick her with the scalpel all he wants. After stabbing herself up the nose with a bit of rubble, she considers herself inured to pain.]

Here, do it!

[rubikscomplex]

[He uses water and then some of his hand sanitizer to clean the blade of the scalpel. A daub of the sanitizer is also placed on the pad of her ring finger. He sets everything up again before taking her hand - his own have the barest tremor to them and look thinner than they should be, rather like the rest of him. House steadies himself before taking the blade to her, though.

It's a momentary pain, and then he's turning her hand over, squeezing out three drops of blood onto a succession of slides. Then it's a swipe to clean things up, and she has a band aid placed over the wound.

He gets one of the slides set up for her, then prepares the scalpel and more slides for himself.]

Tell me what you see again. Like it was with mine?

[heavensreader]

[True to her bold declaration, Kesara never flinches at the process or the prick, just watches it all with interest. Not just the technical details - House's hands, as well. When she feels the faint trembling in them, there is an odd swelling of pain in her stomach. She thinks he must be very tired, and is very sorry that she'd lost her tea brick. She would very much have liked to make him a cup of tea.

There's no option of that, though, and she isn't sure he'd appreciate it anyway - not enough to make up for being upset at her catching him being tired. Maybe she can think of another offering. For now she just steals a glance up, just to look at his face, a gesture meant to reassure her more than him, really. She's subdued as she heads for the microscope again.]

It's the same, yes. [The implications of that dawn after a moment. She looks away from the lens and down onto her hands with sudden suspicion.] Are we sick?

[rubikscomplex]

Yes. [People are randomly developing phantom pain and other maladies. He's not going to pretend for the sake of her feelings.] MN Poisoning. Ten to one, those specks are our MN. Which I'm pretty sure are Medical Nanites or Nanomachines... maybe Nanobots. Tiny machines, medical purposes. Our blood is saturated with them, which means any crap they're pumping out while they're working is getting put directly into our systems - every system because your blood goes everywhere.

[He pricks himself again and squeezes out more blood, two more slides for himself.]

[heavensreader]

[Kesara is not particularly fussed over feelings - not of fear, anyway. Perhaps they are sick, but she's not feeling it, so working herself up to feeling it would be a mistake she knows better than to make by now. She sits back and keeps looking at her hands, carefully turning them one way and another, wondering how many MN fit in each finger.]

That's very silly, [she concludes after a long moment's contemplation.] If they are for medical purposes, why are they making us sick? It can't be what they normally do.

[rubikscomplex]

Ever heard the phrase 'The dose makes the poison?' Anything can kill you. Medication can kill you if you take too much of it. That's why you get prescribed a certain amount, and you take it like the pharmacist or apothecary or whatever the hell it is in your time tells you to take it. They're making us sick because there are too many of them, would be my guess. Or we've got an older model, if you wanna believe Winter that MN poisoning is a thing of the past. Technology improves. We find out something we thought wasn't dangerous actually was. The machines they're using on us might be something that didn't get its factory settings fixed to deal with the problem.

[heavensreader]

Or maybe they just broke. [That honestly sounds like the simplest explanation to her, who comes from a time in which machines break as often as they work.]

So much else in this town doesn't work like it should. The tablets don't - not really, since there is so much Alexander says he doesn't know... I bet he wouldn't know how to fix them either, but I can ask. Unless you think it's some sort of secret. A scientific secret.

[rubikscomplex]

Partially, maybe. [He'll allow that as a possibility, but he's dubious given the regular injections.] Not completely. They're still working well enough to stop that spider chick killing herself when she chugged drain cleaner, or whatever it was she was drinking. Plus, that's what was healing us back before the Admin shut down their emergency protocols.

Go ahead and ask, though. Only reason we found out we could prescribe anything is because someone asked when we thought we couldn't.

[He'll give Watson that credit, at the very least.]