etraya | un: Bachelor

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un: Bachelor | text

Attention Fellow People of Etraya,

I am Doctor Daniil Dankovsky, Bachelor of Medicine. As I understand it, few of you have seen a doctor lately. That simply won’t do! Please, don’t wait to get sick to establish care. I am situated in the hospital, ready to take consent forms and make updated medical histories. At least a few of you have unaddressed concerns, I just know it. The average person comes to see the doctor when it’s too late! Though we cannot die here, there is no reason to suffer unduly.

And if you are otherwise healthy, perhaps think of it as helping me out. In the event of an outbreak, it is far more helpful to have complete clinical pictures of the inhabitants. Especially, as I understand it, there are many biological differences in this population.

Please come visit me during my clinic hours, every day from 10am to 6pm.

[What Daniil really wants is to meet more of the unusual inhabitants of Etraya more quickly as well as conduct casual interviews of the sort of people who are slated to save the universe. But he can’t just say that completely outright.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Joss Sweden, Finch, noted. …I think I did already get on his bad side. I wasn’t even trying to. He’s so senstive. As if an impenetrable man has anything to fear.

[Turns out he and Robert had quite a lot of things in common, down to the poor record keeping.]

[Unfortunately, his memory was excellent. His mind young and agile, his hubris waiting to drown him at its nearest convenience. ]

Yeah, well, you handled that conversation poorly.

[ He's drinking his wine, not mad or anything, just matter-of-fact. ]

He grew up on Earth, aware he wasn't human. Safe to assume he grew up with some fears of being experimented on. The god thing was probably another hot button. First step to not pissing people off is understanding people don't owe you answers.

[Oh Daniil doesn’t like that. People don’t owe him answers?]

It’s not like I’m an inquisitor. I’m not here to string anyone up! Or experiment on anyone!

[Daniil stands up to pace and gesture.]

Why, what’s wrong with being likened to a god?

[Except that he was pretty derogatory about the whole thing.]

[ He hates that he knows this vocabulary, but here they are. ]

It's othering. Alienating, he's just a guy trying to be helpful. Anyway, if your main priority is to sort out your world's plague, between the library and the internet you got a lot of resources.

If you want to prioritize something else that would require people to cooperate with you, you'll have to pick up some people skills and learn to accept people might not trust you even if you do put your best foot forward.

[ In a way he's lucky he has no interest in going anywhere, so his only job is to help people who want his help. ]

“People skills” were never my forte. But I manage. [He takes a sip before really looking at the chips. He takes a few, crunching them. Oh- They’re so delicate. How pleasant.] Mm. Do you think I’ve just decided to make my social interactions more difficult on purpose? I am trying.

[Of course his language othered people. They were other, after all. It flies over his head.]

I don’t believe I can fix that plague from here. I doubt even more that anyone will write about that plague. I’ve looked. It’s no wonder, the town was full of illiterates. I have seen no other disease that manifests in the way that this one does. For now, I have decided to try to understand the nature of death here and learn as much as I can about the people I have access to.

Speaking of, have you died?

[ It's clear to Robert that Daniil isn't really understanding his point, but he was young and full of himself once too, maybe he'll be humbled by the place. ]

Not since I died back in my own world. You can have my blood if you want it, but there's nothing special about it, or about me.

[Daniil is both brilliant and incapable of understanding his point.]

Without how easy it is to obtain a slide, it would be remiss of me to not obtain one. I don’t anticipate there being anything revolutionary in it, but we are all extraordinary people in circumstance, aren’t we? There may be something special about you that you cannot see. [But maybe a microscope can.]

[He grimaces.] I think I died back home, too. I can’t explain it well. I was alive shortly before I came here, though.

I'd tell you not to think about it too hard, but you're clearly not wired for that.

[ It's not that he's not curious, it's that he knows better than to expect any satisfying answers. ]

You should have the bots show you around the equipment you're not familiar with. You're gonna love MRIs.

I’m not. Thank you for noticing.

Oh, I will. Though don’t forget you offered this to me as well. Perhaps I’d like your personal touch. Anyway, I tend to fall asleep late anyway. Maybe I’ll head down after this and look around.

[Daniil is not so old and tired as that, so he thinks. He still expects satisfying answers in awful, miserable places.]

Do you miss anything from home? Did you leave any friends or family behind?

Nope. I'm confident I wasn't mourned.

[ He'd been so angry and depressed that he doesn't miss much either. ]

I miss my dog, but she passed away a couple of years before I did.

[Daniil sounds a little too gleeful about this.]

Oh? A real bastard in life, were you? Were you a bad surgeon as well? Do you think even your patients curse you?

[The bit about a dog is a bummer. But she’s not a loose end. At least. As grim as that is.]

I will remove my arm and beat you with it, don't think I won't.

[ He's not annoyed, but he will do it. He can't be issuing empty threats, that'd just make Daniil double down. ]

I was a fantastic surgeon until I lost the arm.

I have a gun. Not on me, but a handful of meters away.

[It’s not a threat. But it is information.]

You have to wonder about the inefficacy of a punch from a metal arm if you have to wield it as a club. I could show you how to hold your fist if you like.

[He does look at Robert with sympathy though.]

I would have a difficult time adapting to a single arm as well. Opening an ampoule and drawing from it, using a microscope, using any sort of glassware, all of these things would be very annoying without my other hand.

Surely you are a fantastic surgeon again.

[ Robert shrugs, sipping at his wine. ]

I've been doing okay in my practice runs, but my grip is still a little off. It's a great arm— Jayce Talis is someone else worth getting to know. He made it for me with another kid genius' help, Toph.

That’s no good, surgeon. We have to get you in better shape. I’m good with a scalpel— on a dead body. Surely there’s something we can do to assist your rehabilitation.

Especially because we will need you for Talis’ own surgical intervenrion.

[ That last bit gets his attention. He's fond of Jayce, and he kind of owes him. ]

You got him to agree to surgery?

[ That leg is so fucked up and there's magic contamination. They need to sort out so much before putting a scalpel anywhere near it. ]

I did, after this next mission, whatever it may be. So we’ve got our work cut out for us.

[Daniil gives him a sly smile. He loves this feeling, that tone of voice of surprise. ]

He consented to bedrest, even. So do what you can to be ready for him.

Did he tell you about the magic poison?

[ He's visibly wired now. He genuinely never thought Jayce would agree to surgery. ]

No. What is this about magic poison? Do you mean the infection in his leg? I saw it, but I didn’t know what to make of it.

[The change in Robert’s state is obvious, and worthy of paying attention.]

It's some kind of corrupted magic. I wanted to treat that before attempting surgery— I suppose we could do surgery and worry about that after, but doing an invasive procedure on a compromised leg didn't seem like the best possible course of action, especially with a reluctant patient.

[ He stands up and digs into a file cabinet. ]

I have x-rays.

Let’s see them.

[Now that’s the good shit. He never had access to an x-ray machine personally, so he gets genuinely excited.]

It may be possible to keep the corruption at bay, whatever it is. We could do some extensive testing, or perhaps enlist the assistance of one of those elves with the purification magic. I honestly can’t believe I’m even talking about magic, but I’ve seen it for myself recently.

[ Robert hands him the envelope with the x-rays. Jayce's leg is all sorts of fucked up, lots of bone fragments. ]

I don't know how to test when it comes to magic I'm not familiar with.

Something tells me you weren’t familiar at all with magic-

[Daniil’s mouth hangs open as he sees the damage.]

How is he walking at all? How is he not passing out with every step? Even with that contraption on his leg, there’s no way it’s providing enough stabilization.

[Daniil holds his fingers loosely over his mouth, just takin’ it all in.]

I’ll figure out what it is. It’s bound to have some sort of match with something that someone knows about.

…Have you met Emet-Selch?

[ He has no idea of how Jayce is walking. But it doesn't matter, he focuses on the last question. ]

I've met him. He's some kind of "superior" being? You think he can help?

[ Robert doesn't, but he also didn't think it was possible to talk Jayce into surgery, clearly Daniil has some people skills he lacks. ]

He treated me like a fool earlier today. But he’s clearly an academic and capable of incredible magic.

Did you take any photographs to document the infection?

[Daniil has an effect on certain people.]

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