trans_9 | Ensuring Survival [Open]

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Ensuring Survival [Open]

[For the sake of not spamming the front page, I'm combining Alex's visit to the science and medical departments in one thread. Anyone can comment the main log if they want to run into him on his way there. If he's finding you in the departments themselves, comment the department.]

Alex really just wanted to stay in his room at the crew quarters. It was quiet and private and he could browse the comms all day, figuring out the programming.

But, he needed his pills. He could probably talk to the ship about it, though he just knew he didn't like the ship... the exact reason was escaping him though. So he had contacted science when he had noticed a post by them on the comm system. He had his pill bottle with him, as always, so that he could give a pill as a sample to someone in the science department. While they analysed that he'd make his way to the medical department, which was apparently just across the hall or something.

While actually getting the ball rolling on having some tests done was not required for immediate survival, it insured that he wouldn't be killed if when Loretta got on board. He refused to think that there was any possibility that she and Mikel would not show up. Without the government breathing down their necks, it would be far easier to find out what had been done to them. Loretta would kill him if he didn't take this chance to at least try to find out more about what they were being used as lab rats for.

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Alex wandered into the area labelled as "Science Department", hoping to find the guy he had spoken with on the omnicom. His hands were in his pockets as he wandered in, one of then petting the rat sleeping in there.

Looking around nervously he called out, "H-hello? I-I spoke ta someone e-earlier, about m-my pills?"

"H-hello?"

He peeked his head in before entering. "A-anyone 'round?" Yes, he wanted some tests done, but right about now he was regretting his decision to come down here. They'd probably just send him over to that shrink... Doc Samson was it? when he tried to tell them the effects of the experement he had been in.

That was how the government discredited their lab-rats. They openly announced that he children in the program are "crazy", and so no one ever listened to them.

He held on to a small hope that they might be more open here, with all the people on board that had super powers.

Sam was in his element, currently running some tests on Nanashi's blood. When he heard the timid, stammering voice, it pulled his focus away. He didn't recognize the voice, but the boy's scent wafted toward him, and he was a bit confused. He thought he hated doctors.

He left the testing area, and went toward the entrance. "Oh, hello, there." He smiled. "What can I help you with?"

Alex's heart sunk. Of course. That creepy doctor from before had to be the one to find him. Alice immediately hid down his sleeve. Even Alex really wanted to run, but if he ran now, he knew he'd never have the nerve to make his way back over here.

"I... uhh..." He stuttered a bit, finding that his throat was closing and not letting him speak. The tightness in his chest and the trouble he was having breathing was really not helping.

Then he had an idea. He pulled out his omnicomm and typed for a moment, then held it out as far from himself as possible for the doctor to read. He made sure to keep his hand in his sleeve as he held it out, even if he had to have them out to type. He didn't particularly want this doctor to see the scars, even though keeping him from seeing them would be impossible if he wanted this guy to investigate.

||Some of my friends and I were experimented on at home. If I don't try find out what was done to us, Loretta'll kill me when she gets out of the pods.||

He averted his eyes as he held out the comm and used his free hand to flip up his hood. A little movement in his jacket could be seen as Alice skittered from the sleeve of the arm that held out the omnicomm to his other sleeve.

Ratchet had been back in the medical bay proper, mostly engaged in a losing battle to understand just what some of the stranger looking pieces of equipment were for. He'd missed the first voice, but when the second had joined in, he took notice and started towards the front of the department. He hadn't realized that anyone else had been around.

He paused nearby. Well, this was an interesting situation. "Is everything alright?"

Sam's eyebrow quirked up when he was presented with the omnicomm, but he read it. He glanced up to Ratchet before he continued, and abjectly stared. He was standing with a Transformer. How had he not noticed before? He soon recovered. "I think so," he replied to him.

Then he turned back to Alex's message. "I see. Well, first I'll need to determine the end result of their tampering. Can you give me anything to go on?" The better he acted as a reputable doctor, the sooner he hoped Alex would warm up to him.

Alex was too busy gaping at Ratchet at first to answer either of them.

After a moment he managed to nod at the Transformer. It took him a little while longer to manage to find his voice, "Y-yeah..." His voice was strained, choked.

It took him a few more times to say anything else, as well as a consideration of using his omnicomm again. That would have been a good solution if Sam was the only one there, but it was just a hassle to have two people reading off of it.

"We-well... I s-see th-these things... Sh-shadows. Th-they're ne-negative e-emotions. I h-hafta eat 'em 'cause n-normal f-food d-doesn't f-fill me."

There was more he could probably explain, but that was a quick idea of what the experiment resulted in.

Ratchet waited patiently for the staring to blow over. He was getting used to the reaction by now but honestly he was more interested in what would have brought someone to medical in this state. He'd caught enough of the message on the omnicomm to understand the context of the boy's explanation; an.. interesting situation to say the least.

"You're able to eat someone else's bad feelings?" Everything that he'd studied said that emotions were physiological reactions within a person's body that affected mood and perception. Not shadows, and certainly not something that could be consumed unless they were speaking in metaphors. "How?"

He didn't sound like he didn't believe the boy, but he was definitely out in uncertain territory.

Sam, however, had experience with things a bit on the obscure side of supernaturalism. He raised a hand to his chin. "Anything else?" He had a few ideas, but he needed all of the information before he decided on a course of action. Diagnostics wasn't really his specialty, but he knew he had plenty of colleagues with brains to pick about whatever findings he may discover.

After zipping up his jacket Alex buried his hands in its pockets, averting his eyes from the two. He really felt like he was going to possibly pass out, he was having such a hard time breathing. "Y-yeah... I jus'... I-it's s-sorta like I ab-absorb 'em. I-I c-can feel 'em, an' I gotta sorta f-fight 'em d-down, b-but th-that ca-can b-be e-easy w-without th-the c-cause."

He shifted from foot too foot, glancing at the door. "Th-they m-might b-be some s-sorta e-energy, I-I guess... An'... E-eatin' st-stronger ones... Th-they go-give m-me a-abilities... L-like I c-can f-force myself ta f-feel these f-feelings, an' th-then use th-the shadows." He glanced again at the door, looking as sacred as Alice did when she rushed down his sleeve.

It was getting difficult to understand the boy through the stuttering and his stress levels were going through the roof. If he had come here looking for help, he wasn't acting like it... and the ordeal itself was going to be moot if he ended up passing out before anything constructive could happen anyway.

Ratchet frowned, noting the way he kept fidgeting; glancing at the door. Okay, maybe it was time to back up a bit. "Hey, take it easy, it's going to be hard to help you if you're unconscious. Slow, deep breaths. What's your name?" He glanced to the other boy--a fellow medic?--in a quick 'back me up here' gesture.

"It's Alex, right? I saw your post." He glanced back at Ratchet, and gave him a faint nod, as though to say 'I got this'. "Since I'd spooked you so bad on the Obs Deck, I didn't want to approach you again. But it's good that you came to us.

"But it's important that you can trust us enough to believe us when we say we don't want to hurt you. If you want to be normal again, or just understand more of what was done to you, it'll require a lot of mutual trust. I'm not saying that it needs to happen today, because that takes time. But I'd like to think we're off to a good start." He looked up at Ratchet. "What do you think?"

Alex listened to the transformer. He was right. Alex took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and exhaled slowly.

All that really managed to do was stop him from hyperventilating. He was still shaking just as bad and feeling just as panicked. He glanced at the door again, but walked instead to the nearest seat- which happened to be among several for waiting patients- and slumped into it with a deep sigh.

He drew his knees up to his chest, but the way he wrapped his arms around his legs- so that one hand was holding the elbow of the other arm- was far more relaxed than it had been on the Obs Deck. "I... I d-dunno i-if I w-want ta g-get r-rid of th-these p-powers o-or not, b-but i-if we w-wait f-for me to r-really t-trust anyone wh-who's a d-doctor, y-you'll be w-waiting a f-few y-years. I trust the sh-ship e-enough a-at l-least th-that it w-will k-k-keep you f-from r-really h-hurting me." As it was, Alex disliked the ship, but he knew that she was programmed to keep him and the other passengers safe.

Ratchet would take what he could get with this one; that he was going to remain conscious was enough of a battle won for right now. "I think so far, so good," he answered Sam, moving a little closer to where Alex was seated and crouching down so at least he wasn't looming a head or two taller than the smaller humans.

"Then I guess we'll just have to go with that for now. What is it you want? How can we help you?" Ratchet might have had something of a poor reputation when it came to his temperament back home, but there was a vast difference between war worn soldiers and a frightened human boy. At the end of the day he was still a doctor; he still wanted to fix what was broken.

Sam went back to where he had been working, and rooted around with his instruments. He returned with gloves on, a clean needle and a handful of test tubes. He had iodine and other paraphernalia in his lab coat pockets. "Will you let me take a blood sample to start with?"

He pulled up his comm post on his omnicomm and held it out for Ratchet to see. It was easier for him than to explain it all again, especially with the hard time he was having with speaking now.

In response to Sam's question, Alex gritted his teeth. Of course, the thing he liked the least was the thing the vampire wanted the most. A little nagging part of him reminded him of his usual demeanour- that he shouldn't judge.

That nagging part was somewhat yielded to as Alex turned his head to the side, closed his eyes and clenched his fist, doing his best not to shake. He knew from experience that it only hurt more and took longer if you shook.

"Y-you b-better b-be u-using a-a-anaesthesia. A-an' n-not f-for y-y-yourself." His hatred of doctors gave him more strength to speak his bad thoughts about a person than he usually had- not that he even often found himself thinking bad about people. He usually searched for some way to find the best in people. Unfortunately, doctors- or any scientist that did work on humans- was automatically labelled as "the bad guy" in Alex's book.

He might be a little easier on Ratchet, having been inspired to watch the old show by the movie that had been produced. Still, even Ratchet was only spared the sharp tongue, but none of the actions of mistrust.

Getting a better look at what was written on the omnicom helped, but it did raise some additional questions. Propping his chin in his hand thoughtfully, he considered them in silence while Sam retreated; Alex wanted to know what had been done to him, but he didn't seem particularly prepared to actually let anyone do it. Trying to force it was just going to make things worse.

Sam's return and Alex's sudden reaction pulled Ratchet's attention to the other boy, the equipment in his hands given a quick glance. "Whoa, okay, that sounds like a no then." He looked back to Alex and scrambled to offer up a distraction. "Who's Loretta?"

Sam fished through his lab coat pockets. "You mean like this?" It was a swab that contained a numbing agent so there wouldn't be any pain when the needle went in. "Don't worry, I'm with you on that. Until I became a vampire, I didn't like needles much either." He arranged his supplies on a small table near where Alex was. He waved the swab again before he set it down. "This guy is my best friend." He smirked a bit.

Ratchet seemed to misunderstand his actions a bit. The fact that he was here meant that he was saying yes. The fact that he hadn't run out the door meant that they were good to go. Despite his words, he kept himself rooted, and was even offering up his arm. The reality of it was that even if Sam didn't use any anaesthesia, Alex would sit right there and give them anything else that was needed. He shook his head and turned to Sam, not quite managing to make eye contact as he said, "Go ahead."

Seeing the swap he nodded and sighed a breath of relief. Even a small nervous smile twitched at the edges of his lips when Sam waved the swab, but it failed to stay long. He closed his eyes and turned his head away from his arm as he made a fist, clearly familiar with the process.

To distract himself he began answering Ratchet's other question. "L-Loretta's o-one o-of m-my b-best f-friends. She's l-like m-my older s-sister. T-took c-care o-of me b-back home. S-she a-acts very s-serious, b-but she's r-really s-soft. I... I c-can't d-do her j-justice."

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Ensuring Survival [Open]

Science Department

Medical Department

Re: Medical Department

Re: Medical Department

fffff... B|

Re: fffff... B|

how do you feel about canon puncturing? It may happen with these two.

So I see! I'm.. not sure? Let's go with 'no' for right now I think.

No problem, he'll just go "Aaaaaaaaah" in his head

Alex wouldn't know how to go about saying anything about it anyway.

There are more important matters at hand! You can prolly puncture him later. 83

Assuming Sam gets the guts to. He can barely look at Winchesters without turning red.

Well, if we get this mutual trust thing going, Alex won't have too much of a problem. Big IF

A bridge to work towards. Or something. 8V

Re: A bridge to work towards. Or something. 8V

He just needs to see them as <i>people</i> not <i>doctors</i>.

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