Fable - Ask Wouldn't Change Me If I Could

[Edison Attwater]

Not a single person saw Edison slip into the cracked foundation that was Elliot's clinic, which was honestly probably one of the more solid buildings in the subterranean ruins. Staggering, unsteady, and with his face set grim and sullen, he likely should have caught a few eyes. Hardly being much of a mage, the man himself wasn't entirely certain how his ability to go unnoticed worked, but it seemed as if he could just will a metaphorical sheet over himself and suddenly he was the least interesting thing for the eye to be drawn to. He didn't want to to be seen in this sort of state.

Staggering through the curtain that served as a front door, the lanky man grunted irritably as he got caught on the fabric and had to jerk and twist to free himself. Not three fucks were given as he dripped blood on the relatively nice carpets Elliot had laid out and hauled himself to the front counter, where he slapped his hand down hard on it.

"Grantham!" He shouted, leaning more of his weight onto the counter because godsdamnit he was tired. "Are you in? You really need to be in. Need your... uh... assistance."

The brothers were largely respected in their region, and especially within the depths of the Showroom, itself. They provided a valuable service, and they had the sort of money and connections that made them people not to be carelessly trifled with. Still, every now and then someone would get a very stupid, very reckless, very bad idea. And such was how Edison was ending his day with a gaping stab wound in the back of his shoulder.

Though he had lost a fair amount of blood, it was actually not the sole cause of his staggering. No, Edison had emptied the entirety of both his flasks on the way there and even then, as he stood in the front lobby of a medical clinic barely keeping himself upright, he was fumbling at his own person for something to smoke. Anything to take his mind off the barbed and gnawing pain of his shoulder.

"Grantham! Where the fuck're you at, Elliot?"

Elliot Grantham

 

[Elliot Grantham]

Not a single patient had taken him up on his extended Vibrational Treatment Plan. Just one had initially agreed to trying his new and improved skin-knit cream, only to loudly protest that it felt like fire on the wound and rush to wash it off. Didn't that just mean it was working well? But Elliot had long become accustomed to dealing with simple men who knew nothing, such was the way of it.

In short, a terribly fruitless, tedious day of standard treatments for the usual bumps and cuts.

So he sat in the cramped storage room which doubled as his alchemical workspace, staring at the page upon which he had recorded the recipe. A pre-emptive measure to dull the sense of pain could suffice, but if he were to prepare a standalone product that was tolerable to the consumer, he would need to find some way to introduce either a cooling or numbing component which did not interfere with the efficacy of his creation. Mint was suitable for oral and aromatic preparations, but for a topical application it would be better to use...

Yet this quiet pondering was interrupted by the light sound of the multitude of small crystal chimes attached to the top of the entryway curtain, which quickly turned from a gentle muted clinking to a mild cacophony to mirror the struggling of the irritable man working his way through.

Elliot set aside the paper and rose to his feet, taking a beaked mask from where it hung on the wall, pulling it on and tightening the straps as his latest patient bellowed for his attention. Edison... Had that miscreant got himself into trouble again, or was he simply here to bother him about his 'Peace Inhalants' once more? He took a deep breath, taking in the comforting, familiar potpourri scent of the herbs packed into the beak of the mask as the man called for him again. No point in delaying further, if nothing else Edison made for a more entertaining patient than most of the Bulls.

"Yes, I'm coming." he spoke calmly as he pulled open the one legitimate door in the building which separated the storage room from the front desk, stepping out as he gave the man in front of him a once over. Trouble it was then.

Though the now bloodied rugs were relatively well made and soft enough, it was far from the first time they had been stained with blood. Elliot had already learned his lesson in the past that the floor rugs ought to be of a tone that is not disturbed terribly by this - The rugs at this time were a shade of maroon. Even if the palette was limited, and the cleaning frequent, a welcoming atmosphere was important nonetheless, ever more so in such a place as this.

Of course, while the warmth and relaxation inspired by a soft rug could not be underestimated, the man in front of him was clearly not in a state where such a consideration would be noted.

After his momentary inspection he offered a crisp nod and stepped out from behind the counter, pulling aside the plain brown curtains covering the entryway to the treatment area, such as it was. A simple stone room with a half dozen beds along each wall separated by more curtains to provide something akin to privacy for the patients. He held one arm stiffly at an angle towards the nearest bed to the left of the entry, palm upturned, offering only this nonverbal indication of where Edison should go.
"It would appear you can move unassisted, but are you of lucid mind and comfortable extremities?" he questioned as he waited for Edison to move to the indicated bed, his voice raised so as to be heard clearly enough despite the muffling of his mask, before quickly rephrasing his question "Ah... That is, is your thinking clear and are your hands warm?"


Edison Attwater

 

[Edison Attwater]

To say the least, Elliot Grantham was not kept around for his weird treatment plans and unconventional ideas on medicine. The Showroom needed someone to patch up the Bullies and be discrete when the brothers needed assistance. Granted, Edison was always the one to plead his case in regards to his "genius" ideas. Mostly because he thought the odd man was hilarious. Edwin, however, acknowledged the man's actual talent and usefulness as long as he was steered away from anything too offbeat and unsound.

"Oh, thank gods..." He muttered to himself after Elliot called back, relieved to hear his voice. He did not want to have to stumble off and find some other doctor in the Showroom, because there weren't really any. At least, not any that he would trust. He was still a little weirded out by the birdman get-up, however.

"You even really gotta wear that...?" He asked as he pushed himself from the counter with a groan and headed in back as he was directed. In passing and with the sway of his step, his injured shoulder bumped into the doorframe, leading to a long hiss of pain followed by a string of muttered profanities. He was visibly sulking when he deposited himself on the bed.

Edison found downright Elliot hilarious, all right. Except for when he was the one getting treated. Then his eccentricity did start to become a little bit annoying. How easy it was to laugh at the confusion and misfortune of others. How much karma was a bitch.

"... The fuck my hands being warm got to do with anything?" He snapped. He lifted his hands, though, to look at them, as though the answer could be found gazing into them.

Elliot Grantham

 

[Elliot Grantham]

Elliot did not bother to answer when questioned about donning his attire. How many times had he explained that illness and disease came about through discordant vibrations in the aether surrounding them? How many times had he explained that a person who is posessed of a discordant state exudes this unto their surroundings? The herbs for his mask were painstakingly selected over years of experimentation to provide a constant source of healthy, balanced vibrations induced to the body through inhalation. The crystalline dust stitched inside his overcoat provided a measure of dampening between external and internal vibrations. He would be a fool to interact with discordant souls without such carefully constructed protection!

But it would be a waste of breath to go over this again with Edison, or any of the clueless simpletons among his regulars who had previously expressed an inkling of curiosity into his ways. In the end, it was the lot of one on the frontier of knowledge not to be understood, was it not so? He would simply have to prove his methods through demonstration and time.

Instead, he answered the more practical question. "I am ascertaining the severity of your state. A feeling of chill in the extremities, sinking to a dim consciousness or discordant mind, those are signs of concern. I would note you are displaying abnormal levels of exsanguination... Ah... Bleeding a lot given the size of the injury. You've been drinking again, haven't you? I do believe I had warned you and others previously that liquor in excess induces a number of disruptive vibrations within the body, with one such disruption being that the blood exits more readily than usual... Perhaps in a vain attempt to seek more stable vibrations than the discordant mess you have made of your own body, hm?"

Even as he lectures the man, however, Elliot does not remain idle. He retrieves a small wooden table covered in a clean cloth, carrying it to set beside the bed. Removing and carefully folding the cloth on the side of the table, he reveals a number of medical implements and tools, but he does not immediately set to work. With quick routine movements he first readjusts the various tools that had been jostled as the table was moved - Every tool shifted to be aligned with small notches in the surface of the small wooden table.

Only after everything is quickly returned to its proper place does he take a pair of lidded pitchers from one of the nearby shelves, along with a dark folded cloth. One pitcher is set on the corner of the table, and turned just so to align the handle with the corner. For the second, he removes the lid which is also placed on another corner of the table, carefully so it is equally distanced from both edges.

As he moves to examine the wound more closely, Edison's nose would be assaulted by a strong scent from the now unlidded pitcher in his hands. There might be some herbal notes to be found buried within, but it is overpowered by the stench of vinegar. Not that this is likely to come as a surprise, as any who have seen him work would recognize this as his favored cleaning solution for wounds.