003 ∞ whilst this planet has gone cycling

[notsocommon]

WHO: Helen Magnus
WHERE: hospital, schoolhouse, outside the butchers, Inn
WHEN: 7 February - 14 February
OPEN TO: All
WARNINGS: TBD
STATUS: Open

---

i. fixed law of gravity

Thanks to the work done by Rory, the hospital was something approaching hospitable. There were beds inside it, yes, but Helen wasn't certain that the narrow sickbays could really be considered proper beds or not. It was more of a triage station, really, or a field hospital to her modern standards and she was reminded yet again of all the medicine she'd practiced during the two great wars; there was little that rattled the nerves quite as much as hearing and feeling the vibrations of shells and mortar just outside one's door while trying to heal the sick and make them comfortable.

Helen could do without ever seeing another war.

Still, it was the nature of human beings to fight and while there hadn't been many quarrels here in this place, Helen wasn't naive enough to believe that it would always be so calm or that their threats would always come in easy to handle packages. The injuries this month were proof enough of that. No one had been hurt terribly as of yet but she was certain it was not far off, considering the lightning only increased in frequency as days passed.

Currently, she was in the midst of cataloging her meager supplies with which to treat burns. There were bandages, there were poultices and her very precious store of penicillin. She had five syringes, prepared if she should have to use them, and there was no reason to believe she'd ever get more. Their captors had been gracious enough to give her the medicine once. She wouldn't be the one to waste it.

She was ripping linens at the moment in order to make more bandages and hoped that she'd never have occasion to use quite as many as she'd made.

ii. so simple a beginning

After putting in a long day of scouring the woods for more herbs and dodging lightning where she could, Helen found herself in the Inn for a cup of her preciously-hoarded coffee and a bite to eat. She'd been grateful that there was food already cooked when she'd arrived at the kitchens and made a note to bring more berries and herbs to replenish Kate's stores from time to time. It was what she could do to help, after all, and while she could cook she was also content to eat the cooking of others.

She had a bowl of stew balanced on one knee and a mug of coffee in the other as she sat by the fire, lost in reflection and memory. There had been disappearances of late, a rash of them, and she wondered what that meant. Their captors never seemed to announce why they did things and she supposed it was futile to assume they'd start doing it now. Once she'd finished eating, she pulled out her notes from Annie and Finnick's findings, trying to make sense of the new information they'd discovered.

She wound up moving from the chair to the floor and when that didn't give her enough room, she decided to take the lot of her work over to the schoolhouse in order to avail herself of the slates inside there. She took care not to erase anything already on the chalkboards, not wanting to ruin someone else's work, but took up a piece of it herself and started trying to make sense of the muddled equations and endless lines of text.

"It doesn't bloody make sense she exclaimed in frustration, banging a closed fist in an uncharacteristic fit of pique. Even her own mind had been tested by this and if she couldn't figure it out, what hope did she have of ever finding a way back home? How could she provide insight and understanding to the people here if she couldn't make heads of tails with what she'd been presented? She sank down at one of the desks, sitting hard enough to send it flying a few inches.

"Damn."

iii. endless forms most beautiful

Having given up on the mystery of the pods for the time being, Helen decided to make herself useful and was tending a hot fire and a veritable cauldron of soap. The butcher's was the only place where she had the equipment to render fat properly and while it was smelly, disgusting work, the end result was quite nice. It reminded her of being a girl, making soaps and things by hand and once she had the soda ash added to the fat, she could start the process of turning the lot of it into soap.

This batch was going to be scented with lemon, one of the precious essential oils she'd been gifted, and it lent the air a fresh, clean scent. It was something neutral, something that simply smelled of clean and she hoped that the others in the village would agree with that assessment. If not, they were free to make their own soap, she supposed, though she was the only one who seemed to make any in any real quantity.

The next batch was blood orange and the final, at the end of the day, ended up scented with lavender. Once she'd poured it into the crude molds she'd crafted of wood she covered it with towels to let it cure. Later, after it'd set up, she'd slice it into thick bars but for now it would simply have to set. There were more than a few lye burns on her hands once she'd finished for the evening and she wondered if the powers that be would gift her a set of proper gloves. They would have more than one use. Of that, she was absolutely certain.

Comments

i

[zomboligist]

Ravi is, quite honestly, not being very helpful. He's still peering in one of the more reflective pieces of glass as he moves his hair this way and that, trying to determine if his home being struck by lightning has caused a rather permanent change in the way his hair stands up. He could swear it looks different than before, but being without hair gel does make a man use whatever comes across his plate.

"I still think it's changed," he rambles, for what's the third time since he'd come by the hospital to visit Helen, "it's very 1990's," he says, judgmentally, "all I need are frosted tips and I'll fit right into a nascent boy band as the cute one."

Re: i

[notsocommon]

"You know, Ravi, you could help me make bandages if you wanted to get your mind off the current vertical status of your hair," Helen said, just a trace of sarcasm in her tone. After talking to him a bit like Nikola, she realized that part of the reason she'd forged a bond with him had to do with his...Nikola-like tendencies.

"I may regret saying this later but you act an awful lot like Nikola. An awful lot."

[zomboligist]

Blinking away from his self-investigation, he's absolutely not sure whether that's an insult or a compliment, but he's more than a little inclined to lean towards the latter. "I know you're trying to be sassy at me," he says, snapping his fingers in a terrible Z formation, all puffed up nonetheless, "but I'm going to take the compliment," he insists, though it's done the work of shaming him away from the reflective surface.

"Here," he says, gesturing with a hand. "Hand me another pile while you tell me how smart I am, like him."

[notsocommon]

Helen smirked back and handed him a pile of the linens so that he, too, could tear bandages. It was monotonous and mindless, yes, but it was a task that needed to be done so they'd have a nice stockpile in the event of a mass amount of injuries.

"Oh, you're brilliant. And you tend to change the subject just as rapidly as he ever did."

[zomboligist]

"I don't think that's genius so much as a terrible attention span hastened on by a world consumed by social media," he says, with the appropriate disgust of admitting that even as much as he tries to ignore it, he still finds himself consumed by it at times. "I'm not as brilliant as him, either," he points out.

Glancing over his shoulder as he begins to start tearing bandages, he feels like it's time for him to fess up. "I was only partially through my world-changing discovery, after all."

[notsocommon]

"Well, we all start somewhere," Helen said, gently encouraging. "Besides, I've had good luck with men called Ravi. The head of one of my facilities in Mumbai is called Ravi, you know."

Or was, but Helen didn't feel the need to discuss Carentan or Ravi's fate therein. He'd had a happy life there, albeit too brief.

"They tend to be brilliant."

[zomboligist]

"I was hoping to get there," he agrees. "Helen, I think it's time I told you what I was working on back home." Now that Mark knows, he thinks it might only be a matter of time before word circulates to her, at least in an off comment, and it seems quiet enough as they work that he can share without worrying about it being overheard. "And even though you've talked about vampires and other mad things, I'm still half worried you're going to think I need to be locked up at the end of this conversation."

Zombies isn't exactly something that comes up so readily, after all, not in his experience.

[markwatney]

"It definitely smells better in here than it did earlier," I say as I peek into the butcher's shop. Technically we do the fat rendering out back, but it is not exactly a pleasant business and the scent... Let's just say I feel bad for anyone living in homes even remotely close by.

"Have you got a minute?"

About a month back, Helen and Ravi and I had tossed around the idea of essentially consolidating our energies and moving in together. Helen's got one of the bigger houses, which would allow us to each have a room and a proper lab. With the break in the cold weather, it might not be bad timing.

[notsocommon]

"For you, I may even have multiple increments of minutes," Helen said, giving him a quick smile. She was busy, yes, but Mark was one of the few who understood just how paramount it was to continue researching, continue trying to make this place more livable. She could take time to speak with him.

"I could stand to get away from the smell for a while anyway. I think I was due a break."

[markwatney]

"I don't think anyone would try to deny you, considering you keep us all lemony fresh," I reply with a smile. We were making do before Helen began crafting gentler soap, but I'm also pretty sure most of us were going nose blind to B.O. at that point, too.

"I was just looking at the break in the weather, and wondering whether this wouldn't be a good time for the move." With as weird as this place can be, there's no telling how long our good fortune will hold -- If it can be called that when we're all at risk for being struck by lightning everyday.

[notsocommon]

"Probably wise to take advantage of it before the snows come back in full force. I don't know that we're fully clear of winter yet, considering the temperature, and I would rather move things about when there's not drifts on the ground to contend with," Helen said.

"Have you spoken to Ravi? Because we could probably pull it off with just a few hours of work."

[markwatney]

"Not yet," I say, and then smirk. "Given that it's your house, I figure it's probably better to check with you first."

I pause, considering how long a move like that might take; I don't have much that I consider mine personally apart from my plants, which will take the brunt of the effort. But it does beg the question...

"You know, you might want to come by my place before we do it, just to walk through and see if there's anything we ought to carry over beyond the basics."

[notsocommon]

"Yes, I wouldn't want to leave something behind that we could use," Helen agreed. "And naturally, all of the plants are coming. I've always liked living in a house with green things and you're better with them than I am. I used to keep my roses alive back home," she said, laughing softly, "But I'm no botanist."

It was a blessing that he was here, honestly, because his knowledge made growing crops and identifying edibles much simpler. Helen liked knowing the burden of knowledge wasn't solely on her shoulders; collaboration and sharing was much, much desired.

i

[oncewasroman]

Rory was rather pleased with his work, though he was even happier when others had come by or popped in to help. It wasn't great or modern or even very hospital like, but it was certainly better than trying to run around and treat everyone in their living rooms or, worse, the main room of the inn. They now had a centralized place to help the injured, wounded, or (God forbid) sick. Rory took pride in that and was glad that he could be nearby just in case.

It was a strange morning for him though, he'd woken up only to find that there was a very large box outside his door addressed to him. He'd been here long enough to have heard of the mysterious boxes, but of course he hadn't expected to receive one himself. His luck just never worked that way.

However, when he'd opened it for a moment it had felt like Christmas. Even as dour and skeptical as he was, it was hard to look this gift horse in the mouth and he immediately took it up and carted it over to the hospital.

Even though he knew he wasn't the only medical professional in the village, he was still surprised sometimes to find Ravi or Helen in the hospital. It occurred to him that maybe it was because they hadn't truly worked out a schedule or rotation -- maybe something to discuss in the future. For the moment though he had other things on his mind, "I got one of those boxes...but you aren't going to believe what's inside." Or, maybe she would, but he didn't care.

Re: i

[notsocommon]

"Oh, well, don't leave me hanging like that," Helen said, giving him an eager look. If it was something to aid in their pitiful efforts toward making a proper hospital, she would be more than pleased if Rory wanted to contribute it to the common cause.

"What have you gotten from our dubious benefactors, Rory?"

[oncewasroman]

Rory flipped the lid open, the box was rather large but he'd managed to get it here because honestly it wasn't as heavy as it might look -- after all the supplies inside were light. It was a nice haul of supplies though. "Well, it's not quite good enough to forgive them entirely...but I'd say it's a start," he said, mostly joking because how did you forgive someone for kidnapping you.

Inside the box, now opened, Helen would see two large bottles of antiseptic, guaze, ace bandages, medical grade needles and surgical sutures, and a decent sized bottle of aspirin. Rory was glad to finally have supplies to put to use after all that hard work with the hospital cleanup.

"Honestly, it's pretty meager for a hospital, but it's better than nothing, right?"

[notsocommon]

"Oh, Rory, this is absolutely delightful," Helen said, happy to see the medical supplies in the bottom of the box. She'd gotten some here and there but more was always welcome, especially the finite things like bandages and syringes.

"This will be a big help, especially if we get more people and end up having an epidemic or a bunch of injuries."

[oncewasroman]

He was pretty delighted about it, to be sure. "My thoughts exactly. I was probably going to keep this stored here. It also got me thinking...maybe we should try going around to the others and see if they received anything during Christmas that they could donate to the hospital." He hadn't been here for the Christmas haul, but he'd heard enough about it. He couldn't be sure if anyone had received a gift of blankets, bandages, or anything that might be useful to the facility. But that's why he wanted to ask.

"Did anyone get an inventory of what people got during all of that? I only heard there were a lot of boxes."

[notsocommon]

"I don't think a proper inventory was ever made but it's something to ask about. We don't have that many citizens," Helen conceded, "And going around to ask for donations won't be an issue. It would be best if we had all the medical supplies centralized anyway - it does them little good without doctors and nurses to administer them."

Helen had contributed everything she'd received to the common cause. She hoped others would feel the same.

3

[pretendtoneedme]

The smell coming from in back of the building almost put him off of entering the place completely - seriously, he'd smelled some foul things in his day, but nothing that *concentrated* - but he needed to look the place over and, in theory, such a smell meant that someone was in the butcher's to be doing... whatever that made that smell. That, or it was something that needed to be investigated, because whatever that was could not be natural. Clint had his backpack over his shoulder and his hat on his head and looked like he was about to go on a hike more than anything else, but he tugged the front of his scrubs up over his nose - it didn't really help - before pushing open the door.

"Hello? I'm hoping someone's here or I'm gonna assume this place is decomposing on its own."

Re: 3

[notsocommon]

"I am, in fact, here," Helen said. She'd become somewhat immune to the smell after hours of rendering fat into tallow to make candles and soap and while it was cheerless work, the end result was rather nice.

"I'm making tallow so we can have soap and candles. It's not the most pleasant activity but the results therein are more than worth the effort."

[pretendtoneedme]

Having light in darkness and a decent soap was nice, yeah, but that didn't mean the smell wasn't absolutely noxious at the same time.

Clint stepped into the building, doing his best to breathe through his mouth, looking around at all the equipment (some familiar, some not) and finally spotting Helen. "You've gotta be a saint to put up with that smell, even for something helpful like that. I was gonna check out what all's here and how the equipment is, but if I'll be in the way I can come back."

He still had his shirt up over his nose.

[notsocommon]

"You won't be in the way at all but I assure you, the smell is much better at the end of the process compared to now. Once everything is rendered, I can start adding essential oils," she said.

"I'm Helen, by the way. I don't believe we've met just yet? I'm both doctor, soap and candlestick maker. Not a butcher yet, though."

[pretendtoneedme]

"We have essential oils here?" Considering the village was very "bare bones," that was something that just seemed completely out of place compared with everything else. Maybe somehow some had been left behind in one of the houses when whoever'd been living there had been herded out, but it was still one of the more bemusing things he'd heard. In terms of the village, at least.

"Clint Barton. I'm, uh, not a butcher-" regardless of what some of his enemies had said in the past "-but my father was, and I know some of it. I just wanted to see what we've got to work with here."

[notsocommon]

"Well, we don't have them here. I was gifted them by our dubious benefactors and prison wardens," Helen deadpanned. "Has anyone explained that to you yet, Clint? The fact that you can get the occasional box with things that may or may not be useful?"

It was something it had taken her a while to get used to, honestly, but now that she'd received a few boxes, she had come to look forward to them no matter how irregularly they came.