Logs:Materials

Materials
cn: nonconsensual medical experimentation, medical torture
Dramatis Personae Joshua, Lily
In Absentia	2023-05-24 "Do you think it goes with my outfit?" (The other-side view of fun with genes.)
Location <PRO> Testing Room E 38, Lassiter Research Facility - Ohio
There are dozens if not hundreds of rooms like this in the sprawling research complex, and while their specific purposes vary, most of them could easily be mistaken for exam rooms at a regular doctor's office. The exam table against the wall is oddly ordinary, the reclining chair here would be at home in any phlebotomy lab. The shelves and cabinets are neatly labeled and stocked with supplies for basic physical exams, biofluid sampling, and minor wound care. There is a highly adjustable (ergonomic!) work station with a wheeling stool, and two stationary chairs, padded though not particularly comfortable, next to the door. In the observation room between E-38 and E-39, probably it is a bustling crowded mess already: Ms. Tessier, at least, is supposed to be there with Drs Allred and Taverty, but Dr. Johnson and Ms. Gillepsie are there too, and a couple curious interns, and some of the lab managers, and -- -- well. When Lily enters this exam room, the excited chattering is loud through the open door before it shuts again. She's wearing a white labcoat, open over a black button down and checked slim-fit slacks. Attached to one beltloop, a silver chain that leads to a some round weight in her right pocket. There's a slim earpiece in her left ear, easily seen with her hair braided neatly down her back. She's pushing her glasses up her nose again as the door closes, as she sinks onto the stool. She's gripping tight a pen in her hand, twisting the cap to the off position. "They're almost ready for you," she's telling the room's other occupant. "Just calibrating the other subjects. Elie's son is ..." Lily presses her lips together, thin. "... we got maybe a minute or two to go." These weeks have not been the most kind to Joshua; he's looking far too sallow, raccoon-eyed, noticeably leaner than when he arrived. "Sounds like y'all already started the party." He's glancing toward the door Lily just came from, the chattering beyond. Dour expression, the same. So is the bland monotone of his voice. "Mother of the year, there." His jaw has gone just a little tighter at the mention of son. He's sitting up in the reclining chair, picking stray lint from the hem of his scrubs. "Some parents settle for a field trip to the Science Museum." "Apparently this is the biggest watch party they've had here in ages." Lily tucks the pen into her breast pocket, goes to her slack to fish out the pocketwatch there. Clicks it open and watches the second hand tick-tick-tick forward. Clicks it closed again. "Not everyone gets the parents they need. What do you need for this. Water? I can get you some water, probably." She lifts her hand to her earpiece -- maybe she's going to ask! -- and there is a faint babble of noise. "...They're ready." Just maybe, under her own flat voice, there is a touch of faint apology. "Reyes's power first." "Happy to loan my parents out to any takers. You know. If you all ever let me see them again." Joshua drops his hands, bracing them against the edge of the chair as he feels out the edges of the unfamiliar power. "Phone call and your keycard," he's answering Lily, "critical to my functioning." He seems to be managing alright despite this lack, though. The slow rewriting within him doesn't look like much, at first, though when he slumps back into the reclining chair it is with a small flutter of lights, a brief disruptive tug at the equipment in the room that flattens back out in short order. Lily snorts. "They don't even let me bring my phone down here." Her keycard maybe is in her labcoat? It's certainly not anywhere easy for Joshua to see. Her eyes glance up at the flicker of lights, touches her earpiece. "First shift done," she mutters to everyone in the room right behind her back. To Joshua, some concern in her voice despite herself: "How many switches you think you got left in the tank? Taverty wants to go for -- well, until the kid is exhausted, I think." Joshua snorts, his eyes tipping up to the ceiling. "Shit, Taverty's here." He doesn't sound surprised. A little resigned. "He's very good at running on fumes." The corner of his mouth twitches up. "Running me on fumes, anyway." His head rolls to the side -- he's looking past Lily, now, at the blank glass, the observation room hidden beyond. "Who's over there, anyway. What do you have the kid doing." Not that he needs an answer, exactly; he's feeling out the flux and shift of mutations in the nearby rooms kind of intently. "You know him." Not a question, not exactly a surprise, but Lily's eyebrow quirks up anyway. "Anyone else in there you know? Alexis Gillespie isn't quite done her PhD yet, but Cal Johnson has been around a while." Casual, the name drop there, but Lily is looking for recognition in Joshua's expression. Then back to the glass. Her power, to Joshua's senses, is ghosting over his in waves, not yet copying it but so clearly wanting to transform. "Something new," she says, glancing up at the camera in here. "Might help fix Reyes's nerve issue, if it goes well." She opens her mouth to say more -- then more faint noise from the earpiece. "They want Villareal, next." "Me and Taverty go way back." Joshua holds up his hand, two fingers crossed tight together. "He wants my body like you have no idea. Took one look at me and tried to invent a new field of biology about it." His brows lift at the names, and he looks back to the window again. "-- Johnson's in there? You really do have the whole gang. He and Elie can bond over subjecting their kids to torture For Science." His brows lift, and he slumps back heavily in his seat. "New? What, just mix him up a healthier cocktail?" He draws in a slow breath, fingers tapping restlessly against the side of his leg before he quiets the motion. "Might die of shock if Taverty's actually gone into the saving lives business." Lily's lips press together with another flick up to the cameras. "Cal is --" she cuts this off with a frown. "Parenting and science maybe don't go hand in hand," she allows. "Don't keel over yet, I think it's more incidental -- we're trying to put a whole new X-Gene in where the old one was." Maybe this should be more upsetting to Lily, but it's not showing in her tone or one her face. "Please switch to Villareal's power, now." This repetition is more clear, with a wrinkle in her brow as some static comes out her earpiece. "The plant one. Can you keep things on deck? Amethyst Brown's, after that." Lily is biting at the inside of her cheek, the touch of her power resting more heavily on Joshua's. She leans forward, ostensibly fidgeting with her earpiece when she covers its mic and whispers: "I could take a couple? I get the gene-scan data first, I can clean it." "A whole new X-Gene? I can try." Is this actually what they were asking him? Probably not, but Joshua is tired already. He's trying something, certainly; both Lily and the scanners can feel the ponderous shift in his genetic makeup. If it is not quite what it looked like before, that's what they asked for, right? Reyes's mutation has been considerably toned down, in this new blueprint; something new is quietly layering itself over top. To Lily's senses it is probably familiar, an also-muted facsimile of Elie's quiet field of who knows what slowly inscribing itself alongside. "I can keep plenty on deck. They don't love me for that, either." Somewhere through his exhaustion he looks -- briefly -- grateful at Lily's offer; his own reply comes very quiet. "You clone Villareal, be a big help." Lily's power presses down, molding like clay around Joshua's own and reforming in its image. To Elie's poor kid in the next room over, her genetic change is quick enough to miss key parts of the process if he wasn't looking for it. The shift to Villareal, that's much clearer in signal and in pace. She leans back, let's go of the microphone. "No one's asking for that from you." Still, she's watching the construction of the new gene with bright fascination in her eyes. "Save your energy, we're gonna be at this a while before --" her gaze drifts to the cabinets, to the labeled drawer for needles and syringes, and when she cuts off it's with a sharp intake of breath. "Before we're done." "Sorry." Joshua's eyes are closing, now. "Lose track, sometimes. These experiments could use better structure." There's another small flutter, in their lights and their scanners both, just a little blip before he opens his eyes. Follows Lily's gaze to the cabinets -- reflexively he's gone just a little tenser. His fingers dig down hard against his knee, only relaxing after a slow exhale. Much of his focus is still turned outward, quietly watching the shifts of genetics happening in the nearby rooms. "Shit." This comes out as just a quiet huff. "Someone over there can really just write --" His jaw tightens a moment later, as he considers this. "... shit." There's only so much Saving His Energy he can manage, though. Etching Amethyst's power into himself, melting it back away, a slow rotation through whoever they decide to parade next door. Even with Lily's intermittent pinch-hitting, by the time he's modeled another few templates most of his snark has bled away. Has he been modelling the correct templates? Probably their later analyses will be able to tell. His own genetic map has taken on entirely new form -- though he doesn't look snakelike at all, there's a distinct touch of Winters mixed in there, copied over from next door. Elie's enigmatic power blended in, hints of Reyes still lingering. Possibly -- probably! -- the cadre of shitfucks behind the door are not quite satisfied yet, but it's somewhere around here that he's sluggishly stopped responding to their instructions. Lily's exhaustion is not on the level with Joshua's, is maybe masked by boredom when she asks, somewhere around her third power shift, for someone to bring them coffee and water, but she's flagging, too. Maybe that's why she's fidgeting with her pen again, twisting the cap three times, tilting the clip at Joshua. "Come on, Salinas. One more." Lily's cajoling tone might sound pathetic to her colleagues behind the glass, but the concern and fear is clear to her friend. "We're onto templating the psionic in there, that was Alexis's request, we are so close to done, come on..." Maybe her pleading isn't enough, though, to stop the soft garble from her earpiece, to stop the door to the observation room opening, to stop the lab tech rolling in a set of hideous headgear on a small cart. "Graham thinks its about time for this," the tech is saying to Lily, with a roll of his eyes that suggests he thinks they should have done this from the beginning. Joshua does not look like he is about to Come On for One More. At first he only barely responds to Lily's cajoling, head kind of turning (kind of just lolling) in her direction. Maybe it's in the direction of the coffee. His eyes flutter open once -- twice -- three attempts before he keeps them open, looking blankly at the cart and its ugly contraption. "Taverty," he declares, has terrible -- fashion --" This mumbled criticism trails off as his eyes close again. But then open, fixing hard (-- and not without concern of his own) on Lily. "You used that? Before?" Lily is not so subtling pushing the coffee towards Joshua -- is this going to raise some eyebrows, maybe, but Future Dr Allred can cover for her. "No --" is this to the lab tech or to Joshua? Both perhaps, "-- and I don't think that's necessary." "Your first time with Salinas like this, huh?" The tech clicks his tongue. "He can totally keep going, this is all just an act. Just needs a little encouragement." He's crossing to Joshua without much fuss, depositing one ugly headpiece on top of his dark hair. "It's kind of annoying, but kind of fun to operate. You should try it today, at least." He's offering the second headpiece to Lily, now. Lily meets Joshua's gaze. "Do you think it goes with my outfit?" What's the lesser of two evils, she does not ask, but the question is there in the faint frown forming across her face, the way her free hand is tightening around her pocketwatch. "Mind control for fun and profit," Joshua is offering, dry, as he -- sort of, kind of, tries to push himself up enough to settle the helmet correctly onto his head. "You missed out on all the exciting torture it took them to make these things." Slumping back down almost immediately jostles the helmet off again until he shifts to the side. He's slow to struggle back upright -- enough, at least, to pick up the coffee and take a long sip. "I think you rock Mad Scientist couture. They warn you to be careful, yet?" He's resting his coffee carefully on the arm of the chair, largely to steady it in his slightly tremoring grip. "Taverty's got some real monkeys-paw stories about his poorly constructed wishes, with me." "Head of the program himself warned me, you're pretty famous around here." Lily is turning away, ostensibly to sip at her water, but Joshua can feel her shed his power, can see the tremble in her hand when she puts the pocket watch away and it's empty once more. She sets the pen in her breast pocket, clip pointed out towards Joshua. Takes the headgear from the lab tech, trades it for her earpiece. "Maybe his mistake was wishing. Not very scientific, that." Sets it, unsteadily, on top of her own head, taking care not to catch her ear piercings on the device. Takes a deep breath, gripping hard onto her legs. Focuses. Maybe makes a wish. The tech flips a switch, and the helmets begin to glow. Whatever Disney wants you to think, the Three Wishes limitation is a total fiction, anyway. Pick the wrong day and maybe you'll eke out one, at best; with the right timing and the right tools you can keep drawing as much blood as you want out of any stone. Has it been one wish or three or twenty, by the time the experiment is over? Joshua has probably not been keeping good track. The fact that he is largely limp and unresisting by the time the helmets are off, the scanners shut down, the grid ready to come back online, does not stop today's tech from acting as though he might still magic himself out of here at any moment. He doesn't, of course. He doesn't seem to be much conscious at all, as he's wrangled back into the restraints that have been fully unnecessary during this whole operation. Only after the tech is done with him does he crack open a bleary eye. Peer up at Lily. "-- You get your wish?" Lily looks over from her spot at Joshua's side, where she's inserted the butterfly needle into Joshua's arm, where she's connecting it to a syringe, full of clear liquid from a vial loudly marked with HANDLE WITH CARE symbology. Fiddles with it until it's attached, pushes down on the plunger. Is her face paler than before, or is that a trick of the light? "No." Her free hand hovers over his for just a moment, before it falls to her lap. "-- Not yet." Joshua is determinedly not looking at the needle. His arm has gone tense, clenched hard enough there's a tremor running through the short length of tubing. There are tears wet in his eyes when he looks up at Lily -- and then past her, to the ceiling. "Guess sometimes we gotta make our own --" This cuts off into a sharp hiss soon after the plunger depresses. Is his hand reaching up toward hers? Maybe that's just a trick of perception; the restraints curtail the movement, anyway. They also curtail the violent jerk of his arm, tugging as if it could escape the drug that's already been shot into it. The hard clamp of his jaw does not actually stifle the agonized groan that is tearing up out of him. If he's trying to shape any further sarcasms for the shitfucks, they aren't coming anymore. Just ragged and shallow breaths, his glistening eyes dipping to Lily's pocket and the watch hidden away there before falling closed. "Thank God," says the technician, though he's not making any move to help Lily continue to administer this terrible cocktail. "Always breathe easier once he's been dosed." He's packing up the rest of the equipment, now, setting the helmets back on their cart, rolling away with a whistle to turn the grid back on. "I'll be right back to help you with the rest." Lily is silent, just finishing the procedure with trembling hands. Joshua isn't conscious to notice the care with which she wraps the gauze around the wound, after, nor the hot tears that fall onto his arm. He doesn't notice, either, the brush of tissue -- just tissue, her fingertips kept carefully off his bare skin -- across his face, wiping away the tears leaking from his eyes. Certainly he doesn't hear her whispered reply, delayed until they're alone, hardly voiced yet thick with rage and pain. "-- Our magic," Lily promises, "will burn all this to the fucking ground."