Participants:
| Scene Title | Doctor. Doctor. |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | A pair of colleagues meet in the morning at work. Two kindred souls come together. Look out world. Mad scientists on the rise. |
| Date | December 26 |
The lobby of the Suresh Center is an open, very well-lit space; the exterior walls are more window than wall. There's a raised half-level on the right side of the irregularly-shaped room as one walks in, carpeted in pine-green, decked with oak furniture and small table lamps; a comfortable-looking space, with actual living plants at the top of the stairs and scattered here and there elsewise. Continuing to the left brings one to the receptionist's desk, a small vending area located just beyond that.
Passing the receptionist brings a visitor to the core of the building. Here are the Kastin and Chapman auditoria, named for donors who provided the money that built them; rooms designed to seat many people for lectures and presentations, equipped with large projector screens, pervasive sound systems, and video recorders. Four conference rooms fill out the central section, reduced in scale but no less comprehensively outfitted. The wings which branch off to either side contain rows of classrooms: smaller, more private and personal, some with installed technology and some with nothing more elaborate than a whiteboard.
The classrooms, conference rooms, and auditoria are all available for public use; anyone who wants to reserve one may do so for a nominal fee, be it to teach a class, hold a meeting, or present a seminar. There are no restrictions on subject, nor even the credentials of the instructor or lecturer, though the Center waives all liability for courses taught by a third party (which is all of them). These courses and seminars are all by definition open to the public. Donations may be requested, or small fees charged, particularly for courses with a materials cost.
It's at the behest of a DoEA shuttle that the currently carless Dr. Isabella Sheridan is able to get to her place of work. It's almost a shame the service was offered. With the snow this thick, and the relief of vacation still fresh in her mind, Bella would just love to blow off work. Blowing off work is, after all, what she spends most of her time at work doing anyways. Why not just cut out the unnecessary steps?
But a gal's gotta earn her paycheck, not to mention continued immunity post gross ethical violations and association with illegal clandestine organizations and, well, you know how it is. This is New York City. However recent, the past tends to checker very quickly. Ensconced in a great shaggy green scarf and a suade winter jacket with a faux-fur lining, winter boots riding high on her calves, Dr. Sheridan shoulders through the front doors of the Suresh center, her pale red brows and lashes frosted with snow.
"Son of a bitching weather…" is muttered as she starts to unwind herself from her scarf, making her shivering way to the elevators.
On the other hand, there are those who simply cannot wait to get back to work. This Christmas has been just about one of the worst that Yana could ever have experienced. What with the incident at the gala, with her date, followed by the drunken whines of Elijah in the dealings with his daughter, followed by her being dragged into the epic family drama the next day. And then there is Keagan.. Her nephew is difficult at best. His kleptomania she groups in with the PTSD from being trapped in the wreckage of the bomb. He has had a rough time, and now Yana is having a rough time taking care of him.
Work is a welcomed distraction from her personal life, which she prefers the former anytime of the day. The snow isn't really a problem for her, because she isn't the driver. She has someone for that task, so if they get stuck, she won't be the one to pull them out. She can just sit in the back of her car and wait for her attendant to pull them out, sipping on her drink of choice. So when she is helped out of her vehicle in front of the work building, Yana leaves her attendant to his own devices for the day, and walks through the front doors, having to brush a bit of snow off of the pencil skirt that hangs across her legs. With her she carries her lab notes for the day, and idly considers how she will treat Elijah. She is still mad at him. So perhaps she will remain as distant as he does all the time. Until he realizes the err of his ways.
Oh! Someone is at the elevator, so she doesn't have to push the button, that is good. Yana quickens her step a little to bring herself in position next to Bella so she doesn't miss the car. Dr. Blite sighs softly, looking up at the lighting of the numbers above the door. "Whew.. Glad the Christmas season is almost over." she remarks, "You never realize how stressful it is until it is over."
Such trials and traumas would, under Bella's professional auspices, be considered work troubles rather than personal troubles. PTSD is just rife in this city, for understandable reasoning, and while Bella has found a quite excellent treatment for it - at least for Evolved patients - there is this teensy problem with there being the side affect of possible crippling addiction. Now if they could just get that down to 'dry mouth', she'd be in business.
And all business is this distressingly pretty, distressingly young woman that has just stepped up next to Bella. Yana gets a single appraising glance a split second before Dr. Blite offers Dr. Sheridan a shred of chit chat. Bella does not recognize Yana, but that's no so surprising - office slacker and growing misanthrope, Yana could have been working at the Center for substantially longer and Bella might not have had call to run across her. She would have remembered her otherwise. A scan for ID badge yields no results.
"I don't know about that," Bella answers, smiling slantedly, "I think this season felt just as stressful as it was the whole way through. But that may be a retroactive attribution, as per your own observation…" a pause as the elevator 'ding's and the doors slide open. Bella steps through hand lifting to dust snow from her hair, her scarf now wrapped around one arm. "I don't think we've been introduced. Where in the Center do you work?"
This city is crazy. People have their problems and they can't seem to recover from the first traumatic event before another one happens. Until Christmas Eve, Yana had missed such events in her life. Yeah, sure, he brother was taken by the bomb, but that wasn't a very crippling blow. Yana has her own internal taint, and rather than it consuming her, she embraced it, kept it safe and secret. It is this inner madness, coupled with her ability that makes the truth of what she is very… frightening. Serial killers are often the nicest, unsuspecting people in every day life. Yana comes off as being sweet as cherry pie, if that tells you anything. If the therapist could only be in her head, it is a veritable psychological playground.
Her badge of course, is secured in her hands, against the side of the small purse she carries with her. She doesn't want to clip it onto her blouse, as it will only go onto her lab coat in just a few minutes. "Hm, perhaps." a soft, exhausted sigh from Yana, "I'm just not used to nearly becoming a statistic. I was at the gala. Surely you heard of the events that occurred? While I was fortunate to escape unscathed, thank goodness, my evening only got substantially better after that. And my only thought through the whole time was.. Only on Christmas." Yana frees a charming chuckle from her lungs.
As the doors open, she waits for Bella to go ahead, and then steps in after, "Oh, I'm sorry, Dr. Elvira Blite." she lifts her badge up in her hand, "Department of Evolved Affairs, I work along side Dr. Elijah Ruslan. He felt a virologist would be the best assistant to his research, as my knowledge into viruses may yield some further progress in what he is trying to resolve."
Bella has no particular issue with serial killers and psychopaths, borderline or otherwise. She's living with one of the former, is good friends with one of the latter, and while she hasn't personal killed anyone, her own ethical abuses might call her basic humanity into question. Assuming you have many standards for what qualifies as human, which Bella certainly does not. Playground? More like jungle.
But no call for machete work yet. "Gala?" Bella echoes, "oh, you mean at d'Sarthe's?" she heard about it on NPR, her own real news source, "Jesus, you were there? That must have been horrifying. You're still coming in to work? I'd file for a mental health week."
Bella presses the button for her floor, then promptly presses the one for Yana's own. She hasn't worked with Dr. Ruslan, but she knows the layout. Hand free, if still a bit chilly, she extends it in the offer of a shake. "Dr. Isabella Sheridan," she says, smiling with a charm to match, "of selfsame department. Which makes us colleagues, though my specialization is psychology and psychopharmacology. What a pleasure to meet you, Dr Blite," there is a brief pause, in which Bella considers the possible implications of openness with a new person. "I've done some virological work myself, in conjunction with my assignment to Project Icarus. Which, as you may have heard, didn't end so well. But my own experiement yielded results! I'm hardly overqualified, but if you'd want to bounce ideas off of me, please," she smiles, conspiratorially, "I'm always glad to dodge my work in favor of helping with someone else's."
"Oh heavens, no." Yana responds, as if missing work were a sin against god. "I love work. I honestly prefer my work life to my personal life most times. Not saying that it isn't exciting, I mean, just look at the other night." she shakes her head, while her stance as the elevator does it's job is very confident, and by the looks of her shoulder placement, as well as the position of her feet, the woman was very well trained at some refining school or some such. "On top of that. I found out that my date had a bad case of HSV-2, in addition to being an utter coward." No no.. He got a bad case of HSV-2 because he was an utter coward. Nothing says kiss off like an STD when you didn't even have sex. "But anyway.. I survived. So now all I have to do is survive New Years, and the rest of the year is mine."
With her small purse clutched between both hands, and the bag lowered to rest in front of her standing lap properly, Yana pulls one hand away when the offer for a shake is offered, "Dr. Sheridan, the pleasure is all mine." she gives one of her award winning smiles, "Psychology.." her eyes squint a little thoughtfully, "Therapist? It's funny you to meet you here, I've been considering a new therapist for my nephew. I've grown rather dissatisfied with the current that he has." Useless quack that he is. He'd make a fine case study to see just want psychological problems arise when he is wasting away from something terrible.
"Really?" Yana's dark brows raise with interest over the new subject, "I haven't yet, though I am sure I would have gotten to it quite soon. I'm looking into the various areas of viral research that came before me. Seeing if I can possibly lend a hand in furthering it, or finding something that could assist with mine. I—" she considers how to continue, seeing as how she hasn't discussed her private research, "Even have some theories regarding Evolved abilities and a trigger, involving viruses."
"Psychiatrist," Bella corrects, mildly. Any joe schmoe can be a therapist, studies show. Bella went to med school, god dammit! "though I offer therapy as part of my responsibilities here, as well as being able to prescribe medication. I don't know if I could see your nephew, due to potential ethical concerns, conflicts of interest, &c. - but…" she gives a small shrug, "send him my way if you're unhappy with your current situation. I'd be more than glad to make a recommendation, at the very least."
The elevator presses at the bottom of their feet as it begins to rise. "You can read the complete report for all the details, but I engineered an aminophage virus and managed to restore the abilities of an SLC expressive whose expression was blocked. Sadly, the blockage was atypical - it wasn't just Evoflu - so the application isn't wide. Plus I had a team that did a lot of the grunt work for me, as I'm not a virologist by any stretch of the imagination. But if the data could be of any use to you, I'd be happy to present it with my commentary."
Ah, of course. Duel relationship. She has heard of that before. Not something she had considered when the initial thought popped into her head, but.. it makes sense on how it could be a problem. "Psychiatrist, of course." Yana nods, "Keagan is prescribed on pretty extensive medications, in addition to therapy. It is believed to be a chemical imbalance, though it seems like the therapist is conflicting with his psychiatrist. It is a rather confusing situation." she flitters her hand to wave in the air, dismissing the trouble. "But of course, I could have him see you. At the very least, you could refer to someone capable of taking his case." It would be a godsend for her, and one worry off of the pile.
Useful? Why.. this is exactly what she was looking for. Work on the Evoflu, cases where an ability was stripped away, and/or restored, the process, and the work that was done to achieve it. She has no idea how delightful this news is to Yana. "Oh! Amazing." Yana smiles, "That is really impressive work.. I've pondered with the notion, actually, that perhaps a virus could be derived from the H5N10 that could theoretically instill or even eradicate the Evo.. well, we'll just hypothetically call it gene for now— but yes. A vaccine for those who are either Non-Evo, or unmanifested? I believe with my knowledge of viruses, it could one day be possible." Which will only lead to other things. Anyone can develop a virus and spread it, or contain it. But Yana? Why.. she can get downright detailed with infections, adjusting and augmenting the virus' "programming".
"The implications are staggering, dreadful, and may lead to catastrophe," Bella says, sounding amicable and unworried for all that her words wouldn't suggest it, "which is half the fun, I'm sure. I've been remarkably harmless lately, but if you're going to change the face of the world, I'd happily shoot for an acknowledgment. Maybe people will curse my name only a little less vehemently than yours in the dark future we make."
Well, that's a very weird thing to say, and said weirdly, too. There's another 'ding' as the elevator stops at Bella's floor. The redhead dips her head. "A pleasure, Dr. Blite," she says, "I look forward to future endeavors. My number's in the directory. Let me know when I might be able to assist you." And with that, she steps out of the enclosed spaced, the doors sliding to hide her from view.
And Yana is then left to stand behind the doors, impressed. Why, that woman's attitude is positivley refeshing! Surely she is someone Yana has been looking for! Someone who could share her vision, who could possibly be told to truth that she keeps tucked away. What is this? Could Yana have found a kindred spirit? Dare say.. an actual friend? Oh, wouldn't that be great! Someone to perform all kinds of unethical experiments with, and unleash their science all over the world!
She will indeed, Dr. Sheridan.. She will indeed.