crystal & medical questionnaire.

[portalling]

FORM: Sending crystal + blank questionnaire available at the infirmary
SENDER: Stephen Strange
RECIPIENT: Everyone
NOTES: The form is below! Submit your character’s response as a reply to that sub-thread, and this will also be linked from the Riftwatch orientation & infirmary wiki pages for posterity, so you can edit/submit a new one if details change. Your character does not have to take this super seriously. Strange might just come nag if they don’t.

What with the new faces recently, I’ve been working on the medical curriculum and refreshing the infirmary’s recordkeeping. It’s high time to establish some better-kept patient files.

To that end, we’ve provided a written questionnaire at the infirmary — thank you to Amsel for her neat penmanship — and I’d appreciate it if you could fill out a form for yourself and drop it off. The records will only be referenced by healers in the course of their duties, and otherwise locked away; your personal details will remain private. Having as much information as possible will only help the healers take care of you properly.

If you don’t read Trade or otherwise require assistance filling out the form, say as such and we can have someone sit with you. Any other questions, let me know.

— but also, fill it out.

Comments

[portalling]

[ For all that Strange dragged his heels and originally delayed letting someone else write this down, the details are normal and there isn’t even anything worth hiding. Isaac already knew about Gwenaëlle, so the hollowed-out book might be the only item of interest. Perhaps it’s simply a matter of principle: Stephen Strange hates having others know his personal business. ]

Our own addenda to other peoples’ records, you mean? Do you have any intriguing post-scripts?

[wythersake]

Von Skraedder has one working eye, Warden Siorus hasn't seen fit to note his own status, and anyone who's been here a time has doubtless passed through our care.

[ strange's care, derrica's, dickerson's. isaac can't speak to the last few years, but, ]

Magic cannot forestall certain cumulative effects. If you were clubbed in the back every day, I'd keep a closer eye to your spine.

it’s pseudo-action now ig

[portalling]

—oh my god, why wouldn’t she mention a missing eye, I explicitly prompted for missing body parts— [ an irritated rustling of papers as Strange checks on Von Skraedder’s response and yep, she’d only said Grey Warden. And don’t think he hasn’t noticed Viktor’s telling absence too. Although that one’s not a surprise, so they might just have to continue updating their own file on his case. ]

Thank you for pointing it out. And yes, this is simply a starting point; our own additions and expansions to the files are to be expected. Healers’ notes, further thoughts and a record of treatment and things we’ve attempted, what’s worked and what hasn’t, etc.

fair and just

[wythersake]

Good. I'm certain you'll have noticed the Riftwatch phobia for weakness.

[ he leans back, folds his hands. an eye to the scattered pages. strange is a professional; isaac little doubts his capability. but other conversations remain.

well. no time like the present, ]

It's not the only fear they're working off. I know several of them to shy from a spell.

[portalling]

Ah. The reluctance to receive magical healing? I read some old statistics on that front, from six years ago. Asking about people’s comfort levels with magic or surgery for treatment.

I considered including those questions again, to get some comparative data. But [ bluntly, ] 8 out of 10 isn’t bad. Clear enough majority for us to work with. And frankly, if you have to use magic to bring someone back from the verge of death, at least they’ll still be alive afterwards to have an opinion. They can file a complaint later.

[wythersake]

Oh, I trust they'll agree while bleeding out. None of us are so frightening as the Maker's imminent judgment — it's our staff's safety that I am more concerned for. Impairment, panic, etcetera.

I can handle myself. I've doubts the Rutyer boy could.

[ and tav is his own problem. ]

[portalling]

Self-defense lessons and sparring for the healers?

[wythersake]

Not the worst idea, but unlikely to overcome the well-trained. Which we've somewhat an excess of, presently stitching wounds and wrapping bandages. Perhaps we might ask them to accompany an iffy patient.

[portalling]

Like nurse aides, [ Strange ruminates, a little bemused. ] Our infirmary assistants don’t have an official title as such, but that’s essentially the same thing. They had to do similar tasks at hospitals on Earth. Helping restrain a patient if they’re in the middle of a violent fit, and so on.

How do we identify the iffy patients from the get-go?

[wythersake]

Of magic, specifically, I expect we can rule out Rifters and the Vints. Prior trauma may complicate that — we might work back from those skittish enough to lie on their forms. Caution whoever you put on the Templars.

[ because it won't be isaac ]

Oh, and Vlast has bitten me before. He may try it again.

[portalling]

What —

[wythersake]

Mn. Nearly took a finger off.

[portalling]

Qunari teeth don’t seem like they mess around.

[wythersake]

He seemed to expect more of them. From what I understand, he thinks himself a dragon. In any event, do let him tend his own stitches.

[portalling]

[ Strange rifles through the paperwork as well, and locates Vlast’s response: almost blank, with few pieces of information. He’s realising now that he didn’t think to include a line on species; Riftwatch is low on Qunari and dwarves and such, so this was a blind spot. ]

He’s a rifter. Is he a dragon, do you think, or is this some delusion?

[wythersake]

[ the look that he trains upon strange is, perhaps, its own answer. isaac has never held the most starry-eyed view of rifters. that vlast thinks himself a dragon, is little different than thinking himself a sorcerer-surgeon.

more diplomatically: ]

I don't know that the distinction matters.

[portalling]

[ He looks up after a moment, meeting that look. Thanks for the ever-ongoing existential crisis, buddy— But he sighs, exhales. ]

Fair enough. Doesn’t make a concrete difference either way. In that particular instance.

[ Vlast isn’t physically a dragon here. But here, in this world, Stephen Strange still knows where the nerves in the human body are connected and how they work; these things weren’t imagined. ]

[wythersake]

[ that spirits locate and mend the same little pathways, that some blood-soaked anatomist has doubtless their own practice, ideas, dreams,

a peace offering: ]

I've been told that true dragon's blood contains properties of magical distinction. And there are stories, of course, of men drunk on the stuff. Sprouting scales and spines for it.

[ his hand flaps loose. stories. ]

I can't say whether we've tested its effects on Rifters.

[portalling]

[ It might be a peace offering, but it makes Strange let loose a strangled laugh. Airily dismissive, the way he can be once he’s gotten comfortable: ]

If we somehow get a hold of more true dragon’s blood, I’m not giving it to some lug in Forces to drink. We’re setting it aside as an incredibly rare magical ingredient.

[wythersake]

Expand on that.

[ rare ingredients imply rare recipes ]

[portalling]

[ Offhand, not actually realising that Isaac hasn’t heard about Granitefell yet, ]

I mean, the time magic and all.

1/2

[wythersake]

[wythersake]

Expand on that.

[portalling]

Huh.

[ Strange finally looks up from his shuffling of the medical forms (sorting them into stacks, categories, earmarking the ones which require some expansion with the healers’ notes), and glances at Isaac in surprise.

And once he realises, and because he can’t resist showing off a little in the way he relates this: ]

Last year, there was a calamitous mission; it resulted in about a quarter of Riftwatch dying. Myself, Provost Stark, Viktor, and Mademoiselle de Fonce developed time magic to rewind the event and prevent it all from happening in the first place. There’s a report about it in the archives, look under Granitefell. Specifics redacted,

[ The details of the execution are deeply classified — you can’t have Venatori spies joining Riftwatch and then instantly rifling through the Research files to steal all their secrets — but he decides Isaac can presumably be trusted this much to hear about it, at least. He’s been with the organisation long enough. ]

but needless to say, it involves high dragon blood. People almost died getting that specific ingredient, so it’s not exactly a play we can utilise every single time something goes awry, plus you really oughtn’t meddle so frivolously with the timeline—

But either way. It was an elegant bit of magic, if I may say so myself.

[wythersake]

[ he sits in silence. a moment, then another. stands and leaves the room. his hand lifts at the door, and he turns as if to speak —

keeps walking. lets hinges shut heavy. he's gone.

(and if he knew a little more, he might ask, again? and if he knew a little less, he might ask, why? but the real question, the devil of a thought that crawls in his ear, is what quarter of them are worth so much greater sorrow than those dead in his hands) ]