ArchivedLogs:Donors

Donors
Dramatis Personae Dusk, Iolaus	2014-01-31 '
Location <NYC> The Mendel Clinic - Lower East Side
With its sharp crystalline edges and sleek lines knifing up into the sky, this building is one of the most /distinctive/ new additions to the neighborhood. An angular structure in glass and steel, the tall tower has a deceptively slender look to it that is belied by the heavy security as soon as you enter the doors. The front doors are frosted with the Clinic's logo -- a rising sun over a rod of Asclepius -- a motif echoed in many places throughout the building. Visitors to the clinic must first pass through a small mantrap, guarded by some of the Clinic's security guards; once they make it through the metal detector and airlock's double doors they emerge into the much more hospitable lobby. With dark wood floors underneath and comfortable black and red couches at its edges, the high windows give the room an airy feel. A bank of elevators to one side carry visitors to the many destination floors, while the wide welcome desk at the other side is manned by a security guard ready to help point visitors in the right direction. Like many doctor's offices, the busiest times of the week tend to come earlier at the Mendel Clinic. With the weekend so close, people shy away from tying themselves up with errands when they could be slacking off at work, dreaming of the weekend. Even still, the clinic's staff are mostly still booked solid with appointments from many who have not seen a doctor for a long time, or follow-ups from the first few visits. A cancelled appointment here, a late visit there, these are the kind of breaks that most of the clinic staff get on their less busy days. Morning on Friday is no exception for Doctor Saavedro. His schedule, at least, always grows to fill whatever free time, meetings and phone calls being crammed in between the few patients that he does get to see. One of them, though, he is sure to be on time for, stepping out into the waiting room and looking around with a smile on his face. "Dusk?" He looks up from the clipboard in his hands as he lets the wood bump against the blue jeans and white dress shirt he has on. "Come on back." Dusk is not a person often given to /nervousness/. But he's definitely got a restless fidget to him here in the waiting room to the doctor's office, standing rather than sitting, by the windows with a tablet resting in the curve of his wing, fingers swiping against it in jittery-quick motions. Eyes darting around the room's furnishings between returning to his screen. His other wing shifts incessantly at his back. He's in jeans, baggy dark sweatshirt over blue and white t-shirt over grey henley, Vans sneakers, long trenchcoat and backpack and winter gear shed to puddle in a chair. His eyes scan the others waiting in the room too. Possibly warily. Possibly /appraisingly/. He glances up far too quickly at the sound of his name, eyes locking on Iolaus's neck before they meet the doctor's face. "Oh -- hey." His smile is a half-second delayed. He shuts off the screen of his tablet, tucking it beneath his arm to follow after the doctor. "How -- how's it going." Iolaus gives Dusk a curious look and a once over as he leads the other man into the back and into an examination room. "I'm doing alright. Busy busy, as usual. Glad to see you decided to come to my accomidations this time. I hope they're a bit nicer than where we were meeting previously," he jokes, a smile spreading on his face. "Though, I will admit, not much beats room service. Not something I bring to all of my patients, I'll have you know." The doctor waggles a finger for a moment as he closes the door behind him. "What's going on, Dusk? You look a bit..." Iolaus trails off, head tilting to one side as his lips purse and his fingers tap at his nose. "Jittery. Decided to segue into speed or something?" Pot, kettle. "Not a fan of doctors," Dusk answers Iolaus wryly, the fidgeting growing worse as they reach the examination room. He pulls his wings tightly in at his back, staying close to the door rather than proceeding very far inside. "No offense, Io, it's -- nothing personal, I just. Bad. History." He lowers his eyes, dropping his tablet into his hands and running his fingers along its edges. "And I really appreciate what you did for us, then, that was --" His wings press tighter against his back. He exhales sharp at the question about speed. "Blood, actually. Your fault." "No offense taken, Dusk, believe me. I don't particularly like going to the doctor either, and I don't have your... history." Iolaus gives the other man a brief, sympathetic look as he sits down on a stool and looks over the other man. "Blood? I saw you drink blood, and it certainly never made you look like this. What happened? What's wrong? And... how is it my fault?" Iolaus leans forward, looking at the other man. "Relax, please. No one is going to hurt you, here." "Before prison I used to feed off -- a person every day, every /other/ day, a pint at most. Then they were giving me three, four pints a day on your recommendation. Which is what I need. For years I'd been used to living on the bare minimum I needed not to starve to /death/. And then you had me back on -- what I'm actually supposed to have to be properly full and healthy," Dusk explains wryly. His eyes lift, breath slow and shivery as he fixes his gaze on Iolaus's neck and then forces himself to look away. "I can't sustain that, I don't know enough people to get that much blood normally. I'd kill all my friends in a week. I can only take from people once a month about to give them time to get their blood back up so --" He shakes his head, shivering. "It's been hard to adjust again. I got used to not starving for the first time in years. I'm seeing everyone as -- food again. I keep wanting to tear everyone's damn throat out. Right now I'm not worried someone's going to hurt me. /I'm/ about half an inch from hurting /you/, dude." Iolaus doesn't seem to quite know what to make of this at first. His expression turns from concern to worry, to sympathy and then to a professional blankness all in the span of several seconds. There is silence, for a few moments, after Dusk's pronouncement, as the doctor keeps his expression blank, and his body quite still. Then he nods, once. "Well...." Iolaus trails off before starting again. "It seems difficult for me to apologize for making sure you got the food that you need, but I am sorry for the effects it's had on you. Believe me, I had no idea you were keeping that kind of a balance." The doctor claps his hands, once, rubbing them together. "But what's done is done. Now. Let's get you fed, then. We have some blood here at the clinic. Not enough to feed you in the long term, but enough to give you a snack now, and something to tide you over while we can get more from the blood bank." "Yeah you can't really apologise for actually properly feeding me." Dusk is a little wry. He leans back against the wall, still unwiling to stray far from the door -- or maybe unwilling to stray closer to Iolaus. He definitely seems unwilling to /look/ at the doctor for too long, his nostrils flaring briefly as the other man moves. "Packaged blood is hard. Anticoagulants make me sick when I drink it too fast so I have to ration them slow. But it's fine if I kind of just -- snack on them all day long. Better than just --struggling not to rip into everyone I meet, that's for damn sure." "Hm." Iolaus studies the other man, and the door behind him, for a moment. "That makes things harder." He taps a finger against his nose, then turns to his computer. Unlocking it with a quick insertion of his badge and a drum of his fingers on the keyboard, out comes Google. "I wonder if some of the older anticoagulants would have less of that kind of effect on you. Obviously, any kind of storage needs /something/, but even a few days would be a great help, considering how often you are going to need some anyway." "For now, perhaps, we should get some drawn directly and given to you without anticoagulant. If we're quick about it, we shouldn't need it. I assume all the standard blood safety precautions still need to apply?" Iolaus says, turning to look at Dusk with a raised eyebrow. "Disease testing and all that, not typing." "I need about four pints a day optimally. Three pints and I don't really feel the --" A touch of colour rises to Dusk's cheeks. "Hunger so badly." His fingers curl through his hair, the colour deepening. "And yeah. It's not really as romantic as in the vampire stories. /They/ don't get STIs. I mean, when I'm fed my immune system is /way/ hardier than most humans, so it's not /as/ dangerous for me as it is for most people, but it's still a very real danger that I don't want to risk. So I don't feed from people who haven't had recent testing. My friends tend to keep up to date on theirs -- I mean, not generally only for my sake. But /also/ for it." "Right. Well, for this moment, I'm sure I can ask around; I'm sure someone on the staff won't mind donating right now. I will as well, of course; had my tests done just last month, so you should be all set there." Iolaus says, with a smile. "And we'll send you home with some packed blood for the weekend. Might take us a few days to get something together for getting you that much blood, but we'll figure something out, one way or another. Four donations a day or so should do it." At the end, he seems to be talking to himself as much as to Dusk before he tears his attention away from the screen and towards Dusk once more. "Sound like a plan?" Dusk doesn't at first appear to be paying a /whole/ lot of attention to what Iolaus is saying. His eyes have closed, his breathing slowing. But after a long pause he does nod, his fangs bearing in a quick smile. "Shit. I -- that's. That'd be -- thank you. That sounds like a plan that -- you're a fucking lifesaver, man." His smile skews sharply to one side with the admission, "too much longer and I'm not sure it'd be /my/ life." "Well, we certainly wouldn't want that. And it'd be a damn shame if we couldn't do better for you than the Bureau of Prisons," Iolaus says, standing up and grinning at the other man "Come on. Let's take you to phlebotomy and get some blood into you," he says, brushing a piece of lint off of his shirt and stepping towards Dusk, and the door beyond. "My blood, specifically. And maybe someone elses, if I can wrangle it. Should be able to." Dusk growls, low and quick when Iolaus says his blood. One wing flares out towards Io -- then pulls back, quickly. "Thanks." He just nods, gathering his coat and gear, and drawing in a quick breath, to follow after Iolaus, muscles tense and head bowed.