Frustrations
Backdated just a bit, to the evening of this log.
8-23/25-2006 (Reyce, Neiran):
Infirmary
The infirmary is divided into two sections. The larger of these is given over to injured dragons and is joined to the bowl by an immense tunnel. No less than six stone couches fill this area, with stations between each for medical supplies and personnel. The other side of the infirmary is for human patients and is furnished with double rows of cots. A large alcove near the exit to the living cavern houses the healers' area, where they store their supplies and can retreat for a moment of quiet before wading into the battle between life and death again.
Contents:
Neiran
Obvious Exits:
Living Cavern (LC) Bowl (B)
Reyce has chosen a very quiet time of day in which to injure himself, walking into the infirmary in the late evening when there's hardly anyone around. He stops just inside the entrance, eyeing the place suspiciously as though beneath the quiet evening calm, there lay some as-yet undetected menace. Unable to find any such menace, he still looks as though he'd like to flee, but the apparently wounded hand that he holds cradled to his chest forces him to stay.
The healers on duty here are having a relaxed time of the evening, most patients dozing or offering no complaint. There's always the possibility of emergencies and walk-ins, of course, so they have to stay. A small throng of them stands near the healers' station, sipping hot klah from mugs whilst talking shop and politics with bits of Weyr gossip. Neiran isn't a part of that group, but is off at a work table across the cavern, diligently writing away at some project or another. His small concession to creature comforts is the mug of hot tea on one corner of his desk, which he reaches for now, temporarily abandoning his quill.
Reyce surveys his options, though he doesn't notice Neiran at first. He hangs back while he watches the chatting healers, clearly reluctant to make his case known, though he is just as clearly one of those late night walk-ins they have to stay for. As he draws a deep breath, taking another look around just to arm himself for the social plunge, he finally spots Neiran by his lonesome. A quick redirect and he's off to interrupt the more familiar and less chatty healer, letting his right hand fall at his side, the injury made harder to spot that way. "Ah," comes his eloquent introduction. "Neiran. You got a moment?"
Neiran slowly lifts his eyes from the page, fixing Reyce with his dark-eyed stare. "A moment," he murmurs, lowering his mug from his lips unsipped. His eyes take a small traipse across what parts of Reyce he can see, trying to divine his reason for being here, doubting that it's social.
Reyce meets that stare when it's directed at his face, but his own gaze wanders down to the table once it's gone. He gets straight to the point, raising his hand over the desk. Over the second knuckle, his middle finger has started to swell in relation to the fingers next to it. "Hit something. A wall," he admits, his focus abruptly yanking away into an innocuous corner. "Think I blew my knuckle out."
Neiran's reticence melts away as Reyce reveals he's a patient, not a conspirator or a socializer. The young man rises fluidly from his desk, fingers slipping away from his mug before he rounds the table. He passes by Reyce, a mellow gesture towards a nearby cot made as he slips by. "Please, seat yourself and I will examine the injury."
Reyce notices the change in attitude, marking it with a small frown as his gaze returns to Neiran. Motionless, his eyes track the healer as he passes by; then prompted to motion, he moves towards the indicated cot without comment. The edge of a cot is never the most comfortable place to sit, yet that is where Reyce chooses to perch himself, his left hand going down to steady his balance while the right remains carefully out of commission at his waist.
Neiran reaches to his left, and draws a cart on wheels closer to himself. It's laden with the various soft odds and ends one would expect to see at an infirmary: gauze, some cloths and towels, a jar of numbweed, redwort, and a washbasin. Presumably the more sinister metal instruments are kept out of the way, behind lock and key until they're needed. Neiran, if he notices the frown, certainly says nothing of it and doesn't deign to change his own neutral expression. He holds out his own hand, palm upturned, apparently anticipating that the wounded paw will be proffered. "When did this injury occur?"
Reyce looks down at the upturned hand, extending his own wounded paw as anticipated. He does not go so far as to place his hand in Neiran's grasp, however, but leaves it to the healer to take it - contact he seems to be braced for, apparently anticipating pain, with a slight tensing of the muscles in his forearm. "Just now," he answers, eyes still on the hands below. Again, he has to check himself and amend his response more accurately, "Half an hour, maybe more."
Reyce is braced needlessly - the same delicacy with which he handles his writing utensils, his teacup, and everything else is naturally afforded to Reyce. Gingerly, forefinger and thumb hold the man's wrist steady, and the healer stoops a faint margin to lower himself a little closer to the injury. "It was good that you came to us promptly," the dark-haired young man states, a less-than-neutral tone in his voice that might be interpreted as approval. His eyes flick up from the injury to regard Reyce's face stoically for a few moments, likely trying to divine what caused this sudden and recent wall-punching incident. But he does not ask, and in fact releases his feather-light grip of the Bendenite's wrist. "I will retrieve ice for the swelling, and then I will give you something for the pain. I imagine you are experiencing a fair amount of discomfort. When you feel somewhat more comfortable, I will undo the dislocation." He doesn't' sweep off immediately, but waits for the man's reaction to his plan.
Reyce's eyes have something of a brooding, unhappy look lurking in them, but the - one would predict - fury that prompted his assault on High Reaches's walls must have been dulled by the sudden realization of pain that followed. He pulls in a quick sniff and raises his eyes to meet Neiran's inquisitive gaze. "What you think is best, h-uh." What might have turned into a title quickly becomes a huff of breath instead; perhaps replacing it with the man's name seemed too informal, in these surroundings. Having met the gaze, he now once again finds something else to look at, this time choosing the wall past Neiran's left shoulder.
Neiran turns his head, as if to follow Reyce's line of sight. But instead his eyes wander for an aide. None seem unoccupied at this moment, however, most conspicuously engaged in menial tasks and looking very busy at it. With a small nod to Reyce, the Journeyman himself departs to fetch what is needful. At the very least, there's no shortage of ice in this place, and so his brief sojourn is a fruitful one and he's back before long carrying a few items. Within a bowl is a terrycloth bundle tied, emanating coldness. A small bottle holds handmade, rough-hewn pills, and a cup breathes steam as he carries it over. He sets these things down on the trolley, and soon proffers the cup, handle-first, towards Reyce. "An analgesic tea with mild sedative properties," he informs him, while complex, unknown herbal scents surface in the air between them.
Reyce performs an odd half-blink, half-squint at the word analgesic, perhaps filing it away for future reference. His left hand gingerly goes out for the tea cup and brings it up to his face, not sniffing at the herbal scents that emanate from it but reading the heat that comes off the surface. "Thanks," he says after the heat has been tested, and he takes a drink. He gives no indication of approval or disapproval of the taste, but his attention returns from its wall wanderings to peer at Neiran's other fetched goods, the cloth bundle and the pills.
Even while Reyce is analyzing the tea's (not unpleasant) flavour, Neiran is picking three of the small pills from the jar. "Please swallow these," he tells the Bendenite, setting them down on a corner of his trolley. That said, his hands go to the small jar of numbweed, and a brief visit to a small drawer on the trolly has, of all things, a small brush in his hand the next moment. Like a painter preparing to create his masterpiece, he holds the brush in his hand while he unscrews the lid of the numbweed jar, the musky odor quickly rising to replace lighter herbal aromas. "It is incumbent upon me to inform you that while mindhealing is not my specialty, I am technically qualified to listen to any distressing circumstances which may have led to your...altercation." With the wall, that is. That said, he waits with brush and jar in hand, letting Reyce finish his tea and take his pills, eyes half-lidded in tranquil passivity.
Reyce sets the cup down in exchange for the pills, which he tosses around on his palm for a moment or two before he decides to just throw them down his gullet. Unfortunately, this is interrupted by Neiran's offer, and he has to quickly close his fingers around the pills so that, in his surprise, he doesn't wind up choking on them. Pills captured, he looks directly at the healer with eyebrows raised, and a dull flash of amusement joining the other, fouler moods that lurk about in his eye. "That's all right, healer." Distracted for the moment, he forgets to watch himself in regard to that distancing title. "Had a half hour to knock it about in my own head, so I'm pretty tired of the subject. But thanks," this last is added somewhat drily, a formality he almost forgot, yet seems to find necessary in the healer's presence.
"Certainly. I understand. Nevertheless, you are free to retract your negation of my offer at any time." His mellow voice sails through his own formalities, offering them as he's expected to. It's a part of his job he seems to mind little - indeed, though his face is as usual, there's no waves of irritation rippling from him. A routine patient care moment, though piqued with a small bit of wry curiosity that he's now suppressed. If the title is considered a distancing one, it elicits no affronted reaction. "When you are finished the tea at your leisure, and have swallowed the pills, I will apply numbweed topically to further reduce the discomfort before I make the adjustment. Have you experienced a dislocation before?"
Reyce's little flash of amusement fades quietly, but with it go the brooding look and the unhappiness - Neiran has counseled, it seems, without consciously trying to. The last question elicits a shrug, but this time his answer must wait until he's swallowed the three pills as he planned: with a toss, he sends them into his mouth and swallows several times to get them down and then get the itch of dry-pill-swallowing out of his throat. "Yeah," he answers finally, his voice windy from the scratch of the pills. He recovers his tea cup and takes a drink to ease that. "Two turns back, same place." A wry twist, not quite a smile, appears on his mouth. "Why I came here so quickly, this time."
"You are more courageous than many patients," the Journeyman observes mildly, no doubt approving. His vague look towards the entrance tunnel is enough to summon up the thought of reticent residents coming in with niggling complaints that have needlessly been going on for weeks. He smoothes the sleeve of his cassock, eliminating an unappealing fold there, restoring the symmetry of the black garment. He is content to stand and loiter here without any trace of impatience; the night here is calm, with no appearance of a task to rush off to do. "May I suggest that next time, you attempt to find a softer vessel for your frustrations."
Reyce's gaze starts to wander, again, taking in the room again now that he's settled in more, and doesn't view its every occupant as enemy waiting to strike. He returns quickly, however, at the word 'courageous,' as if he needed to verify with his own eyes that Neiran just said the word. Opting not to question it, he ducks behind a long drink of tea that conveniently spares him the trouble of showing any expression on his lips. He's about finished that drink when the healer finishes his suggestion, and offers a shrug in response. "Know it was stupid. Not planning to do it again, really."
The healer's chin lifts, a circumspect expression drifting over his features like a cloud's shadow, the thinning of his lips suggesting a moment of thought, and careful word-picking. "I imagine," he begins, slowly, "that one of sound mental ability does not often /plan/ to strike an object with a greater density than bone." His tacit observation made, he falls quiet once more; surely the man doesn't need a lecture in anger management. Instead, he holds up his hand again to suggest that he'd like to tend to Reyce's injury now, his jar of numbweed ready, a few daubs of the bristles into it soaking the hairs in the numbing gel substance in preparation.
Reyce sees that shadow of an expression, to which his own response is a faint frown. He does not direct it at Neiran, but rather down into his cup. "True enough," he murmurs into it, his own breath swirling off the tea and back to brush him in the face. He catches Neiran's gesture with the numbweed brush only peripherally, but he responds with an immediate raising of his right hand. He's not done with the tea just yet, but perhaps to follow instructions, he tosses the last of it down in one huge gulp without any pause to savor what remains. This, perhaps, is the dislike that he didn't express earlier, and now continues to mask with a blank face.
With no preamble, the healer drags the brush lightly across the joint of the wounded finger. It's a cool, tickly sensation, followed a few moments later by the fuzzy numbness that the salve brings. To anyone watching, it's almost a comically domestic and touching scene, with Neiran stooped over the tea-quaffing ruffian and 'painting' his finger. Unfortunately, the known temperaments of both involved somewhat mars the potential sweetness of the picture. Once the man's finger is unappealingly glistening with the salve, Neiran places his brush aside and rolls his sleeves back to the elbow, and reaches for redwort to wash his hands with. If he's going to be manipulating the digit, he'll need to protect his own hands against the numbing effects, of course. Steadily progressing through the steps of his treatment, he leaves it to Reyce to make small talk, or not.
Reyce starts to shiver at the sensation of the numbweed (though even the tickling is not really that unpleasant compared to the dull throb of the injury), but he clamps down on the response with a systematic tensing of muscles from neck to arm. He keeps a sharp, interested eye on Neiran - and on his face, not on his ominous hands of knuckle reduction - but he makes no effort to fill the silence with small talk. The only noise he does make he's careful to muffle, the ruffian scrupulously careful not to distract the healer as he sets his cup down with only the faintest ring of impact.
Neiran's pale fingers are soon stained frothy pinkish red, his hands following suit a moment later. He washes the antiseptic solution over his skin repetitively, as fickle as a feline cleaning its paws. At last, satisfied by some unknown visual signal or a count of time in the mind, the Journeyman delves his hands into the clean basin of water on the trolley, washing away the colour. He lifts a towel and dries his hands, then drags a nearby stool over smoothly with the use of a hooked foot. He didn't need to look at it to know it was there, simply at home in this infirmary so much so that the piece of furniture was expected to be there; in its proper place, it was duly retrieved. He sits down so he won't have to hunch and loom to see to the digit. He lifts the man's hand a little higher, and proceeds to squeeze the offended digit between thumb and forefinger, feeling the bone beneath the swelling flesh. "You are fortunate. I am not detecting any fractures."
Reyce lets out a low breath of laughter when he hears he's fortunate, finally allowing his eyes to move down from the healer to the digit in question. Looming promises of pain aside, he is curious about what's being done to him. "Good to know," he murmurs, distracted by his own interest and observations of the hand. His index and ring finger stretch out, making more room for Neiran to work - or getting out of the way so Reyce can see the angles better.
Neiran continues 'pinching' along the digit, feeling the line of the bones. The pills, the tea, and the numbweed have all made it so that Reyce should feel as little discomfort as is imaginable. Unless, of course, you count the possible discomfort in having Neiran peering so close, effectively squeezing at your hand. "I will now realign the digit. You may feel some discomfort, despite the analgesics I have administered," he warns. Without leaving Reyce enough time to build wariness, anticipation, or even puzzle over the word analgesic again, he makes a little tug on the finger with a quick motion, likely eliciting a pang as the bones slide home despite all his best efforts. His eyes flick up to Reyce's visage during this moment, checking for a flinch.
Reyce clearly does not anticipate the healer to act so quickly, and so he's actually starting make a sound of response - 'sh,' that would probably be 'sure' - when Neiran tugs the finger into place. Already braced for the slight pang that comes, Reyce does not flinch either when it hits or when he gets to watch his bone popped back in like a child's building set piece; however, the opening sound of his word gets dragged out and morphed: "Shhhit." He sounds surprised, not hurt or upset.
Neiran's lips press together, his brows lifted in surprise to mirror Reyce's; he hadn't expected such a pleasant reaction, likely. He retracts his hands after giving the joint a few more squeezes to ensure it's comfortably placed. "How does that feel? Please do not try to bend your finger - I am going to splint it to its neighbor in order to ensure the muscles and bone recover well." He wipes his fingertips off on that towel, and retrieves some gauze to deftly mummify the finger, using the other like a straightening rod for a coiling bean vine that needs a guide for growing.
Reyce has been through too many brawls to be upset by such a little pang, surely - not to mention that numbweed, and a half-hour's built up inurement, prepared him for the fix. "Ah, doesn't feel like much of anything," he says. "Doesn't hurt." He's careful not to bend, as ordered, but while Neiran's distracted with gauze he can't resist the urge to move the finger up and down from the base. He only moves it a small bit, ensuring that it still seems to function, and after he's done it a couple of times he's content to stop and let his fingers be wrapped. If it's odd that he should be so interested by something he must have seen before, perhaps he's simply finding in it a distraction from his own, injury-provoking thoughts.
Neiran wraps the fingers together snugly, withdrawing now to stand from his stool. "You have been a most amenable patient, Reyce. In three sevendays, I will require you to visit me once more. In the meantime, you are free to come to the infirmary for medication if the swelling increases or the pain becomes distracting, to have a change of bandage if it becomes dirty, etcetera. I can prescribe to you tea, or pills, if you would wish it. It was not a particularly difficult dislocation, thankfully, so I do not anticipate it will give you any trouble," he says calmly.
Reyce's sourness returns, in mild measure, when he's described as amenable, but when the healer finishes speaking he shrugs it off - with the gesture to accompany it, as well as the mental realignment. "Well -" there's a blunt pause, as this time he does catch himself where he normally insert a title. Again he opts for nothing, and continues - "Get banged up a lot. Fixes faster if I go along." He pinches his forefinger to his thumb, seeing how well he can grasp the two with that bulky bandage right next door. Well enough, it seems, as he returns his attention to Neiran. "Think I'll pass on the prescriptions. Tell you if it gets bad, but otherwise - three sevendays, yeah?" He doesn't quite get off the cot, but he rocks his weight forward in preparation of doing so.
Neiran takes a step back, to allow Reyce to step off of the cot. He even gestures lightly towards the door, though it's a hospitable gesture rather than guidance for an inept person. "You may be surprised to know this, but many individuals who 'get banged up a lot' do not contentedly go along with the prescribed treatment. I am grateful for your compliance, and I wish you a good evening. In three sevendays, I shall see you again in this capacity, if not before." Of course, they'll see each other outside of the infirmary before that many a time. It's incentive for Reyce to be honest about his injury, because if he favors it or it begins to swell, the healer could likely breathe down the student's neck during class and see. Other students who've passed through for even minor check-ups have been subjected to this surreptitious scrutiny.
Reyce completes the weight-shift that brings him to his feet, then, as Neiran steps back. He tosses his shoulders into a roll meant to ease, at last, those muscles long ago tightened in defense against the pain. "Their problem," he declares absently, in respect of the noncompliant patients. "See you," he both excuses himself and agrees, adding a nod for the healer as he steps around him and heads for the door. If he has any tendency to hide the pain of his injury - an admitted possibility, given how he masked that of his finger realignment - it'll be hard for Neiran to breathe down his neck with him sitting in the back row almost every class. Reyce steps out into the bowl.
8-23/25-2006 (Reyce, Neiran):
Infirmary
The infirmary is divided into two sections. The larger of these is given over to injured dragons and is joined to the bowl by an immense tunnel. No less than six stone couches fill this area, with stations between each for medical supplies and personnel. The other side of the infirmary is for human patients and is furnished with double rows of cots. A large alcove near the exit to the living cavern houses the healers' area, where they store their supplies and can retreat for a moment of quiet before wading into the battle between life and death again.
Contents:
Neiran
Obvious Exits:
Living Cavern (LC) Bowl (B)
Reyce has chosen a very quiet time of day in which to injure himself, walking into the infirmary in the late evening when there's hardly anyone around. He stops just inside the entrance, eyeing the place suspiciously as though beneath the quiet evening calm, there lay some as-yet undetected menace. Unable to find any such menace, he still looks as though he'd like to flee, but the apparently wounded hand that he holds cradled to his chest forces him to stay.
The healers on duty here are having a relaxed time of the evening, most patients dozing or offering no complaint. There's always the possibility of emergencies and walk-ins, of course, so they have to stay. A small throng of them stands near the healers' station, sipping hot klah from mugs whilst talking shop and politics with bits of Weyr gossip. Neiran isn't a part of that group, but is off at a work table across the cavern, diligently writing away at some project or another. His small concession to creature comforts is the mug of hot tea on one corner of his desk, which he reaches for now, temporarily abandoning his quill.
Reyce surveys his options, though he doesn't notice Neiran at first. He hangs back while he watches the chatting healers, clearly reluctant to make his case known, though he is just as clearly one of those late night walk-ins they have to stay for. As he draws a deep breath, taking another look around just to arm himself for the social plunge, he finally spots Neiran by his lonesome. A quick redirect and he's off to interrupt the more familiar and less chatty healer, letting his right hand fall at his side, the injury made harder to spot that way. "Ah," comes his eloquent introduction. "Neiran. You got a moment?"
Neiran slowly lifts his eyes from the page, fixing Reyce with his dark-eyed stare. "A moment," he murmurs, lowering his mug from his lips unsipped. His eyes take a small traipse across what parts of Reyce he can see, trying to divine his reason for being here, doubting that it's social.
Reyce meets that stare when it's directed at his face, but his own gaze wanders down to the table once it's gone. He gets straight to the point, raising his hand over the desk. Over the second knuckle, his middle finger has started to swell in relation to the fingers next to it. "Hit something. A wall," he admits, his focus abruptly yanking away into an innocuous corner. "Think I blew my knuckle out."
Neiran's reticence melts away as Reyce reveals he's a patient, not a conspirator or a socializer. The young man rises fluidly from his desk, fingers slipping away from his mug before he rounds the table. He passes by Reyce, a mellow gesture towards a nearby cot made as he slips by. "Please, seat yourself and I will examine the injury."
Reyce notices the change in attitude, marking it with a small frown as his gaze returns to Neiran. Motionless, his eyes track the healer as he passes by; then prompted to motion, he moves towards the indicated cot without comment. The edge of a cot is never the most comfortable place to sit, yet that is where Reyce chooses to perch himself, his left hand going down to steady his balance while the right remains carefully out of commission at his waist.
Neiran reaches to his left, and draws a cart on wheels closer to himself. It's laden with the various soft odds and ends one would expect to see at an infirmary: gauze, some cloths and towels, a jar of numbweed, redwort, and a washbasin. Presumably the more sinister metal instruments are kept out of the way, behind lock and key until they're needed. Neiran, if he notices the frown, certainly says nothing of it and doesn't deign to change his own neutral expression. He holds out his own hand, palm upturned, apparently anticipating that the wounded paw will be proffered. "When did this injury occur?"
Reyce looks down at the upturned hand, extending his own wounded paw as anticipated. He does not go so far as to place his hand in Neiran's grasp, however, but leaves it to the healer to take it - contact he seems to be braced for, apparently anticipating pain, with a slight tensing of the muscles in his forearm. "Just now," he answers, eyes still on the hands below. Again, he has to check himself and amend his response more accurately, "Half an hour, maybe more."
Reyce is braced needlessly - the same delicacy with which he handles his writing utensils, his teacup, and everything else is naturally afforded to Reyce. Gingerly, forefinger and thumb hold the man's wrist steady, and the healer stoops a faint margin to lower himself a little closer to the injury. "It was good that you came to us promptly," the dark-haired young man states, a less-than-neutral tone in his voice that might be interpreted as approval. His eyes flick up from the injury to regard Reyce's face stoically for a few moments, likely trying to divine what caused this sudden and recent wall-punching incident. But he does not ask, and in fact releases his feather-light grip of the Bendenite's wrist. "I will retrieve ice for the swelling, and then I will give you something for the pain. I imagine you are experiencing a fair amount of discomfort. When you feel somewhat more comfortable, I will undo the dislocation." He doesn't' sweep off immediately, but waits for the man's reaction to his plan.
Reyce's eyes have something of a brooding, unhappy look lurking in them, but the - one would predict - fury that prompted his assault on High Reaches's walls must have been dulled by the sudden realization of pain that followed. He pulls in a quick sniff and raises his eyes to meet Neiran's inquisitive gaze. "What you think is best, h-uh." What might have turned into a title quickly becomes a huff of breath instead; perhaps replacing it with the man's name seemed too informal, in these surroundings. Having met the gaze, he now once again finds something else to look at, this time choosing the wall past Neiran's left shoulder.
Neiran turns his head, as if to follow Reyce's line of sight. But instead his eyes wander for an aide. None seem unoccupied at this moment, however, most conspicuously engaged in menial tasks and looking very busy at it. With a small nod to Reyce, the Journeyman himself departs to fetch what is needful. At the very least, there's no shortage of ice in this place, and so his brief sojourn is a fruitful one and he's back before long carrying a few items. Within a bowl is a terrycloth bundle tied, emanating coldness. A small bottle holds handmade, rough-hewn pills, and a cup breathes steam as he carries it over. He sets these things down on the trolley, and soon proffers the cup, handle-first, towards Reyce. "An analgesic tea with mild sedative properties," he informs him, while complex, unknown herbal scents surface in the air between them.
Reyce performs an odd half-blink, half-squint at the word analgesic, perhaps filing it away for future reference. His left hand gingerly goes out for the tea cup and brings it up to his face, not sniffing at the herbal scents that emanate from it but reading the heat that comes off the surface. "Thanks," he says after the heat has been tested, and he takes a drink. He gives no indication of approval or disapproval of the taste, but his attention returns from its wall wanderings to peer at Neiran's other fetched goods, the cloth bundle and the pills.
Even while Reyce is analyzing the tea's (not unpleasant) flavour, Neiran is picking three of the small pills from the jar. "Please swallow these," he tells the Bendenite, setting them down on a corner of his trolley. That said, his hands go to the small jar of numbweed, and a brief visit to a small drawer on the trolly has, of all things, a small brush in his hand the next moment. Like a painter preparing to create his masterpiece, he holds the brush in his hand while he unscrews the lid of the numbweed jar, the musky odor quickly rising to replace lighter herbal aromas. "It is incumbent upon me to inform you that while mindhealing is not my specialty, I am technically qualified to listen to any distressing circumstances which may have led to your...altercation." With the wall, that is. That said, he waits with brush and jar in hand, letting Reyce finish his tea and take his pills, eyes half-lidded in tranquil passivity.
Reyce sets the cup down in exchange for the pills, which he tosses around on his palm for a moment or two before he decides to just throw them down his gullet. Unfortunately, this is interrupted by Neiran's offer, and he has to quickly close his fingers around the pills so that, in his surprise, he doesn't wind up choking on them. Pills captured, he looks directly at the healer with eyebrows raised, and a dull flash of amusement joining the other, fouler moods that lurk about in his eye. "That's all right, healer." Distracted for the moment, he forgets to watch himself in regard to that distancing title. "Had a half hour to knock it about in my own head, so I'm pretty tired of the subject. But thanks," this last is added somewhat drily, a formality he almost forgot, yet seems to find necessary in the healer's presence.
"Certainly. I understand. Nevertheless, you are free to retract your negation of my offer at any time." His mellow voice sails through his own formalities, offering them as he's expected to. It's a part of his job he seems to mind little - indeed, though his face is as usual, there's no waves of irritation rippling from him. A routine patient care moment, though piqued with a small bit of wry curiosity that he's now suppressed. If the title is considered a distancing one, it elicits no affronted reaction. "When you are finished the tea at your leisure, and have swallowed the pills, I will apply numbweed topically to further reduce the discomfort before I make the adjustment. Have you experienced a dislocation before?"
Reyce's little flash of amusement fades quietly, but with it go the brooding look and the unhappiness - Neiran has counseled, it seems, without consciously trying to. The last question elicits a shrug, but this time his answer must wait until he's swallowed the three pills as he planned: with a toss, he sends them into his mouth and swallows several times to get them down and then get the itch of dry-pill-swallowing out of his throat. "Yeah," he answers finally, his voice windy from the scratch of the pills. He recovers his tea cup and takes a drink to ease that. "Two turns back, same place." A wry twist, not quite a smile, appears on his mouth. "Why I came here so quickly, this time."
"You are more courageous than many patients," the Journeyman observes mildly, no doubt approving. His vague look towards the entrance tunnel is enough to summon up the thought of reticent residents coming in with niggling complaints that have needlessly been going on for weeks. He smoothes the sleeve of his cassock, eliminating an unappealing fold there, restoring the symmetry of the black garment. He is content to stand and loiter here without any trace of impatience; the night here is calm, with no appearance of a task to rush off to do. "May I suggest that next time, you attempt to find a softer vessel for your frustrations."
Reyce's gaze starts to wander, again, taking in the room again now that he's settled in more, and doesn't view its every occupant as enemy waiting to strike. He returns quickly, however, at the word 'courageous,' as if he needed to verify with his own eyes that Neiran just said the word. Opting not to question it, he ducks behind a long drink of tea that conveniently spares him the trouble of showing any expression on his lips. He's about finished that drink when the healer finishes his suggestion, and offers a shrug in response. "Know it was stupid. Not planning to do it again, really."
The healer's chin lifts, a circumspect expression drifting over his features like a cloud's shadow, the thinning of his lips suggesting a moment of thought, and careful word-picking. "I imagine," he begins, slowly, "that one of sound mental ability does not often /plan/ to strike an object with a greater density than bone." His tacit observation made, he falls quiet once more; surely the man doesn't need a lecture in anger management. Instead, he holds up his hand again to suggest that he'd like to tend to Reyce's injury now, his jar of numbweed ready, a few daubs of the bristles into it soaking the hairs in the numbing gel substance in preparation.
Reyce sees that shadow of an expression, to which his own response is a faint frown. He does not direct it at Neiran, but rather down into his cup. "True enough," he murmurs into it, his own breath swirling off the tea and back to brush him in the face. He catches Neiran's gesture with the numbweed brush only peripherally, but he responds with an immediate raising of his right hand. He's not done with the tea just yet, but perhaps to follow instructions, he tosses the last of it down in one huge gulp without any pause to savor what remains. This, perhaps, is the dislike that he didn't express earlier, and now continues to mask with a blank face.
With no preamble, the healer drags the brush lightly across the joint of the wounded finger. It's a cool, tickly sensation, followed a few moments later by the fuzzy numbness that the salve brings. To anyone watching, it's almost a comically domestic and touching scene, with Neiran stooped over the tea-quaffing ruffian and 'painting' his finger. Unfortunately, the known temperaments of both involved somewhat mars the potential sweetness of the picture. Once the man's finger is unappealingly glistening with the salve, Neiran places his brush aside and rolls his sleeves back to the elbow, and reaches for redwort to wash his hands with. If he's going to be manipulating the digit, he'll need to protect his own hands against the numbing effects, of course. Steadily progressing through the steps of his treatment, he leaves it to Reyce to make small talk, or not.
Reyce starts to shiver at the sensation of the numbweed (though even the tickling is not really that unpleasant compared to the dull throb of the injury), but he clamps down on the response with a systematic tensing of muscles from neck to arm. He keeps a sharp, interested eye on Neiran - and on his face, not on his ominous hands of knuckle reduction - but he makes no effort to fill the silence with small talk. The only noise he does make he's careful to muffle, the ruffian scrupulously careful not to distract the healer as he sets his cup down with only the faintest ring of impact.
Neiran's pale fingers are soon stained frothy pinkish red, his hands following suit a moment later. He washes the antiseptic solution over his skin repetitively, as fickle as a feline cleaning its paws. At last, satisfied by some unknown visual signal or a count of time in the mind, the Journeyman delves his hands into the clean basin of water on the trolley, washing away the colour. He lifts a towel and dries his hands, then drags a nearby stool over smoothly with the use of a hooked foot. He didn't need to look at it to know it was there, simply at home in this infirmary so much so that the piece of furniture was expected to be there; in its proper place, it was duly retrieved. He sits down so he won't have to hunch and loom to see to the digit. He lifts the man's hand a little higher, and proceeds to squeeze the offended digit between thumb and forefinger, feeling the bone beneath the swelling flesh. "You are fortunate. I am not detecting any fractures."
Reyce lets out a low breath of laughter when he hears he's fortunate, finally allowing his eyes to move down from the healer to the digit in question. Looming promises of pain aside, he is curious about what's being done to him. "Good to know," he murmurs, distracted by his own interest and observations of the hand. His index and ring finger stretch out, making more room for Neiran to work - or getting out of the way so Reyce can see the angles better.
Neiran continues 'pinching' along the digit, feeling the line of the bones. The pills, the tea, and the numbweed have all made it so that Reyce should feel as little discomfort as is imaginable. Unless, of course, you count the possible discomfort in having Neiran peering so close, effectively squeezing at your hand. "I will now realign the digit. You may feel some discomfort, despite the analgesics I have administered," he warns. Without leaving Reyce enough time to build wariness, anticipation, or even puzzle over the word analgesic again, he makes a little tug on the finger with a quick motion, likely eliciting a pang as the bones slide home despite all his best efforts. His eyes flick up to Reyce's visage during this moment, checking for a flinch.
Reyce clearly does not anticipate the healer to act so quickly, and so he's actually starting make a sound of response - 'sh,' that would probably be 'sure' - when Neiran tugs the finger into place. Already braced for the slight pang that comes, Reyce does not flinch either when it hits or when he gets to watch his bone popped back in like a child's building set piece; however, the opening sound of his word gets dragged out and morphed: "Shhhit." He sounds surprised, not hurt or upset.
Neiran's lips press together, his brows lifted in surprise to mirror Reyce's; he hadn't expected such a pleasant reaction, likely. He retracts his hands after giving the joint a few more squeezes to ensure it's comfortably placed. "How does that feel? Please do not try to bend your finger - I am going to splint it to its neighbor in order to ensure the muscles and bone recover well." He wipes his fingertips off on that towel, and retrieves some gauze to deftly mummify the finger, using the other like a straightening rod for a coiling bean vine that needs a guide for growing.
Reyce has been through too many brawls to be upset by such a little pang, surely - not to mention that numbweed, and a half-hour's built up inurement, prepared him for the fix. "Ah, doesn't feel like much of anything," he says. "Doesn't hurt." He's careful not to bend, as ordered, but while Neiran's distracted with gauze he can't resist the urge to move the finger up and down from the base. He only moves it a small bit, ensuring that it still seems to function, and after he's done it a couple of times he's content to stop and let his fingers be wrapped. If it's odd that he should be so interested by something he must have seen before, perhaps he's simply finding in it a distraction from his own, injury-provoking thoughts.
Neiran wraps the fingers together snugly, withdrawing now to stand from his stool. "You have been a most amenable patient, Reyce. In three sevendays, I will require you to visit me once more. In the meantime, you are free to come to the infirmary for medication if the swelling increases or the pain becomes distracting, to have a change of bandage if it becomes dirty, etcetera. I can prescribe to you tea, or pills, if you would wish it. It was not a particularly difficult dislocation, thankfully, so I do not anticipate it will give you any trouble," he says calmly.
Reyce's sourness returns, in mild measure, when he's described as amenable, but when the healer finishes speaking he shrugs it off - with the gesture to accompany it, as well as the mental realignment. "Well -" there's a blunt pause, as this time he does catch himself where he normally insert a title. Again he opts for nothing, and continues - "Get banged up a lot. Fixes faster if I go along." He pinches his forefinger to his thumb, seeing how well he can grasp the two with that bulky bandage right next door. Well enough, it seems, as he returns his attention to Neiran. "Think I'll pass on the prescriptions. Tell you if it gets bad, but otherwise - three sevendays, yeah?" He doesn't quite get off the cot, but he rocks his weight forward in preparation of doing so.
Neiran takes a step back, to allow Reyce to step off of the cot. He even gestures lightly towards the door, though it's a hospitable gesture rather than guidance for an inept person. "You may be surprised to know this, but many individuals who 'get banged up a lot' do not contentedly go along with the prescribed treatment. I am grateful for your compliance, and I wish you a good evening. In three sevendays, I shall see you again in this capacity, if not before." Of course, they'll see each other outside of the infirmary before that many a time. It's incentive for Reyce to be honest about his injury, because if he favors it or it begins to swell, the healer could likely breathe down the student's neck during class and see. Other students who've passed through for even minor check-ups have been subjected to this surreptitious scrutiny.
Reyce completes the weight-shift that brings him to his feet, then, as Neiran steps back. He tosses his shoulders into a roll meant to ease, at last, those muscles long ago tightened in defense against the pain. "Their problem," he declares absently, in respect of the noncompliant patients. "See you," he both excuses himself and agrees, adding a nod for the healer as he steps around him and heads for the door. If he has any tendency to hide the pain of his injury - an admitted possibility, given how he masked that of his finger realignment - it'll be hard for Neiran to breathe down his neck with him sitting in the back row almost every class. Reyce steps out into the bowl.