Follow-Up Appointment [For Harrowheart, Viatorus, Steve]

[workthroughit]

The office is just where it's always been, and thankfully, there's no mind tricks that hide it from view this time. There between the glassware shop and the pharmacy is a sturdy polished door with an embossed brass nameplate bolted to the wall next to it: DR. ALAN J. HILL, MD, MPH.

Stepping inside leads to a nicely-furnished waiting room; handsome dark wooden furniture, comfy red upholstered sofas, a decent selection of Nexus magazines laid out for those looking to kill some time before their appointment. (Titles include CHOWDOWN, the leading reviews of Nexus restaurants and bars, SERVOS, a periodical for the robotic denizens of the Nexus, and WHOOPS!, a guide and advice publication focusing on LOLs, curses and similiar.) Soothing classical music is piped in by a speaker resting up on top of a bookshelf. There's no receptionist or desk designated for such. The door to the doctor's office is closed.

But after a certain point, the door opens and one of the poor mixed-up boys is called in. Looks like we're going about this one by one.

The office space is a warmly lit by streaming sunlight through a window opposite of the door. Despite the office being ground level in the Nexus, the window is clearly looking down from second floor vantage, overlooking a park and busy thoroughfare. The weather is sunny with a bit of cloud cover with no sign of snow. It looks to be a nice spring day, honestly. Out of place and strange with the cold and wintery look of the Nexus as of late.

Floor to ceiling bookshelves, an old fashioned victrola softly playing Bach, stained wood filing cabinets, a three-sectioned painting of a distinctly religious (rather demonic) nature, the familiar desk that often shows up along with the doctor in the Nexus. The banker's light, the metronome, the nameplate. The doctor himself is seated there, hands folded on the desk and wearing a smile.

After a gesture towards the open chair opposite of him, he asks, "So! Where shall we begin?"

Comments

[workthroughit]

"Oho! Got to meet the parents, huh? Did you inform them of your situation or did you all attempt to play your parts? I suppose if that were the case, you should get all of you extra points for effort. Being one another is quite different from actually acting as one another."

Dr. Hill has some tea of his own now, the saucer in one hand, the cup in the other. "I had and have every intention of putting you all back in your proper places, fear not. Perhaps I should have stressed that, you're correct. But do you feel at all that this has perhaps brought you closer together? Or do you think being so intimate with Steve and Harrowheart's struggles will only make interaction awkward from here on out? Can't look someone in the eyes after you've caught them with their pants down and all."

[workthroughit]

In response to that dark look, Dr. Hill only gives a tilt of the head and a bright smile in return. If Harrowheart's desire is to make people afraid of him, he's picked the wrong target for this kind of behaviour. The worst target, honestly.

As explanation is plucked back up, the doctor squints his eyes, listening and considering as the poor bodyswapped worgen lays it out. "Anger is a natural reaction to things. Sometimes a healthy one, as there are plenty of situations where that's the reasonable response. But to bottle it up, to feel like every event of it has to be kept in check...That's not good for you, Harrowheart, nor for the people around you. It needs to come out in a constructive way and it needs to be managed properly when it's not.

"Perhaps you'd benefit from anger management sessions? I'd be happy to offer them. Your desire to be a simple creation with a singular purpose and feeling nothing sounds like a desire to distance yourself from the complexities of emotion, or to no longer deal with the hardships of having anger problems. And you have my concern and sympathy."

[juststeverogers]

"I mean. Yeah he's imposing. But..." Steve wraps his arms around himself as though trying to make himself smaller. "There's more to strength than size. Harrow's strong and sturdy and reliable. I never doubted that before the swap. What I can't imagine is how he can function with those...those things. Invading his head. And Viatorus's world is so different from mine it's laughable. If he'd had to live a day truly as me, back home? I think he'd never forgive me."

"I got so swept up by them, I wasn't ready...I just knew I had to protect Harrow as best as I could..."

[workthroughit]

"You're a protector to a fault, Mr. Rogers. Noble. Foolish, perhaps, but noble." He taps the end of his pen against his lower lip in thought for a moment or two.

"But protect Harrowheart from what?"

[juststeverogers]

"...Himself. The Necromancer. It was difficult to tell which was the greater threat the more it escalated." Steve rubs at the back of his neck, shakes his head.

"They backed Harrow into a corner and he panicked. Threatened to kill himself--and Viatorus by proxy, if the Necromancer did anything to his body." Steve gestures to himself. "I couldn't let him get hurt. Wasn't going to just sit there. And I'd have done the same in my own body."

[westfallcorndog]

"Anger management?" He fully intended to ask that as if it were a joke, but it came out sounding so sincere. Is that a normal thing for a doctor to offer? Then again, this man isn't exactly a normal doctor. He doesn't say yes, but he also doesn't say no. From the look on his face it's something he'll be considering in the back of his mind before he gives any kind of answer.

"I feel kinda weird about somethin' I did at V's mansion," he says, none-too-subtly trying to return this conversation to the course of the body swap.

"After I fought his family member, he threatened to kill me. And I... I got scared. And I'm not used to that. I haven't been scared-scared, I mean scared of somethin' real, in a real long time. I forgot what it felt like to be alive, and to be scared for my life. And I also realized that... Bein' scared for your life only happens when you got a life you don't wanna lose. All the ways the world would be different without me in it flashed through my mind in a second. I didn't get that last time."

He swallows hard.

"When I was alive."

"But I get it now. I get it this time."

[workthroughit]

"Well, maybe that indicates your not just some thug. A thug wouldn't concern himself overmuch with his demise, after all.

"Do you think you'll be able to return to undeath after this is all over? Another who undertook this exercise was given the opportunity to be alive for the very first time. She's a construct in every way you resented; made by man for a singular purpose in service to man. Limited emotional range. Unable to take in sensations.

"She was very happy for the opportunity to be human for a short time. She claimed it only made her love and understand them more. Do you share her sentiment at all, Harrowheart?"

[workthroughit]

"And what did you do to save him? And I must wonder why, in your attempts to fix things, you consulted a Necromancer of all things. Unless this had something to do with Harrowheart's status as a member of the undead? Seems a little meddlesome, but." A shrug.

"I can't imagine Viatorus is happy with that threat being leveled at his body."

[westfallcorndog]

Harrow squints at that description. It sounds like someone he might know. Female pronouns, made to serve man, not alive, can't take in sensations. But... Limited emotional range? He can't be talking about Blaze. She seemed as able to feel emotions as himself. Unless...

He's not going to bother himself with the implications of that last thought.

"On the very first day I asked Viatorus if he wanted to be undead in his real body. I used to ask everyone that, but... I think I don't want to anymore. He told me that he's very happy bein' alive. And Steve, when I first got turned into him? I said it was awful, and I'd rather be dead, and it hurt him a lot. He said he was proud to be him no matter how hard it was.

"I think they helped me remember that the living deserve to live their lives, even though mine's ended. And I don't wanna call my friends 'breathers' anymore, either, even if I feel like that's easier to say. I think it was mean all along, and even when I said it for fun I kinda... Thought less about 'em when I used that word?

"But..."

He rubs at his eyes and tries to force a laugh, but it dies in his throat as a raspy wheeze.

"I got to feel some nice stuff? I tasted Earth food at a fancy dinner. I had a dream, and that was nice, even if it wasn't my own. I took a shower." He makes a single laugh that closes his eyes and pushes out the tears that had been welling there. "And it was warm. And I was warm. And it was nice."

As his whole face turns red and he continues to cry he fights with all his focus to keep up the appearance that he's smiling. Even as his throat swells and his nose and eyes are watering he struggles against his quivering lips to look like everything is still alright.

Through the cracking of his voice he says, "I know I gotta die again. I know. But I remembered there's some... Some good things in life. And if I had to make the choice all over again, to live or to die? I wouldn't choose to die. Not this time."

[workthroughit]

Dr. Hill never visibly got up, neither were there the sounds of his chair moving and the footsteps of his approach. But he's standing next to Harrowheart now, a hand resting on the back of his chair, the other offering a tissue. He doesn't add anything in this moment. Nothing to say, just this quiet sympathy.

[heirtothearcane]

"We stayed quiet and tried to play our parts. It was mortifying," he adds with a small shudder and strategic sip of tea. "Steve hated it. Though I think Harrowheart might have actually enjoyed it a little."

The assurance that they're all going to be put back into their bodies earns a relieved sigh. A relief that doesn't last long though, because the doctor is soon asking awkward questions again. He looks down at his cup. At the hands holding the cup.

"I... don't know," he says honestly. "Steve... Steve and I... I understand him better now. Perhaps it will be easier. I'm more used to being the weak, helpless one than he knows... and now I know, truly, how he feels. How strong he has to be all the time. What kind of fire and life that takes to be that strong for so long... It's hard to say. I don't know what he thinks. Maybe he'll think now that I'm just a rich, snobby man with lots of houses."

[juststeverogers]

"That wasn't my idea. He's a relative of Viatorus's. Isidor and he thought that he'd be able to swap us back." Steve shakes his head quickly. No, no. He had known they were going to consult a relative of Viatorus. He had no idea it would be like this. And he still doesn't even know what a necromancer even is exactly.

Bad. Is what he's surmised.

"No one's happy with what happened. I picked him up and ran. I thought Isidor was gonna kill me. But I was trying to save him, not hurt him. I didn't want to..well. That's not true. I did want to hurt the necromancer when he started singling out Harrowheart. His comments about me, I could ignore, but..." Steve sighs.

"I let whatever else was in my head get me carried away. I wanted to do something. Stand up for him. It's my fault..."

[westfallcorndog]

The doctor's mysterious ways are easily rationalized away. Harrow is immediately grateful for the tissues, but he takes them very gently and rubs his borrowed face dry with a delicate touch. His breathing evens out in short order and his moment of tears ends, though his red eyes are quietly threatening to push him over the edge again.

He starts up speaking again, his voice raw, and he finds that a change of subject comes easily. "I learned a lot about... About Viatorus and Isidor and their whole life," he croaks, then clears his throat and tries again more clearly.

"Isidor's real strong. Not just, y'know, magic-wise. She does a lot for her brother. She'd give everything up for her family. She does thankless work, and I... I respect her a lot. And she told me about how it is to be rich. That it's not all easy like I thought. That they can't trust anyone, and don't ever know why someone wants to be their friend or if they love 'em for real or for fake. And Viatorus...

"His whole family treats him like a show stallion. Like he ain't worth anything for his heart or spirit or good intentions. That guy I got in a fight with, that's all he kept bringin' up. That Viatorus deserved his body back more than any of us, 'cause he was special. Physically, I mean. Like an heir or somethin'? And that's all they cared about. And..."

He stops a moment to collect himself before he can continue. "When that man threatened my life, and I got scared? I didn't know what to do to stop him. He wouldn't listen to Isidor, and I didn't know if she could stop him if he tried. I didn't know what to do, so I... I said if he killed my real body, I'd kill myself in Viatorus's body."

His voice speeds up now; he can't explain the story or his motivations quickly enough. "I never woulda done it! I never woulda done that to my friend, but all I could think about was if my body died then Steve's soul would die, and I'd be in his body or maybe they'd just seance me out of Viatorus and send me right to Hell, and Steve's body would die, and I didn't know what to do to make the fight stop so I lied! I lied, I wasn't gonna do it. But then it brought up all kinds of bad memories for me. I started thinkin' about when I died. Isidor started shoutin' and I thought about my sister, and how she –"

He sucks in a quick breath of air and stops abruptly. He's getting off track.

"I felt awful about that lie. That everyone believed me. That nobody had any faith in me not to do that. But mostly I felt bad 'cause I betrayed my friends' trust. I threatened to take away the only person who really loves Isidor. I made Viatorus think about death and violence. I made Steve freak out and have to make a hard choice. And... And I treated Viatorus like his body meant more than his heart and his soul and all those things I wish people saw in him. I was a bad friend. I don't even know how to start apologizin'. How can I expect any of them to put their faith in me when I act like this?"

[workthroughit]

"For what it's worth, you hardly strike me as 'snobby'. Sometimes it's hard for people in lower social classes to think sympathetically of those higher up. But he's been in your shoes just as you've been in his. You're a gentle soul in a very stringent environment, saddled by a great many responsibilities and expectations. I'd be shocked if he didn't see that about you now and feel for you because of it."

[workthroughit]

"When you say whatever is in your head, what do you mean precisely? Does Harrowheart experience voices and you're now privy to them? Or is it some other emotion or sensation worming into your perception?"

He seems interested, threading his fingers together in his lap, his head canted to one side.

[workthroughit]

Dr. Hill listens in silence the whole while, letting Harrowheart spill his explanations and feelings, not even interjecting a nod or a 'right' or any other interruption of that nature. Just listening and listening closely.

When the conclusion comes, he sighs and hunkers down next to Harrowheart, elbows resting on his knees, flat palms together. Getting down so he's not looming over him by standing next to his chair like he was.

"Seems this went well beyond just thinking about how it is to be another person and went into the nature of souls, bodies and the ties between them. You three certainly plumbed the depths more than any other. And I think you understand Viatorus exceptionally well for this all. Realizing that, despite his wealth and prestige, he's still a person. A person expected to be one, singular thing despite his nature making him more naturally another thing entirely. I certainly don't envy him."

He's quiet another moment, thinking over his next words. Wondering what should be addressed, perhaps, and how to do so.

"I don't think you'd have done it. Hurt Viatorus like that, I mean. Despite you feeling like a thug and a brute, that sort of thing is not who you are. I sincerely believe that."

[westfallcorndog]

Somehow, despite having said all of this to Dr. Hill? Despite having aired so many of his personal thoughts and opened himself up to a relative stranger – a stranger who has power over him, at that – Harrowheart feels... At ease. It's calming to look at the doctor now, somehow. He's not intimidating, not judging. It's been a long while since anyone's shown him this kind of sympathy and understanding, but despite that the feeling isn't foreign. On the contrary, it feels... Right.

"His nature makes him one thing, and his heart makes him somethin' else. I see what you did there," he says, and with it comes one small yet honest laugh. He even chances a tiny, cautious smile.

And then he reaches out, and whether the doctor wants it or not, he tries to put his arms around his shoulders for something of a one-way hug. When he's there near the doctor's ear he says quietly, "I'm sorry I made all those posters that said you weren't as nice as you looked. I was wrong about you, Doctor Hill."

[heirtothearcane]

"I don't know." He shakes his head and sets the cup down, using his now free hand to run one through his hair. It's odd. Everything disproportionate to the touch. "I don't know anything. That's what I'm learning more and more. The more I get to know people, the more I realise that I know nothing."

"I used to think Steve was really shy, but he can be strong and confident when he needs to be. Even though his body is weak, he... he has a power in him." Viatorus goes quiet and looks down at the small hands fidgeting in ways they don't usually. "And Harrowheart... I thought..."

He sighs and pulls the cup back onto his lap. "Oh, I don't know what I thought."

[workthroughit]

Dr. Hill looks momentarily surprised that he's getting a hug (he always does, the Plain Doll can attest to that) but then laughs lightly, giving Viatorusheart a pat on his arm.

"Oh, don't worry about the poster. I rather liked them. I have one in my desk for posterity. Did you draw that? It was a striking resemblance!"

[westfallcorndog]

Harrow lets the doctor go and returns to sitting calmly, laughing now and grateful for it.

"I drew it, yeah. But I think Steve's hand made it a little better than I usually do. He's a real good artist. Viatorus is too! He drew..."

He rustles around in his pocket and frowns when he remembers that he's not in the body he was at dinner.

"He drew a picture that I saved. He didn't like it, but I did. I think he was frustrated that my hands didn't draw as good as his, but it didn't hurt my feelin's or nothin'. I was a little sad that he didn't wanna try out bein' strong in my body, though. That's the only cool part about bein' me."

[workthroughit]

"Everything said here is kept confidential, remember that." Just a gentle reminder in case Viatorus is worrying that things are gonna get back to the other two. For all the tricky things he does, Dr. Hill will always consider patient/doctor confidentiality sacrosanct.

"I think realizing that you always have more to learn is an important lesson indeed. Especially when we have exposure and access to a place like the Nexus. Hundreds of worlds with walks of life and morals so different from our own. It doesn't do anyone any favours to ever grow complacent and think you've gotten it all figured out. Because that is certainly never the case."

A moment's consideration before he ventures, "You sound like you've developed some complicated thoughts or emotions towards our friend, Harrowheart."

[workthroughit]

"I don't know, there's something pretty cool about being able to turn into a wolf. I'm surprised the other two didn't take advantage of that a bit more. But fair enough about the hands. I imagine it's hard to adjust to controlling the way they float on top of general motor skills."

[westfallcorndog]

A wolf? How did he know? The surprise shows on his face, but as soon as he asks himself the question he realizes the answer. Hill is a mentalist and a soul swapper, of course he knows small facts like that. But... What else does he know? THAT makes him fidget. Hiding his discomfort would be pointless. The guy probably knows! HE DEFINITELY KNOWS.

"Viatorus didn't want to let my hands float. He wrapped 'em up. And he didn't do any magic in my body. And... he turned into a worgen, but not on purpose. Except we had a good talk then, and I realized he reminds me a lot of myself. That I wanted to help him learn to be a man. But I'm doin' a pretty shit job of that so far, huh? How many times can a person fuck up and apologize and mean it and get forgiven? I figure he and Isidor won't want to see me again after this. Especially her."

[workthroughit]

Dr. Hill either is the most observant denizen of the Nexus or he's real good at guessing. Or he can mindread. Who knows!

"Well, I think the two of you might have a very different idea of what it entails to be a man. He has to live by a lot of rules, after all. Social expectations of what a son of his stature has to do and be. And I'm afraid a lot of his problems can't exactly be strongarmed into a solution. Although I can understand how you teaching him to be more assertive, more sure of himself, could go a long ways as well. Perhaps approach that?"

Although Harrow's other concerns come back to the forefront of his thoughts, making the doctor sigh. "If they need time to make their peace with you or your actions, I'd say give it to them. Let them settle and forgive you in their own time. What you did was shocking, certainly, but it sounds like you know that. That's what you were going for, to get everyone to stop arguing and threatening your own, actual body. But either way, don't fault them if they want a few days away."

[westfallcorndog]

Harrow pushes his tongue around inside his cheek and nods slowly along with Doctor Hill and everything he says on both topics.

"I guess... In a weird way... If he decides not to be my friend anymore, that means he's more assertive already. Right?" A strange thing to come to the conclusion to, but the tone of his voice suggests he's at peace with that, if that's the way things will be. "I'll give 'em their time, though. And when they're ready, then we'll talk." A single nod. "I think that sounds real smart."

Then, a laugh. "But I hope they don't friend-dump me, 'cause I think I was really gettin' along with Isidor there for a while. She and I, we got so much in common... But so much different, too. I was gonna ask her out for coffee after all'a this, but... Shoot, probably not now."