Fill Me Up; Bring Me Down // {Christian}

[Baby Wessex d9b [earthling]]

I still don't know what you've done with me,
a grown up women should never fall so easily

Every day was the same with Pysche; wake up to the beep-beep of her alarm, shower (scrubbing meticulously), dress in a lab coat, eat one banana and two scrambled eggs, and be at work approximately one hour before anyone else in the lab. Routine was soothing; everything else was just another puzzle to be sorted. She didn't necessarily mind things going awry in her day, as long as she had the time to properly break it all down into quantifiable pieces.

She got an hour and twenty-seven minutes of peace with her mute specimens. These days she dealt with petri dishes, things so quiet and so smooth one could forget about them entirely. She would dredge the surface, let them sit, and then inspect the gel for changes. Nothing too advanced, and Psyche was acutely aware her talents were being wasted. But then, she also saw more than she was told. These dishes were the basis for something new, some exciting - and something potentially dangerous. That was always the way of the future, and it bothered her not at all.

It was her direct superior who interrupted her work that morning, a very unusual affair. Usually they exchanged notes over the intraweb instead of meeting in person. It was just less painful that way. After an excruciating period of small talk, he came around to the point: Psyche would be needed in another lab that afternoon. That's it. Something clearly that could have been send through text, and yet he had barged in and derailed her morning. Psyche tried to set it aside and focus on the experiments, but it ate away are her, the way acid could.

Psyche took her long in the common area, only because it was required, and washed her hands twice before she turned away from her lab's door and continued down the hall and up the stairs. She had only been upstairs once, on her first tour of the building. Otherwise there was no reason to go; the mess hall was on the first floor, along with the administrative offices and her superior's nook.

She noted the gentle pink of the walls, the chipped paint near the ceilings. The building had no imagination, which suited her; all of the floors had the same layout. It was thus quite easy to find the numbered lab to which she had been directed, although she still wasn't clear on the parameters of this assignment. Hopefully the lab lead would be able to fill her in.

Psyche turned handle, her lab coat's sleeve over her palm, and poked her head in before she let her body follow. "Excuse me?" she asked, the very bare minimum of civility. "Director Khal sent me here. I'm Psyche Percocet? Lab 152A."

banner credit: halo's slipping
lyrics: abba lay all your love on me

[gamemaker kelsier]

S P E A K I N G // T H I N K I N G

Going home after a day spent in the lab was apparently a rather normal thing to do. Christian had considered it for a few moments last night, and forgotten about it too easily. The light in his large laboratory had stayed fixed and, not gone out at all. Even when all the other lights in the building had flicked off one by one, his had remained alive and full, but not really appreciated by the person using it. All of his concern and interest was focused on the movement of his hands. pouring this into that, ecetera. He might have dropped a bit of acid on his palm earlier, but the bloody burn went unnoticed by the scientist as he worked away. Everything was secondary to this discovery, to this hunger for this remedy for this thing.

When the sun dawned, he only looked up from his work for a moment, eyes blinking in the coming dawn, rimmed with red, shadows of black hiding underneath. A five o'clock shadow topped with a four am shadow marred the smoothness of his jawline. It didn't bother him much. He simply ran a hand through his hair, broad shoulders leaning down over the microscope, hands balancing himself over the small hole as he peered in. Over in the corner, a mechanical cat rolled back and forth, bumping against the wall, softly mewling. And other oddities lined the workshop of a laboratory as well.

Moving back in abrupt excitement, an unnatural thing for the tin man, he pressed his finger to a button on the wall and barked into it, "I need an assistant, and not one of this incompetent ones this time, give me someone who won't balk at blood and charred flesh." Satisfied, he moved back to look over his telescope, brows furrowed. His three quarter sleeve shirt was stained with various things, lab coat abandoned and dusty in the wardrobe since the day he got it. It would be accurate to say that Chris had never been one for cleanliness, not that he was unhygienic. He showered everyday, he just wasn't one to catch it when a chemical splashed up and hit him on the shoulder or something. Where another scientist might have wiped it off in pain or fear, Christian barely even registered it.

The thing he was working on now, it was for that problem. The fact that he couldn't feel. Even as he was leaning against the counter, he couldn't register the way the marble felt against his palms, or the way the edge cut into his palm. Even though it was nearly below freezing in the lab, he was wearing a loose cotton shirt. He couldn't feel it, any of it, and it was all he wanted.

There was a sound at the door, so he flapped a hand back at the scientist finally sent to assist him. Concentrating on the mixture he made, he poured some liquid into a test tube, and then into a needle. Turning finally to look at the other person, he pulled his sleeve up, and held the needle at the ready, eyes falling up to meet the female voice. She was beautiful, was the first thing he noticed, staring in surprise. he didn't know she worked here, maybe on a lower level. Because he was pretty sure that he had never seen her before. All curls and wide innocent eyes. In mild surprise, he said, "Yes, I'm Christian Vea, and I need you to assist me. I'm about to try to use this cure on myself, if I start to seizure, please feel free to save me."

And with that, he pushed the needle into his vein, a look of such calm on his face that one might think he was simply drinking a cold coffee for all the bother it gave him. Conversationally as he waited for an effect, he said, "Psyche, so that's an interesting name, is it your birth one?"

[Baby Wessex d9b [earthling]]

I still don't know what you've done with me,
a grown up women should never fall so easily

Walking into his lab was like entering a centrifuge had gotten off-kilter. There must have been some order to his things, and certainly it was clean, but it was not painstakingly organized and tidy the way hers was. She spent an inordinate amount of time ensuring that everything was in its proper place, even when she knew she'd need it in a few moment's time. Undoubtedly this slowed her down, and she'd made a note to determine exactly how much time was wasted by cleaning in the middle of experiments instead of at the end.

Of course, no matter what the result of that inquiry was, she would still continue to clean as she went. This was obviously not a problem for Christian Vea, scruffy, pale-eyed scientist. He was not at all what she'd been expecting, although Psyche had learned that the mind did not always match the body. He spoke in the clear cadence of someone sure of himself, and in the crisp, direct form she found comforting. There was no doubting what he intended to do, and yet Psyche drew in a breath as he plugged the needle into his arm. "I feel compelled to inform you that my CPR certification expired last year. Apparently that was more necessary than I had anticipated." As she spoke her wide eyes stayed glued on his forearm, shocked at how casually the incident had taken place. A moment later she realized that he would not seizure from the arm, and that she had better watch his facial reactions.

Staring at his eyes, his jawline, his cheeks was equally unnerving. Psyche swallowed and finally let herself sit on one of the high stools across from him. And when he asked about her name, she laughed.

Not the sort of throaty, becoming laugh some people can pull off. This was high and reedy, and a bit too breathy to be anything other than awkward. She cut it off after a few hiccups. "I find that humorous because most people ask about my family name. But, no matter. Psyche is my birth name, and it's caused something of a controversy for me. All of my sisters' names make use of the hard P." She straightened her spine as she lifted her slender digits, tapping each one as she went down the list. "Perdita, Pearl, Priya, Penny, and Palace. I do believe my parents ran out of steam by Pally, and no one has ever given me a satisfactory answer as to why I am the only sister with the soft P." And with the results discusses, Psyche lowered her hand, oblivious to some of the more colorful implications of her explanation.

She found no easy place to put her hand, and so it ended up on her knee, above her white lab coat. Psyche gave a small toss of her head to dislodge a curl which had been tickling her forehead before she resettled her gaze on him. "So far you seem to be having no adverse affects, Mr. Vea. Perhaps you'd like to tell me about your name?"

banner credit: halo's slipping
lyrics: abba lay all your love on me

[gamemaker kelsier]

S P E A K I N G // T H I N K I N G

"Hmm, no matter then, cardiac arrest might turn out to be a blessing."

Smoothly, he wiped the whole where he had stuck the needle, a drop of blood blending in with his skin tone. He should put a band aid on it, but there are a lot of things that Christian should do, and he still hasn't deigned to do them. As he dumped the needle in the waste chute in the wall, the young lady began laughing. Bewildered, he looked back at her, craning his neck around, one hand still on the chute's pedal. Mostly when people were around him they were either angry, or they were about to get angry at him. That's how Chris liked it too, no need to let people feel chummy with him when he'd be leaving or they would. But he had barely spoken to Psyche and she was laughing.

It wasn't a bad laugh either as far as laughs go. To Christian, who had only collected a few laughs in his lifetime, it sounded a bit like china glass. Their was a fuzzy memory from when he was younger, and an old wine glass had tipped off the table. He remembered the liquid inside splashing everywhere as it had fallen in slow motion, and the way the stem broke first, like the neck of a flower. And then the shattering of glass against the old wooden flooring, resulting in tiny pitches screaming across the ground in exuberant freedom. He remembered being clumsy for the next few weeks, just to hear the sound of the glass breaking again, it had seemed so beautiful to him. The sound still seemed lovely now.

Shaking his head, he turned to look at the shoot again. Laying his hand carefully on the lid, it felt like he was touching air. Even then, air didn't have a feel to it. It would take some time to take affect, but maybe it wouldn't at all. Spinning back on his heel, he leaned against the counter again, regarding the woman in front of him. His first thought that she was pretty stuck with him, a slender jaw and neck, with wide eyes and soft looking lips. By soft he meant that if he pressed his to her's they might yield. Quietly, he pulled out a white topped stool, the one that was least damaged. There were a few scorch marks on the rim, but it was safe to sit on. It would be safe for her if it was for him. He placed it down and offered it to her, pulling himself up onto the counter.

So seemed she had a lot of sisters. At least six, from what she counted off. Of course, Christian could have heard wrong, but it did seem weird to ostracize her with a different sound at the beginning of her name. Or maybe Psyche was just a nickname given to her when she was little and she thought it was her real name. Maybe she had been abandoned in her own special way, by a family that didn't understand her, and left her to her own devices. Either way, it was all very interesting.

When she finished speaking, she lay her hand down just above her knee, and it drew Christian's attention. He found himself wondering what it would be like to feel a connection between skin and skin, to know what it was like to feel yourself. Christian might as well be walking through air, and be made out of it when it came to it. He had no fucking clue of what it even felt like to lick his lips. He only knew that if he slipped his tongue out every now and then, people wouldn't look at him weird when blood ran down his chin from cracked lips. It was as if he were wrapped up in a giant bubble. No one could ever tell him they understood. Feeling frustration beginning to boil, he focused on her question, wishing he could reach out and push her hair behind her ear before she dislodged it herself. He wondered what soft was.

"Just give it a few more minutes," and his hands were shaking, he'd noticed the way his pinky was flicking a minute before. It was the beginning, then they could really test. "I assume that Christian is my name because my mother and father are idiots. It means a blind follower of some religion. Ridiculous really, because I don't believe in anything but science, and even then, it's impossible to follow someone when blind because you cannot see, obviously." In annoyance, he turned and picked up a vial used in the day's experiment, not liking the way his voice had risen by the time he had finished talking. He didn't normally let himself get so worked up. "Sorry," he murmured, vial slipping from between his shaking fingers to land with a tinkle on the ground, reminiscent of a wine glass.