Dr. Harry D. S. Goodsir (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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singillatim2024-01-24 11:41 pm
bestsir) wrote in singillatim2024-01-24 11:41 pm
3. You may be a warning of things to come.
Who: Harry Goodsir and divers hands
What: La'an's postmortem and after
Where: The Milton church
When: After the Darkwalker claims its victim
Warnings: There's an autopsy. Goodsir has some PTSD. Fun for the whole family.
The unheated church basement will do for a mortuary. Someone finds a long table and Goodsir has La'an's poor cold corpse laid out on it, covered with a sheet.
He hasn't performed an autopsy—
(Twenty. I have performed on—)
—here, not yet. The deaths that have occurred so far have presented no mystery, but La'an's is something new and terrifying, and Goodsir feels he must get to the bottom of it.
[ There are a couple of prompts for Goodsir specifically, but feel free to start your own threads. ]
Re: Afterward
Goodsir is silent for a moment, then:
"I am sorry, Francis. For the burden you've been carrying all this time. To be the last of us standing in that place—that is not a mercy, but a torment. You deserve better."
Re: Afterward
Crozier turns and looks at Goodsir sharply.
"Who said I was the last?"
Re: Afterward
"I—"
Goodsir thinks: no one told me. I'd only—
"I assumed," he says, soft and embarrassed now. "I thought ... if there were others, surely you would have ..."
Found them? Seen them taken in by the Netsilik as well? Spoken of them?
Re: Afterward
Thomas Jopson knew him, knew his mood by the curve of his spine or the single quirk of an eyebrow. How is it that Harry Goodsir can see what the others cannot?
"Surely I would have said as much."
And he isn't wrong. If there'd been a success he would have said as much. His demeanor wouldn't be like...this. He wouldn't seek his own loneliness as penance or refuse the company of others for fear they could smell death on him.
"You're right. There are no others."
Re: Afterward
Goodsir has had that bleak assumption in the back of his mind since Crozier first arrived, but to have it so bluntly confirmed still hits like a blow. He exhales as if he's been struck.
"Mamianaq," he says softly.
Re: Afterward
Re: Afterward
Goodsir's breath catches; he hadn't meant to hurt Crozier. It was only that ... well, the English of I'm sorry scarcely seemed able to encompass what he felt. He moves closer, cautiously, and puts a hand on his shoulder, offering a wordless gesture of comfort. Maybe even absolution.
Re: Afterward
"Please," he says softly, "there's no need."
Re: Afterward
"Nevertheless ..." he begins, and can't quite find his way to the words he needs. He isn't sure that he needs to forgive Crozier for anything, but he offers that forgiveness; he is sorry for having abandoned Crozier in the way he did, and lives his repentance in every good action that he undertakes here. He understands, in some small way, what Crozier must be suffering, and feels nothing but compassion.
He can't finish the sentence, but he keeps that comforting hand where it is.
Re: Afterward
He soaks in the comfort despite his own resistance to the idea, the touch...the touch so damned welcomed, a flickering candle in the overwhelming darkness.
After a while he sits up and gently pats Goodsir's knee. "You're a good man. Take care of yourself, Doctor."
Re: Afterward
If ever I was a doctor...
He doesn't say it, this time. Instead:
"And you, Francis." A pause, then: "Come see me sometime, will you? There is–there is no need for you to be alone."
Re: Afterward
He nods softly and stands to leave Harry Goodsir alone with his thoughts.