2. Well, I might call you Doctor.

[bestsir]

Who: Harry Goodsir and OPEN
What: Doctor's hours
Where: Harry's cabin, around town
When: Anytime during October, early November
Warnings: TBD

It's taken some weeks—including the awful voices and even, ironically, the words of Cornelius Hickey—for Goodsir to finally act on advice he'd given to Edward Little when they'd first arrived.

He starts by placing a notice on the board. Then he starts scavenging the town for all the medical supplies he can find, consolidating a store of them in his cabin. What he does manage to find, in combination with the contents of his surgeon's chest, isn't nearly as much as he would like, but it will do.

He has learned much, these last few weeks. That disease and infection is caused not by miasma, by tiny animalcules that may be spread by various forms of contact, and that wounds must be kept clean—disinfected—thus averting festering and gangrene. That there are compounds in food that keep the body healthy, and that not all foods contain those compounds. He tries not to dwell on the lives he might have saved with that knowledge on the expedition, and to focus on the here and now. As he said to Little: to live, and do what good he can.

And to try not to let his hatred of Cornelius Hickey consume him.

Comments

[moralabsolutism]

There was a strange movement from Rorschach when Goodsir took his arm. He almost flinched away from the man and just barely managed not to. Even so, his body language remained stiff and uncomfortable. One night chalk it up to his injury hurting him but Rorschach was tough. Even a bite wound couldn't have produced such a reaction in him.

The truth was he was uncomfortable with being touched, even by a doctor. He could count on one hand how many times he'd allowed someone to touch him or touched someone else willingly in the past year that hadn't involved violence. He had a paradox in his mind of being touch-deprived of normal human contact while at the same time shying away from anyone who might offer it to him.

"Little inflammation at first." A wolf's mouth was hardly a sanitary place and the bite had contained a lot of bacteria. "Think it's gone down." Though not entirely. There was still a portion of the injury that looked raw and was healing badly.

[bestsir]

"It seems to be healing well, save for this spot." He looks more closely. "I'll apply a fresh dressing, with an ointment that should help."

Antibiotic creams. Imagine.

He finds a tube of the stuff in question and pauses a moment, having noticed the man's discomfort.

"Would you like to apply it yourself?"

[moralabsolutism]

There was a long moment where Rorschach considered the idea of whether or not he wanted to apply it himself. The part of him that tried to be an ideal rather than a person wanted to. But the part of him that was still very much a human being, the part which had driven him to come see the doctor in the first place, he wasn't so sure.

"........No," he finally said after an extremely long pause. Socially awkward didn't even begin to cover it with this one. He barely knew how to be in a room with a person for more than five minutes when he wasn't trying to crack their skull open. At least he knew doctors more or less had the best intentions with their patients, so he wasn't quite as on edge around Goodsir as he might have been otherwise.

[bestsir]

"All right. This may sting a little."

Goodsir takes care of the wound quickly and neatly—applying the ointment, then carefully securing a bandage over it. Satisfied with his handiwork, he nods. "Come back in two or three days, and I will ensure that there's no festering, and apply a fresh dressing," he says.

[moralabsolutism]

He stayed stiff and awkward as if he was doing his best not to react to the simple motions of the doctor treating him. When was the last time he'd even visited a doctor? He honestly couldn't remember. Most of the time, he took care of his own injuries. But here medical supplies were low, so it was better to seek out a professional rather than let any of his injuries become infected.

He gave a nod at Goodsir's words. "What do you want for payment?" He figured no one in this town would be doing anything for free. The vigilante had a few ways of being able to settle his debts.

[bestsir]

Payment? It hasn't even occurred to him to ask for any kind of payment, no more than he would have done for treating a sailor on Erebus.

"I—I hadn't—there's no need," he says. "I only ask that—if you happen to find any further supplies, in or around town–that you might bring them here."

[moralabsolutism]

Just as Goodsir wasn't expecting to be asked for payment, Rorschach was taken aback by the fact that he turned down any form of payment beyond more medical supplies. Someone either had to be incredibly foolish or selfless to do that and this doctor hardly seemed stupid.

It looked like Rorschach had been wise to decide to trust this doctor. He was a good one. A moral man in an immoral world. "Will do. Good at scavenging." A decade of living one step above pure homelessness would help one develop that talent.

[bestsir]

"Thank you." Goodsir nodded. "Anything will help. If you experience any further complications from the injury, don't hesitate to come see me. All right?"

[moralabsolutism]

Rorschach nodded before gathering his clothes back up and putting them on. Without so much as a word of thanks, he went back out the door and into the cold, just as abruptly as he'd first come in.