networkinthenight | first experiment; 9:53 PM

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first experiment; 9:53 PM

For our more vampiric population, I come to you with a solution for your dietary problems.

I've invented artificial blood. A substance you can consume without harming others, but that will sustain you much as food and water. I owe a debt to Elena for helping me test them.

Unfortunately, it cannot yet be used in a medical sense-- for blood transplants, which are, by the by, a very important part of medical knowledge, which makes up the second part of this announcement.

If you do not know your blood type, come see me, and I can at least determine it. Blood types are a vital bit of information in a place where one routinely gets cut to bits. Transfusing blood-- that is, the act of giving one's blood to another-- can save a life in many cases. However, if the wrong sorts of blood interact, the result can be deadly.

Many of you do not know your blood type. This will, inevitably, come back to bite you.

So. I suggest you come by my lab within the next few days and find out, before you nearly die of an injury, manage to make it back to town, and then die of your original blood sensing the invader and killing off the cells that came to theoretically heal you. What a horrible, ironic death that would be.

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[Mary seems wary, but rolls up her sleeve. There's a large gash on her arm, but it's healed enough to suggest it's at least a month old--maybe healing a bit slower than it should due to the irritation of a fidgeting child.]

I see you didn't escape unscathed.

[It's gentle, though, as she swipes disinfectant against the crook of her arm.]

And how are you now?

I'm okay. It doesn't really hurt.

[If it hadn't been for the manner in which she received the injury, she wouldn't even remember she had it anymore.]

Rosi gave me a bandage.

I'm sure he did.

[She glances up at her, then gets the needle ready. It's easier to do this while they're talking, surely, instead of Rosalind building it up into a terrifying thing. In one swift movement she slips the needle (or intends to, anyway, unless Mary jerks away).]

I've seen him in your company before; is he a good friend of yours?

[Mary does look, honestly, like she's going to jerk away. Her nerves seem odd. She stares at the needle, but ultimately, seems to resolve something, and lets it happen.]

Yes...I love him very much. He takes care of me.

[Mary's blood doesn't seem to want to come out. It's like the needle is struggling. When a very clearly not-blood looking red substance comes out, well, that would explain why. It's red, but it's much too thick and much too bright.]

[. . . well. That's. Hm. Rosalind says nothing, but her eyes are torn between that odd substance and Mary's face.]

. . . has your blood always looked like this, Mary?

[Mary nods slowly, cautiously, studying Rosalind just as intently as Rosalind is studying her.]

It was how my father made me.

And how did your father make you? Exactly.

[What a question, as she tugs out the needle and presses a bandage to Mary's arm. Will it clot? She's fascinated to find out.]

I dunno.

[She does, actually, at least in a sense. Still, she doesn't want to say.]

I wasn't alive until after, and then he was gone and never came back.

Mm. And you lived on your own?

With my brothers and sisters. They're all older than me.

Tell me more about them.

[She takes a seat, tugging the gloves off her hands and settling in. There's clear curiosity in her gaze, but it isn't gleaming eagerness, at least, so there's that.]

How many?

...I don't know.

[The question, in fact, seems to confuse her.]

My father was very famous. He made a lot of us, and we're all very different. None of them are like me, though. They all liked being left all alone, but I always wanted to go outside, where I wasn't allowed.

And how did he make you?

[It's a very careful question.]

Do you know?

[Mary stares at Rosalind, quiet, big-eyed, her mouth a neutral line.]

Do you want to guess?

[And it's interesting, now, how still Rosalind goes, how steadily she stares over at Mary.]

Artificially, I presume.

And does that make you scared?

No.

[That's completely honest.]

It takes a great deal more to frighten me. Which isn't an invitation to try.

But others have been-- scared, I mean. Why?

[At her confident admission, Mary's expression eases, relieved.]

Sometimes I understand things differently than other people. I have thoughts and feelings that they can't relate to, and I think it must be scary. But that's why I like the spirits so much. I don't think they're strange. But I've always been me, so I don't know. I don't think I'm scary.

People are often frightened of what they don't understand.

[Hm. Silence fills the air for a few moments, as her fingers idly brush against the scar creeping up her neck. She wouldn't consider this if Mary was older, but she's so young-- and it's not as if she's in the habit of telling people things.]

Do you wish to hear a secret?

[Mary nods. She always wants to hear secrets. And she bet if it's coming from Rosalind, it's a good one.]

I'll keep it very safe.

I was younger than you, I believe, when I first realized the way I thought and felt things wasn't nearly the same as my peers, or my mother, or anyone else I'd ever met. Attempts at trying to get them to understand only resulted in increasing frustration, until I stopped bothering to try.

My mind works very, very quickly. Too quickly when I was a child, frankly, and I had no one who could keep up. Anyone I spoke to reacted to me as though I was strange. Sometimes they found it amusing, and when I stopped being so funny, they became angry or frightened. I was angry, but more than that, I was acutely aware that I was different from everyone around me.

[Not that they're different in the same way, but oh, god, does she ever know that aching loneliness that comes from being strange. Sometimes it was obvious. Sometimes it was less so, and those are the moments Rosalind hated the most: when it was some minor social cue, some easy thing that everyone in the world understood but her. Groups of girls giggling and gossiping, talking about their days, and it was never pointed, never personal, but for the life of Rosalind could never once understand the point.

It's isolating. And though she never cared, not really, not when there was science to do and physics to discover and she didn't even really like other people, it was still . . . it was still a failure in some small way.

Not that it matters now.]

But the secret, Mary . . . is that it doesn't matter.

You are you. And who you are is undoubtedly different from others. But people are ordinary and dull and petty, often concerned with nothing so much as their own vices and vanities. It's a point of pride to be different.

[Mary listens with intense, unwavering attention as Rosalind tells her story. Her small mouth open slightly, eyes wide. It doesn't...matter? But how can it not matter, she wonders, when being different has meant, for her, the possibility of being hurt and rejected? It feels like the end of the whole world.

But...it doesn't matter. If she's different, or strange, or sometimes even scary. Scary beyond all conceivable reason. Her voice comes out as barely a whisper as she responds.]

Do you promise?

I promise.

[She hesitates, her fingers jerking in an ultimately aborted movement. Half-thinking to stroke her fingers through her hair, but too unsure to commit to it.]

. . . it will be hard. It always is, to be different. But that doesn't mean it isn't worth it.

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first experiment; 9:53 PM

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