View source for Logs:Writing on Bone

{{ Log
| chars = [[Javi]], [[Razi]], [[Ji-Ho]]
| summary = Can you actually do an emergency trach with a pen?
| gamedate = 2022.08.03
| gamedatename = 
| subtitle = Sky Goddess Coffee
| categories = 
| log = Is it a little bit late for coffee? Well, it probably depends on your point of view. Also maybe they sell other stuff besides coffee. But SOME people have been here a while, and so they actually got their coffee at a normal coffee hour. However, he has now forgotten about it for a while, because he has been hard at work doing something else. Not that anyone who hasn't been in here for some hours would know that. But apparently it bears mentioning.

Currently, he's at a table sort of in the middle on the wall, with that coffee sitting off by itself in a very lonely way. What he's actually doing, apparently, is going through a stack of flash cards that he has in front of him. Yes, that's what he's doing. He's very hard at work, too, judging by his expression. Which honestly looks like it might not be going that well, but maybe that's just his concentration face.

If it's too late for coffee, then it's probably too late to be leaving work, and yet here Razi is. He doesn't /actually/ have a briefcase, or at least not the hard, classic ones someone might imagine, but it's more like a very fancy leather messenger bag that he can probably make look more like one when it's not in messenger bag form. ANYWAYS. He at least looks /slightly/ less pristine. Like -- maybe his tie is very slightly loosened. That sort of thing. And now he has his coffee, and maybe he was even going to just head out with it to go, except he has to pause upon suddenly seeing Javi. And his flashcards. He blinks in a rare moment of surprise, because running into the same stranger two days in a row is indeed pretty surprising. "The ray whisperer."

"What is a ray whisperer," Ji-Ho says from Razi's elbow. He holds a cup of sharply minty tea that's fragrant even at range. He looks rumpled, rather than casually tousled, like maybe he slept in this shirt, and he just kind of APPEARS, just like that last rumpled shirt at the bottom of the closet. "Sorry I'm late," he says before dipping his nose to take a sip as he glances over Razi and then past him to Javi. He looks _longer_, and _harder_, like he can peer _really hard_, in a rare moment of focused attention.

Javi's brow furrows at whatever it is he's reading, and his mouth twists as he flips the card over in his hand to read the back, letting out a little sigh. But he can't be annoyed for too long, since Razi's voice near him makes him look up. "Oh, hey." Yes, it must have just been his concentration face, because it shifts quite easily into a smile as he sets the card he's holding on the top of the pile. "Bet you're still thinking about touching that one, huh?" And he might have said more, but then, out of nowhere, Ji-Ho appears. He blinks, his head tilting back in the wake of that stare. And maybe it makes him shift a little uncomfortably in his seat at being the subject of it -- but that could also be just a coincidence.

"You know how they got that touch pool at the aquarium?" At least any potential discomfort is short-lived. "Hang out there sometimes with my ray buddies. You guys want to sit?" He does have two empty chairs at his table. Actually, he has three, but to be fair to him, the shop's not that crowded, so there's no one waiting.

"It's been the focus of every waking moment and every hour of my dreams," Razi says in that solemn, serious way of his that is /remarkably/ difficult to tell is joking or not. He does not seem so perturbed by Ji-Ho's sudden appearance; he seems to take his preternatural focus as a matter of course. "Someone who is adept at handling rays, naturally," he tells him. "He was helping a little girl pet one." He inclines his chin in agreement when Javi clarifies about the pool. His head cants the slightest bit, and while he seems unbothered by the offer, he doesn't immediately sit. "You look like were studying," he observes. "I wouldn't want to interrupt."

Ji-Ho is already sitting as Razi demurs. He slips in, nice and easy, and pushes his hair back with a restless, habitual gesture before dropping his elbow to the table and his chin to his hand. "Oh, _rays_." His eyes widen, all 'oh! of course!' as if he had been thinking something else entirely. "I haven't been to the Shedd in ages. Are you a ray ... handler? There?" He glances toward the cards with a stilled twitch of his fingers as he resists the urge to snatch up the top card.

Whether Razi is joking or not, the answer makes Javi laugh. Maybe it's an amused laugh at any potential well-hidden humor, maybe it's a delighted laugh at being right. "Mm hmm," he replies. "Probably see you there again soon." He shakes his head at the mention of interruption, though, just as Ji-Ho settles down onto one of those empty chairs. "It's all good. Been here a minute already so I could use a break." His hand comes down onto the stack as his eyes flicking up toward the as-yet-unknown person sitting across from him. Yes, he caught that little twitch. He will be taking his cards back now.

As a compromise, once he's stowed them safely in the pocket of his jacket that's hanging on the back of the chair and straightened up again, he offers the new person his hand. "Javi, ray whisperer." He grins, then adds, "Not a professional. I just think they're cool."

Should Razi have introduced them? Probably. Maybe he would have, after he was lured into joining the table, but now Javi is already taking care of it, and so Razi contents himself with drawing a chair out to sit. Since he is no longer needed in these introduction, he settles and sips his coffee for a moment, keeping a minor eye on Ji-Ho. And his fingers. Just in case. "For your EMT classes, I assume?" he says of the cards as Javi stashes them away.

"Ji-Ho," he introduces himself. He sits at a slight angle, turned away, as his eyes skim and roam as though he is people watching -- even without people to watch. He and his fingers are well-behaved. "What sort of flash cards do you have to memorize for EMT classes?" His voice is somewhere between boggled and curious, as if he can't possibly imagine what might be involved. "Bones? Is it bones?"

"Nice to meet you." Javi pulls his hand back and reaches for his cup, lifting it toward Razi as he nods. "Yep," he confirms. "I'm fine with the physical stuff but to be honest I'm not that great at memorizing shit so, yeah." He gestures a little vaguely in the air with it for emphasis, before he takes a sip. From the face he makes after, it's probably stone cold. Oh well. He sets it aside, leaning forward to rest his forearms on the table and clasp his hands in front of him. "Oh, like..." And here he pauses, as if he's actually thinking about whether there //are// bones. Is he worried about disappointing Ji-Ho? Maybe. "You know. What you do first when you get a trauma patient, what's the best way to open an airway, how you see if someone's in shock. Like that. Maybe we'll get to bones later."

"There's so many layers before you even get to the bones," Razi says to Ji-Ho, his voice mild, as if this is a perfectly normal thing to say. It could be! If he doesn't mean it literally. But you'll never know. "But perhaps the memorization would come easier if you could read the words from bones. Or etch reminders on them." His gaze shifts a bit. Drifts. Noting their surroundings in a habitual manner.

"Mmm. I was never a very good student, I think." Ji-Ho sounds a touch uncertain as he says that, or perhaps distracted. His eyes flicker, chasing a reflection of light off the door as someone passes through. "Hmm. Maybe a pop-quiz would help you study. How do you do under pressure?" His eyes slide back. He is PROBABLY not thinking about putting anyone in shock by opening their airway, but can Javi _really_ know that about anyone.

"Uh huh." Yes, a very normal thing to say, in the context of the conversation. Of course, then Razi goes on. When he does, Javi turns that way, the movement //just// a little bit sharp. He squints, tilting his head to one side as he studies the other man, as if he could divine something unspoken there if he looks hard enough. But whether he does or not, after a few seconds he snorts. "Maybe," he agrees. "You got something that writes on bone?"

Before he can follow up on //that//, Ji-Ho speaks. His gaze pulls away from Razi to the other man, eyebrows raising. Then back to Razi. Then to Ji-Ho again. Then, inexplicably, to the space of empty air right between them. There's a pause of several seconds, definitely longer than a normal pause -- but then he laughs again. "I better do pretty good, right?" he replies, and his shoulders relax minutely as he reaches up to run a hand back over his hair. Though not //through// his hair. That would mess it up, and he's having a very good hair day. "Otherwise I'm tryna be the wrong thing."

"I was," Razi says matter-of-factly of his own Good Student status. At that particular question from Javi, there's the /slightest/ twitch in his expression, and then he reaches into the inner pocket of his suit jacket and smoothly draws forth a pen to offer to Javi. Branded, Omega Pharmaceuticals and all that, as if he has a collection lying around. In his jacket pocket. "I suppose I haven't tested it on bone," he admits. He looks slowly between Javi and Ji-Ho, and particularly Javi during that long pause. "Seems reasonable," he agrees. "I don't know that I'd want an EMT who would describe themselves as /bad/ under pressure."

Ji-Ho's gaze slither-steps back to Razi and Javi. He watches the transfer of the pen with an expression of deep and profound thought. "Can't pens be used to open airways? I definitely saw that on TV," he says as though this makes him very knowledgable and wise. "Bees, knife, pen." He looks to Javi, who is now an even greater expert on this than whatever terrible show he was watching, with a fall of his eyes to the pen that will allow Havi to save the bee-stung anaphylactic.

"Yeah, I bet." Javi's agreement with Razi's first comment is not derisive, though -- actually, he turns that bright, open grin toward him as he reaches to take the pen, then lifts it in a salute. "Thanks. I'll let you know." Whether it can write on bone, presumably. Because apparently he's going to be keeping it.

He pulls it back toward him just in time for Ji-Ho's question, which actually makes him pause again. This time, there's no looking at empty spare -- or at least, if he does it's more like he's taking a moment to think, and not like he's actually looking //at// something when there's nothing, like he had been a moment before. "Probably depends on how strong you are," he hazards eventually. "A pen's not that sharp, so you're really gonna have to jam it in there to get it to work."

"I feel like the dramatizations usually involve having something sharper to do the actual cutting," Razi muses. "With the pen used as the airway. Or the ink well inside. Something like that." To Javi, with some sympathy, he says, "I hope you're not allergic to bees."

"Hm." Ji-Ho gives this _real thought_. "I would need a knife, I think, to open someone's airway for the pen--." He breaks off. He pauses. "It can't be the inkwell, can it? It's all full of ink, and they'd get ink all over their lungs. Ink's not really meant for bone, or lungs, or skin. Or -- well, I suppose people make good money off ink in skin, actually. Life or death. Someone's stung by bees. You have a pen. Maybe a knife. How do you save them?"

"Probably work better, yep," Javi says, before Ji-Ho's words have him turning back there. Life or death time: "After you cut the hole with the knife, you gotta take the little ink part out, yeah?" He holds up the pen and draws a finger around it for emphasis as he continues, "Then the outside part works for the air." He was briefly distracted by that, but he does circle back to Razi's question with a shrug. "Never been stung, so I might be. Let's hope not."

He shifts forward, leaning down again to reach into his jacket and pull out a card. Just one, not the whole stack. He flips it back and forth once like he's checking what's on it, before he starts to fold it on one of the blank parts without ruining what's written down (for inquiring minds: 'Deadly Dozen chest injuries' on one side, and a list on the other). He tears off the piece, clicking the pen open and scrawling something down on it before he puts it away again and stands, shrugging into the jacket and grabbing his cup with his empty hand. "Gotta head out," he says. "Nice to meet you." He inclines his head to Ji-Ho with a smile, before he slides that piece of paper across the table in front of Razi. "Let me know if you want to do some next level ray touching." His hand lifts in farewell, the gesture ending in a very brief pat against Razi's shoulder as he passes the man on his way out the door.

"Mm, yeah, I suppose it's probably the hollow tube of the pen once you take the ink and everything else out, not the inkwell itself." Hm hm hm. Razi looks thoughtful about the whole thing, as this is an important thing to consider, but then Javi looks to be getting ready to go. There's that moment where the piece of paper ends up in front of him, and it's another rare instance of something just a little bit like surprise. He blinks down at the piece of paper, the only remnant remaining of Javi's presence. Huh.

Ji-Ho side-eyes that little slip of paper. His fingers curl tighter around his tea. He takes a sip. He is not reaching!! Not peeking!! Not stealing!! "Seemed nice. Definitely going to get stung by a bee, though." His fingers wiggle, twiddling at the edge of his lid. "Or possibly get you stabbed by a manta ray.."

Razi finally reaches for the paper, plucking it up carefully and tucking it away in his pocket. "Try not to will bee stings on people," he tells Ji-Ho with an almost reflexive energy. "Given all the manta pools at aquariums around the world, I can't imagine they're considered much of a threat of stabbing. Imagine the lawsuits."

"Bzzt," Ji-Ho hums as his fingers wrap around his drink and his eyes lid as he draws a deep breath. Mmmminty. "_You_ can imagine the lawsuits. You're better at it." His eyes open again, with a quick side-to-side sweep. "I hadn't actually realized that was a thing. Manta pools. I thought that nature guy died to one. But: lawsuits. Maybe they cut all their tails off."

"I'd say that would spark some sort of public outrage, but plenty of other things don't, so may not." Razi takes another sip of his coffee. "I can't really recall. The -- Crocodile Hunter? What was his name." Who knows. Unimportant. "I don't actually know if manta rays have tails. Or things capable of stabbing. Maybe they're just very docile."

"Outrage seems unlikely." Ji-Ho shifts. He is not looking at Razi. He barely even seems to be sitting at the same table with him. And yet: he's certainly _talking_ to him. "Something only sparks outrage when it's new. If they are all used to the idea that the rays have their tails removed, if they expect it, then the only outrage would be _not_ doing it, and endangering people. Anyway, something is only very docile until backed into a corner. Keep your pen at hand in case it's an elaborate murder-by-seafood scheme."

"Mm, not always," Razi disagrees, although his voice remains mild. Even. "It only has to be new to someone's experience. An injustice or cruelty can live for years due to ignorance, only to swiftly become a cause when it comes to light." A beat. "Isn't that what happened to Sea World?" Speaking of -- well, not aquariums. Sea...exhibit...things?

"Uhhh." Ji-Ho visibly has to catch up, thrown off by the mention of Sea World. He covers with a casual palm of his phone as he slides it to the table and asks -- CASUAL -- "I wonder what _did_ happen to Sea World," as he googles and totally acts like he definitely remembers, he's just catching up on the details.

"Well, I think it's still around, but a lot less popular," Razi says, unconcerned with whether this is a thing Ji-Ho remembers or not. Sip. Siiiiiiiiip. "You going to be at Court on Friday?" he wonders. /Mildly/.

"Oh, I'll be there," Ji-Ho says, entirely distracted by reading up on Sea World's many atrocities and attractions. Free Willy!! "If the question is whether or not you will see me there, though--." He trails off. He glances up. He smiles.

"Yes, you're very subtle," Razi agrees, unbothered. He draws out his own phone at he prompt of some buzz, glancing at the screen a moment before rising. "I've got to go. See you on Friday or not, I guess."

"See you," Ji-Ho agrees, and goes back to learning about killer whales.
}}