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Antipov raised one hand to his ear (was it trembling just a bit? shock? excitement?) and pressed a finger against his right tragus. "Yess," he hissed into his wrist, staring at Silva. "I see. Get me Med team -- now! Include Beckham!"Dropping his hand, Antipov knelt down to the carpet and gingerly picked up Cascati by the wing. He dropped the feien again to the floor and when the little figure bounced and did not move he accepted Silva's assessment of the situation.

"Ridiculous," Antipov said, looking at the halfway-living feien once more. He just sat there, staring, not moving to help Silva or even make an attempt.

It was only a handful of moments until a ruddy-haired man - obviously interrupted from a cup of tea, looking harried and concerned - broke in, pulling up his shirtsleeves and taking in the situation as he stopped dead at the desk. There was a rather younger girl behind him, big dark eyes and long dark hair pulled back in a bun; Japanese by the features.

"Director," the newcomer acknowledged, and then a bit-off - "God almighty! What happened here? Jesus!" He was already pulling a tiny scalpel out of his pocket, moving over to the pen pot and deftly cutting away the twine that held the juveniles' wrists and ankles together. His expression gentled as he got to Soho, one finger lifting up her legs to cut the bonds at her ankles. "Excuse me, young man - how long have they been like this? Hayami, if you please, open up my box - "

"Doctor, we've already got a fatality over here." The voice was soft; Cascati was being arrayed carefully on the table, out of the way, covered up in a hankerchief as the nurse opened up the doctor's kit. This was obviously Dr. Beckham. "Fresh, no crystalisation setting in. Juvenile with a broken neck."

Dr. Beckham sighed. "Well, there's nothing we can do there. The bleeders are the most important now. No clotting. We've got passage bleeding over here. It almost looks like she's been taking some kind of warfurin compound. Thank you for your work," he said gravely to Silva, taking a tiny needle from his assistant. "I notice you've been staunching the blood flow. What have they been taking?"

Antipov snorted at Silva's confession. "I'll take the dead one, and if the others perish I'll confiscate them as well."

"We got here early," Dr. Beckham said kindly. "Don't lose all hope for this young lady yet. You don't look in tip-top condition yourself, old man, I'm surprised you held out with all that magic so long. You've done a really admirable job here. You should be proud of yourself. You've done more than protected her, you've quite obviously saved her - and all these young girls' here - lives. Now, let's see..."

"Warfurin," was muttered a few minutes later to the nurse, who nodded. "Clotting agent. Now - "

The doctor had large hands, but they were surprisingly skillful on tiny limbs. His frown only deepened the more he worked. "Antipov, there will be no confiscation of my patients. They're people, for goodness' sake. What would Verine say if she heard you talking like that?" Well, Verine would possibly agree, it wasn't apparent. "These young women have been under appalling abuse for weeks. This one over here has all the earmarks of severe cranial bleeding. It's a relief that feien are so hardy or we'd have more than one dead body on our hands. I'm not maligning any of your people, but did none of your staff notice this mass poisoning? Hayami, second application, if you please."

Burgundia had gone into a seizure. The young nurse was rolling her into a recovery position even as Beckham injected Sunil, his green eyes grave.

Pink wings lay sprawled across the table. Her skin had taken on a frightningly pale shade. Nearly pure white. The blood around her legs was begining to congeal on the table as fresh red blood began running over it. It was amazing that such a small Feien body could bleed for so long. The clingwrapped chunck of cupcake lay just out of the pool of blood. Hitomi lay on the table, motionless.

"I told Security not to bother me unless someone died on our carpet," said Antipov callously. "Emi had us agree to a general policy of non-interference. How was I to know these Gaians would end up doing just that?" His nostrils flared with annoyance. "Do whatever you want, you're going to be under my observation no matter where you go." Smugly, Antipov crossed his arms and stepped aside.

-/ So i'm going to bed now. I have a fun filled day of girlfriend time tomorrow, and I want to be well rested. Goodnight you guys and hopefully we'll pick it up tomorrow! /-

"C'mon, it's not as if they're even conscious," came a sharp voice. Male, faint accent. British? "Let me poke around for a bit and I'll get Antipov off your back for another day. I'll tell him he has NNL-induced neurocancer. You can play doctor and run tests. I'll even let you wear my stethoscope." The voice rose in mocking derision.

A second male spoke. "That's highly immoral! How could you even think of doing that to a patient? And it's inappropriate to be discussing the director with me, he's your patient."

"Inappropriate, or just uncomfortable? I promise I won't tell them about it in the malpractice suit if you don't. Or would that be too much of a moral burden? Tell you what, I'll throw in the lab coat. It's made from real doctors."

"No!" came the sharp reply. "I'm the Head of Feien Medicine and these are my patients."

"Well, then, doctor, care to tell me why your patient is registering zero brain activity?"

A brief pause. "It's not our fault, this equipment wasn't made for patients of this size and we haven't had time to develop new technology yet, and..." The face hovering over Silva was familiar from his last waking moments: red-brown hair, sparkling green eyes edged with worry wrinkles, the sort of face that couldn't help but to look compassionate. Dr. Beckham. "You're awake!" said the doctor, happily startled.

The second face that joined Beckham's was not so kind. Older, wrinkled by years of frowning, eyes an inpenetrable dark brown and mouth twisted into a frown. The aforementioned lab coat and stethoscope marked him a physician. There was an identification card clipped to his coat that identified him as "Dr. George Hartley, MD (GP/NaEc/NuEc); MED CIV O-5" and featured a picture of the doctor and a string of numbers and letters presumably used for further identification.