Wen Qing does so remember.

"I have a question about the abdominal injuries."

Oooh, food! 

"- Thank you! Sorry, is there any coffee out there?" Marian immediately feels bad, especially since she did in fact trade this morning to get some stimulants for herself, and then took them, and she's - not tired, exactly, her head is sort of buzzing, but she also really just wants something warm to hold onto. 

"I'll fetch it." She's certain that fetching coffee is one of the jobs of apprentices.

Oh no, now Marian feels like she's either being very rude or being....exploitative? Oppressive? She can't think of quite the right word here. 

...She really wants her coffee, though. Even the absolute worst shifts in the Montfort ICU included access to cheap but hot Tim Hortons coffee. 

"Thank you so much! ....I've got some curriculum ideas written down, by the way, we can definitely cover abdominal wounds." 

"Abdominal wounds are what people are most likely to die of."

"- Oh, yeah, right, that makes sense. I'm....guessing people get all sorts of wounds, here? But a broken leg won't kill you on the spot unless you get really unlucky, and it's harder to get fatal thoracic injuries from blunt force as opposed to stabbing or gunshots? ....Uh, sorry, I - I do actually want my coffee before I have to be a prof giving a lecture on this." 

Wen Qing fetches coffee. 

She doesn't really remember the etiquette she learned about apprenticeships; she thought she'd have plenty of time to brush up after the Scholomance. She's pretty sure she's supposed to treat Marian like her mother?

"Awwwww, thank you!" Marian wraps both hands around the paper cup of coffee and holds onto it like it's something precious. 

(It's.....highly mediocre coffee. It reminds her of her clinical rotation attempts to make coffee from the instant-coffee plastic tubes in the patient kitchen plus microwaving water, and then inevitably forgetting to drink the resulting brew until it was mostly cold. Still. It's COFFEE. She is appropriately grateful.) 

"...Uh. Right. So - I had some thoughts about what particular skills and techniques I should teach you ASAP, so that you can make yourself useful if - when - we start getting real emergencies? But, uh, also I wanted to give you a chance to ask questions and tell me what you're interested in first. What do you want to learn about abdominal injuries?" 

"I am interested in the sepsis." (She learned the English word from Grey's Anatomy last night.) "Sometimes people get the bacteria in the belly when the intestines are injured? I'm not always sure how to treat it."

"....Oh, fuck. Yeah. That's - a thing. ...It's honestly pretty hard to treat even with all the expertise we have in a mundane ICU, because a massive systemic inflammatory response causes a fuckton of problems? Like, you can treat the infection itself with antibiotics, but often by the time someone gets to you, their body's already really messed up in a bunch of other ways - you can treat the shock with fluids and pressors, only, we don't have any pressors here, I traded the one bag I had to some trader kid who thought he could maybe get an alchemist student to replicate it–" 

Marian breaks off. 

"- Wow. Sorry. I - that was rambling." Also Wen Qing keeps looking at her with this trusting expectant look which is just terrifying. "Can you, uh, repeat back to me the parts of that you followed?" 

"Sepsis is very difficult to treat with the mundane medicine. I don't know what an ICU is. You treat the shock with the fluids and the 'pressors'-- shock is the cold skin and the shallow breathing, yes? I don't know what 'pressors' are. You treat the infection with antibiotics, like my bacteria-killing spell."

Whoa she has an antibiotic spell–

Okay. Pause and focus and Marian will get back to that. 

"...Uh, sorry. An ICU is also called an intensive or critical care unit, it - was my specialty before I got kidnapped. It's basically for patients who're already really far gone, so if you want to save them then you need them to have a lot of attention from doctors and nurses and a lot of equipment and drugs available. Shock is...yeah, the symptoms are basically your description, it's caused by lack of bloodflow to essential organs but it can be caused in a few different ways. Do you know anything about that yet or should I just explain?" 

"I don't."

"Okay. Right. So - shock is basically when your circulatory system can't get enough bloodflow and oxygen to your organs? The types are - so 'cardiogenic' shock is basically when your heart is in bad shape and sucks at pumping blood? Probably won't happen with students here unless they have congenital heart stuff, it's...mostly an old people thing. Hypovolemic shock happens if you lose a lot of blood volume - can be either literally bleeding out, or dehydration. Septic shock is....complicated, but it's usually a mix of losing fluids - often into tissues rather than out of the body entirely - and also the body's inflammatory response to an infection, if it gets bad enough, messes with how your small blood vessels tense or relax to control blood pressure? So they relax more than they should, bigger diameter, more circulatory space same volume, and so less flow lower pressure - uh, sorry, the physics of why is obvious to me but I don't know if you've got that background?" 

"I take the artificing classes, I understand the physics."

"...Right. Good. So - pressors basically work by mimicking chemicals your body makes, and they making someone's heart beat a bit harder and make their blood vessels constrict - to varying extents depending on which exact kind - and that raises blood pressure. Though it obviously, like, reduces circulation to your skin and extremities, it's not a long term solution– uh, sorry, I don't know if it's actually obvious to you why it does that?" 

Marian is starting to be concerned that she is maybe, possibly, just a bad teacher. 

"It reduces circulation to the skin because the blood pressure is higher so the blood doesn't get that far?"

"I - hmm - so a lot of the way it increases blood pressure is by - basically making the blood need to go less distance? But, like, the way it's doing that is by squeezing the peripheral blood vessels shut, so it's - you can think of it as though it's triaging bloodflow and oxygen, making sure enough gets to the brain and internal organs, skin and limbs are less life-critical in the short term? ...But, like, if you have someone who's really septic and on five different pressors, sometimes you keep them alive and then their fingers and toes die and fall off. Happened to a patient I treated once." 

Pause. 

"Uhsorryifthat'sgruesome." It's.....probably okay? Magic death school and all. It still seems polite to check. 

"Cool. --I'm sorry, ma'am, I think that was disrespectful."

Oh no does Wen Qing think she's offended now. 

"No! I mean, uh, it's fine, I think it's cool– uh, I mean, not for the patient it happened to, obviously, that sucked. But septic shock is really fascinating! And - right, so if someone has an abdominal injury, they've probably lost a lot of blood, yeah? And then on top of that, if their gut's leaking bacteria because it was cut, that's getting into their bloodstream, so they'll be getting hit with septic shock right afterward, and that's pretty lethal without treatment.... Uh. What would you normally do with healing magic, about that?" 

"I try the bacteria-killing spell to help with the bacteria, then the spell that puts more blood into your bloodstream, then I try to encourage the stomach to close up its wounds? I've tried to encourage the body to heal faster but that seems to make the shock worse."

"- Oh. Yeah, it would do that! Actually we often give patients in septic shock specifically drugs that make them heal less well. Uh, I - think you probably know enough things to guess why, if you wanna figure it out yourself -?" 

This is the point at which there's a knock on the door. 

"Uh sorry be right with you!" Marian wants to give her student a chance to answer the question. 

"I think we talk to the patient first? It might be an emergency."

"If it were an emergency they'd be using a different tone of voice and banging a lot harder on the door, but - yeah, we'd better talk to them." 

Marian goes over and opens the door. 

A tall, muscular girl, who looks about eighteen so probably one of the higher grades, is standing in front of the door. She looks healthy - very fit, in fact - but tired, and she's swinging a battle-axe loosely in one hand. "You're the school nurse," she says, her intonation flat. 

.....Okay at some point someday she'll get used to WEAPONS in her HOSPITAL. Well. Not much of a hospital to speak of. Tiny infirmary. Marian wonders if it's magic. 

"Uh, yes. Hi. I'm Marian. Do you - need something, have a question -?" 

"It's for my brother. This is Vanya." The girl takes a step to the side, and nudges forward a younger boy. 

The younger boy looks...probably fifteen? He also looks very underfed, almost to the point of emaciation. His dark hair, unwashed and uncombed, hangs into his eyes, which are fixed on the floor. 

"- Uh, come in, sorry." Marian beckons to the two of them, and then firmly shuts the door behind them. "I - sorry, this is Wen Qing, she's apprenticing with me. Okay if she's here with me for this? I want her to, uh, get practice with this, since -" Vague hand gesture. She is really tired of specifying the 'since she is going to DIE' part. 

"Seen you around," Larisa says to Wen Qing, again in a flat tone. "Shanghai?" 

"Yes, ma'am."

"Anyway. This is my brother Vanya and he - had a bad time last year and he's...um." 

Proooobably where she's going with that is 'depressed and traumatized?' Marian doesn't want to jump to any false assumptions though? 

"Why don't you have a seat?" She gestures at the cots, since the room doesn't exactly contain any other seating. 

"Oh. Thanks."

The girl does not sit down. 

"He - honestly I guess we should tell you the full story? In case it's relevant. He nearly had his entire life-force drained by a maleficer, who was also....romantically involved with him. Uh, before he went maleficer, to be clear. And - he had an affinity for emotions, and was a junior in artificing track, so he - made Vanya an artifact to - emotionally link them, so he'd know if Vanya was in trouble and needed help. Only it....worked both ways." 

The girl looks really shaken just TALKING about it and Marian doesn't exactly want to ask prodding questions but also she has very little idea what any of that meant! 

"...Thank you for telling me," she says on rote. "Uh, I need a moment to talk to my apprentice."

And she drags Wen Qing into her bedroom and shuts the door. "What did that mean?" she hisses. 

"Maleficers get their power from killing the animals or the humans. It makes you much stronger in the short term but in the long term it's addictive and it kills you horribly. An artifact is a physical object that does magic. For example"-- she takes out her acupuncture needle from her pack-- "I can throw this with more dexterity than most people can throw a needle and if it breaks the skin it paralyzes the muscles nearby. The Vanya's boyfriend started to use humans to power his magic and then almost completely killed Vanya and Vanya felt his emotions the entire time." 

"....Shit. So the boyfriend was - murdering people? That....sounds pretty bad." 

"Yes. It's not uncommon in the Scholomance. The respectable enclaves have nothing to do with it, of course."

Okay. Wow. Shit. She is SO out of her depth right now. 

"Have you, uh, ever used healing magic with someone who almost died from a maleficer taking magic from them?" 

"No, I haven't. The maleficers target the weak indies and none of them can afford to pay for my healing."

Shiiiiiit why is her first actually-sick patient something she has no idea how to deal with! 

"Okay. I...guess we'd better just go ask them more questions." 

And she takes a deep breath, and steps out again.

"I'm sorry about that. Can you, uh, tell me - when this happened? And what the main problem is that's bringing you here?"

Wow that sounded so scripted and ridiculous. Awkward. 

Larisa is actually thinking that those are helpful clarifying questions, and she appreciates this nurse clearly taking the situation seriously but also not freaking out. 

"It happened five months ago." 

...Okay it's also really awkward to talk about the kid like he's not there. 

"Vanya?" Marian says, cautiously. "Do you - think you've been getting better, since then?" 

He seems surprised to be addressed, but for half a second he actually makes eye contact with her. 

"....I mean, yeah? I couldn't get out of bed for two weeks." 

Marian tries to communicate to Wen Qing solely by eyebrows that she's asking if that's normal???

"Because of the drained lifeforce or because of the sadness?"

Vanya shrugs and doesn't answer. 

"I think at first it was the drained lifeforce? He wasn't really conscious for a week. ...We're mostly coming to talk to you about the sadness part, though." 

"...Right. Uh, Vanya? Can you - tell me how you're feeling and what bothers you?" 

The kid picks at the sleeve of his shirt. "I spend most of my time wishing I were dead and it makes it hard to focus on classes." 

What are you even supposed to SAY to that aaaaaaaah. 

"I'm really sorry?" 

This really seems more like a Lan Xichen problem than a Wen Qing problem but she will do her best.

"Have you tried planning a pleasant thing for every day and getting enough sleep and eating enough and avoiding building too much mana?"

Vanya gives her the tired and dubious look of someone who keeps getting TOLD to do this by EVERYONE and really cannot see the point and is sick of it. 

"We - try to help him with that," Larisa says quietly. "This week is especially rough because, um..." 

"They don't let me have anything I could use to kill myself in my room," Vanya says dully. "- I don't need anything sharp to fight off mals, and I don't have songs to..." He trails off. 

"But, um, some freshman from Toronto decided to kill herself by walking into the void last night. Which apparently - works. And we....can't take that away." 

"I'm not going to!" Vanya protests. "...I mean I - it's - I know I shouldn't. I know you need me. It's just -" 

This is agonizingly awkward aaaaaaaaaaaah also she had no idea the void was dangerous and maybe she should stop hanging out half in it when she's alone and wants less of her body to be exposed to possible death monsters. 

But mostly aaaaaaaaaaaaah. She is so not qualified to help this kid! Why couldn't they have gotten someone else who had any idea what to say or do! 

"Do you have an idea about the brain medicine?" Wen Qing asks Marian. "Does the bad parent medicine work only for bad parents?"

"- We were coming to ask about that! I - we met this freshman girl earlier, Ribo, do you know her? She knew some sort of diagnostic spell and she had some advice. I - damn it, I know I wrote it down somewhere -" 

The girl starts sorting through pockets. 

"The...bad parent medicine?" Vanya says, with a flicker of actual curiosity. 

Wow. Somehow Marian hadn't thought at all about how awkward it would be if - when - Wen Qing inevitably described it that way out loud to a native English speaker. (Presumably native? Both of the kids have a faint accent but she can't quite place it.) 

"Uh, the other day I was explaining antidepressants to Wen Qing," she says dully. 

"They are good medicine which helps when you are sad for the wrong reasons and you can't afford to have Lan Xichen casting the calm-down spells all the time. The calm-down spells are what we do in Shanghai, it's too expensive if you don't have someone with an affinity but perhaps you could spring for one to get him to eat and so on."

"I do eat!" Vanya grumbles, with what sounds like considerable pent-up resentment.

"Does that...come up a lot, in the Shanghai enclave?" 

Marian was thinking the SAME THING. 

She is also thinking that apparently a kid committed suicide last night???? And she totally missed it and had no idea???? She is managing to mess up this job so badly and she's so worried about this entire school full of kids and what is she supposed to do. 

"We have many parents that are not good and then their children hit tables with purple electricity whips instead of talking about their problems. --Not Nie Huaisang, the crying boy at orientation, though," she clarifies. "His parents are fine. He's just like that." 

Larisa's expression is that of someone who is definitely not laughing at this but is having to put some effort into that. 

"- And, oh, right. The girl who did the diagnostic spell said - fluoxetine? And that then he could try adding lamotrigine which does things about moods?" 

"Oh, right. Wen Qing, I think we talked about the SSRI drug class before. Fluoxetine is one of those. The diagnostic spell thought that one specifically was best? I guess I'll see if the void is in a good mood today." 

"Should I sing it a song," Vanya said tonelessly. 

"No, no, it's– wait, what?"

"Um, at the start of freshman year he composed a very cute little song that's all flattery to the void. And - yeah, it does seem to make it a little bit better-behaved." 

"Whoa! Can you teach me? Or does it only work if you're magic?" 

"Do you speak Russian, it's in Russian." 

Ohhh, that's the accent. 

"Uh, sure, why don't you flatter the void so it's more likely to give me some sweet loot." Oh dear did she just call antidepressants 'sweet loot' out loud, awkward. 

"Do you have earplugs?"

"- Uh, I don't think so, why?" Does Wen Qing really really hate music or something. "There are cotton balls somewhere on the shelf, you could improvise earplugs with that?" 

Wen Qing puts cotton balls in her ears. "I don't want the school to think I want to learn the Russian."

"....Oh, crap, does it do that sometimes? Rude! - It won't do that to me, right, though, I'm not a student?" 

"The school," Larisa says dryly, "can be very rude sometimes." 

Marian doesn't want the school to start giving her medical textbooks in Russian! Or, god forbid, weird Russian drugs which are banned in the US! She sticks her fingers in her ears just in case. 

Vanya sings the song! 

Neither Wen Qing nor Marian can hear the words, of course, but the bouncy little melody seeps through earplugs and/or fingers. 

Also, while singing is the only time that Vanya looks even slightly happy. 

This kid should do music therapy! ....Marian realizes half a second later that obviously she cannot just call social work for a referral, in here. And she herself has noooooo idea how music therapy works. Or any kind of therapy, really. Ack. 

"Okay. I'm going to try asking the void nicely." She glances over at Wen Qing. "Uh, is there anything else you think might be good for this situation, so I can ask while the void is maybe feeling kindly toward us?" 

"I don't know anything about antidepressants."

"All right."

Marian...is going to make some guesses anyway. Kid had a really traumatic experience, he probably has - panic attacks or flashbacks or uh whatever else was on the PTSD list of symptoms she had to memorize once and then promptly forgot about forever? She will sweet-talk the void a bit more and then ask it for some anxiety drugs as well. 

Apparently flattery works on the void! 

It coughs up a blister pack of brand-name Prozac, in pristine condition. The only downside is that, upon inspection, the expiry date is apparently in 1986? 

It sure doesn't look like it's been sitting around forgotten in someone's drawer or under their bed for 35 years though? Maybe if things fall into the void then once they're there time isn't passing for them?

Marian will ask Wen Qing about this. 

"The time doesn't pass in the void."

"Cool! Okay, yeah, this should be exactly what I asked it for, then! .....And, uh, it - gave me a ziplock baggie of mystery pills with a sticky note that says it's Ativan but I'm kinda sketched out."

Is that sticky note written by the void? It's in the same apparent 'handwriting' as the note on the pill organizer, which now that she looks closely is, like, the platonic ideal of generic handwriting. That's so weird. 

"Wen Qing, uh, is there any way to use magic to, like, test a sample of a drug and confirm what it is?" 

"Excuse me, Void-gongzi, I would like a spell to identify the chemical compositions of the medicine please. Thank you."

The void spits out a spellbook.

"Coooool!" 

"Want me to spot you the mana for it?" Larisa says tiredly. 

Wen Qing thinks part of her apprenticeship is providing her own mana but she doesn't object to being paid. "Yes please."

Larisa thinks that when you're in Sacramento's current position, it's very important not to accrue any more debts than you absolutely have to. 

"Say when," and she gives Wen Qing some mana, uncomplaining. 

"Right. So I'll give you the Prozac for now, and - uh, should we just hold onto our mystery baggie until Wen Qing can test it?" 

Shrug. 

"Okay. I'd better explain the possible side effects to you. Uh, SSRIs are really safe - even if you overdose, although please don't because it'd be a waste of my limited supply - uh, it won't necessarily have any noticeable side effects but it can cause headaches, nausea, dry mouth -" 

She is basically recounting her list of Side Effects That Everything Has because she has no specific reference guide for Prozac. 

Wen Qing takes notes on the side effects. It would be a waste of their limited time for Marian to have to teach her these things twice.

Wen Qing is a really good student! Well, apprentice, whatever. Marian thinks she's great either way. 

Eventually someone shows up to, apparently, hand off Vanya to a different babysitter so that Larisa can go do a shop assignment or something.

Marian feels like she hasn't done NEARLY enough to help him. As soon as the door is shut behind that group, she turns to Wen Qing. "We should take some notes on him. Uh, I've started a notebook of files on the kids who see me, so that, uh, it'll be easier for someone else to take over later. What did you think?" 

"I don't know how good the medicines are but I think if Lan Xichen were watching him he'd need"-- she gestures-- "the sunlight, the exercise, the-- talking about problems when you're under a calming spell so you can think about them--"

"....Whoa! That sounds like a really cool way of doing therapy, actually! I - how much would Lan Xichen want people to pay or trade, to cast it for them? I was trying to think of what to recommend - I know in the mundane world there're some studies about treating PTSD by having people take MDMA, that's a drug that - well, people usually take it for fun, but it supposedly makes you feel really relaxed and safe and feel loving toward the universe or something? And then it's easier to think about your problems? The issue is that MDMA is, like, an illegal recreational drug that people take to get high, so it's hard for scientists to study it for medical uses." 

"What is 'therapy'?"

"It's - hmm - it's basically a particular way of talking about your problems and feelings that's supposed to help extra well? There are a bunch of different schools of it, that different people came up with. Oooh, if the void's in a good mood still, maybe I can get a reference book on cognitive behavioral therapy, that's really common so I'm sure someone's lost a textbook on it at some point..." 

"Is talking to people a kind of medicine?"

“So, uh, it’s normally a different speciality than mine. Prescribing meds for, uh, emotional problems is usually also a different speciality. But it looks like here it’s just me and I’d better learn how to do whatever’s needed. And I did learn a little bit about talk therapy in school, at least.”

"I don't think I would be able to get spells for it..."

A Mandarin-speaking teenager barges in. 

"I heard you guys have powder here," he says.

"He wants the heroin," she says to Marian.

Oh for fuck’s sake, seriously? 

“I don’t have heroin,” Marian says with as much dignity as she can manage. “Uh, tell him I don’t give recreational drugs. Does he…have a medical problem he needs painkillers for?”

She tries to get a better look at the kid. Does he seem like a plausible heroin addict? Any needle tracks on his arms?

"We give people medicine for illnesses. We don't give people recreational drugs. Do you have a medical problem you need painkillers for?"

"Yes. I'm trapped in this stupid school."

He doesn't have needle tracks on his arms.

Wen Qing considers this and then says, "Depression."

"...Uh. Right. Can you tell him that heroin isn't a treatment for that? And - can you ask him what symptoms are bothering him the most? Is he - sad, tired, unable to concentrate in classes -?" 

"Heroin is not a treatment for not liking school. What symptoms bother you the most?"

"I'm bored. I want something fun. Like drugs."

"His primary symptom is the boredom?"

....Well. Fair enough, kid– sort of? Having magic death monsters after you isn't something Marian would mainly describe as 'boring', but the food and the atmosphere certainly are. 

"Right. Can you ask him if, um -" damn it what are the questions on the stupid depression inventory, maybe she should just get it from the void... "Tell him to wait one second?" 

Marian says some flattering things to the void and asks it for a printout of the Beck depression inventory.

The void is going to be so helpful! Here! 

"Uh, I'm going to read you some of the questions on this and I want you to translate it and ask him?" Marian says to Wen Qing. "It's a clinical assessment questionnaire for figuring out how depressed people are." 

This is taking him WAY LONGER to get drugs than he was hoping. Why does he have to fill out a stupid form. The whole point of medical professionals is to dispense heroin.

He does not feel sad. He is not discouraged about the future, except insofar as the future sounds like it might contain fewer drugs than he prefers. He doesn't feel like a failure. He does get as much satisfaction out of things as he used to. He has never felt guilty about anything in his entire life. He... probably expects to be punished, because of all the crimes? People shouldn't punish him though, he'll break their fingers. He's not disappointed in himself. He's confused by the 'worse than other people' question, he's pretty sure other people think he's worse than other people but he doesn't criticize himself about it? Why would he criticize himself about it? Other people are boring and lame. He doesn't want to kill himself. Why would he cry, crying is for wimps. 

Marian takes notes. 

"....I think this kid has a different problem than being depressed," she says to Wen Qing in a low voice. It feels weird and awkward talking about a patient 'behind his back' right in front of him, but what else is she supposed to do. "I - wait so he literally said he did a lot of crimes but if people try to punish him then he'll break their fingers?" 

"Yes, he did. I think he has the very bad parents."

"I...sort of feel like to be responsible here I should ask him about his, uh, parents, and history? But I'm worried he'll get mad and violent, he...gives me that feeling. Uh, if he - gets mad - can you stop him from hurting either of us?" 

"Yes," she says with complete certainty. "--He's a maleficer. Do you notice the odd creepy feeling you get?"

"- Ohhhhh. Is that what that is. - Yeah, I noticed, it's sort of - like he's a horror movie character with a horror soundtrack except metaphorically? ...Anyway. Can you, uh, ask him if - people have hurt him before...?" 

"Yes, but then I got strong enough to kill them so now they don't hurt me anymore."

(Marian might notice that he has only nine fingers.)

Marian is so not qualified for this in any way! But even the homicidal maleficer kid is still a student, right? And he's coming to her for help and that means he's her patient, and - he clearly DOES have a problem, right...? 

"...Okay, I'm pretty worried about him," she admits to Wen Qing. "Can you tell him that I really want to help him with his problem and I just don't think heroin will help, and I'm thinking about it?" 

The problem is that if she gives him drugs that aren't fun, he'll...notice, presumably? Okay, are there actually any drugs that are good for - what, childhood trauma plus possibly being psychotic from murdering people for magic? - and also fun? Gaaaaaaaah.

"Heroin will help because when I'm on heroin I'm not bored."

“I think he disagrees with us about what his problem is,” Marian mutters. “I really don’t want to give him heroin though! Can you, uh, ask if he has cravings for it.”

So far her mental search for anything at the intersection of “treats depression and/or PTSD” and “used recreationally” is ketamine, and she’s pretty sure that randomly giving ketamine to a 14-year-old murderer because he asked for drugs is the sort of thing you lose your nursing license for. 

"No, I just like it."

....Well, what the heck. It's not like the Ontario Board of Nursing has any way of finding out what she's getting up to in the magic death school, and...well, if they do, she would trade losing her nursing license for getting out of here alive. 

And in the meantime, this obviously traumatized and possibly-slowly-going-insane-from-blood-magic kid is clearly bored, and giving him heroin is a terrible idea but if she refuses he'll probably try to relieve his boredom by murdering people instead. Which would be worse. 

"...Uh. Can you - ask him if it's okay if the void gives me a drug that isn't heroin but is still fun and will make him not bored anymore?" Marian thinks she can probably sell the school on the therapeutic benefits of something like ketamine. Which incidentally sounds like it would keep him distracted from murdering anyone for, like a while. 

"Yes."

Then Marian is going to go very politely ask the void to please give her some drugs that are known to help with processing trauma, but are also pleasant to take rather than unpleasant. Like ketamine, or MDMA, or– no, she should absolutely not give anyone here psychedelics, regardless of their possible benefits being explored in cutting-edge psych research. 

The void seems to consider this for a bit, and then cheerfully dispenses some little baggies of white crystally-powder stuff. They seem to not all be the same substance; the textures are different. 

....Shit. No sticky note, even. (Maybe the void is trying to give her plausible deniability? No, that makes no sense...) 

"Wen Qing?" she says sheepishly. "Do you, uh, have a spell that could check if this is toxic? I don't know what it is except that it meets the specifications I gave the void." 

"My spell thinks all alcohol is poison, but does it matter if he dies? He's a maleficer, if he's alive he'll just kill people."

"O.....kaaaaaaay." 

Marian thinks this is NOT how medical ethics work, actually! 

She turns back to the void. "Can you please label them for me again?" 

With a vague feeling of grumbly reluctance, the void spits out some sticky notes. 

"....Okay." One of the drugs is MDMA and one of them is ketamine and Marian, having never seen either one before, has no idea which is which. 

She is absolutely not giving both of them to this kid, though, he'll probably take it all at once and then something terrible will happen. 

"- Here," she says, and offers him one of the packets at random. "Uh, Wen Qing, you can tell him that if he wants he can come back again tomorrow and have more drugs, but that's a day worth of drugs." 

"Thank you!"

Free chocolate, free drugs... school is awesome actually.

What the fuck did she just DO??? 

"- Oh uh and please tell him he needs to stay here until the drugs kick in!" Marian adds hastily. "Just in case it's a bad batch or he's allergic or something." 

He already has the drugs! Sayonara, Marian!

- okay, you know what, whatever. He can make his choices and hopefully they'll involve less murder than they otherwise would. Marian is fairly sure that whichever drug he actually got, both MDMA and ketamine are not exactly the kind of high that make you feel murdery. 

She will wait to see if he's actually going to walk out before conferring with Wen Qing on how much of a disaster that was. It could have been worse? He didn't even get slightly violent with her? And possibly if he approves of her, he might be willing to help guard her from monsters later? ...This is probably a really unethical motive to have, as the school nurse, but Marian has limited options for keeping herself alive, okay. 

A cautious head pokes around the door. "Is the terrifying maleficer gone?" its owner says in English.

"Yes, Huaisang."

...Okay, apparently she in fact cannot debrief with Wen Qing because they have another patient. 

Game face on. "Hi!" Marian says brightly. "I'm Marian, the school nurse. What's going on?" 

"I'm bad at paying attention to details and focusing on my work. And I'm very disorganized. And I don't like doing tasks that require mental effort. And I lose things. And I blurt out answers and interrupt people and fidget and I feel very restless all the time. It feels like I'm driven by a motor." He says this with tremendous sincerity.

Oh noooooooooooo the tiny child is adorable. And also has no business being in the magic death school, due to being a tiny child and adorable. 

...and is clearly reciting a script he has memorized in order to get diagnosed with ADHD and be prescribed stimulants. Marian has taken pharmacology. And, more to the point, she's hung out with judgy doctors. And has herself been a college student who was friends with other college students. 

Is she - actually going to try to gatekeeping ADHD drugs here? In the horrible death school? It's not like the FDA - well, the Canadian equivalent of it anyway, she can literally never remember what it's called - is going to be tracking her overprescription of controlled substances and giving her an unpleasant phone call. 

"...Right," she says, also with as much sincerity as she can muster. "I'm sorry to hear that. Is this - causing you distress or difficulties in class or in your social life?" 

"Oh, yes, ma'am. I have a lot of difficulties in school."

"And that's - pretty bad here, right? Because your homework will try to eat you if you fall behind?" 

Marian glances at Wen Qing in hopes of picking up some sort of cue to tell her if she's on the right track here. 

"Terrible," he says. "Very bad. I'm so scared of being eaten by a homework."

"I think it violates the ethics for me to have an opinion because he's my enclavemate."

This is way too high-stakes for Marian's first time attempting to responsibly prescribe Adderall (or...fuck...she definitely knows there are other ADHD meds and that different people have different side effects and benefits but she's blanking on the name– oh, Ritalin is another one, but shit there are like five others she's pretty sure exist -). 

"That makes sense," she says to Wen Qing, in her best reassuring tone of voice.

And she turns back to the newcomer. "It sounds like you would medically benefit from trying some drugs that are known to help with, uh, brain problems that make it difficult to focus in school. And, uh, maybe I should also do the other screening, in case it's relevant...?" 

She scrambles for her copy of the Beck depression inventory again. Since this kid speaks English, she doesn't need Wen Qing to translate. 

Oh, shit, this wasn't on his list.

Uh, so probably if he gives a lot of 4s she's going to give him some kind of medications he doesn't want, but if he gives a lot of 0s then she's going to think he's okay and not give him any medicine. He eventually decides on mostly 1s with a sprinkling of 2s and 0s. 

....Marian is concerned but she's not exactly sure where to point her concern? On the one hand, the numbers she's adding up aren't great? On the other hand, this tiny child is TOTALLY trying to guess the right answers that will game the system and get him ADHD drugs? On the mutant third hand, he a) probably really needs those to not die, and b) has like a thousand excellent reasons to be actually depressed? 

She ends up just adding the total score in silence. "- We'll go over this clinical tool later," she tells Wen Qing. "Don't let me forget." 

And - shit damn it she's terrible she cannot at ALL remember the adorable tiny child's name. 

"Um, h...ey?" She tries to very obviously make eye contact with him. "I'm going to ask the void for some drugs that might help you with school, okay? And...I think you should try that first, but I want to talk to you again in a couple of days? Let's say, uh, Monday. There are a bunch of different drugs that can help with this problem, and different people do better on different ones, and they could also have a lot of side effects -" 

Fuck what are the side effects of amphetamines she KNOWS THIS - 

"...You should be extra careful to eat enough and drink enough water?" she says. "These drugs can make it easy to forget to do that." 

And she's going to go ask the void for more drugs, now that she's probably checked off enough of the requirements for proving they're medically indicated. (It's like the world's worst video game....)

"It also causes sleep disturbances, irritability, and high blood pressure, and while risk of addiction is low with oral use it increases if smoked, injected, or inhaled!" chirps the tiny child. 

Marian isn't sure that she's EVER had such an intense feeling of 'adorable!' and 'concern!' mixed together at the same time. 

"...Exactly," she manages. "Just - be careful and come back sooner if you're having bad side effects, all right? And, uh, you shouldn't take it now it's too late in the day and it'll keep you up all night. Try tomorrow morning." 

"I also need nicotine gum!" he says. "Because I used to smoke."

"You did what."

"I used to smoke! Horrible habit! Three packs a day!"

- wow that is definitely a family sort of interaction and Marian is missing all the context. Ah well. She can sync up with Wen Qing afterward, and it's not like nicotine gum is especially dangerous. 

(...Plausibly this kid is a drug dealer? Then again, just yesterday Marian was encouraging Wendy to be a drug dealer of Adderall and antipsychotics. She's in a different world, here. And - it makes a difference, right? That the kid is asking for substances that will plausibly be valuable to other kids because they help you stay alive and not get eaten by homework assignments? One of Marian's colleagues lent her nicotine gum once during an especially brutal night shift, and Marian's main recollection is that it was the nastiest thing she had ever put in her mouth but it did, in fact, give her a desperately-needed half hour of ability to think.) 

"Sure," she says. "I'll ask the void for that too." 

The void apparently does not have nicotine gum! Instead it gives her a box of 20mg nicotine patches, and some sort of weird sleek black cartridge of 'Nicotine Mouth Spray 1mg per spray'. Which at least has instructions written on the back of it. 

"This is what I got," Marian says, holding it out. "Uh, should I go through the written instructions on the packages with you?" Obviously she should, if she's trying to be responsible here, but also she super desperately wants a break. 

"Yes please! I want to make very sure I'm using it right!"

Then Marian will very conscientiously pull out the instructions packet from the box of nicotine patches and read everything to him, and likewise with the weird spray-cartridge thingy. Apparently patches are supposed to be very good for quitting smoking because they give you a slow constant dose of nicotine rather than the fast spike from smoking. The cartridge is meant to be sprayed under your tongue and should give a very fast effect; it only has 150 doses in it, though. 

"Thank you! I will absolutely use this to treat my inability to concentrate and my smoking!"

He's so earnest and sweet and almost certainly lying most of the time! ...Why does she find that adorable. She's a terrible person. 

Marian wishes him the best of luck and, once she's answered all his questions, ushers him out with a week's worth of Ritalin and the nicotine stuff. 

She sighs and flops down onto one of the cots. "....Wen Qing, I am almost sure he's selling those, and the worst part is that I'm not sure I care." 

It... probably isn't an ethical violation if Marian asked her?

"He's absolutely selling them. He has a store in his room and he's planning to make the alcohol. --Lan Xichen would crack down on him if he sold the things that hurt people, it's not good for Shanghai's image for us to sell the bad product."

And there's another knock on the door.

"- Yeah. That's why I don't really mind. I - the students here need every edge to survive. It's...probably actually not great for brain development, but, like, apparently only a quarter of people here even graduate? So, I don't know. I think that changes the cost-benefit analysis kind of a lot." 

She's so tired. She's not qualified for this and she's been running on adrenaline and bravado all day and she's so tired. 

....aaaaughhhhhh damn it fuck shit– she's good she's chill she can handle this. 

Marian goes to open the door. "Yeah? What is it?" 

"If this isn't a good time I can come back later. I just wanted to introduce myself. I'm Ribo."

Oh, phew, not an emergency. That's way better. 

"Hi Ribo! I'm Marian, the new school nurse. This is Wen Qing. She's a student here and she's apprenticing with me." 

"It's good to meet you both." She repeats herself in Mandarin.

"I speak the English."

Oops, it was interrupted as patronizing not polite. "I'll stick to that then, unless Marian speaks both. What led you to seek out this apprenticeship?"

"I have a healing affinity. I want to learn to use it better."

"That sounds useful. Do you happen to know Lojban?"

"Is that... an indigenous language?"

"It's a constructed language. Some mundanes made it up from scratch. My mother composes most of her spells in it."

"...Oh, right, it's that one! I have heard of that, I think. It's - not Esperanto, that's a language people made up specifically to be really really easy to learn, except it didn't catch on because - I don't know, just turns out it's more complicated than that I guess. Lojban is...the one based on logic, like, programming style? Sorry, I don't actually know very much programming. Although now I'm wondering if you could theoretically get spells in, like, Python." 

Aaaaand oops now she's rambling again and probably making no sense whatsoever to Wen Qing. 

"Yep, you remembered correctly. Most programming languages are basically English with different grammar. I don't think that would work for spells but someone might be able to make it work. The reason I was asking, and part of the reason I came to talk with you is that Mother taught me a class of diagnostic spells and also some minor biomancy and I thought that might be helpful. You don't exactly have an MRI machine or a full lab for blood tests."

"That's a lot to know for someone as young as you."

"Is it? I don't have a good sense for how much it's normal to know."

"- I think you can end up knowing a lot of random stuff if you're the sort of kid who reads Wikipedia and random physics textbooks for fun? ...Uh, Ribo, I'm guessing your education was more specific than that, though. Probably elementary school stuff is way less, uh, bullshit for wizards than it is for mundanes." 

"I wouldn't really know, this is the first school I've been to."

"Were you, like, homeschooled?" Marian glances at Wen Qing. "...Come to think of it, I have no idea what your schooling was like either. What do wizard kids normally do, before they arrive at the Scholomance?" 

"I was, Mother taught me most of what I know, the rest is things I picked up from the internet in my spare time."

"The adult wizards in our enclave taught us what we'd need to know."

This is probably an incredibly awkward question, but - 

"Did they, uh, miss anything important? I mean, was there anything you ended up wishing that you'd learned as a kid, that you found out once you were in here?"

"The biology?"

"...Oh, right - like, all the medical related biology? Uh, do you think they should've taught everyone more of that, or is it just specifically useful for you?" 

"I think my education was well-rounded otherwise? I learned the poetry, the Chinese classics, the languages, the math, the history, the magical theory, the qin playing, the Go, the calligraphy, the painting..."

....Marian feels like she kind of lost the plot somewhere in the middle of all that. 

"Uh, have you - ever actually used your...painting or calligraphy or - whatever 'qin playing' is - in here?" 

"There aren't any qin in here, but I've used the painting and the calligraphy to keep the spellbooks happy. If you don't keep them happy they'll wander off. They're also the good ways of building the mana."

"...Huh. They come alive too, I guess? - Uh, what does 'building mana' mean?" 

"In order to power spells without being a maleficer you have to do effortful things. Like exercising or doing very hard calligraphy."

"....Huh? Is it, like, literally metabolic effort? As in, do wizards - burn more calories and need to eat more food if they're making more mana?" 

"I don't think so? The Lan gain mana by meditating and I don't think they need to eat more."

"....Okay, weird. - Is meditating hard in the right way? I've done a little bit and it - doesn't really seem hard in the way that exercise is." 

"They call it meditating but I think it's a specific way of thinking that's very hard and effortful?"

Well, it's not like it's really any weirder than anything else about this place or their horrible death magic system. 

"- Right." Marian glances at Ribo, in case she has anything further to add. 

"I build mana by holding Yoga poses for a long time and moving between them very slowly. Anything involving fast movement is enjoyable enough that it builds less. As for gaps in Mother's curriculum, probably social skills. She's not really fond of most people and talking to nobody but her and the occasional patient or internet person... I feel like I make mistakes a bunch."

Social skills is not an academic subject. 

"You seem fine to me," Marian says. (Marian is, herself, perhaps not the most socially graceful or perceptive person in the world.) "Did you have, like, friends on the internet? That's...somehow hard to picture going along with the whole secret wizards thing, but I guess why not." 

"It's not hard to keep magic secret. People mostly think you're joking or doing a bit if you talk about magic online."

"Mmm, yeah, I guess that's just about what I would think! ...Except when I was thirteen and wanted to be Wiccan, I guess, but I'm - not sure I really believe-believed it, I think I just thought it was really cool." 

"Yeah, it's also that real magic doesn't quite match up with the stories people tell. Most people imagine fewer monsters. And it's not like I could share the details of Mother's work that she let me see even if it wasn't magic."

"Right, makes sense. Uh, what sort of things did she work on? Or is that secret even here." 

"I think some of it is supposed to be secret, other stuff was like finding ways to cure specific cancers, or other rare conditions. I think her overall priority is trying to apply knowledge she's gained with magic to creating mundane cures but she tends to bounce off because of all the procedural work required. She also wants to invent external wombs because she didn't like being pregnant but that's been harder."

"She– whoa! That's really cool! I've read a bit about mundane artificial womb research - it sounds like they're getting together a prototype that could keep really really preemie fetuses alive outside the womb? But making something that can carry a whole pregnancy sounds way harder." 

"It is, though the hardest part with magic is making sure the final result isn't using magic so it doesn't turn into a Mal or turn the fetus into one. Mother is pretty accustomed to that though, we have very through precautions for containing things if they turn into Mals."

"Your mother sounds great. I'd love to meet her." Wen Qing has a flexible attitude towards things turning into mals.

"She said I was allowed to bring interesting friends to meet her but that I shouldn't send upperclassmen who graduated before me unless I had a really important message."

"That makes sense, I'll wait."

Ribo smiles.

Marian would also really like to meet Ribo’s mother, but that’s not going to happen, is it. She looks down at her feet and tries not to look visibly upset.

She doesn't fully succeed. "Are you okay?"

“Yeah.” Shrug. “I guess I wish I could meet your mom someday, is all.”

"Yeah, that would be nice. The people who added the nurse to the school didn't really think things through carefully enough."

"It was a good idea when they thought the school would be safer."

"Has the school, uh, been getting more dangerous over time? That seems bad." 

"I think it's stabilized at its current level of bad but when it was first created almost everyone survived."

"What, uh, actually changed?" 

"They were supposed to kill the mals in the graduation hall before graduation but the machinery broke."

"Oh. That sucks." 

Marian isn't really sure what else to say. 

"It does."

Ribo pauses for a few moments and then, "I didn't really expect you to have an apprentice so maybe you don't need much help but if you do find yourself in need of diagnostics I have Mother's notes on how to cast and interpret her diagnostic spells. Please let me know if I can be helpful."

"I'd be interested in learning the diagnostic spells. Perhaps we can arrange a trade?"

"I can make an attempt at translating them but I don't really have any experience at doing that so I don't know how easy it is. I doubt you want to pick up a new language with a weird grammar just for diagnostic spells."

"That's probably unwise," she says with obvious disappointment.

"I'll fiddle with it a little in my spare time and if I have something I'm confident enough in I might ask you to spot me the mana to test."

"Awesome, I'd love to."

"Alright then, I'll let you get back to whatever you were doing. I hope you have a nice day."

“I’d be interested in being able to call on you if something comes up, at least?" Marian jumps in. "Since, yeah, no lab or diagnostic imagery here - though I sort of wonder if a good alchemist could come up with something for on-the-spot basic blood tests..." That can be a thought for LATER. "Anyway, uh, would there be a good way to contact you in an emergency?" 

"I don't really know, my room is 225B but I don't expect to spend too much time there. Maybe I can make a tiny communication thing in shop. Also here's my schedule, you can copy that down."

"Thanks!" Marian will do that. 

"It was nice meeting you both." She waves.

Just before dinner, Val shows up, a little out of breath. He's surprised to see another student. "Sorry, didn't realize anyone else was here, I can come back tomorrow."

"Hi!" Marian says brightly. (Also: oh, right, he's that kid. Mildly awkward!) "Uh, this is Wen Qing. I think I'd mentioned I had an apprentice? It's her. She's learning medicine." 

"What can I help you with?"

"Oh, um, congratulations on your job, what hours are you working?"

"Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday afternoons."

So, in the future he should see the nurse on Tuesday, Thursday, or Sunday, got it. Unless maybe having a wizard around is safer? "That's really cool. Anyway, I just came here to let Marian know I do have books she can read but not right now and to ask if I should be picking up any of the other stuff we talked about right now or if I should come back later."

"I follow the medical confidentiality," Wen Qing says, "and will never reveal anything said in here to anyone other than Marian."

"That's good."

"- Do you want to talk for a minute in private?" Marian asks Val. "We can go in my bedroom." 

Surely it can't be that hard to tell him a number of milligrams and hand him a thing? Wait. Maybe this student is holding her hostage and lying about being an apprentice. "Sure, that sounds like a good idea."

She ducks into the bedroom with him and shuts the door. 

"Listen, I - know why you feel really private about your medical needs, it makes a lot of sense, and I would never tell Wen Qing about it without your consent. But I think it's a good idea for her to know? Because, I mean -" 

Deep breath. 

"Because I'm going to die, right. You know that. And I've already told Wen Qing that she has permission to read all of my notes if - when - that happens, and at that point you'd need to go to her anyway for followup. And it'll be better for continuity of care if she's already up to speed." 

Marian is not going to cry she is NOT. 

"Oh, I was assuming I would just not get any more hormones after you died."

"- Oh. I'm hoping that I can try to figure out something with an alchemist student and make a potion version that lasts a lot longer? Or at least that if I'm really nice to the void and flatter it a lot and also tell it what a great student Wen Qing is, maybe it'll be willing to accept her as my successor and give her drugs too."

She's already considering whether she can remember enough of the RN licensing exam to put together a test and convince the void that Wen Qing is a qualified nurse– oh wait she's an idiot she can just ask it for a copy of the exam, duh, that's totally medical reference material. 

"Huh. That sounds neat. Anyway, you can tell her, I guess, but is there anything I need to take with me or anything right now?"

"I think your dose of T should be good for now? I did finish reading that pamphlet, though, so I can go through the basics with you - uh, just a second, let me get out my notes - and then you can take the booklet to read through on your own time?" 

"If I can take the booklet anyway do you mind if I just head to dinner? I just really don't want to be late again."

"- Sure, yeah, sounds fine." 

And they can duck out of Marian's bedroom so she can grab the stapled printout from the relevant shelf and hand it over. 

"Thanks! I'll come show you some books another time!"

Wen Qing is going to wait patiently to be told information.

"Cool!"

She waits until Val leaves. 

"...Sorry. He has a - medical thing that needs drugs - and he's very private about it. He sort of said it was okay to tell you, but didn't seem very comfortable about it? And I don't think it's super urgent, since, uh, I already gave you permission to read all of my notes if I die and I cleared that with him. But hopefully he can build some more rapport later on." 

And they can continue with Wen Qing's lesson until dinner.