#sawbones showdown

[sawbones-showdown]

[dropitdoeeyes]

mvr #1 tumblr medical boy

[tournamentdirectory]

Betwixt th’years of a hundred times seventeen and nineteen, a great deal of surgeons did operate! @sawbones-showdown cuts to the bone on the issue of who the best fictional surgeon or doctor operating then was!

[chiropteracupola]

If I was a blackbird, I'd whistle, I'd sing / I'd follow the vessel my true love sails in...

[flintlock fortress is a collaboration with @dxppercxdxver]

[dxppercxdxver]

in which medic returns from sick leave and is suspicious of the fate of his interim replacement (this is a fic i wrote purely because i and @chiropteracupola thought it would be extremely funny)

contracts being as they were with tf industries, vacations weren't so much requested as they were foisted upon oneself after grievous injury. in medic's unfortunate case, a sudden and nasty bout of pneumonia the medigun simply wasn't cut out to handle had whacked him upside the head one otherwise average week in july, and after passing out from the exertion—drenched in sweat beneath his coat, genuinely slick with the stuff—on the battlefield, a menacingly plain envelope stamped with the seal of the administrator landed itself on his desk, requesting in a way that was really demanding that he make himself scarce until he was fit for duty again.

medic had no argument, and packed his bags as soon as he was able to pry his burning face off the cool metal table.

he had been gone for longer than he wanted. what he had anticipated to be a few days' absence at most stretched into almost a month, bedridden and aching in a cheap hostel a few towns over (teufort, obviously, was hardly an option, what with the entire infrastructure operating almost exclusively on flagrant osha violations and the townspeople's penchant for hangings). it was hardly the most ideal of circumstances, but he recovered all the same, slowly but surely, chomping at the bit to return to the dustbowl and his most loyal patients. medic hoped his teammates missed him; he liked to think he provided a valuable service to RED and that the men around him agreed. after all, his skills were unparalleled. the poor fellows must have been miserable without him.

the day he was set to return to the quarry, he phoned ahead to miss pauling's private number he'd stolen from one of spy's personnel files to let her know he was coming—ignoring her sputtering disbelief in the process—and threw his belongings into a small deerskin suitcase, saluting the hostel owner with his fingers crossed behind his back.

during his unintended sick leave, little had changed. of course, it had only been a month or so, but after residing in the quarry almost four years with no interruption, a month felt like an eternity. he half expected the place to be burned to the ground, and to see it still standing was some sort of miracle, to be sure. straightening his back, medic buttoned his coat and strode inside.

miss pauling was there to greet him at the door, smile the widest he'd ever seen it. just beyond the foyer, the rest of the team stood in perfect alignment, similarly amiable expressions on their faces. while medic was glad to be appreciated, such behavior was wildly unsettling from a group of men whose primary off-shift occupation was ignoring each other or shouting. even sniper was looking at him with a strange fondness.

with a hesitant wave, medic greeted them quietly. "hello?"

"medic, hi!" miss pauling cried, rushing forward. "so glad to see you, can i take your bag? to your lab, right?"

"i— okay." in but an instant, medic's suitcase was snatched out of his hand and miss pauling was marching him down the corridor toward the medbay, gleeful demeanor never wavering. her knuckles were nearly white around the handle. their teammates followed like a silent parade, a welcoming entourage medic was beginning to grow incredibly suspicious of.

"quite the reception here today," he said lightly, peering through the cracked doors that lined the hall. "is everything alright?"

"yeah, 'course, everything's good, why would you even say something like that?" scout piped up from behind him, gesticulating wildly. "we're all super here, doc, absolutely nothin' to see, i can tell ya that."

so something was absolutely wrong.

trying to lighten the mood, medic did his best to crack a joke. "did someone die while i was gone?"

rather pointedly, no one responded. miss pauling simply looped her arm under his elbow and steered him off toward the lab, flinging the door open for him like an enthusiastic chauffeur.

medic was delighted to see that, even with an interim replacement having taken up residence in his quarters, the medbay was just as he had left it, in all its chaotic organization that really only he could understand properly. piles of papers were strewn about on every available surface, his pens tossed into a cup on his desk, and archimedes fluttered down from his rafter perch to settle upon his shoulder.

idly scratching at his beloved bird's chest, medic looked around the office, noting one unusual item out of place.

a metal carrying case sat upon one of the stacks of documents like a paperweight, clean and shining under the fluorescent light. medic was certain this case was not his, and pointed at it with a questioning cock of the head.

"go on, open it," miss pauling said, and the others nodded in vigorous agreement.

he approached the case with some level of consternation, bordering on dread. it was a high quality thing, with well-oiled hinges and a nicely sprung lock. simple etchings decorated the lid, with faint initials scrawled into the center. under the glare, medic couldn't quite make them out, but he reached for the clasp all the same.

inside, pristine medical tools reflected his illness-haggard face back at him; scalpels, syringes, a small saw, scissors, and pins of all sizes were arrayed on a deep red velvet backing, beautiful as any he had ever seen. the blades were sharpened to a wicked edge, and medic could only imagine the ease with which they would cut through skin and tissue and... whatever else he needed them to cut through.

they were lovely, and presumably worth a small fortune, and absolutely, fantastically out of place.

turning to his team, medic fought with equally strong emotions of gratitude and confusion.

"what... how... where did you get these?"

"happy birthday, fella," sniper said, by way of what he probably meant to be an explanation that didn't actually answer anything at all.

medic frowned. "my birthday isn't for several months."

"yeah, well, we just wanted to let ya know how much we appreciated ya. for all the work you do. cutting us open, sticking birds in our chests—" as he spoke, scout counted off items on his bandaged fingers, and medic noted a faint spattering of blood on the gauze, "—and really just bein' an all around pal."

"...really."

"yup!" miss pauling interjected, sidling over to the rest of the team. "really, you've just been such an excellent addition to RED's roster, we wanted to show you how much you meant to us and the administrator."

pursing his lips, medic gently shooed archimedes from his shoulder, closing the lid of the case. "i... see. and you are sure everything is fine?"

"fine and dandy." from near the back of the small hoard crowding his doorway, engineer piped up with a double thumbs-up for emphasis. "right as rain, and all that."

"of course." medic paused, considering the oddly untouched state of his office. "how was my replacement?"

"oh, him? he was— he was good," miss pauling said a little too loudly, waving her hand in what was almost certainly meant to be a dismissive gesture that instead nearly succeeded in clocking pyro across the jaw. "a real gentleman, that one, barely made any trouble for us. and, just, like. reeeeally good at medicine." the grin that stretched across her face was so full of perfectly white teeth medic swore he would go blind.

everything about this situation was suspect, medic knew this, but he also wasn't sure how to get to the bottom of it without discovering more than he actually wanted to know. so instead, he flashed a smile of his own, flashing a loose wave.

"well. thank you all for this gift," he said, eyeing the case warily, "and this... warm return, but i really must get to unpacking. science to be done, and all of that."

"sure, sure, gotcha." ushering everyone out of the room, miss pauling was nodding so hard medic half thought her head was liable to snap off. "great having you back, medic. love ya."

and with that, the team was gone, and medic was left alone.

the first thing he did was inspect the contents of his desk. much of it was just how he remembered it, but hidden amongst his stacks of medical histories and experimental notes, he found a fabric binder stuffed to the brim with papers. the binder, much like the case, was definitely not his, and...

was that blood?

the corner of the binder, though the cloth was a deep green to begin with, was suspiciously darker, soaked through with something that smelled vaguely of copper. upon opening it, the papers contained within boasted the same smears of blood. large passages of text were haphazardly blocked out with what appeared to be a permanent marker. as he flipped through, medic marveled at the thoroughness of the covering up; he could make out very little, aside from the barely-there presence of a name typed up on a page of letterhead.

plucking the page out of its place, medic held it up against the case, tipping it away from the bulbs.

g.h. was etched into the case, and the paper, where it was legible, read "gre—" before it dissolved into inky blood.

well, medic thought, gingerly placing the letterhead into his trashcan, that answered a great many questions.

all that was left was to find where the carnage ended.

medic peeked through the glass in the lab's door, ensuring the halls were empty, before slinking across the tile floor to the one of the rooms they had passed on the way in.

it was a storage room that frequently doubled as a secondary site for engineer's less than high priority experiments, and droplets of blood were clearly visible on the linoleum just outside. when he pushed the door inward, yet more appeared, in streams and smears across the floor. medic followed the trail with his eyes, all the way up to a monstrous machine the size of a small bus. silver and aluminum and copper twinkled in the darkness, lit only where the light from the hall bypassed medic's silhouette and touched the metal. the plating gleamed, obviously freshly cleaned.

as medic examined the nature of the contraption, his gaze was drawn to all manner of pistons and conveyor belts and rotating drums covered in vicious looking spikes. it was, all in all, designed to kill a person extremely efficiently and impersonally, which meant it could only have been engineer's work.

the dissonance between the gore-streaked floor and the spotless machinery was almost poetic, medic supposed.

"ah well. auf wiedersehn," he murmured, resting a gloved hand on one of the plates with an air of solemnity, before exiting the storeroom and pulling the door closed behind him. whoever his replacement was, it was obvious he was lost to the ages now.

but hey, at least he got some sweet new medical equipment out of the deal.

[maritime-matchups]

the thrilling sequel to @sawbones-showdown...

THE MARITIME MATCHUPS!

since we all clearly had a good and fun and non-stressful time watching the doctors fight to death in the pit, let's try it out again with another genre of character that is so very guaranteed to cause no infighting or pain...

and that is the FICTIONAL NAVAL OFFICER!

here are some guidelines about the precise flavor of fellow that I am looking for:

fictional fellows preferred, but you may submit fictionalizations of real naval officers as well. go wild!

we are hunting for organization and structure and gold braid here. privateers, pirates, and other professional boat leaders of non-naval persuasions need not apply, unless they previously held a significant naval position

should operate primarily between the years 1700-1900, or in any setting heavily inspired by these eras

you may submit as many characters as you please, but each one only once, if you would be so kind

questions? ask away, if there’s any confusion!

[trusting you all to be normal about this one. please be normal.]

[neitherabaron]

as one of the co-pollrunners of sawbones showdown, i just wanted to say:

1) congrats on your honorary victory!

2) the amount of of Fear that went through mine and em’s hearts when we saw you’d Seen The Poll was Astronomical

3) thanks for having some fun with surgeons with us :)

I have been sleeping on my asks for far too long, sorry!

This was a delight and I am extremely second-hand honoured if that makes sense!

Apologies for causing you Fear. In hindsight, maybe I shouldn’t have reblogged, I was tickled pink when I saw it but then when the percentages started to change I became worried that I tipped the scales too much, so apologies if that’s the case.

[butler-battle-bracket]

another bracket from those responsible for inflicting @sawbones-showdown and @maritime-matchups on the hapless citizens of tumblr dot com, it's time to get geared up for the

BUTLER BATTLE BRACKET!

this time around, we're calling all fictional butlers, stewards, gentlemen's gentlemen, and all other fellows of this flavor!

this time, we'll set no historical time limit, but do recognize the Vibe we're aiming for here, and act accordingly.

act accordingly in general - please remember that the pollrunner is a human being who will be reading quite nearly everything you write in this form and on these polls as a whole.

as before, keep it to one submission per character, altho' you may submit as many characters as you please!

further questions? ask away, if there's any confusion!

SUBMISSIONS ARE OPEN UNTIL JULY 31st, 10PM PACIFIC TIME!

[les-mis-guy-supreme]

🩻

finally got to answer this bc it wouldn't show up on my laptop </3

🩻 What’s the best piece of propaganda you’ve gotten from this tourney?

I have a few from the spreadsheet that i find really funny so look below :3c

other notes:

someone just submitted JAVERT. no propaganda. not like. anything??? they just javert'd me i guess

someone else submitted napoleon and for propaganda copypasted the entire etre libre speech

i learned about several video games. i want to play them now

my sibling hijacked the submissions form and started submitting half of the amis

this includes bahorel, who i will admit was the only auto at the beginning lmao. he's my favourite if it matters

i miscounted and had to put joly in the bracket myself because i felt bad :( me and sawbones-showdown bonded over this it was nice

thank you to everyone who submitted the french horns that was very cool of you <3

[sailorpants]

fuck it we ball (gonna watch m & c again for the second night in a row). also vote stephen maturin on sawbones showdown he needs our help.

[sawbones-showdown]

[tauremornalome]

how the fuck is marius von raum winning the sawbones showdown..... like yes i am of course his most devoted fan but. there were so many more characters better qualified to make it to the final round

[chiropteracupola]

visual reminder to maybe go over to @sawbones-showdown and cast your vote for the coolest parmesan-carrying, wounded-at-Fontenoy, no-nonsense-taken doctor that robert louis stevenson ever wrote

[trupowieszcz-moved]

Rules: List 10 songs you’re currently obsessed with and tag 10 people

@matt-fuckin-cameron thanks for the tag!

1. Touch-Tone Telephone - Lemon Demon

2. Ultimate Showdown - Lemon Demon

3. Lifetime Achievement Award - Lemon Demon

4. Buried Alive - Creature Feature

5. Nearly Departed - Creature Feature

6. Dem Bones - Creature Feature

7. We Built This City - Starship

8. Brandon Lee - The 69 Eyes

9. Velvet Touch (Savage Garden Version) - The 69 Eyes

10. I Want To Break Free - Queen

@phase2 @doc-sawbones @androidgays @all-ringils-blazing @fata-sidvs-oritvr @diekrotethesecond @gay-ghostboy @raven-clique @finn-a-human @livilazuli and anybody else who wants to do that

[quixoticrobotic]

Oh butts, I dun hecked up. If you'll let me, I'd like to retry that. 2. Fruits or veggies? Fave of each? 4. Fave webshow(s)? 5. Current fave musical? (didn't Lemon Demon do "the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny"? And Sound of Tomorrow is SUCH a good song) 8. Favorite animal?

no worries, its fine!

2. fruit! the only healthy thing i like

4. WELCOME TO ATOP THE FOURTH WALL WHERE BAD COMICS BURN LINKARAS GONNA TEACH YOU ALL A LESSON YOU WONT LE

ive also had a huge crush on Lindsey Ellis since before i knew i was gay, i love her work, especially her newer stuff, she shaped my sense of humor a lot. i also like the podcasts Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine and Dice Funk (even though i havent listened to the former in awhile and am still bitter about the season 2 ending of the latter)5. hmmmmm….im gonna say Sweeny Todd just bc its a very October thing for me because its the closest thing to slasher movies that i like (yes! also lemon demon is just Neil Cicierega, same dude who did mouth sounds, potter puppet pals, ariel needs legs, and brodyquest) 8. *commander cosmo voice* ALL OF THEM

[thatgirlonstage]

Podcast Challenge 3/9/18

Bolded means I listened to an episode today. Strikethrough means I’m all caught up and waiting for the next episode, or the podcast is complete!

The Adventure Zone | Alice Isn’t Dead | The Bright Sessions | Bubble | Can I Pet Your Dog? | Conversations with People Who Hate Me | Critical Role | Ear Hustle | The Flop House | It Makes a Sound | The McElroy Brothers Will Be in Trolls 2 | My Brother, My Brother, and Me | My Dad Wrote a P*rno | The Orbiting Human Circus of the Air | Sawbones | Shmanners | The Thrilling Adventure Hour | Welcome to Night Vale | Within the Wires | Wonderful!

Podcast: Bubble

Episode: S1E6: Into the Brush

Time: 27 min, 60% of goal

Commentary:

Okay so now there’s Mission Beach as well, whatever that is. This world is expanding too rapidly without establishing the parts it already has first

Episode: S1E7: Shareables

Time: 28 min, 62% of goal

Commentary:

Eli letting Morgan go is the first moment of really genuine emotion I’ve gotten from this podcast, which is not GREAT, because the controlling-but-secretly-caring father is a trope I have iffy feelings about and I just don’t think we’ve had enough development of any characters for me to know how I feel about this show’s interpretation

Episode: S1E8: Die Hard

Time: 33 min, 73% of goal

Commentary:

Yeah, so, my opinion on the show is that the whole thing hasn’t earned this massive showdown yet, nor Bonnie’s backstory in the brush. It’s too eager to establish a huge world to explore and send the stakes sky-high that it’s forgetting to actually explore the world and dangers that it HAS created. We’re going into the brush and then into Mission Beach and back on the quest for a doomsday weapon while I still want to know more about Fairhaven and the Dark District and the imps. I’ll keep listening because I think there’s a lot of potential here, but I think that its first season is clunky, rushed, over-exposited (can we PLEASE get rid of the narrator) and under-explored.

Podcast: Can I Pet Your Dog?

Episode: 11: Janine Kahn and Dogfriend Club

Time: 57 min, 127% of goal

Commentary:

So... I have no idea how this could have happened, I really do not get it, but somehow the audio of this episode is... not the audio of this episode. I assume it’s somehow been switched with a different episode? Again... no earthly idea how that would work. But they’re talking about it being December and doing dog gifs and stuff even though the episode is dated to October, and then the guest is not who the title says it is - it’s John Ross Bowie. Who is the title guest of Episode 72. So. I guess we’ll find out when we get there if Episode 72 is really Episode 11 somehow. How??? But anyway, I feel vindicated about the fact that I felt like I had missed something and they were talking about discussions and segments that they definitely hadn’t done before.

Podcast: The Flop House

Episode: #53 - Hannah Montana: The Movie

Time: 58 min, 129% of goal

Commentary:

Oh god I think I remember seeing the trailers for this movie there’s a flashback I wasn’t expecting

Podcast: It Makes a Sound

Episode: S1E2: Genius and Location

Time: 29 min, 64% of goal

Commentary:

So like... she’s very clearly a massively unreliable narrator, I just can’t figure out HOW unreliable. Also I’m genuinely concerned for her mental health.

Podcast: My Brother, My Brother, and Me

Episode: 165: Johnny Billyseed

Time: 59 min, 131% of goal

Commentary: 

I want to meet a dog called Larry’s Fiesta Party on the House

Podcast: My Dad Wrote a P*rno

Episode: S3E1 - ‘London; Thursday 15.55 Local Time’

Time: 41 min, 91% of goal

Commentary:

Here we fucking go, I’m so ready for book 3. It’s already so ridiculous I’m so psyched.

Total Listening: 5hr 32 min, 738% of goal