the_last_resort | Blackmoon Celebration

They are traditional.

I would say the taste is not bad, but I'm currently feeling a bit ill that I ever ate one. [He's not feeling that bad, but Narvin is sometimes prone to exaggeration. And he is still feeling a bit odd now that he really considers the fact that dactyl eggs do, as Kay said, "come out of a flying lizard's ass."

And then he watches Kay watching.]

Do you see something amiss?

[He slides his eyes over to Narvin, slowly, and then back out to the crowd.] Saw someone I thought had nice formal wear for the time period. Pretty functional.

But if I had saw something dangerously amiss, by duty and obligation I would not have informed you, but I would have done something about it. [He very slightly tips his cup to the crowd.] That said, seems like a funny tradition from what I've seen. Why do you have it?

[He looks down to his cup. It's getting empty. It gets lobbed onto a passing tray.]

Edited 2014-07-13 06:48 (UTC)

[Narvin's eyes widen in pre-rant agitation, and he takes a deep breath.

...And lets it out slowly.

He wants to shout, to yell out that he's Lord High Chancellor, head of on and off world security and he demands to know what's going on. But he isn't Chancellor here. And Agent Kay isn't the Castellan and is under no oath to do a single thing Narvin says.

But being starved of information was starting to get to him. If he's not careful, temptation will break him and he'll start hacking computer systems.

He could just see the trial now. "I'm sorry, your Honor, but I was desperate. Surely you wouldn't punish a poor man for stealing a crust of data, a crumb of intel?"

He closes his eyes briefly and focuses on the distraction Kay's question provides. Plasters a mild expression on his face to push away the frustration.]

I'm not sure where the tradition comes from, possibly a hold over from the Dark Times. Gallifreyans ate natural food more frequently then. They are often present at important House gatherings. Loomings and tombings, the ascension of a new kithriarch, that sort of thing.

Uh uh.

[He says it in a tone. His own brand of authoritative, a tone that says he knows what that look means, that someone is upset that they're not getting information that they feel that they're entitled to but aren't actually entitled to, and they're starting to get frustrated with it. But Kay knows it's a slippery slope fro telling one person about one thing to ruining someone's life with a bit of misinformation.]

[So he tips his head and shakes it with his brief "uh uh".] Let me explain a very valuable oft misused but extremely useful phrase in the English language. It's called "calm down". "Calm down" is frequently misinterpreted to mean that the recipient of such phrase has no right to their feelings of anger or unease. For all I know you got some PTSD from a terrorist experience or you're lying through your teeth about the significance of your political affiliation. You know what? I don't care about either because it's your business until you look like you're plannin' something. It's fine. How you feel is what you what you feel. "Calm down" has nothing to do with that.

What "calm down" does mean in it's truest, rawest sense is that the recipient of such statement should consider how fervently they're pursuing their feelings of unease and if what they're doing is actually productive to the situation, not to stop feeling how they feel.

So. "Calm down". You're a technician. If we need you for technical stuff involving a terrorist attack, then we would get ahold of you or the one best suited for exactly what we need, alright? But right now you're a visitor and if you start treating these people as potential threats you're not gonna do many favors to the ones invited into this universe that really need to get away from a bad home and need to make a good impression. You're lookin' pretty high strung.

[He gestures out to the crowd.]

So what's a looming and tombing?[Moving on.]

[Narvin gives the tiniest flinch when Kay mentions PTSD from a terrorist experience. He is quite sure his brain is fine, just fine. He insists upon it, even. He does not have any mental disorder of any sort, and if he did have trauma he'd partition it away. But these recent explosions have got him tense, on edge, prone to nightmares.

But he listens carefully to everything that Kay has to say. And at the end of it all, he nods slowly. He still wants to know everything he can, but Kay has given him something to think about.]

A looming is...I suppose the closest human analogues would be something like a cross between a baby shower and a first birthday. When an infant Gallifreyan is taken from the loom, there is a formal gathering of the House. The name of the newest member is presented and entered into the ledgers. And tombing is much what it sounds like. It is the ceremony where we inter the dead in the crypt after the funeral and the reading of the will, and verify that their consciousness has been uploaded to the Matrix.

[Surprisingly for all the horrors that Kay has been through, that he has seen, he doesn't suffer from the same problems. He can't. Too much depends on him and if he doesn't have a healthy detachment he couldn't allow people to suffer through inappropriate leadership at his hand, bad reflex decisions.]

[And if he doesn't think he can deal with it, he'll quiet literally have it removed from his head and only leave the base information for the event.]

[Kay's pretty level-headed, and he wears his level-headedness now. His hands itch for a cigarette but he doesn't light one up. He doesn't want to put off the dignitaries. Like he's mentioned; this could be a good chance to rehome a lot of people that have nowhere to go, but need better places than one primitive planet of neutral ground.]

Sounds like a nice time. Still probably too much party for you?

Gallifreyan celebrations tend to be much quieter than all of this. [He gestures broadly, indicating not just the party in the gardens but the whole festivities.]

But...well...my House may be my family, but that doesn't mean I entirely get along with them.

Do you have family, Agent Kay?

[Sweet god, in a few words he goes from needing a cigarette to needing some booze. Not even a tick of irritation or any sort of unrest reaches his face, though. Not really irritation at Narvin, just this sense he can't really manage to be sad about something that he very much should be sad about. It just turns into something else in his head, another kind of unhappiness, a sense of regret that he never got to be the father that he feels like he should have been.]

No.

We give 'em up when we become agents.

[Fuck it. He gets out his pack of cigarettes to pack against his hand.]

Do you miss them?

[Narvin thinks it's an innocuous question.]

I can't really take the time, to. [But he does miss them. He misses all those lost chances with his daughter especially.]

I take it you're really missin' home, though.

More like...[he thinks of how to explain it]...I'm missing home as I would like it to be, not as it is or was. I miss an idea of home that has never really existed in the first place. I have always been devoted to my planet, but it isn't all that I'd like it to be, especially these days.

[That earns a little bit longer of a look, and he pulls out a smoke finally. He doesn't light it. He just holds it between his lips.]

What happened to it? It or the idea of it?

[His shoulders slump a little and for the first time his eyes look his age.]

War. Disease. Greed, ambition, lust for power.

I imagined Gallifrey as the centre of civilization. A planet where the people respect the tenets of Rassilon with wisdom, honour, and tradition. A place that stood as the bulwark against chaos and temporal lawlessness. But it isn't, and I don't know if it ever was. Trying to save it has nearly destroyed me. Now, I'm almost afraid to go back. But I have a duty and I can't just run away like a renegade.

My trip here was partially supposed to be a breath of fresh air during a brief moment of peace, but also a reccie to see if there's anything in this universe that might help us.

Ah. I see.

[He fishes out his lighter and looks at the inscription on it, before tilting his head at Narvin.]

I don't think you're doin' any of the breath of fresh air part, are you?

[He crosses his arms over his chest.]

Relaxation doesn't come naturally to me. And I haven't often had opportunity to practice.

What about you? What brings you here? Or is that another question you aren't permitted to answer. [He says with the tiniest hint of a teasing smile, his expression lightening. Frustrating as it is for someone as curious as Narvin to come up against someone as nondisclosing as Kay, as someone in the intelligence business he can appreciate a person who never lets a hint of a leak escape.]

[Without a beat he says-] The fishing. I never have a chance to fish anymore.

This is gonna smell a little bad for you, by the way. [He's at least nice enough to warn him before he lights up, even if the breeze carries it away quickly.]

Fishing. [Narvin repeats, flatly. He's not sure whether to believe Kay or not.]

[His nose twitches at the cigarette smoke, but he manages to keep any expression of distaste for the smell off his face.]

Why do humans smoke? It was all the rage last time I was on Earth, but I've never understood it.

Yeah, nothin' like a nice quiet day out on a lake with nothin' bothering you catchin' fish.

[He looks at the cigarette. Shrugs.]

Nicotine, I guess. Something to do with our mouths that isn't chewing nails.

So what are some other delicacies that you might not eat now? Speaking of fish.

Mammals and their sucking instincts. [He says as if he's forgotten that he, too, is a mammal.]

Well, I'm trying not to think too hard about how you would describe tafelshrew with shlenk blossoms.

I don't know. Those eggs come in a container that keeps the contents pretty well protected from anything outside.

But I can come up with a hell of a description for anything if you give me time. [At least he's honest.] What are you if not a mammal?

Well...technically...I suppose Gallifreyan base genetics are mammalian. But with all the DNA recoding Rassilon did, it hardly seems the same. [Narvin likes to think so anyway.]

Why don't you want to be a mammal? [He asks around his cigarette. But then removes it to smile at an ambassador that's... basically a rock, that passes by.]

It's all a bit primitive. Animalistic. Natural. Not that there's anything wrong with that, I suppose. I know a woman who takes great pride in being primitive and animalistic. It seems to work for her. [But for all that he respects Leela, he still can't help but feel that Time Lord ways are just better somehow.]

[He purses his lips as he thinks about how to explain his thoughts.]

We are technological. Not in the sense that robots are, it's more sophisticated than that. We use technology to manipulate and program biology, to harness and control nature with science rather than be left to nature's whims. In some ways, we're now more like our machines--the most advanced of which are also often living--than we are like the native wildlife. The line between Time Lord biology and technology is a thin one.

[And then Kay, in a glorious display of curiosity, at least waits until the ambassador is well out of the way and there are no dignitaries about before he asks his next question.]

So did you keep nipples or your equipment because it was traditional?

[This is actually a genuine question.]

[Narvin tries to process the question, his eyebrows raised and mouth hanging open. That. Was probably something that nobody has ever asked any Time Lord about before.

Processing...

...processing...

Nope. All mental systems crashing. Instead of a blue screen of death, Narvin's brain failure results in a red face of death as a blush spreads across his cheeks.

Reboot.]

We got rid of navels.

[He doesn't know why he said that. Back to trying to answer the question like a proper detached adult.]

But all the rest is still there and still...ah...mostly standard.

Blackmoon Celebration

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