singillatim | it must be that old evil spirit

it must be that old evil spirit

SEPTEMBER 2024 EVENT

PROMPT ONE — PAINFUL REMINDERS: An Aurora briefly connects the Interlopers to their homeworlds, and with it are able to receive items from home — but these ones will bring no comfort to them.

PROMPT TWO — THE ENEMY WITHIN: Strange and familiar occurrences begin in Milton and Lakeside, growing in frequency and danger for the Interlopers. Who can truly be trusted among their numbers?

PROMPT THREE — BAD BLOOD: The Forest Fighters finally come to Milton, and with it: they bring the yawning grave.

PAINFUL REMINDERS

WHEN: 5th - 9th of September.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: potentially upsetting themes; themes of loneliness/isolation.

For many, the sight of the Aurora is now one they have become used to. There have been plenty of them over the year that has passed since the Interlopers first came to the Northern Territories. Often, they have been a sign of great danger, with plenty of unsettling and unnatural things happening when the skies light up. Other times they have been the herald of aid — a link between Interlopers and Enola, gifting them with abilities to help them survive in this world. There is no real knowing what kind of force the Aurora is, truly. And there is a tension that holds amongst the Interlopers as the day turns to night and there is the soft sound that grows louder.

The ethereal, high-pitched chorus of sounds, is difficult to place. Perhaps it sounds like voices, or discordant strings. And with it, the low-drone of electrical buzz — punctuated with the echoing pops and sharp cracks. The sky is alive with sound, and with it comes the swirling streaking of colour against the inky black of night, growing brighter and brighter as time goes on — greens, blues, pinks and purples shifting and dancing across the night. And much like every Aurora before this one, the electricals of the world come to life too. Homes, streetlamps, cars long-stranded in the snow. Man’s world comes alive, buzzing and flickering precariously.

But there are no ghosts like there once was a year ago. No terrible weather, no poisonous fog. If one could call it a ‘normal’ Aurora, that’s what it appears to be. But there is something else in amongst all the light and noise. Snatches of things: whispers of conversations, names called, laughter and tears.

You realise you recognise these voices. They are the voices of home. Perhaps you hear your mother, your siblings or friends. Whoever they are, you can hear them. And although they might not be able to hear you — for one brief night, the Aurora has connected you, bridged the gap between your world and this one. You may sit for a while, simply listening to the voices, relishing in hearing those from back home. If others join you, you will find yourself compelled to speak of them: to share in stories about those from back home — the connections you share with them.

It’s strange, though. These voices do not fill you with comfort or joy. Instead you are left with feelings of sadness, anger, and isolation. The Aurora has connected Interlopers, but now you feel so cut off from home, cut off from friends and loved ones — reminded of everything left behind. Everything you long for. Everything you have lost.

Something strange skips through the sky, a warping of the sound. It’s unsettling. Something feels... wrong, somehow.

It’s not just the voices that will remind you of this. Something else comes through the Aurora after that night. A small token will be brought through. Whatever the item may be, when you go to sleep and next wake, you will find said item. It may be placed on your bedside, on your desk or dining room table.

The item, you will find, will bring you a reminder of pain. Of sadness. Of horror. Perhaps it’s something you haven’t thought of in some time. Maybe it is something that has lingered in the back of your mind. Perhaps it is a part of you, waiting to be uncovered. A sign of something to come. A painful reminder of your past, or an ominous omen of your future.

THE ENEMY WITHIN

WHEN: The month of September.
WHERE: Everywhere.
CONTENT WARNINGS: kidnapping/attempted kidnapping; attempted murder; murder; vandalism; arson; assault; animal mutilation; corpse mutilation/manipulation/desecration; themes of peril/terror; possible character/npc injuries; possible character/npc death.

It starts with strange happenings at night, things left to be found by the next morning. Those within Lakeside many find themselves unsurprised by it, given their location, but the scenes found in Milton are a foreboding sight.

Mutilated bodies of animals: rabbits, ptarmigans, even deer — mangled and strewn about the streets, blood upon the snow. Some may awaken in the middle of the night to the sounds of their windows breaking, with houses on the Outskirts being targeted more than those in the middle of town. There is… a kind of unrest in the world.

It escalates.

Some may leave their home for the day and return in the evening to find the place trashed: items broken, precious foodstuffs thrown about the place and destroyed. Those within the Outskirts are once again particularly vulnerable, as are those within Lakeside. Fires are started in some of the abandoned buildings of Milton. Something, someone is targeting the Interlopers.

It is hard to pin-point who exactly, and it only puts the Interlopers on high alert. Nothing like this has never happened before. This is new, especially in Milton.

As the month progresses, the acts become more serious. Fires may be started in the middle of the night in Interlopers’ homes while they sleep. Some are attacked in the night, others are taken from their beds. Some killed within their very homes. Of the Interlopers that go missing, their mutilated remains may be found days later out in the wilds.

In Milton, soon enough, someone is bold enough to come out from the darkness, out from the gloom of the night. Interlopers may be attacked in broad daylight — by those they may recognise as newer Interlopers of the community, who appeared from the wilds: lost and shivering, with nowhere else to go. Some of them have been within Milton for a few months now.

Those in Lakeside will face something similar: Forest Talkers are making a move, rogue and isolated incidents — done with sabotaging attempts at hunting and taking a more direct approach.

They have no qualms about being captured or killed, only determined to get rid of as many of the Interlopers as they can. They whisper, they scream: “You don’t belong here. You should never have come here. It wants you gone, it wants us all gone. The end is here, it’s too late for any of us. Nature must run its course. The yawning grave has been opened.”

The attack is on two fronts: the first of Forest Talkers in Lakeside amplifying their actions. The second in Milton, enemies within the ranks of the Interlopers, Forest Talkers hiding as Interlopers.

Within Milton, newer Interlopers will likely be met with suspicion as being some of the Forest Fighters as a result of these individual acts of violence. As the numbers of Milton have been infiltrated, and it’s easy to have mistrust amongst those newer to the community. In-fighting is likely, and the entire town is stuck in some terrible, tense state — unsure of who to trust within their own numbers. In the days and weeks that follow, it remains like this. Acts of violence and vandalism — chaos and disorder.

BAD BLOOD

WHEN: The night of 27th - 28th September.
WHERE: Milton.
CONTENT WARNINGS: attempted murder; murder; vandalism; arson; assault; mentions of blood; themes of peril/terror; possible character/npc injuries; possible character death/npc death; actual NPC death.

Towards the end of the month, the moon is full. They call it the Harvest Moon, but colour seeps into it — oranges and reds: a blood moon, partially eclipsed. The night is calm and cloudless, but there’s an uneasy feeling in the night.

The earth groans, the rumble of another quake that’s plagued the Northern Territories since the beginning of August. It is the only warning Interlopers will get — if they may realise it as a warning. To some, when they look back, it’s a omen, a starting pistol.

They do not come through the Mines. Thanks to the efforts of Interlopers to guard the entrances of the Milton Mines, they know better. They come to town from the south, not the north.
The quakes of August and September have opened a new way from Lakeside to Milton. They are led by their Leader: a man dressed in white, a large deer skull upon his head. And while their numbers are small in comparison, they come armed and with the determination to get rid of the Interlopers once and for all. As they come into town, they launch their attack.

More fires will be set, Interlopers will be attacked with abandon. Shot at, stabbed, beaten. It is a mass execution. They will not stop until the Interlopers, or them, are dead.

Well, the majority of them. There are just under a dozen teenagers and younger people amongst their ranks who have shown hesitance toward violence in the past. Perhaps they can be reasoned with. Perhaps there may be a way to convince them to abandon their cause. There is fear in their eyes. Some of them do not want to die. They fear the yawning grave.

What will do you then, Interloper? Are you willing to fight for your life? Are you willing to take another’s to save your own, or a friends? Will you hide, or run? What choice will you make? The Forest Talkers have long since made their own choice. Now you must make yours.

It is another night of chaos on a town already scarred by the events of June. Interlopers will note two familiar faces in the fray: at some point during the night both Methuselah and Young Bill will arrive. While Methuselah will concentrate on aiding the wounded and trying to shelter Interlopers the best he can, Young Bill will help protect Interlopers from the Forest Talkers with his rifle in hand. But fortunately, it is just for one single night. Ammunition runs out, sides are switched, and people are killed. As dawn approaches, Forest Talker numbers dwindle. Either killed, incapacitated or defected. In the early morning light, bodies lie in the snow both Interloper and Forest Talker alike.

Those trying to hunt down the leader will see him slipping inside an empty cabin, heavily wounded. Following after him, they will find him settling himself down to kneel on the floor. The white of his tactical gear stained red with blood as it blooms from his wounds. Slowly, he removes the deer skull from his head to reveal a clean-shaven man in his late twenties with a shock of white-blond hair. His eyes are blue, calm.

He sets the skull down, panting and sweating. He is dying. He is not afraid.

“My name is Mallory, not that it matters now. We are dead, you and I.” he says softly. “We exist in a dying world.”

He is in much pain from his wounds. He moves again to sit cross-legged on the floor. A hand touches the bloodied fabric of his front and he laughs humourlessly.

“You don’t understand, do you? The end must come. That is the order of things. The end must come so the world can be reborn. That is how it’s always worked. When the world is swallowed, it will grow again from the earth.”

It is a story. The story of the Darkwalker. Some believe it to be the end of the world, but Young Bill had once said there is another telling of the tale. A creation myth. The Darkwalker swallows the world and returns to its slumber within the earth. Within it, everything its swallowed grows again and the world returns.

“We fought against man’s actions to ruin this place, not knowing our true purpose. The Devourer has shown me the truth, and I sought to put that into action.” His head tilts to one side. “The yawning grave is opened. Does new life not grow from the decay? It is a cycle. The grave and the cradle.”

He finds it difficult to breathe, but he presses on.

“You fight to live. You come here and you do not see what you are. You are only delaying the inevitable, perverting the true course. Prolonging the suffering. You are the Interlopers, you are not part of nature’s design. The Darkwalker does not want you here. And where it fails, we have tried to succeed.”

There’s another laugh, something catching in his throat. He coughs, blood bubbling from his lips.

“And failed. For now. The First Cursed cannot hold it forever. She, too, delays the inevitable." Even as he is dying, he still have the energy to sneer. He speaks of Enola. "A woman who plays at being a god. What right does she have? All must go into the Long Dark. ... As will I. Return me to the grave.”

Mallory’s head dips, his body sagging. He inhales once more and then stops.

FAQs

PAINFUL REMINDERS

1. Players must sign up for items. See the toplevel on the plotting post.

2. Items will face the same warps/nerfs as everything else that is brought into the game.

3. Items can be no bigger than something your character can reasonably carry.

4. While items do not have to belong to your character, there has to be a good reason why they’d receive such an item — ie. something related to your character.

THE ENEMY WITHIN

1. The Forest Talkers within Milton are a number of NPCs that have been pre-selected from NPCs who arrived in April and August. Not all of them will show their true intentions as the month goes on but will continue to stay hidden.

2. Two NPCs killed in the June Event were also Forest Talkers. … Good… job?

3. The following NPC Interlopers will out themselves as Forest Talkers at this stage: Devon Busswood; Rita Yee; Realm Lovejoy.

BAD BLOOD

1. Following the events of this prompt, Interlopers now have an additional way into Lakeside. It’s still rather dangerous: it’s through a partially collapsed cave system that ends into abandoned bunker on the Lakeside side. The game map will be marked accordingly in due course.

2. Some Interlopers may recognise a familiar face in the Forest Talker ranks: the man who was kidnapped by Interlopers previously in July has returned. Looks like he made good on his promise. He's come back to cause problems.

3. The following NPC Interlopers will out themselves as Forest Talkers during the attack: Jackie Blackmore; Ross Huguet; Jennifer Kitchen; Daniel Kresco.

4. As a reminder of numbers: around fifty Forest Talkers will show up for the attack.

5. There is an OOC vote on the fate of the remaining Forest Talkers, the link is here.

PLOTTING POST

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It's not just that he can see everything that Raju is describing — he weaves the words together so well — it's that he genuinely feels he's there for a moment. It's vivid enough that the music can almost be heard, the rhythm and vibrations something he can nearly feel himself. And it's just the sort of thing he would have loved to have taken part in, in some way; enthusiastic observer, or wholehearted contributor. He briefly glances to Thomas, to Captain Crozier, just as delighted to see how they're taking it all in, too.

"A proper dance-off, you and your friend leading it all," he grins in utter delight. "You do have a knack for telling it." He squeezes Thomas' hand under the table when he links their fingers together. "Memory's funny and fascinating that way, isn't it? You live a moment so vibrantly, so fully, for days or weeks after. And then more time passes and it fades. Things that were so — prominent, sometimes they fall away. But then you're having dinner with lovely company in a strange land months or years later and someone asks a question and you're back there all over again, the memory is a lived thing once more. But not just for you, for everyone you share it with."

He pauses, smiles warmly, leans in a bit to nod at him. "Thank you for sharing it. I'm very glad I get to keep it with me now," he taps the side of his head briefly with his free hand. They need all they can get, of memories like that.

He agrees with Jopson’s sentiment on the storytelling, though his delight is tempered with sentiment for the man reliving the memory for their enjoyment. It’s a shame he couldn’t see the whole affair for himself; it sounds like was an absolute spectacle, and he’s certain that Rama was just magnificent.

There’s something about seeing Rama this way, unburdened and joyful and a little bit silly, that makes Crozier feel like he’s seeing him with a fresh set of eyes. Maybe he can plead for an encore performance later, when they’re behind closed doors and alone once more.

“What does naatu mean, or did I just make a fool of myself by asking?”

The breathless tone to Jopson's compliment sends a pleased, flattered smile to Raju's face, redirecting his gaze from the far away nostalgia of a place that's nearly a year gone from him and back to the room, the people he's actually talking to. And then the Doctor puts what Raju's feeling into words; he would have let that odd transportation of memory go and forgotten about it if the Doctor hadn't just described the feeling so well.

"His name was Akhtar," Raju tells him, oddly spurred by that tap to the side of the Doctor's head, his idea of keeping some of the friend who's so far from Raju now with him. "He's a good man. I hope he saw her again."

He hopes, but doesn't know. Might never know. It's best not to dwell too long on that; he focuses on Francis' question gladly. "It only makes a fool of you if you try to challenge me to a dance not knowing it," he says, follows an impulse, grinning, to wink at Francis, and then turns his attention to the actual question. "But it means, ah..."

Translating whole sentences is, in a way, easier than doing it one word at a time; in a conversation, the context narrows all the meanings down. Raju takes a second to find the right words in the context here. "Raw, is one word for it. Unfiltered. And something... local. It came out from us, from the land that nurtured us. We could dance it with that passion because it was ours. Something that Englishman wouldn't understand, even if he knew the word."

Raju had started getting heated at the end there, and smothers the anger or passion or whatever it had been with a huff that sounds amused, and a little self-consicous. He sits back in his chair, looking at the table for a moment as he sips the juice, sucks at his lips to savour the tart feeling of it, then focuses on the others. "But that's my turn taken. What about you, Doctor? I can tell you've got a flair for stories. Or, Jopson — you made all this, didn't you? I've been wanting to ask how you did it. It tastes wonderful."

It came out from us, from the land that nurtured us.

It is only another example where they are on land that does not want them, another example of something that can fight back when necessary. Except a dance is not a bear, and for that, Thomas is grateful.

"He can tell his story," he tells the group. "You'll enjoy it. The recipe is not an altogether interesting tale."

He appreciates the vote of confidence, and he likes to think he's a decent storyteller, with all his love for stories and poetry the universe over. He'll needs his hands for this, though, he can feel that energy bubbling up in him with nowhere to go, so he squeezes Thomas' hand once more under the table before letting go, leaning forward a bit, a gleeful look in his eyes. Everyone alive has many stories to tell, of course, but he has perhaps...a bit more than most. So it's deciding where to start. Down to brass tacks first, get that out of the way, then onto something more delightful.

"Well! I'm the Doctor, of course, as you know," he laces his fingers together. And because he's used to the questions by now, for once he'll pre-empt a few that he presumes may or may not be on their minds to ask. "A doctor, on a few occasions, yes. Of many things as well. The, though, is my name." As though it needs to be said — "Sorry, not actually The, though what a name indeed! I'm still hoping to meet someone called The one day. The Doctor is my name, just Doctor. That's less interesting than the rest of it, if I do say so myself." Pausing in the middle of what might seem like just a massive run-on sentence, he takes a breath, letting that sink in before he continues, "I travel through time and space in the loveliest blue box. Every now and then, I run across things and people that need help. I do what I can, like anyone would." He will boast about a lot of things, but not this. He thinks that helping others is just the done thing. What anyone would do. It's nothing he wants to call much attention to, not when there's —

"Oh, the beauty out there, Captain Crozier, Raju," his smile widens, hands motioning a bit up and out to the sky they can't see. "The last light to go out in the big old glorious universe, the first star that ever shone, and everything in between. People who make their homes in the clouds, oceans that sing when the tide comes in. A song like you've never heard."

He finally pauses, looking at the Captain and Raju. "Do you, either of you — wonder much at what's out there? You'd be amazed how many don't take much notice of the stars, don't ponder anything beyond. Which is okay, of course! The lives you lead, there's so much else and certainly far more on our minds here, of all places. The stars are just there, as they've always been, as they will be for a long while, even when we can't see them and the light they hold. But for anyone who stops now and then and looks up and wonders and dreams and hopes — I'm quite fond."

Crozier’s still riding the high of Raju’s delightful story - and he’s glad he asked about the definition of the word - when the Doctor launches into his autobiography. A younger Francis Crozier, though not much younger, would be too cynical to enjoy the kind of wonder in his expression. A younger Crozier would hear the start of the flowery explanation and attempt to shove the crumbly acorn bread into his ears. Thankfully though he’s not that man, and the natural inclination towards cynicism has been replaced with a fair amount of optimism, so he can enjoy the descriptions without cringing or making a face.

He can’t help the snark though. He’ll always be prone to snark, even if he has left the cynicism behind.

“No, I’ve never wondered,” he deadpans, picking up his spoon and having a decent-sized bite of the stew.

First the Doctor answers the question Raju wasn't going to ask about his name, and then he fails to answer it at all in the bizarre, rambling fashion Raju's slowly coming to expect, and then dives into that impulse toward poetry that Raju should be coming to expect, too, and then he doesn't quite insult the kind of person who's always been presented with more immediate problems than the stars and space and what might be waiting inside it, and Raju isn't quite insulted.

Isn't quite, or maybe isn't at all. It's impossible to actually take any offence, even if Raju wasn't determined to be a polite dinner guest here; the way the Doctor speaks, Raju suspects, must insulate him from quite a few consequences of the things he says, well intentioned or no, hidden as every statement quickly is behind a twisting path of topics and words that don't allow the listener much time to decipher the last thing before they've got to stride on past it to the next. Besides, the man's so good natured about it.

Raju looks over to Francis with a wry smile — maybe it was only a figure of speech, or maybe Jopson's somehow never explained to the Doctor what kind of work was done in the Discovery Service, exactly — and plays along with the sarcasm, leaning over his forearm on the table toward Francis.

"No, you must not have. I always thought all that magnetism business must have happened by accident," Raju tells him and then looks to the Doctor, his faux-serious look cut with a bright, cheeky grin while he scoops up a heaping spoonful of the stew himself and shoves it into his mouth. Insulted or not, there's no harm in teasing the Doctor a little.

Thomas laughs to himself, hiding his grin behind his hand and a cough, suddenly seeming quite interested in his stew.

"No, I don't believe any of us have that wonder in us," he says with a very straight face, looking between Raju and Crozier with a knowing sort of smile.

He gives the Doctor a gentle nudge under the table.

That nudge and the teasing do their job. He picks up the veritable baton and continues the ribbing of his own self. How he meant the question hardly matters now since he quickly understands how his phrasing sounded, and adapts with his own cheeky humor. "Oh good, yes! Love when I say something in my head and it sounds fine but then it turns out some other madman's run off with my voice asking silly questions."

With a cheerful smile, "We’re all in good company! I’ve spent many years wondering and dreaming and believing six impossible things before breakfast."

Taking a moment to sprinkle the last of his acorn bread into his stew, he grows thoughtful and attempts to swing back around to the three of them. Their stories will always be more interesting to him. Of course, he has a million questions about the Discovery Service even now, he always wants to know more of their travels, but he starts further back.

“What’s the first place you traveled to that sparked your curiosity? A big trip, a small one — just over to a friend's or down the lane, or even your first adventure with your imagination in a book?” He smiles warmly, offering a bit from his own perspective, though he holds back a few deeper things about himself when he recalls the memory.

“I remember lying out in the fields on a warm night very long ago, watching the stars. Then — a meteor shower, bursting in colors of purple and green and stunning yellow. There was so much — so much I had to see.”

Edited 2024-10-22 17:30 (UTC)

Crozier laughs a little at the Doctor’s self-deprecation; he knows he didn’t mean any harm by the sentiment, it’s just sheer enthusiasm taking over at this point. Crozier himself may have softened his prickly exterior, but he can’t help picking just a little at someone when they go on and on. Even if he likes that perhaps very much, which is becoming the case.

But the description of the meteor shower properly distracts him - a shower of color, purple, green, and yellow. Sounds magnificent, certainly something his younger self would have scaled mountains and traveled to the ends of the earth to see. In that he can see that himself and the Doctor are quite similar.

He tuts and wags his spoon slightly. “I’ll answer, but you’re not using it as an excuse to avoid telling a story of your own,” he teases.

Crozier pauses as he thinks of his answer, then exhales quietly. “London. I was thirteen. I’d never been anywhere quite so large before, or so far away from home. I was terrified, but quietly elated.”

He doesn’t offer any further details, wanting to hear the answers of the others.

"Same age," Raju nods at Francis. The Doctor isn't the only one holding back a few deeper things about himself, although Francis will understand the background here in the same way Raju understands why Crozier was travelling to places he'd never been at thirteen — but there are some truths that don't really have a place at a dinner party, even a fairly informal one. This particular truth is fine, at least, if he doesn't go into much of its whys. "More or less. Not the capitol but a city larger than I'd ever been to. I was a sullen boy, around that time, and a sullen young man after, but the first few times I stood in the middle of all those people, at the foot of buildings that seemed a great deal taller then, looking down a street lined all down the length of it with electric lights..."

He pauses, remembering, then snorts softly, focusing on his food again to pick off a corner of the bread. Made of acorns, he never would have thought to try that. If Jopson keeps insisting the recipes aren't interesting enough to talk about, Raju will have to figure something like it out on his own.

"...Even I forgot to be terrible for a little while," he finishes, smiling faintly, and looks over at Jopson. "What about you? Was it city life, or the stars that opened your mind up to more that way?"

Thomas ducks his head and tucks his forelock behind his ear. "Ah, no. It was simply watching the ships on the docks. I don't quite know how old I was, but I was young. My - brother and I would stand on the docks and make up stories about the places the ships had gone. That one to a desert island with beautiful flowers, that one to the fountain of youth. Another one to a strange desert."

He sits back, picking up his drink and finishing off the juice.

"On my honor, Captain," the Doctor gives him a little nod with a cheeky smirk he can't quite help, crossing his hearts. The teasing both warms and amuses him. Just as quickly, though — as he hoped — he's offered more glimpses into their pasts, the little sparks that lit something in them.

"So! London at thirteen," he nods to Crozier, tapping his index finger once on the table as he says it. "Terrified and elated — all ingredients for the best adventures, obviously." Then a glance to Raju, another nod and another tap of his finger. "A city with electric lights — also thirteen, on your best behavior," he teases a bit himself. Then he looks to Thomas, one brief pat to his shoulder, remembering the stories of the docks and the treasures with his brother. "And you, dear Thomas, stories to rival the greats." It's never empty or idle flattery, not to him, he means it.

"I'll remember it all," he says with ease. Of course, he wants to hear more than just those snippets but he suppose he owes them an actual story; trouble is, picking one amongst...so many. He downs a few more spoonfuls of stew, wipes his mouth, adjusts his bowtie, generally fidgets and leans back himself.

"Okay! A story, a story...ah, well, a bit back, I was knocking around on my own and ran into a spot of trouble." The abbreviated version of, I was saving Earth from an enemy spaceship attempting to blow up the planet and I fell out of the part of the ship that exploded and subsequently fell to Earth in a spacesuit and needed help while recovering from near death. "A very kind woman helped me when I needed it most and I told her if she ever needed my help in return, she only needed to make a wish. Three years later — more or less — she did." He leans forward again, threading his fingers together.

"It was nearly Christmas and there was a war on. Her husband had gone missing and might never come home, they had to leave the life they knew for a bit as it wasn't safe anymore with the war, and she wanted something — she needed help, she made a wish for it. And I — I could make them happy, all of them, for a little while longer, I thought. Before she had to tell the children about their father. So! I took over the estate they escaped to, I got to be Caretaker, dress up their rooms, prepare the lot of them for a proper holiday with gifts and merriment. And the topper: what better than real life Christmas trees — an adventure! A lively bunch, those trees, sentient and jolly."

There's more to the story of course and he's skipping over details, but he pauses, starting to stand up suddenly. "Oh! Before I go on, does anyone need more of anything at all?" Maybe he's just fidgety after sitting so long, too.

He appreciates the short anecdotes about his dinner companions; Rama's earnest but carefully-related story about visiting the city, and the quiet mention of family and a brother's fantastic stories from Thomas. So much left unsaid, but he knows these two men well: they'd had their opportunity to share, they're not going to demand more attention than necessary.

And of course the Doctor completely buries the lede with his own story. Crozier listens to him talk in what he's come to learn is his typically expressive, rambling sort of way, and then completely bowls him over with mention of sentient trees. Jolly, sentient trees.

"Oh, come now," he says with a friendly thump on the table. "You can't just tell us about sentient trees and then get up to leave!"

A little later than thirteen, but it doesn't matter much against the fact that the Doctor might be about to speak about himself. After he finishes fidgeting. Odd to be speaking to someone who doesn't seem to fill the air to brag, but because there's too much in him that wants to come out to do anything else.

It comes out, this time, a little more coherently than Raju might have expected, until the Doctor interrupts his own story and Francis complains about it. About the part, in fact, that Raju least wants to hear about and he shoots Francis a dry look, disagreeing but not about to say it. Of course Francis would be better adapted than him to this place in this way, too, accepting the bizarre, the impossible, in a way Raju can't manage.

But the bizarre seems to come packaged with the Doctor, for whatever reason. So Raju will manage. He turns his attention back to the Doctor. "No thank you," he answers politely and tries to redirect the Doctor back to what he'd been saying, suspecting their chances of losing the end of the story in some wild, indecipherable tangent grows with every moment the Doctor's allowed to stop focusing on it. "You wanted to give the children something grand. Grand enough that they'd remember it, even after they found out about their father."

It's one thing for Thomas to hear his stories and enjoy them; it's quite another for someone else to. Perhaps Thomas has grown comfortable with them. Perhaps he simply has grown comfortable with the extraordinary circumstances that accompany each one. Either way, both Crozier and Raju's reactions amuse him.

He knows exactly why the Doctor rises, and he holds up his cup. "You can refill this for me as long as you continue your story as you do," he tells him in a gentle whisper.

"Only a moment —" He fully intends to finish the story, though sometimes with him, there are detours and sharp turns along the way getting to the end. He's also used to doing things while he sits and chats — even just tinkering with a new gadget to build in his hands would occupy him enough to sit for a longer spell. Like so much since his arrival here, he is however learning, changing, growing. He still wants to get up and refill that cup, which he does gladly, appreciating that Thomas silently understands.

As he stands, there's an extra burst of life in him and he circles back to the last thought. "Back to the trees! Right, so, any other time it would have been the perfect trip: winter wonderland, plenty of snow to build forts and creatures, safe and harmless except that as it happened, the forest was about to be destroyed. The trees were Androzani trees, regarded by some only for their usefulness as a source of fuel. There was a group there along with us, planning to dump acid rain on the forest, ravage it all, gut it for their own purposes."

It's here that his smile fades, expression more serious as he comes back to sit at the table, handing Thomas his cup. "What I'd intended to be a happy time was now quite unexpectedly perilous. But the trees — they're a living force, and clever. They'd engineered a means of escape through a sort of...a metal band, a crown to be worn, like a wheel to steer a ship. They needed a proxy, though, a pilot, someone strong enough to wear the crown and guide the whole forest out and away to a new home." He threads his fingers together, lightly tapping one thumb to the other as he speaks with such admiration. "And who could ever be stronger than Madge Arwell, who loved her children so completely, who needed to get them safe and out of the forest, who wanted to protect these trees she hardly knew, who believed enough in something even beyond me to get everyone home. And I mean everyone. She flew us through the stars, a beacon of her own light, crossing space and time, and the trees were safe, yes, but her husband who'd been lost — she lit the way home for him, too."

The Doctor sits back again, folding his hands in his lap. "Her husband was missing and presumed dead in the darkest night over the blackest sea, and for a moment she crossed a threshold of time where he happened to be flying and it guided him home to them." He pauses here for a few seconds. It might all sound fantastical and nothing more, but it's what he's always known. "The universe is vast and complicated and full of terrible things. But sometimes the impossible happens, the things we can't explain, and there's hope and goodness. This family on this day...by all logic and reason, there shouldn't have been a happy ending, couldn't have been. But there was, and Madge and Cyril and Lily, they were extraordinary."

It's a lovely story, beautiful and poetic and fantastic in the kind of way one might expect from a children's bedtime story. He tries to find logic in it at first, wanting to ask questions about the nature of the trees and the impossibility of moving an entire forest, but the astonishing feat of leading a forest through time and space, and then finding a lost loved one, is just something he can't reconcile. He can't wrap his head around it, the supernatural too much even for a man who saw a beast devour souls, the vagueness too little for a man who needs his science. And he could ask 'how' and 'why', but he knows he won't get a satisfying answer.

So Crozier leaves logic and lets the story be what it is: a story, illogical and sweet, about an incredible woman who made her family whole once more. He listens with a quiet smile on his face, appreciative and entertained, and remains silent even after the story has concluded.

It was a good fairytale. He can see why the doctor would choose it out of all the wonderful and unbelievable stories Crozier imagines he has in that very scattered, but very earnest brain of his. He catches his eyes and nods his head in thanks.

What was it he'd thought to himself a moment ago, about managing? As the story goes on, realisation sets in just what kind of story it's going to be. Raju rubs his thumb back and forth over the edge of the table, jitters his heel where no one will be able to see, bites his lip trying to focus on it, but by the time the children's dead father is alive and home with them as if nothing terrible had ever happened to the family at all Raju's mostly focused on his food — easy to focus on, delicious, and paying so much attention the rest of the time means there's enough left to keep him occupied — and it's a silent moment before he realises the Doctor is finished. He looks up, glancing over at Francis long enough to see him nod— and do nothing else.

Raju looks at Francis, helplessly. They can't all silently nod in respect, can they? Now Raju has to be the one to say something.

"I knew the English went in for extravagant Christmas parties," he tries, smiling a little, raising his eyebrows. "Or, I thought I did. Do all your holidays go that way?"

The story is fantastic and it is over the top and it is unbelievable, but Thomas has heard others. He's all but inoculated himself against these strange fantasies, making them simply a part of his life.

So he smiles and almost thanks the Doctor for the story, but Raju speaks and Thomas can't help but laugh behind a very undignified snort.

"Well, this year, I thought we might have a celebration for the ages. Perhaps we could all agree on a tree and decorate it.

Though he appreciates Raju speaking up — and takes great joy and amusement from his words — the Doctor would have understood if all of them had simply nodded silently, too, and he's quick to nod back at Captain Crozier when their eyes briefly meet, offering a small smile to accompany it.

There's much about his life that can't be known or believed without being seen, and though it pains him greatly that he can't simply whisk them all away — not only for practical reasons to get them safe and away, but for the grandest of adventures — he only has his stories. And the fantastical ones about some of the friends he's made along the way are far easier to tell than stories about himself with any true depth.

"More or less," he smiles back to Raju, though his attention turns to Thomas because now he's excited. "But now you've got my full attention. We absolutely should!"

And presents, oh, presents. He can't wait to work on little trinkets and things for the group.

It’s a beat too late when Crozier realizes that Ram was looking to him for a more vocal reaction, but he reasons that he should know his habits by now. He’d rather stay silent than make himself sound like a fool - and on the odd occasion he did blurt out something, it was because he’d been drinking. Being sober means he’s thoughtful with his words, careful, and happy to sit and listen and react in his own little ways.

Still, he’ll have to apologize to Rama for inadvertently leading him into this sort of surprise. The unknown and inexplicable tends to make him uneasy.

Under the table Crozier taps his foot against Rama’s and listens to Jopson and the doctor form plans for the holidays.

God. The holidays. He hasn’t celebrated a Christmas in years. Giving the gloves to Rama and a few of the others had been as close as he’d come to acknowledging the season, not that he’s completely opposed. He just doesn’t feel a part of that world much.

“Maybe the boar will make a return,” he mutters quietly.

The touch to his foot feels deliberate and Raju leans back in his chair, glancing to make sure it came from the place he thought it did, then sets his shoe alongside Francis' and settles it there. The touch and the fact that he had managed after all, at least well enough to say something well-received about a story far too bizarre for him to know quite what to do with, relaxes him just enough to stop him thinking about saying the right polite thing and start him thinking about holidays.

He hadn't minded it last year, being as far away from holidays as he'd been from everything else. All the different parts of civilization that he's missing tend to blend into one another. But he's thinking about it now.

"It'd be Diwali around now, wouldn't it?" he asks himself. Not something he might have mentioned in his life before, in British company. Maybe that's why he wants to say it now. "Or maybe later. A while before Christmas. But that damn boar certainly doesn't come from there. And it doesn't come from Christmas, either."

He pauses, trying to decide whether a few years of Christmas parties with people he hardly knows has taught him enough to be sure about that. "Does it?" he asks, doubtfully. A gigantic wild pig spitting out blessings covered in drool? Is a tradition Raju's missed?

It's silly and elaborate and certainly not the sort of thing that Thomas would ever actually indulge in...until the Doctor throws his full support behind it. Then he starts to actually contemplate it.

But Raju brings up a more interesting point.

"No, it doesn't come from Christmas, I think. But it did give me enough sewing materials to last the winter of mending clothes."

He takes a drink.

"Do you - mind explaining Diwali?" he asks Raju after a moment, a little awkward to be asking so bold of a question. An outright question of a stranger!

Unheard of.

— a boar spitting out blessings (sewing materials, among them) and he missed it. Dreadful! Now he's genuinely hopeful it makes a return, or...something of the sort. He's already off and wandering in his mind thinking of encountering such a creature, and how delightful it would be to come across it, regardless of its temperament.

But there's an interesting topic at hand and he's looking forward to hearing Raju explain more, glad for Thomas having queried. What the Doctor knows of various traditions, festivals, beliefs, celebrations on Earth and elsewhere rather pales in comparison to hearing firsthand from someone who's lived it.

"Oh, yes, please, do tell," he chimes in with an eager smile.

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