✧ 06 ✧

[bonnypiperlad]

[The snow falls in great flakes from the sky, covering the walkway that's sprung up out in the lake. The one that connects to what looks like some sort of tomb, with a stylized metal man of some sort on the wall outside the great, heavy doors. It has voices, as well, drifting out into the cold - a young girl and a man, both with English accents.]

You look very nice in that dress, Victoria.

Thank you. Don't you think it's a bit...?

A bit short? Oh I shouldn't worry about that, look at Jamie's.

[From the expression on Jamie's face, the girl's voice strikes some sort of cord deep inside - and his own reply is barely a murmur.]

Victoria...

[Some time passes before he notices the footprints, but once he does, he - like everyone else - starts to follow them, eventually making his way to the fire in the observation deck. As he's rubbing his hands to try and warm them, he looks up to see that question scrawled across the many screens in the area.]

Och, that can't be good.

(OOC: Feel free to run into Jamie at the Cyberman's tomb or on the way to the observation deck or at the deck itself. Just let me know which in your reply!)

Comments

[desertdaggers]

Mm… I wouldn't say it's exactly the most obvious solution. And what if we didn't talk? [he considers it for a moment, then dismisses it with a quick hand movement, fingers flat] Well, we've worked it out now. And hopefully it's not too much of a hardship for anyone.

Why you kidnapped the king, if you please! [he grins brightly]

[bonnypiperlad]

[Somehow, Jamie's not surprised - but his mouth pulls off to one side anyway.]

Och, I knew I shouldn't have mentioned that. All right, if ye must know, the reason for it was because he was supposed to flee the country, It was history, something that'd happened already in my time. It happened, so it always should've happened.

[The vaguely disgruntled expression he'd adopted turns rather more rueful then.] Only I'd managed to talk him out of it.

[desertdaggers]

[well, it does sound a bit more interesting.]

Ah… so that's why you weren't fighting them at the time. [His eyebrows raise.] How? Why was he fleeing the country? Discontent citizens?

[bonnypiperlad]

No, not because of the citizens. He was their king, and much beloved by many of of the people. It was other men in power who wanted him gone, people with religious views different than the King's.

And these other men gathered an army, but the King'd not wished to fight them, at least not before I'd arrived. So when that changed, history changed. Mine along with it.

[desertdaggers]

Ah. [He nods, understanding, and that raises his esteem of this King. Someone beloved by many people probably isn't as bad as others.] …different religious views? How so? [This is a strange concept for Hawk- there's minor variances in how people worship the Goddess, but not enough to start a war over.]

How did it change?

[bonnypiperlad]

I'm no so sure I can explain it fully, not being a man of God, but the King believed in a freedom of religion that the others'd not cared for so much. They wanted things to stay the way they were.

[He hopes Hawk can understand that much, at least. He's no theologian, and trying to explain the differences between Roman Catholics and the Church of England is a bit more than he can manage. The rest...well. That's even harder to explain, but he'll try.]

When the King fled the country originally, he'd not given up. He tried to get back what was his by right of birth, and his son tried as well, and then his grandson. During his grandson's time, there was a great battle near Culloden, and after that was the first time I'd seen the Doctor.

But since the King never fled, he never had to try and win back his crown, and the battle never happened...so I'd never met the Doctor in the first place. And because of that, I couldn't be back in England nearly sixty years earlier.

[desertdaggers]

I see. [He's still a little puzzled by the religion part, but people not wanting change… that definitely makes sense.]

[okay somehow time travel makes a bit more sense. Hawk nods, listening.]

So essentially, you wouldn't have been able to come back to change the King's mind in that case. And then… it loops, doesn't it?

[bonnypiperlad]

Hey? [Jamie hadn't actually thought of that, mostly because his grasp on temporal paradoxes is more or less non-existent. But what Hawk says makes sense.]

Aye. Aye, I suppose it would, at that. To tell ye the truth, I'm not entirely sure how I'd managed to stay so I could fix it in the first place. Unless...och, no, that's daft.

[desertdaggers]

[He's wondered a couple of times what would have happened if Duran had warned his father about what would happen with the Dragon Emperor… but it won't happen now.]

Ah? What is it?

[bonnypiperlad]

Well...it's just that I remembered something that happened then. There was a time where I'd felt very strange. And I'd...gone back, I think, to Culloden. I could hear the cannon firing around me, and then...then...

[For a moment, he looks distant, trying to come up with a way to describe it.] It was like I was drifting through a dark mist, rippling like the surface of a lake, but then it cleared, and I was in an alley with the Doctor and Zoe.

The Doctor said I'd fainted, but it was more than that, I think. He said something else, about it being as though someone somewhere was helping us. I wonder if that wasn't true.

[desertdaggers]

As if you'd… been pulled back, somehow? [He nods, bringing his hands together.] Mm… it sounds possible. Someone who… was looking after you, perhaps? Or wanted things to be as they were. [He rubs behind one ear.] It might take a lot out of them, still…

[bonnypiperlad]

Aye. [He shakes his head.] I'll not say as I understand how, though.

[Still, it all worked out in the end. And as Hawk brings his hands together, it occurs to Jamie that he feels much warmer now, but what about Hawk?]

Hey, you're not cold, are ye?

[desertdaggers]

Mm… something a little like that happened with us, too… I don't understand that, either. Still, we're both here.

Ah… it's still a bit chilly. [He tugs one glove off and brings his fingers up to his face to inspect them. The tips are looking a little blue, so he blows on them for a few moments before pulling the glove back on.] My turn to talk, then? What do you want to hear about?

[bonnypiperlad]

Aye, that's true.

[And that brings him back to questions. He doesn't want to pry too much about the Thieves Guild. but a raid, now, that sounds interesting.]

Well...what about that raid? I take it Rolante's a place, but what were ye raiding for?

[desertdaggers]

Oh. That one's not exactly true. There was a… [his lips twist to one side] …a raid, but I wasn't involved at all. Rolante's the kingdom to the north of Navarre. It's a fairly mountainous region, but they still do well enough… so it was about territory. Or so Bigieu claimed, at least.

[bonnypiperlad]

It's not? Funny, there was one that wasn't for me, either. What's the point of forcing ye to lie about something, anyway?

[He really doesn't see there being one, to be honest, and he shakes his head.]

Och, I'll never understand this place.

[desertdaggers]

But the other two were true? Maybe it's trying to get us to distinguish between the two… but then again, I just told you that one wasn't true.

[he huffs out a breath, and leans back, hands on his waist.]

Someone's being capricious, I'd say.

Which one of yours wasn't true?

[bonnypiperlad]

Aye, that's one way to put it. There's some other words I could use, though.

[Some of them not very polite ones, so he'll keep his mouth shut. He does grimace a little, however, at that question. Hawk'll likely think him daft for saying what it is, but if he doesn't he might start getting cold again - so here goes nothing.]

Er...the one about the unicorn.

[desertdaggers]

I'm sure. Well, maybe you'll get a chance to use them on them.

[Hawk raises his chin, eyebrows listing.]

Ah, really? I wouldn't have expected that would be it. [He smiles teasingly.] When did you see it?

[bonnypiperlad]

[Jamie doesn't get why Hawk is looking at him with that particular smile, but after a brief, slightly puzzled look, he shakes his head.]

Well, first I saw it in my dream. And a vicious beastie it was, too. [As he talks, he starts to gesture with his hands, emphasizing the words.] It was charging straight for me, head down and ready for the kill.

And then...I woke up and thought that was the end of it. It wasn't, though.

[desertdaggers]

[Well, that's all right. It's not really integral to the story.]

Goddess… They're not said to be like that, though with those horns… What in the world was it trying to kill you for?

You saw it in the waking world after that, then?

[bonnypiperlad]

Look, I don't know. It just was. [It wasn't exactly something he'd really thought about overly much at the time, as there were other things that had proved to be much more of a problem.]

But aye, we all did, the Doctor, Zoe and me. And it was just like it was before, coming right at us. Ready to run us through just as sure as we were standing there.

[desertdaggers]

…mm. They're not really known for talking, so it's not really a surprise… [He wonders, still.]

…so it was like a premonition, then? What did you do?

[bonnypiperlad]

I thought there was no choice for it but to run. [Which is a totally valid life choice when you're traveling with the Doctor, trust him.]

But the Doctor stopped us, told us we mustn't believe in it, and that we had to say it didn't exist. And when we did, it stopped dead in its tracks. Turned into a picture of itself, mounted on a stand. Like one of those things you find in plays when ye need to have something there for scenery.

[desertdaggers]

It did? [He stares, amazed.] So it wasn't a real unicorn… Then… what brought it to life in the first place? Or who?