roleplay for ibringlife, <lj site="livejournal.com" user="the_cor

[rude_not_ginger]

The Doctor flipped a few final switches on the TARDIS console, adding the information he'd just recieved about Aislinn into the systems, should he ever run across another muse like her again. Well, he doubted it would be exactly like her, but...the same genus at least.

He turned, picking up the teacups that were left behind. Funny, he would've thought Rose would've been back by now. The sound of a familiar key in the lock made him look up. Speak of the devil...

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[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

"...and you have the advantage on me because you've actually seen a police call box before, one assumes..."

Rose was still taking as she opened the door, the excitement in her voice clear even as she tried to be as casual as one possibly could be when one was taking a famous immortal rockstar poet to see the time machine that one lived in.

She pushed the door open and then turned around, stood in the doorway and tried not to bounce up and down in anticipation of Byron's reaction.

"Now I'm going to give you all the warning that I got about the part that comes next, which is exactly none."

And with that she stepped back, into the TARDIS, and flashed a brief, winning smile over her shoulder at the Doctor before she turned all her attention back to her guest.

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

He'd given the call box a rather skeptical look, but at least thanks to Aislinn he had some experience with things not being what they always seemed. Still, even with that his eyes widened and his breath caught as he stepped inside. It was large and golden and beautiful and not at all what he would have expected even if she'd described it in detail. Utterly alien and giving off the feeling that one might have stepped onto a set except for the fact that it was real. There were no cameras. No Hollywood magic. He was a master of illusion, and this...this was real.

There weren't words, not immediately. He just looked around, taking it all in with a slightly bemused smile on his face.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"Finally back, are you?" the Doctor said, with a note of distastefulness to his voice. He always did enjoy the reaction people gave to the TARDIS's interior, and the smile Rose gave him was brilliant, but, really, one must keep up one's appearances, and his current appearance was that he did not like the entire situation. The irritation was not quite as severe, however, as it had been earlier.

With a casual flip of a switch, the TARDIS console began to move up and down, and the familiar roar of the engines signaled takeoff.

"You've got questions, then." It came out more like a statement to Byron than a question.

[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

"We'd have gotten here sooner if you'd parked closer."

She wrinkled her nose a bit at the Doctor, mouthing the words be nice! to him while Byron was looking around.

"It's bigger on the inside," that part was to Byron, perhaps unnecessarily, but she never got tired of pointing that out. "You can ask him how, but don't expect to understand a word of it. Alien science, and I swear he tries his best to make it more confusing."

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

"I noticed that," Byron replied with a touch of amusement but remarkably little sarcasm for him.

"It's beautiful," he told the Doctor with a charming and appreciative smile. He could be winsome when he put his mind to it and getting his way always put him in the mood to be both charming and winsome. Some had called it a lethal combination. "Thank you for doing this, Doctor."

He wandered the cavernous room a bit, not touching, not wanting to intrude, but studying. "I can't say I'm much of a man of science, so perhaps I won't understand, wouldn't even if it was Earth science, but how does it work?"

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

Great. He had thhe charming smile of Jack and the politeness of...well, the Doctor hadn't known too many polite people as of late. It was somewhat refreshing, but the Doctor was already resolved to dislike Byron as best it was possible. It was getting difficult, especially what with Rose's horrific crush on him.

"It's...a bit complicated at the very least," the Doctor said, distractedly, "Most think it impossible. Like...you think you can't put an enormous building into your small sitting rooms, correct? But you've invented television by this time period, am I right? So, by showing an enormous building on your television you've done a bit of the impossible."

He tilted his head to the side, looking at Byron, "Still not quite clear to you, is it? I can tell by your expression you don't understand. And I knew you wouldn't, nevermind." Back to the flipping and twirling of the console's gadgetry.

[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

"Didn't really give him a chance to, did you?" Rose mumbled half to herself. Her tone held traces of affection even as she resisted the urge to stick her tongue out at the Doctor.

"Don't mind him. He's like this with everyone new. It took weeks before I got him to stop saying the word 'human' like it was supposed to be an insult."

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

Byron smiled a little and shrugged slightly. "You could manage to be a bit more clear in the explanation, but I likely wouldn't understand still." He didn't sound overly concerned.

"The concept of the television bringing things in, however, I do understand." He sounded almost amused, leaning half against the wall, half on his cane.

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

The Doctor glanced down at the monitor. Not human, he was right. Not anything that the TARDIS had recognized from before, though. Odd. Very odd. No voidstuff, no biowaves from space travel. An earth-born alien.

A few emotions poked at the back of his mind.

He glared a a bit at the console. "Oh, please," he grumbled, "You're only thinking that because Rose does."

He punched a few buttons and turned back to Byron, "Quantum physics and spacial matter displacement crunches are a bit beyond your time. The dimensions inside aren't what's outside...pretty common on my planet."

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

Byron had worn something if not quite period, very much him. Ruffled shirt, well fitting pants, a brocade jacket. It was close enough to what he'd seen in portraits of his great-grandfather to not garner stares from the courtiers. His cane, his limp, did that, but no more than usual. Fitting in at a court was nothing he wasn't well versed in.

He didn't know where she would be. He didn't know what he would say when he found her. How to explain. But he had told her that he would find a way, and here he was. He just hoped that it was after...after they'd spoken. That she'd know who he was. That she'd understand.

He stepped out onto the terrace, looking down at Louis' gardens, but not seeing her, he moved back inside, searching through salons and anterooms, looking for her. Her smile. Just...her.

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Reinette emerged into some of the more public rooms in Versailes, after sevel hours of formalizing the dinner menu for the latest performance in the petit salon, upstairs. The selections were always chosen carfelly, simple enough for a small number to serve, but satisfying enough that those guests brought up amoung the richest, most intricate foods could find no reason to complain. And then after, the King would always serve the coffee himself. It was his opportunity to play at the ordinary, before the customs and rules of royalty forced him to bed with a dozen men in his bedchamber.


She could only shake her head. How ridiculous the world could be sometimes.

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

He froze when he caught sight of her, unable to formulate thought, let alone words. She was there and he was here and suddenly he wondered why. He had nothing to offer her. He couldn't take her with him--the Doctor would never allow it. That she'd seemed...it was no matter, really. Nothing was as it seemed and everything was simply pretense.

But he'd felt it. That connection to something. Someone. He hadn't felt it in so very long.

He took a step in her direction, the cane seeming too loud on the parquet floor, echoing through the stillness and heating his cheeks with shame that he needed it.

"Madame..." His voice was quieter, uncertain, and he suddenly felt much younger than his 218 years (209 if you didn't count those years).

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Reinette stilled at the sound a voice, its direction and intent seemingly focused on her. She turned to find a darkly attractive man in front of her, yet one that was also a stranger. He had an unkempt yet direct sort of air to his person, and one she rarely observed in court. It was enough for her to stop.

" --Sir?"

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

She didn't know him. She didn't recognize him. They must be too early. He closed his eyes briefly. She'd think him mad if he started in with everything he'd done to find her.

But if nothing else he was trained. He bowed, giving her a charming smile that belied the anguished pain that shone in his eyes for a moment.

"I'm Lord Byron." His French was flawless. "From England. I've...come so very far to meet you."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

Reinette had ever been perceptive. It was a trait that had guided her through years of countless lessons, and seen her way through a court that had, at first, little use for the king's middle-class mistress. In truth, many still felt that way. Perception was more than a mere window to wit and conversation, it was simple surivival instinct.

The stranger could have been one of any number of forgein dignitaries that traveled through the tiled hallways. But when Reinette looked into his eyes, she could not think so. She had taken note of his cane, but gave it little note. Her own health often betrayed her, and she had little patience for being fussed, and hovered over. She would ot treat another like that in turn.

Instead she smiled at him, and offered her hand.

"You traveled all that way? I must consider myself flattered then."

[the-corsair.livejournal.com]

He took her hand in a gentle, but firm, grip and bowed over it, lips brushing her knuckles.

"Further than England, Madame, though I doubt you would believe me did I tell you the truth of it."

[ambitious-woman.livejournal.com]

"That is hard to say." Her featured shifted into something less formal, and restrained.

"You may find I surprise you. I believe in a great many things."

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

The Doctor didn't bother to look at the door as Byron left, he simply watched the man's back leave on the video screen. Out to a world the Doctor could never visit again, to see a woman that the Doctor could never talk to again because she was already dead.

Confusing, that. And it appeared to make the Doctor's good mood dissipate quickly.

[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

Rose stared at the door for a minute or so after it closed, after Byron left, feeling a little conflicted, herself.

She'd wanted to do this, genuinely wanted to help facilitate the meeting, but that didn't mean she was immune to a faint twinge of jealousy when she thought of Reinette, and how the Doctor had been willing to leave her on a spaceship for five hours that could have easily been forever if he'd somehow gotten trapped in that world.

Five hours had felt like forever, anyway.

"So." She spun around with a bright smile pinned on her face, not wanting the Doctor to see anything else there. "Do you think they'll get along?"

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"I'm not sure," the Doctor replied easily, scratching his ear, "She's 25, that's a few years after I...after we met her in the room with the droid, do you remember that? There was a good...ooooh, fifteen years before I saw her again, a person can change in the course of fifteen years."

That, of course, didn't really answer Rose's question at all.

"What I mean to say," he clarified, "Is...she may find him charming, may be completely disgusted with him, I haven't...the faintest idea, really. He's an odd one, Byron."

[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

"I don't see how anyone could find him anything other than charming," Rose replied, with a faint wistful look.

"I mean, it's got to be mostly an act, right? But still, hard to mind much when he's right there in front of you looking like he does."

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"I think he's a bit more amusing than charming," the Doctor replied matter-of-factly, "Got a way with wit and words though, can always respect a man with wit."

Not that he didn't feel newly processed jealousy coursing through his veins. The man had his hooks in one woman he cared about, and was off to try and charm another woman he cared for (and could never see again, another fact which burned).

[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

"Well, whatever you call it. Amusing, charming, anyone can be that if they've got a few centuries to practice."

She said it with forced nonchalance that betrayed very little of what her real thoughts on the man might be. She wasn't sure she had any, yet, not any thoughts based on actually knowing him at all, anyway.

"Have I thanked you enough times for doing this for me? I know you really didn't want to."

[rude-not-ginger.livejournal.com]

"It's all right, I've got a prepared list of the things you'll owe me for for the rest of forever, this is on it," he tossed her a teasing smirk, but his hearts weren't exactly in it. Easier to pretend everything was okay on the trip but now...they were just going to wait.

"Fancy a cup of tea?" He'd just had one with Aislinn, but he felt the need returning.

[ibringlife.livejournal.com]

"Tea'd be nice, yeah."

She wandered idly around the console room, letting herself be distracted by how alien this place still was even now that it was a more permanent home. She still didn't know how half the controls in this thing worked.

"They'll probably have a lot in common, both being used to all that upper-class society stuff. Lots to talk about without having someone asking a million stupid questions because they never paid attention in history class."