rude_not_ginger | (no subject)

"Sounds horrific," the Doctor nodded.

"Having a name meant you were finally free, where I'm from. Free from decades upon decades of schooling. From being told where to go and what to do and how to think. Not nearly to the degree of your childhood, though."

He scratched the back of his head and sighed.

"If you could have that back, that name you were...would you want it?"

"You don't know the half of it. But it was what it was. I learned and did a lot of good things. Did a lot of very bad things to but that'll bite me in the ass when the time is right." No point in worrying now.

"Decades and decades? How old are you?"

He thinks about the man's last question. Really thinks. "No. Who ever that was is gone. Lost in an emptry room somewhere. If I can't remember? Pretty catestraphic, best to let it go."

"Old," the Doctor replied. Old enough that he wasn't even certain anymore. 903, the last time he counted. Which was centuries ago, at least.

"Yeah. Yeah, I know exactly what you mean." The Doctor's own name sat somewhere in the back of his mind that even he couldn't pull it out. No matter how much he often wondered.

"Been around a long time? Or just lived hard?" Because it wasn't the same. His family? A lot of them were old and it had nothing to do with age. He felt like a kid next to Dean and Ruby. and it wasn't the years that they've been around.

"Yeah." He ponder that. "I've always wondered how they made me forget. And yet I've never had the guts to look. Kinda funny really."

"Both," the Doctor replied with a nod. Though he did understand Alec. What was it he had told Lazarus? Some people live more in twenty years than others do in ninety. The Doctor crammed a lot of life into his 900 (odd) years.

"Could you access their records?"

"That's a hard way to live, dude. But I bet never boring." That old curse 'may you live an interesting life.'

"Oh I have my file." He rubs at his barcode. "Just, uh, like my lunch. I tried to read it once. Ally and I got fall down drunk after."

"Nope. Nothing slow about my sort of life." Even if he did want that. Sometimes. A life where he could settle down and be happy. It would be a change.

"Well, I'd read it. See what happened to you. Those are bits of your life you'll never get back. Think of it as a story."

"Oh. . .none of it's missing besides that name." Turns and walks beside the Doc. He could see the Lunch Box up ahead. "I just see it all from a distinctly different view point. One that's a bit less coldly clinical and gorey. But nothings missing but that one fact." Again there is that rub at his neck and he doesn't look at the other man.

"Well, you still have the files. Can go through them if you ever decide you want to know," he said.

His own internal files were too full of holes and missing information and long forgotten passwords that there was no way he'd figure out his own name if he had a century to try to remember.

"How did you escape?"

He shrugs. "I didn't. I was outside the wire when things went pearshaped inside. Madame Renfro" Because their handlers will have their titles until the day he dies. "tried to lock the place down as it went up in flames. Maxie let everyone free."

"Maxie? I don't know a Maxie, do I?" He might've, he wasn't sure. He only just knew Dean and Sam and Ruby.

"No, you don't know Max." He grins. "She's a trip. Bitchy, self ritious but a good person. She's one of the other rabel rousers. Gives excelent speeches. The quick 411 on Max is that she and some of her sibs jumped the wire when we were ten. There was fall out on the twins left behind. Lets not go there. Anyway coupke of years ago she got herself captured. Things went down hill for Manticore after that."

Talking with Alec was the equivalent of talking with a 14-year-old Geretratinan without a translator. His colloquialisms made no sense, but he couldn't possibly stop and ask him to translate.

"You'd think capturing a rebel rouser would make it better. Or didn't they just eliminate her?"

"Couldn't just off her. They wanted her to get to he pseudo-boyfriend. Also? There's some fantablous something or other chillin' in her blood stream, that's supposed to save the human race. I'm doubtful on the sanity of some of the people involved in percolating of this plan. Upshot? No killing of the Maxie." It wasn't fair to the Doctor, but his slang and street accent got heavier when he talked about her. He's accent did that. Shifted to match those he was talking about or spendign time with. "Also? The rabel rousing was after."

Edited 2008-04-02 06:29 (UTC)

"Right, sorry, I understood just something short to none of that."

". . .what? Why not?"

"Too many colloquialisms! Wasn't so bad before but...just a little slower this time, maybe?" He felt a fool having to ask, but, really, Alec was the sort that would understand more than another might. Wasn't as if he was simply talking to a native.

"Oh." Mental shift. "Sorry. I do that. Give me another hour or so and I'll start sounding like you."

He mentally reorders the explanation with out the military slang or the ghetto slang. "They couldn't just kill Max because they wanted to use her to get to her boyfriend. But they're not dating. Emotionally stunted. Anyway, he's an underground journalist and they didn't know who he was so they had to use her to get to him. Also, there are these freaks trying to kill us, lets not get into it, and there is some virus they say will kill all the humans. Like I said, freaks. Max has the cure for it build into her. And the rabel rousing was after Manticore went down in flames. Litterally."

"Adapt to the environment and whomever you're talking to. That's terrifying, Alec." The Doctor said the words with a small smile and an admiring tone. "You ever thought about space travel?"

He nodded. "Right, well. She sounds like she's got quite the life, too. Maybe I'll meet her one day." As for emotionally stunted....he thought about himself and Rose. "And some people prefer the term 'taking it slowly' to 'emotionally stunted'!"

"It's unique to me." He's only a little smug. "I've got a good ear. Accents, dialect, languages, music. Amazingly it wasn't built in."

"Space travel? No, I never have actually, but," he shrugs, "We're all down her thingking NASA, you know?"

"Maybe you will. And uh, they weren't taking it slow. They're emotionally stunted. Seriously."

"Well, it's a good skill to have should you visit places that are...well, rather exotic."

He grinned at Alec, "You should think about it."

"I've never tried anything that wasn't Earth based." His head tilts a little and he bites his lip, considering. "I wonder if I could do it." His eyes skip off the path and over to the Doctor. "You could try and teach me something." Because, quite frankly he loves learning. The last language he picked up was Church Latin.

He smiles back, but it's softer than his normal grin. "I got enough going on here. People relying on me. But I'll keep it in mind as a back up."

He has a sudden idea. And it lights him up like a bulb. "Music. You got anything from somewhere else?" Oh, there is all of that little boy delight.

"Well, the TARDIS, that's my ship, it translates everything for you. So learning a language isn't an issue, it's the colloquialisms, the little bits of culture that tourists don't usually catch up on. That's the sort of thing you'd be good at."

He considered the question. "Yeah, I've got some music back at the TARDIS. I've got to warn you, some of it's not everyone's cup of tea."

He blinks at the man a little doubfounded. "What happens if your ship can't translate? What do you do then. I had to learn most of the European languages before my handlers would let me run missions. Other wise it's like asking for trouble." He couldn't imagin relying on some one else to do all the understanding and translating for him. It just seemed unsafe.

He shrugs. "What's the worst that would happen? I don't like it? Dean can't stand half the stuff I play."

"Well, there's only been one time where it couldn't, and that language was impossibly old. I speak a few languages myself. Still working on English, though. All those tenses are incredibly confusing."

He hopped ahead, leading them to where he'd parked the TARDIS at the end of a pier.

"Most of the music I keep is fairly safe. The Genosiahn Chants, though? Apparently they're so beautiful they drive the listener completely insane."

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