audio >> text >> audio | un: dollhouse (backdated to wedding day 1)

[thedreamer]

Hello, friends, colleagues, partners, traveling companions, ghostbusters, and all other applicable terms suitable for the genuine fondness felt when carrying on through another day together! I'm the Doctor. Not a doctor, the Doctor. Though, I am a doctor of practically everything, in fact. [ As if that's less confusing. And he doesn't elaborate further. ] I've been through this with most of you already so let's skip the finer details, eh? Time Lord with two hearts traveling about time and space in my box, all brand new and ancient, the bluest blue. But here we all are together now, specifically on this train at the moment.

So! Onto the important things! First: everyone okay? [ Narrator: No. No one is okay, Doctor. ] Settling in? Call on me if you need company. You'll find I'm well suited for it, if we haven't had the pleasure of our paths crossing yet. Pity, that!

Second: I had a chat with our dear Contessa Lita recently. Wonderful company, easy to pass the time with, brilliant conversationalist, absolutely forthcoming and nothing at all unusual about her demeanor, just like everything and everyone else is perfectly normal here.

[ An actual pause, an intake of breath. Imagine that! His tone, of course, is overly exaggerated, heavy with sarcasm when he speaks about everything being perfectly normal. ]

A few important and relevant details to share regarding the bridal party we're traveling with. She's—I do wonder if this would be better—hang on.

There. Okay. Good. Write it out. Remember this. Take notes. Brew a pot of tea. Sit and stay a while.

Contessa Lita - happily married? Or is she? Her count, by her own admission, will be around 'some time, at some point, somewhere.' Vague details and seemingly weary of discussing her marriage.

Firo the hero with endless stories and we're all just footnotes in her tale, so says the Contessa.

Prassenze and Firo had never met until now. No doubt you've heard the gossip already.

Prassenze wrote a nearly obsessive amount of letters of admiration to Firo. Said all the right things. An enamored admirer.

No, this text business is a bit more limiting...

There we are, much better. I like hearing your voices anyway!

[ Or...the sound of his own voice...? ]

The Contessa, despite my numerous assurances to the contrary, insists she's the plainer sister. Nowhere near as important as Firo.

[ He did ardently try numerous times to boost up her morale and confidence, but, well, by her own repeated admission, she's but a bystander in Firo's grand story. ]

If you're at all curious about the Cradle itself, as I was, the Contessa shared that the storms used to be far worse before the rules were put in place to prevent dream thieving and the dream thieves were hunted down, but the danger of the Cradle still exists. Now what about the dream thieves, you ask, and naturally you would ask—they were supposedly using the storms to cook things and bring them into the waking world and it made all the nightmares worse.

[ Certainly, not entirely unlike a few things he's encountered before in his own travels. ]

They would...take what existed in someone's dreams and put it back here with the other wakers and no one could tell the difference between what was real and what isn't. Dream thieves look like anyone else, and when they would go messing about, they'd bring things to life in the Cradle, which made the Cradle angry, like a child or a baby throwing a tantrum, she was quick to emphasize. Yes, that isn't lost on me either—a child throwing a tantrum in the Cradle.

Ah, what else—told you, we had a good long chat—oh, right, she also didn't answer when I asked how long she's been on this train. Avoiding the answer, didn't know the answer, didn't want to know, didn't care to know, insert other ideas here.

There we are, then, let's talk amongst ourselves!

Comments

text ★ un: cocked tale

[pathologise]

you're still really bad at being comforting, thomas.

un: ut malum pluvia

[somebadnews]

[ He was taking notes, but he's immediately distracted when he hears someone calling the Doctor a real first name. ]

Thomas?

[pathologise]

he didn't like daniel.

[somebadnews]

[ ("hears", read, basically the same thing.) He's almost disappointed that he didn't randomly learn his name by eavesdropping on the network. ]

His qualifications for 'doctor' didn't cut it for you?

[pathologise]

it's a title

[somebadnews]

So you decided to give him an alias in case he couldn't think of one?

[ For the record, he's always found 'the Doctor' to be a suspicious title to go by. But given his own name, he probably isn't one to talk. ]

[pathologise]

we're trying out different things.

( she is. he's adamant that doctor is his name )

[somebadnews]

[ It’s suspicious, but from what Five knows about him, there’s probably a very simple reason he hasn’t let his name get out. ]

Sounds like a worthwhile use of your time.

[pathologise]

with how he shares information it doesn't hurt.

[thedreamer]

An improvement on Bob or Daniel, which is what she started with. Insisted on it, actually.

[ Honestly. As if the Doctor isn't a perfectly fine name! ]

[somebadnews]

[ Those sound like perfectly good aliases to him. The more boring the better. ]

You never did explain why you settled on 'the Doctor'. It invites questions.

[thedreamer]

and you haven't improved on name selection but i won't hold that against you! come on then at least pick a more exciting name, give it some thought, nothing boring

[pathologise]

boring is subjective.
gerfried.

un: wisdom

[mashiara]

It's a consistent description, but about all of it, how would the train know if the Cradle's rocking an angry infant these days? The lot of you are sent to sleep for your good shut-eye while some of the staff keeps working each night. Anyone the train doesn't could get up to things like that still, couldn't they?

( this is less helpful than it is telling her that things are even more screwy than she knew. )

[thedreamer]

Ah, hello, yes, excellent bit of information! Tell me more.

[ Bit broad, that. But what can he say, he's a curious sort. Tell him everything! Yes, that'll do it. Certainly narrows it down. ]

Some staff you said, let's start there.

[mashiara]

Or we start with what you were talking about any my questions, because some staff is exactly what it sounds like. The whole of the train's staff doesn't sleep on regular schedule, a number of us work through the time the rest are dreaming to power this whole horrible thing. Light! What else do you expect me to tell you?

un : dappled peals of the parted seas (voice)

[beitangmoran]

Interesting.

I admit to being a bit out of my depth where magic is concerned, but the absence of answer about the timeline is... telling.

Does anyone on this train even know what day we are today?

[thedreamer]

Not that I've been able to ascertain. It's all very...somewhere, some-when, somehow...eventually. Couldn't get anyone—least of all the Contessa—to agree to much about the origins of their journey here.

[beitangmoran]

... Do they even know where they're going ?

un: brightsun

[stephanivien]

Could anyone become a dream thief? Is it a skill one could be trained in. Or pay for the usage of?

[ A pause, then, since that's probably a largely not-useful question, since that information wasn't provided already. ]

If the Cradle is the location, what is there to say there is not some... infantile powerful spirit living with in it?

[ Probably not a pirmal, they don't really have primals here. But if dream magic can be cooked up to make things manifest, and power a train, and... well, Stephanivien isn't wholly unconvinced that dreams with intention couldn't summon something. ]

[thedreamer]

That was my sense of it. Anyone at all could be a dream thief, that was partly the fear of them, outside of what they could do, of course.

[ Ah, yes, and here's some line of questioning that he'd considered himself. ]

That was exactly my thought. I'm hoping to speak with someone else who understands a bit more about the Cradle, at least, though how forthcoming they'll be, I can't be sure.

un: hide_and_seek | video

[makemeasong]

You lasted on text way longer than I thought you would. Give yourself some credit.

I have a theory about Contessa.

[thedreamer]

I'll give myself all the credit, of course! Tell me your theory. Have you heard some gossip? Something I haven't heard? Unlikely, but—well, come on then, out with it, Clara!

[ As if he's given her room to say anything at all. ]

[makemeasong]

We-el...it's silly. But she seems pretty flippant about her husband, doesn't she? What if he doesn't exist? I mean, what if she's a wealthy woman because she has a collection of formerly alive wealthy husbands?

[ Like she said, it's silly. And she's casually accusing a woman she doesn't know of homicide. And besides that, the issue is Firo and her missing bride. Not Contessa and her relationship. ]

un: absterge

[downswing]

She appeared sincere?

[thedreamer]

Completely sincere. Not a trace of deceit.

[ Surely the sarcasm comes across perfectly in text. ]

[downswing]

( Congrats, you have found the one person more earnest: )

Then, you trust in her.