(no subject)

[asklepian]

WHO: Julian Bashir
WHERE: Fountain, Inn, also feel free to catch him wandering around looking lost
WHEN: 3/17
OPEN TO: All
WARNINGS: None
STATUS: Open

---

Fountain;
The last few days had been darkness, silence, and stifling confinement. The Dominion didn't exactly believe in the comfort of their prisoners, especially ones that were causing trouble. There was nothing to do in solitary confinement but worry and try to sleep.

Between one heartbeat, one breath and the next, he was inhaling icy cold water, feeling the pressure of it pressing down around him.

His eyes flew open, and he flailed for a bit before striking out for the surface, swimming until his head broke water. He sputtered, spit water, and flung his long arms over the edge of the...fountain.

If he didn't know any better, he'd think he'd finally gone round the bend and was hallucinating. How else could he explain having gone from a prison asteroid to half-drowning in the (surprisingly deep) fountain of a quaint brick-paved park?

He hauls himself out of the water, rolling onto the pavers and taking a very brief moment to shiver and feel the stretch in his muscles before pushing himself upright and taking stock.

Park, late-winter to early-spring, the plants looking for all their nakedness like Earth trees, heavy fog hugging the ground, making visibility limited. The fountain itself could've been at home in any park in London, once he craned his head back to look at it. He almost felt homesick. He would, if he didn't know that what he was seeing was impossible. He was literally halfway across the galaxy from Earth.

And to top off the absurdity he had a bloody backpack and was wearing what seemed like soaking wet, dark green hospital scrubs instead of his uniform.

He shivers again. It's not freezing, thankfully, but it's still too cold to stay in wet clothes, hypothermia is not a laughing matter. But he's tired, weary in the bone-deep way of someone who's beyond physical exhaustion. What can a few more minutes hurt?

Inn;
He'd found the inn after nearly an hour of aimless wandering, only noticing the road straight to it from the park after he'd circled back around from the other side. He'd stopped to peel off his dripping wet clothing a while back, it now hung from the outside pocket of the knapsack, but his hair was still damp and curling wildly around his ears as it dried.

He feels the tension melt out of his shoulders as he steps inside. He's not used to being so defensive, but recent experience...well. He might have reason to be suspicious.

Instead of approaching anyone who might be there, he quietly excuses himself to sit by the fire, settling in and trying to dry himself out the rest of the way.

Comments

Inn

[zomboligist]

There's a new face by the fire. This is what his life has become. Before, he could relax and play Diablo III or Call of Duty, he could watch football (the right kind and not the bastardized American version) and he could enjoy a light smattering of zombie-cure research. Now, he settles around the inn for a few hours and just waits for something to happen. It's sad, really. Sadder, still, with how excited he gets to see someone new.

It's not that he means to linger, but new means that he also doesn't have to stay creepily staring and can instead be an actual person and introduce himself. "If you're after a snifter of brandy or a pipe to contemplatively smoke, you're out of luck, but excellent pondering," he praises.

[asklepian]

Julian jolts and rapidly blinks the exhaustion back as he's addressed directly--he can't fall asleep here, in the open, around people he doesn't know, even if he was entirely sure if this was real or not.

Frankly, he isn't. Disassociation is a wonder. Especially when one's mind works on multiple tracks and he can both sort of experience it and watch it from outside.

"Smoking is absolutely terrible for your health. I wouldn't turn down brandy if it was on offer, though."

[zomboligist]

"Ah, but what would the cliquey high school kids near the parking lot say?" he chides, "Smoking is cool and all?" he deadpans sarcastically, giving the other man a smile to show that he's simply teasing. "Unfortunately, I didn't come prepared with brandy." He digs into his pocket and finds the few slides he'd brought with him. "I don't know if this is your jam or anything, but I was going to prepare some slides with water samples," he allows.

"Yes, life here is that thrilling and exciting," he assures.

[asklepian]

"I have no idea, I was never invited to their social group." He puts his hands on his bony knees as he gets up, intrigued enough by the promise of doing something that is to him so incredibly normal.

"Water samples are always exciting." He doesn't sound nearly sarcastic enough to really not mean that earnestly. "I realize I look a bit rough at the moment..." what with his face in the middle of growing a rough beard and all, "And I admit to being more than a little lost, but I'm a doctor."

[zomboligist]

Well, at least Ravi's found himself some entertaining company, to be sure. He lights up a little, extending out his hand. "Ravi Chakrabarti," he introduces himself, "also a doctor, and you don't look near as rough as I've seen. Most of my friends looked about the way you did at day two of finals in med school," he assures, knowing all too well how a person can break down when something stressful is in your life.

This place? It's sort of like advanced stressology and they're merely beginners.

Fountain

[notsocommon]

Helen made the point of checking the fountain at least once or twice a day just to ensure that no one had arrived and been unable to direct themselves to the Inn or to one of the houses and, as she always was when she ran across a new arrival, she was grateful she'd taken the time.

"Damn. You'd think that this place would be a bit more polite when spitting us up but no, it doesn't really care about the temperature, does it?"

[asklepian]

Julian is getting rather to the point of uncomfortable exposure, the wet scrubs sticking to his equally wet skin, and water dripping down the back of his neck. But he's still not entirely convinced this isn't an elaborate hallucination brought on by sensory deprivation, or a holodeck simulation meant to get his guard down for some nefarious purpose or other. As long as the jury's out, he's just going to take his time adjusting to whatever-this-is.

"So far it's not giving me much of a reason to recommend its hospitality, no."

It beats the prison camp he occupied most recently, but that isn't a high bar of achievement.

[notsocommon]

"Quite rude, this place. Come, I can show you to the Inn, at least, and then you can get your bearings and at least get dry and warm again. I'll give the explanations, too, because there's no point doing it out here while you're freezing."

Helen was nothing if not practical. This was yet another example of practicality and she hoped he'd appreciate her choices in the matter.

"My name is Helen, by the way."

[asklepian]

"Julian." And her suggestion is eminently practical, he can practically feel his body temperature dropping degree by degree. As if in agreement, he shivers.

He puts his hand up on the lip of the fountain behind him, the other on his knee, and stands up, fussing with the backpack to sling it back over his shoulder.

"I certainly won't turn down an explanation, thank you."

[notsocommon]

"Well, so far as we've been able to tell, this is some sort of closed environment and we're being held captive. By whom, we don't know," Helen said, lifting a hand to stave off that potential question.

"I wish I did know, honestly, because then I would know exactly who to give my regards to. As it is, it seems like we're being held for no discernible reason and attempts to leave the area aren't successful."

The Inn

[ad_dicendum]

Several days ago, Gaius had woken to find a box in the Inn common room, addressed to him. Inside, there had been writing tablets, bound together so that their writing surfaces faced together but could be opened, like the pages of his notebook. He'd never seen so many tablets bound together before, but he'd taken to them immediately.

He'd also found three tunics, purple-striped to denote the equestrian rank which apparently means nothing to anyone here. Whether anyone here is aware of the distinction the stripes convey, however, Gaius has been wearing the tunics every day since then, and today is no different.

Gaius has some small morsels of food in one hand, leftover from the village's midday meal. He approaches the fire, quietly, and tosses the scraps in, closing his eyes for a few moments to murmur a quiet invocation to the gods, in accompaniment to their portion of the meal.

It's only when he re-opens his eyes that he turns to the man sitting in a chair a little way apart from the fire.

He has, at least, learned enough English by now that he can offer the appropriate greetings.

"Good afternoon," he says, his voice heavily accented, rolling the r more heavily than he should.

"You are new here?" he asks, after a moment's thought to remember the words. In Latin, he could say it much more politely, much more elegantly, but he has not such skill in English.

[asklepian]

Julian has been watching, quiet, through half-closed eyes. The fire is warm, he's actually comfortable, and the last month or so is catching up with him hard now that he's sat in one place--and that one place isn't his cot in the shared cell, hearing Tain's labored breathing.

What he can hear now is the murmuring of the man over the crackle of the fire, but he can't place the words.

"Yes, I am." He nods, additionally, thinking that from the pause and the accent that English may not be his first language and he may appreciate the additional input.

"My name is Julian."

[ad_dicendum]

The man looks unkempt, like people here usually do after a time, but he's new, which was clear enough from the fact that Gracchus hadn't seen him here before in the Inn. He wonders if that's by choice, if he'd been in some other situation which made personal grooming difficult, or if he'd been in mourning before his clothes were taken and replaced.

Conversing in English is still new to Gracchus, though he's finding himself learning the language at a rate that would have pleased his mother and his Greek tutor. The man offers more than he'd been asked for, and it's one of the first things he'd learned to say. Introductions were covered in book of phrases in Greek and English he'd been given when he was first here.

Julian. It's a name very like a Roman name, the name of an old and distinguished noble family, except for that strange letter at the start of the name that Gracchus still isn't used to pronouncing.

He repeats the name to solidify that sound in his mouth.

"Julian. I am pleased to meet you. My name is Gaius Sempronius Gracchus."

More pleased, now that he can start to communicate with people who speak English.

[asklepian]

Prison will do that to you.

Julian can't quite place the accent, but the fact that he's repeating the name to get it stuck in his head is a clue that whatever language Gaius is used to speaking, it's not English.

"The pleasure is mine." He smiles, the expression genuine despite the tired look in his eyes.

"May I ask, where are you from?"

[ad_dicendum]

Knowing a man's name and remembering what you learned about them is a basic part of Roman political life. It is possible to have someone with you who can study and remember it all for you, but Gracchus has always preferred to know people himself, to remember them and what matters to them.

Perhaps this place isn't the same as politics in Rome, but he remembers what Kate Kelly had said to him about having to earn influence here. He knows how to do that, but his interest isn't entirely cynical. It was part of why the people had liked him so much in Rome, when they still did: he does honestly care.

Fortunately, he knows English well enough now to understand Julian's question.

"I come from Roma. From Rome, they say in English."

fountain

[kestreldawn]

It's the second day since the fireflies had attacked her. Jyn spent the first portion of the previous day arguing with some dark-haired man who claimed to know her, who wore her mother's necklace (how did he know about it?), who reached out to touch her like she'd somehow given him the permission to do so. He'd been a threat, a hostile she needed to disarm and disable in order to escape, and so she'd sent her fist like a proton-torpedo, straight into the shoulder he'd had in a sling. He'd curled over, crumpled in on himself like a leaf in a flame, and she'd taken advantage of his distraction to put her foot to earth.

The rest of the day had simply been spent .. running. Running for cover, running from enemy fire, running in an attempt to find Saw's base. Where had the kriffing thing gone? Why was no one coming back for her? Sure, Codo had refused to look at her since the moment she'd denied his advances in the grotto, but the others - surely the others wouldn't have taken his side? Had they discovered her secret? Did they finally link her back to the great Galen Erso, genius and lackey for the Empire? Had they left her out here to die?

It's during one of her many laps of the perimeter of the town that she decides to cut through by the fountain - hears the unmistakable sound of furious water as she draws near. Something lucid in her knows it's an arrival, remembers hers only a few weeks earlier.

The delirium of the venom tainting her blood and rampaging her system tell her: it's a threat. Enemy forces staging an ambush. How could she have been so stupid?

When she approaches, she sees a man sitting on the ground. He looks perplexed, shocked, confused. Clothes drip, body trembles with the cold she cannot feel. Who shivers while they're on a jungle planet?, she wonders. She takes a step forward, hands loosely clasped into fists at her side, body in a defensive posture - squared shoulders, puffed chest, angled knees with feet like solid roots in the ground. Eyes the color of jade - wild, feral, visceral, untrusting - with pupils far too large try to scan him the way she would any adversary; he doesn't seem to be armed.

"If you're going to learn to stalk more effectively, you should probably work on the volume of your entrance."

[asklepian]

She's very observant--Julian is shocked and confused, his mind not quite yet parsing that he's not actually hallucinating himself but coming closer and closer to the realization.

He's not sure what to do with it, this certainly wasn't how they'd planned their escape, he and the others. And there are no others, at least none that are yet familiar.

But then there's rapid footsteps and a young woman approaching him, looking--not well at all. Her pupils are dilated well beyond normal human conditions, and she does look Human, certainly. She can't keep her eyes still, her skin is flushed, breathing heavily, and there's a tremor in her hands. Right knuckles bruised and bloodied. Julian is instantly concerned--it looks like an acute panic reaction at best. Not that he can rule anything out at this point.

"I'm not stalking anyone. I'm a doctor."

(As if that precludes him from knowing how to cause harm to anyone, which is untrue. He's also a soldier, when he needs to be.)

"Your hand...is it hurting you at all?"

[kestreldawn]

"A doctor?" Jyn practically sneers, feet stumbling back a few steps - clumsy and heavy with blisters and exhaustion. "You can't be a doctor." To an untrained eye, she might appear drunk - extraordinarily so. Her body sways to a current only she can feel, unable to stay in one position for too long before she falls off-kilter, feet fumbling to keep up with her and keep her face from as far from the dirt as they can. "Med-droids. They're the ones who're the doctors." Her words might even be a tad slurred, accentuated with the percussion of sharp, harsh clicks of her tongue on the d's and t's. "You're not a med-droid." Eyes widen and squint in an attempt to bring him into focus, like adjusting a scope on a sniper - but nothing seems to work. He remains blurry and ill-defined no matter how she looks at him.

Mention of her hand suddenly brings it back into existence, and her gaze falls to it while she stretches and clenches the fingers - like discovering a limb for the first time. There is an ache, faint purpling and mutation of color underneath the surface, gashes torn open on the peaks of her knuckles. The blood has dried, crusted and scabbed over - but the tight clenching of her fists tears them open again. Fresh, bright red droplets begin to scurry down her fingers when she lets it hang at her side again.

"It's fine," she finally protests. "More importantly - what are you doing here? Don't tell me you're another defector from the Empire like that other guy had been. Kriffing lies, if you ask me."

[asklepian]

"Med-droids?" Well, that would indicate that, at least, she's from an advanced time frame, though not the same as his own. Commander Data of the Enterprise is the only android serving in Starfleet, the only recent forays into artificial intelligence acting as medical officers were the prototype Emergency Medical Holograms.

He shakes his head. That doesn't really matter, in the here and now.

He gets up, feeling like he should ache more himself, but aside from a deep emotional exhaustion, he feels fine. His hands are held out from his sides in the universal--or so he hopes--gesture of 'I mean you no harm.'

"I'm not with the Empire." He can say that definitively, despite not knowing what it is. Possibly because he doesn't know what that is--somehow he doesn't think she means the Romulan Empire, or the Klingon Empire. He's not yet about to try to explain his loyalties to someone who he's rapidly suspecting is delirious. Not that he can outright say he's with the Federation either, not while following the Prime Directive.

"My name is Julian Bashir."

[kestreldawn]

"That's what I said, isn't it? Med. Droid." There's no rationale behind a person feigning ignorance when it comes to med droids, med bays, bacta tanks, the like. Not in this galaxy, not on Onderon (this being the planet she's currently on, or so she thinks). Something about her childhood nanny droid, Mac-Vee, bubbles in her brain somewhere but is quickly snuffed out like a flame under a glass. There's no time to be weak, no time to crumble.

His movement has her attempting to back up a few more paces, finding it moderately difficult to do so going backwards. A Jyn untouched by fever has a surety in her movements most would envy, but this particular version - the one this man has the distinct displeasure of encountering for the first time - is about as capable as a bantha attempting to swim. Which is to say:

Not very.

But she manages to stay upright, and that has to count for something. Her blinking is more desperate, as though each parting of her lids should present a different scene splayed out in front of her. The world's begun to spin a bit, she thinks.

"Ju-lee-an. Bashhh-ir." Her hands come out to either side of her in a dismal grasp at balance. "Doctor," she murmurs, her voice now a bit more pleading, a bit more urgent. Muted jade find his gaze, struck with horror and fear at the slow dawning of realization that she's not well, but can't seem to understand why or how or what.

inn;

[repressings]

"It's warm, isn't it?"

Credence is in the corner, and when he speaks, it's from there. He doesn't move towards the other and the fire, he merely watches, broom in hand, from a shadowy section of the inn. He doesn't speak right away, either--he watches and observes carefully, taking in the other's appearance, and gait, and the way he sits around people he doesn't know. A survival tactic in Credence's case: observe and judge the room first. It used to be, at least--now he most likely just looks like some strange person with too short hair and a hunched over posture staring at the new arrival like a piece of meat.

Should he smile? He feels like he should smile.

...Probably not. It might come across as terrifying.

"When I arrived here, there was snow everywhere. The fire probably saved my life." A beat. "Are you okay, sir?"

[asklepian]

"Thankfully." He's feeling rather drowsy with it, now. Trusting enough to possibly fall asleep in a room full of strangers is probably something Credence can observe off of him. He's not quite gotten the hang of suspecting people like him of anything nefarious.

He glances over, the shadows obscuring slightly--but Julian's vision is good, and he can pick out sharp features in a young, pale face. Tall, but hunched in on himself in a way that Julian can't help but note looks extremely bad for his back.

"Tired, mostly. I look far worse than I feel, I imagine." He offers a smile, it doesn't really do to have someone younger than he is fussing over him. "Thank you for your concern. Truly."

[repressings]

People are strange. Julian falls into a particular category that Credence has only met here: unusually comfortable. Perhaps it's because he's not from New York, because no self-respecting Brooklynite would trust anyone long enough to doze off in a chair with people they barely know. He files Julian into the Long Island category in his head: trusting, unafraid. Still a chance of being tough, but the exterior is soft enough that Credence finds it easy to imagine him in a big, rich house with lots of light and expensive art.

His accent is anything but New York, but since New York is all Credence knows, he keeps with the comparison. He does, however, take a small step forward. Curiousity has been getting the better of him lately: there are more arrivals, there are more people in the village, now more than ever. It's comforting and alarming at the same time. He keeps his hands at his side, fists tight, and speaks carefully:

"Are you from London, sir?"

[asklepian]

It's not an entirely off-base mental image. Julian's parents had provided nothing but the best for their miracle child, which was simple enough on a world where currency was phased out of use decades ago. His father fancied himself an artist and a collector too, and tended to hoard bright things.

Also not off-base is the assumption that he's trusting and unafraid. Julian simply doesn't think he has anything to fear from another person until proven otherwise.

"I grew up near there, yes. I suppose the accent gave me away."

[repressings]

"There are a lot of British people here," Credence says carefully, and dares to take just the tiniest of steps towards him. Definitely Long Island. He knows the other's words aren't a specific invitation to join him, but there's still that lingering question he feels the need to ask everyone, if only to tally it in his journal later.

"Maybe someone's from your version of Britain? Do you have any friends here?"