Open post, multiple threads welcome!

[teenguerrilla]

Ellie was seated in the dining room, in front of her a plate piled high with vegetables and steak. Both things she'd seriously missed in the past year. Despite everything, she rather enjoyed eating her fill. Again, something she hadn't much of a chance to do since the invasion

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[incorrigibledoc]

The Doctor had no such nutritious compunctions. His Gallifreyan metabolism allowed him to go without food for days at a time, so when he eventually decided to eat, he tended to reach for the high caloric content. And besides, he found that this incarnation had a peculiar predilection for chocolate...

Thus, juggling a rather hefty slab of chocolate cake and a glass of milk, the Doctor looked for a place to sit. Actually, since the enormous banquet hall was mostly empty, he was looking for someone to sit with.

"Hello there?" he said cheerily to the young lady at the table. "Just in for a snack and I do hate to sit alone. May I join you?"

[incorrigibledoc]

Well. He really knew how to make charming table conversation, didn't he?

"I..." I'm sorry that you had to suffer sounded patronizing, even though he meant it with both his hearts. He swallowed before continuing. "I'm very sorry for your loss. And I'm also sorry if speaking about this is unsettling you," he said quietly. While he thought it healthy for the young lady to voice her experiences aloud, he wasn't sure that a relative stranger was the best person for the job, at least not at the moment. "I don't mean to pry."

[teenguerrilla]

Ellie nodded, "thank you."

She took a large mouthful of water, "when we were in New Zealand...my therapist told me I should talk about all my experiences." Another pause, "Instead I wrote them all down and hid them in various places. Some I left with her, others are still in Hell, and a few in the attic at my grandmothers." The point to this? "When I arrived here, every scrap of paper was on my bed. In the correct order." That had scared her more than the rest of her things that had arrived here. "I...you could read them if you want, after I write down what happened after we blew up the petrol station. I'm not the best writer but it's all true." This was a big step for Ellie, but she felt she could trust the man.

[incorrigibledoc]

"The pen is mightier than the sword, and mightier still over its memories," the Doctor said. "I would be honored to read your accounts, Ellie. I have no doubt that they are true, but I do hope that they do justice to your bravery."

[teenguerrilla]

A small smile on her face at the compliment. It felt foreign though she was getting some practice at it since arriving here. "I'm no braver than my friends were. Especially not Robyn..." Ellie looked back at her plate, "nothing I could do could amount to what she did." A sad look back on her face again.

[incorrigibledoc]

That was too bad. The Doctor had grown rather fond of her smile and the way it seemed to lift a burden from her. He wouldn't mind seeing another.

"Who was Robyn?" he asked gently, curious despite himself. "I understand if you don't wish to answer."

[teenguerrilla]

"She...she was one of my friends who'd gone camping with us before the War began..." Ellie paused for a moment, "after we blew up Cobbler's Bay...we weren't careful and got caught. Homer and I were sentenced for execution...and Robyn, Kevin, Fi and Lee...all got prison sentences."

She shut her eyes and drew her legs up to her chin, it hurt to talk about it...but she knew she needed to. "The day before Homer and I were to be shot, we were allowed to meet our friends one last time. The Kiwi's began to bomb nearby, and the area we were in...it fell apart. We ran but Major Harvey came after us. He was going to shoot us all, then and there. Robyn...she'd somehow found a grenade...one moment she was there, looking at me..." A stray tear in Ellie's eyes and she ignored it. She thought they'd all dried up well before now. "The next, she'd just disappeared."

[incorrigibledoc]

There was a suspicious glint in the Doctor's eye as well as he unconsciously reached a hand out for hers again. He had heard tales just like this one before, oh so many times, tales of loss and hardship and people making choices that they should never, ever have to make. Despite all the practice, the hearing never got any easier.

"I'm so, so sorry, Ellie. I wish that-" He broke off with a bitter little laugh. "I fear that I shall never understand humans, sometimes. Such capacity for cruelty and self-sacrifice, all within the same species..." With his free hand, he dug into his capacious coat pocket and produced a clean white handkerchief, offering it to Ellie with a small smile, never noticing the tear tracing a path down his own pale face.

[teenguerrilla]

Ellie gripped tightly the hand that was offered out to her, feeling the coolness in the skin. "She blew up herself and Major Harvey...just so we could escape..." She took the handkerchief and scrubbed at her face with it.

It was only when she offered it back to him that something he'd said clicked. "A-are you saying you're not human?" A frown on her face.

[incorrigibledoc]

...oh, dear. He hadn't meant to do that. He had a sneaking suspicion that a shock like a time-traveling alien was the last thing that Ellie needed, but he wasn't about to lie to the poor girl.

"I'm afraid that I'm not, Ellie. Human, that is," he said gently, not releasing her hand. "I come from a planet called Gallifrey, much closer to the galactic centre than Earth. My people are called Time Lords." He paused, watching her reaction carefully.

[teenguerrilla]

Ellie blinked and stared at the man like he was crazy. The man looked human and apart from cold hands (though her grandmother always had cold hands) seemed it too. "Do you go around abducting people, experimenting on them like in the movies?" A small thought crossed her mind that perhaps he could be behind all this, thought she dismissed it almost straight away.

[incorrigibledoc]

"What? Oh, no! Nonononono!" The Doctor had nothing against Hollywood, really he didn't, but honestly, they never seemed to make his lives any easier.

"I'm a traveler by vocation, Ellie. A professional tourist, you might say. I careen across the entire universe and stop at any place or time that strikes my fancy. I would never experiment on anyone, of any species! And I don't abduct anyone! Sometimes I have friends who come along for the ride, but that's not the same thing!"

[teenguerrilla]

Ellie's brow furrowed, she clearly didn't believe the man but didn't know what else to say. "And your name's the Doctor? Do they name all of the children where you're from after professions?" She didn't mean to be rude, she really didn't. This was...well, too much was an understatement. "How come you speak English then?"

[incorrigibledoc]

"Well, actually, 'the Doctor' is a name that I chose for myself. My Gallifreyan name is..." He said it aloud, syllables and dipthongs sliding off his tongue, but the word was not pronounceable by human standards. "But I am quite fluent in English, as well as several other human and non-human languages. Usually, anything I don't know by hearts, my ship can translate for me."

Despite his explanations, he could still sense her doubt. "May I prove it to you?" he asked. Turning the wrist of his free hand, he gently guided her fingers to it, letting her take his pulse. For someone battle-trained in taking vital signs, he knew that the double-thump of his heartsbeat would be difficult to mistake. "I have two hearts, Ellie."

[teenguerrilla]

Ellie wasn't even game to attempt to repeat any of what the Doctor just said. She didn't want to look silly, or accidentally offend him by accidentally saying comething completely different...

"By hearts? Don't you mean hear-" She was cut off by the feeling of a twin pulse. She blinked, looked rather shocked and tried to find words that wouldn't make her sould moronic. "Two hearts...right." She was starting to believe all his claims now...

[incorrigibledoc]

"That's right," he said with a smile and an eager nod. "Two hearts, thirteen lives, eleven fingers." His grin grew wider as her eyes flew down to his hands. "All right, I confess, that last one was a joke. But really, we aren't all that different. Time Lords may possess a few superficial anatomical differences, we may live a little longer than most species, but humans more than make up for it with their boundless creativity, their drives and passions, their eagerness for knowledge."

He squeezed her hand reassuringly. "Humans are, by far, my favorite species. You're much nicer company than any stuffy old Time Lord, Ellie."