The Bookworm Strikes Again (open)

[first_in_time]

Who: Barbara and Anyone
Where: The Media Library and possible roaming
Summary: Research, tea, discussion and all that jazz. Feel free to simply come and bug her.
Warnings: None

After watching the Daligig slaughter the previous crew twice, Barbara went in search of any kind of material on the Daligig, Stacey, pod-popping and the crews which had traveled on Stacey. She didn't expect to find much more than what GLaDOS had told her but it was worth a look. Especially with all this talk of rebellion and distrust.

So, in a corner of the Media Library Barbara sat with piles books, stacks of visual recordings and audio recordings, plus pot of tea which had been sitting empty for a while. She was lost in her own world, memorising what she could and trying to gain a better picture of the ship, the war and everything else which could be considered relevant.

Comments

[splendid_roman]

Ian wasn't looking for her, but came across Barbara by accident. She didn't notice him arriving, although he hadn't exactly signalled his entrance. So he got to watch her for a moment before we went closer and asked, "Hard at work?"

[first_in_time]

She jumped, catching the teapot before her bump could knock it onto the floor. "Something like that," Barbara smiled pleasantly, "what brings you here? Searching for some Verne? Or some Austin, perhaps?" The pot was put back on the table in one of the remaining free spaces away from the edge of the table.

[splendid_roman]

He shook his head. "I was just out for a walk." And he'd read all of Jules Verne's books. "What does Jane Austen write about that's so good?" He pulled a chair up to her table and sat at it, then picked up the book at the top of the pile to see what it was.


((OOC: I think LJ notifs are down this morning))

[first_in_time]

"Austen wrote lots of good things," Barbara protested, "there was Emma and Pride and Prejudice, Northanger Abbey, Mansfield Park and Juvenilla. You should read some of them, you could learn something."

[splendid_roman]

"Such as?" He couldn't tell much from the titles.

[theprophet]

"Mes Wright." Unlike Barbara, Tarrant had opted to go the high-tech route, downloading all the data he required on a slim datapad. He'd taken quickly to the new technology here out of necessity... but it was also a personal challenge, of sorts, for someone unused to digital tools. Luckily, he had quite a few years of practice acquiring new knowledge to fall back on.

He had settled into his own corner of the library with a bottle of wine and several tens of tomes' worth of reference material on freshwater sea life, looking only slightly out of place in his spot in one of the fleshy ship chairs. "How is your afternoon?"

[first_in_time]

Barbara's brow was wrinkled as she concentrated on the silly touchscreen on one of the tablets. Tarrant's appearance startled her and her finger slipped, losing her place in the digital book. She smiled in greeting but dropping the tablet gave way to her frustration.

"It could be going a little better," she sighed. "I haven't seen you in a while. Have you found your feet?"

[theprophet]

He dipped his head in a slight bow, but didn't comment on her dropping the tablet. It wouldn't be good manners, after all.

"You could say that. Finding a place to rest my feet, helping with the restoration of the City... I've even found a little time to run for the ship's civilian Council, though it appears I have quite a few fellow rivals in that arena. In any case, I heard you've mounted a little expedition or two."

[first_in_time]

The tablet was fine. She arranged it better on the pages of an open book because even though the thing frustrated her, she should better care for it.

"You've heard about those?" that surprised Barbara a little. Although after the attention both her and Sakura had, it was probably to be expected to some degree. "Stacey has been keeping me busy, that's for certain. Not that being idle is all that enjoyable either. I didn't know you were running for council. Is that because you held a similar position before Stacey?"

[makeherblue]

Trust Barbara to not rest until she'd devoured every bit of information at her hands.

The Doctor popped up behind her, unable to resist a good snoop and find out what his friends were up to when they were off on their own. It was one thing to have friends all over time and space - it was another entirely to have so many in one spot, on a living ship! The Doctor might not look like the most graceful of people in this new body of his, but he still had a habit of materializing and suddenly seeming to be simply there, and growing older hadn't changed that. He reached out and touched Barbara on the shoulder.

"Messy history," he said, from that passing glimpse he had over her shoulder. "History tends to be funny like that."

[first_in_time]

A startled Barbara whipped around in her seat, pushing the hand from her shoulder. She jumped up, 100% defensive and ready to fight back if necessary.

But, oh.

She relaxed with a sigh. "Doctor," she gave him an apologetic smile and sat back in the seat, "I didn't hear you come in." Barbara rubbed her eyes and shut the book she was looking through.

[makeherblue]

The Doctor beamed back and joined Barbara, taking his own seat and making himself comfortable. "Human hearing," he nodded.

He gestured at the book Barbara had been glued to. "So! Research! Or research-y things. I suppose you'll want a Plan next, knowing you."

If there was anything he learned, it was that Barbara and Ian were dependable - and that they weren't afraid to want to know the whys, the whats and the hows, like how do we fix this? The Doctor reached out to pull one of the scrolls she had in her pile, unrolling it and taking a look, his head tilted to the side.

[first_in_time]

"I'm hoping that I can help with the planning by learning something new," her elbows rested on the table and her hands provided a convenient surface for her chin, "unfortunately, I'm not finding much of use. I can't even construct a decent time line of the Daligig, or the ship."

The most she'd found were records of punishments or lists of out of bounds areas. And that visual record of the Public Torture. Barbara scowled at one of the digital tablet things she'd been fiddling with at some point.

Hope you don't mind me following up our other thread!

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

Howard notices Barbara's in the Media Library around the same time as he is. Probably doing the same thing, really - Howard's been pouring over old communication logs from Stacy looking for something, anything he can do to help the rebellion in the only way he knows how. Given the tapes stacked near Barbara, she must be looking up similar things.

And it surprises him that he's not mad at her. It's been a few days since her evaluation and flounce, which, honestly, Howard thought was impressively assertive and dramatic once he calmed down enough to think back on it. After about half an hour, he leaves the Media Library and returns to the Susono Inn.

About half an hour after that, he returns to the Media Library with a newly brewed pot of tea and sets it on the table beside her piles of books. He doesn't know any other way to start an apology, but food and drink mean you're sincere. No one from his world would ever waste water on making tea for someone they didn't want approval from.

"I noticed you were out." He stares at his the corner of the table.

Totally fine! Howard can be a sweetheart :')

[first_in_time]

It was more the idea that Howard was willingly approaching her that surprised her, rather than being shocked out of her research haze.

"Howard..." was her wide-eyed greeting, "...thank you." She cleared the table's second chair of old scrolls and data tablets. "Would you like to join me?"

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

"Sure." He stares at the chair like he's not sure whether to just sit down, apologize first, sit down then apologize, or pretend that her tiff at him never happened. After a few seconds he takes a seat and pours himself some tea.

"Sorry about earlier," he says to the table.

[first_in_time]

From the moment Barbara looked up to see Howard, she assumed that he had come to mend things but she hadn't expected an apology. After leaving the room last time, she had marched around the city for a couple of hours to cooling down, and had come to the conclusion that she had overreacted a little.

In all the universe, however, there were fewer people who could forgive and forget as quickly as Barbara Wright.

"I'm sorry, too. I shouldn't have blown up like that," unlike Howard, her eyes were directed toward the other chair, rather than the table. Her gaze wasn't directly on him, but rather his arm or the top hairs of his head.

[lastgallifreyan]

The Doctor slid into a chair next to Barbara, picking up the pot of tea to pour himself a cup and pulling a face when he realised that it was empty.

"I should have brought a refill."

Although he was in a better mood than he'd been in when he'd spoken to Barbara in the aftermath of the reveal about the Daligig, the Time Lord was still troubled. His smile was bright enough to hide that, though, and he wasn't the sort of person to sit and worry about a problem when he could be trying to solve it.

[first_in_time]

The Doctor's sudden arrival startled Barbara, making her fumble with the computer tablet thing and almost drop it.

"Doctor," she said as a greeting and smiled tiredly. "What brings you to the media library?"

[lastgallifreyan]

"Probably the same thing that's brought you here," the Doctor answered honestly. Although he looked calm, he was ready to catch her tablet if she did drop it. "I'm looking for information."

Any information. It didn't matter if it seemed insignificant or not. The Doctor was very good at looking at the big picture and putting the pieces together.

[first_in_time]

"I don't know if you'll find anything useful," she sighed, "what isn't the same as what was in our information packs, is merely the history and fiction of people's home worlds."

So, useless, in other words. Interesting, but useless.

Barbara leaned back in the chair, rubbing at a temple and took a deep breath. "Why do they even have a library if we can't read about their history?"

[boobhat]

There was a young man that made his way into the Media Library to nose around and get some reading done himself. He was dressed in a very old-fashioned way, too, given he'd managed to scrounge up some actual clothes from various shore leaves. (Medieval levels of old-fashioned, given the look of that blue tunic).

One thing that wasn't old-fashioned was the mechanical prosthetic that replaced much of his left leg below the knee.

Hiccup noticed the pot and poked at it as he passed by.

"I still don't get the tea thing."

As in, why people drank it.

[first_in_time]

Barbara's head shot up at the sound of someone else. She wasn't angry, or irritable. Just startled.

"What's there to not get about tea?" she asked, rubbing at a tired eye as she put down a scroll she'd been trying to read.

Last tag before my trip. I'll pick this up when I'm back!

[boobhat]

"Why people drink it? It seems like a cultural thing for some other people where it's almost a ritual to."

Vikings had some herbal infusions, but Hiccup tended to associate them with being sick rather than an enjoyable past-time. What other reason would there to be to stew gross things like moss and birch bark and drink it than to stave off illness and death? It didn't taste the greatest.

"My friend Zuko has an uncle that sounds almost obsessed with it, and I just don't understand the appeal. It's hot leaf water. That'd be like stewing a stick and then calling it a delicious beverage."

His criticism was light-hearted, though. He tended to regard most cultural differences with warm-hearted amusement.

I hope you enjoy yourself ^_^

[first_in_time]

"I suppose it is a little like that," Barbara could see the lack of intent to hurt but she was tired. Too tired to joke back.

She rubbed her eye and yawned behind her free hand. "I believe it is a fantastic, natural stress reliever. Like how bark from oak trees, when prepared properly, can help with pain and aches."