resort_link | Audio

Yeah, sure. I'm around.

[By some miracle he's actually off duty. They've went long enough without a mysterious explosion that security has ebbed some. Or at least a mysterious explosion that's been reported.]

Shall I drop by your rooms, then?

[It's a calculated choice of meeting place that he offers. For one thing, it's private. If Narvin's going to talk about his past failures he doesn't want anyone around to overhear. But also a part of him hopes that seeing Kay's room might give him a bit of insight about Kay. Perhaps he'll spot a picture, or a book, something that would give him a glimpse past Agent Kay's professional facade.]

[There's a sort of hesitation, like he's not sure he wants to go that private. But he does realize his room is decently secured. He does have some personal items, but not many. It's mostly a standard resort room.]

Sure, come on over. [He gives the room number.] I guess we can use that spawner thing to get you a cup of tea if you need it.

Yes, thank you. I'll be right there.

[And he knocks on the door five minutes later, clad in Gallifreyan civilian clothes that are excessively covered and layered even by Gallifreyan standards. Talking about the events that led to the civil war leave him feeling vulnerable so he compensates by armouring himself up with his garments.]

[Kay is dressed as Kay dresses, because adventure is not something that lives in his fashion and his sense of duty came with him, even if his uniform from home isn't required. It helps him still feel like he's doing the job for Zed and not for the resort, even if logically he knows he works for both. Zed he trusts, this place he doesn't know about.]

[This has been his first time truly in charge of something, however. And that by choice; back home he's made an effort to remain loyally dedicated to field work. Here he feels like his ability to address interplanetary concerns comes in handy but having people actually look at him is kind of a strange feeling. As much as Narvin is getting used to the role of not giving orders, Kay is getting used to one of leadership.]

[He dreads it, but he knows he's probably an okay one for it.]

[He gets the door and lets Narvin in.] Have a seat whereever. [He gestures around.] Mi casa es tu casa. So on and so forth.

[Narvin glances around, looking for his seat options but also looking for traces of Kay in the decor. At last he perches on the edge of a chair. He thinks of their last conversation and suddenly feels oddly conscious of the fact that he has nipples and genitals and no navel. At least Leela wasn't around for that discussion of alien physiology or else she probably would have shamelessly started explaining everything she knew about Gallifreyan anatomy.

He shifts in his seat, crosses his legs, clears his throat, and thinks of how to begin.]

How many sets of black suits do you own?

[Nope, that's avoiding the topic, not broaching the topic.]

[That's one of the worst thoughts that can abruptly enter someone's mind prior to a serious discussion about a traumatic experience. Kay's room, however, is pretty spartan and utilitarian, the same level of "comfort" as any room at the resort. ]

[There is an acoustic guitar propped up against the far wall and a couple of old detective novels on the table by his bed. He pulls up a chair and sits down.]

So you were telling me what happened with the bombs?

Yes. [He runs his hand through his thinning hair. It wasn't something he'd spoken of before, not since the events occurred. He's never taken the time to consider what he thinks or feels about what happened, just ran from one crisis to another.]

The terrorist hit the Academy first. Twenty six dead in all, mostly alien students and some Gallifreyans as well. I was assigned to investigate, but it was...complicated. I suspected that one of my own operatives might have been behind it, without my knowledge. [Under orders from Darkel with the power over the CIA that he'd given her.]

The president decided to evacuate the alien students, but the terrorist stuck again at the scaphe port. That one was...worse. We couldn't count the bodies; there wasn't enough of them left intact. [His voice is expressionless, his affect flat as he talks about it. Carefully constructed detachment so his memories and emotions do not consciously intersect.]

[Kay makes himself comfortable and listens, leaning forward and putting his elbows on his knees. He's pretty sure at this point that Time Lords don't have any way to deal with PTSD. Considering how Narvin reacts at the implication of having biological ancestry, whether it's related to vestigial body parts or being descended from something that wasn't over-processed and methodically designed.]

[Having to admit your head was fucked up? Probably not all that of a great thing.]

What actually happened? Was your operative responsible?

No, thank Rassilon. [Bad enough that the terrorist got access to CIA codes through Darkel, but at least it wasn't one of his own. That would be an extra level of culpability he didn't think he could take, if the terrorist were someone who was right under his nose the whole time.]

It wasn't an anti-alien extremest either, much to our surprise. It was a media commentator, a man named Antimon who had been indoctrinated into the ideology of a terrorist organization called Free Time. He targeted the students merely because he knew it would cause the maximum amount of outrage and political chaos. In that, he succeeded beyond his wildest dreams, even though he was killed before he saw the results of his efforts come to fruition.

I was his last bombing victim. Somehow, I survived.

So now you're pretty piss scared of being held indirectly responsible. [He doesn't think he's afraid of the bombs- not any more than any other person is. He doesn't particularly want to be standing on one but he wouldn't be in a rush to get to bombing sites, but rather that he doesn't want to be responsible through inaction if something happens.]

And I take it your people don't do much about PTSD, that sort of thing? [As he assumes, but he asks the question almost more as a formality than anything else.]

We don't succumb to PTSD. [That is the official line. And like many CIA official lines, it isn't true.] Not operatives of the Celestial Intervention Agency. We are highly trained in mental partitioning.

But...yes. Even if Quadratus is technically not in my jurisdiction, I don't want to see any more innocent deaths happen on my watch, not if I can help it.

Bullshit. You don't have this partitioned at all. [Official lines aren't very good lines, Kay finds most of the time. He's frequently responsible for dreaming them up to hand off to humans none the wiser.] It's definitely there and living in denial of it is actually gonna put more people at risk 'cause your more prone to irrational judgement. Like I said, you got too many ideas attached to this.

[He gets up, dusting off his hands as goes.] How do you take your tea?

[Narvin's eyes widen at Kay, startled. That's a bluntness rarely seen in Time Lords. He doesn't know how to respond. But tea, he can answer that question.]

Hot. Milk and one sugar.

[At least at that Kay looks a little kinder, despite the harshness to his words. Kinder in his own way, anyway. He goes over to the spawner and starts fiddling with settings, and puts in a cup.]

Tea will be quicker this way but the milk and sugar I'm going to use natural. Hope you don't mind.

Juice from a creature's mammary gland, you mean? Why not? [He still finds natural food a bit disturbing, but after Kay's description of dactyl eggs, milk and sugar doesn't sound quite so bad in comparison.]

Hypothetically speaking, if a person did have a form of PTSD, how would that person eliminate it? [Narvin is thinking of it almost as a virus to be purged from a computer system.]

See, look at that. You'll be being adventurous. [He starts making the tea, considering a way to answer Narvin's question. The problem is while Narvin was obviously deeply affected by what happened with his past, he's also an alien. He knows how to treat it as a human, how to avoid it, but in an alien? Especially one in denial, and at that for racial reasons.]

[He returns with the cup and offers it to Narvin.] Yeah, I do. The problem is that my PTSD expertise is with humans. So if you take an alien that, say, takes its experiences and segments them off into their own portion of their brain but then has to call upon them to solve certain problems then whatever survival mechanisms their ancestors developed would be what you'd have to consider most there. What their fight or flight is based on.

But that requires said alien admitting that they got some root in some real ancestry and they didn't pop out of the sea on a seashell the practical vision of perfection.

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