Audio

[timesbureaucrat]

[Private to Security Personnel]

My apologies if I've been excessively underfoot for some of you [Charon. Kay. Boone, to some extent.] during the investigation into the explosions. As I have been recently reminded, it is not my place to pry into security matters. I shall henceforth be leaving it to the professionals. And if you find any bomb scraps that need analyzing, I am at your service. [He can't entirely let it go, but at least he's gone from wanting to personally investigate and occasionally tossing around orders to simply offering to assist in his technician capacity.]

[Private to Kay]

Are you available for that talk you mentioned earlier?

Comments

[timesbureaucrat]

Well.

[His eyebrows rise and fall in a quick, resigned facial shrug.]

That's disheartsening.

Perhaps it's better for everyone that I am just a technician. There, at least if I'm not respected, if information is willfully kept from me, no one dies as a result.

[most_feared]

Yeah.

Sorta sad how we're the backwards ones.

But I met way too many species that think the same thing. [He sounds sincerely disappointed by that himself.]

[timesbureaucrat]

[Narvin ponders that for a moment.]

Have you ever been in a position where you start to wonder if it's worth it? If everything you sacrificed and everything you risk to do the job you do is worth it?

[most_feared]

Oh. No. No I work for good people. It's worth it. Sure, sometimes I wonder what mighta been but... for the most part? [He rubs the back of his neck thoughtfully. Hm. Even with Alpha?]

Yeah. Yeah, it's been worth it.

[timesbureaucrat]

[He stares down at his tea. The liquid is making little ripples in the cup from his barely shivering hands not quite holding it still.

He's quiet for a long time.]

I wish--

[Then breaks off. Pauses.]

No, never mind. It isn't appropriate of me to...and certainly not in front of an alien. [Isn't appropriate to question his planet, or High Council, or the work he's done for both.]

[most_feared]

[He lets a silence linger, before he asks-]

Well you told me this much and it's not like I got any political bearing. Speak your peace.

[timesbureaucrat]

[Narvin considers it. Kay's right, he already had enough information to destroy his career if he were in a position and a mind to. He might as well go all the way.]

I wish I had that confidence in the value of my work back home. I did, once. I was utterly certain that everything I did was for the good of Gallifrey, that I was saving my people. I miss that feeling of certainty. I'm...tired. It's one of the reasons I came here. Ostensibly, it was because an alternate universe might contain the key to curing a virus that's been ravaging my people--and that is a strong motive still--but a part of my willingness to come was also a desire to escape for just a little while. It's a terribly shameful motive, but there it is.