The Edwardian Adventuress

Charlotte Elspeth Pollard, but Charley to my friends. I've seen all sorts of things, but I'll never tire of it so long as I live. [Sideblog RP account; might not be here terribly often!]

[theedwardianadventuress]

bowtied

She'd been running back to the TARDIS -- not so much out of fear rather than out of a shared desire with the Doctor not to get caught by the local authorities, whom they'd somehow managed to upset even as the two of them had saved their planet (ungrateful, Charley thought privately, but it was slightly understandable, as the Doctor hadn't been able to keep his mouth shut) -- but somehow she'd lost the Doctor along the way, and had ended up at the blue box alone.

There was no way of knowing if he'd arrived there before her or if he was leading the men following them on a merry chase; so, then, she knocked as hard as she could on the door, hoping that if he'd arrived and was inside, he'd hear.

"Doctor!" she called. "Doctor, it's me, open up!"

[theedwardianadventuress]

physicianhealthyselves

"Have you gone to bed recently?"

She's leaning on the massive threshold from the console room into the rest of the TARDIS, trying not to smile too widely at the sight of him by the controls. "No, that can't be it -- oh, I know! Your hair's grown longer! Or you've styled it!"

Poking fun at him has to be one of her favourite pastimes, and how disheveled he looks today is really just asking for it. Charley grins, now, pushing off from her position and coming to stand beside him. "Does this mean we're going somewhere that entails you having to impress someone, then, Doctor?"

[theedwardianadventuress]

xninths

There was a certain freedom in travelling with the Doctor, but there was even more of one in sneaking away from him -- never too far away -- and waiting for him to notice and catch up. He'd get to where she was eventually -- her bright blue dress stuck out, so just so long as she didn't run into trouble, he'd be able to find her easily enough.

In the meantime, she was having loads of fun watching the people go by and making up stories for their lives. That woman walking by -- obviously a humanoid android on a mission to protect the Earth. The man beside her was her lackey, an alien donning a human guise. The one in leather --

-- strange... He was stopping. Just close to her bench, in fact. And he was --

"Are you going through a bin?" she asked incredulously. (Mind, he might have been looking for a newspaper. She did that on occasion to find out the date, but only if the paper was on the top of the pile.) "What are you doing that for?"

[thinkersdreamersdoers-blog]

"Yes I know the Doctor," he said, smiling at her. "I traveled with him. I don’t think he ever mentioned your name though," he thought. "Did I catch your name? Next time he stops by I’ll have to ask him." Tom smiled at Charley.

"And yes. The TARDIS. Blue police box."

"Do we have the same Doctor?" he asked. "I remember us bumping into the old one. The one with long white hair. And also the one with the Scottish man. Jamie I think his name was." 

[theedwardianadventuress]

"Have you?" she inquired eagerly, wanting to know all she could about someone else who'd been in her very situation. Admittedly, it was a little disheartening to know that the Doctor hadn't ever mentioned her, but maybe it was to be expected. After all, she hadn't heard of many of his previous companions, either. "I'm Charley Pollard -- I'm travelling with the Doctor now!"

Her smile grew even wider as she listened to him, and at his question, she gave a light shrug. "I'm with neither of those," Charley answered, feeling as though it was a strange way of speaking about the Doctor and yet going along with it anyway. "Mine's got light brown hair, almost shoulder-length, and he wears Victorian clothes everywhere. Yours?"

[thinkersdreamersdoers-blog]

"Sorry about the looks," he said, looking her up and down once more. "You just have this familiar look about you. Like… I’ve never seen you before but there’s something about you that makes me think that we’ve had similar experiences."

"I’m either going to sound normal or insane, but have you happened to see a blue box that’s bigger on the inside?" he asked hopefully, hoping that the woman in front of him wouldn’t think him insane. "I sound bonkers to you, don’t I?" he asked.

[theedwardianadventuress]

Charley hadn't been so blind to attempted suitors back when she'd been living with Mama and Papa that she couldn't recognize a poorly veiled try at winning her favour. It was obvious -- she couldn't believe she hadn't realized it sooner. The looks, the 'familiar look' about her...she would have laughed, until he spoke again.

Then, she couldn't believe she'd been so blind.

"You know the Doctor?" Charley replied, almost interrupting his last question. Her eyes were wide, and she leaned forward, now completely invested in the conversation. "You're talking about the TARDIS, aren't you? How d'you know him?"

[snogboxed]

The Doctor let out a small sigh of relief. What was it in him that attracted trouble? Luckily, this time it had been just the human police chasing him — they had seen him use the sonic to try to get into a museum. He had just wanted to take a look around! He liked museums. Oh, well, never mind that now… The police had lost him, but he maybe ought to take a look around the city before sneaking back to the TARDIS, which was, of course, standing right against the wall of the museum building.

He turned at the voice from next to him — and froze, raising his eyebrows, a panicked look flashing to his face. He knew that voice, that tone, that face. How— “What?” His bow tie? “Oh.” He started to fix it clumsily, staring at Charley. Oh, this could be problematic. And… then again… He couldn’t help but smile warmly at her. Oh, Charley.

"Better now?" he asked, managing to compose himself for a bit. "Busy day. If I had stopped to make sure my bow tie is all neat, I’m sure something much more scandalous would’ve happened. For instance—”

“Hey! You!”

The police. “Uh-oh. Sorry, I think I ought to… run.” The policemen were jogging closer, but problem was… he didn’t want to run. Because… well, Charley.

[theedwardianadventuress]

His face went funny when he saw her, she thought, judging the expression with raised eyebrows and a curious look on her face. Was it something about her? She thought the skirt and blouse she'd picked were standard enough for this time period, so it couldn't be her clothes -- the Doctor had okayed them before she'd stepped out, in any case. The problem couldn't be her, really, so it had to be something else.

That made the stranger, in effect, quite strange. Charley almost wanted to laugh, finding just how fitting it was rather amusing.

"Much better," she grinned, giving him an approving nod once he'd fixed it. The more he spoke, the more intriguing she found him; it was an interesting sort of progression. She wondered what sort of scandalous things had happened to him --

-- but her answer came rather more quickly than she thought it would. She hadn't even had time to ask the question! Thankfully, she was used to this. This, in fact, was just the sort of thing that Charley loved.

"Well, come on, then!" Instinctively, she reached out and took his hand, pulling him along so that he'd start running to catch up.

[thinkersdreamersdoers-blog]

Tom was about to cross the street when he felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned towards the person who tapped him and looked her up and down repeatedly. Something familiar about how she looked. A sort of glow.

"What? Sorry. You can get pretty much anywhere from here really. Where do you need to go?" he asked, looking her up and down once more.

[theedwardianadventuress]

The looks were a bit off-putting; Charley looked down at herself after he'd eyed her over, trying to see if there was anything about her that seemed off in a way that would warrant that kind of staring. But she wasn't the Doctor, it wasn't as though she wandered around in a cravat and frankly Victorian-looking clothing, after all. So, confused still, she looked back up at the man and gave him her politest smile.

Even though that hadn't been the answer she was looking for.

"Oh, nowhere in particular," she answered, giving a simple shrug. "I was just taking a look 'round. Difficult to know where I'm headed without a map, though, which is why I've got myself lost!"

She was tempted to ask if he'd seen the TARDIS, but even more so to continue exploring on her own, so she refrained from any questions about the police box in the hopes that he would give her a bit more information to work with.

[theedwardianadventuress]

tomvanderhop started following you

The blonde girl was a bit confused. It would have been helpful to have the Doctor around to tell her where she was, but — naturally — he’d disappeared the moment she’d had her back turned, leaving her to deal with the confusion on her own.

Well, she could most certainly handle it.

Walking up to the nearest person, Charley tapped him on the shoulder and gave her most apologetic smile.

"So very sorry," she said, acting to the best of her abilities, "but I’m a tourist here, and I’ve only just lost my map. Would you be so kind as to tell me where we are or direct me towards where I could get that information?”

[drthetasigma14]

The man in the brown coat and pinstriped suit turned to look at her with a mirroring inquisitiveness— and stopped and stared— for a moment that lasted forever—

—his memory had been erased so many times, amnesias post-regenerative and otherwise, paradoxes too impossibly numerous to count, let alone keep track of— 

—that he was rarely sure, these days, which of those memories were real and which were not. Frobisher, Lucie…

…but that face. Oh, that face. And his face burst into a smile.

"It is now," he declared, "oh, 8 PM, approximately, on 12 November, 1955. And I’d get indoors, if I were you," he glanced up at great big threatening California skies, "gonna be a Hell of a storm.”

[theedwardianadventuress]

It was strange, really, to see the stranger smile so broadly at her for such an odd question -- because she did know she sounded odd, having had to ask the question on occasion before and being the recipient of several strange looks for her trouble. But when the Doctor was out of commission thanks to having dropped her off to wait while he tested the TARDIS' new stabilizers, like he was doing now, she had to do the best with her own wits, and this was what she'd chosen to do.

After all, making friends and finding out a little more about where she'd been left to wait couldn't be too uninteresting of a pastime.

And the stranger's smile was strangely infectious, too. Charley found herself grinning back at him as she nodded her thanks. "You're very kind," she replied, and then, tilting her head and giving a shrug, "but I've got nowhere to go, so I suppose I'll wait it out here." Amused, she added, "And I know my friend well enough that if I go elsewhere, he'll walk himself straight into trouble when he comes back looking for me!"

[theedwardianadventuress]

drthetasigma10 started following you

"Would you happen to have the time?"

An inquisitive smile was on her face -- Charley looked positively innocent. There was absolutely nothing that betrayed the fact that she was currently spatially and temporally displaced, and was really supposed to be in the 1930s (was really supposed to be dead). Neither was there anything in her expression to give away that her next question was going to make her stand out in exactly that way.

"And the date, too, if you don't mind?"

[theedwardianadventuress]

legsyes started following you

Straightening the skirt of her dress, Charley drew herself up and sauntered over to the man standing a few paces away. He wasn't looking at her, but she'd noticed something, and -- while she waiting for the Doctor to catch up to her -- she quite thought she'd like to make friends. This man was as good as any, she'd decided.

"Do you know," she began, conversational as you'd like, but with an amused sort of glint in her eyes, "your bow tie isn't at all centered. It's at an angle, too! Depending where you find yourself, that could be scandalous." Charley grinned up at him then, now fully, visibly amused.

[theedwardianadventuress]

nothing-only-about-it started following you

"You wouldn't happen to know where we are, would you?"

It was perhaps embarrassing to have to ask, Charley thought, but when the Doctor had crash landed them in a city she very much didn't recognize on first glance, she had no shame in asking it. It could be anywhere, really; after all, the Doctor never had been particularly good at steering the TARDIS, or the machine was constantly breaking down, or both, which explained why he'd stayed inside it, tinkering with the console.

But Charley was an adventuress at heart, and so adventure she would. "I've got a bit turned around and I'm not quite sure where to go next, or where I am now, you see," she explained to the brunette woman, giving her a smile.

[theedwardianadventuress]

adventureismyname started following you

It had been a while since she'd seen the Doctor -- a good hour, she thought, at the very least. This wasn't a strange occurrence, not really, not when they often lost each other after wandering around a bit once they'd landed. In the end, though, they did always find each other; now, whether they found each other in a spot of trouble was another situation entirely (and one that happened far more often than not).

It was then that Charley resolved that she'd better go and find the Doctor rather than just stand around waiting; after all, he could have landed himself in real trouble, and if he had, she'd have to save him. Decidedly, then, she walked towards the nearest woman and tapped her on the shoulder.

"Excuse me," she began apologetically, "have you seen a well-dressed man walking about? He's wearing -- sort of Victorian clothes, and he's got shoulder-length, curling, light brown hair, calls himself the Doctor?"

[theedwardianadventuress]

quimedicus started following you

There was something so very lovely about this place, even though she wasn't sure exactly of where they were. The Doctor had assured her that it was Earth, but there was something wrong with his readout otherwise; so he'd stayed in the TARDIS to work on it, and she'd gone out to take a look for herself.

She knew for certain that it wasn't London, and nor did it look like the places she'd been to in France -- and, from the looks of it, it didn't seem as though it was Singapore. Curious as ever, though, Charley stepped up to a man close by and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Sorry, but would you happen to know where we are?" she asked with a polite smile on her lips, for all the world looking only like she'd gotten a bit lost and not like she'd stepped off a time and space travelling machine onto foreign soil.

[theedwardianadventuress]

Impossible

[charlotteepollard]

"I don’t think this is supposed to happen,” the older Charley answered. She couldn’t help but stare a bit; this was her. This was who she was before C’rizz, before Zagreus. Back when she was so very much in love. Back when she still had so much to lose. She swallowed hard and tried to smile—gosh, what a strange thing it was to see herself like this. She suddenly felt very, very old and she shifted nervously on her feet.

"It’s a bit—a bit disorienting, isn’t it?” she asked her other self. “I wish I could tell you what happens next but, well, I’m not quite sure, honestly.”

[theedwardianadventuress]

There was just something so off-putting about the way her older self was looking at her; Charley wanted to come right out and ask herself why she was behaving that way, but there was another something holding her back. Perhaps it was the same something that was off-putting -- maybe she really didn't want to know why, in the future, she wouldn't want to look at her younger self. Maybe something would happen. Something had to have happened, hadn't it, there couldn't be any other reason when the older woman was having such a difficult time of it doing something as simple as smiling at her.

"Yes, it is," she sighed, and ran a hand through her hair in a vain attempt to distract herself from thinking too hard about it. "It's one thing when you're looking in the mirror, but this is something else entirely." It took her another moment, but then she realised -- "Hold on. If I'm going through this meeting now, shouldn't you -- I mean, if you're me from the future -- shouldn't you already know everything that's going to happen? Shouldn't you remember it from being me?"

[oldastime-foreveryoung-blog]

Gabe belatedly realized that he should have been paying more attention; had the woman not caught herself, she could have walked right through him. But the crisis had been averted, so he gave a smile and shook his head.

"Hey, it’s no problem. I should’ve been looking where I was going." He paused, realizing that something sounded strange about her voice. "… Wait, sorry - are you from England?"

He supposed it might be a somewhat strange thing to say to someone he’d almost walked into (or through) but he was curious. He had never met anyone from England before; hell, he’d never met anyone from outside the United States, period.

[theedwardianadventuress]

She hadn't realised that they had landed in America, either, not until the boy spoke; it caught her off guard, and she let out a surprised "Oh!" for it. Shaking her head a little to get herself grounded again, Charley stood up a little straighter and smoothed the sides of her skirt out.

"So should I have done," she replied, now fully concentrated on the boy before her with an even more apologetic look on her face. "That was stupid of me, I'm not usually so distracted." The next question, though, made her smile -- she knew all too well that kind of insatiable curiosity, and this was good as anything to take her mind off the fact that she was supposed to be dead.

"Yes, I am!" Charley smiled, then, and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. It occurred to her that this might not be the same time that she'd left behind, though, so she made sure not to say any more than that in case she betrayed her displacement. "Do you live -- here? Oh, that's a silly question, I suppose. Er -- but have you been to England, then?"

[oneoftheniceones]

Valley of Blood

The young woman reined in her horse, a tall, long-limbed dun gelding, that shook his head and danced sideways away from the other animals. “Vicario, no vamos a parar aquí. No me gustan sus expresiones,” she said, casting a glance back down the town’s main street— its only street. “Sólo tenemos suficiente agua para llegar al pozo.”

Josué Vicario turned his horse around and considered. The town had been populated by a train of settlers coming from the American state of Missouri. It had not been here the times Vicario had traveled this way before. The boards were still newly cut and fresh, adobe still white and clean. Technically these were Mexican open range lands and the settlers should not be here, but Mexican authorities were hard-pressed to keep out all the illegal squatters, especially so soon after the War.

And the town easily had sixty men to the Doña's company of sixteen.

"Estoy de acuerdo. Pero debemos tratar de vender caballos y comprar—" his horse snorted and pawed the ground, rolling its eyes to try to look back at the startling distant wheezing, scraping sound "— what we need."

She shook her head vehemently, silver earrings rattling. “We cannot sell the horses! The horses are the money. They are my family’s blood money. Sell the clothes off our backs first.” The Doña Olalla Fuentes spurred her animal hard and trotted ahead.

Vicario shrugged to nearest of his vaqueros and clicked at his mount to wheel it into the street. The six Mexicans rode slowly, casting wary glances at the hard features of the few men they saw. The wagons needed water desperately. And there would be no reason to expect any sympathy from any outsiders.

——-oooOOooo——-

"Ah! Charley!" the Doctor exclaimed exuberantly, leaning out the door and appearing positively gleeful. "You’d never guess." He whirled back inside, shutting the door behind him and putting his back to the massive double-doors. "Guess," he demanded.

[theedwardianadventuress]

They'd landed, she knew that much, because she'd felt it when the TARDIS had fully materialized. Waiting for the Doctor to allow them both the go-ahead to leave, though, seemed to be taking slightly longer this time, and Charley had half a mind to push forward to where he was and pull him out the doors herself; until he spoke, then, and she turned to face him. Grinning excitedly herself, she quickly stepped out from behind the console and ran around it to place herself directly opposite him, leaning on one of the wooden panels and raising her eyebrows at him.

"You've said I'd never -- I believe it defeats the purpose if you ask me to right afterwards," she replied teasingly, tilting her head and trying her hardest not to laugh. But barely a moment had passed before she straightened, her expression interested. "Well, go on, Doctor. What's out there?"

She might just have been employing her best 'dutiful-companion-who-always-must-give-the-Doctor-a-chance-to-run-his-mouth-with-her-questions' voice, but it was only to play along with his game, she'd swear it.

But then, naturally, she couldn't help adding, "Oh, do tell me that it isn't another war, you've been promising me something peaceful since Venice and it's been nothing but trouble since." (Which, of course, wasn't saying that she didn't love the trouble too. Quite the opposite, really.)