beatrice_otter (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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crack_van2010-07-16 11:35 am
beatrice_otter) wrote in crack_van2010-07-16 11:35 am
Entry tags:
Tea and Sympathy by SelenaK (PG-13)
Okay, somehow I completely managed to miss the fact that yesterday was Crossover Day. It's still the 15th somewhere, right?
Fandom: DOCTOR WHO/STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
Pairing: The Doctor (multiple incarnations), Guinan
Length: 5k
Author on LJ:![[personal profile]](https://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
selenak
Author Website: Master Post, AO3
Why this must be read:
Because it's awesome to watch people try to handle things happening out of the right order due to time travel, and we rarely see that in the show except for the thing with River Song. Because Guinan is awesome, and wise, and has a surprising amount in common with the Doctor. Becauseselenak is a great author and her entry into the most recent ![[community profile]](https://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
multiverse5000 challenge doesn't disappoint.
The Doctor and Guinan keep meeting, not quite by accident, and never in the right order for either of them. Along the way they deal with the destruction of their respective homeworlds, and tea, and home (or Stockholm Syndrome, whichever), and talking oneself into (or out of) things. And a space wedding.
He was old the first time she met him, though he didn’t look it, and he called her by a name that wasn’t hers.
“Guinan,” he exclaimed, “I knew I’d find you here! Space bars are brilliant. Although, haven’t spotted tea on the menu yet, and really, any establishment that doesn’t offer tea is lacking something. What do you say, should we introduce it?”
Hailing from a race of listeners meant she had been exposed to all sorts of ramblings. Right now, though, she wasn’t in a listening mood. She had left El-Auria because she wanted to experience her own adventures, without having to fear a visit and well-meaning lecture from her father afterwards, and besides, the first of her marriages had just ended. That was enough to put even an El-Aurian in a less than patient mood. Still, the being in front of her was intriguing, if only because what she sensed of him didn’t fit together. He was at least as old as her father, who had celebrated his six hundredth birthday not that long ago. Her species wasn’t the only long-lived one that aged slowly, so the fact that he looked youthful in his pin-striped suit, with his hair wild and disorderly, wasn’t unusual, but his body did not match the age of his energy signature. This was disconcerting. Before leaving El-Auria, she had had a most unpleasant encounter with a member of a species her people called “the Questioners”, who could pick their physical appearance at will. Not that she believed this was the same individual – their signatures were entirely different – but that one hadn’t been able to shut up, either, and it was not a good memory.
“My name,” she said in her most unimpressed manner, “is not Guinan.”
“Right,” he said, his smile fading. “Figures. That… actually, that means I’ve found you at the right time. Before – well, before. Listen, you were always there for me when I needed someone to talk to. And you only asked for a favour. I said no then, but things are different now. I’m different. So. You’ve always wanted to travel, haven’t you? That’s why you stuck to that starship so long. Will, in your future. So, why not take a trip through time as well?”
El-Aurians had a good sense of timelines, but they also had it drummed into them from childhood that they must never, ever interfere with them. That was for beings who fancied themselves gods, or the next best thing to it, like the Questioners. Not interfering with timelines meant avoiding time travel as well, on the “best avoid temptation” principle.
But then again, that same principle had been expanded to make everyone at home incredibly phlegmatic and avoid travelling altogether. And she did long for something new.
“Where would we go?” she asked cautiously.
Tea and Sympathy
Fandom: DOCTOR WHO/STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
Pairing: The Doctor (multiple incarnations), Guinan
Length: 5k
Author on LJ:
selenakAuthor Website: Master Post, AO3
Why this must be read:
Because it's awesome to watch people try to handle things happening out of the right order due to time travel, and we rarely see that in the show except for the thing with River Song. Because Guinan is awesome, and wise, and has a surprising amount in common with the Doctor. Because
selenak is a great author and her entry into the most recent multiverse5000 challenge doesn't disappoint.The Doctor and Guinan keep meeting, not quite by accident, and never in the right order for either of them. Along the way they deal with the destruction of their respective homeworlds, and tea, and home (or Stockholm Syndrome, whichever), and talking oneself into (or out of) things. And a space wedding.
He was old the first time she met him, though he didn’t look it, and he called her by a name that wasn’t hers.
“Guinan,” he exclaimed, “I knew I’d find you here! Space bars are brilliant. Although, haven’t spotted tea on the menu yet, and really, any establishment that doesn’t offer tea is lacking something. What do you say, should we introduce it?”
Hailing from a race of listeners meant she had been exposed to all sorts of ramblings. Right now, though, she wasn’t in a listening mood. She had left El-Auria because she wanted to experience her own adventures, without having to fear a visit and well-meaning lecture from her father afterwards, and besides, the first of her marriages had just ended. That was enough to put even an El-Aurian in a less than patient mood. Still, the being in front of her was intriguing, if only because what she sensed of him didn’t fit together. He was at least as old as her father, who had celebrated his six hundredth birthday not that long ago. Her species wasn’t the only long-lived one that aged slowly, so the fact that he looked youthful in his pin-striped suit, with his hair wild and disorderly, wasn’t unusual, but his body did not match the age of his energy signature. This was disconcerting. Before leaving El-Auria, she had had a most unpleasant encounter with a member of a species her people called “the Questioners”, who could pick their physical appearance at will. Not that she believed this was the same individual – their signatures were entirely different – but that one hadn’t been able to shut up, either, and it was not a good memory.
“My name,” she said in her most unimpressed manner, “is not Guinan.”
“Right,” he said, his smile fading. “Figures. That… actually, that means I’ve found you at the right time. Before – well, before. Listen, you were always there for me when I needed someone to talk to. And you only asked for a favour. I said no then, but things are different now. I’m different. So. You’ve always wanted to travel, haven’t you? That’s why you stuck to that starship so long. Will, in your future. So, why not take a trip through time as well?”
El-Aurians had a good sense of timelines, but they also had it drummed into them from childhood that they must never, ever interfere with them. That was for beings who fancied themselves gods, or the next best thing to it, like the Questioners. Not interfering with timelines meant avoiding time travel as well, on the “best avoid temptation” principle.
But then again, that same principle had been expanded to make everyone at home incredibly phlegmatic and avoid travelling altogether. And she did long for something new.
“Where would we go?” she asked cautiously.
Tea and Sympathy