InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "TO INFINITY AND BEYOND"

Arcturus Black (arcturusfirst) wrote in compass_comm,
@ 2022-02-15 21:01:00

Entry tags:

miguel o'hara, rawdon crawley, ~arcturus black

[Radio broadcast by upper-class British guy, early Wednesday morning, may wake some people up]

...see how this ridiculous thing works! There. I have it.

Can anyone hear this? I am in need of an explanation of how I can be away from this place for the better part of twenty years, and return to find that...certain people haven't aged a day. I always suspected I'd be back here, but the timing could not be worse. I've a newborn son to meet; I was supposed to be taking the carpet to London. This is very inconvenient.

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	cpt_crawley 2022-02-15 09:19 pm UTC (link)
	Lo? Osborne? (Reply to this) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 09:21 pm UTC (link)
	I say, Crawley, is that you still here? Who's Osborne? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	cpt_crawley 2022-02-15 09:24 pm UTC (link)
	Yes, what? You look like a man I once... never mind. Who is it? Black?? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 09:29 pm UTC (link)
	Yes, it's me. This is all downright peculiar. I don't suppose you'd know why a little boy who looks exactly like my nephew is soundly asleep in the next room? He isn't...he'd have been past twenty if he lived. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	cpt_crawley 2022-02-15 09:45 pm UTC (link)
	Oh! You grew up! That's fun. That will be Siri. I think you've done a bit of the old time travel there, Black. It's still 2022. You were at the Valentine's ball on Monday. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 09:49 pm UTC (link)
	That can't be right. [a pause] I don't remember a ball. Then again I did try to forget this place after...never mind. What's to be done about this? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	cpt_crawley 2022-02-15 09:51 pm UTC (link)
	Nothing to be done, I'm afraid. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 09:55 pm UTC (link)
	Damned inconvenient. I've responsibilities to attend to, and knowing that I'll go back to them someday isn't enough. [...] It's not your fault, Crawley. You're a decent sort. Always were. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	miguel_ohara 2022-02-15 10:09 pm UTC (link)
	"If he lived"? What the shock? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 10:15 pm UTC (link)
	O'Hara, isn't it? The spider fellow? [quieter, sadder] Siri died in '53. He and my brother both, of the fever. I tried to stop it, but... (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	miguel_ohara 2022-02-15 10:18 pm UTC (link)
	That's me, yes. What type of fever? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 10:27 pm UTC (link)
	The Florentine fever, they said. It was bad in London, in the winter. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	miguel_ohara 2022-02-15 10:31 pm UTC (link)
	I don't know that one. Did you get it and survive? Were you exposed to it at all? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 10:40 pm UTC (link)
	Yes, I survived it...look, I'd rather not talk about this. It was a long time ago and the memories aren't pleasant. He was a dear child, I missed him a great deal. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	miguel_ohara 2022-02-15 10:44 pm UTC (link)
	What? No. I'm not trying to dig up old memories. If you survived it, then I can make a vaccine for Sirius from your blood. You'll have the antibodies specific to that disease, and I can work with that. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 10:50 pm UTC (link)
	I don't have the first idea what you are talking about, but I'm sure you cannot bring the poor boy back from his grave. I told my brother to send him off to the countryside, even if he refused to go himself, but he wouldn't listen. I know...you were fond of Sirius, too, but the tragedy has already happened. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

miguel_ohara
2022-02-15 10:59 pm UTC (link)

Not here, it hasn't. Sirius hasn't gone home yet. Time is weird here, remember?

You got sick but you fought off the disease, and your blood remembers how you did that so you won't get it again, or if you do, it won't affect you nearly as much. So if I can get some of your blood, I can create a vaccine for Sirius so that his blood will learn how to fight off the disease as well. You asked me why I study genetics and look at people's blood. This is exactly why.

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arcturusfirst
2022-02-15 11:11 pm UTC (link)

[a long pause]

I talked to you about magical blood when I was young, didn't I? Even if all you are saying is true, what you would do is create a causality loop. If you give him the fever here and help him fight it off, I would not be telling you about all this. I expect I would be saying that he was the only one of the household not to be ill in '53 - but then you would have no need to try to save him, so you would not have done it. Do you see the trouble?

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miguel_ohara
2022-02-15 11:20 pm UTC (link)

Your telling me has already happened. I can't sugar-coat this, and I don't think I'd want to, false hope is too cruel. If it happens, and I save him, it'll create a new time-line. You just... wouldn't be a part of that time-line. It's happened here before. People have been able to save people who would otherwise have died, but it doesn't change their already-lived history.

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arcturusfirst
2022-02-15 11:29 pm UTC (link)

So I'd die. No, I'd...cease to exist in the way that I do, because the timeline would be changed, and the course of my life would be different.

It would be the honourable thing, I suppose. If it were only myself...but the timing of my marriage was altered because of their deaths, so that would mean my wife too, perhaps. My own children. This is...I am going to need time to reflect on it, O'Hara.

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	miguel_ohara 2022-02-15 11:38 pm UTC (link)
	I understand. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 11:44 pm UTC (link)
	Thank you. What would you do, in my place? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	miguel_ohara 2022-02-15 11:49 pm UTC (link)
	If I had the chance to change one thing and make things a bit better? I'd make the change. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-15 11:53 pm UTC (link)
	Even though it meant you would vanish from existence. Then you're a brave and selfless man, O'Hara - but yes, I think I believe it of you. (Reply to this) (Parent)

	maryanne_walker 2022-02-16 06:06 am UTC (link)
	[barely loud enough to hear over the radio, to hide emotions] Oh, Mr. Black, I'm so sorry. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	arcturusfirst 2022-02-16 07:31 am UTC (link)
	Speak up, if you would? You mustn't fret over it. My present situation cannot be helped, and the past is...a long time ago. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	maryanne_walker 2022-02-16 09:32 am UTC (link)
	Sorry. On to happier things then. You're married? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

arcturusfirst
2022-02-16 09:42 am UTC (link)

Yes. Lucasta is a wonderful woman. My best friend's cousin. We were married when I was eighteen. Five children living - no, six now! A girl and boy away at school, a boy at home, two little girls in the nursery whose magic hasn't come in yet, and now another son, if all is well. We're very fortunate.

Forgive me, I remember now, you're Miss...no, Mrs Marianne Walker, isn't it? A daughter of mine is Leila Marianne.

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	maryanne_walker 2022-02-17 09:41 am UTC (link)
	Hah, sounds like you're trying to catch up to me Mr. Black. Yes... Did you remember me? Or was it sheer coincidence? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

arcturusfirst
2022-02-17 06:30 pm UTC (link)

I shall be honest; my recollections when I returned home were hazy in most respects. There must have been a reason, however, that the name carried pleasing associations!

You have thirteen of your own, don't you? I have always liked a busy household. We have my brother's children there too, much of the time. His wife Ella remarried after her time of mourning - which I don't blame her for, because to be married at fourteen and widowed at twenty-one must be difficult to bear.

But there! Happier things, didn't we say? Tell me news of the station.

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maryanne_walker
2022-02-18 08:43 am UTC (link)

Well, I wouldn't exactly call you adopting your nieces and, or, nephews sad, just the why circumstances. But yes and no, I currently have twelve children, which eight are biologically mine, and the rest are adopted. So I'm a big advocate for taking in young, that aren't technically yours. They are where it counts, in your heart.

Also, not many can say they have pleasing associations with me. I did get angry enough at some people to threaten prove my ability to be a 'man eater' while furry.

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arcturusfirst
2022-02-18 08:54 am UTC (link)

[a slight pause, because he's not sure what to make of all that, but he recovers nicely] I've heard that lycanthropy can affect one's temper, so it would hardly be fair to judge your character by what you say under its influence. It is enough of a burden in itself. What I do see is that you are kind and charitably-minded, to take in children who are not of your blood.

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maryanne_walker
2022-02-18 09:38 am UTC (link)

I didn't mean to scare you, you're safe. I promise. Because, even as a mischievous young man, I like you very much. Also, I'm not a lycanthrope, my mutation allows me to shapeshift into a very large American wild cat called a Mountain Lion, or a Cougar. But 'the beast' as I call her, allows me to keep control as long as she stays sated, though her temper does lend mine some fire, especially if my kids, or people I care about, are endangered. Every person I've ever threatened has done something to deserve it, with an exception of one, who's changed for the better since.

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	arcturusfirst 2022-02-18 10:23 am UTC (link)
	It takes more than that to frighten me these days. Anyone who threatened my children would soon come to regret it, I can tell you, so I do understand the sentiment. Mischievous, though? Are you telling me I wasn't a steady young fellow who settled down and took good care of his nephew? Ah, perhaps I wasn't so grown-up as I tried to be. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

maryanne_walker
2022-02-18 12:45 pm UTC (link)

I try to encourage the mischief though. The reason I like you is because you did for your nephew, what so few would do. I imagine almost everyone here would take in a child if that child needed looking after, but you were just barely out of boyhood, thrust into a world that was very very new, and some concepts weren't even thought of in your time, yet instead of being afraid, or if you were you didn't let it show, you grabbed a hold of your nephew's hand and took on a role that wasn't yours yet.

So, even though you took on that father figure role, you deserve to be that boy again too. Because our worlds force us to grow up too fast, and here you have space to breathe, and to be a boy.

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arcturusfirst
2022-02-18 09:11 pm UTC (link)

Well, it would hardly be appropriate to start acting like a boy at my age, but I appreciate the sentiment, very much. The thought of any of my own children being in a place like this without me is a dreadful one, but I hope that if it did happen, they would look after one another and make the best of things. I did wish, back then, that an older relative would arrive to help with things, but until then I was the eldest and I had to make do. Hold down the fort, you know? I don't think we did badly, Siri and I.

I do remember that you listened to me, and you did not try to push me into things I was opposed to. That is why I think well of you.

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maryanne_walker
2022-02-19 08:08 am UTC (link)

The only thing I was insistent on was calling me Mrs. Walker, because it just reminded me of my mother, and father, and I've had that hot mess well and truly buried and didn't want the anger that went with that to resurface. Especially toward you.

But you're right, you do a very good job with Sirius. Though you are a little strict sometimes, but I understand where it's coming from.

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	arcturusfirst 2022-02-19 10:11 am UTC (link)
	Ah. Now I remember treating him very gently, because I knew he'd been indulged at home, but strictness is all a matter of degree, I think. Certainly the standards of etiquette were...different, here. If your name causes such grief to you, did you ever think of altering it, so that you would not have to carry the burden? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

maryanne_walker
2022-02-19 11:49 am UTC (link)

Ah, they wouldn't let me change my name in my world. My name was a way to track me. Plus that wasn't an expense that I was willing to waste money on. There was food to buy, and seedy lodgings to pay for, and I had younger former mutants to look after. And I was married here, and I usually just gave my first name before that happened.

But you're right, etiquette is very different between us, but there just about two hundred years between us too.

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