shifted_logs | paper cities burning

Entry tags:

paper cities burning

Characters: Braxiatel and anyone ever. It's an open log! Tag in! Join in origami art!!
Location: The Astral Plane. Somewhere near food, probably.
Time: After Narvin has been made into a wee-bitty thing. Before the hypothetical future where Braxiatel jumps into a ravine because he hates babysitting.
Summary: Braxiatel needs to do something in his spare time. This is it.
Warnings: Origami awesomeness.

Among the stars and spaces between them, free of the heavy weight of unease that had haunted the Plane, a man was putting his supreme talents in dexterity and mathematical genius to use by making art out of folded paper. Or to put it more simply, Irving Braxiatel was going slightly mad playing the babysitter and so had resorted to origami to try to keep himself sane.

He had begun with a few simple flowers and had quickly gotten sick with the mundanity. That was how the paper model of the Palace of Versailles had ended up at his feet. Then, when he had gotten bored with that, he crafted for himself origami warriors, the grand life-sized sazu game pieces that once were placed in the floating tombs of the Deathless Emperors of Draconia, that they may battle one another in their sleeping death.

Presently, Braxiatel was putting the finishing touch on Nelson's battleship. He had done a fairly good job of representing the Battle of Trafalgar, as far as he was concerned, and was rather pleased by the final product.

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Leela, on the other hand, was not quite as cautious. They were models of something dangerous, but she spent so much time handling knives and other weaponry that she didn't realise that the paper warriors had weapons as sharp of her own. She picked one up and turned it over in her hands.

"You sound like a warrior of the Sevateem," she said, which was obviously a compliment. "When stories were told around the fire, they were all stories of noble deaths."

But could they be truly noble deaths if you did not take your enemy with you?

"After I left," Braxiatel said, neatly removing from his tone all indications of the circumstances of his departure, "I found myself in the company of Martians more than occasionally. They are . . ." He thought about this for a moment as he watched Leela hold the weapon of another Reptilian species. "They are a very honourable people. Not all, of course, but as a culture. Have you encountered any during your travels?"

"No," she admitted with a shake of her head, "But I think I would like to."

It was rare, after all, to meet someone who felt about battle and honour as she did.

"Even the most honourable of people can be dishonoured by traitors."

Or misled. She had been exiled from her tribe for her blasphemy, after all, but she did not think that it her cost her her honour.

Braxiatel tucked away the brief flicker of grief between his hearts so that it never even reached his face. "If I've ever the opportunity, I will introduce you to a few." It was one of those peculiar facts of his existence that he could almost invariably find and make friends with whatever Ice Warriors he came across. Benny had the same talent.

"Thank you," said Leela, sincerely, "I would like that."

At last, she placed the paper warrior back on the floor. She did so carefully, because Braxiatel had made it, but not as carefully as she would have done if it had been a knife or a sword and not carefully enough to avoid cutting her finger. The wound was shallow and insignificant. It could barely be called a wound. But it did not bleed as it should have and she hid her finger swiftly behind her back.

Braxiatel didn't miss it. Yet, just then, he did not say a word. Carefully, he took the warrior up again, then looked Leela in the eye.

"Well."

Leela was usually very good at hiding. She kept her true self concealed from many of the people she met on Gallifrey, after all. But Braxiatel was not one of those people. He was clever and perceptive and he was a friend. He deserved more than a hasty departure and, consequently, she met his gaze calmly.

"A knife would serve you better than a paper figure."

"I have those, too," Braxiatel said. "And other methods besides for keeping myself alive."

And with the precise fearlessness of one who measures pain, Braxiatel let himself cut a finger on one of his warrior's knives. The black blood rose up briefly, then began to congeal. His body didn't like to abide by injuries. "But they aren't always successful."

As far as Leela was concerned, Braxiatel did not need of a knife of his own. He had hers but, before she could remind him of that, he had cut his finger and she found herself gazing in astonishment at the black blood.

"How did it happen?" she asked, quietly. Braxiatel was one of the most capable people she had ever met. The fact that he had died - without the prospect of regenerating and while trapped under the thumb of those that ran the machine - was difficult to accept.

Braxiatel smiled as he pulled out his handkerchief. In absent, meticulous gestures, he cleaned up his finger until all the traces were gone. He spoke as he folded the handkerchief back up again. "When the rain fell mainly on the Plane, I'm afraid I found myself killed as I have killed once before." He frowned briefly as he put his handkerchief back in its pocket. "The experience was much less exhausting than regeneration has ever been."

"But that is not ..." Fair? That hardly mattered the machine. "Right!"

Even a Time Lord, used to the concept of death and regeneration, should not be subjected to a fate like that.

"How can we fight creatures like this?"

Creatures with no morals and no honour. Did they even have an aim in mind?

Braxiatel showed no indignation at what he had suffered or concern for what might be to come. He rubbed his thumb over the cut finger, though the injury was all but healed by now. "I'm sure that you didn't meet a fair death either."

"No," she confessed, "I always thought I would die in battle. A warrior's death. But it happened before I could even draw my knife ..."

That was the part that truly infuriated Leela. She was not afraid of death. She'd resigned herself to it on more than one occasion and was well aware that she lived every day on time borrowed from the Time Lords and their biofields. The problem was the prospect of facing death without a weapon in her hand and a chance to ready her heart.

Standing by the paper warriors, it seemed to Braxiatel that their deaths had been a little less elegant than whatever fatalities these creations could deal out. They were images more than truths. Illusions more than realities.

As with all such constructs, what mattered most was belief. "You'll have another chance at it," Braxiatel said. "We both will, I hope."

"I am not in a hurry for that," she said, but her voice had taken on a lighter edge. It had been good to talk about it. Although the conversation had confirmed that her death and resurrection had been real, it had also reminded her that she was not alone on the Plane.

"I do hope not. I'd have to leave the Madame President's safety to Narvin." Braxiatel tried not to dwell too much on how completely unsuited to protecting Romana Narvin now was. He certainly would like to stop dwelling on Narvin's safety.

Leela nodded. Although Narvin was an ally, it had taken him a long time to earn that title and it did not mean that she trusted him. He might not have called himself a politician, but he was every bit as cunning as one.

"K-9 would keep an eye on him."

"K-9 is a loyal ally and a good friend, but Narvin was a technician, once upon a time. I think I'd feel much safer knowing you were there."

Though Braxiatel slipped it behind distant, insignificant words, he had really been checking to see if Leela was truly all right with her death. He had no desire to be patronizing (certainly not if Leela could find out), but rather, Leela was more to Braxiatel than one more method of keeping Romana and Gallifrey safe. She was something to be preserved in herself. As capable as Leela was, she still had vulnerabilities, and Braxiatel liked to keep an eye on them.

But for now, with the lightening of her tone, he felt content.

"I was thinking," Braxiatel said, words of warning to anyone who knew him. "We really ought to take precautions against future experiments that may be held."

Her death had hurt her, of course, but the majority of damage had been inflicted on her sense of pride. She should have been more cautious, perhaps, but she was glad that Braxiatel had been thinking. That there was potentially something for her to do.

"How?" she asked, with a certain bloodthirsty eagerness in her voice. It would involve care and cunning, she was sure of that. But if she could aid him in any way, she would.

I am sorry I haven't responded to this. Braxiatel had something he wanted to ask of Leela, and I have spent the last few weeks trying to remember what that was. And I've been failing a lot in coming up with what it was meant to be.

Don't worry about it! Take all the time you need. We can even fade to black if that would be best.

Thank you for understanding. If it's okay, I think that might be easiest, as I'm liable not to think up a good plan again until later, so I don't want to cause you problems with tagging trying to keep in mind something you have no idea about. If I manage to remember it before it would be relevant, I will continue here, and if not, he'll present it to her in a later thread?

That sounds like an excellent plan to me!

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paper cities burning

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OOC

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