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Characters: Oliver Day (

oliverplus) and OPEN
Location: Your reality!
Time: After Oliver's fairytale has ended, and during or after yours, as you prefer
Summary: Oliver goes on an involuntary reality-hopping tour of the multiverse~
Warnings: Oliver is a geek, and depending on your reality, he might just show it. Possibly a lot.

Tag in if you'd like Oliver to visit you! Prose-style or action tags are fine; just tag in the way you feel like playing.

"Samwise! Don't go under there!"

Oliver had learned a long time ago that "getting lost" and "going somewhere in the TARDIS" were basically synonymous, so he'd long since given up on getting annoyed when it happened. Instead, he usually just looked at it as another adventure to conquer--plus, you never knew what sort of cool things you might find in the meantime. And that was all well and good when he was alone, but this time he'd made the mistake of bringing one of his pets along. Watching a dwarf rabbit run off to be lost in the TARDIS was not the sort of adventure he'd had in mind for today.

He crouched down by the random large machine that was sitting by one of the walls of a room that otherwise appeared to be some sort of study. Aside from the hulking metal contraption, the room was lined with comfortable sofas and armchairs, the lighting coming from lamps on sidetables. Fancy rugs were scattered about on the polished wooden floor, although the area around the machine was bare aside from some telltale scuff marks. And while the space underneath the machine was large enough for a rabbit to fit, Oliver doubted he could even get one of his hands in there. "Come on, come out! I'll get you some nice greens?"

As he leaned down to look under the machine, he just caught sight of a furry ball shooting out and across the room. "Samwise!" He jumped to his feet, realising now that he'd been so intent on the rabbit that he hadn't even thought to close the door to the study when he came in. And, of course, he pet was making straight for it. Oliver ran after him, hoping to grab the door and shut it before Samwise could reach it and disappear into the corridor. It was going to be a close thing. He grabbed at the side of the door--

--and missed. Oliver skidded to a stop, almost falling over in his surprise. Because it was immediately apparent that he hadn't simply missed in his grab--the door wasn't there anymore. The study wasn't either, nor was the familiar hum of the TARDIS.

"What...?" Oliver breathed, looking around him in confusion. "Where am I?"

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"Really!?" He couldn't help his excitement. He immediately started looking around again, taking in as much of the look of the ship as he could. Hearing Christine's serious tone, however, he turned back to her, shocked. "Grounded?" he repeated. As much as he wanted to see this ship, he wasn't going to risk that happening to Christine to do it. He sighed, disappointed. "No, it's all right. I'll just go to the Plane," he assured her.

He took one last look around at the ship and, reluctantly, closed his eyes and thought of the Plane. But when he opened his eyes again, he found himself still standing with Christine on her starship.

"Um..." he started, confused. "I don't know why, but that didn't work..."

She nodded when he repeated that she'd be grounded and let out a sigh of relief when he said he'd go.

And then he... didn't. Christine pressed her fingers to her temple, feeling a headache form. There would probably be a huge incident if he was discovered and she would be in so much trouble, because she'd be damned if she wasn't going to accept responsibility for him while he was on the ship.

Taking his arm, she tried steering him in the direction she'd just come from. "C'mon, you can hide out in my quarters and keep trying to get back there. I have to go start my shift." But no sooner had she stopped speaking than she heard voices coming from the direction they were headed.

"Okay," he agreed immediately, allowing Christine to direct him. His mind was racing. Why couldn't he go to the Plane? How had he ended up here? And how long was he going to be stuck here for? It was hard to know what to do without any of those answers. He couldn't ask Christine to hide him forever. They might manage if his stay was going to be brief--and then again, if he had that guarantee, it wouldn't even be a problem for him to get captured and leave Christine out of it. Unfortunately, he knew that course of action was just as likely to make things worse as better if he were stuck here for long.

But he heard the voices as well and stopped short. Spinning around the other way, he tugged Christine's hand. He didn't want to say anything for fear of those approaching overhearing him, but she needed to lead if they were going to retreat elsewhere in the ship.

Christine was asking herself similar questions, but when the voices came nearer, she hurried down the corridor in the opposite direction, her hand in Oliver's. They needed a plan, and fast.

"In here!" she hissed, turning him towards the turbolift. It was just an elevator, but a bit faster than those from the 21st century. She dragged him inside and once the doors shut, she hit a random deck number. As the lift started, she quickly hit the stop button, stopping them between decks.

"Ok, we've only got a few minutes before maintenance notices the stopped lift and investigates. We need a plan to hide you here and get you safely back home without anyone else on the crew knowing who you really are."

He hurried with her, ducking quickly into the lift. Thankfully, after his experiences with the Doctor, this was a rather normal state of affairs for him. He nodded at Christine's assessment of the situation, having been thinking mostly along the same lines, although inwardly he still wished there were a way for him to see this ship while he was here.

"Can you pretend I'm some wounded local from a planet you went to? Do you pick up people like that?"

"Yes!" she exclaimed, but she immediately sobered and added, "Only we haven't picked up any locals for the last couple of missions so it'd be suspicious." Crossing her arms, she looked at the floor, trying to concentrate.

"This whole thing is risky," she began slowly, "so what's a little more danger added in?" Taking a deep breath, she looked over at him. "Since we can't pass you off as a civilian, you'll have to be a crew member. I can replicate you a uniform, I think."

"Oh." He didn't bother to hide his disappointment. For a second, he'd thought he'd come up with something that would work.

But when Christine mentioned adding to the danger, Oliver perked up immediately. That was how he liked to live, after all. Risks made things more interesting. And then she suggested that they make him a crew member--with a uniform!--and he could hardly contain himself. "Okay, let's do that!" he agreed, probably rather too eagerly. "Where do we have to go to do that?"

Christine noticed his excitement but didn't comment on it. "There's a supply closet right off the turbolift on Deck 5," she said, hitting the start button and then the deck number. "With a replicator inside. We should make it in without getting caught."

Oliver nodded. A supply closet wasn't the most exciting place to start a tour of the ship, but he very much didn't want to get Christine caught if he could avoid it, so he could live with that.

"All right, after that, what else am I gonna need? And uh...what sort of things should I know? Am I going to be your assistant or something like that?" He hoped she wasn't just planning to give him directions to her quarters and leave it at that, although he had a sinking feeling that she might do. Still, he could always hope it wasn't close and he'd get to see a few other places first.

"Good question," she answered. The doors opened and she ushered him over to the supply closet, punching in a code on the wall console outside. The closet door slid open and she waved him in.

"I guess you could be an orderly or something. Maybe..." she pressed a finger to her chin in thought. "Yes, we'll say you switched from Delta shift. That'll explain why the med bay staff won't recognize you." Heading over to the replicator, she started pressing buttons and inputting data, looking him up and down a few times to judge his size.

"And you can keep trying to get back to the Plane, of course."

He hurried into the closet without a word. The area looked deserted, but he didn't want to press his luck--or Christine's--until they were at least inside. Once there, he nodded. "Yeah, good idea." He liked the fact that this plan meant sticking with her.

Then again, there was one rather important detail that he was very resolutely not thinking about, and he knew it would be a very bad idea not to at least acknowledge it before he threw himself into the situation. "But...um...you work in the med bay. Like...a hospital." He couldn't help paling a little at just the thought, his fear of hospitals starting to grip him already.

Edited 2011-07-14 17:13 (UTC)

Quickly, she replicated a pair of blank uniform pants, a long sleeved blue uniform shirt, and a pair of black boots.

"Here," she said, holding everything out for him as soon as the machine opened, "try everything on, see if it fits. I need to find you a badge."

She began perusing the supply shelves as he spoke, then paused to look at him.

"Well, yes. But all an orderly does is change sheets and restock things, don't worry." It didn't immediately occur to her that it was the atmosphere itself that was unsettling to him, as opposed to the job he had to do.

He accepted the clothing, looking down at it in some degree of awe. A real uniform! "Can I keep the badge?" It probably wasn't the most appropriate question in the current circumstances, but he couldn't help himself. This was much too exciting.

Her description of an orderly's duties, on the other hand, while a relief in that it sounded like he wouldn't have to be close to injury, did not help his deep-seated fear of the location in which those duties were performed. "Okay..." There was still uncertainty in his tone. He had a feeling he was going to have to fight against himself very hard if he was even going to manage a semblance of belonging in a hospital. "I'll keep trying to go back to the Plane, too, like you said," he added. He wasn't very hopeful it would work.

"I guess so," she answered, forgetting the seriousness of the situation for a moment and smiling. He was really too funny sometimes. She found the place where the badges were kept and picked a medical one.

"Usually we activate these chips in them so the computers can locate us, but for you it has to stay blank since you're not officially crew."

"Fantastic!" he declared rather gleefully. "Um...give me a minute." He moved around a shelf, quickly changing into the uniform. He had a feeling Christine must have programed the machine with a setting related to his height or something because, surprisingly, it fit quite well--it was a tad loose, if anything, which was unusual for him.

"This'll work," he said, fiddling with the fabric of the shirt and still marvelling that he was in an actual, official uniform. Looking down at his discarded clothing, however, he frowned. Normally it wouldn't be a concern, but those trousers had the dimensionally transcendental pockets the Doctor had given him in them. Thinking about how to keep them with him in as non-obtrusive of a manner as possible, he stuffed the shirt and his trainers within the trousers, then attempted to stuff as much of the trousers as possible within the pockets as well--without creating some sort of transcendental loop, although the move did make him wonder if it would be possible to do so. But that would be something to look into when he wasn't a fugitive in some other universe, he decided.

"Yeah, probably a good idea that they can't track where I am." His words were somewhat absent, although he definitely meant what he'd said. But the truth was, as Christine was discussing more important matters, he was focusing the majority of his attention on leaning toward her to try to get a look at the badge that was about to become his. "What's the badge of?" he asked curiously before he'd even seen it properly.

Christine watched in amazement as he stuffed the pockets of his pants. It was almost like there was a black hole inside them or something. Maybe another dimension.

"That's incredible," she breathed out in a hushed tone. Only someone like Spock or Mr. Scott would be able to explain just how that was possible, and it wasn't like she could present Oliver to them and ask.

Smiling at his question, she showed him the badge. "Medical badge, same as mine. Shows a cross on it. All the medical staff have the same, except Dr. McCoy. He wears the sciences badge because he's the head of the medical department." Reaching for his shirt she continued, "I'll put it on you. It's tricky the first few times."

"Huh? Oh!" Oliver grinned, amused by her amazement. He was rather proud of those pockets. "Aren't they? The Doctor got them made for me. You wouldn't believe how much stuff you can put in there!" He folded up the remaining bit of trousers and, eyeing his boots, decided he could probably get them in there. He proceeded to do a bit of old-fashioned stuffing. There. Now he wouldn't have to worry about his clothing at all!

He took the badge eagerly, looking it over with a very wide grin before he nodded and offered it back to her. "Cheers." He couldn't resist adding: "This is so cool, Christine! Does the badge just track people, or does it do anything else?"

Clipping the badge in place over his chest, she stepped back and gave him the once over. He looked the part, now he just had to get the attitude down.

"Just tracks people, though last I heard back at headquarters they're thinking of making a model someday that also works as a comm device." Clapping her hands together, she gave him a friendly smile.

"Now! You are Ensign Day, Orderly to the Medical Bay, Science Division. You just switched from Delta shift to Alpha, and if anyone asks you anything beyond that, say you're sorry but Nurse Chapel has set you up with a ton of work to do and you don't have time to chat. Sound good?"

Oliver looked down, fiddling with the badge. This was one of the rare moments in his life when he wished he had a mirror handy. He was definitely going to stash the badge somewhere safe when they were done because it was too cool to risk losing.

"Wow. That'd be like something out of a film!" he said, poking the badge again and imagining how much more amazing it would be if he could talk into it. Not that this wasn't like something out of a film already. Uniforms, a badge to track people, a ship exploring space... It seemed to him that it was everything the show within the show of Galaxy Quest would have been.

"Ensign!" Oliver smirked at that. There was something exciting about pairing a title with the uniform. "Okay, got it. But um...you're sure I'm just, like, changing sheets? I...I don't really like hospitals." He tried to sound casual about the statement, but the more he thought about it, the more worried this situation was making him.

"You might have to bring patients their meals, but I'll show you how to do all that. And you'll mostly be in recovery and exam rooms stocking things, so you won't see much of the emergency area. Should be ok until the Plane lets you back." Giving him an encouraging smile, she started for the door. She always got to her shift early, but today she'd be cutting it close.

Oliver nodded, still trying not to show his nerves. "Okay, thanks." He gave her a nervous smile back. He didn't want her to think he wasn't grateful for all her help, and he was still very excited to see the ship, but he needed to get himself to stop thinking about hospitals before his normal grin was going to come back fully.

For a second, he closed his eyes, picturing the Plane again, but it was still to no avail. He sighed inwardly and, taking a deep breath to steel himself, followed Christine to the door.

Walking briskly down the corridor, Christine led him towards the med bay. The main exam area had two entrances; one was just a doorway that opened from the corridor, and the other was the turbolift that opened directly there. It was into this lift that Christine brought Oliver and once the doors were shut and the med bay level selected, she took a deep breath.

"You're gonna be great, Oliver. I know it."

The doors opened on the med bay and luckily, everything seemed quiet and peaceful.

Oliver nodded, grateful for her confident sentiment. "And I'll get to see more of the ship," he said, trying to bring back his previous excitement at the prospect. He took another deep breath, reminding himself that he was just visiting and it wasn't like he was in hospital again. This was just another trip, not another disaster. And he was with Christine, who had already saved his life once, so everything was going to be okay.

As they entered the medbay, Oliver dropped behind her, letting Christine take the lead.

Christine led him through the main area, where biobeds sat in a circular pattern, wall screens above them ready to take a patient's vitals as soon as they laid down. But no one was currently a patient there. She headed over to a computer console and signed in, looking a little tense. She relaxed, however, when the computer indicated that she wasn't late to her shift. Looking around, she made sure no one was about to see that Oliver wasn't signing in himself, and once she was sure, she nodded in one direction.

"We'll go down here to the supply closet and I'll set you up with a cart and bedding. Then we'll go the the empty recovery rooms and I'll show you the ropes, ok?"

Oliver watched as Christine used the computer terminal, waiting for her to signal if he needed to do anything. She looked nervous, and that wasn't a good sign, but thankfully her relief when she finished was obvious enough even when he wasn't looking her in the eyes.

Trying to swallow his own nervousness, he nodded. "Yeah, okay. I can make a bed." Not that he did so very often, but it wasn't exactly the sort of skill one tended to forget. Chloe would be proud of him, really--and she would never let him live it down. He'd have to save this story for when he was old and infirm, he decided. The thought almost made him want to laugh, but his stomach was too full of butterflies for that.

"So um...what else can you tell me about the ship?" Admittedly, the question was as much to distract him from the very clinical smell of this area as it was out of his own curiosity. But he had a feeling that going through with this would be a lot easier if he and Christine could keep talking for now.