The Proposed

Let's look at this logically.

She... can't read minds. She doesn't know what anyone's thinking, let alone what you're thinking, which is good because let's be realistic. Not even you know that, most of the time.

But she can sense my confusion, my ... she could know

Randi didn't ask for this. She admitted she should have told me before, but honestly, neither of us suspected there'd be an after. Right? But she'd have known before I'd have. There's so much that goes on between the instant of attraction and the decision to act on it, and she was... she was privy to all of that. It might have even helped her make her decision, which would in turn have "helped" me make mine.

I just... I guess I just want to whine and say I don't understand. I don't understand, because I was sort of... ready to maybe jump in feet first. For cryin' out loud, I had a spare shirt tucked into my bag just in case last night happened again. Who is that? Not me, not usually, and what was different this time? Oh, right, the proposed lady-friend can read my mind. Kinda.

There's a conclusion there I don't want to draw. It's not even worth thinking through to decide whether it's even possible, because Randi wouldn't do that. But even as I sit here writing fervently about how it's not worth thinking about, I'm thinking about it. She... I thought it was so cool how she smiled at all the right times, said the right things, knew what I was feeling and how to sorta... fix it... Well of course she did. But. Those are my things to feel and deal with, and I just can't help feeling infiltrated and smoothed over when my unsettled emotions were inconvenient for he

This is clearly going to take more than 27 minutes writing in a journal to resolve. But I have to try to leave on a good note. Randi needs... well she didn't ask for help. She didn't ask for my help, and that's a whole journal entry by itself, but regardless, she needs it. Probably. Someone to talk to. Maybe eventually, I can be that for her. She was forced into telling me because of what we fell into together, but now that she has --

Well. Eventually.

So I Will

Mark Jacobs is dead.

I just had to write that out and stare at it for a while. And now that I've done that... I guess it's time to record the day for posterity.

Only, I don't really... want to. I've already written down the worst part of today. But in the future, I'll look back and the memories will be fuzzy - let's be honest with ourselves here, self. The memories are already starting to blur together, jumbled up by drugs and conversation and circular thinking as I sit here in Sonya Wilcox's guestroom, mixed around by life continuing on as though nothing's happened.

So I will.

Early this morning, we all got the call. The briefing was huge. The pictures were grotesque. I was thoroughly dwarfed by the magnitude of our mission. Eight went off without me, and while I worried about them, I have to admit I was relieved. And I had a mission of my own.

A mission which I put off in favour of walking Randi to wherever she needed to go. I was worried about her, for sure - she's not usually so agitated - but there was an element of procrastination for which I feel extraordinarily guilty now. Minutes wasted cost how many lives? I can't change it now, nor can I say with a certainty that walking around with her didn't do something to clear my head, that if I had stayed, I'd have been more frazzled and unable to do my job at all. But still.

In the end, all I did was do what someone else asked me to do. Ferris found an underlying infrasound signal, isolated it with all his devices and know-how, and all I did was the code-breaking routine. Drone communications are simple enough - I just had to decipher which signal groups were meaningful components and glean from our own radio communications what sort of drone action corresponded to it. And I think I got snappy at people doing it, which just sucks more. I did some reading online, though - the effects of infrasound on the old noggin are supposed to wear off in a few hours. So I can't blame being snappy on that any more. Sigh. Maybe in conjunction with the concussion...

Which brings me to Josiah's monumental screw-up for the day: Going out and about after we'd solved things but before we'd actually fully implemented it. There is no glory in getting mauled by the bad guys after you've told them to go away. It's just stupid. Stupid and... stupid. I ache everywhere. Randi had to cut my shirt off. Just embarrassing and ... stupid! And my head hurts. This isn't my first concussion, luckily, so I'm not wanting to puke every few minutes because I've turned my head too quickly or stood up too fast or, you know, looked at something too hard. But it is pretty miserable. I don't think I'll go see Randi tomorrow like she wants.

She might tell me I can stay in my own quarters again.

Here's to you, Lieutenant Jacobs. You saved all our lives, and we'll repay you by complaining about how tired, sore, and miserable we are. I'm sorry we didn't come up with a better plan. I'm sorry your last vision must have been of thousands of hungry, horrible drones bearing down on you. I'm sorry I sent them to you. But I'm not sorry that you went out the way you did; we all have to go sometime. You'll always be remembered by the people who know better as That Guy Who Saved The World.

a Day, in Two Movements

Today I woke up in my own bed for the first time since setting foot on base. It wasn't the glorious, restful, peaceful experience I'd long dreamed of. Air Force mattresses leave much to be desired, and I'm considering getting a lift to a camping store for an air mattress to go over top it later today. We shall see - I've gotta put in some time on that translation. And check in with Molyneux re: the RSP key. And find Silverhawk to ask her something about my report. And figure out which songs on my iriver would best educate young Sean of the hideous taste. Related to that, I've gotta make a note to get Glo to get Harriet to fuddle through my things and find my laptop. I hope she and the lads haven't donated all that junk yet. Some kid's gonna get a terrible piece of junk with my whole music collection and every episode of M*A*S*H on it. What a horrible fate.

-8:39 am

So Randi and I had lunch again today. She's one of those people I enjoy watching, thinking about her reasons for things. The usual question - why she chose to wear what she did - doesn't really apply, since we're all strutting around in doofy-looking army stuff. But everything else stands. Why's she choose that for lunch? What's going through her mind when she looks away to formulate answers to my questions? I know how this sounds, future-self-who-may-read-and-not-clearly-remember, but I'm not falling for her. Remember, we did the same thing with that inmate, that time in Prison Ministry? And he was a guy. It's the same thing.

She's fascinating.

Anyway, so we had lunch and I watched her speak and eat and think about things. She really listens - one of those people who actually hears everything you say before thinking about her reply. It's nice. Something I've tried to do all my life and usually fail at. Oh, she's also really perceptive.

All right, enough about her.

Translated - well, formulated transcription anyway, most of the day. I thought I was close to done, but it turns out that t->k only sometimes, and I've yet to figure out the rule for when it doesn't. So I started translating, but it's slow-going.

Didn't get around to meeting with Silverhawk today, and didn't get around to getting out for that air mattress. It wasn't even really that bad, separated now by space and time. I was probably just grumpy earlier.

Tomorrow, I plan to go outside and explore a bit. We'll see how that works out.

-11:54 pm

A Travelogue

For the third night in a row, last night, I didn't sleep in my own bed. Of course, this time it was my own fault.

We got back from P5X-208 around 5 or so, er... 1700 hours, right. As soon as we stepped through the gate, there were a couple of moments where I really thought I was goin' down, gonna smack my knees into the grate and just take a nap on the ramp. Luckily I didn't, because in retrospect, that woulda been pretty embarrassing. Especially now that everyone's told me we had a pretty nice, smooth mission compared to... well, everybody else.

So the routine is: Get home, Get checked out, Debrief, Go write your report. We got home, and then we got checked out. The nurse who did it was nice enough. No major anythings. She winced along with me when she pushed around on a sorta dark bruise on my arm from falling, but she didn't say anything, which was nice, because the rest of the team were sitting around nearby and none of them were complaining. And she apologized for having to keep me a little longer to run extra tests for having dropped yourself in a room of cold, foreign sea-water. I looked around for Kelly but she wasn't around, which was a shame. She owes me one.

Next up: Debrief. Have I mentioned I hate meetings? Man, it's like I park my butt in a meeting chair and my brain says, "Oh, nap time." I mean, I lived through it the first time around. Old news, boooring. But I tried very hard not to be a 12 year old in a history class and managed to at least look like I was alert. No idea if I succeeded.

Anyway, I got to talk a little about stuff, and it got me kinda worked up to start working on the translation from the Haleauau journal. Only I figure I sat there looking at whatever for maybe ten minutes before crashing out.

SOO when I woke up at eight and called Sonya for what I thought was a late-ish night coffee, I got somewhat bemusedly informed that it was indeed 8 am. In the morning. Cripes. (s'Why there's no journal entry for yesterday.)

I didn't shave or shower, and the closest clothes I had at hand were civvies, all of which Silverhawk called me on later, much to my embarrassment. I mean, I was happy enough to've got my hair to lay down flat. She didn't yell at me though, really. Just off-handedly mentioned it when I was leaving, so now I'm left to wonder whether she was just making sure she did her job and doesn't really care if I go around in BDUs all the time, or what. But I don't think I'll make her resort to yelling just to test my hypothesis. Which is why I changed before going to work, and why I changed back into them after dinner at Sonya's. And when did I start thinking of her as Sonya? If someone'd told me a year ago that the woman whose work I was shamelessly stealing would be inviting me to her house for dinner, because the commissary in the top secret alien-fighting military base I work in is utter crap, I might've bashed that person over the head with a book or something.

Anyway, the point is, yesterday I was on a planet far, far away, checking out hidden doorways and high tech alien labs, and today I spent mostly in my office, translating an alien language that used to be an earth language, and wow. Just. Wow.

Note to self: Self, come up with cover story before Maggie starts to ask. Also, think up a way to give Sean Lester a musical education without sounding like a music snob. Maybe a mix CD? Is that gay? If it would keep him from singing along to his headphones, I might not care how gay it looks.

Dr. Rookwood and the Big City

Three Years Ago, Baltimore, USA

"You're late, Doctor."

Josiah laughed and waved her off. "Sorry, Glo." Gloria Great, his boss and senior by some 25 years, a larger than life sort of woman who embodied Baltimore in all of the good ways and few of the bad. He shook out his umbrella and left it in the foyer, open. "Bus. You know." He shrugged.

"You should get yourself a car," she said, tsking over him without actually tsking. She looked up at him over her glasses and quirked that eyebrow the way she had of doing, the way that made him want to shrug sheepishly and make excuses. "You know them busses don't run on time."

"Sometimes they do," he managed weakly, gingerly pulling off his coat. He ignored her frown as he hung it up. "You got that study I put on your desk?"

"Mmmhm." Oops. Mmmhm meant that she wasn't interested in anything he had to say excepting what he offered as answers to her questions. Questions he had to guess, of course. How unfortunate that she was so much smarter than he was.

"Ah..." he foundered, flipping through possible targets. "The principal isn't pressing charges," he suggested.

"Oh, I know. That's my doin'." Josiah must've looked surprised. "We go back," she said simply.

The linguist nodded uncertainly. "Ah... ha. Well, then..."

"You're dripping all over my rug. Sit yourself down," she ordered, and he did, raising his brows. "There's hot water on, if you want."

"Uhm, sure." Tea sounded good. Or coffee. Or a nice warm bed. It was only 11 am, though. And he couldn't just turn around and come home after standing in the rain to catch the third bus to pass his stop. "Hey Glo?"

"Yes, baby?"

Josiah smiled. It was Baltimore, which meant any woman more than 20 years older than you was allowed to call you little cute things. Expected to, even. Same as servers in restaurants in Hampden were allowed, expected, to call you "hon." Doctor Professor Gloria Great, PhD times two, called him "baby" because he was a little white boy from the midwest, because she felt protective of him, and he had to be fine with that. So he was. "What's up?"

"You have to ask?" She turned to face him full on, and her serious gaze was a little startling. She was imposing of stature and not given to lightheartedness to start with, so when she got serious, she got very serious. "You ok, kid?" Kid? That was like a mom using someone's full name, and it got his attention even more than the head-on seriousness she was exuding.

"Yeah- Yes. Fine." Oh, ok. This was about - He smiled minutely. "I'm fine, really."

"So if I told you I had an assignment for you back at that school, you'd be fine with it this time? What about the Y?"

"The Y? What's..." He trailed off, and felt his face go pale as he mentally traced the route he'd have to take to get there.

"Look in a mirror this morning?"

"Uh... Yes?" He hadn't liked what he saw, either, but more because he was embarrassed by the questions. How'd you get that black eye, buddy? Whoa, what happened to your face?

"Then you got no excuse for that scraggly shit on your chin."

"Ah..." As usual, he was at a loss. "Sorry. I'm just gonna go up to the study, get some of the pre-lim done..."

"I didn't tell you you could go," she said firmly, gently. She leaned forward, the whole mass of her, and he suddenly couldn't meet her eye and found himself staring at her cavernous cleavage instead. "Joe." He hated being called Joe, but it never made him angry. Now, he felt angry.

"Josiah," he corrected, softly, but just as firmly. She smacked her palms on the desk in annoyance and the sound shattered his anger into a split second's worth of terror. He jumped. And then he dropped his head forward to rest his forehead on the heel of his hand, elbow propped on the chair's arm. "Crap..."

"Didn't shave."

"I don't want to talk about this, not just now," he murmured.

"Were you actually afraid I'd hurt you?"

"No." Crap. He sounded petulant- petulant for cryin' out loud.

"I got a new kid upstairs in the study. Bright boy, top of his class. He's a black kid. You're not gonna have a problem with that, right?"

That snapped his head back up. "What? No!" He'd expected her to be frowning at him, maybe even... if she thought he was a racist or something, if that's what she thought, maybe she'd even be angry enough to fire him, and he didn't know where he'd go then, maybe back to Boston, maybe IBC would take him back after all these years, maybe - but she wasn't frowning at him. She looked concerned, her big ol' face done up in laughlines turned now into creases of worry. Over him. "No," he repeated insistently.

"I didn't think so."

"I mean, unless he put 'beats up scrawny nerds for their bikes' on his resume. Then I think I'd be pretty mad at both of you..." He smiled weakly.

"Did they find it?" She was just Gloria again, now. No mysterious 'figure out the questions to the answers you already know' sort of thing going on. "The cops called earlier for you."

"Yeah, they found it," he replied, leaning back and trying to relax again. His heart hadn't stopped pounding from the totally terrifying sound of a 50-something lady smacking her hands on her equally horrifying desk with pictures of cats on it. "Not salvageable." His beautiful seafoam green 1969 Vespa. Totally demolished. "They got me at home."

"Had a bad year, huh?"

"Uhm..." Josiah thought about it. Losing the Vespa - no, call it Being Beaten and Left for Dead in the Street, that's the part she's talking about. Whatever - last week had just been the latest in a string of bad luck. Witnessing the near rape had been horrible and he'd almost gotten his behind handed to him, except that he'd called 911 before yelling and rushing in headlong, and so saved himself from too much hassle and prevented a girl being just another statistic. So that was good. And coming home to find his lock'd been wrenched and lots of his stuff was gone or broken had been... harrowing, to say the least. But he hadn't come home when the robbers were in the middle of the act, so he hadn't been party to any violence or anything, so that was good too. "Not really," he replied then, and smiled.

"There it is," the old black woman said enigmatically. "Been waiting around for the real one for this whole week. So, you gonna shave tomorrow?"

The linguist scratched through his thin, reddish stubble. "Ah... maybe." She was harping on it, which meant she knew. Stupid intelligent woman. But maybe, sure. "Ah..." He gestured with his eyes toward the ceiling. "What's with the new guy? Throwing me over? Damaged goods?"

She laughed. "Hell, no, child," she exclaimed. "This city takes too much. I ain't about to let it take you, too." Josiah pinked up, and felt all warm and squishy. Being loved really, really never got old. "He's working on your project."

Josiah frowned. "My project? But the budget can't support two-"

"No, it can't-"

"You're moving me? Glo - you can't - this is my--"

"Would you calm down and let a lady talk, you great gaggling oaf!" The linguist shut himself up, but all the questions and protests were written across his face already, and he didn't feel like trying to erase them, even if he could. "The budget can support exactly one chief researcher and one assistant. So I'm giving it to you."

Josiah stared.

"Giving it to you. Understand? Give?" She made the universal motion of giving something to someone else and cocked her head like she was talking to a complete moron. Which he was, for the moment. Shake it off, Jack.

"Giving it to me," he repeated dazedly. "I'm the..."

"Chief researcher."

"On the project... I get my name on the... And I'm... And you're?"

"Still your boss." She grinned. "Get to work. You got a kid up there probably filing everything wrong and crashing our 800-year-old computer."

Josiah grinned back. Yeah. He was a boss now. Maybe he'd shave tomorrow. Maybe his hand wouldn't shake every time the blade got too near this throat. Maybe the close, dark hallway leading from his room to the bathroom wouldn't echo with teenaged laughter, heckling him until he could get to the switch just inside the bathroom door. Maybe tomorrow.

P5X-208: Day One, part two

Ok, so it's been... three hours since I sat down here by the fire with my pen light and notebooks and camera. For posterity, maybe because this is my first mission ever, I'll just list everything I know so far.

- there are way too few consonants for as many vowels as this language has.
- like Japanese, it favours CV constructs. Unlike Japanese, this favouritism is exclusive. Like Japanese, it considers L and R allophones?
- there are way too many missing minimal pairs to be any kind of language based off Latin, which is my first choice right now because of the writing samples and pieces of culture we've found.
- common errors and erronial drift due to graphemic representation don't actually coincide with natural language procession; this language doesn't seem to have evolved into writing. The culture was pressed into having a written language?

Annnd, that's about everything I know. I can read most of what I brought back from the library now. Or sound it out, anyway. I'm pretty sure now that the three key words do refer to the places themselves rather than just abstractly standing for them. "Pipiliokeka." Library. There's something so... familiar sounding about that word, but at this point I can't be sure that it's not just that I've said it under my breath so many times now, called it out at the top of my lungs over rushing, murderous water, or created that initial, sort of intimate relationship with it when I first sounded it out and transported myself to a whole other place.

Words have power, which is sorta why I took this job. I just never thought the notion would be so ... literal.

Ok. So. If this language didn't evolve graphemic representation on its own, then... it's possible that the original word didn't actually sound anything like pipliokeka. And it's possible that the CV construction isn't native either. So... if voiced plosives did exist, but didn't get written, much as aspiration doesn't in English, then...

bi bi lio... gega? kega? bibilio--

Ahhh ha. Biblio (/i) = book; bibliotek = library. What kind of language considers k and t to be...? OH.

So... borrowed words. Oh oh oh. Obviously if the native language didn't have a written counterpart, then it wouldn't have had a word for library. It's gotta be a borrowed word, transliterated according to rules. (Refer to mission book 1-A, page 13.) I'll spend some time looking through the scrolls we brought back to try to pick out likely suspects. Bibliotek is Latin, so... I'll look for mysteriously Latin sounding words.

Oh. Atriolum. For akaliolum. Has to be. Which means it's definite, the CV thing. No compound consonant clusters. Still don't know what ke e na means. Even with all of the options for K... Must be a native word.

And I still haven't answered the question about k and t.

The language isn't without historical representation, though. I found what appear to be instructions for hand signs, like a sign language. It looks pretty structured, although it involves more than just hand movement and placement. I moved through a couple of the smaller motions earlier when Austin'd moved out of sight a little, and ... it's sort of like dancing. Formalized, linguistic dancing. Amazing. Course, I have no idea what it means until I can translate the little definitions under each movement. And as fascinating as it is, unless I can find a way to connect it to the symbols around this place, some culture-based influence that can help me figure out who was here or where the other words on the RSP go, it's not that helpful.

I'm going to look through the reference stuff I brought with me, just to try to jog the whole intuitive leap process. I know now that it's not Greek and only sometimes Latin, so really, I'm just going to give myself a 15 minute break to look through books before I start in on the serious code-breaking.

P5X-208: Day One

Well, the best thing I can say about today is that I did not sprain my ankle.

I thought maybe, which is why even though I really, really wanted to, I didn't take off my boots to change my socks after going to... hale au au. Whatever that means. Big room full of water. For all I knew, keeping my boots on and tied tight was the only thing keeping my ankle from swelling up, and I really, really didn't want to be incapacitated if we had to climb or run or jump or frolic, or whathaveyou.

But we didn't. Thank goodness. And we got out, thank goodness again. And boy, was Silverhawk mad. But she's a medic, so even if she was pissed, I'm pretty sure she'd still patch me up if I somehow broke myself, which is why I waited til camp to pull off my boot and inspect the damage.

And I did not sprain my ankle. Whoopie. Just a twinge, fine by tomorrow, sort of thing.

I did, however, manage to transport me and two of my team to parts unknown, bereft of radio contact. And I did manage to nearly drown myself. I really deserved worse than she gave me, but I'm not gonna complain.

For future reference, cuz I'll probably have to put it in a report: When trying to decipher the symbols around the stone on the ring system podium (find better name, maybe... RSP?), I accidentally brushed the stone while sounding out the word in the upper left hand corner, "ha le au au." I was transported to a dark room full of water about two inches over my head. I was swept off my feet by a current, but found the ceiling of the place to be a mere foot above the surface of the water, and so, had a hand hold to keep myself from being pushed around. The water was cold, frothy, and tasted of seawater, so I surmise that the room is near the shore, possibly on the other side of the gate from the city. I doubt the EO (note: don't write "EO" in official report) of this place would intentionally put a waterlogged room on the RSP, so my inclination is that the room is on this continent, near the volcano. Cracks in the integrity of the room were caused by an eruption, which allowed seawater to flow in. Probably, the air I ringed in with me is what saved my life. (Uh... don't put that part in report.) I managed to get my hand back onto the gemstone in the RSP while keeping my face above water to say the keyword to get back to the library, "pi pi lio ke ka," and was transported back to the library.

So anyway. Silverhawk: I thiiiink we might be making headway. After today, I figured I'd have a hard time of it, and I was right. But at the same time, while everything was actually happening, I wasn't that worried. Except for those ten seconds in the drink, of course. I think I still have water in my ears. When we got back to her though, I saw just how worried we made her. I made her. Not that she looked all mother-henny, not even a little. Man, she was pissed. I find myself never wanting to make her that mad again, but not for the obvious, 6' tall reasons. She owns her responsibility for our safety. For my safety. And I royally screwed that for her today. And she didn't even yell at me.

But we had a little talk, and I'm happy to say that she's a completely reasonable human being. She says she's going to have to adjust for having a civilian on the team, and even though I didn't say it, I'm pledging to make adjustments as well.

We'll see how well that works out.

And Austin?: He's ... funny. Funny haha. And serious. And he's unpredictable about when he's going to be which, too. I make a joke, and he takes it literally, and then I'm babbling about linguistics stuff I should be keeping in my own head for the sake of the people who have to listen, and he comes back with light hearted jokes. I don't know if he's just trying to make me feel comfortable and safe or... what. I can tell he's underwhelmed by my field expertise. That bumble today with the hand signals thing? Man alive. I got the more interpretive part and bunged up the whole "one" thing? What the Heck. Next time, I'm just gonna nod and smile and do whatever he does. Hopefully, he wasn't too too annoyed by my whole... presence, thing. He's nice enough and says he doesn't have an issue with civilians, but I don't know if he's ever had one make him disappear right out from under his CO's nose before.

Jacobs: We didn't get to talk much, unfortunately. There was a nice lunch, some wild animals, then we fell through a floor. My fault. Then we got ringed away. My fault again. And then he was off doing his job and I was at the podium doing... well fixing my screw up. And then everything was awkward on the way back because ... well. Cuz of me, again. If I don't shape up, I'm gonna get a guilt complex.

Annnnd James: We haven't talked at all. She cleared the debris, I dug out the fire pit. Then we adjorned on our own to settle in. Maybe tomorrow. When I'm doing just what I did today, but on orders, and therefore not screwing up.

And now, to work on translations until I pass out.

Dr. Rookwood and the High King of Ireland

Two Years Ago, Inis Mór, Ireland

"Water?"

Josiah looked up and smiled briefly before glancing around nervously. "Trying to get me tossed over the cliff?"

Annabell laughed and leaned back against the low wall, providing the labouring linguist some much-desired shade. "I won't tattle." Her voice was heavily accented - not the dialectical English of her mainland counterparts, but actually accented by her native tongue. One of the handful of people in the whole country for whom her mother tongue was her first language. "Do you really think they'd send you to the mainland?"

Josiah shrugged. "I don't really want to risk it." He squinted in the sun and made some notes in a notebook that was falling apart at the seams. She slid down the wall to sit beside him in the grass.

"Doesn't it hurt your head to think all day as Gaeilge?"

"Does it hurt yours to think in English?" He brushed away a little more dirt to expose a bit more of the wall text.

"No," she sighed. "But I grew up with it. It's harder if you didn't."

Josiah frowned and blew out a breath. "Tá a fhios agam." She was practically quoting him. "I think this is a fairy tale, here," he said, changing the subject and gesturing to the wall. "Do you
recognise any of this?"

She took the notebook from him and glanced over the page. "Some words. It's old," she murmured. "Macha? She's the..."

"Horse goddess," Josiah finished for her when she didn't remember, peering at his notebook upside down. "I think she's the Irish cognate for the Greek Demeter Melaine. The king of Ireland was supposed to mate with her and then ... bathe in her blood to claim kingship." He
made a face, and she laughed at him. "Demeter Melaine had the head of a horse, and the concept of Demeter in general has a lot to do with rebirth and things." After a pause, he added, "If I'm right, it makes her a cognate of Isis, as well."

"You don't sound certain."

Josiah looked at her, shading his eyes with a hand. "I'm not certain."

"But you /are/ thirsty." She waggled a little thermos.

"Oh." He grinned sheepishly at her. "Yeah."

"And you missed lunch."

"Oh." He looked at his watch.

"It was three hours ago."

"Oops." No wonder he'd felt snippy. "She actually /is/ the land. That's where I keep getting hung up."

Annabell frowned. "What?"

"Macha. She /is/ Ireland. The king mates with Ireland, to... conquer her? So that he can protect her as her ruler?" He knitted his brows thoughtfully at the stone slab wall.

Annabell pursed her lips. "Mr Rookwood."

"That doesn't annoy me," he replied without looking away from the wall. It'd been a year since he'd replaced the "mister", so while it didn't annoy him, the fact that she /thought/ it'd annoy him just embarrassed him, because he himself couldn't yet say "Doctor Rookwood" without going all pink and mumbly about it. "It would make sense, though."

"That you're a mister?"

Josiah quirked a brow at her in confusion. "What? Oh. No. That in a society where women are still regarded as something to be possessed and protected, the king should possess his land in order to protect it..."

"So why are you getting hung up on it?"

"Because while Demeter protected the land, 'the bringer of seasons,' she wasn't the land itself. And whenever a man crossed her," he continued thoughtfully, brushing away more debris. "She..."

Annabell frowned and followed his gaze, but she didn't see the big deal. "What?"

He didn't look at her, only gently pulled his notebook from her uninterested fingers. He mumbled under his breath for a few minutes as she creased her brow, doing calculations using his own historical transformational rules. "Conas a dearfá..." He glanced up at the wall. "Conas a dearfá 'scaith,' as Béarla?"

Annabell blinked. "Scaith? Nothing. Do you mean... 'scaipthe?'"

The linguist wrinkled his nose. "What's that mean?" he murmured, running a pencil through his rule set again.

She shrugged. "Scattered."

"She made them.. scattered? That can't be right..."

Annabel sighed and shifted so she was leaning back against the wall again. He did this. He was such a kind, gentle guy, but when he got entrenched, he forgot anyone else was around. So detached.

"Oh."

She looked at him askance. "Not 'scaipthe?'"

"Not even 'scaith,'" he replied, correcting a couple of rules in the algorithm. He looked between his notes and the wall to translate the past into the present, step by step. "What's 'sc... scrio...s?'" He petered out, once he'd figured out just what he'd figured out. But it didn't fit. She didn't... He looked up at Annabell. "Conas a dearfá 'scrios,' as Béarla?" She didn't answer him right away, just looked surprised. "Ta Béarla 'destroy,' isn't it. She destroyed them."

Annabell nodded. "I thought you said she was the bringer of seasons."

"Ah, no," he murmured distractedly. "That's Demeter. This story here is about Macha... Demeter was nasty if you crossed her. Macha, though." It didn't fit. The horse goddess should have been the compliant, willing sacrifice to ensure Ireland's safety under a king. She wasn't supposed to have any other volition but to protect her soil. Of course, there /was/ the issue of the fifty some rock slabs in the western shore that'd been cut out but never hauled off. Someone stopped right in the middle of it, and no one really knew why. Macha? Someone pissed her off? That was silly. She was just a myth.

Josiah shook his head. "I think I'm hungry now," he said.

"Ah, ah," Annabell chided. "Gotta make up for all of that illegal English. En francais, sil vous plait."

Josiah rolled his eyes. "Tá ... ocras orm," he said, feigning heavy thought about it. "Was that right?" He blinked innocently.

"Yes. You get a cookie. Now hush up. You don't want to get thrown off the island, do you?"

Dr. Rookwood and the Lucht Siúlta, Part five

Two Years Ago, West Ireland

part one
part two
part three
part four

With a hand still clamped to the side of his face, he stumbled along with the travellers as they dragged him toward the sound of the villagers, who'd gotten pretty vocal. It could have been heartwarming, if Josiah'd been in a state to appreciate it. As he was pushed back down to his knees in front of the rebuilt bonfire, he called out, "Imigh sa bhaile, Aodh." Well, he tried to call it out. Groaned it out would be a better description. For his effort, he got a foot between the shoulderblades and pitched forward onto his hands. Seriously, Aodh. Go home. You're not helping anyone here.

"We won't be goin' home!" Missus Ó Connacháin replied. Crap. Was the whole village here? There were some largish rocks near his knees on the ground. He /could/ conceivably get to them, aid in his own rescue. But he'd have to conk someone on the noggin, and he knew from experience now that being bashed in the head was a trying experience. No, better they all just go home. The Travellers had treated him well until the entire gaeltaecht'd shown up to take back their property.

"Lemme just-" he started, looking up to the oldest brother beseechingly. "Lemme just get one of them here, to talk. How about that?"

The traveller considered it, then grinned. "Oiya!" he called, and Josiah sat on his feet and tried to rally his waning attention as a conversation ensued. He didn't actually end up getting anyone over to talk, because all the traveller needed was the seed of idea, and then he did the rest on his own. Whatever they were saying, Josiah didn't pay attention except to listen for tone. He breathed a sigh of relief when the conversation ended without raised voices. But when the representative from the gaeltaecht stepped into the firelight, he almost groaned again.

"Missus Ó Connacháin," he muttered. "This is not a good idea."

"Think they'd hurt me?" she replied in that lilt that barely passed as English. "I'm safer here than you are."

Maybe if the travellers had been more unsavory, maybe if she'd been alone, she'd be wrong. But they weren't, and she wasn't, and if the travellers wanted to take out their anger on anyone, a male stranger without kin in the area was a much better target.

"Please go home," he mumbled instead of acknowledging the truth of that.

"Leave you here, should we?"

"Yes. I can get home on my own."

"And can the pig get home on its own, then?"

Josiah blew out a breath. "Obviously not. Just. Give up on the pig, all right?"

Missus Ó Connacháin leaned forward a bit. "Come along, then," she murmured, glancing up at the travellers who stood just feet away. She grabbed at his arm and he saw what she meant even as he got himself to his feet. Yes, ok. He was in for this part of the plan, at least.

He'd only gotten two steps into escape when he heard the "Oi!" and the backward jerk of an arm around his neck. A moment later, he found himself on the ground, dazed and coughing through the sudden, if short-lived, strangle hold. Crap. He looked up just in time to see someone shove the Missus back into the dark. Someone else yelled something about a "blac," and he realised in a crowded moment that they wouldn't deal with a woman again. Not because of any perceived weakness, but because they wanted to be able to beat up on anyone who tried that again without damaging their personal moral codes. Cripes. Stupid complex society.

Okay. This was figure-out-able. It was probably even more figure-out-able in the light of day, with a whole night of nice, satisfying sleep under his belt. And whatever happened to the idyllic Irish countryside the pamphlet talked about, huh? No one ever said, be wary of situations involving stolen pigs. By the way, if a teenager says "we're just gonna steal it back," get the Heck out of there. And while you're at it, don't try to break up the fight. They needed a new copywriter.

"Oi!" Ok, so, the travellers wanted an answer. All right. They didn't want to be ignored. Right, because as a people they were either ignored or reviled by the country at large. That was easy. And they weren't bad - they were good to visitors, had solid if unusual moral boundaries. Ok. So. There was a reason this pig got stolen. Why did they steal the pig? Rabeen's voice filtered back to him as he sat up in the dirt. /They deserved it, Mister Josiah./ Moral code, plus a fairly unbothered philosophy on life - meant probably that they weren't actually taking stuff just because they simply felt marginalised. They probably really did deserve some kind of... payment.

Duh. The ó Cuinns just got their roof reshingled, didn't they? And who did that work? Probably these guys. What if...

"Hey, Muireadhach," he murmured, sitting on his butt in the dirt and rubbing his temple. But while he was figuring out something everyone else already knew - including Aodh, the little jerk - the travellers were having an argument of their own. Rabeen had her finger in Muireadhach's chest, sounding kinda miffed. She glanced over at him and huffed, putting her hands on her hips. She was still angry with him, probably, for asking about the pig. But it seemed like she was on his side.

Unfortunately, she didn't win the argument. Muireadhach strode over to him and hauled him to his feet by the arm. "Oiya!" he called, and they all just sort of assumed the villagers were watching from the dark. He shook Josiah violently as he spoke, and before Josiah could fully translate what he'd said, the traveller'd spun to him and crashed his knuckles into the linguist's jaw.

/Ow./

On the ground again. Grrreat. Oh, right. Boxing was a popular past-time among gypsies, wasn't it? No wonder he was still seeing stars. He wasn't a big guy to start with, and had no experience fighting. He didn't much enjoy the prospect of being a punching bag just to win a pig. "Wait!" he bumbled, palm of one hand to his jaw. The stupid ring had split skin to bone, it felt like. Ow crap ow. "Wait wait wait!" He got to his feet and put his hands out to either side, an alarming reminder of what had gotten him into this mess to start with. "Damn it, wait!"

The members of the gaeltaecht had never heard him curse before, and on them at least, it had the desired effect. The travellers were less impressed, but looked at him in amusement.

"You," he said, gesturing loosely toward the travellers. They looked a little agitated to be gestured at, but he didn't care. "Did /not/... steal a pig." Outrage from the villagers. Of course. "You were owed payment, right?" Outrage on one side, vehement agreement on the other. "But!" he continued, stemming the premature victory. "A pig wasn't the agreement, was it?"

Shuffling feet. Murmurs of "nil" and "nip" and "No it wasn't!" from both sides.

"Ok," he said raggedly. "Then what are you going to do about it? Fight? You're all civilized, bi- or tri- lingual people here, for cryin' out loud!" That got them thinking. He put a hand up to the cut on his chin and winced. A few feet off, he heard Rabeen's murmuring voice at Muireadhach's side, damning and beseeching all at once. He wavered on his feet, feeling dizzy and sorta sick, and let her do her thing for a few minutes, assuming a purely observational role, as he should have done to start with. Voices were lowering. Some little kid started wailing in a camper. Some coin jingled. And from what he gathered before he passed out in the dirt, the villagers had decided to buy back the pig, and keep it in the village rather than giving it back to the ó Cuinns, who through the entire ordeal had slept soundly in their beds in a big house on the hill.

Wow, he wanted a bath.

Dr. Rookwood and the Lucht Siúlta, part four

Two Years Ago, West Ireland

part one
part two
part three

"S'a fight!"

Crap. That snapped him awake. "What? Why!"

"Com'on," the traveller said, jerking on his arm. "Yer our one, a'right?"

"No, no, no," Josiah muttered, swinging his legs over the side of the low bunk. "I'm not getting in the middle of this. No way."

"Awready did," the lad snapped back in a so-far rare display of temper. He jerked the linguist out of bed and propelled him down the camper steps. Josiah winced at the spinning ground and stumbled. Already did? What'd he do? Tried to save either side from going to battle in the first place, didn't he? Did he? He still couldn't remember how he'd gotten on the ground, but he assumed it'd happened right after his whole "can't we all just be friends" routine. But if he'd said something else, sparked some kind of feud that wasn't already there... Craaaap.

"Sho-sye!" That was Aodh's voice, for sure. He yelled something Josiah was too groggy to understand. He sounded worried though. The lad next to him yelled back, something not very polite, and shoved Josiah forward and onto his knees.

"Aodh!" he called, rubbing at his temple. Ow, damnit! "What are you doing?"

"Oi, gadje," said the oldest traveller brother, suddenly crouched at his side. He snapped off a bunch of Shelta that made Josiah's head spin, and the linguist put his hands on the gypsy's shoulders in an attempt to slow absolutely everything down, lest he throw up the dinner they'd so graciously given him.

"Wait," Josiah mumbled. Clearly, whatever the old woman had given him for dizziness the night before had worn off in his sleep.

"Stee quiet, yeh?" the traveller hissed. In the distance, one of his brothers called out something in broken Irish that insinuated a trade, then Josiah's sort of mangled Irish name Sho-sye, and... pig. The linguist sighed. They were going to make a sort of trade - the villagers could either have him back, or the pig, but not both. And as obvious as it seemed that they'd choose Josiah over a pig, it was just as likely that they'd leave Josiah to leave the gypsies on his own. It wasn't as though the travellers were into the white slave trade, or anything. Theoretically, he could just take his leave of him the next day.

Apparently, someone from the gaeltaecht had come to the same conclusion, and shouted back that they'd take the pig, along with an unnecessary comment about it smelling better anyway. Ha, freakin' ha. Josiah slumped a little. Now that that was settled, maybe they could all go back to sleep. He wasn't feeling his best.

He felt even worse when the eldest traveller brother hauled him to his feet by his collar.

"Whoa, wait--"

"Oi!" the taller guy called out into the darkness, where presumably, Josiah's rescuers waited for their pig. He shook the linguist by the neck, and Josiah couldn't help grunting a little at the wave of nausea it induced. He missed the string of mostly Irish that followed, but he caught Aodh in the distance saying something like "You haven't got the balls!" or something. Not smart, Aodh. He didn't need to concentrate to understand that the vehement jabbering that came next meant, "Oh yeah! I'll show you balls!" The lead traveller leaned close to say, "Gov us a yell, then, blac."

Josiah wrinkled his nose up. "Just give em the pig. You stole it to start with." Not smart, Sho-sye. But even though his head ached and it'd really suck to walk all the way home the next day, it made the most sense.

Until it suddenly dawned on him what the string of mostly Irish had been, and what the traveller really did have the balls to do. Of course, it had to occur to him /after/ the traveller'd shoved him backwards into the waiting arms of two of his brothers. "Wait--!" he started, and was cut off by a backhand that would have sent him reeling if he hadn't been held up by the brothers on either side of him. He must have yelped or something, because Aodh's voice was almost immediate, asking them to stop or wait or something. He dragged a hand up to his face. For poor gypsies, they seemed to have no problem finding rings to wear. /Ow./

part five

Dr. Rookwood and the Lucht Siúlta, part three

Two Years Ago, West Ireland

part one
part two

Hands were on his shoulders, pulling him up and over onto his back and rolling a wave of nausea up against the back of his eyes. "Wait, wait!" he sputtered haplessly. He squinted up at the eldest gypsy through crooked glasses, ashamed to be surprised at the lack of malice.

"Oi, gadje," the lead Traveller said.

Josiah worried his bottom lip for a moment, then went for broke. "Josiah," he said, touching his chest first, then extending his hand to shake.

The gypsy's face broke into a relaxed grin and he clasped the linguist's hand to help him up. "Sho-sye!"

All in all, they were just as welcoming as the villagers in the gaeltaecht had been, maybe a bit moreso. After the wizened old camp mother had finished patching up the knot on his head and had given him some kind of herbal something for the dizziness, he was pressed into dinner, had to refuse several offers of drink. When the ragged looking musical instruments came out, he'd put up his hands against dancing with a shy-looking girl with wavy dark hair and big golden-brown eyes. She pouted, he relented, and halfway through the song, she had to laughingly walk him back to the stump he'd been using as a seat because the world wouldn't stop spinning around and he'd stepped on her feet too many times to be cute.

Josiah was in danger of thinking movies weren't romanticised after all, and that gypsy camps really were just as fun-loving and relaxed as the stories made them out to be. Once the party died down a little and some of the brothers went off to play cards, the mother and some of the girls fairly cooed over him, grilling him about his family and what he was doing in Ireland in a stilted, heavily accented Irish-English mix.

"Oh, no..." he murmured, frowning a little as he understood the question. "My mother's passed on. Ah... Mother?" He mimed cradling a baby, and the shy girl he'd danced with pursed her lips in thought for a moment before murmuring, "Nadram." He was getting the hang of this canorous language. "My, ah, nadram... she's..." He crossed his arms over his chest in what he hoped was a meaningful way.

"Ah," breathed the girl. "Tarsp. Yer nadram's tarsp..."

Josiah swallowed. "Nadram's... tarsp," he echoed hollowly.

The old woman made a disapproving sound. Her daughter, or maybe her daughter's daughter, batted at her. "Husha, karbug..." she murmured. "Sho-sye's in shliuchter." She smiled at him, and then repeated, "Learner, yes?"

Oh. Scholar. Shliuchter. More of that inversion stuff. "Yes, scholar."

"Yer nad's shib? Sho-sye," she explained, touching his chest. "Rabeen," she continued, gesturing to herself. She pointedly didn't introduce the old woman, casting her a glare before smiling back at him. "Yer nad?"

"Oh. Alma Dooley."

That seemed to spark some heated discussion, and the other girls just watched in undisguised amusement as his would-be tutor rattled at the older woman. He hadn't meant to cause anything, and he had no idea what was going on. And his head ached. But the lucht siúlta were sort of known to be linguistically stingy, in academic circles, and this was a great opportunity. He had a willing teacher, and even if the lump on his noggin had come from one of the gypsies, they'd taken him in and seen to his owie, and that was good enough for him. After a few minutes, the girl turned back to him, all smiles. "Yer our one," she announced, looking pleased. "A Dooley's alwas wulcome." She spoke better English than she'd let on. They probably all did. Cripes. Just making fun of him. He sighed and grinned and relaxed. "Stye wi' us fer a night," she invited. "'N tak ya ham on morrah."

Take him home tomorrow, he worked out. Gosh, did he even want to go? One look at the "karbug" was enough to tell him he didn't actually have a choice. Pleasant people or not, they'd developed their own language and customs specifically to keep themselves separate from rooters, gadje, like him. He nodded.

"Hey," he said, snagging her sleeve as she stood up. "Did your boys really steal a pig?" It was a risk.

Rabeen twisted her mouth up at him and looked disappointed. "Dey deserved it, misser Sho-sye." And then she stalked off, her mood considerably darker.

Damn. He'd been hoping Aodh was wrong about the gypsies.

They'd let him stare into the bonfire for a couple of hours before pulling him fully clothed to his borrowed bunk, among the lads. They slept six to a trailer, including him, and though he couldn't usually fall asleep quickly in strange places, though he was worried about the whole pig thing, and though he was sort of worried that his continued dizzyness and slight nausea meant he had a concussion and shouldn't sleep - though /all/ of that, he dropped off before most of the others even started snoring. That concussion stuff was just old wives' tales anyway, right...?

He woke up to the sound of his own name being called, from just beyond the camp's unmarked boundary. ... Aodh? What time was it? His watch glowed briefly in the dark when he touched it. Four am. Barely three hours' sleep. And wow did his head ache. Lights swam before his eyes while they tried to get used to the dark.

"Misser Sho-sye," said a voice near his ear. One of the lads took his arm and sat him up.

"Wass goin'on," he slurred, rubbing at his face. In the scant moonlight that made it through the lace curtains on the window, he could see the gleam of the lad's grin.

"S'a fight!"

part four
part five

Dr. Rookwood and the Lucht Siúlta, Part two

Two Years Ago, West Ireland

part one

"Lucht siúlta stole the ó Cuinn's pig."

Uh oh.

"You sure?" Josiah murmured, eyeing the somewhat abandoned campsite. Now that they were closer, there were obvious signs of habitation, dashing all hope of convincing the boys that these gypsies hadn't stolen anything.

"Just gonna steal it back," Aodh murmured, apparently trying to reassure him. He wasn't reassured.

And then he was even less reassured when four or five gypsies appeared as if out of nowhere, looking wary and jabbering to each other in some dialect of Shelta, a language that wasn't fully Irish or English, and not something he could decipher on the spot. He looked to Aodh, who looked slightly concerned. Crap.

"Hang on, Aodh," Josiah murmured, tugging at the young man's elbow. He was the grown up, but he was so, so outside the situation, he might as well have been a two year old.

Aodh didn't acknowledge him. The gypsies were more ranged in age, starting around maybe... eighteen or so, and rounding out probably twenty five. Their dynamic bespoke a sort of relaxed hierarchy, the younger ones looking to the oldest, but the oldest without an overt sense of leadership. From their features, Josiah thought they might have all been related, brothers possibly. And then he mentally smacked himself in the forehead for thinking about such ridiculous stuff when there was a fight impending.

The silence that settled was uneasy. Neither group /wanted/ to fight. An undercurrent of uncertainty filmed through the non-verbal dialogue between the two of them. But there was a pig in the balance, and out here, that mattered.

Augh, it was so stupid to put himself in the middle of this. He'd just end up looking like an idiot and probably get his kiester handed to him by either the gypsies or the villagers who thought he was meddling. Still.

"Hang on," he said more loudly, stepping forward. He knew the Irish would understand him, and the gypsies were looking like they at least got the drift.

Aodh barked something in quick Irish, his temper putting a flare on the usually relaxed drawl of it and mangling it so that Josiah didn't recognise anything but "pig!" Craaaaap. The gypsies laughed and made fists and their body language told Josiah what their speech could not - they were prepared for a fight. But more than that, they were defensive, indignant. Who wouldn't be, being accused of stealing a pig? And suddenly he was pretty convinced they hadn't stolen a pig at all.

"Aodh!" he called sharply. "Do you even have any proof?"

Aodh pushed him and Josiah could see the stoic kindness leech away into the back of the boy's mind as he stumbled backward a couple of steps. Aodh pushed him? He glanced quickly at the other village boys, and they were all looking pretty uncomfortable. There'd been scraps between the boys and the gypsies in the past, Annabell'd said, but never over actual property. And while it was true that half the time, the village treated him like some invading force, the other half of the time, they treated him like a lost lamb of God, had taken him into their homes and listened to him in their church. And he'd never been laid a hand on. Crap crap crap.

One of the gypsies hefted a shovel, barking something unintelligible and pointing at Josiah. Crap. Tuama snapped something back, and Josiah caught "outsider" and something about leaving him out of this. But damnit! He was standing right here, couldn't just watch whatever this was happen without at least trying to make someone see reason!

"Ná troid!" Keep it simple, stupid. The gypsies looked over in surprise, clearly astonished that the outsider could make himself understood. Josiah had his hands raised to both sides, his heart hammering in his chest for no good reason at all save that he felt impending doom hulking just in the wings. "Ná troid..."

Well, that hadn't worked. Josiah winced himself awake and coughed on the mouthful of dust his wakefulness had tried to breathe in. Rapid mostly-Irish dialogue whipped back and forth over his head, so he knew he hadn't been out more than maybe thirty seconds or so. He didn't remember how he got on the ground, and honestly didn't know which side he should've been rooting for, and then he grimaced into the dirt to think that he might root for /anyone/. Trying to lift his head more than an inch off the ground only brought nausea and a worrying fuzzyness to his vision, so he dropped his cheek to the dirt and watched, trying to rally. They were fighting, despite his best efforts, or maybe because of them - he couldn't remember. And then, the unthinkable. Aodh shot him a guilty look before backing up a couple of steps, and that before turning tail and running, the rest of the village boys hot on his heels.

Leaving him alone with the gypsies he couldn't understand, lost in the middle of the Burren.

part three
part four
part five

Dr. Rookwood and the Lucht Siúlta, Part one

Two years ago, West Ireland

Josiah winced as the back of his head conked against the dirt road. He was a mess, dirty, a little damp from having stepped full-foot into a water-filled rut in the worn road.

"I give up!" he cried, but his assailants were ruthless, all four of them piling onto his chest. He looked up at them, half-heartedly shielding his face, and said, "You'll never get away with this! Yarg!" And with a surge of energy, he gathered all four small, giggling boys up in his arms and overpowered them, sitting up and laughing maniacally. "Ah hahaha! You can never escape!" One boy squealed as he got away only to be pulled back by the belt on his muddy trousers.

"Sho-sye!" he screeched, laughing and trying to look demanding at the same time. He twisted and exclaimed something half-Irish, half-Universal Kidtalk.

Josiah grinned. "English."

"Le - mee - GO!" the kid repeated, emphatically stamping his little foot. Josiah didn't actually have a choice, because keeping one hand on the kid's belt left only one arm to corral the other three, and they jostled him so much that he had to let go anyway. Freed, the kid didn't run away, only stumbled forward a few feet and then turned on him and growled like a lion, clawing his little hands up. Inspired, the other three suddenly became lions as well, and Josiah got more than one tiny foot in the gut for his trouble.

"Samhradhán!"

Samhradhán stopped mid-grr, then scampered around to the other side of the prone man to peer at his mother. The three other boys vaulted over to join him, and Josiah winced good-naturedly up at the approaching woman, shielding his eyes from the watery afternoon sunlight.

"Missus Ó Connacháin."

"Mister Rookwood," she replied, smiling grimly. "Thank you for watching the boys," she added, her voice seeming to barely touch English. The boys in question scattered toward the tiny town down the dirt road as she knelt in the damp dust to help him sit up. "You've got your trousers all muddy."

"It's no big deal," he murmured.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't teach my Samhradhán to speak English."

Josiah flushed pink. "Missus Ó Connacháin," he started, but she cut him off.

"He has got only a few more precious years until schooling will force his native tongue out of his head. I should prefer it to be well set-in before then. /Mister/ Rookwood."

Thoroughly chastised, Josiah averted his gaze and folded his hands together, elbows on his knees. "Tá brón orm," he mumbled, clearly contrite. Her face softened, which he didn't see. He didn't agree with her. Learning languages simultaneously wasn't a detriment to either language. It only meant Samhradhán would have the edge he'd need to stay in the school he'd only be able to attend three times a week as it was. He didn't agree. But it wasn't his choice. So he sighed and looked back up in surprise when he felt her hand on his arm.

"Don't think of me unkindly, Mister Rookwood. Thank you for getting him into school." And then she was gone, striding away in all of her deceptively complex grace.

Josiah collected himself gingerly, hugging an arm round his ribcage. Little kids had the unfortunate advantage over grown men, in that they kicked without thought and didn't have to worry about retribution. He shook out his wet foot and looked into the sleepy village that had been his home for the last three weeks. He'd broken the rules of the Gaeltaecht more often than he should have, and only thwarted his punishment by giving painstaking Masses on Sunday mornings. He'd had to spend every night a week translating a Mass he was unfamiliar with into Irish, those weeks he'd been egregiously defiant. No use complaining that he wasn't Catholic, didn't even know the Latin, let alone the English. No use mentioning that the presiding Father would've given the Mass in Latin anyway. Never should have let on his previous life's work.

But it was that, or be thrown out, sent back to Galway, kicked out of the program with a dishonorable discharge. Not that it truly mattered. He wasn't in it for the little embossed piece of paper.

"Not getting sweet on widow Ó Connacháin," said a voice behind him, interrupting his thoughts.

"Oh, no," he replied. He hadn't meant to start a revolution, and of course he hadn't actually done anything of the sort. And it wasn't that his Irish was so abysmal that they could think he mightn't understand them. He was getting pretty good at it, actually. But it seemed he could tell who liked him and who didn't by whether they spoke to him in Irish or English. He'd given the matter some thought and come up with two possibilities. The one he actually hoped was more true was the one where they tried to get him in trouble for speaking English. Simple, straightforward.

"It'll be far too soon for that," the younger man advised, somewhat less than pleasantly.

"I know." Josiah turned to face Aodh, a dark haired youth whom he was aware fancied himself the village's chiefest protector against those who'd try to force change. He considered Aodh frankly, standing up to his full height and just barely cresting the still growing teen. "I'm not after anything, Aodh." He tried a smile. "Let's take a little walk."

Aodh gave him a thoughtful look and nodded after a moment, starting off down a path headed away from town. They didn't talk much, just walked along /almost/ companionably. Josiah didn't expect any revelations or to forge new friendships. He remembered being Aodh's age - seventeen or so, full of thwarted emotion and mis- or undirected drive to... do something. It wasn't true that young men were angry, not necessarily. Aodh, for example, was a fine specimen of that elusive and understated complexity that hung about the whole village. He wanted a simple life, and he wanted to protect the people he loved, and at the same time, he wanted what youth wants - to change the world, to change /something/. And Josiah thought he was kind. That under the stoic, protective-through-intimidation exterior, he was capable of great kindness.

Of course, Josiah thought, glancing at the boy askance, his idealism had made him a poor judge of character in the past.

"So, where're we goin?" he murmured, glancing around. Fields, as far as he could see. The ocean was a dull rumble just under the sound of sea birds and lowing cattle. Stone walls gridded up the countryside haphazardly.

Aodh looked around. "Nowhere," he answered simply. Josiah understood. They'd just been walking without direction, a common past time. Aodh'd know how to get home, no matter where they ended up. The Irish took hours' long walks without even thinking of it, and if Josiah'd remembered that, he might've suggested something else. "Dia duit, Tómmán."

Josiah looked up and over to see Tuama and the rest of the crew hopping over a low fence. About six of them, including Aodh, from sixteen to about eighteen. A pot of barely-surly, subdued frustration. Awesome.

"Ná glaoigh Tómmán--" Tuama complained jokingly, but stopped short when he saw Josiah. He twisted up his mouth and looked away. "Don't call me Tómmán," he muttered more darkly, his accent thicker than Aodh's by a lot and barely understandable even to the linguist. Another villager who didn't like him. Josiah offered him a meagre smile and gave them their privacy as Aodh moved to join them near the fence. Their murmured Irish was too faint and fast for him to make out, which was probably the point.

And then they were moving out, on some kind of mission. Josiah raised his brows and looked around. Crap. Oh man, he was lost. His instincts to leave the young men to their task warred with his more logical drive to not be lost in the middle of the Burren with no food or water and the closest house some hours' walk away, /if/ he chose the right direction. Well, he could always head for the sea and loop round the coast. There were always houses on the coast. If he was lucky, one of them would have a working car, or maybe a pony for rent.

And then Aodh was turning back to him, raising his brows and asking without asking, "You comin'?" Thank goodness for that buried kindness. They walked for another twenty minutes in uncomfortable silence. Clearly, it was only Aodh's presence that had garnered him this rare opportunity to observe the wild young Irishman in his native habitat. Ahead of them, the once colourful signs of an encampment waved in the breeze, and Josiah wrinkled his brow in thought.

"Lucht siúlta stole the ó Cuinn's pig."

Uh oh.

part two
part three
part four
part five

What the Heck am I doing?

Of course I missed my flight. It wouldn't be nearly as fun if I were, you know, on time. Or early, even. I meant to be, by a day. Instead, I arrived in Colorado Springs a scant three hours before my first meeting, and got on Base a mere 17 hours before we're due to step through the Gate. I haven't seen it yet, by the way. Seems like I could get to it though, if I tried. There are 50 trillion guards everywhere, but there aren't a lot of places my card doesn't scan, not that I've found, anyway. I admit I haven't tried. To scan my card in random doors or to see the Gate. This has been a really long day.

Thoughts on Silverhawk: She's ... standoffish. Not that I don't understand it or can't deal with it. I'm a bit standoffish myself, I've been told. (By a treehugger, but still.) She has this... way about her. I know, how trite. Of course she has a way about her. But I mean it. I'm hoping I'll be allowed to call her Rowena eventually. That name is really under-rated. Of course, "Major Silverhawk" is fine too. Nothing wrong with showing respect. Actually, that might be better. She's the boss. She deserves to be acknowledged as one.

Thoughts on this whole military thing: I don't like it. I never did. I don't like the idea that so much of my training to get here involved how to kill stuff. (I really don't like how bad I was at it, either.) That being said, I'm determined not to mess with the system. I wouldn't want military dudes coming in and wrecking my nice, orderly (there's order! You just have to know the system!) researchy stuff, waving their guns around and reorganizing the files. So, I'm going to do my best not to subvert the system, to follow my CO's orders, not get myself in trouble I can't get myself out of, and generally be a good kid.

Thoughts on whether I'll succeed: Don't know. Really don't. I've messed up on this before, with the best intentions. It's always been hard to sit by, and while I've been told that the best way to study is to sit back and observe, I've never been able to. As a historian, there's no one left to save. As a linguist, there's more value in getting into the dirt and actually talking to people. As either of those things, there's nothing in the back of my mind telling me that I'm screwing up, that I shouldn't be getting involved. Not until I'm already involved and blood has been spilt. Figuratively. Well, ok. Once literally. But it was mine. Does that count? Oh, forget it.

Thoughts on the Tok'ra: Whoa. Ok. Yes, I was briefed. Do you know how many times I've had to backup today and say "Oh, yeah, I was briefed. I just..." whatever? Yes. I was briefed. But come on! You're a freakin' alien with two personalities, and some great measure of power, and apparently we've been working with you for years. Just give me like... five minutes to decide you haven't just been fooling people for those years, to decide I should trust you too. Because where I come from, if you say you've got two personalities in you, they lock you up. Still, it was incredible talking to her - them. Arg. I fear both of them are waaay smarter than I am. Then again, I've been given such a really really short time to adjust all of my "country" references to "planets," "worlds" to "star systems," and "fiction" to "fact." I can't believe I actually thought she was talking about a parallel universe. I'm embarrassed to think about it even now. Gotta set the dial a little lower - not everything that once was science fiction has become fact. Some stuff is still just ridiculous. Parallel universes. Pif.

Thoughts on other people I met today: Man there were a lot. Note to self, self: Stay the Heck away from Malone. Also, find Randi Kavangh again and smile at her. You'll want all the friendly faces you can get. Start making a list of people you haven't embarrassed yourself in front of yet. Try not to cross anyone off. Good boy.

Final thoughts: I am SO not going to be able to sleep tonight. -sigh-