And the power of the people shall come to believe they do rule

[mickey-cops.livejournal.com]

((Continuing from this post.))

In the passageways beneath the park, where a group had gathered to break down a long-closed door, a laser beam was widening, and a broad circle began to blacken the surface of the wood, the locks melting and streaming down in shining rivulets, to puddle at the doorstep. The room was getting hot, now.

Outside, all at once, the rides all stopped. Animatronic figures jolted still; boats bumped each other confusedly; rollercoasters fell to the bottom of their tracks and did not continue up. The lights inside the buildings flickered off; the perpetual background noise of music and soundeffects went silent.

Below, the hole in the door began to crackle and spark around the edges, and for just a moment all the eyes trained on the door could see through it a fathomless darkness. An odd, organic silence filled the air; everyone's breathing and small movements were audible, but so too was a new absence of sound, as though the walls were all holding their breath.

And then the air around the door began to shimmer.

Comments

[iron-and-latin.livejournal.com]

A huff of air out his nostrils.

"I'm sorry. I should have warned you. But… you see at home, my visions… they let me see bad things before they happen. So I can stop them. I didn't tell him why I was there, and I guess he just got annoyed and did that, that thing he does, where he gets into your mind and makes you do stuff? To make me go away. And I didn't respond right, so he got curious." He gave her shrug of sorts- the best he could manage in his current… form. "I… I'm a little out of my depth here," he confessed. "I wasn't sure…"

[una-harlequin.livejournal.com]

That thin, humourless smile was back, and she stared at some point slightly past Sam's ears with a gaze that was disturbingly blank.

"I made him curious, once," Una said, her tone quiet and abstracted. "That's how we met. He got curious and he decided he just had to have a look around..." She raised one hand to her temple; the other rested still against Sam's neck.

She blinked, and when she looked back at Sam, the blankness was gone, replaced now by something a little too much like grief. "I'm sorry, Sam. I'm sorry it happened to you. I thought—"

"It won’t happen again," he'd said. "I promise. Not to anyone else, and not to you. I won’t let him."

She shook her head to clear it. "Never mind what I thought." The cold sharp feeling was worse now. Then: "...warned me?"

[iron-and-latin.livejournal.com]

Sam shook his head, which came off looking rather like he was trying to rid himself of flies. One good thing, he supposed, about being a llama in Disneyland; he'd never have to worry about pests. Like fleas.

"The guy's a monster," he said, voice slightly strained. "He's a killer and a psycho who likes to torture people. How could you possibly…" He broke off suddenly, and changed to softer, slightly apologetic tone. "I'm… I'm sorry. I shouldn't… I mean, if there's one thing I should know by now, it's that these things are never that simple. And that I usually don't know what the hell I'm talking about. It just... seems like it's pretty easy, in a situation like... yours..." he swallowed. "for something to go wrong."

[una-harlequin.livejournal.com]

She gave Sam a very rueful, sad smile and patted his neck. "Oh yes. Very easy indeed. It's an endless gamble, and while I could claim I did it because I thought it might ... keep him under control, I—well. I'm afraid I'm just a little too addicted to the taste of adrenaline. And that's the simple explanation." The full one, she reflected, would take a lifetime.

"You take so much time to wonder about defences and don't seem to be considering the possibility that I might just snap—" a click of the fingers to illustrate "—one day."

"So that's what you saw, then," she said aloud; then added for clarity: "You saw him ... snap."

[iron-and-latin.livejournal.com]

Sam shrugged again.

"I'm not… trying to say anything specific, or anything. Heck, you're a woman of the multiverse, and I'm just a little llama from Kansas." Llamas can't smile, exactly, but there was a little bit of one in his eyes, just then. It fell away again at her question.

"Yeah, I guess so. It wasn't pretty. But I think me showing up on his doorstep must have done something, since obviously it didn't happen. Unless the park…." he left it open-ended if she wanted to answer that or not.

[una-harlequin.livejournal.com]

"Troublemaker of the multiverse, you mean," matching the smile in his eyes with one of her own. A little self-deprecation in there too.

She sobered at his account. Memory now of a hard hand on her throat, her own sharp desperate intake of breath, and suddenly she was deeply angry, all the pieces falling in place: anger at all of them, the Doctor, the Master, and not least at herself.

"Has he harassed you since then?" she asked. Hoping for a no, hoping it was only the once, however terrible it may have been.

[iron-and-latin.livejournal.com]

Llamas, Sam discovered just then, can't shrug.

"He couldn't figure me out that quick," he admitted, glancing away. "It's..." He couldn't quite get himself to tell her that it wasn't a big deal. "I'm sure he's going to have better things to do after all this."

He glanced in the direction of Club 33. "I should go find someone to, um... fix me."

[una-harlequin.livejournal.com]

The better things comment elicited a little snort of laughter. "Sorry," she said quickly. "It isn't funny, it simply—" She sighed. Well, there was the answer she'd been afraid of. She wasn't sure exactly what she meant to do about it, but clearly words were going to need to be exchanged with at least two time travellers.

She gave him a worried look. "You sure you'll be all right? That you'll be able to find someone to ... to help?"