Stubborn Quills ((open RP))

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

((Intended for a few, open for anyone who wanders by!))

The decorations had finally been swept up, the cake cleared away and Kurama had at last escaped the birthday celebration inflicted upon him by the house elves. The Great Hall was deserted, save for one man seated at a long table. There were piles of books surrounding him and at least three dictaquills hovered expectantly nearby. Every few moments, the man would raise his head, aim his wand at the quill and mutter a charm. Sometimes the quill sprang to life, scratching on the paper. Most of the time it refused to move.

Giving a frustrated sigh, Methos reached for the beer at his right hand and took a deep drink. He stared at the quills thoughtfully – he had been working on the translation charms for weeks without much luck, but when you’re an immortal at a magical school, you have to find some way to pass the time.

Comments

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

Enter Rory, carrying a cushion from the Gryffindor common room and only looking slightly self-conscious about it. "Oh - hi." He nodded to Methos, with a curious look at the books. "I'm not going to bother you, am I? I was looking for somewhere to practice summoning and banishing charms, and there's more space to chuck cushions around in here than the common room, so..." He gestured to the far side of the hall. "I'd be down that end, but I can go somewhere else if you want."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

"Hn?" Methos looked up, peering at him as he forced his brain to reset from Aramaic to English. It wasn't really necessary in a place like Hogwarts, but it was a habit that had served him too well to let it get rusty. "No, not at all, cast away."

He pointed his wand at the nearest floating quill, "And if I can't get this to work, you can pratice banishing these damn things as well."

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

Rory came a little closer, interested. "What are you trying to do with them?"

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

He cleared a few books out of the way to allow Rory a closer look. "I've been trying to teach the dictaquills to write in ancient languages."

Methos pointed at each one in turn. "Aramaic, Greek, Persian. I tried teaching one hieroglyphics, but I think I broke it. Bypassing the translation charm is trickier than I first thought."

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

Rory peered at the sheets. "I see what you mean. I take it you weren't trying to write 'flying ship full of eels'."

It didn't immediately occur to him that the other man might not expect him to be able to read them.

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

"Exactly. It understands the words, but it misplaces the letters, misses the markers and sends the syntax all to hell.." Methos looked up at Rory, startled out of his rant. He didn't look that old - did he? "I'm sorry, you understand it?"

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

"Oh..." Rory blinked. There was a slight dizzy moment as part of his mind insisted that of course he couldn't read Ancient Greek, where would he learn something like that when he'd lived in Leadworth his whole life...? It passed, though. The conflicting timelines almost made sense by now, unless he thought about it too much. "Yeah, I can. It's a really long story."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

The flicker of confusion that crossed the young man's face only served to pique Methos' interest. He leaned forward, his gaze curious. "You're not immortal, at least not the flavor I'm used to, and you look remarkably well adjusted so I'd venture the Hat didn't pull you here straight from Athens."

He began stacking the papers, most of them with scribbled nonsense and ancient dirty jokes, alongside the books. "I'm all ears if you'd care to share."

With a pang, he tried not to recall how much that sounded like something Joe would say.

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

"All right." Rory took a seat, putting the cushion down on the table. "I'm Rory, by the way. If we're going into this I should introduce myself properly. And -" He sighed. "If none of this makes any sense you're not the only one who thinks so, trust me. I'm not even sure where to start."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

"Methos," he said, shoving the rest of his work to the side, curling his fingers loosely around his beer. "Have you considered keeping a journal? After a few thousand years, it's the one thing that helps me keep things straight."

"Start where you'd like, I'll try and keep up."

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

The 'few thousand' made Rory double-take again. "You are - actually older than me, then. I should've known, round here, but..." He shook his head. "I did have a journal, for a while. The trouble is most of what I remember never happened, now, and there are two or three timelines running at once and - you know. Complicated."

He took a deep breath, sitting back. "So, my wife and I are friends with a nine-hundred-year-old time-travelling alien called the Doctor." Which he managed to say with a perfectly straight face, for a few seconds. "Yeah, I did warn you. I won't get into how we met, that's - really Amy's story to tell, but the night before our wedding, he took us off on a trip around the universe together. It was supposed to be sort of a romantic cruise, I think, except we ended up running for our lives a lot and saving the world. A couple of times, actually. One of which ended with me getting shot. And - there was this crack, a rift, in space and time. I fell into it, when I died, and ...the next thing I knew I woke up and I was a Roman centurion." He ran back over this in his mind, and sighed again. "And maybe I shouldn't try to tell this in chronological order for me, but this is the best I can do."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

"It doesn't matter how complicated it might seem to someone else, so long as it helps you keep things clear in your head. I can't recall what I was doing in Carthage until I read it - too many lives, too many pasts, the details all get muddled."

Methos leaned forward, his eyes intense as he laid out his rather complicated story. His brows shot up at the mention of being a Roman. "Then you're in good company. There are a few Romans in the school," he brought the beer all the way to his lips before the words fully registered in his brain.

"Wait.. the Doctor? Tall, odd fellow, blue box?"

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

Rory nodded. "That's him. You know him?" It was likely they'd met at Hogwarts, but Rory wouldn't be surprised to hear otherwise.

"And the Roman part's not even as weird as it gets. It's the next bit that's hard to keep straight."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

((edited after getting approval from Doctor-mun))

Methos swore softly, setting his beer down. "I had no idea he was here. It's been.. a damned long time." He seemed to shake himself, "I'm sorry. I tend to babble sometimes. Please.. don't let me interrupt."

[eleventyrags.livejournal.com]

While interrupting things may not have been Methos' prerogative, the Doctor had no trouble insinuating himself into conversations.

As it happened, the beer might have turned him off (too much sake had put him in a very compromising position recently... not that he was complaining) but the sight of someone vaguely familiar sitting with someone more than vaguely familiar notched his curiosity up to eleven. _Hah.

"Tell him about what you did after the box closed," the Doctor said, sitting next to Rory since he was the more familiar one. "Honestly I'd like to know too. There's kind of a gap between Centurion and Museum Security."

[thefuturemrpond.livejournal.com]

"...how do you do that?" Rory muttered, but he smiled, and shifted over on the bench to let the Doctor sit down. "I haven't explained about the Pandorica yet. The technobabble stuff's not as easy as you make it look."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

"I think it's one of those special Time Lord skills," Methos drawled as the Doctor sat down. He looked entirely different since their last meeting, but there were certain small mannerisms that hadn't changed.

"It's good to see you again. Been a long time since Athens."

[bloodlettersson.livejournal.com]

Books and beer was Vishous' kind of thing. "What's doing?" a large man asked, seating himself across from Methos.

He arranged his leather jacket to be less of a nuisance and leaned against the table, scratching idly at his goatee.

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

Methos eyed the nearest dictaquill, "I'm trying to shortcut the translation charm so they'll write properly in ancient Greek, Aramaic and Egyptian. Not much luck so far. I think one of them shorted out and another is writing dirty jokes in Latin."

He waved at a house elf who set a fresh beer in front of Methos, then looked at the big man expectantly for an order.

[bloodlettersson.livejournal.com]

Vishous spoke sixteen languages. He would have offered to translate if he'd known any of the ancient language's besides his own race's.

He tried not to stare at the elf (still getting used to the creatures) and asked it for a scotch. He felt nostalgic today. Nothing new there though.

He poked at one of the books, tapping it with his index finger. "It'd be easier for you to just learn Greek if you don't already know it, and write it out by hand, true? Maybe on one of those ancient-ass computers they got here."

[ancient-adam.livejournal.com]

"Oh I already speak the languages, those and quite a few more. I've been writing these out longhand," Methos flipped one of the journals open, "for a very long time. While I'm here I thought I'd pass the time and try to teach the quills to do the writing for me."

He smirked and tapped the side of the beer bottle with his wand, "Once I tackle that, I'm going to learn a decent replication charm and make sure I never run out of beer again."

A scotch. Just like MacLeod would have ordered. Christ, when did he get so sentimental?