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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Nov 14, 2014 10:39:52 GMT -8
I will give this a date soon!
Alan felt tired to his toes. But that was sort of what happened when you worked a couple of double shifts in a week. On top of everything else he was doing with his... now secret after work life. He was also trying to look into information that Lydia could use about whatever contacts she was now trying to find. All in all, the red head felt pretty exhausted. Then there was all that hub bub that had happened a number of nights back with what seemed like werewolves in the middle of city. He had no clue what had happened then, but he had lost all contact with his older sister afterwards and that sort of worried him.
Then again, Lina could have easily been drunk in a gutter somewhere. That wasn't exactly out of the realm of possibilities with her and until she contacted him, he really couldn't do anything. He was worried, stressed, and over worked, but what else was new in his life? He slowly trudged home, groggily staring at nothing with some take out in hand. It was easy enough to explain why he had extra food. He was a big guy, he ate a lot, never mind the fact that there was a rather tiny lady staying in his apartment hiding away from everyone else. Compared to how much he ate, it was easy to just buy extra food and blame it on over working. Hopefully she liked Chinese because he had been in the mood for it after his shift.
He fumbled with his keys when he got home, sighing slightly under his breath as he did so. After a little bit (and struggling with the idea of just knocking to get her attention), Alan managed to get the door open and shuffle his way in. He waited until the door was closed and a muffling spell was in place before calling out to her. "Lydia! I got Chinese if you're hungry." He didn't have to yell, his flat was pretty small, but Alan didn't even know if she was home. If not... he'd probably wind up eating it all himself.
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Nov 26, 2014 22:03:50 GMT -8
Lydia preferred the future. That was what she had decided today. Sure, this place had its perks like an abundance of jelly toast, the possibility of shopping, and the rather cute bloke she was staying with during her little mission, but it was dull. Very dull. Boring, even. She spent her days waiting for word from her mother regarding the attack while resisting the urge to head overseas to see her mom. Merlin, confusing bit there, but at least Lydia had decided on titles for both. She couldn't very well call the woman who had given birth to her and raised her for six years "Evie" or "Evelyn," but she couldn't call her mom or mum either. The prior were too cold, but the latter were just too...endearing. And strange. She was used to calling the woman who adopted her "mom." And "mum" was too British. She was certainly no longer British. She'd been away too long to consider herself that. Hell, she didn't even have an accent.
But off that rabbit trail....
Her evenings were certainly more interesting than her days on the nights Alan was actually home and not staying over for an extra long shift. How that man did it, Lydia couldn't understand. Still, she did enjoy his company when she had it. She was just hoping he would help her find a way in soon, but she supposed if she came clean about everything concerning herself, it might be easier. Maybe he could actually help her. He'd told her on many occasions that he could and would, if she'd just let him. If only she hadn't been stubborn, maybe she'd have already found her dad. Then again, why hadn't her dad found her? Why hadn't her mother tried to help her and tell him she was alive? Or had she and he didn't care enough? That last thought was scary, and it certainly didn't fit with the father she remembered. He'd always loved her and Julian, even if that year Julian started school, that year grandfather had taken her away to that orphanage, he had seemed very distant compared to usual. She hadn't understood it then. She still didn't entirely. She could guess, but guesses were hardly truths.
The sound of keys fumbling into the lock made Lydia sit bolt up. She'd spent much of the cold day on the couch cuddled under the blanket and hadn't even changed out of the pajamas she'd worn to bed, which really amounted to what she could scrounge from Alan and were ridiculously oversized. She was sure she looked like a hobbit in them. Her hair was pulled back into a lazy bun. Quickly, Lydia reached out for the book she'd abandoned on the coffee table, Pride and Prejudice, and pretended to be reading it just in time for him to walk into the house. Maybe she shouldn't have overeagerly turned the page because she looked to be halfway through the book when she'd only read maybe a quarter of it. Hopefully he didn't ask her about spoilers.
Lydia realized just how hungry she was at the offering of food. She closed her eyes and took in a long sniff, a smile gracing her features before she looked at Alan and grinned. "If I'm hungry? When am I ever not?" she asked as she pulled back the blanket and got up so she could join him at the table. |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Dec 3, 2014 22:33:49 GMT -8
Alan couldn't help but grinning just a little bit. For such a tiny person, Lydia really did pack away a lot of food. He wasn't completely sure where she put it all, but then again, considering the amount of food he put away, a lot of people weren't entirely sure where he put it all either. Despite his height. Maybe it was just one of those unexplained things, at least for wizarding sorts, and the red head quickly shed his jacket and scarf before placing the Dhinese food on the table for them to share. "I just sort of got a general smattering of things." He still didn't know the things she liked, but Lydia didn't seem too picky, so he was decently hopeful he had gotten something she would enjoy.
It was with a tired sigh that the big guy eased himself into one of the chairs around the table. He rolled up the sleeves to his sweater and began to open up the various containers he had brought. Alan set them carefully between the two of them on the little table that could barely seat two. How Lydia had hidden beneath the thing the first day they met, Alan still hadn't figured it out, but he wasn't exactly the most astute person when he was tired. One could easily call him a bumbling idiot when he was at this state.
Still, despite all the weariness, Alan had secretly been trying to help Lydia even though she didn't quite... trust him yet. Not that he completely blamed her, it was a good habit for the day and age they lived in, but she had been holing up in his flat for quite some time now. No questions asked. He bought food, let her be, offered to pick up whatever she needed... Alan liked to think that he had garnered some amount of trust at this point. But who was he to assume? Assumptions always got him in the end. Alan had been poking his nose around in the hospital, trying to get a hold of records of men who would be the right age to be Lydia's father. So far he had found two people who might be a good match. One had been arrested and thrown someone for "safe" keeping, never to be heard from again. Another had been treated and released, apparently the correct documentation had been found shortly after the man's arrival. He was alive, but nobody knew anything about him beyond that.
But they were the right age and looked a little related to Lydia. Some similar features, but there were strangers out there who looked like his family. Merlin, plenty of people thought that the Nobles were distantly related to the Weasleys because of all that red hair, freckles, and pale skin. Knowing the pureblooded community, he was inclined to agree, but the red hair came from the Russian side of the family. So perhaps not. He was still rooting around, trying to find as much information as he could while still having his hands tied, but he was going to try and help no matter what Lydia said, because that was just the kind of guy he was.
After taking a couple of bites of food, Alan slowly and carefully pulled two files from his bag and considered them for a few moments. He had taken a bit of a risk shuffling these home, but considering they were older files that no one really cared about, he figured misplacing them for a single night wouldn't hurt too much. The tall young man slid them across the table to Lydia without a word spoken and then continued to eat without a single explanation. Maybe something in those files would pop out for her.
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Dec 3, 2014 22:34:26 GMT -8
Lydia shrugged and smiled, sitting forward eagerly on her little seat. She didn't care what he got so long as it didn't have a bug in it. Though, come to think of it, despite all the times people insisted Chinese food places that weren't clean had bugs in them because they'd had an experience or someone they knew had? Well, she'd never seen a bug in Chinese food. Ever. That was saying something. Rare, that. Her mom had been a huge fan of Chinese growing up. If she had to work over or took longer shopping than anticipated, it was always Chinese she'd picked up on the way home. Usually it was sweet and sour pork, chicken chow mein, walnut prawns, and broccoli beef, but this girl had tried plenty with friends once she was old enough to go out. Admittedly, that wasn't that long ago that that had started.
Once Alan finished with one box, Lydia took it and spooned some onto her plate and continued the process until she had a little of everything and her plate was full. She began to eat, closing her eyes. This place was good. She wondered if it was one of those hole in the wall places no one back home would advise her to touch. Those were always the best, somehow. She continued to munch happily, completely unfazed by the silence. She was eating, he was eating, and it was comfortable. There was plenty of time for talking later. Eating was serious business.
When Alan went into his bag, Lydia looked at him and arched a brow. She knew what they were. Hospital files pretty much all looked alike. There were only so many ways one could fix up a manilla folder, after all. But still, the question was why he was giving them to her. She took them regardless and opened one up, looking through it. Ok, arrested. Brunet, blue-eyed. The other, a mental patient who had been released? Or something like that? She wasn't quite sure, notes were brief. Brunet, brown eyes. She scanned over the one again just to see if she could figure out why Alan was showing her the files then looked through the other for the same reason. When she continued to draw blanks, she looked back at him. "Tough cases?" she asked before taking another bite of food. She watched him while chewing. Maybe he wanted advice? or to talk it out? She might not have any advice for him, but hey, she could listen. |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Mar 18, 2015 17:15:35 GMT -8
She didn't understand what the files were for. He just sort of stared at her for a few seconds, completely unbelieving of the situation, before he took another couple bites of food. The food was of course, just to give him a few minutes to think on how to respond. Why was she here then? Why was she staying at his flat, if not to get his help with finding her dad? Maybe she didn't have any other place to go. Maybe it was just safer here or... something. He was a little stumped on the subject, wondering if his assumption had been totally wrong.
After Alan managed to chew through his food properly he sort of glanced at her, then the files, and then back to her. "I'm trying to help you as much as I can." He was trying to be gentle about the subject because the last thing that Alan wanted to do was upset her. Despite his size and his ability to intimidate people with it, Alan didn't like upsetting others. It had a lot to do with how he was raised and what was happening in the environment around him during his youth. The red head didn't like upsetting anyone, thank you very much, even people he didn't like. It was an odd personality perk for him, but it suited the healer just fine.
"At least, as much as I can on the information you've given. I was just trying to see if either of their faces seemed familiar to you at all." But nothing had registered, which probably meant that neither of them were the right sorts of people. Of course, there were a lot of things that Alan didn't understand about the subject. Like how old she really was at the moment and how old her dad really was. Or any of the other little details that went along with everything else. It was a little frustrating but true to his nature, Alan wasn't pressing for more information. He was just really trying to help. "I'll take a closer look at the others and see if any of them would fit." He moved to slide the files back into his bag, a bit of a sigh on his lips. He had been hoping to bring her some sort of good news. Finding the right person was just a step in the right direction, right? But he had struck out and would have to try again. He took another bite of his food, trying to remember the details of the other files and thinking about what he could have been wrong about. |
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Mar 18, 2015 17:16:37 GMT -8
The silence that followed her response made Lydia feel uncomfortable--awkward, even. He was chewing food and not nodding instead of giving some sort of response. That meant she had totally misread his intentions. She looked at the table and picked at a little defect in the wood with her pointer finger. When Alan finished chewing and she felt his eyes briefly on her, Lydia looked up, chewing her lip and having an obviously insecure look on her face. What had she messed up? What had she misunderstood? She liked the guy enough not to want to upset him, and she obviously had done something. At his statement, it clicked what the files were. "Oh," she said quietly, chewing her lip a little harder for a moment before abandoning the motion entirely.
At this very second, Lydia felt small and rude and inconsiderate. Of course he was helping her. That should have been her first assumption about the gentle giant--not that he was asking her for help. It made more sense than him asking her for help on a case. How had she not jumped to that conclusion to begin with? She might not be used to help from strangers, but Alan was the one good person still left in this world aside from her mom. This right here only proved it. He didn't know a thing about her, really, yet he was trusting her in his home with his belongings and his life (he did have to sleep while she was here, after all). He was trusting she was a good person who was really in need when this could be so many other things in this political climate, and she was trusting him with nothing.
That was the primary difference of the age in which he had grown up in compared to hers. Alan had grown his entire life until a few years ago trusting people. She had spent many years of her life trusting people, but then, things had happened just a few years ago, and it had turned her off to trusting more than she had to. Quite silly, really. If she could trust Alan with her life, why couldn't Lydia trust him with her secret? She'd always told herself it would be "too much" for him to comprehend, that she was really 10-going-on-11 in this year but the person before him was 20, that she was from the future--a horrible, rotten, no-good, very bad future, at that. She'd told herself she was doing it to protect her father, a fugitive, from being caught. After all, the more eyes looking for him, the worse off for him. But maybe none of that mattered. Lydia had a good guy in front of her, one willing to bring home hospital files despite what it very obviously could mean for his career--especially since they clearly weren't his patients--for her, to help her.
Lydia's face was full of emotions. Her eyes were teary with the realization that a stranger could care to this extent, her mouth trembling, yet behind it all was a sort of serene resignation, a silent happiness. And after a few seconds of staring at Alan, a tear streamed down her face. And then another and another. Lydia wiped them away. "Sorry," she said. "Well, not for this--ok, yes for this--but also more. I mean..." Lydia swallowed, not sure where to go with this. Her heart was racing in her chest at a speed she was sure would send her into heart failure at the prospect of telling him the truth, but he'd done this for her. She could trust him, couldn't she? And there was that seed of doubt, that little voice that always kept her from telling Alan the truth in the end. But not this time, Lydia told herself after a few moments of staring at the table, her eyes searching it like it had the very answers to life itself.
"I'm sorry for keeping things from you," Lydia said when she looked up at Alan at last. "You've given me no reason not to trust you, but you see, where I'm from...rather, when I'm from? You can't trust people. If you do, you end up dead. If you care, you end up worse. And the truth of the matter is I've lived scared for my life the past few years. This...this light-hearted attitude? All an act. It's the only way I could bear things was to talk like that and think like that or I wouldn't have known how to go on living, and they knew that. They knew that when they sent me back here. They knew I was better suited for this time and trying to prevent what happened to bring things about."
Ok, Lydia, slow down, she scolded herself. "Am I making any sense?" Lydia asked Alan in earnest. "I mean, you get I'm from the future, yeah?" Little bits at a time would be better. Alan might have questions now, and she needed to allow for them. She could tell him more once she was certain he was with her. |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Mar 18, 2015 17:17:59 GMT -8
If there was one thing Alan didn't like, it was making other people cry. Angry cries, terrible sobbing, crocodile tears, what kind of crying really didn't matter. All of it squeezed his heart in all sorts of terrible ways so the moment he saw those emotions playing on Lydia's face, his heart squeezed. "Oh! No, no, no. Please don't cry." He was already moving out of his chair and around the tiny table to somehow help. The women in his family cried so little that it was something he felt he did more than they did. Which was also something his mother found unforgivable of a man, but that was an entirely different subject. There were plenty of people at the hospital who cried, but because Alan was a healer who actually cared, he did as much as he could to help them through whatever pains they were going through. It also sort of made him a sucker for certain situations where people could easily take advantage of him. Nothing too terrible had happened to teach him a lesson. At least not yet.
He didn't actually reach out to touch her, instead on hand was pressed against the table and the other rested on the back of her chair, but he was there all the same. Alan didn't want to somehow upset her further. "It's really alright, I'll just look at other files. I mean, it's not... please don't cry." He crouched down next to her seat, moving down so that his face was just below hers. Merlin, what had he done to upset her?! "It's nothing to apologize for, Lydia. You've... you've got stuff going on. It's alright." He really wasn't expecting her to start spilling any secrets. Everyone had a right to them. Alan had quite a number of secrets he held too, despite the fact that he wanted to express a number of them to the world sometimes. But they were called secrets for a reason, right?
Rather when I'm from? The words sort of settled on Alan's mind and didn't quite stick right. He was a nice, understanding sort of bloke but the ideas of time travel weren't something that exactly fit nicely in with everything else he knew about the world. It was like someone was pointing at the sky and telling him it was green when everyone knew it was blue. "What?" He still spoke softly but the confusion was rather easy to read on his face. Alan had a hard enough time keeping his face straight when he had to lie, he was completely caught off guard by her sudden confession that he sort of sat back further than he should have and ended up sitting on the ground. It wasn't so much as falling as it was just sitting down all of a sudden as his mind tried to process things correctly.
There were many parts of him struggling with the situation. Her being scared made him want to reassure her. Living that way really wasn't living and he had sort of assumed that she was scared of something all things considered. But confessions of fear played on his heart strings rather strongly. But then there was another side of him, a logical side, that wasn't entirely sure of time travel and sanity levels. There were plenty of people who thought they knew everything about the universe and they were totally off their rockers. Time travel was not a normal thing. It also meant that she was... well, he had been looking for the wrong age group for her dad, hadn't he? At least if what she was saying was entirely real, and Alan wasn't entirely sure he believed. Funny enough, he felt bad for not believing her hook, line, and sinker.
"I think I understand what you're saying." At least, Alan understood the concept. Whether it was the truth or not, he couldn't help but be a little bit skeptical. "So uh... how does one... how does one time travel, exactly?" He was trying very hard not to upset her, but it was obvious that he felt he needed more information before he fully accepted what was going on. But if the future was so bleak... "What happened between now and then?" He didn't like the way things were now but he didn't want things getting even worse either. Alan just sort of sat there on his floor, looking up at Lydia, trying to piece everything together as best he could. |
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Mar 18, 2015 17:18:40 GMT -8
The closeness was nice, Lydia realized. She hadn't had that in a long time. Even though Alan wasn't physically touching her, he was still closer to her than any other human being had been in a long time. She may have hugged her mother but emotional closeness? Actual real feeling on the other person's end? No, not in what felt like forever. Not since she had found the Isis cell which had eventually sent her back in time to the present. She almost felt the need to lean against Alan, but she refrained for now. It might be a little odd, she reflected, given that their current relationship was somewhat awkward. Alan tried helping her, but she was wary of him, yet she wasn't sure if "acquaintances" worked for what they were. "Friends" certainly didn't quite. At least not yet. They might be able to be friends in time, but right now? There was still too much between them.
As Alan responded to her, Lydia turned her body enough to see him more comfortably. If they were to talk like this, she didn't want to perpetually keep her head turned to the side just to see him, after all. "This little device," Lydia said, pulling the time turner's chain enough the small turny spinny thing was revealed. Once she was sure Alan could have focused on it, she tucked it away. "Not sure that it works to get me back, but maybe. We'll see on that. Though if why I'm here works, I'm not sure going back would quite work well. Be a little disconcerting, change things too much."
Realizing she was rambling a little, Lydia paused then cleared her throat lightly. After a moment, she sighed. "And the what happened's kinda loaded, if you know what I mean. Lots did, but I was in America, so I only know what other people told me happened over here, but suffice it to say, what happened universally is that the muggles found out about us, and everything went to hell in a hand basket." She remembered people trying to make it work, but the tension and fear and panic had likely become too much. "And I'm here to try to stop it."
((Is this before or after "Where, wolf"?)) |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Mar 18, 2015 17:19:13 GMT -8
At least she wasn't mad at him for not believing her right away, that was a good thing. Alan wasn't entirely sure what he would have done had she gotten mad at him. He may have had a good foot on her height and at least a hundred pounds on her, but he wasn't a violent sort of person. She'd probably be able to beat him within an inch of his life before he'd do anything back. Which probably would look funny to anyone who saw such a scene, but long story short, he wouldn't have been prepared for anything angry.
He sat there while she explained, even pulling out a necklace to show him... well, he wasn't even sure what that was too but it didn't exactly look like a time traveling device. But what was a time traveling device even supposed to look like? Alan didn't have a single clue. He really hadn't heard of time traveling before. He didn't know if it was a necklace, a broom, or a box, so he supposed he'd have to believe her on that level. If he believed in time travel at all, at least. Alan's mind was still trying to jumble around the information into a bit of order and failing to do so.
And I'm here to try to stop it. "By yourself?!" The words sort of popped out of his mouth before he could stop them. It wasn't the fact that Lydia was a woman or that she was so short, or anything of the sort. Instead, Alan thought "saving the world" sort of stuff couldn't be handled by one person. It sounded like it needed way more than one person unless they were someone like Dumbledore. Alan wasn't Dumbledore and unless Lydia was somehow glamoring herself to hide a huge, white beard and wrinkles, Alan didn't think she was Dumbledore either. So how could one person do this by themselves?
He sat back further, his hands supporting his weight as he leaned back. "If finding your father will help you, tell me everything you can?" Despite the fact that Alan still wasn't entirely sure of what Lydia was saying, he'd still try and help her. He wasn't even pressing for all the information. He was also not asking how old she was in the current day. For some reason, trying to imagine her any younger sort of disturbed him a little bit, and he didn't want to think about it. Had nothing to do with the fact that he thought she was cute. Nope, not a bit. That had nothing to do with anything, thank you very much. "I'm guessing he's lot younger than I assumed. How... uh, how much younger should I be looking for?" Hopefully not too much younger. Maybe she was in school now. Maybe she wasn't that much younger than himself at all. Maybe he wasn't being a total creep and just totally confused by all of this. That was alright. He hadn't done anything. He just... wouldn't do anything but help her as much as he could. Everything would be alright and he'd figure out if he believed anything about time travel or not.
((Before. Otherwise Alan would be acting totally different. )) |
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Mar 18, 2015 17:19:43 GMT -8
"By yourself?!"
Alan's obvious shock nearly made Lydia laugh despite herself. Well, obviously not, she wanted to say. It just made no sense to transport a whole team and effectively leave yourself open in your present times when there were easy enough ways to ensure that someone in the time you sent one person back to would believe. In her case, she had her looks, her name, her memories...all tools to convince either Evie or Casey Winslow of her identity in this time, and if that wasn't enough, they had sent a letter approving and outlining the basics of the mission in Evie's own writing to be used only if the prior hadn't worked. Once you had one person with some level of influence convinced, you could start to effect change. The only problem was that she hadn't found her father yet, and her mother was already doing something that might work. She just wanted to find her father to get someone to go about it another way so if one way failed there was a back-up plan in place. After all, her mother was very hellbent on revenge. She might be alive where she came from, but they had no way to guarantee Lydia's mere presence wouldn't change things in that vein. Time travel was a fickle thing.
"His name's Casey Winslow. He's got to be in his thirties. Trevor Williams hated him, so he may be on the public enemy list. I don't know. I know he was at one point from what I was told. If he's in the wizarding world, it's under a different identity. He was part of the Order." Lydia shrugged. "But honestly, as much as he might be able to help me, even getting an idea for what's going on in there would help. Give me some ideas to plan for." She had no real hope that Alan might find her father, but he had been a key. A key she hadn't dared to trust enough to use properly until now. Not that she just saw him as something to use. No, he was kind, someone she could definitely see becoming a good friend over time. Just...he was a useful potential friend. Yeah, that. |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Mar 18, 2015 17:20:21 GMT -8
Alan sort of flinched the moment she said Order. That was one secret he had managed to keep because it was rather... well, it was rather deadly for Alan to ever admit that he was in the Order. Just because he had just joined and it was starting back up (from his understanding some of the members had never left), but the fact that her father had been part of it... it was sort of a kick in the gut. Alan wasn't a suspicious guy by nature, really it was pure luck he had lasted as long as he had, but this seemed all too... perfect. This random cute girl had basically landed on her doorstep from the future looking for her father who happened to be apart of the secret, underground, resistance group that Alan was apart of. Was it just fate or was he being a colossal idiot?
He felt like his chest was tight, his breath was shallow, and the healer in him knew that he was on the verge of some sort of panic attack. Alan forced a nervous sort of smile to the surface of it all and took a deep breath. "Well, at least I know who I'm looking for." Which was the truth. He could find out from the Order if Casey Winslow was even a person. If any of her story was true at all. It was a way to sort of... reassure himself that he could trust her. And Merlin, he wanted to trust her. For whatever reason, Alan really wanted to... not lose Lydia. Maybe he was three kinds of an idiot.
"What do you mean by 'going on in there'?" Hopefully she didn't mean the Order. Hopefully she thought what the rest of the wizarding world thought, that the Order was dead and gone long ago. Maybe being from the future meant she knew it was revived, but frankly, Alan hoped that she was looking for a more general outlook on life or even thinking about her family instead of anything else. This was truly a complicated sort of situation. How did he always get himself into these things? |
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Mar 18, 2015 17:20:51 GMT -8
Lydia was a bit confused at the fact Alan had flinched. Had she been harsh or something? She decided she didn't think she had after reflecting on her previous statement. She'd only been describing her father to him. She just wrote the response off as a "weird Alan thing" and moved on while taking a bite of her Chinese. She closed her eyes a moment and savored it as she chewed and then opened them as she swallowed. Alan had found a good place. She hadn't had Chinese in so long, and this was really good.
"Yep," Lydia replied at Alan's statement of the obvious. He liked to do that sometimes, she'd noticed. It was mostly cute so far. Mostly. Alan's question caught Lydia off guard. She thought her question was clear enough, but apparently it wasn't? Why not? Didn't matter why, she supposed. She needed to clarify, and there was no reason not to. "You know. In the wizarding world...?" She inclined her head. She knew the facts from her timeline, and this should be the same timeline, but she didn't know where exactly things stood at this point in time. It should be near enough the beginning to give her mission hope of success, and given Julian's presence here, it had to be a key time in the timeline, but she didn't know every detail from that side of things. She knew whereabouts Isis was in things, but that didn't give her enough information to go on and decide how fast she needed to expedite things.
"I just have a vague idea that it's an important time and what should be going on, but if any of our records weren't good or whatever, I need to know. I mean, time travel is a fickle thing. You can turn the time turner so many times and end up ten years in the past, but you can't predict what you've changed by doing so." It was the truth and a major concern of Isis' when they'd decided to send her back. And truth be told, given her brother's mysterious (and suspicious) presence in this time, Lydia was even more concerned than she had been when Isis had mentioned the possibility of things going off plan just from her mere presence. |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Mar 18, 2015 17:21:18 GMT -8
Time travel confused Alan. He had a head for healing and he had no idea how to comprehend what she was talking about. It was like asking him how a muggle car worked. The big guy didn't have a clue in the least bit because he had never considered it. He didn't even know how the Knight Bus worked besides the fact that it worked on magic. And magic was such an easy explanation for everything that most average wizarding folk didn't even think twice about how things worked. Or the why. Or anything similar. Alan was an average wizard. He had a good amount of smarts that could be centered on one train of thought. He could heal some crazy things, but figure out different time lines? Not his thing in the least bit.
Frankly, it was all sorts of confusing, but Alan didn't think he had to understand. He just knew the broader concepts. Lydia was here from the future (supposedly) and was trying to fix a supposedly terrible future. He could get behind that. He could help her find her dad. That was the important part. The bigger part was not trying to figure it all out. There were smarter people than he who could dechiper all of this.
He was listening to her carefully, following along as best he could when she spoke, but Alan felt a little lost in it all. "By changes... do you mean making it better? Or uh... worse?" The red head figured that if she could make things better than she could make them worse too. Not on purpose, of course, Lydia seemed too nice to really cause much havoc. But if she could do this, who else could...? Merlin, he was going to have a headache at this rate. He was already tired to start with. "Are you planning on... going back?" That was an important question to Alan, but for all the wrong reasons. But he was a young man, so could you really blame him? |
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Post by Lydia Thomas on Mar 18, 2015 17:21:45 GMT -8
Lydia shrugged a little at Alan's questions. "Could be either, but...my brother, he's somehow here too, and I just..." Again she shrugged, not wanting to say the words aloud as though somehow saying she didn't trust her own brother would somehow make her fears any truer than they already were. "And I don't know," Lydia continued, deciding to switch to the last question. "What we've done... No one's tried it before. At least, not this extensively. Time turners are rare enough as it is, and aside from rumors of overachieving students using them to fit in extra classes and basic functioning, not much is known about how those who have acquired them use them." Lydia was a little afraid to try, frankly. She would be more willing to try some other magical means to spring back to the future, if she decided to go back.
But what would she be going back to? What if it was worse? What if by going back she was dooming herself to a worse fate than any other? At least her parents were places she could have an easier time finding them in this time. And frankly, Lydia wasn't sure if she wanted to go back at this point. She hadn't really given it much thought. She supposed she might have to before the point in time she had left the future but maybe not. Time traveling was just confusing. Paradoxical thinking gave her a headache, and so she preferred not to think about it beyond it had worked to get back here, and if need be, she could possibly go back further to try to correct. Maybe they'd have chances. But what if by doing what they did they just put it off by ten more years each time? You could waste a whole lifetime trying to fix the future. It had to be done right the first time or it simply couldn't be done.
After a moment, Lydia looked back at Alan, a look of amusement on her face. "What do you care, anyway? Thought you'd be happy to get rid of little annoying me!" |
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Post by Alan Kalkuskov on Mar 18, 2015 17:22:15 GMT -8
Her brother was here too? Alan hadn't exactly heard about him before so he wasn't sure what to think about that. Maybe it was another one of those things that she hadn't felt she could share before this point. Which was understandable, Alan's family had a lot of secrets that he hadn't told her because well... it just wasn't important. And if he was the future like she was, well, she wouldn't have been able to share it before this point. Just like Alan hadn't shared the fact that he was pretty much certain his mother was a Death Eater. She was certainly devoted to the Ministry, but the death eater portion was just speculation on Alan's part.
Alan nodded along with what Lydia was saying. It sort of made sense. It would be a daunting task for anyone. Merlin, Alan was pretty sure he wouldn't volunteer for such a thing, but he didn't know what the future was like for Lydia. He didn't know how terrible it had gotten. Would something make him desperate enough to go back in time and fix? Of course, then he thought about Lina and the entire mess with his family. If he could go back and time and fix that somehow, to make his family somehow whole, then he would have. He would in an instant, even if it meant he couldn't go back himself. Even if it meant that he saved his dad from dying by getting stuck almost twenty years in the past. And that was just his family. If he became desperate enough to try and save the world... the future had to be bleak indeed.
Thought you'd be happy to get rid of little annoying me! Her words snapped her out of his depressing thoughts and back into the moment. Alan really couldn't help the fact that his face colored instantly, he just sort of hoped that his beard helped cover it up as he suddenly stood. Sitting on the ground had left his already tired body a little sore, but the tall young man managed to pull himself into his seat without too much trouble. "You're not annoying, Lydia." Certainly, she had been a bit annoying at the start, but Alan liked having her around. For many reasons, but mostly because he wasn't so lonely anymore. The petite brunette wasn't always around of course, but when she was there it was just... nice. Better than coming home to an empty, dreary apartment at the end of a long day. If she left, well, Alan wouldn't know how to adjust being a bachelor living by himself again. Alan just hadn't noticed how alone he had been until she had stumbled into his life. "Little, now that's a different statement. I've never met someone as short as you." It was a little bit of a tease with a small smile on his face, but they really were rather different. She could tease him about his height just as easily and he wouldn't have gotten mad. Alan helped himself to the Chinese food, careful to keep his gaze on the plates instead of her. |
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