gotosleep_idiot | Mata Test Drive Memerz

"Fine, so what we need to do is find a book both of us have read, but neither have memorised. The way it works is this: they would be identical in the real world. But since they don't exist in our memories, in a dream, they can't be."

He shrugs. It's rather basic, when you think about it.

"Hugs are not good for me any more. Touching isn't good for me right now."

There is weight to his last sentence. Rose would be better off not to touch him. And he won't be responsible for his actions if she does.

She glances at him. That's.... a very strange statement. And Rose has a very bad habit of touching things she shouldn't, like you know, daleks of all things, but she's trying to learn to keep her hands mostly to herself and out of harm's way. Still, she files it away, even in spite of her protests. "No one should go without any kind of contact, Doctor." Hadn't that been part of the problem with living flesh turned human that the cat nurses created in New New York? Then again, she never could completely figure out how the devil possessed people and if the Doctor said not to touch him...

"Come this way," she almost immediately messed up by grabbing his hand, but firmly stuck her hands in her jacket pocket. "There's a library. I don't know if they have it, but they should have something else we've both read and not memorized if nothing else."

"Given the kinds of touch I experienced recently, not sure you'd still say that."

But that's all he's going to say about his experiences in the Confession Dial. The story is too long and painful to tell. Besides with all the 'Clara-holes' it's too hard to remember.

He also shoves his hands into his pockets as he followers her. "I hope they have two copies, because that's the only way this really works."

She frowns. She doesn't want to know, because as far as she's concerned, she's going to stay with the Doctor forever and ever the end, and she knows that's crazy and probably impossible, but she likes impossible. In any case, no sense learning spoilers for what she's totally, absolutely going to live through.

"Mm. Yeah, let's hope." Or they can find a book they do have two of, maybe. Did you ever read any Dr. Seuss, Doctor? Because they have a lot of that for the sake of teaching children or other species how to read. She grins impishly though, trying to test how similar he is or not, "You're still dashing though."

"Dashing?"

He's not sure how he feels about that. Sandshoes was dashing. Even Bowtie was dashing. He's just attack-eyebrows.

"If you say so."

She laughs. "What, you don't think so?" And she skips on ahead, clearly in a better mood now that he's there. "I didn't think you'd age well," she spun around to stick her tongue out at him teasingly, "And yet~ Only a tenth the worry lines, and the hair is actually kind of nice." She means it too, and she's pleased to still be able to surprise him.

"It took me awhile to adjust to it. Though, now that I've had it awhile, I don't mind it."

He still likes to hear confirmation every now and then that he's not just 'grandpa'.

"Dashing," she insists with a grin, and she makes a gesture with her hand to signify she means it. "Bit grumpy, yeah?" because of whatever awful things he'd been through and/or missing Rose, "But still handsome." Another nod. And while she'd normally argue the Doctor absolutely was the last person in need of an ego-boost, he still seemed a bit too down not to use one.

He is a bit too down to not need all the boosts he can get. Killing himself over 230 billion times had that effect on him.

And he can't help the awkward grin that makes its way across his features.

"Erm. Thanks." He gestures. "Library is this way, right?"

Yup, that would do it.

And oh god, that smile should not be so cute. BUT IT IS. Proving to Rose at least, that she definitely needed to deal with her crush on a massive dork. All the mental sighs, but Rose is a happy puppy enough for the both of them as she leads him in, "Yup! And there's this giant museum with all sorts of weird stuff in it! Again, probably nothing major to you, but you still might find something even you haven't seen before, I'd wager."

"That'd be good. I actually do enjoy moments of not knowing something. - It happens so rarely..."

And again, he features cloud slightly. He's said that before too. Not to Rose, this mouth said it to... maybe Clara? Why?

Whoever he said it to before, Rose doesn't know or seem to mind, she laughs all the same. "Surprises and hugs are both good for you, probably."

She blinks, suddenly remembering that most surprises for the Doctor hadn't been that good but... "Oh! And no one dies here! They all come back, isn't that fantastic?" And terrifying. And zombie-y. And afterlife-y and scary as she can possibly imagine. But she's in the rare position of surprising and trying to cheer up the doctor so... all smiles about it, it is. "Which isn't to say, there's no consequences for death or anything, it's just... Everybody lives. Happily ever after." Which is probably a good thing that they're at the library and she starts scouring for books with two copies they both might have read.

The Doctor will just skip over talking about how he'd met ghosts and how they came back 'murdery.' Because she's just given him another 'teachable moment' and if there's one thing the Doctor likes to do, is teach.

"No consequences for our actions is bad. Very bad. It leads to social breakdowns. And there's no such thing as 'Happily Ever After'. That's just a lie we tell our selves because the Truth is so hard."

The Doctor hasn't gone to Darillium yet. Hasn't met River in this body, but the truth of that statement is still true for him right now and he will repeat it until his voice falls out. He follows her down the stacks, more to see what kinds of books are her.

"I suppose all of these books came into existence with Bending. And when you read them, there's some kind of Bending that goes on. This test is going to be difficult here."

Because how will they know if things are wrong because of Bending, or because of the dream states. Well. To be fair it doesn't matter. Such Bending doesn't exist in their universe that he knows of, and Bending itself is something that happens in dream states.

"I suppose..." Rose muttered quietly, a temple throbbing idly. This was so opposite the way she'd reunited with the Doctor's younger counterpart she was practically getting a headache thinking about it. But being told that Happily Ever After was just a lie, made her half determined to find a book that specifically ended with that just to push that button on him.

"Even if it's made by bending, shouldn't it still work? So long as neither one of us were the one to bend it, yeah?" Although bending was still a bit beyond her in general.

She pulls out two identical-looking books of human fairy tales, since she's pretty sure the Doctor would have grown up on Time Lord ones or whatever that entailed. "How's this?"

The Doctor takes the books in his hands. "I suppose it should. Hopefully."

He smiles fondly. "Brothers Grimm. They're on my darts team. This should work well enough. I've never read it, only heard the stories directly from them."

And there would be differences.

"Yeah?" a giant curious grin, "Are they good at darts?" Because that is obviously the most important part.

She flips open to Hanzel and Gretel.

"Did they have a stepmother they didn't get along with or was that just a thing for the time period in Germany?"

"Actually, they weren't bad."

They were better than he was, not that he'd ever admit that.

"Sort of a mistranslation. Bit like in Slovak fairy tales. 'Baba Yaga' didn't quite mean witch, but an old woman. Many grandmothers were called 'Babbi' - not to be confused with baby, it's a short 'a' not a long one as an adaptation of the full word. Anyway. Wilhelm wanted to use something like 'Kinderbetreuerin' which means childminder and Jacob wanted to use 'Tante' which means Aunt. An academic argument happened that lasted weeks. Eventually, they settled on 'Stiefmutter' which meant 'step-mother', mostly, because it was rare to actually call such a person by that name in those days."

The Doctor, finally getting back to the point, nods. He reaches on the shelf and grabs the book next to it, which is exactly the same. "This will do. And it's not about the specific story, it's about page numbers... You'll understand in a minute."

The Doctor makes his way to one of the Circulations desks. As he does, he explains how this all works. "These books should be identical in the real world. But as they don't exist in our memories, in a dream, they can't be. So... now for the experiment."

When he gets to the desk, he speaks to the woman sitting there. "Excuse me. This is going to sound a bit odd, but can you pick any two-digit number."

The woman behind the desk looked perplexed but replied, "Thirty-one."

The Doctor nods and turns to Rose. "Right, turn to page thirty-one and read the first word on the page. I'll do the same."

"From you, I'm getting the impression that's quite the compliment," Rose teased lightly, although she meant it, and filed it away mentally. As he launched into the explanation, Rose was actually completely rapt with attention. It was interesting, and luckily, NOT completely over her head, so she was eager to keep up and absorb all the information. Baba Yaga, nannies, and eventually step-mother. Interesting! "You'd make a good professor," she grinned, tongue poking out teasingly, "Especially with the field trips, yeah?"

Her brow furrowed as she looked back down at the book, intently focused. "Just the first word?" Rose echoed as she opened to the page, "strange village," it continued from the previous page, and Rose accidentally read the whole sentence into the next one, "And employed himself in keeping sheep." A glance up to the Doctor to make sure it was the same on his end, though since she didn't know about the Baba Yaga before, she was pretty sure that she at least wasn't dreaming. Was a figment of someone's imagination capable of that much individual divergent thought? It was kind of a strange notion, that she could be a figment of the Doctor's imagination. Then again, it was the Doctor, so anything was hypothetically possible.

The Doctor was a little confused because Rose had said too much.

"Rose, literally just the first word. Not the whole sentence. One word."

Because it's part of the test. And he can't make this work right if she's cheating.

"Strange," she nodded confidently.

And then completely ruined it with more talking, just in case you ever could have doubted that she was truly Jackie's daughter. "Oh but that's continued from the sentence on the last page. Want the first one unique to this page?"

He sighs. "No. Just the first word."

He opens his book to the proper page. A part of him hoping it's different, a part hoping it's the same. Because each would have their good and bad about them.

"Stranger."

Oh... splitting the difference. He pulls a face.

"Well. That's annoying."

A dramatic gasp.

"Oh my god you are dreaming?! I'm just a figment of your imagination?" She glances down at her usual chav clothes and folds her arms. "Couldn't you have come up with something sexier for a dream? I mean yeah, jeans, and hoodies are comfortable, that's why I like 'em, but all of the TARDIS' wardrobe at your availability, and this was the best you got?"

She looked around at the library and bounced on the balls of her feet. "If this is your dream, that means I can fly, yeah?" She closed her eyes and tried to will herself to fly, to no avail. So she opened them and stared at him intently. "Make me fly."

Yes.

She is obviously the absolute best choice of his companions to have this talk with. The best.

Sorry, Rose, this Doctor actually does face-palm and he's doing it right now.

"Rose, how do you know I'm the one dreaming? Hmmm? How do we know it's not you? Actually, it could likely be both of us. Or more likely, it's a fluke of whoever used Bending to create the books. Maybe one was better at Bending than the other."

Too many variables. And the Doctor hates it. He needs solid evidence one way or another.

Poor frustrated future Doctor.

"Because if I was dreaming, you wouldn't be a version I never met before. And you'd be cuddly, not dashing and grumpy." LOGIC. Sort of.

"Ohhhh right," she said about the Bending. That made way more sense.

She closes her eyes to think hard. It didn't seem much like the few times she'd dealt with dream things, but...

She opened her eyes and leaned both elbows on the table in front of the Doctor. "It's like testing whether anything is real, right? Why do we know Earth's sky is blue, other than that we all agree on it, yeah? So you don't have to trust yourself, Doctor, but that's why you've got me and the others, right? So you can trust us. Um. Objectively speaking... if this was still dreaming, then what would you do differently if you could be sure that it wasn't?"

Because she would clearly just disobey all the laws of physics. For fun. But the Doctor is a little more spoiled in getting to opt in and out of a lot of them as he pleased.

"No, Rose, it's not like that at all."

He pauses.

"Okay, for you and from your point of view, it probably is exactly like that. If this place is real, then why do I not have my Time Sense? Arriving here without it is no different than if you were to arrive here without one of your senses. Have you tested them all? Do they all work for you?"

Because that is the biggest reason why the Doctor can't believe this place is real. If he had lost his sense of touch, or smell, sure. But his sense of Time is inherit to him being a Time Lord, so why would they take that from him?

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My replies are getting short, I might goto sleep soon.

You read my mind XD I'm only still up to get one or two last tags in

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excuse me while I make crap up... also, sorry if NPCs aren't allowed, couldn't find it anywhere

XD No worries I think

kk thanks XD

XDDD Also sorry for Rose except only a little sorry lol

She's fine XD

YOU SAY THAT AND YET.....

Okay, well I'm def. apping at least. Since I got it done, I should just submit it.

yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay >:3333

Thought that'd make you happy. They accepted the Reserve, so I assume he's appable.