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Jan. 18th, 2006 10:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
nitro_is_aceThere are people, in the cosmos, who are fueled by a nearly fanatical belief in a righteous cause.
There are people who are out to promote their own ends by any means possible.
There are those, even, who delight in creating chaos where ever they go.
There is one thing that binds these three groups of people together - they cause no end of trouble when given access to time travel technology.
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Ace tugs at the high lacy collar of her dress, standing in the faintly lit hall of Ford's Theater, on a muggy night in April as the play most of the people in the building have come here to see starts up further inside. It will be a good hour until the excitement begins, but as Ace couldn't think of a good way to get out of the theater in time when needed, she's going to have to wait it out here.
Almost immediately upon telling the TARDIS to search out temporal anomalies, it had centered on April 14th, 1865. In these last hours of Good Friday, in what is, for the time, a well-appointed theater, something went disasterously wrong.
Some bloody idiot with a cause decided to fix history.
Ace looks down the hall, to a closed door which leads to a private box. The Presidential box. There, Abraham Lincon and his wife, along with an army major and his fiancee, watch the new play brought over from England. Figures the backdrop for one of the great tragedies of American History is formed by a musical comedy. As the show goes on inside, and Ace tries not to become stiff with standing still so long, she wonders if it would do much damage to warn that major's fiancee to not marry her beloved army darling. It won't be too many years until he goes mad and murders her, after all. Charmin' bloke.
Stealthy footfalls coming up the stairs give Ace just enough warning to duck into an alcove. As quietly as he can, the shadowy figure of the famous assassin creeps by, intent on the door to the Presidential box, a .44 caliber Deringer gleaming in the dim light of the gas lamps. John Wilkes Booth, actor and Southern sympathizer. Poor John, she thinks. You'd have a longer life if you turn around now. There won't be any revolution due to your actions. He doesn't stop, of course - he's committed at this point. So far, so good. Now, to wait for the interloper.
She doesn't have to wait long. The second shadowy figure climbing the stairs is tall, fit, the very image of a well-fed, well-off middle-class American of the twentieth century. No doubt, inside the collar of his Union uniform, the words 'Made in China' are printed somewhere. He didn't even bother to bring a historically correct weapon, Ace notes, eyeing the gun in the man's hand with distaste. She does hate it when these fanatics get the details wrong - shows less brains than are needed to have any hope to peacefully talk them out of it. This is one Thomas Lowry, of Detroit. Enthusiastic if somewhat inept member of the local Civil War Reconstructionists club, author of some rather horrid papers on the Messiah-like traits of the dear President Lincon. Seems Mr. Lowry has decided to take matters into his own hands, and improve the world by assuring that Lincon does not die tomorrow morning due to his wounds.
Booth's hand is on the door handle, as Lowry pauses just past Ace's alcove, raising his gun to fire.
The door to the box is eased open... and Mr. Lowry crumples onto the hall runner, victim of a sharp rap to the back of the skull, delivered by one highly satisfied pyromaniac. Thank God for Knuckle Dusters. She busies herself in hogtying her prisoner while she waits for the shot to ring out - even with Booth's careful timing, everyone will hear the shot that will end the President's life.
Suddenly there is a sharp crack, a scream, then more, and closer hoarse shouting from the box as Booth and the army major grapple. In the few minutes she has left Ace hits the recall for her TARDIS, its groaning, wheezing arrival muffled by the racket inside the theater.
Both Ace and Lowry are gone by the time the first of the crowd rushing up to see what damage has been done hits the bottom of the stairs.
There are people who are out to promote their own ends by any means possible.
There are those, even, who delight in creating chaos where ever they go.
There is one thing that binds these three groups of people together - they cause no end of trouble when given access to time travel technology.
Ace tugs at the high lacy collar of her dress, standing in the faintly lit hall of Ford's Theater, on a muggy night in April as the play most of the people in the building have come here to see starts up further inside. It will be a good hour until the excitement begins, but as Ace couldn't think of a good way to get out of the theater in time when needed, she's going to have to wait it out here.
Almost immediately upon telling the TARDIS to search out temporal anomalies, it had centered on April 14th, 1865. In these last hours of Good Friday, in what is, for the time, a well-appointed theater, something went disasterously wrong.
Some bloody idiot with a cause decided to fix history.
Ace looks down the hall, to a closed door which leads to a private box. The Presidential box. There, Abraham Lincon and his wife, along with an army major and his fiancee, watch the new play brought over from England. Figures the backdrop for one of the great tragedies of American History is formed by a musical comedy. As the show goes on inside, and Ace tries not to become stiff with standing still so long, she wonders if it would do much damage to warn that major's fiancee to not marry her beloved army darling. It won't be too many years until he goes mad and murders her, after all. Charmin' bloke.
Stealthy footfalls coming up the stairs give Ace just enough warning to duck into an alcove. As quietly as he can, the shadowy figure of the famous assassin creeps by, intent on the door to the Presidential box, a .44 caliber Deringer gleaming in the dim light of the gas lamps. John Wilkes Booth, actor and Southern sympathizer. Poor John, she thinks. You'd have a longer life if you turn around now. There won't be any revolution due to your actions. He doesn't stop, of course - he's committed at this point. So far, so good. Now, to wait for the interloper.
She doesn't have to wait long. The second shadowy figure climbing the stairs is tall, fit, the very image of a well-fed, well-off middle-class American of the twentieth century. No doubt, inside the collar of his Union uniform, the words 'Made in China' are printed somewhere. He didn't even bother to bring a historically correct weapon, Ace notes, eyeing the gun in the man's hand with distaste. She does hate it when these fanatics get the details wrong - shows less brains than are needed to have any hope to peacefully talk them out of it. This is one Thomas Lowry, of Detroit. Enthusiastic if somewhat inept member of the local Civil War Reconstructionists club, author of some rather horrid papers on the Messiah-like traits of the dear President Lincon. Seems Mr. Lowry has decided to take matters into his own hands, and improve the world by assuring that Lincon does not die tomorrow morning due to his wounds.
Booth's hand is on the door handle, as Lowry pauses just past Ace's alcove, raising his gun to fire.
The door to the box is eased open... and Mr. Lowry crumples onto the hall runner, victim of a sharp rap to the back of the skull, delivered by one highly satisfied pyromaniac. Thank God for Knuckle Dusters. She busies herself in hogtying her prisoner while she waits for the shot to ring out - even with Booth's careful timing, everyone will hear the shot that will end the President's life.
Suddenly there is a sharp crack, a scream, then more, and closer hoarse shouting from the box as Booth and the army major grapple. In the few minutes she has left Ace hits the recall for her TARDIS, its groaning, wheezing arrival muffled by the racket inside the theater.
Both Ace and Lowry are gone by the time the first of the crowd rushing up to see what damage has been done hits the bottom of the stairs.
