scurlock | oom: outside of milliways sorta

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oom: outside of milliways sorta

After returning from Green Lake the night before, Doc had a promise to keep to Miss Katherine in regards to the stables and taking her out riding for a proper tour of the grounds. And even with the immediate exit blocked by strange plants and vines, he'd gone out early to take care of the cleaning, feeding, and general work that he'd missed over the last few days before slipping back in for breakfast and to have a waitrat deliver a note upstairs to her room while he got changed into more riding-appropriate clothes.

The note (which she'll find along with the clothes Bar has most likely helpfully left for her upstairs -- don't ask how the rat got in to leave it, these things just happen) says simply that he'll be out in the stables after she's had breakfast and is ready, but not to rush, and to avoid angering the strange plants and she'll be just fine walking through.

So when she does wander outside, she'll catch him singing if she's quiet walking into the stables. It's a more modern song, but one that he heard while in the bar one day and it caught his interest and he's heard it enough that he's got a little bit of it memorized.

"Well Maggie was my true love, the only kiss I knew
I’d meet her at the oak tree in the cool evening dew
Where we would walk beside the levee, our fingers intertwined
While the crimson moon gazed through the needles of the pines

We’d lay beside each other, staring at the sky
Listenin’ to the whistlin’ of the train blowin’ by..."

That's all he knows, so he trails off towards the middle of the verse.

She'll find that he's in one of the store rooms gathering up the tack they'll need for two horses, and there's a few papers pinned to the wall near the door with his handwriting on them, notes and lists of feed and supplies, reminders, that sort of thing.

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"You'll see," he says, and true to his word, it's not long before they make it up the slope to the top of the ridgeline.

The air's a bit cooler, since they're closer to the mountains, and even though it's still summer there are hints of snow on the tops, much higher above them, out of reach without the proper gear. But the view is incredible, once they come to a stop, and he ponders for a moment in silence before he speaks up again.

"Y'know this reminds me of somethin', a poem, actually."

Her eyes are wide with awe as she looks over the spectacular vista, taking in every inch of the terrain. It's beautiful, so she can't help but look a little agog.

"Which poem is that?" she asks.

"I don't got it memorized, but actually," he pats his hands over his chest and then his hips, then shifts in the saddle, rising up a bit in the stirrups so he can pull the small, black-bound paperback journal out of his side pocket. "It's called 'Autumn Evening in a Mountain Retreat', it was written by a Chinese poet -- Wang Wei, in the 700's."

Doc leafs through the journal (this is a book she hasn't seen before, and is almost always on his person out of habit) and flips past his own scribbles and writings, a few bible verses, some of his favorite bits and pieces of Poe and Keats, until he finds what he's looking for.

"Ah, here it is."

He clears his throat lightly, before he reads the poem off the pages:

"After the rain,
the empty mountain
at dusk
is full of autumn air.
A bright moon
shines between the pines;
The clear spring water
glides over the rocks.
Bamboo leaves rustling —
the washer-girls bound home.
Water lilies swaying —
a fisher-boat goes down.
Never mind that
spring plants are no longer green.
I am here to stay
my noble friends!"

Katherine is focussed on him now--just him.

Her eyes are glinting with an expression that could make a grown man blush, and there's an unassuming little smile quirking the corners of her mouth.

"That was beautiful," she breathes.

When Doc glances up, he does blush, and his hands lightly fold the small journal closed and hold it there between his palms, reins resting lightly against his thigh. Rachat isn't going anywhere and he's not concerned about it.

"The Chinese really were artists. Poets, yes, but...artists. That could have easily been written about this view."

Another slow-spreading smile graces her face.

"I'll have to come sometime to look at it in the moonlight, then," she murmurs.

Duncan steps to one side and then back, snorting softly.

"I haven't seen that book before," she remarks, smile growing.

"Not alone," he says, a little seriously. "The bunnies tend to be a bit more active after dark."

Doc looks down at the journal and then opens it, and leafs through the pages. "This...this ain't nothin' special. Just have some of my favorite works, some words from the Good Book, names and dates of important stuff, that sort of thing."

And his own work, but, to him, it really isn't anything special.

He smiles a little and then closes it, before he tucks it back into his pocket and lightly pats his leg.

She gives a solemn nod.

"Then I won't come alone."

You can take that however you want, Mr. Scurlock.

She shrugs lightly before remarking, "Special enough you keep it on you."

She can guess by the way he's acting that it probably contains some of his own work, but she's not devilish enough to press him about it.

She peers out over the vista again, pulling in a deep breath and closing her eyes. There's a light breeze drifting through, and in the higher altitude it makes her shiver into her jacket.

"This truly is spectacular," she whispers.

"It is."

That applies to everything, at that moment. The view of the mountains and the forest below them. Milliways, and the fact that it's safe and they've got whatever they need. The company he's with. The morning so far. That kiss. (And the second one.)

The smile on his face is evident in his words as he speaks them.

"Spectacular's a pretty fine word to use for it, actually."

Doc sits a spell, looking out over the horizon before he thinks about that book in his pocket. The verses. The poems. The names.

Tunstall. McKloskey. Brewer. Stephens. Bowdre. McSween.

O'Folliard.

Not Scurlock. Not yet.

Not ever.

There's something in his voice that makes her grin, though she's not sure what it is.

She's content to sit quiet for a moment, just taking everything in. But after a time she turns to look at Doc. There's a look on his face, like he's lost in thought.

She doesn't want to rob him of his moment, but at the same time she's wondering if there's not something she should be saying.

So it's cautiously--almost timidly--that she stretches out her arm and very gently tugs on his sleeve.

If he turns to look at her he'll see a patient smile and a sweet but concerned look in her eyes.

He is lost in thought.

Doc feels her tug on his sleeve before his brain registers, and he startles slightly, for a split second, then he shakes his head and blinks a few times.

"Sorry. I got to thinkin' 'bout somethin' and drifted off to who knows where," he says, a sheepish smile on his face and a hint of a laugh (at himself) in his voice. "Do that sometimes."

"Begging your pardon," she apologizes herself, recoiling when he jumps.

Right. Probably not the wisest thing, catching the known outlaw off-guard.

She smiles timidly: "It's no bother. Just making sure you're still here. And curious as to where you plan on taking me next."

"No need to 'pologize, would have sat here another few minutes if you hadn't brought me back to Earth," he quips, as he picks up the reins. It's not like he's really strung-out at the moment, either. Thankfully.

Doc smiles over at her to reassure her that it's alright, then he nods.

"Back down off this ridge, then back down and around the lake, bit more of the inlet area perhaps? Ain't really got no plan."

"Did your travels take you anyplace interesting?" she wonders, questioning the strange phrase.

She smiles back.

"Sounds like a plan. I'm yours for the day, so I'll follow you wherever you feel like going."

"Careful," he warns again, but he's teasing and it's obvious. "I might just get you into trouble. Ruffian and all...or did we decide that I was still an upstanding gentleman? I can't remember."

Doc grins, that smug little 'I've been a bad schoolboy' smile, and then softly clicks to the gelding under his breath to start the trek back down the ridge and to the forest floor below.

"To be honest, neither can I," she chuckles, a soft blush returning to her face. "So I'll just have to put my trust in you, Josiah."

That smile--that smug little smile--is met with the appropriate look from a scolding schoolteacher.

Just ignore the wicked grin.

"Now that trust I can promise you won't be done wrong," he comments over his shoulder, before he chooses to focus leading the horse down the ridge and to the forest. "Cross this outlaw's heart."

Once they're off the slope and able to ride alongside each other, curving around the lake, he looks over at her.

"Did I tell you about the squid in the lake?"

She slowly turns her head to peer at him with round eyes from under the brim of her hat.

...

Yeah. That about answers that question.

"There's two of 'em. They like fish. Friendly critters -- sometimes they'll wave at you when you walk past, big arm stickin' up out of the water."

Doc tries to think of other things he should tell her about Milliways.

"You've gotta keep an eye out for the rabbits in the woods, though I think I told you that part."

If Katherine wasn't seated on a horse, she might have fallen over. She laughs like she can't believe it, trying to picture the spectacle.

"I take everything I said back; Jules Verne couldn't never in his wildest imagination think up this place," she chuckles, her proper diction slipping a little in the presence of the outlaw. It makes her cheeks pink.

"Do we get to see these ...ah... freshwater squids?"

"We ain't far from the lake, we just might get to," he says, slowing the horse a moment to reach up at the nearest tree and break off a low hanging branch with a solid snap, as they ride on he reaches to his holster, opposite the gun, and draws the solid bowie knife Teja had made for him.

The reins are resting lightly in his lap as the horse moves alongside hers.

He's breaking off the larger branches and slicing off the smaller twigs as they move on through the forest.

She watches with quiet amusement as he begins to whittle, reins laying idly in his lap, as they meander along the trail. Whittling. On horseback.

When he catches her staring, she quickly turns her face back out toward the trail ahead, biting back a smirk.

"Sudden need for a fishin' rod, Doc?" she teases.

"Not quite. Close, though."

He continues, as they follow the trail, but once they reach the open edge of the lakeshore, he's made himself a single piece about three feet long, and he slips the knife back into the sheath and then hands her the reins.

"Just hang onto him for a second?" He asks, as he shifts and then dismounts from the saddle and hops onto the ground, pole in hand.

Katherine blinks, Rachat's reins suddenly in her hands.

"W-what are you doing?" she asks, eying him curiously.

Doc smirks.

"Fishin'."

A beat.

"For squid, though."

He turns and puts two fingers in his mouth, whistling sharply in the direction of the water, much like a cattle driver would signal to get the attention of a fellow cowboy across the riverbank or among the herd. The sound echoes, back off the other side, before Doc hauls back and hurls the stick into the lake, watching as it spins and then lands on top of the water with a splash.

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