oh brother I can't believe it's true

There was a long moment after Dr.Neville told Kris to sit down, fleeing into a chair while trying not to look as though she were quite terminally afraid of the doctor, wringing her hands where she still felt as though she were the naughty child being sent to the Headmaster's office. Squirming in the seat, staring off towards a point in the wall away from Dr.Neville's eyes, Kris decided it would be best to try and at least give some details, no matter how unpleasant they were. "Until now they've behaved themselves, but now they want me to hurt people, and when I don't do what they say, I get punished. They are so loud, Doctor, so loud I think my head will explode. They've been there since I was young, but now they're angry, so angry, so full of hate."

Turning to look at Sean's chest, Kristina swallowed hard. This was going to end badly, she knew it. She would be in trouble for not saying something sooner, for potentially endangering so many people, for letting something like this go unreported and for burdening other people with her problems rather than the professionals - it was all going to end one way. She was going to be sent away; sent to the white room with the straight-jacket to rot, to gibber and whine and scream with the rest of the crazies while the nurses fed her morphine and visitors paid to come in and watch her as part of an exhibit of madmen. Her parents would be told that their daughter had simply broken under what seemed like no pressure at all, and there her story would end, with only the long wait between incarceration and the grave to serve as an epilogue.

"Doctor, are you..." Another gulp, another swallowing of pride before she vomited her fears over his floor (entirely metaphorical vomit, of course, but metaphorical messes are messes nontheless). "Are you going to send me into a home?"

[/i]

Some people had said that Dr.Neville's voice was like a fluffy blanket, or a lick from an affectionate but unintelligent dog, calming, soothing, relaxing, like watching an episode of Mr.Rogers while a fuzzy thing purred and hugs enveloped the viewer - right now, Kris wasn't quite receiving that. All she could detect was a sort of clinical indifference, a professional monotone that failed to betray a single clear, identifiable emotion, with the possible exception of contempt. It's probably just your nerves. It would be fair to say that Kristina was, at least, a little bit apprehensive, and it would also be fair to say that she was more nervous than a man covered in magnets walking into a pool full of mines and sharks who were mine-proof - although if Kristina ever found herself in that particular situation she would probably be too busy laughing at the sheer incredulous silliness of it.

"The first time was when I was in a museum back in England. It might be something to do with the retrospection, sir- I mean, doctor. The one I heard then is in charge, see? He's called Lord Fortesque, he's a noble from the 17th Century, and then there's Lucile, Heinrich, the Colonel..." You are going off-track, Kris, he's going to start thinking that you really are crazier than you seem. Oh shite, I forgot he was a telepath. Oh shite, I just said...shut up brain.

You will regret this, girl, I promise you that, snapped Fortesque, and for the first time Kristina suddenly felt a cold hand on her shoulder, too scared to turn and look for fear that what she thought that was really was the truth - or rather, her fantasy-truth, the construction of misfiring brain thingies. You will never be rid of us, Northampton, we own you. You are a guest at our sufferance, and you are not long for eviction. You cannot fight us all - and you don't need to. Bear that in mind. A dread silence fell across Kristina's thoughts as she finally looked over her right shoulder, only to see exactly what she expected - a wall, the rest of Dr.Neville's office, not a thing out of place.

Turning back to face the doctor, Krissi blushed before carrying on, realizing just what she had done and resisting the urge to facepalm. "But lately, they want me to do things. Before they were just talking to me, but now they want me to go places, to run away, to hurt people, and I don't want to. They don't like me any more, Doctor, I just...you just heard, didn't you? W...was he really behind me?"

That wasn't possible - that simply was not possible. No matter what Sean had said, he must have been behind her; he was real enough in her head, and by extension must have been real outside of it - that hand could only have been his. As she fixated on the moment, she became more and more certain that she had seen a flash of his white glove from the corner of her vision, and the nagging doubt grew into a vast uncertainty about the encounter; he must have been there, he must - no logical dissonance made itself clear in Kris' head, only the apparent facts, marshaling themselves into order. Regardless, Dr.Neville being a little closer made her more comfortable - if he was there, Dr.Neville could at least scare him off for now - Lord Fortesque was a gentleman and would not fight an unarmed man, but he certainly wouldn't let Dr.Neville get between him and her...oh good Lord, what if he killed him? Then what would happen? Would he kill her? Everyone would think SHE had done it!

"But he..." Defeated, realizing she would not convince Dr.Neville any time soon, she settled down to answering his question. There were some gaps, but the key ones were memorable enough - Lucile had been from a Revolution exhibit detailing the lives of aristocrats against the lives of the normal peasantry at the time of the uprising and the destruction of the French monarchy. The Colonel had emerged during a trip to, ironically, Kentucky back in 2009, and while Heinrich was the product of visiting the British Museum back home in 2011 and suffering through that bloody centenary of the Battle of Britain - how a time so fascinating could be made so dull was astounding. Thinking for a few minutes in silence, Kris began to speak, telling Dr.Neville what she knew, listing times, dates, personalities, names, places, everything that came to mind, until the well of knowledge ran out and she found it to be very shallow indeed.

"I'm sorry I can't be more helpful, sir. M-maybe if they start talking to me again, I could ask them, but I can't remember anything else." Finally gathering the strength to look Dr.Neville in the eyes, Kris asked a particularly selfish question. "They just seem so real. They're real in my head, sometimes, very rarely, they come out of my head...h-how sick am I, doctor?"