#cwss

The Civil War Soldiers and Sailors Database

As a lead-in to a more analytical article I plan on posting here toward the end of the month (hopefully), I thought it’d be useful to highlight this wonderful tool. The National Park Service’s Civil War Soldiers and Sailors Database (CWSS)is a thing of beauty. With a little info on a relative or subject of interest (say, a surname, a state, and on what side the subject fought), one can find…

Drabble #1: You requested 8/Charley/C’rizz with C’rizz changing colors and them being domestic.

"C’rizz, have you seen my golden cravat? I seem to have misplaced it." the Doctor was running around his TARDIS, on the hunt for a cravat he hadn’t worn in at least thirty years, maybe since before he was even in this body, he had no recollection of the last time he wore it, just that it existed and that it should be sitting in the wardrobe, yet it wasn’t. He’d just busted into C’rizz’s room, urgent look on his face. He stopped about one step in, due to the scene that was happening in front of him.

Charley was painting C’rizz’s nails… sort of? Did C’rizz have fingernails?… questions for another day, the Doctor decided. He was changing the hue of his body dramatically and rapidly, to make Charley giggle and have to stop painting the nails for a second. It was a quiet moment, and the Doctor knew he had intruded the moment he stepped into the room. Charley quit paying attention to what she was doing, and looked up to talk to the Doctor, which caused a spill of the nail polish. As soon as it hit the floor, the Doctor had swooped in to clean it up, before he’d even realized that he didn’t have anything to do that with, and ended up dragging Charley into the mess, too.

C’rizz was dragged down soon after that, and soon they all had little bits of the polish all over them, but the Doctor seemed to have the most, as it was all in his hair and covered his coat almost entirely.

"Well, that’ll be difficult to get out." he states, as Charley and C’rizz begin laughing loudly at him, and a smile breaks out across the time lord’s face. Soon, the two are gasping for breath from their laughter, and the Doctor’s question of: "Wait, is there something on my face?" doesn’t help at all.

Drabble #2: You requested 6/Peri where they banter at each other.

"If we get out of this alive, I’m going to set that coat on fire… with you in it!" Peri screeched, straining against the cuffs that were hooked to an identical set that were around the Doctor’s hands. There was a fire climbing the staircase, and they both could smell it advancing, as the room filled with smoke.

"I resent that, we’re going to make it out of here in time to have a nice brunch. If my jacket’s on fire, how does that help your situation, my dear Peri?" he seemed genuinely curious as to what lighting Peri’s jacket on fire did for them, and she actually caught herself thinking about how it would help at all.

"Hey! It would make me feel better!" she throws back at him, after a couple of seconds of silence. She actually feels like this might be the end of Perpugilliam Brown as she sees the flames coming into the room, with the door igniting quickly. The smoke’s almost too thick for her to even see the Doctor, or that pointless coat of his, and she can already feel the tears falling down her cheeks, without her approval. She had regrets, tons of them, and now she was realizing that she’d never said a few things to someone who was sitting back-to-back with her, still trying to save her life even if it was useless now.

"Doctor?" she asks, quietly. He almost couldn’t hear her, and he feels one of the locks snapping, along with a bone in his hand. But, damn, he wasn’t going to regenerate during a fire.

"What do you want, Peri?" he snaps at her, scowling in pain as she unlocks her handcuffs and grabs her hand in the non-broken one of his, dragging her towards the blue box in the corner that he knows so well.

"Never mind…" she says, and allows herself to be dragged down into his world of insanity again, but keeps her feelings as far away from the surface as she can.

Drabble #3: You requested 4/Romana learning about Earth customs.

"Doctor, I simply don’t understand why humans celebrate the day they make it around their sun one more time. It’s done that for years and will continue to do that for many more, will it not?" Romana did not seem to be as impressed as the Doctor was with the Times Square set up. The year was 2009, and they were pressed up against each other, fighting the crowds and both wearing ridiculous "2009" glasses along with hats and necklaces labeled with the year all around.

"Oh, Romana, just enjoy it while it lasts, we’ve only got a couple of minutes until midnight. Who is that performing?" the Doctor had always meant to visit a Times Square New Year’s event, ever since his last body. My, it had been almost a hundred years since he’d had the idea to take Jo. But, alas, Jo had left him for Cliff several weeks later, and he’d never gotten around to it until Romana said something about learning of human holidays.

They;d already visited Easter in the year 2385, where the eggs were hidden by robots and finding an egg could mean winning the lottery, along with Christmas in the late 19th century, which Romana actually enjoyed. The New Year was the next big one, and it was shaping up to be an actual nightmare for Romana. She preferred to not be touched, as that’s kind of how things worked on Gallifrey, yet here she was, in a mass of millions of people, with the Doctor’s scarf the only lifeline she had left anymore.

"Only a minute or two now, you’ll love the countdown part. Almost like a hive mind." the Doctor states, offhandedly, as he properly listens to the music that’s being produced onstage. A larger redheaded woman turns to Romana, and smiles at the petite blonde.

"Don’t worry, you won’t get crushed unless you fall over, if that’s what you’re worried about. It’s my second time here, and this time I’ve actually got a New Year’s kiss at midnight! Can you believe it? Are you here with your boyfriend?" she had a thick Brooklyn accent and piercing blue eyes, and Romana just kind of nodded at her question without giving it much thought. "Well, he’s very… tall. No way you’ll get trampled with a man like that."

She wants to correct her, and ask what that was about a “New Year’s kiss”, but she hasn’t the time, because the Doctor has stepped in to be his normal, charismatic self. “Don’t worry, I’ve got her. She’ll be fine, and what was your name?” Romana zoned after a few seconds of the conversation, and realized she was holding on to the Doctor’s scarf rather tightly. When the countdown started around the number 45, she didn’t even realize that she’d turned around to face the Doctor, and would no doubt miss seeing the ball drop, and the timer on the big screens finish going off.

"Doctor, did you drag me all this way just so you could get a ‘New Year’s kiss’ out of me?"

"Perhaps." was his response, as the clock started it’s countdown from ten.

The pandemonium around her was intoxicating. Or, at least that’s what she’d blame it on the next day. When their lips met, it was just them learning about the culture of a new, strange world. That’s what Romana was traveling with the Doctor to do, learn new things, right? The confetti filled their hair as the screams of joy and happiness became louder all around them, but they didn’t pay too much attention to that. They were too busy wrapped up in a scarf to notice the people hugging or to sing the “Auld Lang Syne”. They disconnected from each other as “New York, New York” began, and the Doctor began singing in his worst shower voice.