tushanshu_logs | [open; here there be catch-all!]

Entry tags:

[open; here there be catch-all!]

Characters: Commander Shepard, Arthur, Booker and YOU! Yes, YOU!
Date: Throughout November.
Location: Various locations.
Situation: Various. This is a catch-all log for all three of these characters. I'll post at least one open starter for each (plus some pre-determined closed threads). If there's something specific you'd like to set up, feel free to PM any of my character journals or pp me on plurk @

frodabaggins!
Warnings/Rating: Pre-emptive warning for some discussion of violence-related trauma in Booker and Elizabeth's thread. Will update this as necessary.

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"It happened. I searched all over Comstock House, but it was - it had changed. It was... I dunno. There were strange people all over."

He frowned down at his feet, trying to put into words some of the things he'd seen, and at the same time not wanting to upset her with it - because why did it matter, now that they were here?

"When I found her, she told me she'd used her power to bring me there. To give me advice. Because I'd failed. I hadn't been able to save her. Because of Songbird. Comstock had won and... And New York was burning."

The tea hit the floor, splashing Elizabeth's bare feet with hot liquid, the mug shattering on the stone floor as Booker's last words fell. She shook her head. "No- no. That's- that's not right. It can't be.

"I would never- never let him win! Not him or Songbird or anything. Not when I knew you'd save me. Not when-" she takes a deep, shaking breath, trying to steady herself as she feels her knees tremble.

"Not when I planned to kill myself before I became a monster."

Her words were quiet, hardly audible to her own ears. It was the first time she'd said it out loud. But it was true. She would fight as long as she could against the doctors and Comstock's administrations. But if it meant she was going to lose herself, become his pawn, his lamb, she was going to kill herself. There was no way she would let him win. Never.

He winced at the sound, not sure how to comfort her. Not sure what he could say, when he'd been harboring such guilt. After what she'd told him, after what she'd asked him to do, he'd let her get taken again, he'd failed her.

"She was old," he said finally. "It had to have been... sixty, seventy years. He'd done horrible things to her. I'm not even sure what, exactly. But she was still tryin' to fix things. She wasn't a monster."

"I know what he did to her." Her words are a stark contrast from what she'd just said, strong and dark.

She knew what the rest meant: She'd brought Booker forward to try to fix things, give him information he could use to rectify her past, Elizabeth's present. She hadn't done it then. Maybe the brainwashing had gone too far by that point...

"Because I couldn't save you," Booker finished for her, looking miserable. "And I don't have the code she gave me - I put it in my pocket, in Comstock House, that's the last thing I remember before... I wound up here. And it's gone."

And now he was dreaming about goddamn New York burning again, that weird New York that was so big, with so many tall buildings and all those lights and signs that didn't make any sense to him, but it was definitely New York, and it was haunting his dreams, even though he was far from being able to do anything about it now.

"No." She crosses the broken pieces of porcelain, coming over to take his hand. "You were going to save me. You are going to save me. You are saving me." Oh my god, she sounded like the Luteces.

"I knew you would come for me. And I would never, ever lose that hope. Whatever you saw- whoever that woman was... It couldn't have been me."

"And Songbird?" he asked quietly. "She told me that I tried dozens of times. That Songbird stopped me every time."

Maybe hearing that they might be sent back to Columbia at any time was what had brought this on, because the thought of ending up back there, with Comstock and Songbird out to get them, it sent a chill down his spine. Comstock, he could kill. He was a man, like any other, and if Booker ever got his hands on him, he would die. But he couldn't fight Songbird.

Songbird... Her friend. Her best friend. Her companion. Her warden. Her body guard. For so long, she'd loved Songbird, had conversations with him, sure that he could answer, that she could make sense of what he sang. But then everything had turned sour, when she'd realized what he really was. When every time she tried to find an escape, he was there. He'd come through the ceiling, not caring about what she was doing, to deliver his message, his gift, or his punishment.

She loved him. She knew she still did. But on top of all of that...

Songbird did what he did because he loved her.

And she knew that.

"I can't talk about Songbird," she said after a moment, her voice quiet again. "I'm sorry- but I can't."

Booker nodded. He didn't understand what was between the girl and the bird - it didn't make much sense to him, but not much about Elizabeth's life made any sense to him. There was a connection there, though, that was for sure and certain. And Booker was the last man alive to try and push her into talking about something she didn't want to deal with.

He gave her hand a squeeze, with his bandaged one.

"It's all right. I did say I was just runnin' my mouth. Not the first time it's gotten me into trouble."

"I don't care." She'd found herself sitting next to him on the couch. "You just made me worried- I don't like hearing you like that. You sounded- sound so scared." He wasn't supposed to be scared. Not Booker Dewitt. Never Booker Dewitt.

He sighed. That was the secret, wasn't it? That was the reason behind all of it, for him. The violence, the drinking, the gambling, the inability to keep a steady job.

"I'm always afraid," he admitted. "Especially for you."

"Well, you can't be," she told him flatly, doing her best to keep any emotion out of her voice.. "You're not allowed to be afraid. Not for me. Y'hear me? You have to be strong and brave here."

"The two don't have to be mutually exclusive," he pointed out, almost wryly. "There's different kinds of fear. There's the kind that paralyzes you, and then there's the kind that motivates you."

He'd experienced plenty of both in his life.

"Long as I've got a gun, if anything comes along that needs shooting, I'm your man."

"I know," she said after a moment. "I believe you. Just- you scared me, Booker. Leaving those messages. I was just so worried for you. I'm glad you told me, but..." She shakes her head.

"Booker, I know you'd rescue me. Even if it took 123 times, and then some. You'd rescue me."

He nodded. "I'd do my damnedest. And I'm sorry - sorry I scared you. Like I said, it won't happen again."

He wasn't planning to stop drinking, just... well, he wouldn't get drunk and leave her voice messages anymore. That was kind of a new low, even for him.

"It's okay," she said softly, squeezing his hand again. "It happens to everyone." She assumed. "You're all I have, Booker. So I worry. I care about you. A lot."

Well, it happened to drunkards, perhaps, a bit more often than it happened to sober folk. But he wasn't about to correct her on that.

"We're lookin' out for each other. I think we've been doin' okay so far," he pointed out. She was, of course, all he had, too.

"We have." She couldn't argue with that.

She looked down for a moment, back towards the mess that was the tea cup on the floor, then back to the table in front of her. A small shimmer appeared in the air. Perfect. Elizabeth let go of Booker's hand, reaching to the Tear and, with a little difficulty, opened it, revealing two more cups of tea. Taking both in hand, she handed one to Booker, keeping the other for herself, before closing the Tear.

"Booker... Is there anything else that she showed you? Or you learned?"

It was always a little disconcerting, watching her do that. In some ways, it was even weirder when she did it for something completely mundane, like making tea. Booker just shook his head at her question, sipping carefully at the hot drink.

"No. Nothin' we didn't already know." Well, there was that thing about a leash, but Booker didn't understand that, and he didn't plan to say anything else that might upset Elizabeth unless he thought it was really important.

After a moment, he raised his cup, and pointed vaguely at the air where she'd opened the Tear. "What about your powers here? I'm assuming you can't just take us to Paris, otherwise you would've done it by now."

Elizabeth looked at him for a while, her tea cooling in her hands. For her, using Tears for mundane things was the normal way she used them. Like tea.

After studying Booker for some time, she nodded. "I believe you." She had to. She trusted him, after all, at the end of all things. Following this declaration, she took a timid sip.

"I can't. I tried it, when I first got here. I just open up ones like that. From what I've gathered about different parts of the city... This tea comes from the Fire Sector. You can tell with the cups." She gestured to his. "I don't think I can open any Tears to places that aren't Tu Vishan."

"...Huh." Frankly, Booker was still too drunk to try and figure out the whys and wherefores of that. Or maybe it was safer to say he was never drunk enough to try and figure that out. He rubbed absently at his jaw, staring at the teacup in his other hand, and finally shook his head, as though dislodging an annoying insect.

"So we're not goin' anywhere for the time being," he finally said. Yep, that's all he got out of that.

"Right." That was easy enough. The next part? Not so much.

"I've been talking to people here with us... Apparently time stops while we're gone. If we go back, we're put right back where we were when we were taken." The gravity is evident in her voice, the tea sloshing slightly from side to side, so she placed it back down.

If we go back. Booker'd been talking to a few people, too. People who'd been sent back, even. He nodded slightly. "Then I guess we'd better not go back," he said eventually.

The thought of Elizabeth just one day being sent back there, no warning, no way to stop it, made him see red. Made him want to shoot something, make something bleed. Accept the things you cannot change, he could hear a voice in his head, and it sounded like - someone long gone. Booker had never been good at that, never known how to deal with feeling helpless.

He usually answered it with violence, or drinking.

Not the best words of encouragement, Booker.

She shook her head. "We won't. And if we do- Booker, they've turned it into a hospital. An insane asylum. I don't know if it's to dishearten me or what- but I won't give up on you. No matter how long it takes. When they're not with me- I'll find a way to make it easier for you. Find a way to defeat Songbird." And if she couldn't, she would kill herself.

He nodded. He knew it wasn't the greatest response, but he wasn't really sure what else to say. He wasn't used to having another person around who needed to be reassured.

But, still.

"I don't - " He started, then paused, scratching at the back of his neck. "I can't say I really believe in myself, much. But I'm glad you do," he finally admitted. "And I won't stop tryin', if you're ever in trouble."

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