tearmeanewone | deux + voice/action

Entry tags:

deux + voice/action

[Voice]

I've-- Oh, wait. Hello Luceti! [Right, she can't just start talking like you do with Voxophones.]

I've recently, this past New Feather cycle, brought two more people into my apartment. Up until now I haven't been... cooking, exactly. [She's been eating whatever she can get ready-made, namely.] Does anyone have any... somewhat simple cooking recipes for two adult men and one slightly smaller girl?

And can someone explain to me how to work the oven...?

[Action]

[Later in the day, Elizabeth ventures out to the grocery store to pick up things for her first cooking adventure! Though it's a trial, even at the store. Elizabeth keeps looking between different things and consulting her journal and looking back at the shelves... and frowning. Because this is all extremely complicated. No wonder this was done for her every day... This would probably take her weeks to figure out.]

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[Her first statement actually makes Robert chuckle. There's a genuine -- small, but very real -- smile on his features as he begins to nod in acknowledgement of the truth in it.

Then, Elizabeth goes on, and his smile alters. First thinning, then... he can't keep it up at all. It hits on a thought he's been nursing since he could truly take in what happened since his arrival here.

He'd intended to see Elizabeth back to the New York in which Booker DeWitt lived. He hadn't foreseen how stunning her powers would prove or how resolute she and DeWitt would be. He had not known how to break the cycle of events, how the story would end. And he had only begun to fathom the cost of it.

Without a Comstock, Rosalind would struggle. It was the work of a driven zealot that had funded her grandest creations, that had made her more than just a woman strangely interested in physics. That genius would go unregarded. They might each, in their restarted timelines, discover the Lutece Field again. Perhaps they'd even open the window again. But without Comstock, there would never be a Lutece Tear. They would always be separated.

Robert sighed softly.]

I would like it very much if she was here.

[Elizabeth realized, a little late, that she might have opened up something that was more depressing than it was worth. At least when she had been alone in Luceti, no one had deliberately pointed out that she was alone. And perhaps it was different because Elizabeth was entirely used to being alone. Not that she enjoyed it...]

[After a moment of hesitation, Elizabeth reached out and lightly rested her hand on Robert's elbow.] Well I'm not your sister by any stretch, but I'm here for both you and Mr. DeWitt. I owe you at least that much, for the whistle.

You would have figured it out on your own. [Which he fully believes. Giving her the schematics for it was merely a bit of insurance, and, well...

But he did place his other hand lightly over hers, a small acknowledgement of the gesture.]

If anything, the whistle made us even. I... was deeply in your debt.

[After all, there could be no second guessing how deeply involved he and Rosalind had been in studying Elizabeth all those years, in working for Comstock. Who else could have even begun to understand what she could do naturally, other than the two people who had learned to do it with machines?]

[Elizabeth didn't know just how deep Robert's involvement really was. But she had guessed that Robert had been somehow involved in her first stage of study--thankfully not the second...]

I saw people throw their lives away for Comstock's sake. And I saw people throw their lives away because Comstock gave them no choice. What would have been accomplished if you had let me out before I could actually escape?

[What would have been accomplished?

It's a thought that, over the last half decade, consumed Robert's mind. Rosalind was of the mind to always look forward; Robert often looked back, too. Rosalind did not worry about what she could not change; Robert felt regret.

He sighed softly, withdrawing his hand.]

A great deal.

[He even shifted a bit, as if to loosen her light hold on him, to reinforce that distance.]

It would have been the simplest thing to have taken you to our home. No one would have questioned me, possibly not even Comstock. [Not if Robert had realised his mistake early enough, not if he'd been quick enough.] And there... with our machine? Rosalind and I could have seen you well out of his reach.

[That, perhaps, had been the worst part his last years alive and the years after that: knowing how powerful he had been and how many opportunities he'd squandered.]

[It would have been that simple? From what Elizabeth had seen, it looked as though Comstock wouldn't have let Elizabeth see anyone or go anywhere for any reason. She was too vital to the continuation of Columbia for her to leave, wasn't she? Too dangerous maybe...]

Why didn't you, then? [She pulled her hand back, her expression more confused than angry or betrayed.]

[There might have been smuggling involved, if Robert were fully honest, but... If Comstock had still trusted him, he might have managed it.]

Because I... [He let out a soft sigh.] I was too focused on my work to look at a wider scope.

[It was a horrible answer, though Elizabeth couldn't bring herself to be disgusted by it. Perhaps it would have been easier if she had suffered more under Robert and Rosalind's study, or if he had tried to keep her from escaping instead of aiding her and Booker. As it stood, his answer was simply tragic.]

Was it you and Ms. Lutece who decided I was too dangerous without a siphon to control me? Was that the scope of your work?

[The siphon. Robert supposes it was only a matter of time before he was asked about that.

If anyone had the right to question him, it was Elizabeth.

And before he answers, he settles into his chair. This conversation might prove long.]

We designed it, yes. But as a conduit. A restraint on the powers of a child who didn't know what she was doing. It was meant to limit your powers until you were taught enough to control them.

But I never was taught how to control them. I was never told anything about it until I broke out! [It was even turned against her in the tomb, and then they attempted to take her control entirely. It had never been a child restraint, it was a tool used to buy time until they could create her leash.]

[She was getting angry now, and she could feel parts of the apartment starting to quiver and fissure. It wasn't entirely Robert's fault, it was Comstock, entirely Comstock. She dropped her bag and sat heavily down in another chair. Before things started threatening to open up.]

[He can feel it. The ever-so-slight stirrings of the world around him in response to her anger. He understands, and he knows to be cautious. Knows to embrace the slight fear that prickles at the back of his neck.

Instinctive fear is a survival instinct.]

That wasn't my decision. That wasn't our decision.

We intended for you to learn how to use them, how to control them. Comstock decided differently, and he had the power to enforce his will over ours.

Exactly! [Elizabeth nearly stood up again, but settled on gripping her skirt.] It wasn't a matter of just taking me away, it would never have been that simple with him.

[At least, she wanted to believe that it would never have been that simple. That she was kept in captivity not because of a collective do-nothing effort, but because of Comstock's influence.]

Please Mr. Lutece. I've already been through too much to have someone tell me I could have been free long before I was.

And you know enough, Elizabeth, [he paused, leaning forward] to know that there are always moments where prevention is possible.

But where people do not act.

And then, at the eleventh hour, a cure is necessary. Something far more complicated, far more dangerous than if anyone had intervened earlier.

[Because, as far as he was concerned, it had been the inaction of a hundred people. A thousand, really. But a hundred were very responsible. A hundred people could have ended things so much faster. Could have done more than pull a man to the world over a hundred times to make him cure what could have been prevented.

Even if he was just as responsible.]

But no one intervened earlier! Countless people watched me through glass windows, and built lead walls, and posted signs about how being near me would result in cancer or sterilization! I had a plug stuck into my spine without even local anesthetic!

[Being calm was clearly not on the table. Not while Elizabeth actively relived every trauma that came easily to mind--and she had quite a few to choose from. Little pops of light started forming around Elizabeth, by the door, down the hall...]

And no one, no one except you and Mr. DeWitt even thought to do something for my sake. So why are you telling me that I shouldn't be grateful for that? That I should feel betrayed for all of the times you didn't risk being murdered by Comstock for helping me escape?

...at least you did something for me...!

I opened a door.

[Which was, at the end of it, the sum of what he had done, at least to Robert. And, though he wouldn't say it, he didn't want gratitude for something that had, ultimately, gotten Rosalind killed.]

The one who deserves gratitude [he and the man might bicker, but it was worth giving him this credit, deflecting this] is the one who stepped through.

[Her moment was over, fortunately. She was still shaking slightly, hands clasped tightly as she tried to smooth over the anomalies, snap each one shut. Control, it was about control even here.]

You opened more than one, I think. [Booker hadn't seemed so sure that the key he'd handed her was he right one--if Robert had been the one to send Booker after her, he'd no doubt given him the right tools too.]

I can't begin to doubt the people who helped me, Mr. Lutece. If I do... I'll never stop.

[Robert stared at her for a few moments. She looked so like...

so like Rosalind.

Not Rosalind in her element, no. But a Rosalind he'd quarrelled with. Shouting between them, him at the machine, her in the bedroom upstairs. All but screaming at one another through the hole in the ceiling to accommodate their work. And then he'd gone a step too far. He'd used the only thing left in his arsenal. He'd threatened to leave. Sworn he'd do it.

And he'd seen her go rigid and withdraw.

Only to find her an hour later, when he'd calmed down too, sitting alone, ready to cry but refusing to, her hands held so tightly together.

He knew this was Elizabeth. This wasn't Rosalind.

But her distress was as much his fault as Rosalind's had been that night. So, he repeated what had worked then.

Robert got up and knelt in front of Elizabeth's chair, covering her hands with his and looking up at her.]

I apologise.

[Elizabeth had let Robert into her apartment because she was concerned he would starve and talk to himself while doing so. She hadn't known what to expect from him, but she was almost certain she hadn't expected a discussion like this. But who else could she talk to? Booker had a tendency to go quiet and end conversations like this, and Elizabeth couldn't imagine anyone else understanding her history. Not really understanding.]

[Robert taking her hands and apologizing of all things... it was a relief. Not for the reason Elizabeth thought it would be, but because it was a sign her fear was real and Robert was listening to her.]

[She pulled one of her hands out from under Robert's and laid it on top of them. She nodded, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly.] I'm sorry, I shouldn't have brought all of that up. But when Booker couldn't get to me for months, I had moments where I thought... I thought I had misjudged life entirely, and that I would always be alone.

[Elizabeth closes her eyes and shakes her head again.] I never want to think that again. You and Ms. Lutece had an odd way of doing it, but I know you helped us.

[He never understood the obsession with religion. With sin and damnation. But he could grasp what the promise of forgiveness felt. After all, hadn't he been trying to earn it? For a crime no one need ever know he committed? It had been a very private... sin. The word was appropriate enough.

An offence against morality.]

We started the matter; we had to finish it.

[We. Not I. Even if Elizabeth has heard Rosalind's recordings, know she held aloof from the moral quandaries of her "brother." She still, when the time came, helped.]

I'm... very grateful that Mr. DeWitt is so stubborn. And that you are, as well.

[Elizabeth laughed wetly, squeezing Robert's hand a little with a nod.] We're both the same kind of stubborn, fortunately enough.

[She was stubborn enough to hang on, Booker was stubborn enough to fight through to her. Luck was following her, right after it fell through her ceiling. Booker would probably disagree, but Elizabeth hadn't ever had a problem disagreeing with him.]

Do you want chocolate? [It seems random, but Elizabeth is trying to get herself to come down from the stress.] I think I need some. I usually feel better after.

[Or incredibly sick. But that was one time shortly after discovering all the food was free in Luceti.]

[It is a strangely affection gesture, and Robert keeps himself from acting on it, but the temptation to kiss either her forehead or the top of her head is very strong for a moment.

But she is not his daughter or anything like it.

...Even if she is the closest he'll come to such a thing.]

I think some chocolate would be quite nice.

[Elizabeth nods and manages a smile that isn't forced or strained. It seems that the tense moment has passed and she's fine, if not a little wound up.]

[She stands and goes into her room, returning with a box of cordial cherries.] These are ridiculously sweet, but usually one or two helps with any stress I'm feeling. [She opens the box and holds it out to Robert first.]

[Robert stops for a moment when he sees the offered sweets, and he chuckles faintly when he takes one. He takes a bite of one and considers the taste.]

Is this syrup? Or proper cordial? [It isn't asked as something of vital importance. Merely an interest in a point of fact.]

'Proper cordial'? [Elizabeth looks up from her half cherry, then looks back when it starts to drip on her hand. They are in fact non-alcoholic, but Elizabeth doesn't know there's any other kind really.]

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deux + voice/action

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