Loop One

[wipeawaythedebt]

When he wakes up it's slowly, his neck screaming and his mouth tasting the wrong end of a horse. It's a familiar, if somewhat disorienting feeling. The kind of feeling he used to have waking up after a night of gambling at the saloon down the street, after passing out on his desk with a bottle in his hand. But that was before Columbia, before her and last night he can swear he fell asleep in the living room. Still with a bottle of whiskey in his hand and still after gambling away what he should probably be spending on food, but he shouldn't be face-down anywhere. Unless he's fallen off the sofa.

Wouldn't be the first time.

Cracking his eyes open, he blinks in the diffused light. Something's wrong. There's something over the window - shutters? He doesn't have shutters over his windows, just those blinds things. And some curtains Elizabeth bought. He's surprised she didn't take them with her. Maybe she did. Maybe that's why the light hurts. Groaning, he pulls himself upright, blinking as his eyes adjust... and then blinking again. In the gloom he can see a door across from him. An old familiar door with old familiar lettering. He can only see the backside of it, but he knows what it says: Booker DeWitt Investigations into Matters Both Public and Private. His eyes drift down and he can see the papers, New York, 1912.

He's home. Whatever that means.

Straining to his feet, he grabs the nearby, always nearby, bottle and takes a swig, carrying it as he heads to the washroom to relieve himself and splash some water on his face. Was it all a dream? Some kind of drunken hallucination. Whatever it was, he's mostly glad it's gone. The whole thing was a wreck from the minute that man knocked on his door.

Comments

[wipeawaythedebt]

"Why? I'm here to pick Mr. DeWitt up for his job."

Booker snorts and rubs his hand over his eyes, wishing he'd never woken up. This whole thing is just ludicrous. But if there's a chance that Elizabeth's still in that tower, that some version of Elizabeth is still in there... well, he fucked it up once, at least this time he's going with his eyes open.

"Fine, let's go. Let me get my gun, I'll be damned if I'm going up there unarmed this time." He heads back to the desk, trying to catch the eyes of either the doctor or Elizabeth. "You girls stay here. Hopefully this goes better than it was when I left the first time, I'll be back soon."

[professionalcuriosity]

"No, I'm sorry," Alana says. "I'm not just going to stay here and hope you come back soon to explain." What's in front of him is dangerous and her patience, though plentiful, is not endless. Lutece and the situation both have her spooked more than she'd like to admit anyway. It's almost certainly safer for Elizabeth to stay put, but she'll be just as out of place one way or another.

[cagedlamb]

"You have no idea what's going on, Booker, and you're just telling us to stay here? Absolutely not," she said, looking between him and Lutece with a stern expression. "I'm right here. You have no reason to go along with this any longer, and splitting up might be exactly what we shouldn't do."

[wipeawaythedebt]

"I know exactly what's going on here, that damn city dumped me back here just in time to rescue you again. And maybe do it right this time, without the Vox, without getting chased across the whole damn city and if I can do that, I will." Moving to the desk, he pulls out the gun, hoping like hell that what he just said is the truth. He can do this, he's not going in blind this time, he knows exactly what kind of place Columbia is.

"I won't leave you, any version of you, locked up in that place for Comstock to... do whatever it is he wants with you. I just won't." Turning to Lutece, he points towards the door. "And don't think I'm giving her to you, either."

"But haven't you already? Or won't you eventually? You seem so certain, Mr. DeWitt and yet I wonder."

"Wonder away, Lutece, but we're going and they're staying." Walking past the girls he goes right out the door and everything goes black.

[To be continued HERE.]