other worlds than these

[dividedgirlofmine]

Who| Susannah Dean and anyone
What| Susannah thought she was going back to New York. This place is not New York.
Where| Tribute tower, all around.
When| Today!
Warnings/Notes| Possibility of Detta Walker showing up.

For gutless sons of bitches who were planning to send her into a death match, the people of the capital had been pretty cordial. They'd given her clothing--quality stuff, even if some of it wasn't really the kind of thing Susannah would wear outside of the bedroom--and even rustled her up an electric wheelchair.

She was riding it now, going from floor to floor and room to room in the tribute tower, trying to get the lay of the land--which definitely wasn't the Central Park, New York City, that her dreams had promised her lay beyond the door. Roland, she thought ruefully, had been right about it all being a trick.

What in the world was she going to do now?

Comments

[wiredup]

"Nah, I already did that song and dance. And won."

His mouth hooked up in a familiar, cocky little grin. One she knew well, even if the setting was slightly different.

"And you are, I'm betting?"

[dividedgirlofmine]

That grin breaks her heart.

"I am," she says. And then, because she'll have to tell him sooner or later, "I'm sorry. I knew someone very much like you back in the world I came from. His name was Eddie too."

[wiredup]

"Oh yeah?"

He was, as far as he knew, the only Eddie he had met. So someone like him, named Eddie?

It made something on the back of his neck stand up.

"So you got a name to go with that face? Cause some of these Tribute don't, so if I'm gonna give you one I better start thinking quick..."

[dividedgirlofmine]

She could tell him Odetta Holmes. That was the name she was born with. But that's not her anymore.

"Susannah," she replies, "Susannah Dean." She takes a deep breath and then a familiar voice inside of her decides fuck dat shit.

So she tells him.

"You reminded me of my husband."

I'm sorry this is so late bb

[wiredup]

"...you're husband named Mr. Something Dean reminds you of me, Mr. Eddie Dean?"

He really does not like the way this conversation is going. he's heard these people are from other worlds. He doesn't understand that, but he's starting to get the feeling he's going to understand a bit more way more than he wants to soon.

Re: I'm sorry this is so late bb

[dividedgirlofmine]

"My late husband," she corrects, wondering why she told him, except she's going into a death match and she doesn't feel like lying or avoiding with this Eddie who doesn't even recognize her. "Edward Cantor Dean--not that he'd like the middle name spread around."

She's said too much. She knows she has already. "I should go."

And she nudges the switch to make her wheelchair turn.

[wiredup]

He was already mentally bracing himself for it. But it's still a shock to the system. Another him.

A dead him, apparently.

He tries to stop her. And to give condolences. And to make a joke to make this all easier. And none of them really win out, and so instead her say.

"That's not good."

Brilliantly.

[dividedgirlofmine]

"No," she says quietly. "It's not. But it's how it is."

Something makes her hesitate from rolling back to their elevator, though.

[wiredup]

By this point, he should really be much better at dealing with people who had lost loved ones. He hadn't even been doing this that long, and he had a nice, hefty list of grieving family members he ran into far too often, given the size of three. And that list didn't even touch his Victory tour.

But none of those people had lost him.

"I'm sorry." he finally said quietly. "I don't know...but if I can do anything...I'm here."

[dividedgirlofmine]

She turns the chair around, looks at Eddie's face. "What are you doing here, sugar?" she asks quietly. "Are you here to fight too? Or... is this the world you belong in? Because if it is, I'm sorry to say that it's a pretty rotten one."

[wiredup]

It was weird, the urge to defend Panem. Panem was a shit hole. She was right.

So instead he looked down at his feet, and shrugged.

"I'm a victor. I fought awhile back."

[dividedgirlofmine]

They explained mentors to her, sort of. "So they make you babysit the rest of us? Oh honey." There's a sense of relief, though, that she won't be expected to have to kill him or be killed by him in the arena to come.

"I'm sorry. I asked you that twice, didn't I? It's been a long day. It's been a long year. And I didn't expect to come here anymore than I expected to come to Roland's world."

She wonders, suddenly, if where they are is something that Sombra and the Crimson King's people set up. She thinks it could be. They had those doors to Mr Lincoln's and Mr Kennedy's assassination--they had VISIT CIRCUS MAXIMUS--why wouldn't they have an interest in maintaining a regular death match like this?

"I'm not making much sense am I? But this isn't my first strange world. You know Cuthbert, don't you? He lives on this floor, I think."

[wiredup]

He wants to reach out, to lay a hand on her shoulder, but he has no idea what the protocol for that is. For her in that chair, for him as her sorta dead husband, for them as actually total strangers and this being too weird a situation to mack on someone with. So instead he laughs, awkwardly, and nods.

"It's rough. I'm sure. The whole damn thing...at least we're raised with it."

When she mentions his tribute, he latches on to that significantly more comfortable subject. Sucker.

"Yeah. He's one of mine."