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Voice; 1 night after the island "adventure" @milton

[bindlestifflost]

Hey, uh...Donna?

[He clears his throat, his words a little soft and slurred at the edges. Quiet.]

If you wanna call me back, I'm up.

I ain't in the hotel room. Nick won't hear nothin'. I jes'...[An audible sniff, sounds more like discomfort than a sniffle.]

I wanna check on you and, uh...clear some things up. If that's awwright with you.

OK, then. Oh, it's George.

[Click.]

[thedoctorsmate]

[Somehow, she'd been hoping for more time. More space to get her head on straight. There never is enough of it, and she owes George a serious conversation after what happened. It's about twenty minutes later that she calls him back.]

Hey, George. How are you... How bad is it for you right now? Scale of 1 to 10? Hovering around an 8, sometimes into a 9. Bad for all this investigation work we're doing, yeah?

[bindlestifflost]

[He answers on the second ring, only because his finger missed the swipe on the first.]

Hey. Yeah, that...that sounds about right. 8 or 9 and hard to stay focused.

[A quiet breath.]

Before I jes'...spill anything on you, do you want to know what happened? It's bad, and I... I been carrying it since I got here. I can keep on doin' that. You don't owe me nothin', and you don't...

Well, I wouldn't blame you if you don't want to hear it. That's all. I'm sorry you ain't OK.

[The last bit wavers on the last two words but holds.]

[thedoctorsmate]

[The fact he's asking means there had been some truth to all of that. She's been going over it in her mind the past day, trying to tell herself it was lies, something made up so she'd have a reason to act so awfully toward him. That's not George. She hasn't known him a long time, but he hadn't seemed like a violent or cruel man in what she has seen. But how much can you ever really know someone?]

I... I want to hear it, yeah. The truth. The context. George, all those things I said to you... I really am so sorry. I didn't mean any of it. I won't say anything until you're finished. Promise.

[It might hurt more to hear this, but she can't just leave him thinking she thinks the worst of him.]

CW: Mention of lynch mobs

[bindlestifflost]

Them vines twisted both of us up. I didn't...once we got out a' there, I didn't think you meant none of it.

[Or at least most of it. There's a sloshing sound like liquid in a bottle.]

I been wrestlin' with where to start. I think I gotta get the most important parts first or you'll jes' be sittin' there waiting for them.

[His deep inhale is audible as well as the swallow that follows it.]

Lennie kilt a woman. Not on purpose. Wasn't a mean bone in Lennie's body. I don't know for sure exactly what happened. Knowin' Lennie, I can make a good guess. When anything scared him, he'd grab on tight, and... Lennie, he was a big guy. Big. Strong like I ain't never seen afore or since. Bigger'n Jaeger.

[He pauses for another slosh.]

So he prob'ly grabbed onto her, and somehow he broke her neck. First I seen her, I thought she was jes' sleeping. She looked jes' that peaceful in the straw.

[The silence drops on the line for several long moments.]

It was me and Candy that found her. And he... I told him I needed some time. I'd always told Lennie where to meet me if we ran into trouble. We usually did sooner or later. I knew, or I hoped I knew, where he was going. He had a hard time rememberin' stuff.

[He's talking faster now, words gaining momentum and exaggerating a slur.]

I knew as soon as them other fellas saw Curley's wife, they'd be after him, and I knew Carlson had a luger. He'd badgered Candy near to death about lettin' him shoot his old dog until he finally give in. So Candy bought me some time to steal the gun, then I come up behind everybody else like I ain't seen nothin' yet.

[More quiet. This time his sniff sounds a little wetter.]

They got together like some...God damned lynch mob. Rifles, dogs, horses. I told 'em I thought Lennie'd run to Soledad. Curley said when he caught him, he'd gut shoot him. Curley...he was a mean little sumbitch, the way some little guys is. I knew. I knew he meant it. Gut shot ain't no way for any man to go. So I run like Hell was at my heels down to the river.

And he was there, jes' like I told him. You know...[A waver starts in his voice that he bites down on hard.] Only thing that boy ever remembered was the things I said. For once in my life, I was almost hoping he'd forget.

An' he was jes' going on about that damn puppy, and worried I wouldn't let him tend no rabbits. Them damned rabbits. I got...I got so tired a' hearin' about them rabbits, but I'm the one that put 'em in his head. [He's more breathless now, shallow words, shallow breathing.]

So I told him...I told him, naw, I wasn't mad at him. I ain't never been mad at him. Not a day. And I told him...[A thick swallow.] I told him to look off across that water, and I'd tell him all about the stake again, and how I was gonna let him tend the rabbits.

And then I...[The thickness threatens to cut him off. There's a longer slosh.]

I shot him. I could hear them dogs and the men shoutin', and I knew if I didn't, then they would. And them dumb bastards...[There's a growl in the thickness.]

Them dumb bastards believed Lennie had the gun and tried to kill me.

[The laugh that comes really isn't.]

So yeah. I killed Lennie. And all a' that, all a' that twisted shit them vines made me say... Some of it was true sometimes. I was jes'...I was always in over my head and feelin' like I was one breath away from drownin', but I never...

[This time when he cuts off it sounds like he's muffling the phone with his hand. Maybe a minute or so later he finishes.]

I'm sorry. I can't. I can't no more.

[thedoctorsmate]

[It's not usually in her nature to actually just sit there and listen, but in this case? After what she's put him through- What they've been through together? Donna knows she owes it to him. So, she's quiet, even when he breaks in places, and her heart aches. For him, for the woman, even for Lennie. The problem is that it's so messy. Even if it was a mistake--an accident--Lennie had murdered someone. In the modern day, she'd have advocated for putting him into an institution. From what it sounded like, he wouldn't have belonged in prison, but that woman deserved justice... and other people needed to be kept safe.]

George, I... It's okay. You don't need to say anything else. I'm just... [She lets out a breath.] God, that's complicated and unfair and- I wish you were from my time. We have- some of the problems, the problems he had, Lennie, there are places that can help handle that. Compassionately, not just throwing him to some medical wolves.

[He's not from her time. If traveling with the Doctor has taught her anything, it's that her current morals and the opportunities and choices she has don't apply to most. Certainly not those in the past.]

I don't know what I would have even done. There weren't any good options.

[The police would put Lennie in prison or kill him. They do that in America still. The lynch mob would kill him horribly. Lennie escaping would have been a travesty of justice for the woman. George taking Lennie and running with him, then containing him would have been unfeasible, not to mention as much a punishment for George. A mental health clinic, from the sound of it, would have been a nightmare.]

I hate you had to make that choice. It's not fair. None of it's fair. And you-you resenting how hard he made your life is... understandable. It really, really is. Even when you love someone, it's still- you just get tired.

[bindlestifflost]

[He hadn't known how hard acceptance could hit until he's hearing it through the phone to his ear, his hand still over the mic to hide the sounds he's trying desperately not to make, choked little noises that click his throat and ache like strep. His cheeks are wet.

Complicated and unfair. Life, all of it, from the top down, no one making it out without scars and holes. Some just get the real shit end of the stick, like Lennie. He'd never understood that. Never will to the day he dies.

No good options. One of the more ragged sounds breaks through the muffle. He curls in tighter on himself and drops his hand away from the phone to bring the gin bottle up to his chest for a crush of cold, curved glass. Pain to counter what's happening to his throat and that trapped feeling rearing its head from recent memory, how his mind had raced circles like a wildcat in a tight cage with only one inevitable end facing him down no matter where he turned.

Understandable.]

Naw. Naw, please don't... Don't say that. God.

[His voice is so twisted and thick he isn't sure how much of that she could understand, if any. He tips his head back against the wall, mouth open to gulp shallow breaths.]

I don't know how to...

[He can't let himself have that with Lennie in the ground and so much of it his fault. That realization is enough to give him hold of himself and swallow past the knot. His voice is steadier now.]

You're a good person. I 'preciate you hearin' me out. But I gotta go. I'm sorry.

[He taps the button to end the call. Lifts the bottle in the dark. Burning comfort is the only kind he knows what to do with.]

[thedoctorsmate]

Sorry...

[Donna holds the phone up to her ear for a few seconds past the point he hangs up. It's far too long later that her hand slowly drops away and the phone slips from her fingers to land on the floor. Bath. She's taking a bath. She doesn't care wherever that medieval girl is or if she needs the toilet. For now, Donna's claiming the bathroom as her own. She can almost convince herself she's not crying when she splashes the water across her face.]

text ⌬ @stark; encrypted

[fightinginfinity]

Hey Ginger Spice

Just checking in after the thing

[ This is a weird message for a few reasons, listed as follows:

1.) Tony and Donna have definitely seen each other around since the Submarine Incident
2.) Despite this, Tony hasn't brought it up once
3.) He hasn't really talked to her at all actually
4.) These aren't really individual reasons are they
5.) Too bad just go with it ]

@supertemp

[thedoctorsmate]

[He's definitely not someone she's expecting to hear from. Donna lifts a brow.]

All right.
I mean, as all right as anyone is here.
Sorry about screaming at you.

[fightinginfinity]

Look neither one of us was on our best behavior
But I shoulda had it together
I've fought worse than that thing
In space even

[thedoctorsmate]

I mean, that's horrible.
I'm sorry that's happened to you.
I've seen some pretty horrible things, but never been trapped sealed in a submarine in a blood ocean.
I still don't understand what the coordinates were even supposed to be for.

[fightinginfinity]

Nah I got off easy actually
Space guy TKO'd half the universe the same way old people get wait staff's attention
So definitely worse than Cthulu's half brother or whoever it was down there

I got a hunch

[ Pause and then. Oops. Not everyone flits between subjects like a strung out hummingbird, Tony. Typing... ]

About the coordinates I mean

[thedoctorsmate]

I'm all ears and eyes (and mouth and nose) if you've got an idea.

[She has no idea what he's talking about with that first comment, so best focus on what she can parse.]

text; un: cupkate

[bossyboiler]

Hey Donna. Do you think you could help me plan some kind of service for George? I've never planned one before.

[thedoctorsmate]

[The message is stared at... and closed for a little while. Donna eventually comes back to it.]

Yeah, sure. Just a sort of wake, you mean?
Or something like a church thing?
Dunno that we should do a church thing, under the circumstances.

[bossyboiler]

Yeah. Something simple. I was thinking of holding it in a pub, just something casual. George doesn't I mean he didn't strike me as someone who would appreciate something formal.

[thedoctorsmate]

No.
He wasn't much for all that flash.
Not unless he was showing someone a good time.
I can pick out a place.
Is that what you need from me?
Or sending out invitations?
I can help.
Sorry, Kate.
It's just really hard right now or I'd help you more with organizing.
Him and Nick in one fell swoop, right?

Flipping hell.

[bossyboiler]

Yeah. I need help finding a place. It'll go quicker if I'm not the only phoning around. As for announcing it, I was thinking of a mass group text.

It's ok, Donna. I can do it on my own if you're not feeling up to it. We're you and George close?

[ She doesn't know! ]

You know about Nick?

[thedoctorsmate]

We were getting closer.
Went out with him.
That was nice.
Was planning on it again.
Nick was gonna help me dress him up in something fun and suave.

Sorry.
I know I shouldn't be so down.
Nick might not be dead.
But with George being that way.

[bossyboiler]

Oh, Donna. I'm so sorry. Is there anything that I can personally do for you? Anything at all.

Don't be sorry. This is a lot for anyone to go through.

Maybe Nick just vanished? He could come back.

[thedoctorsmate]

No.
It's okay.
I mean, it's not okay.
But it's not the first time.
I just need a little time.
We weren't, like, proper dating. Not yet.
Dunno if he would have wanted that.

[But she'd daydreamed about it.]

And yeah.
Maybe he'll come back.
But that's him losing one of his closest friends here, if he does.

[bossyboiler]

Take as much time as you need. My offer still stands.

[ Kate thinks she gets it. They weren't dating regular but the promise of something special had been there. ]

Maybe he would have. It sounds like he liked you.

[ Does that make it better or worse? ]

That's true. Maybe he went back home?

[ It's better than thinking of the alternative. ]

[thedoctorsmate]

Maybe?
Hopefully.
Better than getting eaten by some horrible fear monster out in the ether.
I'll be by to the thing, Kate.
Not sure if I'll say much to anyone, but thanks for reaching out about it.
George deserves it.

[bossyboiler]

You're very welcome, Donna. I'll see you then.