shifted_logs | only one can take you from this place

Entry tags:

only one can take you from this place

Characters: Emil [d2] (

pactum) and the Tenth Doctor [d6] (

bit_impossible).
Location: The Ballroom on the Astral Plane.
Time: Before Marta and Emil leave Meltokio, a couple of days after he finds the first clue left by his amnesiac self.
Summary: Ten and Emil have a heart to heart.
Warnings: Dramaz with, as always, a dash of psycho. Poor kid. Also spoilers for the latter half of the game, since Emil in this deviation is a HUGE WALKING SPOILER. Yeah.

Emil felt a bit apprehensive as he sat there in the ballroom, waiting. They'd been playing tag for a little while now as Ten and Emil kept missing each other on the Plane. But it was the message that counted, right? Emil admired the Doctor greatly even if this wasn't the one he'd originally bonded with. But he was scared, too. Some weird things had been bothering him. And then there was something the Ninth Doctor said, and that blue-haired kid said something too, and... now Emil was torn between pursuing the leads he had or chasing the only goal that mattered. He wondered if the Doctor knew. He'd always looked after him, in any incarnation, and for that he was incredibly grateful— but guilty, as well.

He didn't want to know. The last time he'd looked into this, it ended up the death of at least one innocent person, and he'd hurt many others. His partners, creatures he'd tamed in the name of Ratatosk, were slaughtered in his defense. Emil's fingers trembled as he stared at the note before him.

Nothing made sense anymore.

He shoved the paper back into his scarf and pulled his knees to his chest. The boy sat alone in the golden pool of light the chandelier cast upon the ballroom, closed his eyes, and tried to imagine a happier time. But as he reached into the darkness for a memory of his parents, he could only draw out the same one.

"Mom..."

His grip in the fabric of his pants tightened until his knuckles turned white like bone.

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Whistling rather loudly to himself, the Doctor made his way through the hallway outside the ballroom. Normally, he wouldn't have announced his presence in such a way, but he didn't want to surprise Emil or let on that he had been watching him from the upper balcony in silence for a few minutes to make sure that this was the Emil he had to deliver the message to. The one he first met was a bit twitchy, he thought--the one he was certain was the proper Emil. From what he learnt from his ninth self, he really didn't want that third personality in there, Ratatosk, to have any reason to come out prematurely. But what brought out the second, the one he dubbed "Alex", he wondered.

Or, more to the point, what would happen to the memories of both Emil and "Alex" if he did figure out a way to summon the other up? Did anything happen to Ratatosk's? He placed such thoughts in the back of his mind for the time being.

"Emil!" he exclaimed jovially once he had the young man in sight. "There you are. That probably has been the worst game of Tag I've played in a while."

Emil looked up sharply as he heard whistling. His momentary alarm ceased when he realized that it was only the Doctor. Twitchy? Sure. But Emil was always on edge, if one looked closely enough. It happened when you were raised a small-town kind of guy and thrust into something you wanted no part of.

Oh well. That was a long time ago. It felt like ages for Emil, though he could almost remember home. He clambered to his feet and dusted himself off, then tried to look like he wasn't carrying the world on his shoulders.

"That was pretty bad, wasn't it?" He laughed a little, though he didn't really feel it. "Sorry about that. Things are kinda crazy at home." He paused, and then added, "We're still chasing leads around." Smooth, Emil. Real smooth.

"Are you?" he asked lightly, his left eyebrow arching high. "Well, I'm not entirely surprised. From what I've learnt recently about your predicament, I'd say you're in quite the pickle."

His hand idly drifted to the pocket containing the camcorder he'd been keeping safe on his person, but he didn't pull it out just yet.

Emil nodded, his lips forming a bit of a frown. "We're trying to find a jewel before someone else does, and it's been driving us kinda crazy." He hoped that was what the Doctor meant, anyway. He wouldn't permit himself to think of any other predicaments he might be in. Emil glanced briefly at the Doctor's hand but didn't pick up on what might be hidden there, instead distracted by that second remark. He murmured quietly, "I don't remember telling you about the Centurion's Cores..."

Edited 2010-09-07 02:31 (UTC)

The mention of a jewel did nothing for him, unfortunately, except subtly clue him in that he didn't know too much about Emil and what he did off-Plane. Not that that ever stopped him from helping others before. Far from it!

"Nope, you didn't." None of them had, he thought. "But another self had learnt of them, and in turn, passed that on to me when we ran into each other." Amongst other things, he didn't want Emil to learn about how his ninth self had been punched in the face. Now that he'd admitted he knew, however, he wondered if that would be enough to bring Ratatosk out...

It certainly wasn't enough to trigger anything. Emil simply blinked at the Doctor, then accepted it. Of course the Doctors would talk to each other about that sort of thing. Maybe it was a bit strange, but it wasn't a secret that Emil kept that closely. It was, after all, his driving mission since before he'd touched the Astral Plane, and he'd told the other other Doctor about it when he asked for sword training.

The thought made him ache unexpectedly; it'd been a very long time since he'd conversed with that Doctor, and he missed him terribly despite having another one standing right in front of him. But he liked to think of that other one as his Doctor for reasons that he couldn't place. Emil wondered if he'd ever see him again.

He subtly worried the fabric of his overcoat and looked up at Ten. "Did he send you to help me find Glacies' core somehow?"

He frowned, watching Emil. If only he'd run into the version of himself who knew Emil best, his job now might be all that much easier. As it was, he felt he like he was merely at square three--he was at least some ways away from square one, thankfully--while others were far ahead. Ah well. He played that game every time he landed some place new, never minding how different the circumstances were now with nexus points and multi-verses.

"Glacies' core? That'd be number...what, exactly?" he asked idly while he stealthily pulled the small camcorder from his pocket. "Actually, you sent me to help you--well, I offered to help you, but not you you; another you, and--" He had opened his mouth to continue, but something told him that if he continued on like that, he'd probably confuse Emil a bit. "Well. Long story short, I've got something from you for you."

Perhaps in time Emil would come to accept this Ten as a new sort of friend and not just a slightly more curious replacement, but that was pending Emil's own disastrous self-identity issues, which were compounded by the Doctor's meddling. Confused yet? The Doctor never wanted to hurt, only help, but some things were better left alone until the time came. It approached quicker than either of them could anticipate, however.

"We only have three. Glacies would be four, but Lloyd has Lumen's core, so until we take it back from him we won't be able to get all of the cores." He sighed a bit at this, but it was forgotten when he saw the Doctor take something out of his pocket.

"I did... what? Are you sure it's for me?" Everything that he'd been worrying about came flooding back all at once and it made him a little sick. He clutched at his tunic until his knuckles turned white. He was curious about whatever the Doctor was holding (some kind of magitech no doubt) but if it was anything like the notes that had supposedly been left for him, then he didn't want to know at all.

But he did want to know. It was why he still searched for the other notes when he could get the time. It wasn't only a matter of his personal identity. He was curious about the other boy who looked like him, too.

"I'm very sure," he said, his voice soft and reassuring. "You're the Emil I need."

From what he remembered about the contents of the message, Alex's words were...well, they were a bit of a downer, in his opinion. However, he knew Emil had to hear them, had to know what it was like for this other personality inside him.

He stepped forward, opening the viewing screen on the camcorder while it powered up, and held it out. "Here. All you've got to do is press this blue button and it'll turn on. That's it." He'd already primed the tape to start a little before "Alex"'s message weeks ago.

You're the Emil I need.

Those words shocked him momentarily. What did that mean? Why was he needed? Maybe it was in a different context than, say, needing a friend. But it felt like it. He realized that he had to stop running from his problems for a moment because the Doctor was running, too, and he'd always catch up. That scared him. Having to confront what might be the end of everything he knew (and was forgetting). So Emil looked up at the Doctor for reassurance... and he found it.

Emil pressed the button and braced himself.

On the screen, a blonde boy with green eyes adjusts his hair and tries to think of what to say while staring into the camera. He has a small smile on his face, a very sweet one, but also very thoughtful. He's wearing a tank top that looks very familiar to Emil, but he doesn't say that, nor does he remark on the star-shaped birthmark sitting on the boy's collarbone.

"He looks... just like me..."

It was like some kind of creepy dream, but the blood pounding in Emil's ears told him that what he saw was absolutely real.

Edited 2010-09-11 01:21 (UTC)

He waited patiently and watched Emil's face for a sign of, well, anything. A twitch, a furrowing of the eyebrows or the raising of them; anything that'd signal a possible good or bad reaction. He much preferred the former, especially since he wished to avoid receiving a wound to match that of his previous incarnation's.

"Yes," he said simply. "If you need to stop, press the button again. You should take your time with this."

So far Emil seemed to be in control of himself. His grip on the camcorder was almost a deadly one. He couldn't have stopped the video if he wanted to. Wide green eyes stared into the pixelated face of his counterpart. The voice came through rather tinny, but it was still recognizably Emil's, as Alex went on to introduce himself, his condition, and went through the things he remembered.

Emil didn't move. He didn't even seem like he was listening to Ten. He blinked once or twice, but that was it. He might've been dead with his eyes wide open for all he cared.

This could not be happening. It simply didn't make sense. A third personality. No. No. No. Mr. Crane might have said something about that a long time ago, but that was Mr. Crane and he was a bad man and he made Emil kill people. He made Emil sick. He made Emil see things that weren't real.

And he was gone.

So how could this be happening?

"I will always be curious about how you-- or rather, I-- live in the future, what kind of friends I have, what I'm doing, that sort of thing."

Emil realized that he was doing exactly that. He was poking into this boy's life, trying to find out as much as he could, because he was curious to a fault. Curiosity wasn't really a Castagnier trait, or at least he didn't think it was, but what if this strange boy and his mission were connected? He had no way of knowing unless he found out everything he could get his hands on.

"Courage is magic, after all."

The tape ended. The camcorder shut off.

Normally people looked very happy to receive messages from people, but Emil looked like he'd just watched his mother die again. That could be a problem. He hugged the camcorder to his stomach and slowly slipped onto his knees, his tunic splaying around his feet.

Edited 2010-09-11 06:33 (UTC)

What Alex had said about living in the future made him wonder, if for a second, if there was some sort of time meddling shenanigans going on. Then again, he simply could have meant how Emil was doing after he resumed control every time. That was probably it.

A frown crossed his features, concern furrowing his brow. He squatted down in front of the young man, almost reaching out a hand pat him on the shoulder but thought better of it.

"I'm sorry, Emil. I'm so sorry." It seemed like the most appropriate thing that could be said.

"It's not me," he whispered, fingers tightening around the camcorder until his skin turned white as bone. "It's not me. It... it can't be me. It's not me. It's not me." He sucked in a deep breath. He wouldn't cry, not about this. He had to think, think, think.

"Doctor... It happened before. It happened a long time ago. I was... I was getting treated. I was getting help from Dr. Crane because I was scared of everything. And then people said I came to the Plane acting like a different person. I didn't believe them." He shook his head fiercely. "How could I? But then I found a notebook, a little blue notebook, and I gave it to Dr. Crane along with everything else. And then... and then..."

His grip on the camcorder loosened. He set it beside his foot, tried to keep hold of his own sanity. It was hard when he had a message from a twin sitting in front of him.

"And then I hurt people. I-I... I tried to kill the Doctor, the ninth one, and you, and Roxas, and Marta— oh, Marta..." He bit his bottom lip again. It was starting to bleed— black, too. "If this boy is really me, then it might mean that I'm about to do something terrible again. I don't want to kill anyone! I don't even want to hurt them, or fight, unless it's to help Marta. But I'm so messed up. I can't trust myself not to hurt the people I swore to protect!" And with that, he buried his face in his scarf as if that would hide him from the world.

His eyes flicked downwards when he caught sight of the black blood, but went back up to Emil's eyes before the young man bowed his head. He wanted to ask when and how that happened, but finding that out could be left for a much later time. At least he knew now what happened to the notebook his other self had given Alex.

"Emil, listen to me," he said urgently. Leaning forward, he gripped the young man's shoulders, all caution be damned. "You're not going to kill anyone or do any such thing. Do you understand? Crane isn't here to harm you or influence you in any way." Not that he knew this Dr Crane; only what his other self had told him and he certainly didn't like the man.

"This other you was kind and confident, and he certainly had plenty of opportunities to harm me if he so wished, but he didn't. He wanted to meet you and this video was the only way possible. He's trying to find answers just as badly as you are!"

That was one mystery solved. There were dozens to go, however.

The Doctor's outburst stunned Emil right out of his circle of despair. The blood rushing in his ears stopped, and it was just them, two lonely and desperate people hiding on the floor of an abandoned ballroom. Emil stared into the Doctor's face with wide green eyes, unable to look away. Ten wanted to fix him. Not some quick fix, not a lie, not... anything. Crane was never this passionate about wanting to help Emil; he only revealed the cool attachment one would expect from a therapist. An insane one, too. It was completely opposite from what Emil expected from the people around him.

"Doctor..."

He was well-versed in violence, the way that complaining would get him beatings from his uncle and aunt, so having anyone care about him to this magnitude was alien to him. Only Marta had ever really displayed that much passion. Richter cared about him, too, but he couldn't be sure how much. Emil wasn't that great at reading people.

So he had... one note from this strange boy who looked like him. There were more. He needed to find them now; he absolutely had to. But even if he did, he wasn't sure it would answer his questions. "I can't be that boy, though. I... remember my childhood. Where I grew up. And my parents. They were my parents, not someone else's. How can I be anyone else but me?"

He let out a soft sigh as he relaxed his grip. A sympathetic, saddened expression crossed his face. "It's difficult, but...there is a way. You see, the mind is a tricky, extremely complicated thing, especially a human's. I don't know anything about your past, but something traumatic must have happened then. Something you cannot recall voluntarily no matter how hard you try--but something else does remember, or did at one point in time. Think of it like the switch on that camcorder. Press a button, and it turns on; press it again, it turns off. Your conscious mind shut down, but another part of your mind turned on, something that had access to the same base memories as you to start with--which is why he mentioned parents and childhood--and it handled the situation that caused you to shut down in the first place.

"To you, you would've just blacked out. Probably woke up in a new place. Maybe others around you wouldn't tell you about the incident in question on purpose because they didn't want to scare or worry you--or make you remember." He paused for a moment, his eyes still on Emil's face.

"But perhaps...well, it's just a guess, but when you became a Ratatosk knight and began collecting those Cores, maybe that's when things started to change for that other self inside you. He started to lose hold on those memories and even now is having a hard time accessing them. That notebook you gave to Dr Crane, for example. Another version of me gave that to him for the express purpose of being able to write down things that have happened in case he lost even more memories--and from the sounds of it, he did. I don't know how yet, but I want to find out. It's not fair to you to live your life like this."

Granted, it might not have even happened in that order, if at all. The situation was far more complicated than he expected, only now...he really wanted a look inside Emil's mind to see if he was right at all.

Emil listened to the explanation, but it still didn't make sense to him. However, the part about people around him-- did. "Marta... said I had forgotten her, back then. That one time, after Dr. Crane. When I fight, though, it's different. Everyone says it's like I become a completely different person, but it's not true, because I usually remember..." He paused and adjusted his gloves. "But sometimes... I don't."

He shook his head again, feeling helpless and lost and confused, and not even the thought of the Doctor finally helping Emil solve the puzzle could help. He clutched the fabric of his tunic like a lifeline. "What happens when the 'other' me remembers everything? I have my own memories and my own opinions about things. What will happen to me? To my oath as a Knight of Ratatosk? You can't just say it'll work out, not when it comes to something like this! I don't feel like that boy is me, even though I..."

Words failed him once again. Silently, Emil tugged his scarf down. A star-shaped birthmark, identical to "Alex"'s, sat just above his collarbone.

"I don't know who I am anymore. Maybe I'm not even a 'who', but a 'what'..."

"No," he said simply, firmly. "You're no more a "what" than I am the President of the Earth Empire. Saying that you are would be the same as me saying that two very good friends of mine are..." He couldn't bring himself to finish. Tegan and Oliver had both been possessed with nasty, awful entities and neither were the same after. Even now, he worried about Oliver's well-being.

Not that he didn't have his own experiences with being possessed and losing his sense of self. But he'd never gone through anything Emil was currently experiencing. Or perhaps the things that took him over simply liked to torture him with the memories of what it did while in his body...

He dug into his pockets, pulling out a stethoscope a moment later, and held it out to Emil. "Listen, I want you to put this on and hold the end against your chest. Tell me what you hear."

Ten never did finish that sentence. It left Emil confused as to what that meant. He added it to his ever-growing, seething mud pit of doubt. No longer just a shadow at his bedside, he felt Doubt, wearing the garb of Death, hovering over his shoulder. His gaze when locked on the Doctor was at once terrified and completely hopeful. He wanted to believe that there was something better. That there was some big mistake. That maybe, just maybe, he wasn't screwed up after all.

"Okay," the boy managed. A flicker of courage crossed his torn expression. He reached out and took the stethoscope, fidgeted with the ear-things once he realized it wasn't a necklace. "S'cold," he murmured, slipping the metal part under his tunic a little ways.

"My heartbeat...?" It was such a simple reminder. Maybe even a childish one. Emil felt foolish as he realized what it meant, and a protest rose to his lips. "Doctor, I..."

"So long as you can hear that, for as long as it continues to beat nice and strong, you'll always be you. It's the same for those two friends of mine. Something bad happened to them, and they struggled to feel the same again, but they're doing well."

He reached out, gently putting a hand on Emil's shoulder, a faint smile on his lips. "And you will be too. Everything always works out in the end somehow. It just takes time."

Emil's eyes fluttered, but he nodded and took the stethoscope off. "Thank you," he murmured. "For everything. You're right... It'll work out." He had a terrible feeling that time was actually about to run out, but what could he do? He had to trust the Doctor, and he had to trust in himself...

"You don't mind watching me and making sure? I thought you would've gotten sick of this mess by now," Emil said with the lightest bit of humor. At least he didn't flinch.

He shook his head, holding his hand out for the stethoscope. "You don't need to thank me. Not yet. I help anyone who needs me--and even then, those who say they don't need the help. I want to help you figure this out. I'll watch for as long as it takes." A pause, then he added, "Or do a little bit more than watch if I need to."

Meaning that like always, he was more than prepared to interfere.

Emil handed the stethoscope over carefully. He took a deep breath. The fact that the Doctor would spend all this time on him to try and fix him just... it was intimidating, and flattering, and it moved him deeply. Behind those big green eyes was a spark of determination that once lit would remain for a while yet.

"I'll figure it out," he said firmly. "With you and Marta and everyone else supporting me, I know I can do it. I know it."

Though he said that, there would always be some element of doubt lingering in the back of his mind. He ignored it. He might not be able to fight under his own power, but he was gonna try, damn it.

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only one can take you from this place

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FFUHFJHKFFKJKL sorry i hate tense changes

Silly tenses!

Re: Silly tenses!

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I'm so terribly sorry for this being late, Saffy ;_;

awww it's okay! I WILL WAIT A MONTH. i love your ten so much ♥♥♥

♥♥ Thank you ;_;

xB ♥

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