outsiderslogs

Entry tags:

OPEN;

who. York and YOU!
what. for anyone who wants to talk to, see, or run into York since her injury
where. anywhere in Zeta District -- The Quad, York and Wash's apartment, somewhere in the markets, etc
when. anytime this week!
warnings. probably lots of feelings :(

It hasn't been a good week for York. It's the understatement of the century, really. The mission on Saturday with Garrus and North had gone so fantastically awful, she's still reeling from it a little. It's too fresh in her mind, still, even the admittedly blurry memory of the incendiary grenade going off in her face. Garrus and North had had to drag her out of there to the clinic, and she'd lost a good day to emergency surgery and recovery. And in the end, they'd botched the job. Nobody had even gotten paid.

Mordin had done his best, and honestly, considering the limited resources, he did a pretty damn good job. Especilaly for an alien. She wouldn't have figured a salarian could fix up a human face this nice. No, nice isn't the word for it. It doesn't look even close to nice. The wound is healing, but it's still fresh, an ugly red swath of skin around her left eye, pulling down her cheek. Even when it's bandaged, it's impossible to hide the way the damaged skin pulls unnaturally tight around her eye. And she can't hide the eye itself. Even once the skin heals -- if it even heals all the way -- her eye will still be that awful, milky white. She'll be lucky to get it back to fifty percent functionality, at this point. Last time this'd happened, she'd had UNSC medical facilities available to her; better equipment, more staff, more resources. Last time.

York's starting to feel like the butt of some cosmic joke.

It's bad enough to have a job go so fantastically wrong like this one did, to have her ass land in the hospital with such a severe injury. To have it become something permanently debilitating, to have to wear it like she does. It's bad enough that it hurts. But it's even worse that this has happened before.

The similarities are too eerie, so much they make her feel a little sick. She'd gotten the eye fixed back on Sacrosanct because she didn't want to be a liability. She wanted to be able to watch her own back, and without Delta, she couldn't do that, not with a busted eye. And now she's right back where she started -- worse, even -- and this time, she doesn't even have somebody else's Delta to understand. Maybe six months with a new eye and she'd gotten used to it. She'd gotten used to looking in the mirror and seeing the perfect symmetry of her face, to smoothing her hand over her left cheek and feeling only smooth, soft skin. She'd just gotten used to the delightful ease with which she could read and focus and see, with no headaches, no strain. She'd only just gotten comfortable with it. And what -- that's it? That's all she gets? Well, joke's on her for ever thinking things might be easy, for once.

But there's nothing York can do. She doesn't have Delta to help her compensate and Mordin's got the best care she can receive on the station on her paycheck. So York does what she does best -- she keeps moving forward, making like nothing's happened, because what's she gonna say, anyway? She goes back to work at The Quad as soon as she's able, because she can only stand to be laid up for so long and it's just her face, it's not like she can't walk, and her boss comments on her face in a way that's maybe supposed to be funny, but maybe she doesn't get krogan humor. She keeps going about her business, just like before, and she doesn't look in mirrors much anymore these days, but at least she's still moving.

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It's been something of a rough week for him, too.

He'd spent a few days in Mordin's clinic, burned and bandaged as he had been, and though York had only been a short distance away from him, he hadn't been able to see her. Hadn't been able to talk to her.

And that just makes the guilt sitting in the pit of his stomach worsen. Makes every muscle draw tight so much to the point that when his jaw clenches against it, he thinks his teeth might be in danger of shattering.

He debates for a long while on whether or not it would be appropriate to go see her. He knows she has to be feeling horrible, not only because their mission had gone as it had, but of what it had done to her. The York that he and Carolina know, the one from their universe had dealt with an eye injury of his own, and though North knows that this York had had hers repaired wherever she had been before, the fact that she'd had it happen again ..

It makes his heart clench, makes his chest tighten and his throat dry up, and even though he's standing right outside the door to the apartment she shares with Wash, he's finding that he's hesitating.

Because he doesn't know what to say.

Because he feels like this is somehow his fault.

And he's never had to deal with this sort of guilt before.

He doesn't even realize he's holding his breath until he lets it out and finally knocks on the door.

They hadn't let him in to see her at first. She was still healing, she'd be unresponsive, she's under the sedatives. Wash doesn't care. It hadn't stopped him back on Sacrosanct, and drones or aliens, he's not leaving her alone. Not like this.

It's never been one of the things they talk about, the eye. Sure, York would always play it off with a laugh, but he'd seen just how much it meant to her to get it fixed. And now?

What a cosmic joke.

So Wash parks himself at her bedside and stays there, ignoring anyone and everyone who tries to get him to leave. Like fuck he is. He cares more about York than anyone else on this station, and he'll be damned before he lets her wake up all alone here.

York wouldn't sleep if not for the sedatives, she doesn't think. She'll have to ask the doc if she can get any of those to go. She's got a feeling she's gonna have a lot of restless nights coming up. Still, she can't sleep forever, and she comes back into consciousness slowly, her thoughts still muddled and groggy. She cracks her good eye open, the other half of her face still swathed in gauze, and though her vision is still bleary, like her brain can't focus, she catches sight of a figure in her peripheral vision, enough to make her roll her head to the side.

It's not a surprise to see Wash there, honestly. It's not the first time she's woken up with him at her bedside, even with this Wash in particular. That's probably not a great track record. God, the look on his face makes her stomach twist up on itself. She licks at her lips slowly for a moment before she tries to speak, her voice still a little dry and creaky, the words still slow and half-mumbled.

"Wash? Christ, you didn't sleep here, did you?"

York had spent a day or so laid up after she'd come home from the clinic, but that was about all she could stand. She's never been one for lying around for too long, especially when she can't stand the sight of her own reflection. Wash is out for a while, much to her relief, and she's spending some time picking up around the apartment, just trying to keep her hands busy.

When she hears the knock on the door she sets down the dirty dishes she'd been gathering up and goes to answer it. She doesn't expect North, though maybe she should have -- she knew he and Garrus were all right, thanks to Mordin, that they'd suffered only minor injuries on their part. She'd been the one to get away unlucky. She should have figured he'd come by sooner or later, and honestly, she feels as though she should've dropped him a line earlier, if only to let him know she's okay. Then again, maybe she just couldn't commit to those words.

She manages a dim smile when she opens the door, and when she does it pulls at the skin around her eye, even underneath the gauze. It's hard not to see. "Hey."

He hears about it. She goes back to work, people go to bars, people comment. Arthur does patrols and hears some Krogan talk about the 'battle scar' the bartender at the Quad, and feels his stomach turn.

Christ. What qualifies as a battle scar to Krogan?

So he waits until it's too early for the Quad to be full and goes to visit, finds York - and she's got her good side to him, so for a moment he doesn't see, until she turns to do something - ah, shit, bandages.

He'd gotten used to York with her good eye. It takes a moment to conjure up the memory of her before, but it's clear, it's the same side. Like some sort of horrible irony. Arthur feels for her.

He approaches the bar, figures the best way to start is normal.

"Whiskey, neat." Well, almost normal. This is no time for his regular drink.

"York--"

Wash had fallen into a light doze, but nothing more. Couldn't let his guard down that much, especially after what had happened to her. They'd both known Omega was trouble from the start, but it hadn't hit quite so close to home until now. Until this.

He scoots closer to her bed, reaching to press a hand against her shoulder in case she gets the idea to move too much, and tries to give her a smile. It doesn't meet his eyes.

"Hey," he says, softly, and finds himself at a loss for how to continue. What can he even say right now? "You're awake."

He doesn't make a joke right off the bat, not even a lame one, and York doesn't find that exactly reassuring. That's what he's supposed to do, now. She's not dead, so they're supposed to joke about it. Make it not a big deal. But he just keeps looking at her like that, like it is a big deal.

"'Course I'm awake," York mumbles, reaching up to wipe her hand over her mouth. Christ, she could've been drooling. She manages to keep a tired smile on her face, trying to keep it glib. "Doc says I can go home later today, probably."

Honestly, York's thankful for normal. She can't stand thinking too hard about what happened, especially not when she can see it on Wash's face every time he looks at her. Christ, it's been a long couple of days.

York hesitates for a moment, almost stiffening when she sees Arthur, but he's cool, he's casual, and she's grateful for it. She relaxes, nodding only slightly, and even manages a tired smile. It pulls at the skin around her eyes, tight and shiny from where it peeks out from underneath the bandage. "You got it, chief," York says, reaching for a glass and a bottle of whiskey -- some of the better stuff at least. She doesn't look too hard at his face as she pours him his drink and slides it across the table to him.

His eyes are drawn to the injury a little while she moves after she smiles - it looks worse than what she had before, but he wasn't there for that healing process.

He could ask Wash, but it seems wrong. Wash is probably worried enough about it.

Regardless, he doesn't make it obvious, not that she's looking at him enough to notice if he was. He takes the drink when she slides it to him, curling his hand around it. He debates asking about the injury, but for the moment...

"Looks like there's a clean up squad going around Zeta. You heard about it?"

Someone will be waiting for her outside the bar after she finishes her first day of work. He'd heard about the news from the streets; some smart-ass guy made a crack about the Dun's lack of an eye being similar to the bartender's at the Quad. A few more enquiries around lead him back to Mordin, who offered him the bare minimal of facts about what happened. Dun doesn't know how or why she got hurt, but he does feel that he needs to see her, just to check on how she's doing.

Also, he's got a package next to him. It might be for her as well.

"Yeah, they told me." Wash manages to smile a little wider and rests his other arm on the bed. He knows what she's like, knows she's not going to want to face this, but he's going to be here for her whether she admits it or not.

He squeezes her shoulder. "Dunno how much you remember, but North's fine. He's the one who called me." His smile turns lopsided, one side curving up. "I didn't tell the cat. Promise."

"Yeah, I heard." York winces only slightly when he squeezes her shoulder -- it doesn't hurt, nothing much really hurts right now, it's just...a weird feeling, is all, but she lets out a hoarse laugh at his lame joke. She licks at her lips again, reaching for the cup of water on the bedside table. Her throat is still dry, her voice a little cracked. "Garrus, too. Both of 'em made it out okay."

She doesn't try to sit up, just lift her head a little as she takes a few slow sips, settling back into the cot with a breath. It's not the coziest hospital bed she's ever slept on, that's for sure. "Figured North'd let you know." She tries to grin, lopsidedly, but it just looks tired. "But just in case he didn't, I was gonna call, I swear." It's a weak attempt at a joke, but hey, she has to do better than Wash, at least.

With the exception of her boss, nobody had really dared to make any comments to York's face about...well, her face. She's keeping it bandaged per the doctor's orders, and she's been working at The Quad long enough to have garnered some respect from the usuals -- she'd have to, being the only human bartender and lasting this long. And Davrax making a remark about how the krogan appreciate a woman with a good facial scar -- well, it'd been crude, but York suspects he'd just been trying to make her feel better, in his own gruff way. She'd shrugged it off like everything else.

She stops abruptly when she nearly runs into Dun on her way out the door, eyebrows raising slightly. "Uh, you waitin' for somebody?"

"I was waiting for you."

Well, here comes the conundrum. How do you treat a female comrade-in-arms without breaking social boundaries? He wants to express that he's going to support her if she needs him, but at the same time he doesn't want her to get the wrong idea, especially because he's married and he's noticed that polygamy is frowned on here.

So after a few seconds of false starts for conversation, he just presents the package to her.

"I heard. So I made you some proper nourishment. It's better than the rubbish that people call food here; it'll help you get your strength back."

His voice is assertive but subdued, gruff and loud yet reserved and polite, a mixture of all the feelings and struggles he's having when he went over to see her. But most importantly, he just means her well, so he pushes the pot of rice porridge that he made into her hands. There's some shredded meat there that looks like chicken, and even some vegetables. Heck, there's even ginger inside. Don't ask how he managed to find those rare ingredients; he had a lot of threatening and demanding to do at the market place.

"What, you mean Dun's little charity party? Yeah, I heard about it."

Somehow adamantly not talking about it and having someone actually go along with it isn't as comforting as she'd thought. It makes her a little uneasy, somehow, but she has to hand it to Arthur. The guy can really keep his cool -- he's barely even flinched -- and she appreciates that. She mops up a small spill with a rag, raising her eyebrows.

"You gonna pitch in?"

"Wouldn't have helped, you already missed curfew."

The jokes aren't getting any better, and they both know it, but that's York for you. Back in his timeline, it hadn't taken any time at all for York to start cracking jokes and acting like it was no big deal he was half-blind. He can only figure it was the same for this York. It's just... different.

And he can't keep that weight out of his eyes as he looks at her. Sets his hand on hers, keeps the touch gentle. She matters too much for him to take this lightly.

"What do you need?" Wash asks, softly.

York's figured out by now that Dun's got an issue with interacting with women. It's not like it's not glaringly obvious, anyway. She figures it's whatever world he came from, or whatever time. His apology last time had been pretty genuine. The poor guy just doesn't have any idea how to talk to a woman.

If it were any other day, if she weren't just days away from nearly having half her face blasted off, she'd be a little more enthusiastic, a little more engaging. But she's oddly sedate when she takes the pot and peeks inside, a look of mild but mystified surprise on her face.

"Oh, uh -- thanks. That's...really thoughtful of you." York's not really sure how to respond to all these platitudes, even when they're genuine. But a look of concern crosses her face, her brow knitting. She hasn't exactly made her injury public knowledge, and the list of people North and Wash would contact is pretty short. "Where exactly did you hear?"

It's unnerving, is what it is. Wash's hand on hers is comforting in a way, sure, and in a way she needs, but the way he keeps looking at her, the tone of his voice, it makes her a little uneasy. It's not like she and Wash haven't ever been frank and honest with each other like -- like they've never had a heart to heart -- but Christ, it's not like she's a sobbing mess in the bed. This doesn't have to be a big deal.

She makes as if to shake Wash's hand away, but she just shifts, letting out a quiet snort. "For you to stop lookin' at me like I'm made of glass, for one. I'm not dyin' and I don't think I even came that close, anyhow. I'm getting outta here later today. I'm gonna be fine, man." The drugs don't make her too hungry, but York knows she hasn't eaten much in the last couple of days. By the time she gets out of here, she'll probably be starving, and food's an easier topic than how she feels right now. "You could order pizza later, or somethin'."

He's been meaning to come see her sooner than he's actually found himself outside her apartment. He hadn't been sure if she wanted to be alone, if she'd wanted to spend her time healing with Wash - because even though he hadn't spoken to either of them on the matter, he could tell there was something between them.

And that was their business, and no one else's. But he hadn't wanted to potentially intrude on anything.

He's been going over and over what he's going to say to her once she opens the door - ranging from I'm sorry to I should have protected you better to thinking that he shouldn't say anything at all. And once that door is open, once his gaze finds the gauze covering her left eye, his breath catches. Anything he might have said goes right out the window, and his fingers curl in on themselves just the slightest bit at his sides.

"Hey .. how are you feeling?"

Honestly, Arthur's seen worse - he's seen guys with their legs blown off, he's seen stranger and sicker things in people's minds, what their projections can do, beating someone to a pulp -

But most of that has been in dreams. Something ethereal that won't last. This permanence is one he's not used to entirely. At least he's got the practice not flinching.

He takes a sip of his whiskey, appreciating the mild burn as it goes down.

"Might. At least with anything near my apartment." He gives a rueful grin. "My room mate is missing, so it's just me again. Real bachelor pad."

It'd be so easy for York make a glib comment, something cool and distant so she doesn't have to feel it, but even now, she's conscious of the way North is looking at her. She doesn't know exactly what yet, but he feels something about what happened, and just based on what she knows about him, she has a good guess. She doesn't need to make him feel any worse.

"Not my top day of the year, but I've had worse," she says with a one-shoulder shrug, as noncommittally as possible. She doesn't want North to feel guilty, but it wouldn't do him any good to fake it, either. Not that she's sure she could, right now. She steps back out of the doorway, nodding her head. "Hey, come in. You look kinda like you've been through the wringer, too."

"I know. Doesn't stop me from worrying."

God, his heart had leapt straight to his throat when North had called. Far as he can tell, this place is nothing like Sacrosanct. If they get injured, if something happens -- they're not coming back. There aren't any teleporters to pop out of in a couple days, good as new.

It's funny how painful mortality is after so long without.

But York doesn't want to think about this. Probably won't want to talk about it, either. And though they're sitting at the tip of his tongue, Wash doesn't know how to say these things.

So he relents. Gives her a half-smile. "I'll get Hawaiian, if I can find it."

She's been wanting to see York for a while, ever since her brother came home. Ever since she heard what happened. And yet, every time she's almost talked herself into going over to York's place to actually see her, she's immediately talked herself back out of it. Probably not the best time, probably not welcome, who knows how things would be... etcetera. None of them are particularly good excuses, but they're what she has.

So when she hears that York's back at work, the next day, she shows up.

She acts like nothing's different when she makes her way up to the bar. She rests her arms there, lightly crossed, watching York work for a few seconds before she finally calls out to her.

"Hey. Got something really strong you wanna pick out for me?"

To her credit, she's trying to act like nothing heavy is on her mind. And she's doing a pretty good job, except for the tiniest hint of tightness in her otherwise usual smirk.

Dun shrugged; the exact unflattering comparisons between him and York aren't the best conversation material. "I heard that the female human barkeeper at the Quad had acquired a serious injury," he explained, taking care to keep Mordin's name out of it. And it was technically true; it was a conversation he had overheard on the street that had first tipped him off.

"I don't put a lot of stock into rumours and hear-say, but your employer told me that you would be missing from work for a few days so it was not difficult to make the connection."

He coughs; he hates half-truths but there is no way he can let York know that he had been considering dropping by her home to visit her either and that he had enquired about her at the bar for her address.

A moment passes, and then another, before he asks her in a low voice "What do you want to do, York?" Do you want vengeance, he asks silently. Because Dun's blade is sharp and ready. Or do you want to rest? Do you wish for solitude? Or companionship?

What can he do to help you feel better?

York had only ever come close to dying once, on Sacrosanct, and she doesn't want to think about that again. If Garrus and North hadn't pulled her out of there when they did, it would've been a hell of a lot dodgier. Those vorcha weren't messing around.

She looks relieved -- tired, but relieved, and she lets out a slow, long breath through her nose. "Thanks," she says, her voice still a little creaky. "I'm not really hungry now, but I bet I will be later. Hey, maybe pick up a movie or somethin', too. Gotta have somethin' to do around the house."

She doesn't want to, but she has to take it easy for at least a day or two. She can't go back to work in this condition, anyhow. She's got painkillers in her system now, but later, it's gonna hurt. She remembers what it's like.

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Page 1 of 5

OPEN;

FIRST. FIIIIRST.

and sunday comes afterwards

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gives u a medal

:(

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:'(

i was trying to find an emote that's york now but alas

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yiiissss.

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