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Voxophone 7/?? - Voice

Citizens of Luceti.

[It is, perhaps, the first time Robert Lutece has ever used the journal as an actual means of reaching the community at large rather than simply a voxophone others happened to hear and respond to.

For all intents and purposes, he sounds as if he's discussing the weather or another phase in the Lutece Field he and Rosalind have been attempting to re-discover here and the machine they intend to re-build.

It's a very calm, very scientific tone.]

I would like to know if anyone here has information regarding conception, gestation, and delivery of children as it pertains to Luceti.

Physics is my specialty, but I am well-versed in anatomy and biology. [He does not need the "birds and bees" talk. That isn't the purpose of this.] However, there are anomalies in this world in regards to anatomy and biology -- the wings, for instance.

It is of interest to me whether these changes or the progression of the alterations of reality commonly referred to as "shifts" affect the aforementioned topics.

[...And yes, that is all he's going to say on the topic. Not why it matters or why he's decided to start researching this. It's simply stated as a matter of fact.]

Any information or Luceti-specific literature on the subject would be most helpful.

Thank you.

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She was supposed to be my mother though, even if she wasn't my real mother. She was supposed to protect me. Instead I became this... source of jealousy and resentment.

...I know I was put in my tower because of my ability to open tears. But I can't help but wonder if she hadn't resented me so much, if I could have grown up knowing someone other than Songbird.

She was, but she had no choice in the matter.

[It wasn't that he liked Lady Comstock, but he'd found her more tolerable than her husband. Her death had been the warning signal to him that something had to be done about the Prophet.]

She had a child forced into her arms and told to raise her. She was given no indication where the child had come from and was told to say she had given birth to make her husband's "prophecy" seem true.

She was tied further to a man who had already trapped her by this baby she'd never asked for.

She never wanted a baby? [Elizabeth seems puzzled by this.] I know that Comstock wanted an heir, a child of his own to continue his work. But I thought Lady Comstock just wanted a child to raise.

...Was Comstock... forcing her to have a child? Not realizing that she didn't want one while he was... desperately trying to have an heir?

I... think she wanted a child. [He couldn't be sure. It wasn't exactly something he'd spoken to her about.]

But look at where she was. She was alone in Columbia, put on a pedestal where she wasn't even human. Again and again, she tried to give her husband a child.

Then, he brings home this baby and tells her it is now theirs, without any explanation. Without asking her if she wants to raise someone else's child as her own.

She wanted her own child. Not me.

[Elizabeth can appreciate the predicament, honestly. She's not sure she would want to raise a mystery baby with Gai, but she can't help but think that she wouldn't have left the child to be raised in Monument Island. Even if it wasn't hers, it was an innocent life that needed caring for.]

[They were both victims of Comstock, that was for certain. But Elizabeth didn't agree with Lady Comstock's choice to send her away and how could she?]

I guess I wish she'd accepted me, even if I wasn't hers. Maybe things would have been different.

I wish she would have, too.

[For a time, the woman had believed the child was Comstock's. The product of an affair. The truth had only disturbed her more.

Had it been done another way, had she known before the child was put in her arms what her husband intended to do... Perhaps things would've been different.

Perhaps they wouldn't have.]

She wasn't ready, not for what was asked of her. Unfortunately, she had no power to strike out against anyone but you.

Seems to be the popular choice. [She sighs and lays her head in her arms as she looks over at Robert's notes.]

So... if you know that I'm not going to have a baby anytime soon, who are you asking these questions for?

[Well, there's no reason not to tell her.

He gives a small shrug of his shoulders, his voice casual with the remark.]

Rosalind is considering it.

Rosalind? [Elizabeth looks startled and alarmed by the thought.]

...Rosalind. Wants to be pregnant. For at least nine months. And raise a baby. For at least sixteen years.

Three months, here, it seems. The gestation period seems to be accelerated, though, so far as I have heard, the further development, once the child is born, is not equally increased.

Nine months crunched into three. Sounds... great... [Elizabeth's face suggests otherwise.]

Who would she have a child with, though? Not... [She looks horrified.] Not Booker!?

[OH GROSS, THAT IMAGE WILL NEVER LEAVE HER NOW.]

[That? That causes open laughter.

Robert can't help it. Because that mental image is far, far too amusing.

After a moment, though, he's got himself under control and can shake his head.]

Dear God, no.

Good because... [Because... because Booker having any kind of relations with any woman just makes Elizabeth want to shudder and expire on the table.]

Because Booker probably isn't interested in Rosalind that way.

No. No, I shouldn't say he is, and I'm quite certain Rosalind would be horrified by the idea of it as well.

Good. I don't need any more nightmares. [She makes a face and arches her eyebrow at Robert. She's going to have nightmares anyway.]

I assure you -- nothing of that sort will be happening.

Then who? [Elizabeth frowns and tilts her head.]

[Robert's half tempted to see how long it takes her to realize the answer to that question.

So, for the moment, he only arches a brow and looks at her. As if challenging her to consider it for herself.]

[Elizabeth opens and closes her mouth, still at a loss.]

Not... not Gai...? [Certainly he wouldn't, not even for science!]

I'm inclined to say he's a bit young for her tastes.

I'm glad to hear that. [Elizabeth sounds a little territorial there, but pacified.]

[But now she's really well and truly stumped. She tries to think of all the men she's seen Rosalind interact with and comes up very short. Frankly, Rosalind's social life wasn't something Elizabeth watched closely.]

[Then she remembers her time in the Lutece house for some reason. ...and the one bed. And the one bed that hadn't multiplied to two when Rosalind and Robert had moved them into the house.]

Robert... you and Rosalind aren't... [She looks very nervous about making this particular guess.]

[And there, Robert's expression betrays him. He smiles a faint bit and gives a slight nod of his head.]

For nearly twenty years, in fact.

[Since about a year after his arrival to Columbia.]

[Elizabeth is truly stunned, and for a long moment she can't think of anything to say. It isn't that she had previously thought that Robert and Rosalind were siblings, it's that she had never thought they would be romantically involved together. She'd never thought they would be romantically involved at all. But it did make sense. Robert and Rosalind understood one another, shared experiences like she and Gai had.]

[But when she thought of them having sex, it was much like when she imagined Booker in coitus.]

[She opens her mouth and closes it again, still trying to parse this.]

[Well. If he and Rosalind chose to do this, she'd have found out then. So, it might have had to have been broken to her eventually.

Robert, for his part, is quiet, letting her give the issue as much or little thought as she chooses. It's quite a bit to process, he knows, and so he's not going to press it too much.]

[She is giving it quite a bit of thought, mostly because of the various taboos and strangitudes that surround the concept. But why not? They were both adults, if they both had a mutual attraction to one another Elizabeth wasn't in any kind of position to say no.]

[And it made sense, in a way. She and Gai were attracted to one another because of similar backgrounds and similar hopes for the future. Robert and Rosalind, even though they were technically the same person, understood one another on that level. They wanted the other's happiness, they wanted to take care of each other. They had spent an infinite amount of time together, it was only natural that they sought some kind of solace and comfort in one another. It was only natural that it grew to something more. Maybe something neither of them had experienced before, but wanted to experience.]

[If they loved each other enough to want to have a family together, Elizabeth could understand that. Eventually her neutral expression of deep thought relaxes into a smile.]

I guess this means I might have a cousin, then?

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