I usually prefer to explore the themes of KCD through fanfic rather than a metapost. But I've been sick for the past 2 weeks and fallen behind on my chapters, so I'll indulge some stupid Hansry thoughts instead.
To me, KCD is a tale of being haunted.
Henry in his nightmares, who is haunted by those he has conquered but cannot move past still. And in his dreams, by the parents he couldn’t save. One that exists to taunt him; the other to act as a sounding board for him to rationalise his actions. Both determine his constantly changing place in the narrative.
This is the beginning. Get up son, even if you are at your lowest point.
This is the middle. The words of a snake informing you that every decision is a hypocrisy, that you are no better than your enemy.
This is the end. Here are the reflections on your journey, the man you chose to be.
But Hans is being haunted too.
His is less visceral. We aren’t privy to his inner monologue, nor the visions he sees in his unconscious moments, but he talks about them a lot.
Henry haunted by the past. Hans is haunted by the future.
Hans is haunted by who he ought to be. A childhood spent waiting for the magical day when everything would fall into place. Then he became an adult, but one with no autonomy (beyond those of his selfish inconsequential whims). He is still waiting for that magical day when he is “all grown up”. In fact, he goes back to that phrase twice during the two games. Both whilst drunk, interestingly, that ghost more easily revealed beneath the surface.
Hans is also haunted by his father, arguably. The timeline and the canon are wobbly, it’s hard to say how much of him Hans remembers. If he ever knew him well at all. He wouldn’t be haunted on the literal sense as Henry is, because he probably did not know him well enough. Only that he has so much to live up to, boots that could never be filled. A liked and respected man, taken too soon. Who made the mistake to leave a boorish, ill-tempered son who will drive the town to ruin.
He is haunted by a looming betrothal and all that represents for him. Restriction and futility. The life of a bureaucrat, not a knight. Before he has had the chance to make his name, achieve his own goals. Haunted by a woman he has not even met yet.
And he is haunted because however he tries to act or take responsibility for his own path, he is constantly shut down. Coddled and shielded because he is too precious a commodity for either side to possess. Haunted by the people who will steer his fate, far outside of his control. These are too numerous to count.
Where Henry sees his parents and Toth, who does Hans see?
I think that as the game progresses, he starts to see Henry.
Henry, who focusses on the past because he is willing to abandon his future in the name of what he wants. Willing to sacrifice himself, over and over. Cannot and will not stop until his task is completed.
Henry, who threatens over and over to become an absence in his life. A gap where a man once stood. If he survives, and Henry does not, as is his fear, then that absence will only deepen. Will blur at the edges. Fainter and fainter, more and more distant.
Hans is haunted by a future without Henry in it. And how he has no say in that choice. Yet he tries his hardest, plays his gamble at the last possible moment, in the hope that it is enough to stop him.
It isn’t. Henry leaves anyway
And Hans gets drunk, haunted yet again by the future. The siege will end soon, with them broken upon the enemy's forces, or starved. A future haunted by nothingness, oblivion. When all hope is lost.
But fortunately, Henry will always come back.
