The Nice and Accurate Ramblings of Offside, Kineticist

I have no clue what's going on.

[offsidekineticist]

Since tagging stuff hasn't been working so great for making sure people can actually find all the breakup arc posts, I'm making a *checks notes* "pinned post" with links to each part that is out so far:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

Part 11

Part 12

Part 13

Part 14

Part 15

Part 16

Part 17

Part 18

[offsidekineticist]

In the aftermath of an unsettling break-in, Theoven Derenge decides to unleash his inner child. Unfortunately, his inner child is a lonely hypervigilant child adventurer whose coping mechanism is trapmaking.

Or, the second time Theo met Giliys.

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[thebirdarts]

It's been hell of a year for my art, even without my style reboot in september, it's amazing how graduating allowed me to grow so much in my art, and I've finally reached a point where it's fully sunk in that I'm good at this shit actually. I'm not gonna get long & sappy like last year's year of art but thank you everyone for all your kind words and encouragement throughout is year 💕

[offsidekineticist]

In case anyone wanted to know what I was basing Theo's yellow coat on - this is what I picture.

Banyan | British | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "The Eighteenth-Century Woman," December 12, 1981–September 5, 1982.<br/><br/>The Metropolitan Mus

[offsidekineticist]

I just had a realization about how Theo and Giliys first met. Giliys, badly wounded and on the run, breaks into Theo's house and falls on his knife when he goes "no witnesses" at Theo. Giliys wakes up tucked into a warm bed, his wounds cleaned and bandaged, and Theo patches him up and washes/mends his clothes and puts him to bed in the spare room....

And I just realized....That was a prank. Theo was pranking Giliys.

Like, ok, there were other practical/altruistic reasons Theo didn't want a (probably) wanted criminal bleeding out in his living room (he definitely didn't want to risk the authorities searching his home and finding one of his extremely illegal books, and Theo's generally very compassionate), but once he fed his guest some healing potions and cleaned the blood from the living room, he was definitely giggling to himself (on the inside) about how confused this failed home invader was going to be when he woke up to find his would-be victim being so aggressively agreeable, which is probably what drove the more over-the-top kindnesses Giliys woke up to.

Like I picture him at the wash basin, sleeves rolled up, up to his elbows in bloody water as he washes his attempted murderer's clothes at two in the morning, and he's got his usual mostly blank expression, but on the inside he's cackling like "oh, I can't wait to see the look on his face when he realizes that I expertly mended his clothes. OOH I hope I have time to crochet him a hat before he leaves. Ooh! Or a sweater! No, if he's here that long, there's probably something wrong. Alright, a hat then. Oh this is going to be hilarious!"

[offsidekineticist]

And this gave me an inspiration to write how that first meeting went!

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

[offsidekineticist]

I just had a realization about how Theo and Giliys first met. Giliys, badly wounded and on the run, breaks into Theo's house and falls on his knife when he goes "no witnesses" at Theo. Giliys wakes up tucked into a warm bed, his wounds cleaned and bandaged, and Theo patches him up and washes/mends his clothes and puts him to bed in the spare room....

And I just realized....That was a prank. Theo was pranking Giliys.

Like, ok, there were other practical/altruistic reasons Theo didn't want a (probably) wanted criminal bleeding out in his living room (he definitely didn't want to risk the authorities searching his home and finding one of his extremely illegal books, and Theo's generally very compassionate), but once he fed his guest some healing potions and cleaned the blood from the living room, he was definitely giggling to himself (on the inside) about how confused this failed home invader was going to be when he woke up to find his would-be victim being so aggressively agreeable, which is probably what drove the more over-the-top kindnesses Giliys woke up to.

Like I picture him at the wash basin, sleeves rolled up, up to his elbows in bloody water as he washes his attempted murderer's clothes at two in the morning, and he's got his usual mostly blank expression, but on the inside he's cackling like "oh, I can't wait to see the look on his face when he realizes that I expertly mended his clothes. OOH I hope I have time to crochet him a hat before he leaves. Ooh! Or a sweater! No, if he's here that long, there's probably something wrong. Alright, a hat then. Oh this is going to be hilarious!"

[offsidekineticist]

Happy Holidays, all!

I've had some inspiration lately, but my next dry spell will probably see me moving this fic to AO3. It's getting long enough that as much as I don't like the idea of putting it up there with the PWOTR tag (since it is 99% OCs and nowhere near the worldwound), putting it all on tumblr is becoming increasingly silly.

For now I want to focus on getting the next couple of chapters done, but next time I run into an issue like "ok I guess this throwaway background character is a viewpoint character now and I need some time to let that marinate," I'll probably start the move to AO3.

Speaking of which, yes, we have a new viewpoint character! Everyone say hello to Mori Strongheart!

CWs for this chapter: blood and viscera, medical procedures, negative self-talk and ableist language, dissociation, extreme loneliness, dysphoria/dysmorphia

Summary of previous chapter: Giliys's patron is forcibly and physically removed from him by an unknown force, severely injuring him. Qweck immediately sets to work healing him. Laria Longroad, having heard Giliys confess to murdering escaped slaves for his patron and knowing he is responsible for the burning of the Villegre, tries to convince her to let him die lest he give up Bellflower secrets if he's arrested. Qweck refuses, and Laria evicts her and warns her to leave town with Giliys. Qweck, unable to heal Giliys alone, enlists the aid of coworker Mori Strongheart, instructing her to darn a hole in Giliys's heart while Qweck keeps him alive with a stabilization cantrip.

Thank You, Beautiful Person!

Let it be known that darning a heart is nothing like darning a sock. You’re not going to elaborate because you’re only able to get through this by not thinking about it. You really would rather do literally anything but this, but Qweck needed your help, and right now she’s basically your only friend.

(You don’t mean to be annoying, but when you have something in your head, you kind of forget how to talk about anything else, and most folks don’t want to hear you gush about Chelaxian high opera and the subtle beauty of the Infernal language. Qweck doesn’t seem any more annoyed by your opera talk than she is by everyone else, so that makes you friends.)

So now you’re doing your best to pretend you’re someone who doesn’t get lightheaded at the sight of blood while you try to fix a serial killer’s heart. 

(Ooh! Save that line! That's a good one!)

“Okay, I think it’s done,” you say, and you’re terrified that it’s not enough, but you also can’t spend another second stitching flesh that is moving and wet and gushing– 

Qweck mutters her stabilization spell and nods. It’s honestly impressive that her voice hasn’t given out after all this time. This is probably the most you’ve heard her speak since you've met. “Step back!” she warns and you almost jump away, taking the magical needles with you. You look very deliberately towards the ceiling, barely able to see her hand in your peripheral vision as it glows with healing energy.

You don’t watch the wound heal, but you’re sure it’s very impressive. Qweck seems like her magic would be very impressive. You’re so nervous you think you might throw up again; you never wanted to hold anybody’s life in your hands. You don’t know if you could stand knowing you failed them.

But you have to. You hear Qweck’s voice quicken, hear her muttering grow to shouting–

“No, no, no, no! You are not leaving me to handle everything alone! You don’t get an out, asshole!” 

It didn’t work. 

You couldn’t do it.

You weren’t good enough.

(Of course you weren’t. You’re just useless little Mori. You don’t know how to do anything that actually matters. The only one who didn't see it was Qweck, and now she sees it, too.)

You feel sick, and you’re not sure if it’s because of the blood or the guilt or the fear that she’s going to hate you for breaking her oath.

“I’m sorry,” you say.

“Not yet you aren’t,” Qweck snarls, and you feel lightheaded because Qweck is scary even when she’s not angry, and now she’s angry at you–

“You need to go. Now,” she continues. “If this doesn’t work, tell my father that I tried. And I’m sorry.”

Before you can question what the eff she means by that, she turns to the patient and starts chanting. Her hands start glowing. Magic sparks over her body like lightning, lashing around her arms and chest and neck. Her eyes are glowing. The patient starts convulsing, and you don’t know if that’s just the magic flopping him around or if he’s alive. If he is alive you’re pretty sure he won't stay that way for long. The magic arcing from Qweck is getting stronger, reaching farther. The hair on your neck is standing on end, and you can see welts on Qweck’s skin left after each arc. You’re no mage, no healer; you don’t know what’s happening, but it looks very bad, and you should probably do something.

You just…don’t know what.

(Because you’re useless)

“Uh…Qweck? What’s happening?” you ask. She doesn’t answer–she's too focused on her task, even with her hair standing on end and her power sparking. Light is pouring out of her eyes, but also her nose, her ears, between her teeth–something inside her is glowing, and you’re no expert, but that seems very, very bad. You need to snap her out of this…somehow.

“Qweck?” you repeat.

"You...need...to...go!" she grinds out through clenched teeth, and it sounds like she's in pain, so of course you don't go. You reach towards her, into the storm of magic. You think maybe if you can pull her away from the patient, maybe if you break the connection between them, maybe it will stop? Or maybe some of the extra magic will go to you, and maybe between the two of you, you can make it stop?

(Stupid little Mori. You'll only make things worse)

It hurts, magic stinging your arm like tiny embers from a fire, and it gets worse the further you reach, but you grit your teeth and persist.

('Now isn’t the time to be soft, girl.')

The light is growing unbearably, blindingly bright, so you look away as your hand reaches Qweck’s shoulder–

There are no words. I will try to explain what you feel, but you will not understand. You are beyond words now. And when you return to yourself–when you can hear my words–you will not be able to understand. But I will try to describe it, and you will try to understand it, and we will fail together.

You are, at once, nothing and everything. You are connected to every living thing in every place and plane and planet. Words are pointless, crude attempts by toddlers to replicate the connection you feel. You feel their feelings. You think their thoughts. You are them.

You are everyone.

You are Life. All life, everywhere, all at once.

And then you are nothing. Empty. Where there once was a roaring furnace, now there is only a single spark, lost and adrift and abandoned to a prison of flesh, doomed to burn out alone in the ashes. 

There is no word to describe what you are–the agony of the loss you now embody–but I will try.

You are alone.

“Mori? Mori!”

Someone is shaking the body that is called Mori. Someone is shaking your cage, and it reminds you that while you are no longer everything, neither are you nothing. You are something, locked away from everything, but still something, even if you are almost nothing. Almost nothing is still something. 

“Whoa–wha’ happened?” your body slurs, because you are not your body, and it’s hard to control something that is not you.

“You didn’t listen to me is what happened!” the body that is Qweck snaps, and she is scowling at your body because she thinks it is you. “I told you to leave! You could have died!”

If you were your body, it would laugh at that. You didn’t die. You did the opposite of dying. You didn’t die so hard that there isn’t a word for what you did. You consider using your body to tell her this, but she would not get the joke.

“You still didn’ say wha’ happened.”

Qweck’s lips press together. “He needed a regenerative spell to heal. I’m not strong enough to cast such a spell, but I knew the incantation and the movements. I had hoped I would be able to control it long enough to heal him. When you touched my shoulder, I lost concentration and you absorbed the excess positive energy. You are incredibly lucky to be alive.”

You are not your body, but your body feels that you do not understand, and so it blinks in confusion. “Cast a spell...even though you can't...That sounds like a really bad idea,” it says.

“I did tell you to leave.”

“Yeah, but it sounded like you were about to do something silly. Which you were.” Your body is good at speaking. It hardly needs much input from you–just a vague idea of what you want her to understand. That's good, because you're too busy wondering why you can't just be her, and why she can't just be you.

Qweck’s body is taut and angry. You think Qweck is, too. “That’s why you were supposed to leave!”

“But my friend was in trouble!” your body whines, and now Qweck (who you think might be her body) looks confused.

“Your…friend?”

“Well…yeah. We’re friends, aren’t we?” 

Qweck opens and closes her mouth a few times. “You’re not okay, are you?”

That would have crushed you only minutes ago. You used to be desperate for friendship. Now it just feels like a hollow reminder of what you’ve lost. That paltry connection through word and deed is nothing to one who has been everyone. The sting of rejection is nothing compared to that loss.

“I’m fine,” your body lies, because Qweck-who-is-a-body can’t understand that none of you are okay, and you’re the only one who knows. Before she can tell you that she knows that you’re lying, you’re interrupted by a groan next to you. There’s a body on the floor, and it is moving and groaning and sitting up.

“Ugh…what…what the fuck happened?” the body groans, looking around, and some piece of you–a piece that is both with your body but also not–remembers that this body is your patient, and that if it is moving of its own accord, that means you succeeded. Your body turns its gaze towards Qweck, and you expect to see her relieved or happy or grateful or some other positive emotion you haven’t remembered yet because you’re too lost and alone to remember what they feel like, but instead–

“I have no fucking clue!” she explodes. “You came in here and tried to get me to provoke me into killing you with a dagger of fucking healing by confessing to murdering your crops, and then a fucking rock burned its way out of your chest, and I had to spend an hour stabilizing you while Mori patched the hole in your heart. You tell me what fucking happened!”

The patient’s eyes seem to sharpen, at that. “A rock–you mean a gemstone? On a gold chain?”

“Yes, that!” her body shrieks, and its voice cracks and it is crying, and your body feels sick, and its face burns, and you think it would feel better if it wasn’t here to see this. “It burned its way out of your chest and it fucking floated in the air and then it talked! It fucking talked, Giliys! And then POOF! Gone, but not before it fucking blinded me and blew out my ears! I had to stabilize you without being able to see you or hear myself cast the spell!”

You don’t remember any of that happening. Clearly you were wrong to listen to Qweck the first time she asked you to leave. She is even less suited to aloneness than you are.

“No,” the patient–Giliys?–says softly, a faraway look in his eyes. “There’s no fucking way.” His eyebrows squeeze together, like he is trying to think, and then he snaps his finger. His body grins. “It didn’t work,” he says, and he seems like he can’t believe it. There’s a short silence, and then he laughs–just a short shocked laugh. “It’s gone–I can’t use it anymore! It’s really fucking gone! 

“What’s gone?” Qweck asks. 

“The hellfire–and the thing in my head that gave me the hellfire! She’s gone! No more hellfire! No more harvests! No more losing control and burning down the Villegre–she is fucking gone!” He throws his head back and laughs. “Oh, fuck. I didn’t realize–fuck. I haven’t been alone in my own head for forty fucking years. I forgot what it was like not to have her in there. Fuck, I didn’t even realize–fuck, is that why I’m so cold? Cuz I don’t have fucking hellfire in my chest anymore? Holy fucking shit. Is this what normal people feel like all the time?! Fuck, how are any of you ever fucking sad? Shit, this is incredible–” He stops suddenly and looks at Qweck with a very serious face. “I love you. Not like a girlfriend, though, that’d be weird. And not like a sister, either. Like…like that weird friend that you can’t stand but also work really well with and never actually walk away from even though you don’t do shit except bicker?”

You have so many questions. Your body turns to Qweck, and you hope for some explanation, but she just seems angry. Very angry. It makes your body feel light and shaky, like it really, really needs to run. 

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Qweck demands.

“I’m just so happy,” he gushes, and you can see Giliys is his body even more than Qweck is, and you don’t understand how someone can revel in being more alone. “You are such a good healer, Qweck, probably the best fucking healer ever, better than…than…I don’t fucking know of any famous healers, but think of one that’s really good, and you’re better than that one.”

“Stop–just fucking stop! Read the fucking room! Mori is hurt because of the magic I did to save you.”

You don’t want them talking about your body. Thinking about your body. Looking at your body. You don’t want them to realize your body isn’t you anymore, because then they will fuss and try to fix you, and they won’t understand because people-who-are-bodies can’t understand. So your body picks up a burlap sack off the floor–one that’s crusty with dried blood, but you’re ignoring that because your body doesn’t like blood.

“Here–you said you were cold?” your body asks, its voice shaking, before throwing the sack at the still-shivering halfling. The sack swallows up Giliys’s head as it lands and completely engulfs him.

The distraction works. “Thank you, beautiful person!” Giliys calls cheerfully, seemingly unbothered by the fact he can’t see. “And I mean beautiful on the inside–I mean you’re probably beautiful on the outside, too, but I didn’t get a good look before you turned out the lights, so I mean that you’re holistically beautiful. And not in a creepy way. OH!” He struggles for a moment, rolling around trying to find his way out of the sack. He finally manages it, poking his head out, grinning wide, and he waves at you. “You’re the first person I’ve met in forty years without her in my head! Hello! Wow.” He looks over at Qweck and whispers, “is she super special, or are all people as cool as she is, and I just couldn’t tell before?”

Your body, you realize, has its own feelings. Right now it desperately wants to hide in a box under a blanket curled up in the fetal position so it can die of embarrassment. You, on the other hand–

I mean beautiful on the inside.

You were wrong, you realize. Giliys is not his body anymore than you are. He only seems that way because he has never controlled it by himself before–he has always had to fight for control, and now, without a rival, he controls his body effortlessly. But Giliys is not his body. He did not have his own body until today. This body belonged to him and someone else who was not him–he could not be his body because it was not only his. He will become his body later, but so will you, as much as you hate it. You are alike, as much as you are opposites.

Emotions seem to belong to your body except for the gnawing, aching thing that there are no words for. But looking at the body that is not Giliys and knowing that you do not see Giliys–it almost makes the loneliness ache a bit less.

“You’re upsetting her after she saved your life! Why can’t you just shut up?!” Qweck demands tearfully.

“I just–I can’t! I’m so happy! The fire is gone, and now I have a new friend, and she’s awesome and brave and powerful!”

“I-I’m actually pretty normal,” your body mumbles, deeply embarrassed. You, meanwhile, are gratified to hear him acknowledge your kinship, even if he can’t explain that kinship.

“Yeah, that’s what Thay always says, too,” his body says, “but he–OH! THAY!” 

Giliys’s body springs to its feet suddenly, almost tripping on the burlap sack still wrapped around it. “I gotta go tell him–he probably thinks I’m dead–I gotta go, I gotta go, I gotta go, I gotta–”

It looks like a child declaring that he needs to pee–it's even doing the funny restless dance, though you think it’s just because Giliys's body is charged with energy and needs to do something with it.

“Then go!” Qweck snaps, wiping the tears from her eyes with the back of her hand. “I need to pack because I’ve been evicted.”

Giliys’s body freezes, one foot still in the air (still in the sack), eyes wide. “Evicted? Laria evicted you? Why?”

“Irreconcilable differences,” Qweck says with a sniffle.

“Oh, well, that’s okay, you can come back to stay with me and Thay. OOOOOOH!” His body begins dancing again. “Thay is going to be so happy! he’s missed you–oh, but he’s going to be upset that you’ll see how much his hands hurt. Shit! I wasn’t supposed to tell you that. Pretend I didn’t say anything? And then pretend you don’t notice? It’s hard not to notice when he’s so cranky all the time, but you can pretend, right? You’re so good at pretending you don’t hate my guts, so you can pretend about this, right?”

Qweck just looks incredibly done with everything. She usually looks incredibly done with everything, but she also looks like she’s about to fall asleep on her feet. “I can’t–I can’t deal with this. I’m going to pack, and then I’ll go to the apartment. If you want to wait, fine. If you don’t, also fine.” 

She is somewhat undermined by how she seems to stagger towards the ladder. Your body steadies her. “How about I get you home, and then I get your stuff for you?” your body offers, and you have no objections. Whether you help her or not, you are still lost.

“They live in Redroof,” Qweck says.

“Then we’d best get a move on,” your body says with a smile, as if that news changes nothing, because it doesn’t, even if your body feels a pit in its stomach. You’ve heard stories about Redroof, of course, and an hour ago those stories might have given you pause. Now, though, you know that whatever harm might befall you would only harm your body. You are not your body. You don’t want to be your body. You don’t want to have a body. You don’t want to forget what it was like to be without a body.

“Are you sure? You should probably rest,” Qweck says.

“I’m fine,” you lie, but it is only half a lie–your body is fine, and your body is all she sees.

The walk to Redroof is exhausting. Giliys pouts when you tell him he can't bring the blood-encrusted sack with him ("but I wanted to see how far I can walk in the sack!"), but his spirits are irrepressible, and soon he is, once again, chattering away. He waxes poetic about cobblestones, wondering who invented them and whether they knew they were brilliant. He points out shapes in the clouds–a linnorm kissing the hand of a cantaloupe, though he concedes that it might actually be a dragon proposing to a watermelon. He complains that Kintargo is really more pearly than silver, and that pearl doesn't get enough credit, so it's "not fucking cool" that silver gets to claim the city. He sees beauty and possibility in a world bereft of connection, and you are grateful that your body is so practiced at humoring people that you don't have to pay much attention to engage with him.  

You don’t understand his joy. You understand that the creature that shared his body demanded that he do terrible things. You understand his relief that he will never have to kill again. Surely, though, this relief would be tempered by the crushing loneliness? You only knew wholeness for a moment, but this nothingness is destroying you–how much worse would it be if you hadn’t had to face this isolation in decades? Surely that's a heavy price to pay, even if it is one worth paying?

Perhaps the body is the key. You were everyone, but everyone was not forced to share your body. Becoming everyone meant escaping your cage. Perhaps being confined to a body is less tortuous than being confined to a body you must share with someone else? You can’t fathom that, though–the absence you feel is such that, even knowing what she would demand, if Giliys’s devil offered to share this prison with you, you don’t know that you would say no. 

Qweck doesn’t say anything, but you can tell that she’s tuning you two out, trying to escape her body while it staggers home. She fails; she doesn't know how to be anything except a body. She leans on your body from time to time–she pretends it’s an accident, and your body always apologizes for getting in her way, because your body understands her pride.

You make it to Giliys’s apartment without incident. It looks like someone built a few cottages, and then added second floors to some of them, and then third floors, and then fourth floors, and so one, and at some point the multi-level cottages became interconnected by walkways and tunnels, andl the whole thing became so heavy that it sank to the ground, and some of the first floor cottages are now cracked and halfway buried. Giliys and Theo (and now Qweck) live on the top floor, at the top of a rickety wooden staircase that looks half-rotted, which makes you think the landlord may have decided to rent to them because smallfolk bodies are light enough not to fall through. Probably.

Giliys doesn’t seem to notice the stairs could break at any time. His body bounds up them, two at a time, barrelling through the apartment door (does it not have a lock?) shouting “Thay! Thay! Thay! You’re not gonna fucking believe this, she’s–” His voice cuts off abruptly. “Thay?”

Your body climbs the last steps and sees Giliys’s body standing still as a statue just past the doorway. Your body looks past Giliys’s into the apartment. 

There’s nobody here.

[offsidekineticist]

△ Theo (bleachling specifically), if you could have 5 minutes of time to speak to your brother again without any other distractions or interference and he HAD to listen. What would you say to him?

Under a cut because this is like 11/10 so CW: panic attack and self-harm (intentionally aggravating an old injury as a response to anxiety)

He freezes. His expression, previously warm, goes mostly blank. Mostly, except for the ways his eyes widen and his stone gray flesh turns ashy. He opens and closes his mouth several times, and you realize he's trying to speak but nothing is coming out.

"Please...don't make me answer that," he finally chokes out, trying to hold a stoic expression but shaking nonetheless.

"You must answer. Those are the terms," the Questioner says. Theoven wraps his arms around his chest, hands tucked between his side and his arm less carefully than you would have expected, the shaking persisting.

"I...I don't think I'd be able to speak," he says, voice unsteady. "Does - does that answer the question? Please, I swear, every time I saw him - or the thing that seemed like him - in that place, I couldn't - it wouldn't - " he stops himself, and you see his shoulders bobbing up and down with every breath, each breath coming more quickly than the last. He nods in a hollow imitation of confidence. "Yes, that is my answer. I wouldn't be able to speak."

"'Without any other distractions or interference,'" the Questioner repeats. "Loss of the ability to speak would inarguably be a distraction."

"I don't want to see him!" Theoven barely gets the words out through the sob he cant hold back any longer, and now his cheeks are darkening again, and he squeezes his eyes shut trying to clear the tears. He slouches, curling in on himself, arms held so rigidly against his body that his hands must hurt terribly, and you can tell the only reason he doesnt curl up into a fetal position is theres no room for it at the table where he's seated. "I don't want to know - if he was there, I don't want to know! I don't want to hear him tell me why he - how he - I don't want to remember him like that!" His sobs are more violent now, racking his body as he struggles for breath. His breaths are sharp and loud and fast, each one sounding almost like the bark of a sick dog.

The Questioner waits.

It takes time, but slowly - painfully slowly - the sobs die down, becoming more like hiccups. They slow, coming less and less often, until he is breathing normally again.

"I would ask him to leave," Theoven finally says softly, head bowed as he stares at his lap, arms still pressing his hands painfully into his side. "I'm sorry. I know that...if he wasn't...wasn't there, there are things he deserves to hear me say but - I don't think I can say them anymore. And if he was there - " he stops. "He hated spiders. Loved chess. Every brawl I ever lost, he was there with a stern, rambling lecture and enough potions that my mentors at the library never noticed an injury. I should be allowed to remember him like that. I shouldn't have to remember - " he stops and slightly shakes his head before whispering, "I would ask him to leave."

The Questioner is satisfied.

[offsidekineticist]

Been thinking about this one again. There's always been a universe where Theo's daughter Qweck becomes a hellknight herself. I think in that universe Theo would send Qweck off with reassurance that he loves her and is proud of her for following her calling, even if it takes her away from him. He'd probably tell her about his brother, and Qweck would ask him if there's anything he'd like her to tell Regill if she ever runs into him. And while I don't know that Theo could bring himself to speak to Regill directly, he does have things he wants to tell his brother.

This is what I think he'd say:

He takes a moment, and you know he’s choosing his words, making sure he says exactly what he means and nothing else. “Tell him that I love him, and I’m sorry,” he says hoarsely. “Tell him I should have sent him off as I send you off now. And tell him…if he was there…if he was at Rivad…tell him that he broke me. But there is life after breaking. And I have nothing left to dread.”

[offsidekineticist]

Whaaaaaaah? Two chapters in 1 month?!

Yeah so that 1 chapter I was agonizing over for months, the one I said was actually 2 chapters? Turns out it's actually gonna be 3 chapters.

This is how "oh this will be a five part arc, probably" turned into...*waves arms in general direction of everything.*

Heads up that there are some unusual CWs on this one, so I will make sure to put a summary of this chapter at the start of the next one if anyone needs to skip.

In the meantime, enjoy another Qweck POV!

CW: body horror, graphic burns and wounds, medical gibberish (I'm not a doctor) and medical horror, referenced mass casualty incident and serial killing

Yet Perfect

You have no time, and people are about to die. Your rage slips away, replaced with a cool calmness. You need to act quickly, efficiently, decisively. You need a plan. A checklist. 

Item One: Evacuate the building.

“FIRE!” you shout as you bolt out of the store-room. “FIRE!”

The entire shop–from customers to employees–stares at you for a moment. Then they register what you just said. Some customers head for the door, others start demanding answers, questioning whether the alarm is real.

You rush to Mori and grab her by both shoulders. “There is a fire in the back and it’s going to explode. You need to get everyone out now.”

She stares at you with wide eyes before nodding shakily and climbing onto the counter. She puts two fingers in her mouth and silences the room with a loud, shrill whistle. “Alright, folks, shop’s closed on account of it being about to explode! Please proceed to the nearest exit in an orderly fashion!”

She didn’t even finish speaking before people started rushing for the nearest exit–which wasn’t always the door. The shop was filled with the sound of breaking glass as people fled the building. Not ideal, but at least people were getting away.

“Where’s Laria?” Mori asks. Right. Laria is upstairs.

“I’ll get her. You get out of here, we’ll be right behind you.”

“Is there time for that?”

No. “There has to be. Now go. If this goes bad, the others will need someone to look after them, and you’re the only one with any sense.”

Hopefully that will be enough to convince her to leave. You don’t have time to save her if it isn’t.

You rush back to the store room. To your surprise, Laria is already there, standing over Giliys who is now laying on his back, burned hands at his side while he struggles not to scream.

“Mori is evacuating the customers,” you tell Laria. “You should get out of here. I don’t think I’ll be able to snap him out of it.”

Laria has been warned. You can’t save her if she won’t save herself. You register that she says something to you, but you don’t pay attention. You need to move onto the next item in the checklist.

Item Two: Evaluate the situation. 

This task is trickier than you’d think. Giliys is sure he knows what’s happening, but this is not what happened the last time you saw Giliys lose control. You kneel by Giliys’s side, his jewel encrusted dagger still in your hand. “Giliys, I’m going to cut off your shirt. I need to see what’s happening.”

“Go…please….”

Yes, Giliys, refusing freely offered aid when you’re about to burn down the city is sooooo heroic. We will all stand solemnly in the ashes and weep at your funeral at how selfless and good you were and how blind we were to have never seen it and then we’ll build a fucking statue, you fucking over dramatic piece of–

“I can’t. I have a duty of care,” you say before slicing through his shirt to expose–

“What the fuck?!” Laria demands, and you have to agree. Under the burning skin, there’s a strange glowing bulge growing out of his chest, like something is trying to force its way out. Given the heat and your burned arm (which still smarts), this is likely the source of the fire burning Giliys’s flesh, and you won’t be able to put the fire out as long as the thing is in his chest.

You still don’t understand what’s happening, but you understand enough. Item complete. Time to move on.

Item Three: Get that thing out of his chest.

“Giliys, whatever that is, it needs to come out now. Do I have your permission?”

“Abso-fucking-lutely not,” he croaks. “Go. Away. Thay…Thay needs–”

Oh, now you care about what my father needs? Not when you made him accomplice to a serial killer, or when you told him about it, or when you jumped straight to “manipulate his daughter into violating her beliefs and murdering me” to solve your problems, but now that it lets you escape the fucking consequences of your fucking actions, now you–

“I have a duty of care,” you repeat a bit more sharply than before. “Do I have your permission, or do I have to sit here and watch you burn to death?”

“Fuck you.” He grunts in pain–a long primal sound–letting his head fall to the floor with his eyes squeezed shut. “Fine!” he shouts. He’s barely finished before you’ve drawn blade over glowing flesh, cutting an exit for the thing within.

Or rather…you tried to cut an exit for the thing within. Melting flesh seals itself shut as quickly as the knife slips through it. It takes a moment for you to understand what happened, and when you do, you are livid.

The dagger–the one Giliys asked you to use to kill him–is a dagger of healing. You’ve heard of such things, but you didn’t think they actually existed. There are cheaper and easier ways to avoid accidental injury from ornamental weapons–keep the blade dull; don’t remove it from the display case; commission a tastelessly ostentatious scabbard for it; do literally anything but spend exorbitant amounts of money on creating something as pointless as a dagger of fucking healing!

I swear on every deity, Giliys, if you fucking knew this dagger wouldn’t kill you and this is all some sort of sick test–

The burning flesh around the glowing core melts away like wax. Something blindingly bright shoots out of his chest into the air, heating the room like an oven, screaming like a chorus of a thousand discordant voices. And then they speak, not quite as one–

“HOME!”

There’s a bright flash and blast of heat–and then silence. It is gone, but your ears are ringing and you can barely see after that flash, but you need to act quickly. You don’t hear yourself cast the spell to stabilize him–you don’t have time to wait until you can see. Whatever power was keeping him alive through that ordeal is almost certainly gone. You have seconds to cast the spell before he’s beyond help.

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

You can’t see if the spell has taken, and your ears still ring, but the heat and the stench tell you that he is still burning. You take off your outer tunic and throw it over where you know the fire is. You find his body with your hands and roll him over, chest down, in a bid to smother the fire. 

The ringing fades. The world pokes through the cracks between the blackspots in your vision. You don’t see any more fire. There’s a good chance it will start again once you turn him back over, but you don’t have time to wait to heal him. You whisper a quick spell to protect yourself from the fire–it should keep your burns mild.

Item Four: Save Giliys’s life.

You turn him onto his back. There are still motes of smoke and tiny glowing specks, but for the moment the fire is mostly gone. His eyes, still open, are back to their usual green–the fire is gone. Whatever just happened, it’s over now.

You’ve never seen burns like the ones in Giliys’s chest. Some flesh has melted. Some has charred. The biggest problem is his heart. It is exposed and blistered and charred and barely still beating, spurting blood with every beat.

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

You’re going to have to stabilize him constantly until you can heal him. The problem is that a healing spell would seal his chest shut, but you’re certain it would not heal his heart. Your spells only accelerate the body’s natural healing, and the heart’s ability to heal itself is extremely limited. You would need to use spells that go beyond the body’s natural ability to heal, and those are well outside your power.

That’s it. You can’t fix this. It’s over. He’s about to die, and you’ll be alone with Theo, and Theo will not survive this and–

You’re panicking. Stop panicking. Don’t worry about your father. That’s task five. Or–six? It depends on how this task goes. So focus on the now, on the smell of blood and the sting of your burn and the sound of your heart in your ears. 

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

Think. Start at the beginning. What is the problem?

The problem is that your spells can’t fix the hole in Giliys’s heart.

Is there something else that could?

Maybe…could you stitch it shut? Not like stitches–the hole is too wide for that–but almost like darning a sock? Weaving the thread you use for stitches into a patch over his heart? Yes, that might work. It won’t perfectly patch the hole, but it will be enough that scar tissue could form over it and seal it. In theory. It’s a longshot, but it’s his only chance.

“Laria,” you call, because for some reason she is still here, “my black bag is by my bed. I need it now.” 

“Why?” she asks. You look up at her, not bothering to hide how utterly inane you think that question is. “You’re trying to save him?” She sounds surprised, but you don’t have time to puzzle out why.

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

“We don’t have time to talk. Get the bag.”

“Qweck,” Laria says with an edge to her voice, “Giliys is the target of a city-wide manhunt. He knows everything about the Kintargo Bellflowers because he helped me set it up. If they catch him, and he sells us out for leniency, we are done.”

The hair on your neck stands on end at that. “He wouldn’t,” you say. You’re not sure if you believe it, but you need her to stop talking and get the damn bag.

“Like he wouldn’t kill his crops for whatever just came out of his chest?” 

Oh. Oh no.

“You were eavesdropping.”

Laria rolls her eyes. “You don’t get to be an experienced tiller by being polite, Qweck.” You’re fairly sure Giliys told you something like that once, though he used a lot more profanity. “He is a serial killer who threatens our entire operation and everyone that depends on it. Let him go.”

Something that’s been out of place for a long time–since you got the letter about your father’s arrest–clicks back into place. Ever since that letter, you’ve been abandoning duties: your duty to your faith; your duty to Cheliax; your duty to the resistance; your duty to your father. This is the last duty left. Your healer’s oath is the one singular duty you have not yet abandoned in your selfishness.

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

Item Four, Sub-Item A: Protect Giliys from Laria.

You stand up. You are almost a head taller than Laria, and you draw yourself to your full height, looking down on her as you speak. “I took an oath. If you want him dead, you’ll have to do it yourself–and go through me to do it.”

You can see the cogs turning in her head as she calculates whether she can draw a hidden dagger and strike before you can grapple her. You count down the seconds–you can probably go for around twenty seconds without stabilizing your patient, though that would be cutting it close. Does she know that? Is she going to try to wait it out and attack when you’re distracted by your duty?

The door swings open. Laria jumps and reaches for her dagger, but stays her hand when she sees the intruder.

“There you are!” Mori exclaims. “I got worried when you didn’t come out–what are you waiting for? You said the place was going to explode!”

“The situation has been resolved,” you say, returning to your patient's side. “Now I’m performing emergency surgery. There’s a black bag next to my bed. I need it.”

“Oooookay?” There’s a brief pause. “Oh! Yes! I can get that!” Mori rushes past you and Laria and clambers up the ladder through the open trap door to the living quarters above the shop.

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

“You just had to drag her into this,” Laria hisses.

“She dragged herself into this. Do you really think someone who ran into a building that was supposed to explode is going to step aside if you try to kill a dying man? Or were you planning to walk all over her, make her forget she’s free so she’ll stand aside for her new master?”

Laria’s eyes flash, and her jaw sets, her body shaking with rage. “I’m going to help the search parties looking for the missing from this morning’s massacre. By the time I come back, I want you and your things and your pet serial killer gone. And you can tell him that the day I see him again is the day his victims get justice.”

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

Item Four, Sub-Item B: Successfully Perform Extremely Experimental and Unsanctioned Surgery.

Mori slides down the ladder with your bag balanced on her arms just as the door closes behind Laria.

"Uh...here you go!" she says with false cheer, putting the bag down next to you before taking a step back. She looks down at Giliys and turns pale, covering her mouth.

You realize as you glance at your bag that you won’t be able to perform the procedure while keeping him stable. The spell takes too much concentration for you to manage sewing up a heart that’s still beating. You need an assistant.

There’s a retching sound, and then the sound of liquid hitting the floor and the acrid stench of bile. “Sorry,” Mori says weakly, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “I'm not great with blood.”

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

“I need your help,” you say. Mori recoils, eyes wide.

“Me?! But…I don’t know anything about healing!”

“You know how to darn socks?” 

“Well, yeah, of course I know how to darn socks, but what does–”

“That’s all there is to it. He has a hole in his heart. I need to keep casting the spell to keep him stable. I need you to patch it.”

“You want me to darn his heart?!”

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

“It’s a lot to ask, I know–”

“Why is it so important to you to keep him alive?! I heard what Laria said before–not all of it, but enough! If he’s really a serial killer, and it’s so hard to save him, why not just let him die?”

For the love of–is there no such thing as privacy in this building?!

“Because I swore an oath,” you snap, dropping Giliys's dagger and opening your black bag, because apparently you’re going to have to do this yourself because nobody in this damn city knows how to mind their own damn business. “Unlike you, I don’t get to pick who’s worth saving. I just heal.”

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect. 

You start rummaging through your bag with one hand, desperate to find the spool of thread before it’s time to cast again.

Something touches you. You look up. Mori, face ashy, nervously biting her lip, has laid her hand on your arm. “I’ve got it,” she says, and she gently takes your hand out of the bag before looking through it herself with shaking hands. She takes out a spool of thread. “Is this what you were looking for?”

Why is she...? “Yes."

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

“Where are the needles?” she asks.

You don’t have needles in the bag. There’s a spell, usually used as a weapon, that creates needles out of a piece of metal. You usually use the spell to create your needles out of a piece of jewelry if you need to suture a wound–it’s rare for a wound to require sutures before magical healing, so you don’t need it much, and you’re less likely to prick your fingers while digging around in your bag.

But you don’t have any jewelry. You sold it all when you arrived in Kintargo to pay for the apartment.

What other metal is there? You look around the room–

There, on the floor: Giliys’s dagger.

His healing dagger.

You pick up the dagger and focus on it. The blade warps and breaks away from the hilt, splitting into three needles of healing. You grab the needles out of the air before passing them to Mori. “There. They’ll heal whatever they pierce, so if you nick something you’re not supposed to, it will heal itself.”

“O-oh. Good.”

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” Mori says softly. “I just…I got the bag and got to the ladder, and it seemed like a bad time, so…I waited until she left.”

You would usually be furious at someone delaying emergency medical care out of politeness, but you can't afford to lose focus right now. “It’s alright, Mori. You deserved to know who you’re doing this for.”

“I’m not doing it for him. I think Laria…well, she’s not right, but she has a point. And I think this plan is so crazy that nobody would blame you for giving up on him.” She sits down across from you, on Giliys’s left side, wincing in disgust at all the blood. “But if you say this is what you swore to do, then I’ll help you keep your oath.” She stares down at his burned and bloodied heart and wobbles unsteadily. “J-just as soon as the room stops moving.”

May the Master of Masters hold back death, that time may this one yet perfect.

[owlcatober]

Owlcatober 2024

Welcome to our fourth year of Owlcatober, where we celebrate the Owlcat CRPGs during the month of October!

Do as many or as few prompts as you’d like, in whatever order you want, for Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, Warhammer 40,0000: Rogue Trader, or any of theirs dlcs! Writing, art, music, whatever creative endeavor the prompts inspire!

Please place spicy or potentially triggering content under a Read More. For your post to get reblogged, tag @owlcatober, or #owlcatober 2024. There’s also an “Owlcatober (Pathfinder)” tag on AO3! If your post hasn’t been reblogged in 24 hours, please message this blog to make sure it hasn’t been lost.

And without further ado, the prompts!

Teatime

Fake Names

Shelter

Aim and Fire

Forgiveness

Alone

Lamplight

Archetype

Haggling

Second Chances

Medals

Home

Another World

Scratch

Flying

Invisible

Parents

Compromise

Duty

Honor

Dance

Sweets

Alternate Universe

Footsteps

Smooth

Records

Portrait

Fireworks

Sleep

Wedding

Funeral

[offsidekineticist]

I'M BACK!

This chapter took forever to figure out. Turns out the pacing was off, and what I figured would be 1 chapter is actually going to be closer to 2 or 3 chapters. Which is frustrating cuz it really feels like the fic just keeps adding chapters to itself at least as quickly as I can write them.

ANYWAY. Time for More Feelings! And Qweck being Absolutely Done with her customer service job.

Previous chapter (part 16) here

CW: Suicidal behavior and ideation; references to burning to death; burns; body horror

Nobody Is Always Right

"Yeah, so, would it be possible to get the Laria's Latte with no milk? And no caffeine?"

You take one of the ceramic cups on the counter and hand it to him. "Yes. Here."

"Oh...do I go fill it somewhere?"

"You wanted a latte with no milk or caffeine, right?"

"Yeah."

"There you go. NEXT!"

"Wait - I never actually ordered - "

"Sir, you have been served. If you want something else, please go to the back of the line."

"Whatever happened to 'the customer is always right?'"

"It was a lie. Nobody is always right, and you're old enough to learn that."

Usually this is where Mori, the brown-eyed girl from Corentyn who came in with a crop a few days after you arrived, would slide in between you and the countertop with a fabricated excuse for you to go back to the store-room while she smoothed things over with the customer. You would pretend to be torn about leaving someone so newly freed to handle the customers alone before acquiescing. By the time you returned, you’d have calmed down, and the problem customer would be gone.

Usually.

Today, though, Mori is desperately avoiding your gaze. All of your coworkers are desperately avoiding your gaze. They barely speak, and when they do it is only what is purely necessary. No niceties, no small talk, no jokes–just the bare necessities. And it’s not even your fault.

He took her in, raised her on his own, and she has nothing but contempt for him–and so she started pouring poison in your ear and you just believed her?!

The trap door to the dormitories above the shop was still open when Giliys arrived last night, and he was loud. Everyone in the building heard what he had to say.

But of course you did–she’s a pretty face, isn't she? She's someone new and exciting and we both know you–

So now, instead of bailing you out, Mori is very deliberately looking through the beans and blends under the counter, even though you don’t need any, while you are having the worst self-control day you’ve had since you were an initiate at the cloister in Ostenso.

You don’t know what exactly has caused their alienation–are they embarrassed at having heard that? Are they upset because they believe what he said about you and Laria? Are they jealous that you have a “father” you don’t supposedly don’t appreciate? You don’t know. Nobody will tell you.

“Where is your manager? I want to talk to her!”

“You’re talking to her.”

“What about Laria?”

“She’s out sick today.”

Laria came downstairs before sunrise to open the shop, only to find ash covered streets swarming with guards. She went back to her room after that, leaving you in charge to “keep the customers from walking all over” the newly freed employees. The others think Laria is just really upset about all the people who are missing or dead. You know better. You don’t know the nature of her relationship with Giliys, but she seemed surprisingly fond of him. You wonder if she still is, now that you’re sure she knows what he is.

“Well, then,” the customer–a dark haired youth, almost certainly a student–takes a moment to recover his equilibrium. “I’ll be back when she’s better to lodge a formal complaint! You have no idea how much trouble you’re in, Miss, I–”

“PRINCESS!”

The entire cafe seems to turn to look at the harried halfling running through the door. 

“What are you doing here?” you hiss.

“Look, it doesn’t matter. I have to talk to you now. It’s an emergency.”

You feel your face cool. “What happened? Where’s Theo?”

“What? No, Thay’s fine–it has to do with–y’know–remember at Rivad? The part I don’t remember?”

“Excuse me! I am still here!” the customer exclaims. You throw a wet dish towel in his face before turning to Mori.

“You take care of the customers, I have to deal with this.”

“You’re just leaving?!” Mori asks–the first thing she’s said to you today.

"How dare you!" The customer shrieks, his voice cracking. You ignore him.

“Yes. Is that a problem?” You don’t mean to glare at her, but you must have given how she seems to shrink into herself.

“N-no. Sorry,” she mumbles, and you know you’re going to catch hell for this later from Laria, but you don’t care.

You walk out from behind the counter, grab Giliys by the arm, and drag him into one of the backrooms of the coffeehouse, ignoring the brat's entitled spluttering. You do not slam the door behind you. You push it closed with exactly the appropriate amount of force for the situation. 

“The fire in the Villegre. That was you,” you say, skipping pleasantries. “It happened again.”

He squeezes his eyes shut and nods. “Yeah.”

That fucking bastard. You pick up the first thing you can grab–an apple–and hurl it at the wall with a roar. “I should have killed you at Rivad,” you snarl.

“Yes,” he agrees. “You can kill me now, instead.”

“Don’t tempt me,” you snap.

“I’m not tempting. I’m asking.”

Your body feels like ice. “What?”

He closes his eyes with a deep breath, and you are suddenly struck by how exhausted he looks. “I can’t stop her. Next time she comes out, I won’t come back. So we can’t give her the chance.” He flicks his wrist, and an ornamental dagger slides out of his sleeve into his hand. He holds it out to you, pommel first, tip angled towards him. “She’s weak from what she did this morning. If you’re quick, she won’t stop you. When it’s done, get rid of the body–make sure nobody will ever find it again. She’s trapped in a gem in my chest. Nobody can be allowed to find it again. She’s too strong now. My fault for feeding her.”

This–he–what?

“What about Theo?” you ask, suddenly remembering why you are so glad you didn’t kill Giliys at Rivad. “You’re going to leave me to deal with him alone?”

His exhaustion shifts to regret. “I’m sorry. If I had a choice–”

“You did have a choice!” you snap. “You had a choice when you decided to let a monster live in a gem in your chest!”

“I know.” He takes a deep breath. “Please, Qweck. I don’t know I’ll be able to do it by myself.”

He never calls you Qweck. He also never begs.

Another thought strikes you. “What does Theo think of this?”

His jaw sets. “Just take the fucking dagger, Qweck.”

“Does he even know?”

“Please–”

“It would kill him to lose you, you know that, right?”

“He hates me!” Giliys exclaims. “He just forgot. I confused him–he’s not himself. It’ll be better once I’m gone.”

“He could never hate you! I don’t know why you keep saying he does, but he doesn’t, so if you actually care for him, you’ll find another way to–”

“I fed her some of my crops.”

For a moment you wonder with confusion when Giliys was ever a farmer, and why plants would satisfy a creature that fed on souls. You know what the word ‘crops’ means to a Bellflower tiller, but no tiller would ever think of doing what Giliys just said he had done.

And yet, as you stare at him in dawning horror that you’re sure is visible on your face, he holds your gaze with something like defiance. “I had to feed her souls to keep her from taking over. So every so often–when she got hungry–I would pick out someone from my crops. Someone alone, who had no one waiting for them. Someone that no one would miss. I’d say I had a place in the city and invite them to stay with me while they got their feet under them. They always said yes. Always so happy to finally have a friend. I’d take them down a back alley and….” He stops, still looking you in the eye. “They’d always try to scream. It was always too late by then, but they’d try. Hellfire burns fast. It never took long. Just long enough for them to realize. And then they’d be gone. No soul, no body, just a pile of ashes that I’d spread out to be less obvious. And then I’d go back to Cheliax, to Brastlewark, and Thay would see there was something wrong, realize I’d ‘lost’ one, and he’d fuss over how my clothes were wet and muddy, and he’d give me some of his to wear while my clothes dried out, and I’d pretend not to notice they were much too big for him and nothing like what his normal clothes, and he’d give me cocoa and tell me stories about the kids at his library until dawn, and by the time I left, I’d feel ok. Every time I felt her hunger and felt like this time I couldn’t do it, I’d remember that he’d be there when I was done. And it would be enough.”

You’re shaking now, and you don’t know if it’s rage or shock or cold or all of it. “Does he know?” you ask, voice low with anger.

He nods. Oh, gods, he nods. “He told me he’d kill me if he ever saw me again. And then you called me to get him out of Rivad.”

Theo knows. He used Theo to carry him through damning innocents, and he let him find out. 

You’ve known Giliys for decades, worked with him, even vouched for him on occasion. You’ve known from the beginning that he was a murderer, that he subsisted off of a combination of paid assassinations and corpse robbing, but you let it go because he was dedicated to the cause–or so you thought. You shouldn't have. You should have realized–how did you not realize–

But what you’re feeling right now can’t possibly compare to what your father felt when he realized. To care so deeply for another for years, only to discover that he was a monster who used your affection to motivate his atrocities–it would be heartbreaking. The confusion and uncertainty–wondering if you had ever known him at all, if he had ever returned your affections or cared about you beyond your ability to comfort him when his conscience woke. Asking yourself how he fooled you for so long–how you could have possibly loved that–

It was a betrayal that would destroy anyone. How had it not destroyed your father?

Maybe it did, and you just never noticed. 

There’s no thought in your movement. You have barely realized you’ve taken the dagger from him before you have him pressed against the wall, golden blade bared against his throat.

“You son of a bitch,” you growl through grit teeth. You feel his body relax, and that only adds fire to your rage–does he think you won’t hurt him? Does he think your healer’s oaths will keep him safe? That your self-control and discipline will hold you back from giving him what he deserves?

No. He knows they won’t.

This is why he told you. He told you so it would be easy to kill him. So that even if it would break your oaths, you’d kill him in a fit of rage. And it almost worked.

What is wrong with you??

You are a child of Irori on the path to perfection. You should be above this. You should be above snapping at customers. You should be above lashing out at Corvinius. You should be above abandoning your father to the monster who used him.

The bastard must see the rage clearing from your eyes, because his face hardens. “Do it,” he hisses. “Just fucking do it! I deserve it–you know I do–just–”

You need to think. You need everything to stop so you can think and figure out what to do–if killing him is right or if you just feel like it is because you’re angry or–

Pain.

You hiss in pain as you recoil, practically jumping backwards, away from Giliys. You look down at your left arm–the one that had been barred against his chest to hold him in place–and find an ugly burn on the side of your forearm. You hear a strangled cry, and when you look up at Giliys, face twisted in pain as he gasps for breath and claws at his chest.

His chest which is now glowing through his smoldering shirt.

All else forgotten, you move to help him. “What–”

“No–get back! Get back!” he croaks, left hand shooting towards you to push you back if you come too close, right hand continuing to claw at his chest, heedless of the flames and growing burns.

“You’re–”

“What is going–” Your words die as he raises his eyes to meet yours–green eyes ringed with hellfire. You know the answer before he says it.

“Get everyone out. Out. Out now!” he pants.

“We’re too late. She’s back.”

[jean-dieu]

Pathfinder : Wrath of the Righteous, an Ask Game for your Knight-Commander

Hello fellow crusaders! Here's a little ask game that is specifically aimed at your Knight Commander from Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous. Have fun!

Do they think they're going to make it out alive?

How do they feel about Areelu Vorlesh?

Who is/are their best friend(s) among companions and why?

What did they do before they became a crusader? Did they have a job, an occupation?

Do they have a family? If so, what kind? Do they miss them? Do they still have hope to see them again?

Which mythic path did they choose and why? Do they regret it?

Is your KC religious? If yes, which deity do they follow? If not, what is their view on religion?

What do they desire the most?

Do they have hobbies beside the crusade? Any passions or skills they have?

What would be the meal that give them a little ability bonus?

For martial KCs, favorite weapon? For spellcasters, favorite spell?

What is their alignment, and why? How do they feel about it? Do they change alignment at one point?

What is their biggest regret regarding their time as the KC?

Which companion is their closest friend?

Which companion do they hate/really don't like?

If applicable, who did they romance and why? If no one, why?

Which non-companion NPC do they really like?

If they survived, what is their life post crusade?

How did they feel during their time in the Abyss?

Which event of the crusade traumatized them?

Did they actually like something about being the KC?

Who was their favorite advisor during crusade council?

Where did they get their name from? Family, themselves? Does their name have a particular meaning?

Where do they come from in Golarion? Do they miss their homeland? How do they feel about their homeland, its politics and current state?

How did they welcome the physical change that came with their mythic powers? Did they embrace it/reject it?

Did they separate from any companions? Why? (Consider killing a companion too for this question)

Favorite animal companion?

Would they be a companion instead of the KC? What would their storyline and personal quest be?

What would their domains be after a potential ascension?

Did they chose to take the crossbow or the scroll to run away from Deskari right at the begining?

[theheartmold]

if you’d like to help support me this pride month this is my ko-fi btw. I fear my job may be gearing up to fire me in relation to my disabilities

[offsidekineticist]

❛ i don’t think i’ve ever seen you smile. ❜ for anyone :3

Hey Arrow! Gonna take a peek into the timeline where Theoven never leaves Cheliax for this one, so we can take a look inside Giliys's messed up little brain before the two get together.

Prompt from this post.

You are a fucking idiot. This isn't news to you, but it's especially relevant right now, when you realize you're feeling angrier than usual because you've never seen your best friend - the guy you are stupidly in love with, no matter how much you tell yourself it'll never fucking happen - crack a smile.

There are a lot of emotions you've never seen on Thay's face, on account of him being a bleachling and just not emoting all that much at all. Rage. Despair. Disgust. You've seen him pleased, but that wasn't worth a smile to Thay - when he's pleased, his face is relaxed, and his chin bobs in this quick short nod.

(You live for those fucking nods, cuz you're a fucking moron)

And you've seen him laugh - well, laugh by Thay standards. Your sense of humor is as warped as the rest you, but for some fucking reason, Thay finds you funny, and when he does, you get a Thay laugh - a short but audible exhale through his nose.

(Those weird little breaths make your day. Like a fucking idiot)

The thing is, you know he fakes it for other people. Other people find his lack of expression "creepy." Because they're stupid. The fact he doesn't bother with that when he's talking to you is a sign of trust, and you treasure that, by Thamir you do -

But you want to see what your friend looks like when experiencing pure joy. No, that ain't it. You want to cause him pure joy. You want to see him smile and know it's because of you.

Here's the part that makes you an idiot: he handed you the opportunity to do that years ago, and you said no.

It was a few months after you first met. You were passing through Brastlewark, so you stopped by the library to say hi, and he asked if you'd like to get dinner together sometime. And you wanted to say yes, because Thay's smart and kind and cute and funny and so far outta your league, and you'd already started daydreaming about his wispy white hair and charcoal gray eyes, and also he'd probably insist on paying because he's the one with a job, and you never say no to free food just on principle -

But getting that close would mean telling him about the Thing, and you know he'd hate you forever the moment he learned about the Thing. Better to just stay friends.

That left you a dilemma: how to turn him down? Cuz you can't say "sorry, can't, cuz then I'd have to tell you the truth about how absolutely shit I am as a person, and you'd never want to see me again." But you also don't want to give him the impression that he's somehow failed to meet your standards (cuz you don't have standards, but if you did he'd have outdone them a hundred times over). But you also -

"I'm straight." Sweet Silent Blade why did you pick that lie?!

It did the trick, of course. He nodded, but with a little crease between his eyebrows (that's his "accepting disappointing news" face) and thanked you for "your forthrightness." Because what else was he going to say? "No you're not"?? Sure, you could think of a few people you'd met who might say that, but not Thay. Even if he suspected you lied, he'd have the good sense to realize you were trying to let him down easy.

You don't regret it, not exactly. Well, you do, but you don't see what else you could've done without telling him about the Thing. But it seems like the longer you know him, the more you wish you could've just gone to dinner with him. Sometimes you think about just asking him out - but even if it was acceptable to do that without discussing the Thing (it's not), it's been years. He's definitely over you by now. Probably wonders what he ever saw in you in the first place, cuz even without the Thing, you're a pretty twisted motherfucker.

But that doesn't change the fact that you love him - or as close to love as your warped heart can manage. Doesn't change the fact that you want to bring him joy.

"You know," you say casually one day, "I don't think I've ever seen you smile."

Thay looks at you with a blank expression. "Well, I must keep some secrets, or you'll grow bored of me."

It's a joke, you're pretty sure - he's rarely completely expressionless, but he is as he delivers his line. It's also the only answer you get, and for the millionth time you wish you could've just said yes.

[offsidekineticist]

In a camp dialog with Camellia, Regill basically says that he was so badly hazed as an armiger that he considered it a worse test than his actual Test to become a hellknight.

And the thing is in their last fight, Theo basically predicted that. He said the hellknights would never respect or accept Regill, and that Regill was abandoning his home to become (at best) the hellknights' gnome mascot.

So l picture baby Regill moving through armiger training, mocked and bullied relentlessly, with those words echoing in his ears, and whenever he thinks about just giving up and leaving, he reminds himself: you have nowhere to go. You can't go home. You can't go slinking back to your brother and admit he was right.

And when he thinks about just giving up and accepting the abuse of his peers instead of pushing forward and asserting his right to succeed, or even just settling for mediocrity, he reminds himself: you are no one's mascot. You can't settle for being less-than, for being the butt of everyone's jokes, because that would prove Theo was right.

And when he thinks about just giving up and swallowing his pride and reaching out to Theo and seeing if they can't patch things up, he reminds himself: you would not have the resolve to persist if you had a home and family to return to. Family will make you weak. You are going to be a hellknight, and hellknights need no home. Hellknights need no family. You have your duty. That is enough.

(This is how Armiger Regill Derenge finds himself in the postmaster's office, asking that any mail to him from Theoven Derenge be returned to sender)

[offsidekineticist]

WIP Wednesday May 15 2024

Giliys raises the mug to his lips with shaking hands. He takes a sip, and then looks at his mug in surprise. "What the fuck - I like coffee now?!"

"It's a pumpkin spice latte!" Tilly pipes up. "I know we're not supposed to start making them for another month or so, but I don't see why we can't always - "

"What? No!" you exclaim, easily snatching the drink out of Giliys's unsteady hands. "You shouldn't be having coffee! You're recovering from shock!" You glare at Tilly. "I told you to make him an herbal tea!"

She shrinks back a little at that. "We...didn't have any...but spices are plants...and plants are herbs...so I thought...pumpkin spice?"

"And that was a brilliant fucking decision, and don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise!" Giliys exclaims. "You are a beautiful being and make drinks worthy of the gods. Fuck, I love you all."

[shabbytigers]

Petition: Do not ban transgender people from receiving care in mainstream hospital wards

The Health Secretary has said that transgender hospital patients in England may be banned from being treated in female- and male-only wards.

[onedaywellgotomars]

Also:

Petition: Do not support the Health and Equality Acts (Amendment) Bill

I am concerned that the Bill would restrict access to gender affirming care for trans children, such as hormone therapy. It would mean that

[partypuppy-nastja]

For my fellow UK residents, please sign these two petitions!

Note that it is residency, not citizenship, that counts.

If you live elsewhere, please share but do not sign, as invalid signatures can be held against the petition and get it potentially thrown out.