With each Nein Again episode, I wish more and more that we could have seen how the relationship and pressures from Nott and Molly would have developed in tandem.
Nott’s coping mechanisms for her own hangups are usually projection and an alcohol addiction. She’s quite intelligent; she has so many thoughts at all times, and when her fear ratchets up, she drinks so she can get things done. She doesn’t repress her feelings, but she questions others’ because that’s easier to do than to spiral about her own, and it’s easier to spread the judgment around than to center it entirely on herself. She has a life to go back to, and while she is stuck in circumstances where she doesn’t believe she can simply return, it’s still something she wants.
Molly opts for denial. He doesn’t know, he doesn’t care, and if someone forces him to face something, it doesn’t matter. He’s made up his mind that everything about Lucien is not and should not be something he has to deal with—unless it puts the group in danger. He only put up with Cree at Yasha’s insistence, and he couldn’t exactly cause a fuss in a crime boss’s personal hideout. Molly only told the Nein what he knows so that they could be ready if danger arises. As Taliesin said in a Talks, Molly is a celebration of the ephemeral. However, Molly also strives to exist only in that space. He doesn’t want fame, doesn’t want to be tied to anything, and he insists on having the option to cut and run, as shown with his reaction to the declaration of war in episode 18.
The most obvious example where they could have conflicted is Caleb’s backstory. We know from canon what Nott’s response was: Caleb did something horrible, but it was not his fault, he was a child, and he needs to forgive himself. Caleb pushed back on this for nearly the entire campaign, and whether he forgives himself or not, his perspective eventually shifts to recognizing that Trent Ikithon bears the brunt of the blame. Caleb also witnesses her struggle with the choice to go back to her family and when, and there’s no doubt in my mind that seeing Veth choose to adventure with the Nein impacted Caleb’s choice to destroy the T-dock. Her story was about reconciling elements from her past with her present, and Caleb eventually accepted that he is allowed to have a present life of his own.
We don’t know how Molly would have reacted to Caleb’s backstory, but it’s not a stretch to imagine that he’d say something along the lines of, “Well, that was Bren, and you’re Caleb. Don’t do it again.” And leave it at that. Nevermind that Caleb is Bren, because that would poke at Molly to consider that he and Lucien might be the same. Nevermind that Caleb wanted to do it (which is his primary hangup) because that was then and this is now, because anything otherwise suggests that Lucien might have something to do with why Molly is the way he is. Nevermind that Caleb’s memory was manipulated because that plants the idea that maybe something similar happened to Molly, and the sheer thought is terrifying. Why is Molly so skilled with swords? Why does he know things he doesn’t remember? Does it stop there, or is there more about him that actually comes from Lucien? Molly doesn’t even want to consider that, and he’s going to reject any mentality that even raises the question.
Molly would have been a character that resists Nott’s pressure in the group. He’s already been cruel to her unknowingly, but we don’t know the extent to which he would have done it once she revealed her story in Felderwin. I get the feeling he would have hated the whole arc; Nott has a kid, they’re chasing her kidnapped husband to Xhorhas, and then they’re the heroes of the Dynasty? Oh, that’s almost all his buttons. I have no doubt he’d have stuck with the group, but he’d have been anxious about it the entire way, and that would have added some delicious conflict.
Molly would have been the ongoing “We don’t have to go” voice whenever another PC was going to willingly face their backstory, which would have added more direct conversation for that PC to commit to why they’re doing it. Fjord doesn’t need to claim the last orb, but he felt he was responsible for keeping it safe from Uk’otoa. Beau doesn’t have to face her family, but she wanted to. Caleb could flee Rexxentrum instead of meeting with Trent Ikithon to see the beacon, but he accepted that he cannot run forever. We got some exposition on those regardless, but a character like Molly drags the reasoning to the forefront because he’s going to be sassy about it.
Granted, Molly could have sounded a lot like the annoying kid asking “but why?” after every answer, but Taliesin also played him as a bit of a pushover whenever someone offered up a reason. He didn’t want to deal with Cree at all, but when Yasha said she thought he should deal with it, he stayed instead of running out of the Evening Nip. He didn’t want to investigate the weird sounds in Labenda swamp, but once the group committed to saving the little bird girl, Molly ran into the fight. He didn’t want to get involved with the Scheuster kids beyond giving them some money, but once Fjord insisted on helping fellow orphans, Molly went along with it. One answer to the “why?” would have been enough, and “I felt like it” is good enough for him. He didn’t want to go deeper than that.
Nott served a similar purpose because she pushed back against the others as well. However, unlike Molly, Nott wanted to know the underlying motivation. She pushed Caleb to admit that he had grown to care for the Nein when they stayed at the inn in Shadycreek Run. Her questioning added tension to the arcs for Fjord, Jester, Yasha, and Essek.
So how would they have interacted? I could see Molly either refusing to engage with the conversations if he could avoid them or insisting that people don’t have to answer when Nott keeps asking them. But what happens when they ignore Molly and answer Nott? Would Molly have changed tactics when the other PCs decided they wanted to talk and they wanted to change? Would that have changed his perspective?
Crucially, how would he have reconciled his mentality with Yasha’s seeming betrayal? The PCs hadn’t had the time to recognize that she was under a Geas; it was a theory. Fjord and Beau believed Yasha had turned on them willingly. Jester and Caleb believed it was some kind of charm or control. Sure, Molly would have told Yasha not to chase Obann to begin with, but how can he reconcile “live in the present” with Yasha’s inevitable part in the Angel of Irons cult? He’d be clinging to that theory of mind control for his life, and the Nein went months without confirmation. Would Molly have changed his tune when Caleb insisted on meeting with the captive Volstrucker several times? Would Molly have supported Fjord’s decision to rebuke Uk’otoa when that meant the Nein had less power to rescue Yasha? Would Nott have needled him for trying to save Yasha after he likely needled others for trying to save their loved ones? Man, I’d have loved to see Nott corner Molly the way she had cornered Caleb in episode 27.
“Live in the present” is a lovely mantra—when there isn’t a past you want to return to or a past that’s chasing you. It would have been fascinating to see how that and Molly would have developed alongside Nott.