apa sih definisi yang sesungguhnya? yang katanya nggak bisa untuk sama satu dengan lainnya. yang katanya nggak selalu rumit, tapi kalau disebut sederhana pun nggak bisa.
makin ke sini, rasanya definisi bahagia itu makin sederhana, namun memang untuk mencapainya justru makin dirasa susah. benar nggak?
bahagia bisa tidur cepat dan bangun dengan badan bugar. sederhana, tapi ya nggak mudah. bahagia bisa makan makanan enak, tapi ya tetep aja mau makan enak juga butuh usaha dari beli dan/atau bikin. bahagia bisa punya waktu tidur siang. sederhana, tapi kesempatannya yang jarang ada.
tapi yaaa memang, semakin berkurang waktu hidup di dunia. definisi bahagia yang tadinya segambreng, mengerucut jadi hal-hal yang bisa dinikmati di sela rutinitas yang tiada henti dan memberi jeda. tapi apakah semua orang seperti itu? ya belum tentu.
masih banyak orang yang definisi bahagianya adalah hal-hal besar. tapi kemudian ada juga yang ketika hal itu terwujud justru bertanya, setelah ini apalagi? lalu kalau sampai di sini, udah nih gini aja rasanya? kok nggak bahagia-bahagia amat.
yap.
happiness itu dicari dan ditemukan.
nggak mudah tapi nggak juga selalu susah.
tapi katanya sih kuncinya hanya dua. merasa cukup dan selalu bersyukur. dengan begitu, setidaknya kita akan menghargai apa-apa yang ada di sekitar dan saat ini sedang berlangsung.
semoga ya, semoga bahagia selalu melingkupi kita. dengan cara apa pun, dengan keadaan apa pun, dengan upaya apa pun. semoga, ya!
Dragon Age Origins
Alistair vs Isolde
Alistair frets at Eamon's bedside whilst his uncle is in a coma, trying to have a moment with the complicated, so-so last ditch at a father-figure he has left... But of course, Isolde isn't going to give him the time & peace to do that.
A little one-shot to explore some of the BS Alistair grew up dealing with - especially from Isolde! Oooh this made me hate her even more.
⁘ Written for @chaos-company's Angstpril 2022, Day 9 - Unworthy ⁘
(On AO3 here)
================
"You will save him. You owe him that much."
Isolde's voice issued forth from the room’s shadows, clipped and cold even through the cloying nougat of her accent. She watched Alistair from the back of the room like a chantry sister looming and waiting to catch him in some crime. He could hear that her arms were folded, despite her standing directly behind him; the hairs on his neck could feel the expression on her face. The sensation evoked childhood memories of brandished shoes and sizable rings. Eamon always kept her decorated.
Alistair's hand tightened around his uncle’s, his jaw pressing shut as he swallowed retorts of 'It isn't that simple' or, even worse, 'Do I?'. The first went without saying, and yet no one around here seemed to be acknowledging it; the second, if uttered, would unleash a fresh Blight as surely as storming the Golden City. Some thoughts should never be opened, never be voiced.
"I know."
The air in this room had always been too heavy. The fire never stopped burning, the elves tasked with keeping it stoked day and night; it burnt now, rumbling to itself like a lurking creature, some hostile pet, or so it had always felt to Alistair as a child. It had a presence, a life of its own, belching brewing anger and oppressive heat. It made the air feel thick, the room’s weighty fabrics of proud carmines and over-zealous scarlets only amplifying the inebriation. Red layered upon red upon red, an exhibition of patriotic vanity nailing its tactless message against the terracotta of the Arldom’s famous stone. There was a fleshiness to this space - it seemed to gape and yawn and breathe, the ribs and chamber of Redcliffe in which, in his silken, overtly garnet pajamas, Arl Eamon was the failing heart.
Alistair studied the face of the waning man before him. The vibrancy of his bedsheets only exaggerated how pale he had become. For all that his uncle had never been particularly warm to him, or kind, or even fair, really, he had still been there. He had placed a roof over Alistair's head (until the woman now watching them like an Orlesian falcon had demanded he lose it), had given him education and a start in life (cushioned and cautioned always by reminders never to excel, never to apply himself or aspire). He had, at the very least, given a homeless boy food and clothing, and Alistair wasn't so self-centred as to be blind to his privilege when compared to many of his - Eamon's, Cailan's - own people.
Decency, proximity and habit demanded that he love the man; some battered survival instinct, curling and snarling around the recently healing remains of his dignity, wanted to refuse.
Yet, once again, in Eamon lay Alistair’s salvation. He was the late Queen's brother, meaning he had as much a claim to the throne as Loghain. High born, son of the Rebel Queen's and Maric's famous General; the late King Cailan's real, legitimate uncle. He was more a relative of the King than whatever the two of them had been to each other all this time.
Alistair’s eyes dropped to the man's hands. He felt unnaturally drained, relying on him this way. He needed his uncle more than ever, and almost predictably, Eamon was achieving new levels of unresponsiveness: were he not being watched so closely, Alistair would crack a dark smirk at the humour in that. We’ve finally done it . This is ‘Peak us’. “I’m proud of us, really,” he muttered to himself, dryly amused.
Unbidden, his thoughts summoned the never-distant image of Duncan. More surprising, they also conjured Maric. A boy’s version of Maric; the face from coins, the portrait on walls, the sometimes-imagined returning father, ready to tell him that the beating he was smarting from had been an injustice and a mistake, both comical and yet unforgivable. Instead, there had been Duncan, the stranger who did show up; did whisk Alistair away; did give him a purpose, a family and trust.
Seizing in a sudden spasm, Alistair’s hand gripped and locked around the frail one beneath it. His jaw clenched, head bowing abruptly, face quavering as he fought a losing battle against tears. A single, strangled bleat escaped him.
The potential widow scoffed. “Pitiful. Are you still a child demanding his mother? Whoever she was."
Alistair said nothing. His shoulders were hunched, his hand holding desperately on to the last shred of something paternal in his life. For once, unlike with the others, he had time to say goodbye. He was well-used to Isolde’s barrage chasing him from rooms, but he would not be chased from this. To have had this time with Duncan, even with Maric -
"Eamon told me who your father was, finally," she continued, needling bitterly. "I do not see it. There is nothing of Maric in you.”
“Have you tried leaving?” Alistair snapped over his shoulder, head turning part-way to her, not leaving his vigil. “Perhaps to check on your son? Make sure he’s not playing with any more maleficarum?”
“Have you tried leaving and completing this task?”, the Orlesian retorted, her composure maintained but her words loaded with a trained impersonation of dignified hysteria. It was a well-practiced skill. “Or will you only sit and weep as you watch him die?!”
“What task is that? The impossible fairytale you sent half our army chasing? Leaving our entire Arldom exposed to your son and your, frankly, truly TERRIBLE tutor-screening process?” Losing the battle, Alistair rose and whipped around, turning his back on his uncle. His voice spat as hot as the burning vomit occasionally coughed up from the fire. “What woman banishes one son to the Chantry to gargle lyrium and serve the Circle for the rest of his miserable life, but hides the other son even when he starts POSSESSING people?! ‘Oh, not the Circle - that’s a fate worse than death. We can’t send him there - he’s not Alistair. ’”
He wanted a fight. Her son - something that would hurt her. Templars and mages - something unresolvable and, even better, completely unrelated to this. True to history, she did not give him what he needed. Resolute, she stood impervious to prods that would otherwise topple her, were Eamon or Taegan here to run to the tune of her weeping.
“It is his Arldom,” she uttered, icily. “Not yours. You have a right to nothing.”
Even this room’s heat could plummet. Alistair took the bait, stepping smartly forwards, his tone as frosted over as hers. “How could I forget? I've missed you being here to remind me.”
Without any change in her expression, no performance wasted when there was no audience here of note, Isolde struck. One swift, smart motion of the hand. The sound resounded off the Redcliffe stone.
“ How dare you .” Her tongue’s sharpness, Alistair felt suddenly sure, may have been the only reason she had never bothered with a whip. “You make your uncle’s bedside a poison. How will he survive it?”
Alistair smirked, voice a barbed coo. “He’s survived you being here, hasn’t he?”
As one, the pair sensed movement in the doorway. Teagan stood, hovering, backlit as he passed over from the world of light into the darkened realm of histories of clashing psyches within.
A weight added to the scales, in Isolde’s favour. Alistair glared at her, knowing not to allow her to perform now that she had a crowd to sway. Yet, he had never quite mastered the quick exit. “- You’re right, aunt. This fool’s errand won’t complete itself. It got all of our knights killed, but SURE, let’s send Alistair, the kid we always told couldn’t put his feet in front of his arse. He’ll save us.” Smirking savagely, his voice dropped to another coo, as defensive as the last. “Why, auntie, it almost feels as though you’re starting to believe in me.”
Her expression was unmoved. “We are out of options. And your friend is capable.”
“Charming.” The Grey Warden turned to leave, looking to the air beside him as though to gather his companions. “Come on -...no-one. Let’s go.” Wearing that final indignity with defiance, he stormed towards the door.
“You can tell Eamon, if he ever wakes, that he’d better step up and save Ferelden from the bumbling moron that rescued Redcliffe. And saved his child. Oh, no, wait - that was all ‘my friend’ too, wasn't it?"
Without slowing, the discarded ward shouldered past Teagan and forged through his childhood half-way house, temper and face still burning long after he put the kiln-oven of Eamon’s bedroom behind him.
Anakin rushes into her apartment with so much force she's afraid he'll crash into a wall.
His gaze is wild and skittish, and he's shaking uncontrollably. When he looks up to meet her eyes, she sees that his own are wide and bloodshot.
"Padme." he says, straightening up somewhat.
"Anakin," she says in a cautious response. "What's happening?"
"Uh," he glances at the Temple, then back at the apartment, then at the door which he hurriedly shoves closed. "We're clear, right?"
He must really be desperate. He knows this apartment is swept for bugs nearly on the hour.
"Of course."
"The Chancellor is the Sith Lord." He sinks into a couch and keeps his gaze on the floor. "He's the Sith Lord, and he just killed all of the Council members that went to arrest him without so much as breaking a sweat."
Padme drops the comb. "What?" she says numbly.
"I ran before he could see me. I don't know if he sensed me or not."
"He's the Sith Lord?" If she had a bit less control, she would have shrieked. "The Chancellor? Sheev Palpatine?"
"Yes."
"And he killed—he killed Jedi. With a lightsaber, presumably."
"Yes."
"He declared himself Emperor. In a Senate session just now. He's the Sith Lord." She whips back around to look at him. "Where were you when he was declaring himself Emperor?"
"In the vents."
"Of course you were in the vents—he said he had a plan. To eliminate the remaining 'traitorous' Jedi."
Anakin's face, if possible, grows even paler. "He did?"
"Do you know anything about it?"
"The clones—Fives—he said they had control chips."
"Anakin, what are you going to do?" She already knows what she has to do. She, Bail, and Mon have already made their plans. It'll have to come to a Rebellion after all. She'll have to get their child out of here and somewhere safe once they're born—Naboo might be too obvious. Alderaan, maybe?
"I can—convince him," Anakin says desperately. "I'll convince him that I've joined him. That's what he wants, anyways. I'll warn the other Jedi and get them out. And when the time is right, I'll kill him and we'll never have to worry about this again."
"Anakin, he's already set everything up in stone. Even if the Emperor dies, the Empire won't die with it. He's already divided up the galaxy amongst the Moffs—he'll just become a martyr. He'll never really die." She wishes everything could be solved by killing one man. It'd make everyone's life much easier. But while they have foundations in place for the Rebellion, there's nothing there yet for what comes after. They'll have to build it from the ground up.
"Then—then I'll feed information. You and the Senators still have the alliance, right? We'll tear it down from the inside, and then we'll kill him."
She watches him closely with a pang. This might be the last time they see each other in a long, long time. "What if he doesn't believe you, then?" she says evenly. "What if he decides to kill you?"
Anakin laughs half hysterically. "Martyr me, then. I don't know. But I have to try."
Something deep within her aches. "You have to leave now, don't you." It's not a question. She already knows.
He pulls her close. "I wish we had more time."
She knows. She wishes the same.
But the galaxy is no place for such wishes anymore.
Kya idly opened her eyes. She noticed the light coming from the kitchen. “Weird,” she thought and rolled over under a soft sheet. Her hand fell on the cold side of bed when she tried to embrace her wife. She frowned and looked at the pillow laying near her hand.
“Very weird,” she whispered suspiciously and sat on the edge of the bed.
The sun was still down, the sky was dark with a little orange reflection near the horizon. The night was crisp and wet.
Kya rubbed her sleepy face and headed towards the kitchen, where the light was coming from.
“Lin?” she said more consciously. Her hoarse voice was a bit worried.
“I just wanted a cup of tea, go back to sleep, I will join you in a while,” she smiled a little.
Kya sighed. She knew Lin better than anyone. She immediately recognised the lie.
“I also wanted a cup of tea.”
Lin blinked with confusion.
“It’s the middle of the night…”
“So why aren’t you in bed then?” Kya folded her arms with tryumf.
The earthbender gave a sigh.
“Because I wanted some tea?” she raised her eyebrows. She was aware that she wouldn’t convince Kya to let her alone.
“No, Lin, you hadn’t wanted it,” she looked deep in her eyes. Lin swallowed. “You still have those nightmares, am I right?”
She nodded nearly noticeably. Kya came closer and gave her a secure hug. Lin tilted her head to the right and rested it on Kya’s arm. She didn’t notice when tears started to run down her face.
“You need to face it, Lin,” she touched her chin and forced her to look at her. “I will be waiting for you in the bed.”
Kya turned around and was about to go but Lin caught her hand.
“Please, don’t leave me.”
She said emotionlessly.
“Those nightmares… They aren’t about Amon anymore,” she took a deep breath. “They are about you. I’m scared that someday you will leave me like everybody always did. I don’t want to be alone again, Kya. I don’t want to lose you.”
Kya squinted.
“How could you even think that I would leave you,” she took her other hand and clasped their hands together.
“Let’s get back to sleep, you look like you’re going to collapse.”
SETH- “Mark, you are sensitive, caring, passionate and responsible. I love these traits in you and that is why I am giving you this rose to continue on. Will you accept?”
MARK- “Yes, most definitely, and thank you Seth for choosing me to move on.”
BROCK- “This means that Cooper is left without a rose, and will return home, but not empty handed. Congrats for coming this far, Cooper, you were a great addition to the show! And a big thanks to your sponsor, @manlysims for sharing you with us!
Cooper ended the competition with a total of 361 Points!
Only 4 points less than the third runner up, which we will see who that is momentarily...
SETH- “The next person to leave the competition is a difficult choice for me, as have all the departures. But I have really enjoyed this guy and getting to know him. He was a little mysterious in the beginning, which is a good thing, But, he finally was able to break through that wall I built, at the end. I had a whole lot of fun with him and he added so much to this competition!! But we do have to say Goodbye...”
SETH- “Owen, you were awesome, and it was so good to get to know you! You will be a success regardless of what you do in the future, and you will certainly make someone really happy. I wish I would have been able to have more time during this competition to get to know you. Hopefully we can keep in touch.”
BROCK- Owen completed the competition only 4 points ahead of Cooper, with a total of 365 POINTS!! So close guys, great competition!
Thank you @dandylion240 for such a great character!!! He was so much fun!
I plan to see both Owen and Coop in the Schrieber Legacy, so keep your eyes open!
