Hawke was born the (victimofaname) wrote in valloic, @ 2020-07-13 10:31:00 |
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Entry tags: | !: action/thread/log |
WHO: Anders & Hawke
WHERE: Their Apartment
WHEN: Late July 11th, following the disappearances
WHAT: Talk of the the disappearances
WARNINGS: Mentions depression, suicidal ideation, mentions of canon events of DA2
STATUS: Complete
In all truth, she hadn’t reacted well when she’d gotten the notification of the disappearances. Not as bad as it might have been, but still bad enough. Her favorite way of dealing with it (just drinking until the pain stopped) wasn’t really something she was reaching for, at least. But the anger was still there, along with the sadness and there wasn’t a great outlet for that. And she had come into a tendency to shut down a little, raise up what walls she had left.
So she hadn’t said much when she’d chucked her phone somewhere and left the apartment. Technically it was after patrol, and technically going out after dark was a terrible plan but those kinds of rational thoughts were a bit beyond her. Dealing with the harsher emotions had never been her strong suit.
It was hours later she got back. Thankfully the forest always provided distractions, and after some choice words to one of the crystals she came back. She still felt numb and distantly angry and sad and like her feathers felt a bit weak. She came in as quiet as she could and set her sword aside. She hadn’t really brought her armor, another not great move, but save a few scratches wasn’t hurt. Instead she made her way to the giant bear and collected the cat from it. He wasn’t a Mabari, and not nearly in tune with her like Dane was, but when she sat down on the long fuzzy limbs of the bear and held the cat close he at least let her do that and purred. She felt like she was back in Kirkwall, and everything was falling apart.
---
To say Vallo was complicated was akin to saying water was wet, or gravity made things fall down, but the last few days had been particularly complex. Solona's arrival had opened old wounds Anders had almost forgotten were ever there, the new researcher's refusal to give an opinion on anything had gotten under his skin, and the invasion of vicious rabbits had him run ragged collating data and patching up wounded farmers. Justice's presence had "helped", in much the way he usually "helped", but even the Spirit's uncompromising nature had had to bow to exhaustion eventually, and so he'd succumbed to sleep - and, so it transpired, to blissful ignorance of this latest batch of complications.
The sound of movement elsewhere in the apartment stirred him from his torpor, and he reached for Hawke instinctually, only to find empty, cold space. Gone for a while, then. Concerning. He shrugged on a robe, reached for his staff, coaxed a few sparks of flame to hover and illuminate the darkened room, and padded out into the apartment proper, gaze still bleary and throat still hoarse from sleep.
"... Love? Is that you? Come back to bed."
---
She hadn’t even noticed how dark it really was. It wasn’t the first time she felt helpless like this. The last years of Kirkwall had solidified that feeling in odd ways. It had been like fighting the tide. A relentless battle tinged with desperation because she knew nothing was helping. Here it was almost worse. When she heard Anders’ voice she looked up, blinking into the bits of flame. It was like a reverse, because how often had she stood, trying to coax him back to sleep.
The knowledge he could just be gone settled into her stomach. It wasn’t like before, when there had been obvious reasons and things she could fight, even if it was a tide. This was random, and as uncaring as she believed the Maker to be. She blinked and realized she was crying.
Dane would have let her hold him, but she let the cat go when he struggled. She was quiet for a moment before shaking her head. “They’re gone. And I can’t do anything” She set her head in her hands, feeling awful and knowing she wasn’t making the most of sense. “Everything is falling apart and I can’t do anything.”
---
Captain, released from Hawke’s grip, scurried to a darkened corner, and sat, fur puffed out, licking himself indignantly; Anders, meanwhile, spent those first few heartbeats in mute confusion, brain slowly joining the rest of him in the realms of ‘awake’ and ‘upright’, before the sadness in her tone galvanised him into action. He crossed the room, kneeling before her, gaze roaming to reassure himself the hurt wasn’t tied to some new injury.
“Hey. It’s alright.” Satisfied she wasn’t in the process of bleeding everywhere, he set aside his staff and set his hands carefully on hers. “Whatever’s happened, we can…. We’ll deal with it. You and me.”
----
“It isn’t alright,” there were a lot of times that she felt defeated. And mostly tired. She accepted Vallo’s weirdness with surprising grace (killer bunnies weren’t as odd as seemingly finding the giant spiders and demons pretty much everywhere) and there had been disappearances close to her before. But first it had been Varric, and now this. And she couldn’t even point at a demon and say ‘that one’s to blame’.
She curled her fingers around his, distantly aware she ought to make more sense. But his last words sank in and she gave a soft little sound. Anger and sadness, mostly. “Until it makes you leave too.” It wasn’t really fair, and she realized that. He was as annoyed at the random chance as she was. Both of them, really.
She looked up at him after a while. “Fen.” She gave still knowing she wasn’t making the most of sense. But he was incredibly clever, and she was sure he’d know what she was talking about. Or at least guess. “And Dorian.” Then she lowered her head. It wasn’t just the disappearance and what it meant it was just everything. “I can’t. I don’t know what to do.”
---
“I’m not g-”
- Justice stopped his tongue quicker than he could do it himself, the knowledge that that is not a promise we can make a cold and unwelcome weight in their shared stomach. For all his talk about not becoming content, or complacent, he had allowed himself to relax more than he should have, to trust that while things were weird and unpredictable he and Hawke would at least both be here to endure them - after all, hadn’t that vision of the future promised as much?
Except now Dorian was gone, the ritual he’d been developing would never happen, and that glorious golden promise had shattered in an instant, revealed for the lie it perhaps always had been.
Shit.
He didn’t have any answers; all he could really do was pull her that big closer, pressing a kiss to her forehead.
----
She didn’t resist when he pulled her closer, leaning into him for a long moment before wrapping her arms around him, perhaps a bit tighter then she really should. He’d been a rock and an anchor for years now, and that hadn’t really changed. Without him, she knew she’d flounder a lot more than she already was and if he disappeared she wasn’t sure how well she’d deal with it.
It wasn’t so much the promise of everything being taken away that was hitting her so hard, although that was a big part of it, it was more the sense that she could wake up without him one day and there’d be nothing she could do about it. Helplessness didn’t sit well with her, and in other circumstances she’d at least had the sense she could try. There wasn’t much of that here.
She sat there for a while, just holding him until she felt at least somewhat more solid. “What now? And don’t say nothing.” Which, granted, was the answer that popped into her head but even if it was a vague something she’d take it. “Even if it’s just kicking a crystal. I don’t care. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do and I hate it. I can’t change anything. Everything is falling apart and I don’t know if I can fly through this.” She’d taken what Flemeth had told her somewhat literal, made it advice rather than the cryptic nonsense it had actually been.
“So. Please. Just tell me what to do. Nothing I do matters.” She’d had the pretense of it, before. Now she didn’t.
---
“I…”
I, what? Doing ‘nothing’ was never going to sit right with him (or, more specifically, with Justice; the man Anders had been before had, after all, made an artform of deciding things were someone else’s problem and leaving them in the dust behind him), and yet… what exactly could they do? Whatever was driving Vallo had defied all efforts to communicate with it, and seemed content to simply do whatever the hell it wanted, whether that was giant killer rabbits or sudden influxes of cash or stealing people away with no warning. Varric would probably have had a clever answer, but he’d never had Varric’s gift for words.
He sighed. “I don’t know. We can go shout at a Waypoint for a while, if you think it would help. Maker knows enough people have done that without everything exploding already. Or we can head into the forest, find something to hit, or…” Another sigh. “I wish I had better answers, love. I try and I try to make things make sense and it just…. doesn’t. “
----
“I did all that already,” she really shouldn’t go out alone, she knew better, but it had made the most sense at the time. “Shouldn’t go alone, I know that.” She felt, and sounded, endlessly tired. She’d always fought, whether with swords or with what influence she’d wrestled together in Kirkwall but knowing that whatever plans she might make were up to whatever random chance ran this place was weighing on her.
Before she’d at least had the excuse that no one had exact proof there was a divine being (assholes pretending to be notwithstanding) and she could pass off her disbelief. Here there was less chance of that. There was Something, and it didn’t much care about plans or dreams or goals. You had to take what moments you could and hope it mattered. Somehow.
She sighed and lowered her hands. She didn’t want to hurt him, although she knew that was unlikely, and went to take his hands. “I need to know what you want. Both of you. Not what you think I want. It might not even matter in the long run, considering, but right now it does. I think that’s what’s important. It’s focus on right now or I go mad.” She looked up at him, watching for a moment. “I love you, you know that.” No matter what else she’d been with him (both of them) for years now. “I know it’s complicated for at least one of you and a lot of it might be influence. That’s fine. It’s always been fine.” She knew she wasn’t making the most sense again but at least getting this out was good. She hoped. “And your happiness is foremost in my mind. The Blight has to be dealt with, that’s not an option and I know that’s selfish and cruel of me but beyond my cousin, my sister, and her potential royal friend, or whatever, they can all go hang. You're getting better. I saw what it did. Does. But I want you to be happy, and I am when you are. If that’s here, I can accept that. But I need to know. Hang what others say. We don’t know what the next day brings, and I really hate that, so short term plans seem to be better.” she waved one of her hands, hoping she made sense. “I need something though.”
---
He exhaled, letting her take his hands. That was the question, wasn't it? The one they kept coming back to. What did he-that-was-they, or indeed he-that-was-he, want? That part, at least, had always been so easy at home, with the monolithic oppressor to rail against and the downtrodden masses to uplift. Here? Not so much.
He cleared his throat (when did his mouth get so dry?), spoke slowly and carefully. "You asked us that before. Do you remember? After the whole.. glimpse of the future, thing."
Anders glanced up, briefly, a thin nervous smile forming and fading, before letting his gaze drop again. It was easier to speak when he didn't look directly at her. "I told you then we - I - hadn't 'earned' a happy ending. There's days my being alive at all feels like the greatest injustice, because what I did was…"
He glanced up again, bringing one of his hands to cup her cheek. None of that sounded good, he knew. Nor was it what she needed to hear from him. Unfortunately for them both, he didn't have a great deal more to offer.
"... what I did was Right, and Necessary, but it was also Terrible and Cruel. And every day since feels like one I've stolen. Does that make sense?"
----
She watched him for a long moment, feeling oddly grounded by his touch. “Aye. And I’ll steal as many as I can. If you want penance you’ll have to take those days and use them to do more good. I cannot be the one to give it to you Anders. I’ve held too many daggers to people I love.” The last was soft, and carried the hurt of the pain that hadn’t really left her ever since she’d found her mother. Kirkwall had taken so much of her at that point. “I’m sorry if that’s cruel of me. I’m sorry if one day that might make you angry, or whatever. Better angry and alive then anything else.” She motioned to his chest then, “besides. Would it even have worked? Even if you wanted it?” She’d never pressed, never pointed it out but she knew sword wounds.
It hadn’t really been an answer but she hadn’t really expected it to be clear as day. A lot of it was complicated. “If you feel like you want to earn them, I will help. But I understand, somewhat.” She sighed. She’d have to tell him one of these days. “I think I’m not the one who was supposed to make it out of the Fade, back when we all fell in. Corypheus was my fault, wasn’t he?” she glanced up, knowing he’d disagree. “Don’t. I could have walked away from it a dozen times. By that time I had plenty of coin, and plenty of influence, to keep all of us safe and well away. I could have found a way to make sure no one came near that pass so he’d stop having his weird little minions to send at us. It was Hawke blood that bound him, and Hawke blood that let him free. I walked in there thinking it’d be an easy problem to solve. Just the Champion, fighting weird talking monsters.” She set her hand over his, brushing his knuckles with her fingers. “Without my actions, the world would not have been broken. The Warden that went with us said that it was their job to fight this. It wasn’t. It wasn’t even the Blight, or Corypheus itself. It was a demon. They could have been a lot more help in Weisshaupt, probably solved it a lot earlier. So the feeling of stealing days? I get it. But I’m selfish.” She’d always been,m in some aspects. Even at the base of it all, under all her fighting Kirkwall, it had all been to ensure her family was safe. She set her free hand on her forehead. “I’m not sure I even know where I’m going with this. Look if you want to stay together and try and make it up I’m far from going to stop it, but I’m going to stay with you. Does that make sense?”
---
"Corypheus wasn't your fault." Very few things were certain these days, but that he knew for a Fact, and that assuredness ran through each syllable much as it had before, in Kirkwall, when he'd spoken about mage freedom. Two voices, speaking at one, united in a rare moment of complete agreement. "We killed him. He was dead. That should have been the end of it."
And the moment passed, and he pulled back slightly, gaze once again avoiding hers. He sighed. "I don't know if it would have worked or not. And I know there were Plans and Schemes and Compelling Arguments but Dorian's gone, Fenris is gone, and… Maker help me, it's awful but it's also a relief, knowing there's no longer that Easy Out. Because we don't deserve Easy Outs. Without the Templars, without the Blight or the Oath, maybe being stuck like this is the only real Consequence we can't dodge…"
Another sigh. "I miss Darktown. Does that sound as insane out loud as it does in my head?"
----
Even though she’d known, somewhere, they’d make that argument. So she just gave him a look. “Talking darkspawn that was somehow able to not only manipulate Wardens, keep one of them alive long past his Calling, but also non-Wardens it was able to infect and then was put in one of the darkest corners with a shit ton of Tevinter reliquary? Oh and one the Wardens were so afraid of he doesn’t even exist? I did check the books you know. Kirkwall wasn’t mentioned. Oh aye, that really did sound like ‘sword through chest’ was going to solve. I should have gone for help instead of going in half cocked. “ The reassurance was welcoming however. Knowing they both had her back was always welcoming. “And something the Wardens needed outside help with, mind you.”
She offered a long sigh of her own. “Look. If that’s something you feel you need to stick together out of penance I will accept that. But Dorian came up with bloody time magic, I’ll take good odds he knew what he was about. That and you know our current situation isn’t a vacuum. I’ll remind you we literally work with someone who can bloody fly, and that Sabrina is a Hell Queen or something. Even Dan, who’s as mortal as I am, is able to put Justice to sleep. Dorian’s option’s gone. It’s not the only one. However,” she gave pointedly, “that’s my only argument. You don’t want the options, that is fine.” She took a breath not wanting her opinions to sway him, but he deserved to have them nonetheless. “I maintain it would be nice to have that future you saw. But I have made my peace Anders, so if it’s just us I will be happy.” She tried for a smile, “might get a dog though. Point is, I’m going to maintain you deserve that future for as long as I’ve got breath in me and you’ll maintain I’m not to blame for Corypheus for as long as you have breath.” She gave a shrug then.
Then she gave a quick laugh, “no. It doesn’t. In what way though? Granted it made more sense. Darktown never threw murderous rabbits at our heads.”
---
He smiled, a soft and uncertain thing, hearing her laugh. That was definitely preferable to the abject misery she'd been in when he found her.
"That's very true. But… alright. So. Do you remember what I was doing, when we first met?"
----
“Threatening to set me on fire,” she gave cheerily because badly timed jokes were a Hawke staple at this point and it was either those or go back to feeling like absolute crap. And well she knew what she preferred. “Of course I do, you were saving that little kid. You had your clinic and you helped.” She added with a soft smile.
“If that’s what you want to go back to, healing, you did come into that bit of money courtesy of whatever weirdness hands out bribes. I can help you find a place and everything. The Emporium might even be handy in getting it all set up with herbs, I’m fairly sure we can see about getting some of those to grow.” Even if it might not matter, if this is what he might want she would help.
---
"I don't know if… the clinic's not the important bit; there's far better healers than me out there now. Sabrina and Sydney can literally cure death without breaking a sweat. But I miss… Helping, perhaps? Being needed. Having that little corner that was Mine, My People, and watching them thrive. Whether that's Darktown, or the Rebellion, or…"
He glanced up. "That's arrogant, isn't it? Wanting to Matter?" Sighing, Anders pinched his brow. "I thought maybe the Research would be… Not the same, but scratch the same itch, maybe. But it doesn't. It's going nowhere, and everyone knows that. I feel like I'm treading water."
---
She nodded, although it was different for her. She’d always fallen into things, never really finding the one thing that had really called to her. Even Kirkwall had been like that, and she’d had more of a goal then a purpose. “S’not arrogant. If Research isn’t doing it then alright.” she gave a shrug. Things could change in an instant here, but she got what he was trying to say.
“And don’t compare yourself. Being unable to do what others can just means you find a different way to approach it. You can still help, still heal. It’s the small bits that matter. Those kids parents will certainly tell you that. However, I would ask,” she stressed that not wanting him to think she was going to demand. “You at least have a schedule. Three solid meals a day and not getting too lost.” she gave him what she hoped was a comforting smile. “You’re a great healer Anders. If this is your purpose then you’ll do amazing at it. And I’ve got your back.”
---
"You know I can't promise that." He quirked a slight, but genuine smile. "Getting Lost is… not the point, but a part of it. But I'll try."
He leant in, pressing a kiss to her forehead.
"I love you. And we can keep talking to Sabrina, figuring out that Blight Cure. It's not just me that stands to benefit, and there's no reason Justice has to stand between us and the important parts of that Future, right?"
---
“Aye, well, I more meant spending too long of hours but you know I’ll still come drag you out. But I know. The trying’s important.” And it wasn’t like she was without her flaws either. If she had to send him reminders to actually eat, she would. And if this made him happy, that would make her happy too. “It’ll be like old times. Except the lack of giant spiders.”
She smiled to the kiss. He always did that, helped her out of her darkest parts. It hadn’t been as bad as it had been when her mother had died but it had been bad enough. She wished she could express how grateful she was for him.
“Exactly my point. We’ll give her a heads up and see where she stands. And, one day at a time.” she went to lean her head against his. “Sorry I woke you. And that I left alone.”
---
"I'm not wild about that last part." He rested his forehead against hers. "I know you're a terrifying independent murder machine, but next time" - because there would be a next time, there inevitably was - "wake me before you go?"
---
She gave a laugh and a nod. He had a point, really. “Aye, alright.” Smiling she leaned up to steal a kiss before closing her eyes. Right now she had this, and let it ground her. It’d been just them before, against everything else. And that was plenty for her.
--