Tasslehoff Burrfoot is not a thief (tas_wanderlust) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-02-03 12:59:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, raistlin majere, tasslehoff burrfoot |
Who: Tas and Raistlin
What: Tas learns of Alyssa's death and is a sad panda.
When: After/during this.
Where: Their apartment.
Warnings/Ratings: Sad Tasslehoff. Talk of character death. Otherwise low.
Status: Complete
Tas had never lost one of his friends before, so he could barely believe it when Alyssa’s boyfriend had mentioned over the network that she was gone. It had taken Tas a moment to really understand that she had died somewhere in that fog, while Tas had been having the time of his life. Knowing that made Tas feel sick, like his stomach had managed to simultaneously leap into his throat and sink to the bottom of his feet.
It was a weird feeling, and Tas didn’t like it. He had tried to watch Bridezilla in honour of her, but the show had far less giant lizards dressed in bridal gowns than he was expecting and a lot more mean women. Instead, he’d managed to find a copy of Charlotte’s Web to watch. Alyssa had mentioned it was one of her favourite books, and Tas, never being one for movies or for books, had never seen or read it. Now was the time to rectify that. Now, he was sitting in the dark, hugging his knees to his chest, and watching the old cartoon. Tears streamed down his face, though with the exception of the occasional sniffle or quiet hiccup, he was silent for once in his life.
While this sad little scene was taking place, Raistlin was on his way home from spending the evening in Regina’s crypt studying his recent acquisition of basilisk skin and blood. He had taken a few other samples of the beast, such as a tooth and a bit of flesh, but for the moment the skin and blood fascinated him the most. It had overall been a productive day and Raistlin was in a fairly good mood. Good enough that he had stopped and gotten dinner for himself and his roommate.
The apartment was dark when he entered, which was odd. Raistlin would have made a comment about the apartment building’s faulty wiring when he heard the TV on in the living room. This had better not be some Poltergeist weirdness, Raistlin thought as he made his way to the living room. There he found Tas huddled on the couch staring at the TV and sniveling. Raistlin stared at him a moment before turning to see what in the name of the gods he was watching.
Charlotte’s Web? Raistlin blinked at the talking farm animals attempting to spell “Terrific” in a spider’s web before looking back at his roommate. He couldn’t honestly be crying over this old movie, could he? But there he was, face glistening wet with still more tears streaming from his wide kicked-puppy eyes. It was all very disconcerting.
“Tasslehoff,” Raistlin commanded with just enough jerk in his voice to get Tas’s attention.
Tasslehoff hadn’t heard Raistlin come in, and he jumped a little at the sound of his friend’s voice before turning to him. “Oh, hi Raistlin,” Tas said, rubbing his eyes with the backs of his hands, though it wasn’t incredibly effective as Tas continued to cry. “Are you done work already?”
Raistlin didn’t think he’d ever seen Tas cry. He honestly didn’t think the other man was capable of it. Not that he didn’t appreciate when something was sad, necessarily, but it was just his nature to look for life’s silver linings. That was one of the biggest differences between the two. While Raistlin considered himself to be a realist (although, most people would call him a pessimist), Tasslehoff was the walking definition of optimism. It was as though he’d been put on this Earth for the sole purpose of reminding others to look at the brighter side of life.
It was fucking annoying.
And yet seeing a subdued Tas with tears streaming down his face made Raistlin feel strangely uncomfortable. He’d been done work for hours. Just how long had Tas been sitting there in the dark watching an old movie about saving the life of a pig and crying? The question made Raistlin even more uncomfortable.
“Uhm, yeah.” He answered. Great, now his grasp of speech was suffering. “I brought dinner…” Sigh. He couldn’t bare this. “What’s wrong?” He asked finally, trying to sound as annoyed as possible. “Why are you sitting here in the dark?”
Tas started a little when Raistlin mentioned he’d grabbed dinner. It was good that Raistlin had, because Tas had completely forgotten to make supper. But at Raistlin’s question, Tas started crying even harder. “My friend Alyssa died,” he sniffled. It seemed almost as though that was going to be all he would say, but after he flung himself off the couch and at Raistlin, intending to hug him. “She - she died in the fog and Raistlin I’m s-so g-g-glad that you came out of it okay. What if you had died too?”
Someone had died?
Raistlin shouldn’t have been surprised. He’d seen the monster that had gone after Jonathan. Twisted and grotesque, all fang and glowing eyes. It could have killed them both and Raistlin was thankful that between the two of them, they had managed to defeat it (even if Jonathan had really done most of the work). If it had caught either one of them on their own, they might have been so fortunate.
Still hearing that someone - someone Tas had known - had died struck something deep within Raistlin that took whatever annoyance he may have had and shattered it. What if it had been him? Or Tas? Or Bela? Or Regina?
Surprisingly Raistlin did not attempt to sidestep Tas. He let his roommate hug him because...because...Honestly, Raistlin had no idea why. Aside from sex, he usually didn’t like people in his personal space in such a manner. Bela was one of the few he’d let even get near enough to loop her arm through his. He’d certainly never allowed Tas to hug him before.
He stood there awkwardly with Tas latched onto him with absolutely no idea what he should do next.
It didn’t even occur to Tas that Raistlin might push him away, but when he’d look back at this moment later, he’d be very thankful that Raistlin had allowed him to sob into his shoulder as he was now. “She was going to kn-knit me a hat. And we were going to make p-p-pancakes together,” he sobbed. He wasn’t going to get the chance to try her cooking anymore, and that made Tas feel awful. “And her poor b-boyfriend is all alone now!” It occurred to him that the man might not even have someone to hug like Tas did right now, and that just made him cry harder.
This was excruciating. Raistlin had no idea what he was supposed to do with a blubbering Tas. He had felt uncomfortable before, now he felt awkward and uncomfortable. This was why Caramon was so much better at this sort of thing than Raistlin was. Caramon would have known exactly what to do and what to say to make Tas stop crying all over him. Maybe...he should call Caramon? Let Tas cry into the phone to him.
But he did not reach into his messenger bag for his phone to call his twin. Instead he continued to stand where he was and let Tas soak his shoulder. Human contact was likely what his roommate needed and he wasn’t going to get that from a piece of cold electronic equipment. Raistlin sighed and tried to think of what Caramon would say if he was there.
“I’m sure her boyfriend will be fine,” he started. Oh, that was a terrible way to start! Even Raistlin knew how cold that sounded. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Look, Tas. I don’t think your friend - Alyssa. I don’t think Alyssa would like it if she knew you were crying so hard because of her.” What an asinine thing to say. Alyssa was dead, what did she care? But that’s probably what Caramon would have said, probably what he would have thought too, so Raistlin kept going with that concept. “She’d want you to remember her and be happy. She’d want you to remember all the fun the two of you had together. So if you want to honor her memory, that’s what you should do.”
Tas pulled away from Raistlin and rubbed the tears from his eyes much like a child would have. It didn’t stop the tears from coming, but he wasn’t sobbing nearly as hard as he had been a few seconds ago. He hiccuped. “You’re right,” he said. “Alyssa wouldn’t want people to be sad.” He even managed to smile at Raistlin, though the effect was slightly ruined as another sob escaped his throat. He was feeling better though. “I bet she’s watching us right now. She was part angel, you know.”
That last claim sounded a lot like one of Tas’s farfetched tales, however there wasn’t some kind of long drawn out story to go with it. Just the statement, so Raistlin had no idea if it was true or not. He didn’t believe in angels, but then again he was dreaming of a world in which old gods were not only a thing, but apparently still dicked around in the lives of mortals. If believing that Alyssa was an angel and somewhere smiling down on him made Tas feel better, than Raistlin decided it was best not to argue. “Sure she is.”
“It’s true, you know,” Tas said, brightening up a little more. He wasn’t sure if Raistlin believed him, but he hadn’t said he didn’t believe him. “I bet she’ll find all sorts of ways to tell me fun pranks to play on people. Like, all the ones she wanted to play when she was… when she was…” he became a little subdued again, not quite being able to bring himself to say ‘alive,’ and instead substituted it for “still around. Did I tell you about how we snuck into the bar? We climbed in through the ceiling vents, just like James Bond.” Did James Bond ever sneak through air vents? Never having watched the movies, Tas had no idea.
Raistlin really didn’t believe him, but he kept that to himself. As it was he was afraid Tas was about to burst into tears again and there was only so much salty water Raistlin’s shirt could take in a single evening. He was a bit relieved when Tas managed to regain control himself enough dive into one of his stories.
“No,” Raistlin shook his head. Talking seemed to be helping Tas muddle his way through his grief, which was better than sitting alone and crying over a talking pig. So Raistlin set the bag containing their dinner on the coffee table and took his messenger bag off over his head. There would be no studying his spell book tonight, it seemed. “Why don’t you eat something and tell me about it.”
Tas sat down, cross-legged, at the coffee table, and began to divvy up the dinner that Raistlin had bought. He hadn’t felt hungry at all while he’d been on the couch, but now that he’d stopped crying and had the food in front of him, he realized that he hadn’t eaten anything in quite some time and was starving.
“Well,” he said as he dished some food for Raistlin. “We were going to the bar, and since Alyssa’s only twenty, she couldn’t get in without some creative thinking. We decided that we’d climb onto the roof, and then…”