WHERE Cad’s tower at Xhorhaus WHEN June 13th, day of her arrival. WHAT Empire Sibs chat, a cute Kiri reunion! STATUS Complete! WARNINGS Spoilers for Critical Role 141! Some references to past traumas, revenge idealizations, missing loved ones.
Beau’s head was still spinning but if there was something she was really good at, it was landing on her feet. And in a dope monk pose too. She wasn’t posed right now, but she did have a dumb look on her face as she poked her head out onto the roof of the Xhorhaus looking for Kiri. Caleb wasn’t far behind her.
“Kiri, are you up here? It’s uh, it’s me, Beau. Do you remember me?” She peeked inside Cad’s little shack, her nerves really starting to rattle. She liked to think she could handle most things. People missing memories of their time with her was a hard pill to swallow. Being separated from Yasha right as Yasha paid her respects to Zuala was also a hard pill to swallow. All she could do was hope her barbarian followed or they found a way home on their own. And that maybe people would remember everything in time. Caleb saying he’d been here over a year didn’t bode well though. Beau’s expression started to fall but as she came around behind the giant tree on the roof, a mass of feathers crashed into her and everything was a little better.
“I miss you!” Kiri singsonged, sounding exactly like Jester.
Beau wrapped her arms around Kiri and kissed her feathered head. “I missed you too. So much. Let me look at you.” She backed up and lifted Kiri’s arms out.
Kiri chirped, “I am very cute.”
“Yeah, you are,” Beau laughed.
“Has she shown off her rainbow leggings and her layers of glittery, rainbow clothes yet?” Caleb called up the ladder as he followed, a little (lot) slower than Beauregard but okay with that. It gave the monk a little time to give Kiri some private hugs before she could get awkward that someone was standing nearby watching.
But he was going to catch up eventually, and when he did, he couldn’t help the smile at the two of them. Kiri chirping away in their voices (and a few new ones that Beau was going to be unfamiliar with) as she made conversation in her own unique way. Feathers ruffled and the little Kenku puffed up proudly, showing off the knitted leggings Blue had made her. “Rainbows are best.” It was in Jester’s voice again, and Caleb chuckled ever so quietly.
“At least you’re here in time for her birthday party. Since none of us know when it is, we decided on the day of her arrival.” Kiri once again perked up at that, and put her feathered covered arms out so she could run a circle around Beau’s form, chirping in Caleb’s voice. “We’re going flying.”
“Rainbows are pretty fu—great,” Beau stuttered. In a different circumstance, she wouldn’t have censored herself. She likely would have smothered her smile though, kept it mellow. But this was Kiri and Caleb and she didn’t feel the need to censor joy. Her grin was bright and charmed as Kiri circled her. She stood up from her crouch.
“Glad I wasn’t late for somethin’ important.” She squinted at Caleb. “What’s this about flying?” Kenku not being able to fly would always feel like a weird injustice but there was a long list of those in Exandria. “Polymorph or something else?”
Caleb should have used the opportunity to let Beau know that the Mighty Nein hadn’t really curbed their swearing around the Kenku child. And the fact that she spent half of her time at the Barns with someone that could rival any of them in swearing. But it was probably only a matter of time before Kiri was saying something vulgar in Ronan’s voice and he was selfishly looking forward to Beau’s face when that happened.
He had a fond look directed at Kiri when Beau squinted at him, and he straightened slightly. “I uh- made a magical flying tunnel. It simulates in-air flying without letting them just-- take off.”
Beau's eyebrows rose comically high. "No shit? That sounds amazing."
She wasn't sure why she was surprised. Caleb was full of incredible ideas and had proven time and time again that there was no spell too big if he was given enough time to master it. And he'd been here over a year. Fuck, that was doing a number on her. Her smile faded a little around the edges but she caressed a hand over Kiri's feathered head and gave Caleb a cheeky look.
"Is it just for the birthday girl or do we all get to fly?" Kiri made a trilling noise that Beau thought might be excitement but it had been awhile since she'd seen the kenku. "Which one of you do I gotta bribe?"
“Welcome to the Mighty Nein!” Kiri responded before Caleb had the chance, but then she was gone in a mass of feathers not unlike when she crashed into Beau the first time. She would be back, likely with whatever toy she’d been playing with or some art she had drawn to show off. Caleb brought books up here to read while she ran around in her playful way, vanishing and reappearing as she did.
He took a seat and made himself comfortable. “I don’t want you to bribe me, so it’s probably easy enough to just say everyone can do it.” At current, there was probably a size limit, but Caleb was already working in his head just how to fix that. “I am glad you’re here, Beauregard. It hasn’t felt the same without all of you.”
Beau's heart jumped a little as Kiri shouted and ran. Part of her wanted to give chase, because Beau was a chasing kind of person and she'd just found out that almost everyone she cared about had been snatched away to another plane without her even noticing. That kind of thing made a girl twitchy. But Caleb's calming influence was as strong as ever. Beau plopped down onto the seat next to him and kicked her feet up into his lap.
"You can just say you missed me, Caleb. I won't tell anyone. Well, except Yasha." She flashed a crooked smile and leaned back to look up at Cad's tree. It was a little warm up here, but her lack of sleeves were doing her just fine in this new world. "I mean, besides when I was apparently here before. God, I hate competing with myself. That's the worst."
Caleb flashed one of his very dry, quick smiles. They never lasted long, because he usually put a wall or mask up immediately following, but Beau had earned them more than most. "Ja fine, I missed you." He had, and it wasn't a lie, even if he made it sound like she had forced that out of him. But it was mostly bluster, and not as well hidden as it usually was.
"If it helps, you were very boring. Did nothing of importance. We barely talked. It was almost peaceful." All lies, of course, and she was bound to see right through them, but attempting to help his friends was all part of Caleb's love language. "But you did start dating Yasha, so that is a universal thing even without the memories of it back home. If that helps."
"Boring!" Beau shuddered, like that was the worst thing she could've heard about herself. Worse than a lost limb or actual death. She didn't believe a word of it, of course, but she played along. And the rest of what he said eased some of the tension out of her shoulders anyway. Her smile softened at the edges. "Guess I could deal with boring if it still got me Yasha."
She squinted at him after a moment, really examining him for changes. A year hadn't made a huge difference but there were noticeable changes. Longer hair, different way of dressing. How he carried himself. He looked more comfortable in his own skin. That pleased and upset her all at once. "You look good. Is it an act or are you actually good?"
"So boring." Now he could definitely tease. "Boring and so hopelessly in love." Even if they had kept them relationship mostly a secret before, that infatuation had been plain as day to all of them, even the most obtuse. Which was not Caleb, out of all of them. But he could have hoped for boring, even if he knew none of them were destined for it. But the Mighty Nein had deserved a break. All of them, even himself.
He didn't want to admit it even now, as he glanced down at himself, somewhat surprised at her question. It had been a gradual change over the year, giving up the bandages and sleeves that constantly covered his arms, opening himself up to the world around him. "Ah- Better? It is a work in progress but I am trying. You have all been very good for me, here and home."
Beau nodded after a long quiet stare and then she pulled her feet out of his lab to rest her elbows on her knees. She propped her chin in her hand. If pressed, she might admit that she was tired. She and Yasha had gotten a little much earned rest on their trip to Yasha’s village, but it had been the slow trek type, not the vacation type. With everything that had happened and everyone going their separate ways, it had been about time for some rest. But this place made her anxious and uncertain about her place. She needed Yasha.
“Good,” she grunted. “You were doing ok at home too, minus a few bumps along the away.” She wasn’t sure how much she should blab. Some stuff was better experienced. If someone had told her about Zeenoth rather than her getting to watch it all go down in person, that probably would’ve driven her nuts. “I don’t know how much you wanna know,” she shrugged. “Or how much I want to ramble about cause it’s a lot of shit, Caleb, fuck. You know two months for us is like two years.” She sighed and slouched into her chair. 'I'd have missed you too if I'd known you were gone."
That was the question of the hour, wasn’t it? How much did he want to know. Ever since finding out that Beau was from the future of all of them, it had been on the tip of his tongue to ask a million and one questions.
At the very least they’d confirmed Essek was doing good. That had relieved him immensely, given how everything had been going and his at-home assumption that Essek was very likely to get back into his old tricks again. Here, he was removed from a lot of the fuckery, and had a more stable foundation under him. Back home everyone was chaotic and apart from each other.
He echoed her sigh with one of his own. “I want to know it all but none of it at the same time. People wake up with new memories all of the time here, but I haven’t in a long time. Nine months? I had been worried things went bad because of it.”
"Yeah, that's fair." Beau rubbed at her face and then stared off across the roof. "How about I just...highlights? Lowlights? Fuck, I don't know." She took a deep breath.
"If you wake up with any eye tattoos, come find me. That's bad news and we need to figure it out fast." As vague and ominous as that was, she didn't clarify. She was cycling through the last two months in her head. "We stopped a very bad thing from coming to Exandria and we all lived too. We even...well we sort of saved Molly but he doesn't remember us and he's going by Kingsley now, trying to figure himself out I guess." She shrugged. The Molly situation had been heavy and emotional, and while she was glad he was alive, he was a different person now and she still missed her friend. Her face lit up though as she thought of something better she could tell him.
"You finally got to face down Ikithon. And we kicked his ass." She leaned over in her chair to squeeze Caleb's arm. "Astrid helped."
Caleb went through a whole host of emotions, most of them evident on his face. Eye tattoos, he distinctly remembered Mollymauk’s, the several that he had seen (primarily because the tiefling had been practically allergic to clothes when they had all shared space) and he wanted to ask more but she had already moved on, so he silently filed it away for later.
When she got to Ikithon, his former teacher, he looked up at her sharply. Caleb had never let himself do more than just daydream about taking Trent Ikithon down, even if he knew his friends would have his back, he knew how powerful the wizard was. He knew there was a chance someone would be hurt, and never would have asked them to put themselves in harm's way for him. For that revenge. Astrid’s mention made his cheeks flush. “Good. I am glad to hear it.” And Eadwulf? Without his being mentioned, it could have meant his former friend, their lover, had died instead of willingly turning. Or turned tail and ran.
Caleb wasn’t sure he wanted to unpack that right now, so he only nodded. “Ah-- Molly was here, for a time? It had been a shock to us all then. So I suppose hearing his name now is not as much of one?”
"Molly was here? Calling himself Molly?" That reveal made Beau wince. That she'd missed it, that it had been temporary, that she had no fucking control over any of this. Things were supposed to be looking up. They had been, even if they weren't perfect. She grunted her frustration through her teeth and squinted at Cad's tree.
"It really sucks that Cad doesn't drink. I really need this tree to have a whiskey stash." She propped her elbows on her knees again and buried her face in her hands.
Caleb nodded solemnly, feeling a matched sympathy for his level of knowledge for Vallo compared to her level of knowledge back home. But he also had a slight trollish instinct, and need to throw her a little off of her game before fixing it. A rare smile peeked out. “He also fucked Fjord. That was more weird.” Not that he could blame Mollymauk for that, given how often his own blood had boiled around their half-orc friend.
But still.
He gestured back down the ladder. “We have whiskey and Essek has a very generous stash of plum wine that he’ll share, if you want? Kiri’s bedtime is at 7.”
Beau choked on nothing but air. "On second thought, I'm glad I'm not drinking right this second. I would've spit alcohol all over the fucking place."
Molly and Fjord, wow. It was unbelievable or anything. They were friends. She'd thought Fjord was a little straight and narrow to go after someone like Molly but mostly, her brain was so used to Jester and Fjord now that it stung to think of anything else. She knew things could've been different very easily, though. Their whole lives could've changed because of this place. She still shivered dramatically as she stood up.
"Lead me to the wine, Caleb." She lifted an eyebrow teasingly and reached out with a foot to nudge his ankle. "If you think your boyfriend really won't mind."
Caleb chuckled quietly and followed directly behind her nudging. “You go wrangle our kenku and I’ll go talk him into it.” He knew it wouldn’t take much, at least, with both of them as relieved as they were that Essek was fine back home. That relief made his shoulders a little lighter, and with him being close in, Caleb closed the gap and wrapped his arms around Beauregard before she could push him away.
He mumbled against her shoulder. “We don’t have to talk about this and I promise not to do it again, but thank you, Beauregard.”
Beau huffed as she found herself suddenly in a hug. She'd never been very good at this. A few months ago, she'd have awkwardly patted his back with one hand and rolled her eyes. But they'd been through a lot and the idea of Caleb being away from her for so many months annoyingly made her want a hug for herself.
She rested her head against his and encircled him with both arms for a quick fierce hug. "Why are you thanking me? Wait--no--don't answer that." She pulled away and gestured at the entrance to the house with an embarrassed little smirk. "Wine, Caleb. Then we can talk about how soft you've gotten."