faderift | You can't wake up, this is not a dream [OPEN]

WHO: Logan and YOU!
WHAT: Open log for August and Kingsway, Logan settling into Skyhold.
WHEN: August and Kingsway
WHERE: All over Skyhold
NOTES: mild to moderate horror in introspection, probably nothing else

1.you are not a human being
Some person of seemingly minor importance was being entertained in Skyhold. Logan stood against a wall in his whole uniform except for breastplate and shoulder pads, finely-made clothing that marked him out. He had his arms crossed, hiding the marked left hand, observing quietly as someone he hadn't met yet made a formal welcome to this visitor. He was learning the etiquette and social requirements of this place, so he might be somewhat prepared whenever he had to meet someone important.

2.low on self-esteem so you run on gasoline
Logan had been offered a bed in a tent, at least for now, down in the valley below the castle. It was cold and terribly public and not at all what he was used to, but he told himself it was temporary and accepted it without complaint. He was not a king here, and had no right to demand things of the organization that had taken him in. The distance of several worlds from the Crawler seemed to make him more able to take such things rationally. Some small blessing.

It didn't stop the nightmares, though.

Some nights, he could control it enough to stay in his bed until dawn. Other nights, it drove him up and out of the tent, gasping and staggering behind it to vomit and just praying he didn't hit anything important. He stood there in his trousers with no shoes or shirt, hands on his knees, shaking, left hand clenched tightly. He was covered in sweat, despite the cold night air.

3.are you insane like me
Most of the soldiers didn't want to spar with Logan, which was fine. He was left-handed, which made a spar awkward, and he didn't know what would happen inside his head if he injured someone. The Crawler's influence was lessened, but not gone.

His preferred style of sword seemed rather uncommon, so he had a plain, common longsword, and he was learning on a training dummy what movements might work and what didn't. He paused, thinking he might get a drink of water, but his attention was caught by the light when he let go of the sword. The ache was radiating up his arm -- he'd overworked it, and that was making it worse. He stared into the light, wondering if he might see through it.

Cut it off, hissed the Crawler's sibilant voice. It won't hurt anymore, and it is no use to you. You don't need to fight. You're tainted, broken. Let the blade fall, let all of the blades fall...

He clenched his hand tight, then picked up the sword again and began swinging almost frantically. The water was forgotten.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

A turn came, and he managed to guide her through it somewhat smoothly. He was picking up the steps quickly -- he'd learned a fair few dances as a child, after all, his mother knowing he would one day have to socialize with the elite, and at a certain point, they were all rather the same. This wasn't too dissimilar from one that was common in his world.

"King Logan of Albion," he introduced, once she was back properly in his arms. "A title that's become more or less meaningless, in recent days." He didn't want to introduce himself without the title, particularly because he had no surname to speak of, but it seemed important to acknowledge that he had no sovereignty here, lest anyone get the wrong impression.

Oh, a King.

What a strange thing it is, all of these people from their different worlds; how strange it would be, she imagines, to be somewhere that Lady Vauquelin meant even less than the little it means here. She considers, for a moment, that dragging him bodily to dance with her (however skillfully it had not looked like dragging) could have gone much more poorly, and she must suppose that he adapts well and quickly to that distinct lack of sovereignty.

Comte's daughters do not typically presume quite that far with royal persons.

There's no one here who'll scold her for it, though, when - well, who's to say it isn't entirely invented? No one from Thedas can refute any claims he cares to make about his own past, where it was and what he did; he's quite obviously high-born, and the simplest answer is probably the truest, that he says he was a King because he was, but ... it's as he says. More or less meaningless.

"You're very new, then. I thought so." She isn't acquainted with everyone, but she is ever-present in Skyhold and very curious; most interesting faces she has at least seen. "Is it very different to where you're from? To your Albion."

Edited 2016-08-17 11:56 (UTC)

Really, his reaction to the lack of sovereignty had a lot to do with how tired he was. He didn't want to be the vicious tyrant anymore. He wanted the Crawler to be someone else's problem. Now it was.

"There are differences. And similarities." Confident that he had the steps as they began the next sequence, Logan began leading. Maybe not the most skillful lead that Gwen had ever had, but competent. Really, ninety percent of one's success in these things was down to confidence, and Logan didn't think it mattered much if he had a foot three inches out of place (so long as it wasn't on one of his partner's).

"The people seem similar," Logan said. "Fickle and easily influenced, but set in their ways. Only wanting to get by. I can see my world having been like this one in the past, perhaps. A hundred or two hundred years ago." Thedas was further away than that from the Industrial Revolution, but Logan had only a loose grasp on the factors involved. "But I haven't seen much in the way of factories, steam ships, clockwork."

'The people'. Gwenaëlle wonders what that phrase means, particularly; who it is he considers 'the people' so easily influenced. It's a more interesting thought than bristling at the idea of Thedas being someone else's past - she doesn't ignore it, per se, so much as tuck it neatly away and set it aside, a thought to be returned to when she better understands to what she's returning. Hard to challenge when she doesn't know what she's challenging, and hard to learn from when there's a wealth of things immediately he simply takes for granted that are entirely alien to her.

This is his world now, she thinks. He'll get used to it. He seems like one of those that might be one of the rifters to adapt better than the others; certainly, turning her about the floor, he is light enough on his feet.

"I don't know anything about that sort of thing," she says, frankly unconcerned by her own illiteracy on the subject; probably he does not expect a young lady of means to be educated in industry. That she has any number of areas of knowledge unusual for a young lady of means is irrelevant, because he doesn't know that about her, anyway. "Well, I know what a ship is," deprecatingly, with a laugh.

It helped that the dance was very similar to one he'd learned in Albion, as a boy. It had fallen somewhat out of fashion, but it wasn't something one forgot easily. He was basically doing that dance and just adding a spin when everyone else did one.

"We have ships that are a marvel of engineering," he said, one corner of his mouth tugging up. "They have machines in them that propel the ship without need for sails. We're no longer at the mercy of foul winds."

"How clever," she says, her tone polite but her interest in the topic - limited, at best. In all honesty, her interest in what his world is like at all is limited; she isn't sure what to talk about with these rifters, solving that problem most frequently by simply not speaking with most of them at all. They make her uneasy, and uneasier still now that her own reputation is tied to their good behaviour after her very public, on-record reassurances about their overall trustworthiness.

It's probably good to be more acquainted with at least a few. Besides Thranduil, who is a thing unto himself and raises more questions than he answers. Logan, king or otherwise, seems - if she has to acquaint herself with rifters, a mannerly one who can think on his feet is better than for instance that big, odd man who interrupted her on the battlements.

She does at least try to offer a segue instead of letting her awkwardness sit in the air -

"Probably you'll see more of how Thedas solves those problems in time. The Inquisition doesn't decline anyone's help when there's so many places as need it."

"It does seem an interesting place," Logan agreed. "At the very least, I doubt I'll be bored. We've nothing like your mages and rifts here." Well, there was something, but he didn't want to talk about his sister now. She and Garth were the only ones Logan knew of who could control the power of Will.

"Is there anything I ought to know, then?" he asked, spinning her again. "Any pertinent information I may not pick up on my own?" People often looked favorably on humility, and were flattered to be treated as authorities.

"Undoubtedly," she says, smiling. "The Inquisition has an extensive library and any number of people willing to teach you, if you join its ranks."

It isn't that Gwenaëlle is immune to that sort of thing - only that her position on rifters is one of firm skepticism, and she's less flattered by the idea of being considered an authority than she is reluctant to have any of them view her that way and expect anything from her. They're of value if and when they join, and either way, she's done enough for them without feeling she needs to oblige herself to be seen as someone they can expect to ask for assistance.

"That seems to be the best thing for all involved."

You can't wake up, this is not a dream [OPEN]

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