faderift | OPEN ↠ FALSE GODS, GREAT DEMONS (OPEN LOG 1)

WHO: Living Residents of the Horrible Future
WHAT: Ah ha ha ha stayin' alive, stayin' alive.
WHEN: ALTERNATE FUTURE, 1-15 Cloudreach 9:48
WHERE: Anywhere, but especially Orzammar
NOTES: This is the first open log for False Gods, Great Demons. Anything that happened prior to Cloudreach 9:48 should go on the flashback meme. Most members of the TTT and their friends in Kirkwall will be arriving in Orzammar on approximately Cloudreach 7. In the meantime, feel free to make your own adventures. If you want to blow up an bridge, assassinate an NPC of your own invention, steal supplies, or anything else--it's all yours, go for it!

SOUTHERN THEDAS is a wasteland. The Blight crawling across the Orleian countryside and into Ferelden leaves nothing alive in its wake, scarring the land like an insatiable fire until no birds sing and the only things that grows is the Red Lyrium that speckles cliff sides and crawls up dying trees until they look like rows of jagged bloody teeth. And where it's still green, where people can still survive, the atmosphere is nearly as stifling. Every city and settlement is watched over by a Venatori or trustworthy collaborator. Those who don't keep their heads down and their dissent a whisper may vanish without warning. They may take their whole families with them. There are flashes of hope--an assassinated lordling here, a village rousing itself to brief and doomed rebellion there--but for every man the Imperium loses, they seem to find two to take his place.

NORTHERN THEDAS is at war. The worst of it doesn't reach west into Tevinter or the Anderfels; the line between the Qunari and the Imperium is drawn straight through Antiva, with Nevarra and Rivain on either side quiet and calm as only lands under martial law can be. The Free Marches vary between complacency and rebellion, but the rebellious ones risk ruin--there are murmurs it won't be long before a whole city is made an example. A steady stream of desperate refugees is fleeing north to the Qun, but plenty are picked off and punished as traitors before they can cross into Qunari-controlled territory. Your best best for a clean escape are the pirates who still hold Llomerynn free from both sides of the conflict.

ORZAMMAR is the only kingdom in Thedas that looks much the same--and Kal-Sharok, but they're not accepting outsiders. The heavy doors at Orzammar's entrance are sealed and guarded, as much against the steady flow of refugees asking for help as against the Venatori. The refugees are turned away. There's no way to know who can be trusted, and even if there were, there's not food enough for people who can't fight. Orzammar Thaig is still the dwarves' home--though with stealing shrinking numbers and poor prospects, King Bhelen has been amenable to allowing casteless surfacers some leeway--but the once-abandoned Ortan Thaig is the Inquisition's. Quietly. The only things stopping a full assault on Orzammar is the Venatori's need for dwarf-mined lyrium and the plausible deniability that the Inquisition's remaining rebel bands are using the Deep Roads with Bhelen's consent.

An hour's walk through caves and deepstalker swarms, Ortan is a city in its own right. A crammed city, one where cots and bunk beds crammed into shared housing are the norm no matter how important someone is and you occasionally have to protect your dinner from a restless, swooping griffon, but one where you can still find a pint of ale or a game of cards if you've time to waste on them. It's just that not many people do. There's the watch to keep; the tunnels that creep further into the deep teem with darkspawn who are held back at barricades, while the hidden, narrow tunnels that lead to the surface are watched at all hours so anyone coming or going can be identified. There are weapons to forge and sharpen. Plans to make. Bands to lead. Maybe you weren't a leader five years ago, but these days, there aren't that many people with more than five years' experience still alive to give orders. Fewer every week.

And so we burned. We raised nations, we waged wars,
We dreamed up false gods, great demons
Who could cross the Veil into the waking world,
Turned our devotion upon them, and forgot you.
Threnodies 1:8

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Kirk rolled his eyes because how many times had he heard that argument? He was not quite so tired, had been in for hours and time to get a proper meal and change his clothes. Bruce looked like he had just slid off his horse not ten minutes ago and had been riding most of the day besides.

"Work that will suffer if your mind isn't working at one hundred percent," he challenged him, following, stubborn as usual now that he had in his head to at least get a proper sandwich down Bruce's throat.

"My mind is always working at one hundred percent." He never lets himself stop thinking, always considering on their next course of action, the next step they needed to take to try and secure their chances for another day. With the situation as desperate as it is now there was no chance for rest. He always needed to be on the move, to make sure he was doing something. He had spent enough time in the past stewing about and doing nothing.

He doesn't say anything else beyond that, simply continuing walking towards his destination. He doesn't care what Kirk thinks to do; as long as he isn't distracting him from his work, he could do just about whatever he wanted.

"No, it isn't," KIrk countered with a stubbornness that should have honestly been legendary. "Your brain needs sleep to "clean house" as it were and repair itself from the day's work. The less sleep you get, the less repair work gets done, the less efficiently you function." He might not be a doctor, but he had been lectured enough by Bones to know that much.

He huffed and crossed his arms as he continued to walk with him, not quite stomping, but thinking about it. "Will you at least wait for five minutes and let me get you something to eat off a street vendor?" he asked, unable to let it go until he felt like he had done something for Bruce besides nag at him.

Bruce is hardly in the mood to keep up with the argument - not when all it did was to waste time and have the both of them circling around their respective points with no use whatsoever.

Its the only reason why he lets himself pause at the offer, silent for a moment before he reluctantly gives Kirk a nod. If that's what it took to get the other off his back, then he could suffer through whatever it was that Kirk wanted from him. Especially if it was just five minutes; better than than five hours.

If nothing else, Kirk could outlast people in most arguments. Living with Iskandar had giving him quite a time to build up that particular trait. There is a sense of relief when he gets the other to at least stop and do so much as eat a bit of food and not move for five minutes. Honestly, Bruce's type was the most frustrating of all. Were all doctors like this?

"This way," Kirk said, waiting for Bruce to come along side him, not wanting to risk Bruce being sneaky and dodging away. He was keen to those particular tricks. "There's a good stall not far from here."

Bruce knows better than to try and escape, especially with how persistent Kirk is. And besides, escaping meant giving Kirk more opportunity to hound him for some reason or another, and Bruce would rather not have to deal with that. Better to just please him now and make sure to avoid him after that.

He nods once and starts to walk next to Kirk, easily ignoring the people who quickly scramble out of his way. When you've got an arm covered with lyrium crystals, people tend to want to stay away for their own good.

Kirk looked at Bruce, as if debating something for a second, before buying two of the little pocket sandwiches. He wasn't sure what the meat was that went into them, but you learned not to question those things down here. Meat was meat, and you got it while you could.

He brought them back to Bruce and held out both. He would be happy with one, but he thought Bruce could do with some more calories. "At least give your body some fuel to burn if you're going to go through the midnight oil." He was mixing metaphors here, but whatever.

They reach a stall soon enough, and Bruce waits... a little bit further just so people will stop avoiding Kirk's general area just due to close association from him. He may not have as much courtesy skills as before but he does still have some.

He watches Kirk return, then stares a little as he holds out two sandwiches for him to take. There's a noticeable pause before he reaches out and just takes one of them.

"Thank you," he says with something of a grunt. As mentioned, some>/i> bit of courtesy is still inside of him. He just doesn't find the necessity of it as much now these days, not when getting to the point tended to produce more results.

OPEN ↠ FALSE GODS, GREAT DEMONS (OPEN LOG 1)

such a butt, why is he friends with you?

the eternal question

someone has to be, guess it's him

kirk is doing the maker's work

truly. hopefully his past self is rewarded for this selflessness

i'm sure it the good karma will come upon him eventually

maker willing

indeedly