faderift | [CLOSED] oh, the sweet sound of survival

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[CLOSED] oh, the sweet sound of survival

WHO: Kit Gandir, Vandelin Elris, Myrobalan Shivana, Melys, Anders, the Medicine Seller
WHAT: Kit coping badly w/ shit.
WHEN: The week after Kit gets back from Orzammar.
WHERE: All around Kirkwall.
NOTES: Probable discussion of child abuse, murder, mercy killings, death more broadly. Will update as needed.

I. THE HANGED MAN (VANDELIN)

Kit loses a game of Wicked Grace. (It's not a common occurrence, but it's been known to happen.)

The direct aftermath of the game sees Kit shelling out the last of his coin to the Antivan deckhand with a poker face like a slab of granite; with that miserable task taken care of, Kit finds a quiet corner of the Hanged Man's taproom, slouches into an empty chair, and swallows his pride.

Out comes the sending crystal; fiddling with it, he calls Vandelin.

"Hey, um." Grimacing his eyes shut, he rubs at his eyebrows. "I need a favour, salroka."

II. DARKTOWN (THE MEDICINE SELLER)

For a mind already predisposed towards dark melancholy, boredom is dangerous. Thankfully, Darktown provides plenty of opportunities to alleviate that--as well as unexpected familiar faces.

He recognizes the Medicine Seller easily; the strange elf would stand out even in Hightown, and in Darktown, his strange attire and mannerisms are a beacon for stares and trouble.

Taking a drag off the cigarette he carries, Kit threads his way through the dingy road towards him. "You turn up in the weirdest places, salroka," he says by way of greeting.

III. KIT'S HOVEL (MELYS)

The hole in his wall where the desiccated corpse had been residing for only ancestors' know how long was an eyesore when it had a body inside of it. It's still an eyesore now, but at least letting it air out has gotten rid of some of the mouldering corpse stink.

(Hopefully Vandelin has a cast iron stomach.)

The first level of his home now looks a bit like a stone mason's shop, with mortar and stone and building tools strewn about while Kit goes about making the necessary repairs to his dwelling after the ash wraith debacle. It's been over a month; time to deal with it.

The front door has been left open.

IV. THE GALLOWS (MYR)

Shortly after his call with the rest of the Other Powers project members ends, Kit can't stand the confines of his office anymore. He heads outdoors for a smoke, stares across the water back towards Kirkwall, then detours towards the training grounds. When in doubt, when you can't keep your demons at bay, best to try punching them instead.

Barring that, swinging an axe at a training dummy can't hurt.

V. DARKTOWN (ANDERS)

His appearance outside Anders' clinic isn't entirely by happenstance; recalling his last chance encounter with the (rather unpopular) Warden mage, he's taken to strolling around the area in the evenings, maybe just to discourage anyone else from trying to take a second stab at the guy living on his own.

This time when Kit shows up, it's in the middle of the day, and he's rubbing at his arm like he's injured it. "Hey, salroka," he greets Anders with what he hopes is a casual smile, "hope I don't need an appointment or anything."

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Nobody bothered the Medicine Seller. Not in Dark Town. The people there had enough sense to recognize the difference between a strutting peacock who took a wrong turn while slumming in Lowtown and a brightly coloured viper that slithered where he pleased.

The way the Medicine Seller carried that heavy looking pack while wearing those impractical sandals with effortless grace painted him very much as the latter. His uncanny palour, icy stare, and the little fangs peeking out the corner of his mouth only cemented the fact that even the most desperate wouldn't consider him a target.

He had presently stopped, examining something etched in an exposed bit of masonry where centuries of plastering had worn away. His eyes narrowed and his face contorted into something resembling irritation.

"Hello again," he greeted, not taking his eyes of the peculiar grooves. His expression faded into its usual mask-like state, and he regarded Kit with polite interest. "I do not often run into others down here. It is good to see you."

Not a sentiment he usually had, but Kit seemed a decent sort.

It's hard to tell when exposed masonry is a sign of decay, down here, or when it's a sign of something more sinister. Sometimes the two are one in the same. Kit comes to a stop beside the Medicine Seller and looks at the grooves uneasily; should he expect to encounter another dead body in this wall?

"I do not often run into others down here. It is good to see you."

"That goes for both of us," Kit replies, and doesn't bother clarifying whether he means one or the other. It's probably both. Looking at the marks, he takes a drag off his cigarette, then breathes out the smoke. "What're we looking at here?"

"I do not know, yet."

He folded his hands inside his sleeves, trying to sort out his thoughts. Kirkwall was... wrong. There wasn't really any other word for it. It seemed more chaotic than other places, but when you threw yourself into its ebb and flow, there was a strange rhythm that felt almost alive.

The Medicine Seller had been to many places and seen many things - perhaps the darkest edges of what people were capable of. But Kirkwall was the first time he'd ever felt overwhelmed.

"Places have a... current to them. I find when I try to go against it here, I wind up lost."

The way he said it made it certain getting lost was something that happened to other people.

"So I decided to follow it where it led. Along the way, I have seen these in the old masonry."

"A current?" Kit repeats, bemused. Thinking of Kirkwall as a river of something unsettling isn't really news, though it's news he tries not to dwell on to the best of his ability. He frowns and turns his eyes back to the strange marks in the masonry.

"This city used to be part of Tevinter, I think," he says, in the tone of voice one adopts while scrounging for something useful to say, and coming up short. Still, the Imperium is widely known across Thedas to be the home base of all manner of magical weird shit. Suggesting it doesn't seem too wildly off the mark. Jokingly, he adds, "Maybe they left one in my place, too."

He's kidding. ...He hopes.

"Sometimes ideas and concepts take on a life of their own," the Medicine Seller explained in that slow and halting way of his.

"Like an Inquisition..."

He gave Kit an aside glance, his lips curling into one of his unpleasant and mirthless little smiles.

"...Or a city."

"So," Kit responds slowly, "you're telling me the city is haunted."

Not an entirely unprecedented explanation, all things considered, but--"So is that a bad thing or...? Because I'm getting--" and here he points at that smile, "--mixed signals here."

"No, no."

The chilly smile faded a little. "I simply thought of something amusing. But 'haunted' may not be the right choice of words."

He raised his head, for a moment resembling an animal trying to catch a scent. And then, without a word, began to trail after whatever he had sensed towards the entrance to the sewers.

Kit watches him go at first. There was no explicit invitation to follow offered, exactly; but with the Medicine Seller, social niceties seem to fall by the wayside like bits of unwanted clutter.

It's clear enough where the batty-looking elf is going. Exhaling, Kit takes a final pull from his cigarette, then puts it out underfoot and jogs after him. "You want some back-up?" he offers. If his memory serves him well enough, the Medicine Seller can hold his own in a fight, but a little extra muscle couldn't go amiss in a place like Darktown.

"I would never presume to ask for another to endanger themselves while I sate my curiosity," he said, glancing over his shoulder.

"But your company would be appreciated."

He never liked asking for help, but this was a foreign world and he still wasn't completely sure what still held true to his understanding of things and what didn't. And that could mean the difference between life and death. Kit had shown to be steadfast and reliable in the past - if things got hairy, an ally could be a very good thing.

He pushed aside the grating to the sewer and descended into the stinky gloom.

The line that traditionally separates life from death in Thedas has been understandably blurred for Kit since he was initiated into the Legion. Nevertheless, he has clearly managed to keep himself more to one side of it than the other.

He follows the Medicine Seller down into the dark of the sewer with only the faintest grimace at the stink of it; undoubtedly he's smelled worse in the Deep Roads, though time above ground has weakened his sensitivity to it a bit. There's a corner of his thoughts that draws uneasy parallels between this descent, and the one that he recently took with Yngvi and his other companions during his trip to Orzammar. He pauses long enough to steel his resolve and push the grisly memories to the back of his mind, and picks his way after the Medicine Seller.

"So," he says, choosing to speak rather than let his thoughts wander, "what are we looking for down here?" We, because he's definitely along for the ride now.

"This city has a peculiar history," he said by way of explanation. "A seemingly endless cycle of misery and carnage."

He knew full well that was just like saying the sky is blue and water is wet, but he stopped speaking when he spotted familiar grooves in the wall under the new(er) brickwork, and centuries of slimy mold and lichen. He traced the pattern, until it vanished under the mortar.

"The very air of the city spirals like a whirlpool though I do not know what feeds its momentum."

He pressed on into the murky gloom, intent on finding what he always sought. Form, Truth, and Regret.

Misery and carnage ought to be old hat to Kit; everywhere his feet have carried him, he's seen it in some form or another. But there's something in the way the Medicine Seller says, "The very air of the city spirals like a whirlpool though I do not know what feeds its momentum," that makes him keenly aware of the gap in his knowledge between the world that he knows, and the world that exists beyond the Veil.

He knows it's there. He just doesn't like to think about it if he can help it.

Instead he fixes his attention on the peculiar grooves wrought into the wall, edging closer to take a better look at it. "Looks almost like a sword's fuller," he observes, and glances the Medicine Seller's way again.

That was an interesting observation. The Medicine Seller had been thinking they were for water - these were sewers after all - but such a small amount seemed... perplexing.

"...Hmm."

It wasn't an answer - not much of one. But there was a note of realization in his tone, as though Kit had opened up a whole new range of possibilities.

A sword's fuller. Was this not originally a Tevinter settlement? And were they not particularly fond of blood magic?

It was all circumstantial, of course. The grooves could be anything. But they kept showing up on the path this strange undercurrent pulled him along.

As they descended further into the dark sewers, the Medicine Seller retrieved one of the folded paper lanterns in his box, made it expand suddenly with a gesture, and lit a candle in its basin. Then, quite gently, he levitated it into the air to trail alongside him and Kit, bathing the sewers in a soft, lavender glow.

Quite suddenly, his sword rattled insistently in its case.

Kit edges away from that floating lantern a bit like a spooked horse, but has enough dignity not to demand that the Medicine Seller put the damn thing out and use a torch instead. Even he has to admit it's better for them to have light down here, and all the better for it if they're able to keep their hands free in the process.

Then the sword rattles.

"Uh," Kit starts helpfully, moving a hand slowly to one of his axes, "is it--supposed to do that?"

"Yes," he said, as calmly as though it were a wavering windchime in a spring breeze and not some weird goblin-headed, potentially sentient magic sword.

There was a draft from one of the walls, crumbling plaster smeared over decaying brickwork that was quite a bit different than the original masonry. Some bricks were missing, and the Medicine Seller moved the lantern to illuminate what appeared to be some kind of alcove or tunnel that had been covered ages ago.

The mortar was soft, the bricks decrepit... they could probably get through with a little force.

"I might need your assistance," he said, dislodging a few of the bricks. The clatter echoed down the dark, concealed corridor, and the Medicine Seller smiled to himself.

"Should I expect another dead body behind this mess?" It's a rhetorical question; of course there's going to be a dead body in here. Maybe multiple dead bodies.

Kit steps up to the wall and readies his axe, squinting at the crumbling masonry in search of the best place to strike first. Then he does, the metal striking the brickwork with a thick, clunking sound as the plaster and mortar gives way beneath the blade almost immediately. Kit grunts with each swinging strike, but he makes short work of it, stepping back and rather instinctively putting up an arm before the Medicine Seller, just in the event that some of the bricks and stones might collapse onto him as well. (They don't.)

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[CLOSED] oh, the sweet sound of survival

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