faderift | (no subject)

WHO: Felix and Adelaide. Then Felix and OPEN.
WHAT: Felix isn't feeling well and collapses. Adelaide tends to him. After, he's up for visitors but is still very weak.
WHEN: Current.
WHERE: The main hall. Then, Felix's private room.
NOTES: Description of illness?

[For Adelaide]

Felix was probably pushing himself too hard, if he was honest. It was becoming more and more clear every day that his time was running out. He didn't have much left and he wanted to try to get as much done as possible before. He had been up all night drafting letters home urging those he had ties with to support the Inquisition.

Then early in the morning he had gone to visit his father. The elder Alexius had fussed more than anything, but Felix still made the effort to try to see his father as much as he could, while he could. Then came arranging the letters to be sent north.

He was exhausted just doing those few things, though the lack of sleep hadn't been helping. He felt the headache coming on. There was a pounding in his head. It was rhythmic. A song. His ears were ringing with it and his head felt like it was swimming.

He made his way up the stairs to the main hall of Skyhold. He was planning to use this path to get to his room while picking up something to drink along the way, but when he bent to pick up the cup he felt his head swarm. His vision blacked.

He heard the gasps and exclamations from those in the hall as his body fell to the ground, but he wasn't aware of much else outside of that.

[OPEN]

Later he's in his room, resting. His body feels clammy. He's sweating but his skin feels so cold. There's very little color left in his cheeks which seem hallow and thin.

Still, he knows rumors are spreading about his health and he's willing to see visitors if anyone wants to see him.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Bruce never argued back, of course, but this time he had even less desire to really say anything much, the reality of the situation weighing heavily in the air. The Blight within him was spreading and getting worse and soon--

Best not to think about it now. Bruce walks over to the side of Felix's bed, setting down the tray and pouring the tea out for him. "I heard you took a pretty bad fall earlier," he began, by way of conversation.

Felix can't move a lot but he does look over curiously at the tea. He smiles a bit, with a tinge of embarrassment at the corners of his mouth.

"Yes. I'm afraid you missed all of the excitement."

"I think I'll be fine having missed that." The words were wry and no matter how Bruce tried, there was no real way to keep off the grim expression on his face. In his travels Bruce had seen a fair number of people wasted away by the Blight, and each time was no better than the last. And now to see it once more, somebody who clearly didn't deserve such a fate having to suffer it--

It wasn't fair. Nothing about this was fair.

Bruce set the teapot back down and carefully brings the cup over to Felix, helping the other up and making sure he gets some of the tea down. "You shouldn't have pushed yourself so much," he said, and despite the words there was no anger to his voice, only understanding. He can understand why Felix is trying to do all of this, but it doesn't make anything easier.

Felix is grateful for the tea, and for the distraction it provides. He isn't sure he'll be able to keep much more down. He watches Bruce move around the room as he gets it and brings it to him.

He doesn't respond right away. He really isn't certain what can be said.

"I need to make sure I do everything I can to change minds," he said finally. "I've made peace with the inevitability, but now as it draws nearer all I can think on are the things that I can do with the time I have left."

It was hard to blame Felix for what he thought - if he were in his place, Bruce knew he would be doing the same. But once again it didn't make anything easier, and it certainly wasn't going to make the situation better. The reality of everything still hung between them, heavy and laden with unspoken words.

"You're not going to help anybody by collapsing either," he chides gently in return as he places the teacup back down. "Try to be reasonable about that, at the very least."

"I doubt I'll be leaving this bed much any more," Felix said honestly. He didn't seem too torn up about it, more accepting. "Hard to collapse when you aren't standing."

There was a moment of silence from Bruce, then. With everyday that passed he knew it was another tick on whatever time that Felix had left. At this point it was nothing else but a matter of time, and it wasn't easy, to know that but not being able to do anything at all to help.

"How is your father taking it all?" he asks instead, because he figures its easier to change the topic - or at least as much as it can be changed. They both know what's already going on, so there was no use beating a dead horse, as it were.

"I..." Felix pauses for a moment, and frowns. It's strange how much he thinks he's okay with this until someone says something and it makes his chest ache.

"I spoke with him this morning, but I haven't been able to see him since I collapsed. I asked Adelaide to speak with him to let him know I'm still here." He sighed a bit. "I worry about how he'll be once I'm gone. Hopefully the Inquisition will be able to put his knowledge and talent to good use."

Felix's worries weren't unfounded - he isn't entirely clear on what the circumstances of the elder Alexius's arrest and crimes were, but he could at least see that father and son did love each other very much. Losing something that close... Bruce could easily imagine what it would do to anybody.

"I'm sure that both sides will respect what you wish for, if anything else." There would only be shame if either party didn't go out of their way to respect the needs of a dying man, especially one from somebody as kind and noble as Felix. "You don't have to worry on that account."

"And yet, here I am, worrying." He offers Bruce a small smile to show that he's not entirely serious. It's not as if he has intense amounts of anxiety over it. "It's a nice change from everyone worrying about me."

Bruce returns that amusement with some of his own, quirking a wry smile in response to his words, even if the pain he felt for Felix was probably recognizable on his features at the same time.

"I suppose you do have to start somewhere eventually," he said in a tone of bemusement. He reached out to take a biscuit, breaking it into half before passing one of the halves to Felix. "Here. At least try to have a little something in your stomach."

Felix takes it and eats slowly. Surprisingly, he feels much better with food. It was probably one more thing that he wasn't taking care of properly.

"Thank you, my friend," he says with an appreciative smile.

There is a moment where Bruce pauses here, because--well. Felix called him 'friend', which probably shouldn't mean anything at all but. Maybe it was because Bruce himself was getting sentimental (he knows he's always been the sort), or maybe it was because Felix was dying, but it was hard to deny the bit of emotion that he felt from that.

Felix was dying, and there was nothing that Bruce could do about it. The guilt wasn't going to leave him for a while.

"It's the least I could do," he returns eventually, doing his best to smile.