Ellie's breath hisses out between her teeth, and for a moment or two, she looks far older than they both know she is. She wants to mute it out, to push it all away, to pretend that this conversation never happened, but she knows from experience that it doesn't actually work that way.
Instead, she shoulders her satchel, fitting her quiver and bow into place.
"... I'm not going after her," she says, answering before Glimmer asks again. "We agreed on it. I won't get in her business, and she won't get in mine."
She clenches her teeth together, releases the pressure.
"It's what Joel wanted. He told me, back in New Amsterdam."
"...Yeah," GLimmer murmurs. She remembers Joel. Her brief interactions with him. He had been a stern, stoic sort--a lot like Ellie in some ways. Holding himself aloof with a sense of something else hiding behind that distance. She'd never known him well, but there's some relief in Glimmer's expression that he at least didn't want that for Ellie. Glimmer knew what it was to want revenge. It ate you up inside. Consumed you.
"I'm just glad you're okay and the neither of you ended up dead," Glimmer finally adds. She squeezes at Ellie's shoulder and tries to be brave--tries to act like the distance doesn't bother her and that she's not still worried sick.
Neither of you, she says, and the expression sits uncomfortably. Glimmer's a kind and empathetic person, and of course she'd care about Abby -- but Ellie still isn't ready to think of Abby being human. A person with hurts and fears and loves and triumphs. With any redeeming qualities.
But Ellie thinks again of the boats, and the boy in Abby's arms, and she sets her heart all over again, walling it up as best she can.
If she starts, she won't be able to stop.
"Yeah. That sounds perfect right now."
A good fight, some good work. Something to do, something to stop her fingers from itching and get the buzzing in her blood to calm.
Ellie takes the lead without discussion, leaving Artichoke behind -- he'll happily fend for himself and come when called, but she doesn't want him in a direct line of fire -- and heads up the hill at a steady, mile-eating jog, falling into the old pattern without effort, heading towards the smoke.
Glimmer watches Ellie, almost imagines she can feel the wall going up. Ellie always does that when things strike too close to her--she puts up a wall, makes herself out to be impassive and tough and untouchable. She wishes Ellie wouldn't do that. Not like it can be helped. Not here and not now, anyway.
Balancing her staff in her hand, Glimmer hurries along in Ellie's wake. She's in better shape than she used to be and that job, while not as easy as it is for Ellie, proves simpler than it might have been a few months ago. She glances up towards the smoke, frowning.
"They're being a bit obvious, aren't they?" she murmurs.
"That's awful," Glimmer says, reaching out to take the offered hand and haul herself up the outcropping with a grunt. If she were home, she'd probably just go on and zap herself up there. Here, though, she needs to conserve her energy. Wouldn't do any good to wear herself out early.
"Some people just... I don't under why people would do things like that." It's not like there aren't selfish people back home. Not like there aren't liars and cheats and traitors. It still feels weird.
"Were they desperate, do you think? Or just cruel?"
Ellie pulls her up, steadying her with a hand on her upper arm before she steps away again, making a thoughtful noise in her throat. She still remembers how her stomach had turned when she'd walked into that garage, after the crash. The smell of it.
But there are lots of details Glimmer doesn't need to hear.
"I think they started out desperate," Ellie says slowly, as she climbs up. "But by the time we came around..."
She hesitates, thinking of what was nailed to the humvee. The ropes in the trees.
"More than that? What does that mean?" Glimmer catches her footing and steadies herself for a moment, adjusts her grip on her staff. There's a pause and she seems to think better of her question.
"...You don't have to answer if you don't want to."
Ellie hesitates, runs her thumb along her bowstring in thought, but then turns to look fully at Glimmer.
"I don't mind telling you, but do you wanna hear it?"
Glimmer insists all the time that she can take care of herself, but- she doesn't want her losing sleep over it or anything. It's been some time since Ellie has.
Ellie sighs, looking from Glimmer's face, over to the smoke trailing up over the hillside. She stares at it for a long moment, then turns back to her, putting her bow down across her knees to sit on the side of a rock outcropping.
"It was a trap. They crashed our car and pulled us out," she says, like she's recalling going to the store, doing errands. It doesn't bother her to think about, these days. It's just one of hundreds of things she's somehow survived.
"I didn't see what happened with Joel, but I bit the guy who grabbed me, so he started to beat the shit out of me, and I was fourteen at the time. It definitely wasn't my first time taking some hits, but usually it wasn't grown-ass adults. Anyway, Joel got him, and then we got into a shootout with the rest of them. Joel got them all, but then we had to find out way out of the city on foot, and... we found where they would've taken us."
Ellie purposely looks down at her bow, rubbing her fingers along the wood. This part does disturb her.
"They were killing people for their supplies. There were... a whole lot of them. All stripped and stacked up in this old garage. Accounted for. Lists of the things they took off of them. Things like shoes, first aid supplies, bottles of water."
She doesn't mention the smell, or the flies, or how many of them weren't adults. Or how it had been the height of summer-
"Later, it turned out that we weren't the only ones trying to get through the city without getting killed. The Hunters had a humvee they were driving around -- and we saw them corner another couple of people. They shot them, then checked their stuff. It wasn't good enough, so they just left them there in the road."
Edited 2021-10-01 04:13 (UTC)
Re: cw: violence, cruelty, mistreatment of corpses
Glimmer listens, because it is what she asked. It sounds awful enough, at first. The fighting. The killing. That part of things is at least... familiar, in a way. There's a picture of what that looks like in her mind, even if her experience with guns and combat isn't quite the same as Ellie's. As the story continues, though, her breath catches a little. It's hard to imagine it simply because she's never seen anything like it. Sort of. She's seen what happens when towns are destroyed, when people die, when lives are uprooted. This sort of thing, though is different.
It seems so needless. So cruel even compared to things she's seen in her battles.
"So they just killed them for no reason except because they could." It's more a statement than a question. A little more of Ellie's life slides into focus. A little more awareness of just how difficult things must have been enters Glimmer's mind. Even if the thought of that violence makes her feel a little sick, she's privately glad to know it. Glad to know more of Ellie.
"All the more reason to make sure these guys can't hurt anyone else, if they're bandits," she adds in a small, serious voice.
Glimmer's reaction makes Ellie a little bit glad that she held back on some of the gorier details. Glimmer didn't need to hear about those to get the point; but if they have to kill somebody today, she doesn't want her feeling too awful about it.
It'll be better if she starts now, Ellie thinks -- now when she has the space and safety to break down about it if she needs to. Better now than when the war comes to Kirkwall.
It's going to change her, and it's going to hurt, and Ellie knows it all too well. All too personally. She's not looking forward to it. But with luck, she'll survive it.
"Right," Ellie says quietly, watching her with serious eyes. Even if it's all true, even if Glimmer asked, she still feels like she's murdering something innocent.
She wonders if this was what Joel felt like with her. If this was why he didn't want her to carry a gun. Not because he thought she wasn't capable, but because he knew that given the chance, she'd be more than capable, and that she'd never be the same.
Ellie sits in silence for a couple more seconds, and then gets up, dusting off her leggings.
Glimmer takes a minute to check herself. The dagger strapped to her waist, just in case. Her staff. Everything where it's supposed to be. No loose ties or worn buckles that might give out at an inopportune moment. In her mind's eye, she remembers the brick smashing down on a man's face and wonders if it will feel the same a second time.
Even if that's not really her memory. At least that's what she tells herself, sometimes. Because it's easier that way.
"Yeah. Let's go." She adjusts herself, then moves to follow after Ellie. Better to focus on the here and now.
Ellie gives her a nod, and starts again up the hill -- she's trained newer patrols, along with Jesse, so she treats it like that. Compensates for the both of them, but keeps quiet as they approach, readying her bow to nock an arrow, ready just in case.
The area with the smoke comes closer, and they start to see ruts in the dirt, a place where a wagon was pursued at speed. Farther along, there's a splintered wheel, and then the indistinct sound of voices, around a bend. They're close.
Ellie drops to a crouch, making sure she stays off the dry late-summer deadfall, and goes near-silent as they get closer, staying behind cover.
There's a wagon overturned, blood on the ground. Ellie doesn't see a body, but as she circles, she comes across them. A merchant and his wife -- no doubt injured in the crash, throats cut. It's a clean kill at least, no signs of torture. Ellie puts her body between Glimmer and the remains, but she won't be able to block it all out.
Glimmer is careful to follow Ellie's footsteps. She's not nearly as expert at moving quietly as Ellie, though she does her best. When Ellie stops, she does too and her breath catches. Even if Ellie is doing her best to hide what's happened--or at least the full horror of it--Glimmer can still see it. There's a low ember of anger and sorrow in her chest. Righteous grief. Her grip on her staff tightens.
"Oh no," she says quietly. She doesn't know what else to say. Then, a whisper:
"Where are they?" She asks and the murmur of conversation reaches her ears. Men arguing? Someone is laughing.
"Some merchant. There's barely anything in the bloody money chest."
"Told you he looked too poor to bother with."
"Oh, laugh it up. Not like you've picked a better fuckin' target recently."
They killed these people for nothing and they're laughing?
The bandits are definitely being cavalier about their own safety; they could have been much louder and not have had to worry about being noticed. Ellie nods to Glimmer, and sticks to the cover of the rocky slope and deadfall, the side of the wagon.
There's a lot of blood on the ground, and she's careful not to track over it, leave footprints.
"Three of them," she says under her breath.
It's possible that with the patrols in this area so far lapsed, they're feeling particularly bold, especially with so much potential prey rolling through. Fleeing the encroaching war.
"Might be more."
Ellie steadies her bow, then shifts to peek around the edge of the wagon. Her shoulders are tight but steady, and she moves like a predator. She draws a breath deep into her chest, and the blue glow faintly pulses through her armor, shines in her eyes before she disappears from sight.
If Glimmer's looking at the ground, she'll see the slight disturbance in the grass as Ellie moves to a different vantage point, behind a nearby tree, and shimmers back into view.
"On three," she mouths, and pulls the bowstring back.
Like Ellie, Glimmer carefully moves around the blood. The thick, coppery scent of it makes her feel a little sick, but she can't do that. She can't. She has to focus on the now. On what has to be done.
"Okay," she murmurs. She presses herself up against the wagon, staff gripped in her hands, and waits. Watches as Ellie moves invisibly to her new position. She takes a breath. Steadies herself. Glimmer nods back at Ellie and waits.
One.
Two.
Glimmer digs her toes into the ground a little, preparing herself for what's to come.
Three.
Glimmer blinks out of existence and reappears atop the wagon. There are startled cries and she lowers her staff to send a blast of energy down at the man crouched over the money chest, his hand raising an axe as he looks up at her. It catches him full in the chest and there's a sour scent of burning cloth as he's pitched back into the road. She isn't quite sure where Ellie is, but there's not really time to worry about that as someone--a fourth man--leaps up onto the wagon next to her. She spins to block an incoming blow with her staff and staggers back, missing her footing a little in the mixed goods still piled in the cart.
"Get off--!" She yells and then tumbles back into the cart with the bandit after her. The staff is too clumsy now as he presses down onto her, the blade in his hand shoving at her face. She presses back, staff held across her body as she struggles against him, her world narrowing to the struggle over life and death atop a bale of textiles. She strains and pushes, but he's larger, stronger--his breath reeks of garlic. Her arms are trembling from the effort and she knows that if she stays like this longer, she won't be able to keep it up.
Glimmer has to do something. So she does. She gives one last shove with the staff and then wrenches herself to the side all at once, releasing her weapon and scrabbling her waist belt. The man's blade pierces the space where her head had been and she comes back up with her dagger in hand and plunges it into his side. Once. Twice. Thrice. She doesn't stop as the color drains from his face, just rolls over to sit on top of him and plunge the dagger down again and again and again.
One of the hardest things to do when fighting alongside someone you care about is let them protect themselves. At any point there could be a slip, a mistake, a moment when something goes from well in hand to too much to handle, and Ellie's watching for that moment- but then the blast takes the first bandit full in the chest, and he slams down on the road, and Ellie isn't nearly as worried.
Her bowstring twangs against her glove as her broadhead arrow buries itself in another's throat, and then that's two down.
Ellie starts for the third, but then she hears the scuffle atop the wagon -- and she would've gone, but the third bandit's got another axe, and he's charging at her, swinging wildly.
They're not soldier-trained. They're used to defenseless merchants and travelers. Ellie dodges back once, recovers her balance, and slams her bow into his temple with both hands, hearing a good crunch, feeling his skull give. She whips back around to see Glimmer struggling with the fourth uncounted bandit on the cart.
Just in time to see Glimmer get the upper hand, and keep on going.
Cold steals over Ellie's skin as she realizes what's happening, because she's been there, more than once, and she remembers the hot taste of blood, the feel of it on her skin, the screams of terror and pain.
"Glimmer!" she calls, and rushes toward the wagon, vaulting up next to her, making sure to stay clear of the range of her knife. "Glimmer- Glimmer-"
Knowing it's possibly a shitty idea, Ellie reaches out, her hand on Glimmer's wrist, and pulls her into her arms.
The dagger is red up to the hilt and Glimmer is still stabbing it down into the cooling body of the bandit underneath her. He his Hordak. He is Horde Prime. He is the unknown, unnamed phantom of the man who she can so clearly remember killing her mother. He is everyone who has wronged her and hurt her and she has to make sure he's dead. So she stabs again, then again. Someone is calling her name from what feels like a great distance. There are hot tears on her cheeks and as she draws the dagger back again, red splattered on her sleeves and her chest and her cheek, she feels a hand on her wrist, the embrace of familiar arms. The dagger drops from Glimmer's hand and she begins to shiver violently as Ellie bundles her closer.
"I killed him," she mumbles. "He's dead. He's not--he can't hurt anyone else--"
She's still shaking, the adrenaline starting to seep away to leave her to try and put herself back together.
Glimmer has killed him and the worst part is that it felt easy. She didn't think about it. Didn't try to talk him down, didn't try to find another way around it. She just killed him and it was easy. She wrenches herself away from Ellie and vomits over the edge of the wagon. So much for breakfast.
The worst part about killing people is that it is easy. Ellie told her that what seems lifetimes ago, and she remembers it now, as she keeps a hand on Glimmer's back, rubbing gently as she lets her get it out. They're both blood splattered, and it's horrible, and it's horrible that Ellie's as unbothered as she is.
She shuts it down, concentrates on her friend, who needs her right now.
"You did," she says quietly. "You did good."
It sounds hollow and a little bit sick, saying it, but she never really had anybody talk her through it, and she doesn't know what to say. But she tries, tries to grope for what she would have wanted when she was this girl, once upon a time.
"He would have killed you, if you hadn't defended yourself," she says softly. "It's okay to feel fucked up about it, but- but you didn't do anything wrong."
You did good, Ellie says. Glimmer doesn't feel like she did good, but Ellie is trying to comfort her and she appreciates that, more than anything else. Her friend is here and comforting her and it's going to be okay. It's okay.
Glimmer is okay.
"I know," she says. Glimmer's throat aches, sore from the struggle, stings from the acid in her bile.
"I just--" What does she say?
"The first time. The first time I remember it felt so different." She doesn't know if that memory is real or not anymore. Her Aerie-self and her real-self feel so blended together in her mind that separating them is harder than she remembers. Maybe it's just the adrenaline.
Ellie takes Glimmer's arm, and draws her in closer to her, turning her away from the blood, the bodies. She doesn't hesitate to touch her, doesn't mind the blood splatter. There'll be time enough for that later, to clean up.
"C'mon. We don't want to stay here. Let's get the people they were after- find out if they have... any family to tell. Give 'em a decent burial."
Not the bandits, no- but Ellie's dug enough graves on mountainsides, in swamplands, in valleys and summer fields. She'd like to think that when she bites it, somebody'll do it for her.
Glimmer hugs Ellie tight as she's turned away from the bodies. It's a comfort, though not for the first time Glimmer finds herself missing the closeness of that shared emotional connection. At least... at least she's not alone. She stumbles, then hops down off the wagon.
"Yeah. Let's do that." She just wants to focus on the task ahead. Thinking about what just happened makes her feel too jittery.
Ellie hugs her back, letting go only when Glimmer starts to draw away. It feels like it was too short, like she's pushing herself to the next thing to make sure she doesn't have to think too hard.
It sucks, seeing someone else do what she does. Do her friends feel this powerless? Did Joel?
"Okay."
Ellie hops down, lightly touches Glimmer's elbow, and points out a grassy, flatter area with some likely-looking stones, which looks like a good place to dig, and goes to check the corpses herself. Drags the bandits to the edge of a drop, tosses them down unceremoniously, and then looks over the murdered couple.
Slowly, she walks over to Glimmer, holding the husband's waist pouch in her hands, along with a letter. She's squinting to read it, has managed the gist.
"... they've got a son down in Crestwood," she says softly. "They were refugees. He invited them to come and live with him and his family. They were going to meet him in Kirkwall in a week, and travel back together."
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faderift2021-08-27 09:27 pm
no subject
Instead, she shoulders her satchel, fitting her quiver and bow into place.
"... I'm not going after her," she says, answering before Glimmer asks again. "We agreed on it. I won't get in her business, and she won't get in mine."
She clenches her teeth together, releases the pressure.
"It's what Joel wanted. He told me, back in New Amsterdam."
no subject
"I'm just glad you're okay and the neither of you ended up dead," Glimmer finally adds. She squeezes at Ellie's shoulder and tries to be brave--tries to act like the distance doesn't bother her and that she's not still worried sick.
"Let's go mess these guys up, yeah?"
no subject
But Ellie thinks again of the boats, and the boy in Abby's arms, and she sets her heart all over again, walling it up as best she can.
If she starts, she won't be able to stop.
"Yeah. That sounds perfect right now."
A good fight, some good work. Something to do, something to stop her fingers from itching and get the buzzing in her blood to calm.
Ellie takes the lead without discussion, leaving Artichoke behind -- he'll happily fend for himself and come when called, but she doesn't want him in a direct line of fire -- and heads up the hill at a steady, mile-eating jog, falling into the old pattern without effort, heading towards the smoke.
Either they're refugees or bandits, or both.
no subject
Balancing her staff in her hand, Glimmer hurries along in Ellie's wake. She's in better shape than she used to be and that job, while not as easy as it is for Ellie, proves simpler than it might have been a few months ago. She glances up towards the smoke, frowning.
"They're being a bit obvious, aren't they?" she murmurs.
no subject
Ellie says it with the patient wariness that Joel had -- one of the many things she's unaware she's inherited from him.
"When we went through Pittsburgh there was someone who ran out in front of our car, begging us for help. I thought we should stop."
Vaulting up over a rocky outcropping, Ellie turns and leans down to offer Glimmer a hand; she's shorter and it's a bit of a jump to get up.
"Joel told me to put my seatbelt on, gunned it and ran him over. Turned out he was a Hunter, and he and his buddies wanted the car, and us."
no subject
"Some people just... I don't under why people would do things like that." It's not like there aren't selfish people back home. Not like there aren't liars and cheats and traitors. It still feels weird.
"Were they desperate, do you think? Or just cruel?"
no subject
But there are lots of details Glimmer doesn't need to hear.
"I think they started out desperate," Ellie says slowly, as she climbs up. "But by the time we came around..."
She hesitates, thinking of what was nailed to the humvee. The ropes in the trees.
"It was a lot more than that."
no subject
"...You don't have to answer if you don't want to."
no subject
"I don't mind telling you, but do you wanna hear it?"
Glimmer insists all the time that she can take care of herself, but- she doesn't want her losing sleep over it or anything. It's been some time since Ellie has.
Maybe that should make her worry more.
no subject
"I'd rather--" Glimmer exhales and tightens her grip on her staff.
"I'd rather know than keep wondering about all of it. About what your life was like. About what you've seen."
cw: violence, cruelty, mistreatment of corpses
"It was a trap. They crashed our car and pulled us out," she says, like she's recalling going to the store, doing errands. It doesn't bother her to think about, these days. It's just one of hundreds of things she's somehow survived.
"I didn't see what happened with Joel, but I bit the guy who grabbed me, so he started to beat the shit out of me, and I was fourteen at the time. It definitely wasn't my first time taking some hits, but usually it wasn't grown-ass adults. Anyway, Joel got him, and then we got into a shootout with the rest of them. Joel got them all, but then we had to find out way out of the city on foot, and... we found where they would've taken us."
Ellie purposely looks down at her bow, rubbing her fingers along the wood. This part does disturb her.
"They were killing people for their supplies. There were... a whole lot of them. All stripped and stacked up in this old garage. Accounted for. Lists of the things they took off of them. Things like shoes, first aid supplies, bottles of water."
She doesn't mention the smell, or the flies, or how many of them weren't adults. Or how it had been the height of summer-
"Later, it turned out that we weren't the only ones trying to get through the city without getting killed. The Hunters had a humvee they were driving around -- and we saw them corner another couple of people. They shot them, then checked their stuff. It wasn't good enough, so they just left them there in the road."
Re: cw: violence, cruelty, mistreatment of corpses
It seems so needless. So cruel even compared to things she's seen in her battles.
"So they just killed them for no reason except because they could." It's more a statement than a question. A little more of Ellie's life slides into focus. A little more awareness of just how difficult things must have been enters Glimmer's mind. Even if the thought of that violence makes her feel a little sick, she's privately glad to know it. Glad to know more of Ellie.
"All the more reason to make sure these guys can't hurt anyone else, if they're bandits," she adds in a small, serious voice.
no subject
It'll be better if she starts now, Ellie thinks -- now when she has the space and safety to break down about it if she needs to. Better now than when the war comes to Kirkwall.
It's going to change her, and it's going to hurt, and Ellie knows it all too well. All too personally. She's not looking forward to it. But with luck, she'll survive it.
"Right," Ellie says quietly, watching her with serious eyes. Even if it's all true, even if Glimmer asked, she still feels like she's murdering something innocent.
She wonders if this was what Joel felt like with her. If this was why he didn't want her to carry a gun. Not because he thought she wasn't capable, but because he knew that given the chance, she'd be more than capable, and that she'd never be the same.
Ellie sits in silence for a couple more seconds, and then gets up, dusting off her leggings.
"Ready?"
no subject
Even if that's not really her memory. At least that's what she tells herself, sometimes. Because it's easier that way.
"Yeah. Let's go." She adjusts herself, then moves to follow after Ellie. Better to focus on the here and now.
cw: murder, corpses
Ellie gives her a nod, and starts again up the hill -- she's trained newer patrols, along with Jesse, so she treats it like that. Compensates for the both of them, but keeps quiet as they approach, readying her bow to nock an arrow, ready just in case.
The area with the smoke comes closer, and they start to see ruts in the dirt, a place where a wagon was pursued at speed. Farther along, there's a splintered wheel, and then the indistinct sound of voices, around a bend. They're close.
Ellie drops to a crouch, making sure she stays off the dry late-summer deadfall, and goes near-silent as they get closer, staying behind cover.
There's a wagon overturned, blood on the ground. Ellie doesn't see a body, but as she circles, she comes across them. A merchant and his wife -- no doubt injured in the crash, throats cut. It's a clean kill at least, no signs of torture. Ellie puts her body between Glimmer and the remains, but she won't be able to block it all out.
Re: cw: murder, corpses
"Oh no," she says quietly. She doesn't know what else to say. Then, a whisper:
"Where are they?" She asks and the murmur of conversation reaches her ears. Men arguing? Someone is laughing.
"Some merchant. There's barely anything in the bloody money chest."
"Told you he looked too poor to bother with."
"Oh, laugh it up. Not like you've picked a better fuckin' target recently."
They killed these people for nothing and they're laughing?
no subject
There's a lot of blood on the ground, and she's careful not to track over it, leave footprints.
"Three of them," she says under her breath.
It's possible that with the patrols in this area so far lapsed, they're feeling particularly bold, especially with so much potential prey rolling through. Fleeing the encroaching war.
"Might be more."
Ellie steadies her bow, then shifts to peek around the edge of the wagon. Her shoulders are tight but steady, and she moves like a predator. She draws a breath deep into her chest, and the blue glow faintly pulses through her armor, shines in her eyes before she disappears from sight.
If Glimmer's looking at the ground, she'll see the slight disturbance in the grass as Ellie moves to a different vantage point, behind a nearby tree, and shimmers back into view.
"On three," she mouths, and pulls the bowstring back.
no subject
"Okay," she murmurs. She presses herself up against the wagon, staff gripped in her hands, and waits. Watches as Ellie moves invisibly to her new position. She takes a breath. Steadies herself. Glimmer nods back at Ellie and waits.
One.
Two.
Glimmer digs her toes into the ground a little, preparing herself for what's to come.
Three.
Glimmer blinks out of existence and reappears atop the wagon. There are startled cries and she lowers her staff to send a blast of energy down at the man crouched over the money chest, his hand raising an axe as he looks up at her. It catches him full in the chest and there's a sour scent of burning cloth as he's pitched back into the road. She isn't quite sure where Ellie is, but there's not really time to worry about that as someone--a fourth man--leaps up onto the wagon next to her. She spins to block an incoming blow with her staff and staggers back, missing her footing a little in the mixed goods still piled in the cart.
"Get off--!" She yells and then tumbles back into the cart with the bandit after her. The staff is too clumsy now as he presses down onto her, the blade in his hand shoving at her face. She presses back, staff held across her body as she struggles against him, her world narrowing to the struggle over life and death atop a bale of textiles. She strains and pushes, but he's larger, stronger--his breath reeks of garlic. Her arms are trembling from the effort and she knows that if she stays like this longer, she won't be able to keep it up.
Glimmer has to do something. So she does. She gives one last shove with the staff and then wrenches herself to the side all at once, releasing her weapon and scrabbling her waist belt. The man's blade pierces the space where her head had been and she comes back up with her dagger in hand and plunges it into his side. Once. Twice. Thrice. She doesn't stop as the color drains from his face, just rolls over to sit on top of him and plunge the dagger down again and again and again.
It is distressingly simple, in hindsight.
cw: gore/death
Her bowstring twangs against her glove as her broadhead arrow buries itself in another's throat, and then that's two down.
Ellie starts for the third, but then she hears the scuffle atop the wagon -- and she would've gone, but the third bandit's got another axe, and he's charging at her, swinging wildly.
They're not soldier-trained. They're used to defenseless merchants and travelers. Ellie dodges back once, recovers her balance, and slams her bow into his temple with both hands, hearing a good crunch, feeling his skull give. She whips back around to see Glimmer struggling with the fourth uncounted bandit on the cart.
Just in time to see Glimmer get the upper hand, and keep on going.
Cold steals over Ellie's skin as she realizes what's happening, because she's been there, more than once, and she remembers the hot taste of blood, the feel of it on her skin, the screams of terror and pain.
"Glimmer!" she calls, and rushes toward the wagon, vaulting up next to her, making sure to stay clear of the range of her knife. "Glimmer- Glimmer-"
Knowing it's possibly a shitty idea, Ellie reaches out, her hand on Glimmer's wrist, and pulls her into her arms.
"Hey, hey, it's okay. It's me. It's me."
Re: cw: gore/death
"I killed him," she mumbles. "He's dead. He's not--he can't hurt anyone else--"
She's still shaking, the adrenaline starting to seep away to leave her to try and put herself back together.
Glimmer has killed him and the worst part is that it felt easy. She didn't think about it. Didn't try to talk him down, didn't try to find another way around it. She just killed him and it was easy. She wrenches herself away from Ellie and vomits over the edge of the wagon. So much for breakfast.
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She shuts it down, concentrates on her friend, who needs her right now.
"You did," she says quietly. "You did good."
It sounds hollow and a little bit sick, saying it, but she never really had anybody talk her through it, and she doesn't know what to say. But she tries, tries to grope for what she would have wanted when she was this girl, once upon a time.
"He would have killed you, if you hadn't defended yourself," she says softly. "It's okay to feel fucked up about it, but- but you didn't do anything wrong."
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Glimmer is okay.
"I know," she says. Glimmer's throat aches, sore from the struggle, stings from the acid in her bile.
"I just--" What does she say?
"The first time. The first time I remember it felt so different." She doesn't know if that memory is real or not anymore. Her Aerie-self and her real-self feel so blended together in her mind that separating them is harder than she remembers. Maybe it's just the adrenaline.
"It was easier this time."
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Ellie takes Glimmer's arm, and draws her in closer to her, turning her away from the blood, the bodies. She doesn't hesitate to touch her, doesn't mind the blood splatter. There'll be time enough for that later, to clean up.
"C'mon. We don't want to stay here. Let's get the people they were after- find out if they have... any family to tell. Give 'em a decent burial."
Not the bandits, no- but Ellie's dug enough graves on mountainsides, in swamplands, in valleys and summer fields. She'd like to think that when she bites it, somebody'll do it for her.
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"Yeah. Let's do that." She just wants to focus on the task ahead. Thinking about what just happened makes her feel too jittery.
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It sucks, seeing someone else do what she does. Do her friends feel this powerless? Did Joel?
"Okay."
Ellie hops down, lightly touches Glimmer's elbow, and points out a grassy, flatter area with some likely-looking stones, which looks like a good place to dig, and goes to check the corpses herself. Drags the bandits to the edge of a drop, tosses them down unceremoniously, and then looks over the murdered couple.
Slowly, she walks over to Glimmer, holding the husband's waist pouch in her hands, along with a letter. She's squinting to read it, has managed the gist.
"... they've got a son down in Crestwood," she says softly. "They were refugees. He invited them to come and live with him and his family. They were going to meet him in Kirkwall in a week, and travel back together."
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