MOD PLOT ↠ ALL SOULS WHO TAKE UP THE SWORD

[faderifting]

WHO: Nearly everyone
WHAT: Retaking Val Chevin
WHEN: Late Firstfall into early/mid-Haring, 9:47
WHERE: Val Chevin, Orlais
NOTES: Generated injuries here! CWs for violence, slavery mentions. Use content warnings in your comment subject lines as needed.

THE BATTLE

The battle begins just after dawn, once the distraction at the harbor has drawn as much of the enemy force to that end of the city as possible. Bombardment (magical or otherwise) is fruitless while the elvhen shield artifact continues to magically reinforce the walls and gates, but a Riftwatch team is on its way and will soon have disabled it. In the meantime, while the enemy's attention is focused on the harbor the assault begins. The first waves of soldiers are sent up ladders to try to fight their way over. Some make it, and fight their way along the battlements to try to reach the gate below, in hopes of unbarring it from within even before the shield is broken. The attacking force very nearly manages a lightning-quick victory, numbers pouring over a section of the wall left unmanned by the harbor distraction. They might have managed it when, suddenly, a rush of magic descends down onto the walls, physically, enough to blow their hair back and everything, and a glowing dome spreads over the city—essentially an enormous magical barrier.

Those at the tops of ladders suddenly find their blows absorbed by the magic rather than landing on the overwhelmed guards along the wall, while the defenders' blades still pierce through from within. The tide quickly begins to turn in favor of the Tevinter defenders. Some of the attackers are caught already within the walls when the barrier drops, and without more following behind them are quickly outnumbered, either killed or forced to flee deeper into the city to try to avoid capture. There is traffic jam at the top of the wall as forward progress abruptly halts, and at least one ladder accidentally falls in the resulting confusion, taking a dozen or so attackers with it. Attacks from the walls above now rain down with impunity as the attackers attempt to force their way through the barrier, reasoning that all barriers break eventually and it's just a matter of applying enough force. For a short period that feels longer, the battle stagnates, all the damage being taken by the allied forces, the Tevinters on the wall able to regroup and reinforce their ranks.

It takes longer than anyone had planned but finally the Riftwatch team inside the city is successful and the barrier dome dissipates as abruptly as it had appeared. A cheer goes up, flagging morale restored, and the assault takes on renewed intensity. Without their magical protection the gate is no longer unbreachable. Rams are aimed at it and magical force as well, protected by archers and more mages, with assistance from some griffon riders above. The enemy throws down scalding stones, oil, even Antivan fire, but their force is stretched thinner and thinner, and more and more attackers make it over the walls to harry them back. Finally the gate splinters, and the armies of Orlais and the Divine stream into Val Chevin.

The Tevinter and Ander forces don't give in that easily. They make a stand in the central square of the city, fighting on the steps of the Chantry and the lip of the great fountain itself with its four leaping seahorses. They retreat through the streets, broken up into smaller groups, some barricading themselves inside a building, others seeking to hide in a home, more running, or looking for chokepoints they can defend, mages tearing stones out of walls to block pursuit. Some of the people of Val Chevin, sensing an end to the occupation at last, join the fight, driving soldiers out of their homes and shops with pitchforks and butcher's knives, raining trash and debris down on them from windows, calling out warnings and directions to friendly forces, offering water or aid where they can.

By mid-afternoon, it's over. Some of the occupying force have managed to flee into the countryside or into one of the few ships remaining intact in the harbor. Many more are dead. The remainder, perhaps as many as a thousand, are gradually cornered at various places around the city and give themselves up. Not all surrenders are honored--some, particularly Orlesians and locals caught up in the fighting, are eager to dispatch the enemy occupiers once and for all and unless someone intervenes may ignore the laying down of arms. Stragglers still attempting to hide or escape are rounded up throughout the day (some even later), tracked down by searchers or turned in by locals.

THE "SAFE AND SECURE" SHIP

Anchored at what is believed to be a safe distance just up the coast to the northeast of the city, Riftwatch's shipboard base of operations provides a landing and launch area for griffons, triage for wounded, and on large tables and boards a collection of detailed maps of the area and of the city and its various districts on which action is tracked as crystal reports come in. Some are assigned to shifts manning the crystals: taking in reports, asking questions, soliciting aid, sending griffon riders where they're most needed. Others analyze the information provided, plot it on the maps, or coordinate with allied movements. Supplies are doled out from the ship as well, from spare weapons and armor to food and water, grenades, lyrium potions, healing poultices. Though the breeze only intermittently carries the sounds of battle out here, the ship is still a buzz with activity throughout the day.

Disaster doesn't strike until the afternoon, when a group of Tevinters fleeing the city manage to commandeer one of the remaining mostly-intact ships and somehow make it out of the harbor despite not entirely knowing how to sail. They straggle out into the bay, catch the wrong current, and are suddenly on top of the Riftwatch ship. Though smaller and already beginning to sink, the Tevinter vessel manages to tangle itself with Riftwatch's anchor cable, and the couple of mages on board make a doomed attempt to trade up for the bigger, more seaworthy model. They fail, but not before managing to do some serious damage to Riftwatch's ship, sufficient to sink it as well.

A hasty evacuation follows by griffon and longboat. The ship sinks rapidly, leaving just barely enough time to get all the wounded ferried to shore and still come back for the healthy before they go down with the ship.

THE AFTERMATH

IMMEDIATE NEEDS

First things first: the wounded from the battle need to be attended to, including not only those from Riftwatch's ranks, but also members of the Orlesian military, local civilians, and Tevinter and Ander prisoners—though opinions vary about whether or not to provide them with any assistance. The Orlesian military has supplies and surgeons, and Riftwatch will be welcome to either seek care or help provide it in medical tents that are set up on the outskirts of the city even before the fighting has fully concluded. During this first evening, this area is not a peaceful place to be, filled with shouts and moans and blood-spattered people darting between emergencies. Even with Riftwatch's help (and magic), resources are stretched thin enough by severe injuries that those who look like they're going to survive without help might be turned away to deal with their pain and cosmetic concerns the old fashioned ways: finding elfroot sprouting up between the cobblestones to chew on, or gritting their teeth and getting over it.

Throughout the night, paranoia persists about the possibility that belated reinforcements—or, worse, a dragon—might arrive to prolong the battle. Soldiers keep watch along the walls and at some forward locations, and Riftwatch's griffon riders are sent to observe the portions of the occupying force that fled north and ensure there's nothing amiss. Nothing seems to be, but continuing to lightly harass the Tevinter and Ander forces to hurry them on their way and keep them from pausing to ransack anything won't hurt.

In the morning, back in Val Chevin, those who look strong and uninjured are enlisted to help with clearing debris from the places where the fighting was heavy and magical enough to collapse walls and roofs or topple statues, or else loading bodies onto carts bound for the pyres outside the city. By mid-morning plumes of smoke streak the sky. The bulk of the damage and death is concentrated on the docks, where the dreadnought crashed and where the initial smash-and-burn fighting took place. Meanwhile, throughout the harbor, griffons will prove useful in examining the water for concentrations of floating bodies—which need to be fished out to avoid a walking dead problem in the future—or debris that's potentially either useful or dangerous. Given what the dreadnought assault team reports, there's also a careful search for any red lyrium-infested sea creatures in the harbor, but while other pens like the one that contained the very large red lyrium octopus they encountered, all have been destroyed in the chaos and no other beasts are spotted.

TAKING STOCK

Over the course of the week, supplies arrive by land and by sea from across Orlais—some from the government, some from charitable patriots who put together donation drives as soon as they heard the news. About eighty percent are practical and useful: winter shoes and clothing, flour and preserves and other long-lasting foods, bolts of fabric, apothecary supplies, a few dairy animals and chickens. The usefulness of the rest varies, including a crate of used toys (labeled FOR THE SWEET PEASANT CHILDREN), an assortment of expensive hats that were in season last winter, and collections of plain masks and face paints in case Tevinter was cruelly forcing anyone to go barefaced. Riftwatch is given leave to distribute these to people as they find needs to meet.

The surviving Orlesian civilians who have been trapped in the occupied city for the last two and a half years haven't been as starved or brutalized as popular imagination may have assumed, but the experience has been plenty miserable. Outside of a few public executions, agitators and those who fomented rebellion against the occupiers have by and large disappeared more quietly. Due to its collective general experience with the Tevinter language and magic, Riftwatch is given the fairly depressing task of sorting through the cells and torture chambers in Val Chevin's central keep, where records and other evidence of executions remain. It's enough to determine who died and how. Some had quick deaths; others were tortured or used for blood magic rituals. A handful appear to have been removed from the city and sent north to be held in Tevinter instead. Relaying the specifics to family members will generally be the responsibility of Orlesian officials, but family members eager for information may corner Riftwatchers coming or going from the fortress to press them for details.

Over the next couple weeks Riftwatch is also called to assist with handling other remnants of the Tevinter occupation, such as translating documents, evaluating evidence of blood magic, and sorting through relics and enchanted objects accumulated by the Venatori. Among the things left behind is a trove of elven artifacts seemingly extracted from nearby temples. None are as powerful as the shield; most seem to be completely unmagical cultural relics.

Elsewhere, many locals were evicted from their homes to make room for Tevinter occupiers. While Orlesian officials sort through claims to those homes, including several contentious competing claims, Riftwatch is sent into them to sort through what the enemy left behind and make sure they're safe for their occupants to return to. In many they find the ashy remains of hastily burned private documents and a variety of fairly mundane magical objects: spoons that stir themselves, hats that are always cool on the inside, candles that light and extinguish in response to clapping.Each is the work of a bound spirit that can be released or destroyed—or left to continue its eternal work, if someone wants to pocket an object rather than restore it to its original inanimate state. Throughout the city, there may also be opportunities to reunite grateful civilians with appropriated belongings ranging from fine art to beloved old horses.

Orlesians aren't the only ones in the city in need of assistance. A small number of Tevinter slaves—exclusively those performing menial tasks, as far as anyone can tell—remain in the city now that their masters have been killed or captured. With the Orlesian populace and military inclined, on average, to consider them threats and collaborators, Riftwatch's intervention on their behalf is necessary. Interviewing them and checking their stories against witness accounts and Tevinter records, to ensure none of them are Venatori mages or gleeful torturers in disguise, will allow Riftwatch to vouch for them confidently. They may also be able to find sympathetic locals willing to shelter and hire those who would like to remain in the city, though there aren't that many who do want to stay.

Throughout their time in the city, Riftwatch representatives are asked to report what they find regarding the treatment of the locals and any practice of blood magic. While Orlesian officers ask for Riftwatch members to give this information to them directly, it's quickly clear that it's likely to influence Orlais' decisions about how to deal with the thousand-odd Tevinter prisoners. Individuals identified as responsible for atrocities are being tortured or executed, especially if they're unlikely to have or provide information, and there is nothing ensuring the entire group won't be ultimately executed after the dust settles. With that in mind, Riftwatch receives instructions from the Division Heads to instead bring the information to them so it can be compiled, double-checked, screened for any individuals Riftwatch may need to question themselves, and delivered with a diplomatic touch.

GOING HOME (OR NOT)

Approximately a week after the battle, as the majority of Riftwatch is preparing to leave, Empress Celene and members of her retinue arrive in Val Chevin. They're greeted by a restrained military parade and less restrained enthusiasm from the civilians, who will line the streets to catch a glimpse and celebrate the symbolic return of the city to full Orlesian control. Riftwatch's attendance is not mandatory. Most of the organization leaves that day to return to Kirkwall and their other work. However, a small number remain behind for a few more days, overseen by the heads of Diplomacy and Forces, to provide administrative support while the Ambassador and Commander liaise with the Empress' people about their plans for the Tevinter prisoners. As thanks, they might be invited to endure a few stifling fancy dinners.

Comments

[notathreat]

Even before Ellie's fully aware that Abby's on the battlefield, she knows it. She keeps track of her in some pocketed corner of her mind, and when they cross paths it's inevitable that they draw close without realizing it.

This blaze of fire and blood feels familiar, close to home, though with far fewer gunshots. Instead there's the whirring sound of air displaced, the bone-crunch of the impact of Abby's hammer, and Ellie isn't terribly surprised to hear her voice.

"Holy shit," she mutters, as the mace comes down on the man. It only takes the one blow, and later, Ellie will remember the way her ears rang and buzzed, and parts of her felt numb.

But this time she's on her feet, and it doesn't take much thought.

Ellie closes ranks and her back bumps into Abby's, bracing herself there as she pulls back on her bowstring, lets an arrow fly. It punches through an eye socket, and Ellie's on the next one before the mage hits the ground.

"Two on your left."

[armd]

One blow, one hard wrench of the mace back out of flesh and bone: seconds, and her target is dead, or close enough to it that she can comfortably move on. She turns. Ellie's right there, back to her, and her shoulder digs momentarily in against Abby's spine through her armor to steady herself when she draws her bow back, lightning fast.

The whistle of her arrows raises the fine hairs on the back of Abby's neck. It's a sound she's always associated with Seraphites, and blending that in with Ellie makes for an uncomfortable experience, sets off that fight response almost immediately.

At least it's tracking away from her, not at her...

It's the little things, huh.

"Got 'em."

But the soldier that accosts her is bigger than she is, and almost as wide. He blocks off the mage behind him with his body alone, and she torments Abby with blasts of magic, forcing her to duck and weave as she fights. It's a struggle to commit to any one blow.

"Could use an archer–" she seethes in Ellie's direction, adding, "Oh fuck off!" when something bright and dazzling hits her squarely, the energy cold like ice, webbing out across her breast plate in icy patterns.

[notathreat]

"Gimme a fucking sec," Ellie snaps, as she casts another arrow off. This one doesn't have magic behind it, but it still punches through a neck anyway, and she gives a huffing breath of satisfaction as the soldier drops.

"Brace up," she warns Abby, and spins around, the back of her forearm bracing against Abby's mace-side bicep, pulling back on the string.

Magic locks it into place, a burn of gold that fires up, pulses along wood and crystal and cruel, curved points. Abby becomes her shield, magic her guide, and when she releases the arrow it practically finds a groove in the air.

Slips through a tiny gap in the soldier's guard to slam through the mage's eye socket, and he goes down with a gurgling, clawing gout of blood.

Ellie's starting to think she could stand behind Abby in front of just about anything.

[armd]

She wants to snap back that she doesn't have a fucking second, but the ice magic sinks down through her armor and makes the next cold breath practically freeze in her lungs. Her words stick. She wheezes instead. The lull in action might have been enough to get her killed if Ellie didn't spin around at that moment and aim up against her. She's so goddamn quick. Abby feels her draw the string, the quivering strength of her arm and the critical calm that follows while she aims, holding for a second–

The arrow bursts forward in a haze of golden light. Abby holds, and watches, and shivers crawl up her spine at the sight of it thudding home. Her mouth is open.

That's what you get for fucking with us– a triumphant shout on the tip of her tongue that she swallows once she realises that Ellie just ​bought enough time for her to thaw out. Plenty of time to celebrate once they've won.

For now, she gulps air, and meets the hard swing of a sword inelegantly as she shoves out in front of Ellie to give her cover, time to redirect. The clang of the blade on metal spikes is deafening. Abby pulls back faster, her second strike ringing true, and crashes hard into her opponent's forearm.

He drops the fucking sword. She snarls, and brutally slams her mace into his knee.

[notathreat]

Abby guards her, a physical shield between her and the hulking, armored soldier that could probably pick her up with one hand.

They both move without thinking, Ellie letting her absorb the damage, Abby swinging to protect.

Her mace catches and crunches into their opponent so hard it has Ellie's teeth rattling at the sound, leaves her breathless. Not for the first time, she wonders how the fuck she'd ever had the balls to go hand to hand with Abby, unarmed, more than once. She's a goddamn hurricane.

Ellie drags her attention from Abby dispatching the soldier to another attacker that's trying to flank her -- she notices the knife flying at her almost too late. It's something she could dip and easily dodge, she's fast enough -- but that risks the blade sinking into Abby's back.

So Ellie brings up her bow, using it almost like a sword to knock the blade aside, letting it clatter to the cobblestones. It's an imperfect hit, though, and it raps hard against her knuckles, splitting skin.

"Fuck," she gasps, and pulls out another arrow, drawing back on the string.

[armd]

Her opponent isn't so easily disabled. The crush of metal is a terrible sound, and for a second she thinks that she broke something, but he charges back up and briefly overwhelms her when he grabs the handle of her mace.

They struggle clumsily like that; he swipes at her face with a gauntlet, catching her roughly in the cheek, hard enough to make her swear. Ellie isn't there any more. Abby can't get a sense of the rest of the battle when this needs all of her attention, but she's waiting for the arrow, hoping–

Ellie gasps, somewhere over her shoulder. Clearly occupied.

Abby grunts, and uses the motion of her opponent to send the mace suddenly flying at him when she lets it go. He staggers backward, and she takes advantage of his confusion to punch him square in the face, his nose breaking across her knuckles.

"Fucker," she spits, and snatches her weapon back. He barely has time to process the switch before she's ramming the end right into his throat. She stands over his body for a moment, breathing heavily, baring her teeth.

The sound of a bowstring drawing pulls her back in. It makes her turn, she's hefting her weapon back up to come and help Ellie– when something heavy collides into the back of her arm, with a sickening crash.

Her awareness tunnels immediately on the slow agony spiraling out from her elbow. It's a terrible shock, the way that it blossoms and steals all of her breath; before Abby knows it, she's crumpled onto her knees with a ragged gasp.

[notathreat]

Ellie hears the crunch of bone, Abby cursing from somewhere behind her, the grunt of impact and the faint scent of blood. Her own pulse is pounding in her ears, and the bowstring is bloodying her fingers, but she lets the next arrow fly.

It hits home, she knows it does before she sees her opponent crumple to the ground -- but there's no time to follow that line of awareness.

Instead, there's a deafening crash and crunch of metal at her right side, and Ellie realizes with a sickening jolt that Abby's been hit. That she's falling to her knees.

The world goes gold.

It's an explosion that bursts across her vision, and Ellie reacts. The world around them seems to slow, even the breath in her lungs, but she moves faster than she knows what to do with, faster than she can logically think it through. Her reaction is to protect, as it always is when she fights alongside someone, and that's what she does.

Ellie's hand finds a chunk of the rubble from the siege, and before she can properly think about it, the rock practically explodes against the soldier's face, crushing itself into jagged chunks and dust and a splattering of blood as it breaks bone.

Jaw, nose, she's not sure. But it staggers him, stuns him, and gives them the opening they need.

[armd]

It was a club, Abby notes with a detached kind of irony: somebody else wielding something heavy and two handed, swinging it into her. A taste of her own medicine. It tastes very bad, thank you.

There's a strong tang in her mouth and she may have bitten her tongue, but the war won't wait for her to get back up. Honestly, Abby's surprised her attacker didn't use that window of her shock to finish the job, and she wastes even more precious seconds glancing around stupidly to check for him instead of getting out of the way.

First person she sees is Ellie.

Impossible not to notice her really, she's a lightning strike through the field. A flash of gold zig-zagging past to pick up the tail end of Abby's dropped fight for her.

She staggers on the way back up, every movement of her body howling at her to stop stop stop, but the arm that was hit wasn't her right and she can still hold her mace. Is still holding it, grip flimsy and wrecked, gravity tugging sharply on the other side of her as she turns.

The soldier that attacked her didn't die from Ellie's attack, but he's going to fucking wish that he did.

The mace is too heavy for her to swing it safely with one hand, so she kicks him down while he's distracted to put him at Ellie's mercy instead. The impact of her boot on his chest jolts up the length of her body, making her grit out a sound of agony. Fuck, that's bad.

cw: gore/death

[notathreat]

Abby's up and moving, knocking the staggering man to the ground, where he hits with a heavy, burbling grunt, trying to reach out to strike at them, too disoriented to hit. There's blood, streaming down, painting the flagstone, and Ellie grits her teeth.

Abby's alive, but she can see how disoriented she is. She can hear the sound of pain she makes, hauntingly similar to ones she's heard her make before.

There's only one part of the soldier unarmored, and that's his face. And Ellie is still in the grip of Gold, and still on her feet. Every thrum of her blood sings like drums through her veins, burning bright.

Ellie lifts her boot and brings it down with all the force she can muster. Back in the universe they came from, it was something she'd done so many times she'd lost count- though usually it's an end to an Infected, whose skulls are made brittle by the fungus stalks growing through the faultlines. They burst apart like overripe melons and smell of rot, of forest floors and carrion.

This man's skull crushes in at the temple, her heel caving in the weakened bones. His body jerks grotesquely, and then he slumps to stillness as Ellie harshly catches her breath.

She stares at the body, as the gold leaks away. Something in the back of her head sounds like a distant scream. It smells like snow and smoke and metal and seawater, and there's a fine mist of blood on her face. Hot. She sways on the spot as the magic saps its price out of her body, the fatigue hitting like a wall.

cw: gore/death

[armd]

With Ellie out in front Abby takes the chance to wear the pain on her face more sharply, doubling over on the spot. It's hard to tell what went wrong. She can do no better assessment of her arm than that's not good, not with her armor still on, dragging her down. Her head briefly swims, and she lifts it again almost drunkenly.

Ellie's a shimmer of gold ahead, roles briefly reversed. She's the shield and the sword, the way she brings her foot down to crush the soldier's head underneath the heel of her boot.

Abby flinches.

She tells herself that it's the sound, the combination of a bone's harsh snap and the unpleasant squelch of flesh and blood. The sound, and the way that Ellie stares after she's done it like she's lost her grip on something. She shivers, like it's cold. Only once.

For a wild second, Abby thinks she's going to faint when she sways in place like that.

"Ellie," she calls, rough and urgent, "I have to go."

She needs to get back. There's no more fighting like this, Abby's done. Even gripping her mace in one hand is too hard when the sick ache pulses up one shoulder and to the other, bright enough that she's barely clinging to the weapon's grip any more. She isn't about to take herself quietly off and leave Ellie stumbling all over the field though. Just can't.

[notathreat]

Ellie doesn't faint. But she doesn't tear her eyes from the body, either. The world flickers, red lights, cold snow, smoke and rot and steel and blood. There are screams of pain in the air, and Ellie has to remind herself to inhale past the crawling feeling.

Abby's voice comes up like it's through water, and Ellie breaks the surface. Realizes her hands are trembling. She clenches them into fists.

Go, she wants to tell her, not knowing how hurt she is, not knowing if she'll get back if she's left to manage on her own. That should be fine with her, but it's not. It's tugging at her, like a red string around her throat, cutting off her air. She can't let Abby die at the end of some lucky Tevinter arrowhead. They've been through too much. She's done too much.

"Okay," she manages, and turns herself away, brushing past Abby's unwounded side.

"Can you walk?" she asks, roughly.

[armd]

Ellie is terrifyingly blunt, every movement sharp and wild but shivering, a hurricane fighting to burst out of her tiny body. Her voice is sandpaper rough, and it reminds Abby a little too much of the theater when she was shouting at her in the low, red darkness while she hunted her down.

How far they've come. She lets Ellie push past her without trepidation. She shows her her back.

"Yeah," she manages, through a strange tremble of her own, teeth clenched. It's fine. Only to do with the uneasy pain in her elbow, "S'my arm." It's dangling oddly at her side, half-bent. She's trying to keep it as still as possible, but gravity and armor are doing Abby zero favours.

Then, because she doesn't want Ellie getting the wrong idea, or anything, "I don't need an escort."

Awkwardly and unconvincingly spoken through a wince.

[notathreat]

"Yeah. And if you don't get it looked at right away it'll be too swollen."

It comes out flat, even if the words feel like they should be sharp. She still has the scars, the fucked lines along her left forearm and elbow, where Abby had personally snapped the bone with one wrench of her grip. They'd had to re-break it back in Jackson, to put it right.

She knows exactly how much it hurts.

"C'mon, walk."

[armd]

"I'm walking."

She's sullen with pain, resentful of the help and the way Ellie looks at her like she's holding a sharp edged accusation back. It's not her fault this fucking happened... Not like she chose to get hit by a club. She isn't sure why Ellie feels the need to rub salt in the wound.

Right. Because they hate each other; because they spent the last five minutes fighting back to back, and Ellie needs to remind them both that no part of her is for Abby's benefit.

She sucks in a breath, and holds it, resolving to stop complaining. It's bad enough being injured in front of her, she doesn't have to let on how badly.

Even so, straightening up and walking isn't as easy as she'd like it to be. She weathers it with a tight jaw, and a slow, steady breath in and out... concentrate on your breathing.

"That was cool," she pipes up suddenly, as if it just occured to her to say it. "What you did with that arrow, through that tiny gap." Really fucking cool, actually, but this is more than enough for now.

[notathreat]

They walk close, Ellie taking a slight lead, and she ignores Abby's salt. Knows that she's in a lot of pain, and honestly, they're still in a warzone. It doesn't fucking matter.

So she guards as they move, but the fighting is breaking up. They attract little attention, and make good time. She's concentrated on getting Abby to the healing tents, so the comment brings her up short, makes her feel strange and awkward and sharp-edged. It feels wrong to accept praise from her. It should be Joel standing here at her back, not her.

But...

"Thanks. Glad you got there when you did."

It's... stiff, saying it. Even if it's fully genuine. It feels wrong on her tongue, twisted and awful and so, so sad. Because she is grateful, and that's hard to reconcile. She doesn't know how to admire Abby and hate her, to despise what she's done and value what she's doing. In another world, another life, they might've been friends.

If Marlene had brought her to Salt Lake as a baby, instead of leaving her in FEDRA's care in Boston, and never letting her know she'd existed. Dangerous, she'd said back then... that it was the safest place for her. That she had people checking up on her.

But she and Abby were almost the same age. It made her question things she wasn't sure she wanted the answer to, and added a new layer of complicated feelings.

"S'magic," she says, suddenly. If only to have something to say. To interrupt the stream of thought, and to let her know, because someday it might actually matter. "From the place I was before Thedas. Glimmer was there too."

Glimmer will tell her all about it, if she asks. Maybe it's better that she does.

[armd]

Abby's stiff receiving it. She grunts in acknowledgement, leaves it at that, and opts to silently wear the rest of Ellie's gratitude like an ill-fitting coat. It's awkward, and it always will be. This is the best they'll ever get: working together. Working well. Before the interruption that ruined her elbow they were a whirlwind of destruction set to blow the entire city down, and that knowledge sits oddly in Abby's chest, part vicious satisfaction, part disgust.

Ellie is still unfathomable to her. She walks without looking back, her arms at her sides, her bow on her back.

When she finally speaks, Abby answers without thinking.

"New Amsterdam?" That's what it's called, right? Glimmer told her, back in the library. She said that her and Ellie had gone through a lot together. Abby hadn't been curious about that at all, but she would like to know more about the magic... the force that seems to all but magnetise Ellie's pointed arrow ends.

Ellie said that gods gave it to her. Abby doesn't believe in any of that shit, and so she asks again. "How did you get it?"

[notathreat]

"Yeah," Ellie breathes, a shiver along her spine as she confirms that Glimmer and Abby have talked. There's no logical reason to think that Abby will hurt her, but some part of her is knee-jerk terrified. That Glimmer is in danger, simply because she cares about Ellie.

She's not, though. She knows that much. Abby is the same kind of monster Ellie is.

Maybe that's why it's so terrifying.

"Everybody who came to New Amsterdam from another world got... something. A shard of it. Whatever it is. They called them gods. I never saw enough to figure out anything either way. But the blue-"

Ellie taps over her chest, over her heart where the glow lights up before she disappears.

"That one came first. Everybody had the blue glow. Everybody did something different, but we all glowed." Ellie sighs again, roughly. Trying to sort out her own memories of everything rapidly gets complicated. Even she doesn't know how it all fits together.

"Whatever gave us our powers, there was another one. Gold, this time. It's what makes me... faster, stronger. Harder to hurt. It gave me that aim. And I can use it for anything."

[armd]

Abby has a moment to wonder blithely if Glimmer is going to get in trouble later for mentioning it, and it makes the corner of her mouth curl in a sardonic little smile. She can imagine Ellie being that paranoid. She loves her secrets, and hates Abby having them.

"Right." Gods again. This makes one thing very clear though: Ellie doesn't know how it works either. So at least Abby doesn't have to feel stupid about not really getting it. She watches Ellie's back as they pick their way back across the battlefield, and Abby's gaze automatically canvasses from one side to the other out of habit.

Her arm is throbbing. It's making her feel sick. Why can't the gold thing offer pain relief too.

Nevermind. She's putting the magic aside to run through all of this out loud, "You were in the New Amsterdam place... after Santa Barbara. And then you came to Thedas. But I skipped a stop?"

And missed out on the magic as a result... how convenient.

[notathreat]

"You skipped a couple of stops," Ellie says with a rough sigh, reaching up to scrub her hand back through her hair, finding a patch of blood. She makes a face, breaks it up with her fingers, and keeps on moving. They'll be there soon. It's like this, with Abby. Glimpsed bits of humanity, parcels and scraps of information handed out like stolen looks.

It's not ideal, and Ellie doesn't like it. But it's starting to be what works for them.

"Santa Barbara, for one. But you were in New Amsterdam too. Not for long, but. Long enough."

Long enough to see her. To create some semblance of this before the world fractured again, and a Rift spat her out.

She wonders what happened to that Abby. If she disappeared into the ether, or if she went back home. If she went to another reality still.

[armd]

Abby looks up sharply. Ellie's hands pluck through her hair, come away rusty, blood flaking from under her fingernails.

"No I wasn't."

All these places she wasn't, while Ellie was. It leaves such a terrible taste in her mouth, and she stumbles because she isn't looking where she's going. The pain flares in time with her anger and her response twists up in her throat, comes out mean and sarcastic, "Sure you didn't imagine me there?"

Obsessive much?

It's either that, or think of this... shadow version of herself, mocking her movements, doing things that Abby isn't aware of.

[notathreat]

"Sure I didn't," Ellie snorts under her breath, but keeps walking.

"But yeah, it wasn't the same you. We both remembered the same things."

Her voice goes tired, suddenly, her eyes stinging for reasons she can't fully work out. Probably the smoke from the fires.

"But came to the same... agreement, I guess."

At least this Abby has the grace to stay out of her fucking head.

[armd]

That shuts her up. Different versions, Loki had said. People like you, with different lives but similar arcs.

At least two of her have made some kind of truce with Ellie.

Instinct runs deeper than a bit of bad judgement does.

"Here's fine." She's numb and angry and tired. She knows what direction the goddamn tents are in, and the fighting has long since died out around them; Holden told her they have the skies. She'll be fine. "Go back."

Get out of my sight. She has a lot to think about, and she doesn't want to. Why does Ellie have to be an endless source of aching work?

[notathreat]

Coming to a stop, Ellie looks back over her shoulder, then assesses the area around them. Yes, she can probably make it back without trouble.

But her eyes linger on Abby a second longer, like there's something else she wants to say. The problem is there aren't any words, just a feeling that seems bigger than her skin, like it wants to tear and spill out of her, but can't find anywhere to go.

Instead, she nods, and shoulders her bow, collecting it in her hands as she turns to head back.

The back of her neck prickles, but she doesn't look back.