[closed]

[ophidia]

WHO: Richard Gecko, Loxley, Gwenaëlle Baudin, Seth Gecko, Richard Dickerson
WHAT: Richie and Loxley are trailing the same guy, shit goes sideways for both of them
WHEN: Time is a social construct
WHERE: Kirkwall -> Gallows
NOTES: Blood, violence

It's a clinical pragmatism and cool acceptance of what he is that has Richard calling this hunting. He could easily pretend otherwise - it wasn't like tailing a mark was a practice he'd only learnt on being turned, after all. But it's the result that makes it different. A job would end with a score. A hunt ends with a kill. There's no hiding from the reality of that.

The skills are the same though. Recon first, hanging around the various taverns, blending in with the usual patrons while he watches and listens. Chooses the mark. Tails them for a couple of nights, learns their patterns and habits. Then, it's location.

He'd had it down to a fine art long before Kisa, and long before Kirkwall. Sure, it had needed some adaptation here, but now it's been three months. He's ironed out the kinks. Has it down smooth as silk. And Seth hasn't needed to get involved once.

So he'll argue it's confidence, not complacency that has him failing to notice this particular slaver has another tail. Quickening his pace to bear down on him as he takes a left into Richard's chosen alley, not seeing that there's another shadow following in both their wakes.

Comments

[ophidia]

Richard's all for adaptation, but how easily Loxley seems to take in the situation feels unreal. Just a simple comment of misunderstanding, like it was a social faux pas in one of those regency romance movies, and not him accidentally tracking the same guy as a literal bloodsucker.

Or maybe it's more the threads of real panic starting to leech into the back of Richard's mind that are making him tip into paranoia. There's too much blood under his hands, head starting to feel light, and he'd just fed. He should be healing.

He can't refuse help. But he doesn't know Loxley, and he doesn't know who Loxley knows, and he hasn't felt this for a long time: the sense of absolutely any control slipping completely out of his reach.

"Gallows," he says, a little blurted. "My brother, Seth. Seth Gecko. Just help me get to him."

[charmoffensive]

"The Gallows, yes."

As far as Loxley knows, Seth Gecko could be a figment of this fully dying man's imagination, but at least they have a common direction. He is still thinking about eating, I need blood as his remaining eye flicks a last look over the countenance of Firstname Gecko, before—

Fuck it. In for a penny, and all that. Loxley pulls him to his feet with about as much mind for the mess of injury in the other man's midsection as he can afford to pay, which isn't very much, and wrangles an arm around his shoulders for him. They're mostly of a height, Loxley bending to make the ordeal a little easier as he begins to walk them out of the alleyway, into the tunnel-roads of Darktown, strange fogs whirling around their feet.

To the nearest exit, which will at least bring them not so far from the docks above. There isn't a lot of conversation until they find the narrow switchback stairs that lead up.

"Lean there," Loxley says, not actually removing Gecko from the grasp they share so much as keeping him upright between damp brick and his shoulder, freeing up one hand to get out his crystal. "What's your name, anyway?"

[ophidia]

"Rich," is all he manages at first. It's an effort to talk, a fact only just noticed now with the question. The walk through Darktown had been silent, all of Richard's limited, fraying attention focussed on trying to keep his feet moving. Helpful or not, he doubts even a qunari will be able to - or want - to drag him far. But he doesn't know how much further he'll be able to manage it. Without Loxley keeping him leant against the wall, he'd have dropped again already.

He tries again: "Richard." Then, disbelieving, "Fuck." Ironic, downright stupid in the circumstances, but even this stranger who was carting his dying ass along had known his brother's name first.

[charmoffensive]

"Nice to meet you."

Something funny about all these men who only appear to be human called Dick, but not so much that Loxley pauses to ask Rich Richard if that really is his real name. His sending crystal twitched out from under his collar, twisted like so that it glows a dull gleam between greasily bloodied fingers—

Muttering his own name to activate, he more clearly states Gwenaëlle Baudin, before he says, "Change of plans. I've an injured rifter with me who needs healing.

"Catch your breath," is more to Richard, Loxley keeping him half-pinned to the wall with a hand clenching his collar, braced there.

[elegiaque]

“What—?”

No, not helpful, she reorients before she can pester him for an explanation that presumably she'll get in more detail when no one's in danger of bleeding out.

“How bad is it? I can bring my bag and stabilise him,” and it sounds like she's moving, already. “At least a bit. Does he need a mage right now or—?”