therookery | CRYSTAL | MISS ME, DARLINGS?

Entry tags:

CRYSTAL | MISS ME, DARLINGS?

FORM: sending crystals, during the truth event, you know what to do
SENDER: your favorite rogue, Astarion xoxo
RECIPIENT: as always, everyone
NOTES: if you drank Truth Soup, cough up your feelings; if you didn't drink the soup, make it worse for everyone, I dare you

[Someone's bored tonight. And it's been over a year since the last time he felt restlessness stirring him into needling action— particularly when he's noticed a couple of blurted-out confessions running high and harsh in the air. He could sleuth around. Sniff about for any signs of volatile tampering (or ask if this is just the next phase of whatever sleepless affliction's still nipping at everyone's collective heels)....

But this is so much more fun.

Anyway— ahem, and all that:]

Name one thing you like about someone else in Riftwatch. Anything. Anything at all.

Bonus points if you feel like getting weird with it.

[And don't think he's generous enough to actually start this game himself: that, you're all going to have to do on your own.

Or maybe just ask nicely.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Dear Provost, the logic of a good person saying I'm not a good person does not entirely hold up.

Sure it does. Never trust a person who thinks they're all good. Chances are they don't see what they're doing bad.

Agree. But the converse is not necessarily true. A bastard can be self-aware and still a bastard.

Uh huh. Case in point.

But that's not why I think Gwenaëlle has a heart.

[ tony which one of them are you talking about with that "case in point" ]

The matter under question certainly is not whether or not she does. She clearly does. It's simply the fundamental proposition that's flawed.

[ :) ]

So what, you're gonna lowball me in the kumbaya compliment circle and then undermine my thing? Gimme a break.

The - what now?

[ what the fuck is a kumbaya ]

I didn't invent pizza, you dick.

Oh. Ah.

[ Yes. All right. Byerly clears his throat and thinks I hate this and then, because of truth soup, says: ]

I hate this.

[ Fuck. ]

You all think I'm an idiot.

[ Maker damn it - ]

I - You might well be the cleverest man I've ever met. But I don't know for sure, because your work is - utterly incomprehensible to me. Not because it's poorly articulated, but because I can't understand it. And I'm very embarrassed by it.

Well jeez, Rutyer, don't be. I'm a genius engineer from a world that's several hundred years more technologically advanced than this one. The number of people who don't know what the hell I do in the day to day is nearly everybody, homeworld inclusive. If just anybody could pick up what I put down, what the heck did I spend forty years working up to?

Besides, the fact that magic is a thing and it messes up about 70% of what I do know has me feeling like a dumbass too, most days. Damn it.

[ Truth soup. Anyway. ]

Okay, whatever. [ Focus. ] Thanks, that was, uh, better. I'll do you, gimme a sec. Gotta— harness the energy.

Oh, Maker, please don’t.

No no. It's like aikido, you just gotta redirect it. Okay, here goes, ready?

You're such an asshole.

[ SIGH ]

Okay, well, wait—

[ Harnessing. ]

You wouldn't be in the position you are if that was all there is. I don't a hundred percent get why you feel the absolutely unhinged need to stir every pot in front of you when you could just be, like, likeable, because I've seen you do that too, but whatever, I know as much about diplomacy as you know about quantum physics.

I think you care a lot, 'cause I remember the look on your face when the other two went missing, and you'd probably have said yes to friendship if I hadn't been asking the question. But it was bigger than that. You saw the exact amount of shitshow we'd be if this place broke down, and it scared the hell out of you. That means something too.

Also I'm rooting for you in this slapfight you got going on with Loki, even if you're already double married.

[ That could have been...worse. Somehow. Maybe. ]

Thank you for starting with insults, at least.

[ Oddly, that doesn't sound sarcastic. He seems to mean it. ]

I appreciate that you care. As well. I thought you were a typical Rifter, at first - treating this like a game - But you're really fighting for us.

I mean, that was true for a minute, so I don't exactly blame you. But I'm super dead in the world I came from, so this is kind of it for me. And that's honestly—fine. Most people who die are just dead, you know? And this stupid nonsense universe is home, so I get to show up for it.

[ Some irl stretches occur here. ]

You know, something about all this sincerity is wrecking havoc on my neck muscles. My trapezius is, like, rock hard.

Disgusting, Stark. I don't need to hear about that.

[ Is he joking? Hard to tell.

But - ]

Is that all it's about? You being forced into this dreadful place, reluctantly fighting for it just because you have no other choice?

Trust me, bare minimum effort wouldn't put me in a room with you three clowns.

[ —he says with, you know, affection. ]

I'm just saying we share some stakes.

[ He grunts in acknowledgment. Then, bluntly - ]

I absolutely loathe it when you Rifters talk about my home like that. Stupid nonsense universe. It frankly makes me want to not help any of you, or work with you. And I know I'm not alone in that.

Damn, that was a glorious two seconds of being not like the other girls.

[ But, with equal bluntness, ]

We're scared. That's why. Scared and homesick. There's so much here that doesn't make sense to me on a real and fundamental level. Like. There's music I'll never hear again, food I'll never eat again, materials and experiences that are simply not replicable, and that's before you even get to friends and family. My daughter's name is Morgan, my wife's name is Pepper, and,

yeah, Thedas is my home now. Despite all that. I get it, we have to prove that that's true, that we care, whatever, but you could cut us a little slack for being smartasses. Maker knows you expect the same treatment.

I'm scared. And homesick. Do you think I like Kirkwall?

[ But The Who-Has-It-Worse competition is never productive. And Byerly can go home, in time. So: ]

It goes far beyond simply being smartasses. Half of your conversations focus on how backwards, ignorant, and foul-smelling we all are. How provincial our towns are, how benighted our people, how barbaric our practices. This is my home, Stark; I have bled for it, I will continue to bleed for it; my friends have died for it and will continue to die for it. So yeah, when you can't stop talking about how disgusting we all are, I want to punch you in the fucking mouth.

Aw come on, it goes exactly as far as being smartasses, okay. And nobody likes Kirkwall, but it's not physically impossible for you to go home if you want. I mean, we don't have cars or planes here, unlike my super awesome non-barbaric universe, so you'd have to ride a horse or something like a total jackass—

[ wheeze ]

Sorry. Don't punch me. And it's not like you don't fall back behind the 'you Rifters' rhetoric. How's that meant to feel? Welcoming?

Only when I'm pissed off at you. Which I usually am, because you're constantly shitting on everything I hold dear. You've heard the way that woman Sylvie talks, haven't you? And even the Rifters I like do it every now and again.

Mm-hm. Who are all the Rifters you like?

Wh -

[ Ugh! Irritably: ]

You, Astarion, Ellie, Abby, Thranduil, Cosima, Glimmer, Wysteria. A few of the others, I simply don't know.

[ A chuckle. ]

This truth stuff isn't so bad. Maybe we should just go hogwild on it once a month, what with therapy not being invented yet.

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