#curious to see how she and rakha are gonna get along

[blackjackkent]

Bit of a later start on liveblogging adventures today than I intended; work got a bit nutty right as I thought I was wrapping things up. XD But here we go, back into Moonrise Towers!

So far Rakha is not particularly enjoying her visit but she (and I) are very intrigued by the first encounter with Ketheric Thorm, who very strongly implied that Rakha has been here before her memory loss.

I'm trying to decide what order to do things and I think I wanna go ahead and get Minthara to safety immediately, so we're starting with the prison break immediately and then exploring the rest of the Tower afterwards. Fundamentally I don't think Rakha specifically cares about Minthara, but her greatest goal in Moonrise besides wreaking a bloody revenge on Ketheric is probably finding Wyll's father for him, which also would entail investigating the prison as soon as possible. (And Shadowheart has planted the idea that Minthara might be useful to them, since she's marked for death at the cult's hands already.)

To the basement!

The prison smells deeply of blood.

In a way it's something of a relief. The Towers' main level, while at least free of the painful prickle of corrupted magic, had a sharp decaying scent to it, something Rakha can't quite put a name to. The prison, however, smells like death - and for better or for worse, that is familiar.

(This ties, of course, with that continuing nagging feeling of certainty that she has been here before, that she knows these people. It itches at the back of her brain and makes the beast growl angrily.)

She follows the blood trail into the nearest room on the left, half by intention and half by instinct.

And, sure enough, there is Minthara, flanked by two Absolutist torturers and clutching her head in evident agony.

For a little while, Rakha stands in the doorway of the torture chamber, listening with muted curiosity as the torturers pepper the unfortunate prisoner with questions. What she hears is... illuminating.

Sumera: "Do you yet recall your name, prisoner?" Minthara: "Minthara Baenre." Jasin: "We will take it from you soon."

Minthara: "Queen of Spiders, I beseech of you the strength to destroy my foes." Jasin: "Lolth cannot hear you. She has forsaken you." Sumera: "There are no gods left to you, Minthara. You are alone."

Sumera: "How can you hope to resist the voice of a god?" Minthara: "It is no god!" Jasin: "Blasphemer!"

Jasin: "You are despised, Minthara." Sumera: "A blemish in the Absolute's design." Jasin: "We will cleanse you."

Rakha's jaw works thoughtfully. Some of the words here - Lolth in particular - are unfamiliar, but the implications are interesting, regardless. Minthara is being tortured with the intention of blanking her mind completely; "purification," one of the torturers calls it. And yet Minthara is fighting back, and not only that but is calling out to a different god, as if she is fighting not only the torture but the Absolute's control itself.

Beneath this cool analysis, Rakha's thoughts rage with other questions. She knew these people once, and in those memories lost to her, she is certain she once tortured and killed without question. Did she torture others like this, in this very room?

And deepest of all, a question she does not quite dare to examine - was she cleansed as Minthara is being cleansed? Is that what happened to her memory?

"You were adored, Minthara," one of the torturers purrs, looking pleased as Minthara doubles over with a new surge of pain. "Brought up from the darkness and into the Absolute's light."

"She cherished you," says the other. "But it wasn't enough. You were distracted by your own desires. Bloodlust. Murder. Chaos."

"And most damning of all," says the first, "an inability to follow orders."

"I obeyed to the best of my ability!" Minthara cries. Her voice is strained with agony.

"And isn't that depressing?" sneers the torturer. "You are nothing!"

Narrator: Minthara's mind connects with yours. Not strong as you remember it, but fractured... disintegrating.

The difference is stark. Rakha remembers Minthara's mind closing around hers in the dark dampness of the goblin camp - singleminded and full of purpose, driven by fervor for the Absolute. Nothing like this broken, shattered woman whose mind touches Rakha's in frightened wisps.

Is this how I too fell to oblivion?

"Come to observe, True Soul?" the torturer asks with casual eagerness, turning at the sound of Rakha's footsteps. "She is a lesson. None can rise so high that they cannot fall again?"

"What are you doing to her?" Rakha asks sharply.

The torturer gives Rakha a slow, gleeful smile. "We are erasing her."

Rakha does not care about Minthara's survival per se. In fact, she already thought she killed the drow once and in some ways would be happy to do it again. But Shadowheart's earlier suggestion was salient - there's reason to believe Minthara might be of use to them since the cult has discarded her. And she wants to know more about this cleansing, and anything Minthara might be able to tell her about her previous time here.

That, of course, requires getting rid of the two pipsqueaks. Tempting to simply kill them, but as usual... answers first.

[INTIMIDATION] "Stand aside. I'm taking charge here."

"Yes - your authority is great," the torturer says with eager deference, stepping aside. "We can learn, watching you break what little remains of her mind."

And indeed, there is some part of her that hums with instinct. She knows with sudden certainty that she could shatter Minthara's mind apart like a cracked egg, if she wished. It would take no effort at all; she would melt, broken beyond repair, her body sprawling upon the floor with a dying whine...

Reach out for the drow's mind.

It takes remarkable effort to maintain her focus, to ignore the destructive temptation and instead to listen.

Narrator: Immediately, your mind is swept into a greater vortex. A psionic storm with Minthara at its center.

Dizziness swamps her. For a moment she can't remember where she is or what is happening. There is only her mind and Minthara's, entwined in a dance that is mysterious and familiar at the same time.

But no-- there is something else.

"--CANNOT-- -hide- -SUBMIT-- -embrace-----"

The voice shudders through her like the blade of a knife - the same voice she heard on the path to the goblin camp, weeks ago.

Narrator: Her torturers are not dominating her. They are destroying her mental defenses and exposing her to something else. The Absolute?

[WISDOM] Push past the presence, towards Minthara.

Narrator: Navigating the storm, you reach the nexus of her mind. It is a wound, bleeding raw emotion and shattered memories. But she senses your arrival.

It feels deeply uncomfortable. Even with Wyll and Lae'zel, she has never connected so directly and deeply with another person. It is strange and intimate and sour-sweet; it tastes of the torture that part of her still longs to administer.

Minthara peers inwardly at her, the interloper within her broken mind.

"So it is you who will end me," she rasps. "Make it swift, then. Anything to silence that thing - that voice..."

Tempting. Tempting... so tempting to reach out and strangle her again, choking the life out of Minthara's mind as she once choked the life out of her body. But no. There are better targets now.

"Share my strength," she answers, cold and calm and practical against the battering waves of Minthara's terror. "And strike the guards down."

Minthara's breath catches; Rakha can feel the flash of hope through her where before there was only black despair. She nods. "But first... let's make these bastards bleed..." she snarls.

Narrator: Her mind fills with warmth, and she gently releases you.

Rakha feels the solidity of her body again; as her eyes open, she watches Minthara cease her trembling and struggle back to her feet, shaking off the torture and clenching her fists.

"Impossible!" she hears one of the torturers shout. "She was broken!"

Rakha pulls the staves from her back with a flash of brutal satisfaction. And now you will be.

[blackjackkent]

OK I went ahead and finished the Raphael fight before going to bed.

(I thought this was just gonna be a quick cleanup post but the game ended up rocking my feels at the end, ahhhhhhhhh! [falls over])

Combat highlights:

Wyll landed a massive Slow on the first round of the fight that basically kept Raphael from doing anything significant.

Yurgir missed every attack he took.

Korrilla existed for about 0.5 seconds before being obliterated.

Minsc hurled Boo at Raphael's face hard enough to knock him on his ass (and do 4 damage, get Boo in biting distance, and maintain rage).

Just cos I was curious if she could do it, I had Jaheira cast Planar Binding on Raphael; she did actually succeed, and he briefly became an ally and the fight ended! For one turn, and then he got mad again and the theme song started over. XD

Wyll then landed Slow a second time on him. :P

Wyll also counterspelled the one attempt at Ravaging Inferno that Raphael managed to attempt in his ascended form. (That's the big attack that covers the whole floor in hellfire, so stopping it was a big deal.)

Jaheira in saber-tooth tiger form managed to knock Raphael prone and rip the shit out of his jugular, which set up Lae'zel for the final blows to finish him off.

In conclusion, Wyll is awesome and MVP, everyone else is pretty cool too, and Raphael is a loser. >:)

-----

"It is absolutely preposterous that any of us are alive! Maybe we're not!"

"PINCH YOURSELF AND CHECK WE'RE NOT DREAMING THE LAST OF OUR LIVES AS WE DIE SCREAMING!"

Pinch yourself.

(Rakha doesn't quite understand the intention here, but if Hope thinks it's a good idea, she'll follow along.)

"Ha!"

Narrator: You are wide awake, and Raphael truly is defeated.

"We're fine, Hope," Rakha mutters. "We did it."

"Then we're not just fine!" Hope says eagerly. "We're spectacular! What a wonderful, jubilant, glorious day!"

Honestly I think at this point Rakha is less jubilant and more just tired. She's so tired... of everything, but most of all of fighting, of finding more and more situations that she only knows how to solve with violence. And there are so many battles still left to fight.

Hope's excitement doesn't really last either; her face falls almost at once.

"OH BUT MY POOR SISTER KORRILLA," she wails. "It is not right that she died... and it makes me want to weep an ocean..."

Rakha remembers the notes she found throughout the house, the records of Korrilla's complicity in Raphael's torture of Hope. She considers explaining this, but in the end just shrugs.

"I don't think there was any way to save her," she says flatly.

"When we were children, she always kept the last piece of pastry for me," Hope mumbles. "And bloodied the nose of the bullies who pulled my hair." A pause. "She was my sister."

Another pause, and this one is heavier somehow. Hope draws a long breath through her nose, lets it out through her mouth. Her eyes close and for a moment she does not move a single muscle.

Then she opens her eyes and looks at Rakha steadily. "But, as a wise woman once said, there's no point in crying over spilt blood. We must go on. And despite all the years I've lost, I have enough love in my heart to guide you home."

Narrator: For the first time since you heard her voice, Hope seems calm. And the peace flows from her into you, soothing your very soul.

Rakha, too, goes very still now. She meets the battered little dwarf's eyes and feels something strange and unexpected come loose inside her chest.

The air is quiet. The Weave has calmed. Raphael is gone, and with him the rough cruel edge that his magic brought to this place. And Hope is at peace - a gift that Rakha helped to give her.

Does she, perhaps, see in Hope a reflection of the thousands of victims she tortured in the life now lost to her? Does she see a fragmentary mirage of forgiveness in this moment, out of the face of a tormented woman she helped to save?

Perhaps. Or perhaps it is merely a reminder that she has no choice but to go forward, and leave the past to what it was.

There's no point in crying over spilt blood. We must go on.

She lets out a breath and hears it tremble in her throat.

"What will you do?" she asks hoarsely.

Another long silence while Hope studies her. Then she smiles sadly. "I'll hope," she says softly. "What else?"

"I hope I'll see Korrilla again one day, and that she'll say sorry, and I'll tell her she's forgiven."

"I hope I'll find all the pieces of my mind that fell out of my head over all those years, and that I'll be able to put myself back together again."

"I hope the echoes of pain will fade, and memories of sorrow will die, and that you'll visit me here some day."

"And I hope you have a happy ending of your own."

Rakha doesn't speak. She suddenly feels like she can't, like possibly she's forgotten how entirely. The blast-furnace air of the room feels suddenly heavy, weighing down inside her throat.

I hope I'll find all the pieces of my mind that fell out of my head. I hope the echoes of pain will fade. I hope you have a happy ending of your own.

I won't, she wants to say, bitter and tired and broken. I know I won't. There is too much blackness behind me, too much violence still left in my heart.

Wyll would say otherwise, of course, and she might even believe him for a time - but oddly enough, in this moment it is not her future with him she is thinking of, but the future inside her own mind. And that future has felt very bleak indeed, in spite of the love and friendship of those around her.

But...

I hope the echoes of pain will fade, and memories of sorrow will die.

I hope you have a happy ending of your own.

For a moment, just this moment, she hopes.