#it's getting dark

[atsadi-shenanigans]

Feeding Alligators 47 - Soul Jar

Decisions, decisions…and none of them good.

Trigger warning: suicidal ideation.

On AO3.

You don’t look at nobody as y’all set up camp that afternoon. Wyll is moving and speaking, but still weak. Shadowheart monitors him between starting a campfire. Karlach hovers around, unable to settle in any one spot too long, either looking at him all anxious, or you with big, sad eyes.

Astarion fucks right off without saying a word to nobody. Hopefully he’s out hunting something.

And Lae’zel…

Gale is brewing what turns out to be the very last batch of blood potion. After everybody got settled in, and the mummy man just fucking emerged from the shadows to loiter at the edge of camp—Gale went over and had a long discussion with him. Must be nice to be able to look into the hollow sinus cavity of the guy you’re speaking to without screaming and flinching away. In the end, Withers does confirm the evil bottle will in fact hold your soul, so he starts prepping for whatever the fuck that entails. He wants you to guzzle down another blood potion right before, but supplies are running low, and Astarion ain’t here, and Lae’zel flat out refuses to help.

“The useless istik will live or die on her own strength,” she says, loud enough y’all catch it. “I will waste my time no more.”

Gale looks to you, but there ain’t shit you can do about it, so you just shrug. She’s right to cut you loose. You fucked that up and ran like a bitch. So much for being some kinda leader.

“I believe between Withers, Shadowheart, and myself,” Gale says, “we can successfully summon your soul to this plane and bind it here. We, ah, don’t have many other options.”

Because you got maybe three more blood potions left and then off your soul goes.

“Okay,” you say.

Gale looks at you. Squints slightly. There’s something to him, the stiff way he’s holding himself, that sets alarm bells clanging.

“What?” you say.

“I…I thought we would have more time to prepare,” he says. “Both to gather supplies, and to, well, to let you ready yourself.”

He’s waffling. You already feel like shit scraped off the heel of somebody’s boot. You don’t mean to snap, but your control and your manners are frayed. “Yeah, and? It there a point here?”

And the man looks at you with such grim pity, you’re sure he’s gonna say it ain’t gonna work.

“I’ve been researching on my own,” he says. “My sources are rather limited, but I did study soulwork and astral travel with, ah, anyway. I have full confidence we can do this, as long as you’re up to it. But you do understand that it requires magic to perform?”

He waits for an answer. Seems important, though you cannot fathom why.

“Uh huh?”

“If what you say is correct about your plane, Ay-yarth doesn’t have much, if any, access to the Weave, strange as that sounds to my ear.”

He stares. You stare back.

And it clicks. Oh how it clicks.

“I can’t just pop the cork on that jar if I get home, can I?” you say.

“There isn’t much theory in that field. It could very well settle into you again, as it’s meant to. It may be an instinctive thing, once you’re back in your own realm.”

But.

“But it might fly off into space again,” you say. “Because, what, it’s all destabilized now?”

He nods.

You’re sitting criss-cross on the ground. The sun shines down warm and the breeze smells of leaves and green, growing things. The sky is blue, with happy clouds puffing along as Shadowheart helps Wyll sit up so he can take a drink of water, while Karlach sits about ten feet away, shredding grass with her talons.

“You’re telling me we gotta do this today,” you say.

“It…seems most prudent, yes.”

“And if we don’t, and I run outta potion, I die or whatever.”

He nods again.

“But if we do do this, and I, by some motherfucking miracle, find a way back home, I still gotta carry my soul around because it still might fly off into space.”

“I’m…not sure it would even be wise to travel across the planes once it’s been transferred.”

The forbidden carry-on. Well.

“I am sorry, Eleanor. Truly. I wish I bore you better news.”

You wave, all distracted. “Ain’t your fault. Y’all been going outta your way to help me this whole time, and I appreciate it. How long does this take to set up?”

He takes a breath, hands folded behind his back. “Not long. We would give you a sleep draught—of which I have a few—so for you, it can happen as soon as you lie down.”

Magical surgery. Neat-o.

You nod. Push yourself up and both your knees creak. You feel heavy and slow. No energy, everything in your body vaguely hurting.

“I’m gonna take a walk,” you say.

Gale’s head dips in a bow. “Of course. Take all the time you need. And whatever you decide, we’ll be here for you.”

He’s a good dude, even if he did eat your very first ring. You put a little effort into your smile as you brush past him to head down towards the river y’all set up next to.

***

You made yourself stop caring about some “afterlife” years ago. If God is a bitch who don’t deserve nothing, then heaven and hell and all that shit can go get fucked right alongside him. You don’t do woo-woo shit anymore.

But you always liked the idea of seeing Grandpa again. Of meeting your dad, maybe. Of seeing your ancestors and finding wherever they went once they left.

Somehow, you don’t think your soul is gonna make it across the space-time continuum between here and Earth to ever see that, if it’s even real.

You can die. Or you can stay here. Forever. Away from your friends, away from Uncle Randy and your aunties (they’re technically cousins, but eh) and all your little third and fourth cousins. You ain’t never gonna catch fireflies or sit on Uncle Randy’s porch, giving him shit for smoking. You ain’t never gonna see your apartment or listen to the rain with Christmas lights twinkling and a mug of cocoa in your hand.

Never catch up on any of your shows or movies. Never listen to a podcast ever again. Never hum along with a favorite song because you ain’t never gonna hear your people’s music again.

Never hear English.

Never learn more Cherokee.

You start sobbing at some point. You’re seated in a hollow among tree roots next to a stream. You can’t stay upright anymore.

You’ll never go to a cafe or a library. No more pizza. No blackberry mochas. Stir fry. Fry bread. Biscuits and chocolate gravy. Fucking ice cream. You will never find a funny meme or have to explain an internet video to your relatives.

Never text Sasha again. Never hear her voice. You’ll forget what she and all the others look like, what they sound like. You’ll forget all the people you love except for their names—

You can die. Or you can lose everything except your fading memories and your own skin. Stuck in a place where you can’t speak the language. Where you don’t understand the clothing. Can’t cook the food. Can’t even read a book or tell a joke because the strangers around you won’t understand why a boat stuck in a canal is so goddamn funny.

The hyperventilating kicks in. You’re far enough from camp you can’t hear the others. You can risk making noise, even if it’s shameful bawling.

Ain’t no one to see or hear you, no one to stop yourself from clawing at your own hair or hitting your head against the dirt. Nobody to point out the wet mess of your face.

Just you and the golden sunshine.

It’d be easy to die. Wouldn’t have none of these worries, no more, and wouldn’t be around to care if Astarion friendship-dumped you and Lae’zel was down with letting you die. No more nasty potions. No more sleeping on hard ground with a rock wedged into your hip. No goblins or brainworms or murder or devils. No more goddamn decisions. No more horrible fucking waiting for the decision to be wrong and for that other shoe to finally, inevitably just fucking drop already.

And if your soul is still on Earth, or closer or whatever woo woo bullshit this all is, maybe if you kick it here and now, it can find its way back.

You don’t want to die. You’re just kinda tired of being alive.

Gale said this was risky. It might not even be up to you in the end, huh?

And that gives you some fucked up comfort. Small, weak, but there. All you have to do is walk back, drink one last, goddamn potion, and lie down. Let what happens happen.

You look over the silver glimmering of the water dancing in the light. Your ancestors went to water to cleanse themselves. Probably not a bad idea. Live or die, at least you can do it clean of spectator guts.

***

The sun skims the treetops by the time you come back. Gale is deep in conversation with Shadowheart. Karlach notices you first. Comes bounding over and opens her arms to kind of hover her hands near your sides.

God, you want to hug her for real.

“How’re you feeling, soldier?” she says. “Up for this wizard shit?”

You’re quite numb, actually. But you throw her a thumbs up and a, “Let’s do this.”

“Fuck yeah, that’s the spirit! Gale told us what he told you. You’re a mean, clever little thing. You got this.”

Shit, she’s kinda worth staying for.

Gale has optimistically laid out a bedroll for you near the fire. Karlach has apparently punched her tent poles around that bedroll and set up a canopy over the whole thing (minus the fire).

“Thank you,” you say.

She does that head-duck shrug thing again.

Gale and Shadowheart meet you at the edge of the magical operating theater.

“Ready?” he says.

No.

“Sure,” you say.

It ain’t really your choice no more.

You lay down. Wiggle around until you’re at least kind of comfortable.

Wyll has propped himself up on his pack so he can give you a smile. He says, “For moral support.”

And then Karlach looms over you again, and she’s got that raggedy teddy bear, Clive.

“I thought,” she says. Shuffles. “Thought this might do you more good than me right now.”

That plucks something in you. Baby soft, thinner than spider silk, but it’s there, and it’s touched. She has to drop it on you so she don’t get too close and burn off your eyebrows. Clive’s a bit charred, a bit tacky from whatever she puts on him to keep him from lighting up, and he smells of sulfur and grease.

You tuck him into the crook of your arm.

“Right,” Gale says. And you been so busy watching all the others you didn’t notice Withers lurking in. You only jump a little, this time. “Eleanor, we’re going to give you a sleeping potion. Should knock you right out. I don’t know what this will be like for you, but we will do all we can. Try not to lose yourself, and hopefully, the potion and our spells will draw you back here, yes?”

You nod.

Shadowheart kneels and holds up a bottle. You feel cold all over, super detached. Death or exile. One of them’s gonna happen.

“Bottom’s up,” you say and slam it down.

For some godforsaken reason, this one tastes like motherfucking cotton candy.

“What the shit,” you sputter. Try to grimace. But a cool hand slips over yours to hold it and you…

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[brightlotusmoon]

"Don’t forget to turn your clocks from sunshine and happiness back to misery and despair this weekend.

🙄😑😭"

[land-of-brains-and-chocolate]

genuinely i'm completely lost on recent symbiote continuity. i think liz allen's getting one soon for some reason. i know there's at least three different entities referred to as carnage at play. i don't know where eddie is physically or spiritually. was that still dylan in that last post? is flash still made of goo? where am i

[bruciemilf]

Bruce: I know it’s hard, but you must remain forgiving and merciful, Jason.

Tim, who had to watch Bruce skin a man alive like a piece of salmon with a batarang for saying something rude about his then deceased son, throw him in the back of the Batmobile, and drive him to the hospital just to beat him up again:

[jojaxcola]

the jojamart mockumentary that constantly plays in my mind

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girls will be like “this shade of green 😍” about every shade of green they see, and they’re right

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has this been done already

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and they were roommates

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Psittacosaurus

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feeling spherical lately 😮‍💨

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that life was taken from me long ago

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THINKING ABOUT HOW THESE ARENT "FLASHBACKS" SHADOW IS SEEING WHILE FLYING TO THE ARK ITS FUCKING FANTASY MY GUY ITS SHADOW'S ✨WISHFUL LONGING IMAGINATION✨

THERE AINT NO GRASS ABOARD THE ARK THIS IS SHADOW IMAGINING WATCHING THE NORTHERN LIGHTS WITH MARIA WHERE HE WAS WHEN HE DOZED OFF BEFORE THE NIGHTMARE SEQUENCE IN THE FIRST EPISODE LOLOLOL FUCK OFF SEGA IM SOBBING

bro really dozed off to the idea of falling asleep next to Maria while they watch the Northern Lights i cant take this anymore

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“Chuuya wasn’t in Dark Era, why is he in this art??”

wdym, he’s right here 🤨