#morphic pool

[chilljustacat]

Baldur's Gate 3 locations 38/?

[worfs-glorious-hair]

Us against the world

❤️ Pairing(s): Gale x Tav/ Reader; Tav & Shadowheart, Tav & Astarion

🧡 Rating/ Warnings: Teen up (implications of consensual sexual activities between adults in an established relationship and implied masturbation)

💛 Words: 5.388

💚 Summary: What goes on in Tav’s mind at the shore of the morphic brine pool before they pass the point of no return and get on board of the rowing boat? They reflect their relationship with their companions, the people they love the most in this world, the people with whom they will stand shoulder to shoulder for the last chapter, their last battle on their journey. They reflect on their love and devotion to them and gather the strength to make that one final step into the boat.

✨ Some musings I wrote before I played the finale and stood at that exact point and was beyond terrified. These are ethically and authentically sourced feelings I spent a day to write down while they were still fresh. Based on my game experiences and relationships to the characters but kept generic enough to be read by anyone.

POV: First Person, Unnamed Tav (no pronouns); color green is associated with them and it is implied that they are a druid

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Us against the world

“Well, I guess this is it”, I say and turn to my companions who stand next to me on the small landing stage of the shore of the morphic pool with tight, serious faces. But their eyes must be mirroring mine, deep with unspeakable emotions in them.

What should one feel when directly faced with an enemy like an elder brain with the power of a god?

This, this is absolute!

The fight of our lives, the last fight, the fight that is our reward for surviving until now. The fight that always waited for us at the end.

But maybe we could turn the tides, avert a fate worse than death for the world and for us.

Using the Netherstones to dominate the brain and finish this before it can become even worse.

None of us is hiding the dread that fills our souls considering the gravity of such a prospect.

And why should we hide our turmoils here at the end of all things in the company of the only ones who understand, why should we hide how our souls fared when we have the company of those we trust with our lives and deaths?

Why should we hide what we feel before the people who are insane enough to even consider slaying such a foe with us when we already came so far together and slew other foes deemed impossible to conquer?

I am afraid, terrified, and so are my travel companions, the people I love the most in this world and with whom I already survived the oddest of odds.

But there is more, I see it in their eyes, there is the determination of someone with everything to loose and yet willing to finally get it on with.

To end this. Once and for all.

And I see the love I have for them in their eyes for me.

We are not afraid to fight for our souls and those of the world, we have done that before, on a smaller scale, but still, we have done this before – no, we are afraid to loose each other. That we have to say goodbye today, that there will be no tomorrow, not for us, not for the world.

“When we get into this boat this will be it, no turning back”, I say, soul heavy with everything as I look at each of my companion’s faces.

I want to look at them for as long as I can, before this game will end, one way or another.

There is Astarion, his eyes are soft for a moment as he looks back at me and the shadow of a warm smile dances over his face. The smile he graces me with since we killed Cazador together, since he calls me friend and means it.

“There is nothing for us to do in the city anymore but to save it, apparently”, he says and looks at me expectantly and takes a step towards the boat.

“Ready when you are, my friend!”

I try to smile back at him but my face feels stiff and tight.

But he understands and he bows his head lightly, so lightly you could overlook it, but it is there.

It says everything he does not say out loud and neither do I. But we both know.

It says ‘we came all this way together, we fought and ate and slept and lived at each other’s side, what fools would we be to not trust each other unconditionally?’ It says ‘We are one hell of a team, do not mess with us! If anyone can take on an impossible fight and win it, it’s us! We have fought gods before and won, godsdamit!’

And ultimately it says ���I am grateful for you in my life and it is my honour, my privilege and my duty to fight and to hopefully not die at your side. And should I end up dying can I trust you wholeheartedly that you will bring me back like you have done before on this dreary journey. And you can trust me with your whole heart to do the same for you if your overly eager and little insane lover is not faster than me!’

And it is a mutual feeling.

I was very wary of him at first, his smile too perfect, too sharp and nature repulsed from him. I felt in the way that the wind in the trees whispered of danger around him, I saw it when small animals fled from him through the undergrowth wherever he walked.

But he was determined to find a cure for our condition and he was willing to do whatever was necessary and to help however he could.

So I kept him in my company. I needed him as he needed me.

He was all alone in the world and he needed friends, or at least friendly company he did not had to seduce or compel to like him. He needed companions, people who helped him carry his load on the road.

He began to drop his facade when he revealed his true nature to me, which explained why I had always felt like prey and had sensed death all around him, and opened up to me even more about his past and the abuse he suffered by Cazador’s hands in the times to follow.

Also, Astarion is the best lock picker I ever met and a true trap whisperer, no mechanism, no matter how clever, could escape his skilled fingers.

I decided back then that I would never touch a trap disarm kit again, not if I had Astarion on my side.

But a part of me had never believed that we could become true friends, that we would fully trust each other…

This changed some day in the shadow cursed lands when he asked me if I would be at his side, when we would make it eventually to Baldur’s Gate, to help him kill Cazador and I had agreed without a second thought and as I had seen his face of sincere gratefulness and relief I stood there corrected.

Without me or him realising, through every battle, each healing spell and help, each joke and patched up wound at the fire in the evenings and every hour on the road we spent together were we growing closer. So close that we ended up trusting each other with our lives, without doubt and without condition.

I knew he had my back like I would look after him!

Our alliance that had grown out of necessity and availability the day when the nautiloid had crashed had bloomed into a deep bond of reliability and trust.

Of course I trusted him, of course I cared for him, how could I not?

Surviving a mindflayer tadpole infection, slaying a whole camp of Goblins, travelling through the Underdark, surviving and breaking the shadow curse and fighting gods and devils does that to you.

So if this was it, the end of our tedious journey, the last day on this very last road and whatever awaited us there at it’s end, did I not want to face it with anyone but Astarion and his exploding acid arrows by my side.

“We have the Netherstones, let’s bring the Absolute to it’s knees!”, says Shadowheart, her voice is strong and determined, always the fighter and it slightly echoes around us in the cave.

“I am with you!”, she promises and I turn from Astarion to look at her for a moment, for as long as I can.

Taking her in, the faint scar on her cheek, her silver hair illuminated by the glow of her Moonlight glaive with the parted, stylishly disheveled bangs, her dark, smokey eyes that bring out the green in them that now look at me with heaviness behind her determination of the gravity of what we will have to do, a vulnerability she allows me to see.

She was the first person I found after the nautiloid’s crash that did not want to kill me.

And I was hers, I was ‘the first friendly face’ she saw.

And together we found Astarion (who did try to kill me), fought some brain devourers together and she was with me when I saved Gale from the malfunctioning portal.

She was with me at every step of the way, we fought Goblins together, rescued Halsin, we traversed through the Underdark and explored the Grymforge together. We fought cultists and True Souls and we survived the shadow cursed lands together.

And ultimately she did Shar’s trials deep in the heart of the Gauntlet that led her, us, into the depths of the Shadowfell only to surrender her life’s dream there and what she thought to be her life’s calling to free Dame Aylin from her chains instead and to become something, someone, new.

She became Shadowheart who lets light grow out of darkness. Shadowheart, the blessed shadow of the moon.

Shadowheart, the first friendly face when all of this began, Shadowheart who became so much more than a partner for the roads to me, Shadowheart my companion and friend. My Shadowheart!

We look at each other for a moment in silent understanding, we will do this together! Like we have done everything together so far.

She at my side and I am at hers.

She takes a step closer to the boat and looks at me, patiently waiting for my sign to continue.

“It is time, my love”, whispers Gale and steps closer to me, I close my eyes for a moment, who knows if I will ever hear him call me his love again.

I don’t want to look at him, I don’t want to see the encouragement in his eyes that can seduce me to do anything, not if that encouragement means today that it would lead us to a place where we will have to say goodbye, maybe for forever.

His head moves next to me, he gently rests his forehead against my temple and I feel his breath on my cheek.

It is comforting and warm and I melt into the closeness of his body but I wish I would feel his gentle hands on my hips and lower back more than just the shadow of his touch through the layers of leather and metal of my armor.

I reach for his hand on my hip and I sigh, I can not even feel this because we are both wearing gloves.

But our fingers lace immediately together, holding tight and never wanting to separate again.

“Let us go on, my love, today is not worse than any other day for the grand finale of our endeavour”, he murmurs against my face but I am still only focusing on his skin on my mine, on his mouth so close, how I can sometimes feel his beard against my cheek when he moves.

It is all I ever wanted, since I pulled him out of the portal. Him close and all around me.

His breath mixing with mine, bodies intertwined, unable to say where I end and he begins.

One forever.

His forever.

“Waiting another day will not change anything for us. Besides going insane from uncertainty of what will come. We are as ready as we can be, or as unprepared, however you want to see it, but with the Netherstones in our possession we stand a chance. However small it may be. But even a small probability of success can grant hope — so let us face this nightmare today and let there be hope that a new dawn awaits us at the other side tomorrow…”

I breathe in, trying to clear my head but the Undercity’s air is thick and unpleasantly hot from the stinking sewers, the temple of Bhaal with all of it’s decay and death and the morphic brine pool infused with magic on which’s shore we stand.

But there is also Gale and his scent and I focus on him, concentrate on the scent in his hair and beard that smells like orange blossoms and spiced plum that comes from an oil he uses for it. And there is what I like to call the ever-lingering scent of knowledge that surrounds him always, even when I am the one wearing his comfortable purple velvet tunic with the silver ornaments that always smells like a library.

He is still surrounded by the sweet and yet tangy scent of wisdom and his nearly infinite arcane mastery through knowledge.

But his scent of knowledge is even more than all of that, it is dusty ink, written and printed by hands long gone but their words, their thoughts, their insights live on, it is the smell of his books, some old, some new, some have been wet before and have dried again over a small tenday. It is the fresh ink on his fingers, purple and black and blue and now only green. For me.

“Not that I need any help to think of you, not that I need anything to remind me of you, when everything reminds me of you, but writing in green ink brings me joy, the joy that you fill my life with!”, he had told me one day when I had noticed that he had stocked up on green ink from a shop when we had just arrived in Rivington.

“I don’t think I will ever write in any other colour ever again…”, he had finished matter of factly and at the same time had his face been adorned with the most sincere smile and the brightest eyes that had shone with his love for me.

His love that I wanted to swim, dive and bask in for the rest of my life.

The look on his face, the love for me could have been be overwhelming but it was not. Because it was Gale. My Gale!

Because I looked at him in the same way.

Because I knew that he was unable to lie, I felt his truth and his truth was that he loved me as I loved him.

There was no uncertainty, just our devotion.

So I had smiled, had grinned in unmeasurable happiness and had kissed him. Pushing him backwards onto one of the straw bales in the barn that we slept on and his surprise had only lasted for the span of a heartbeat.

After his surprise had faded he pulled me even closer towards him by the hips and our kiss slowly became more heated than I had originally planned it to be. But I was not complaining, on the contrary, not when I could not hold back a moan as his eloquent tongue, so clever and practised, slipped past mine, not when he was so close to me and wonderful and warm and how he bucked his hips against mine.

Not when my hips moved on their own accord as well to meet his, not when his tongue and mouth slid down my neck to gently suck and lap, not when his beard burned so deliciously in contrast to his, smooth, wet tongue on my skin.

This is were I was happiest, surrounded by his scent, by Gale, by his warmth and love and he knew that. He knows what he does when he comes so close to me now as we stand here at what could most likely be the beginning of the end of the world.

So I keep my eyes closed, just for a second longer to pretend that it was only Gale who surrounded me, that we were home, or well, at the camp that was the closest we had to a home currently, and that we were travelling and exploring like we had for so long now that I could barely remember my life before this. My life before Gale.

But truth is that our time is running out, no matter if I keep my eyes closed to pretend that it would not.

And I was loosing precious moments that I could be looking at him.

So I open my eyes again and turn towards him, his lips and beard brush over my cheek as I do so, and I take a step back, enough to take him in fully but not so much that I would loose his embrace around me.

He looks at me, his eyes shine warm and bright and I know he smiles just for me. I know he tries to make things easier for me.

I look at him and I see the day I met him, the day I pulled him out of the portal, how he had called me friend, had shook my hand and I had not wanted to let go of his hand.

How he had smiled and had offered to join my quest.

‘A parasite shared is a parasite halved’ he had joked, his eyes had sparkled and I had only one thought: ‘I will never want to be without you again!’

Back then I thought it was only his optimism, his cheerfulness and hopefulness, that he was so different to Astarion and Shadowheart, who were both still their reserved, closed up, snarky selves, that drew me towards him, like a moth towards the light. That I needed one face, that was willing to smile sincerely at me and that was not dripping with charm that did not reach the eyes like Astarion’s did.

But it had always been more.

I looked at him and was overcome with a hunger, a desire that I had never felt before, I longed to be close to him from the beginning on.

I reached out for him whenever I could, tried to be near him, especially at camp in the evenings, seeing if he would accept my company when he cooked or sorted through his spells.

And he did. And my heart had sung.

While he would not let me help cooking, which was understandable, cooking is a one person only job, he would gladly let me sit by him on a log, chatting away the night, while he chopped up ingredients and put together our meal.

One time he did let me help, he allowed me to create water into the pot, because he claimed that he did not want to make all the way to the well, ‘’my knees, you know”, he had claimed, but the way he had looked at me when he said that made my insides turn and twist with a pleasantly hot flutter.

A flutter I was and am well accustomed with, he just needed to look at me with his burning eyes and I would be a mess.

A mess I tried to hide behind a laugh, a polite smile, a joke, a conversation with Shadowheart about eye makeup or the divine source of her magic like mine came from nature.

A mess gave in to when I was alone at night and feeling so guilty to be using him for my pleasure, my lust, but I was unable to help myself. Not when I looked at him and was overcome with a burning, scorching desire. A carnal desire I had never felt before for anyone!

So I imagined him all over me, lips, tongue and fingers, and silently bucked against my bed roll and it’s pillows until I found the relief I was looking for.

While Gale seemed to be perfectly content in these days to let me do the idle chatter about our day, our finds, our companions and some occurrences and anecdotes from my life was he barely talking about himself.

I occasionally asked and while his answers were interesting for me to learn, he enjoyed good wine (of such we barely found anything of, especially in the beginning of our journey, (it changed when we finally came to Baldur’s Gate), much to his, Astarion’s and also Shadowheart’s disdain), had Tara, even though he did not tell me her name back then nor that she was no ordinary cat but a tressym, and liked to try his hand at poetry.

About which my only thought was that I would like to be the reason for his poetry or alternatively I thought that he could read me poetry, or a law book for that matter, he could read me truly anything with that voice and I would be a swooning puddle.

I was down bad for him from the very beginning on but I did not realise it back then, back then I only basked in his company and the look in his eyes he gave me.

I was pulled to him, wherever we went, I looked out for him in battle, urged Shadowheart to help him or did it myself if I could.

I was searching for the best armours for him, gifted him anything I found and that could protect him. I did it for the others, too, but Gale had quickly become my priority.

The others were more experienced outside in the field, they had survived worse so far, with Shadowheart protecting the artefact and apparently having gone a long way with it already and Astarion with his charm and tendencies to bite and his sneaky nature was he gone from danger before you knew it.

But Gale was different.

His robe was expensive as his taste in wine and food, he was well-read and educated and oh could I watch him practise his magic for hours.

How he flicked just his fingers and the world changed, how he murmured incantations to remember them and how he bellowed them with all his might in battles.

But he was not invincible despite all of his magic and his vigour, he was vulnerable and I would not have that.

I needed everyone to be strong and nearly invincible if we wanted to survive this whole ordeal, if we wanted to find a cure.

So I looked out for him however I could.

This is what I told myself back then, to care for those who somehow ended up under my protection, because they saw a leader in me, someone who could guide them, unite them as a team.

And for that was my duty to look after each and everyone of them, to make sure they would stay sane and healthy, as much as possible, given the circumstances and how each of us had their extra load of the past to carry.

This is what I told myself, what I wanted to believe. But truth was that I loved him from the beginning, that I cared for him more than I ever had for anyone in my life.

So when he pulled me aside in the grove to tell me about his condition with the orb, how he needed magical artefacts in order to survive I did not hesitated for one moment to help him however I could.

Anything he would ask of me I would give him. And more.

I wanted him to like me, to see me, to feel what I felt for him. To desire me like I desired him.

I parted with the magic items I found willingly and quickly, whenever anyone of us found something was my first thought of Gale, not how we could use it but if it would help him.

Help him ease his pain, his arcane hunger. I did not even think of the danger he posed, I just wanted him close to me and safe from the pain and hunger.

And when he told me his full story, how he had been abused and groomed by Mystra for his powers, when he had pressed my hand to his heart and had opened himself up to show me the darkness of the orb, the darkness within and all of the pain and had offered to leave, my heart broke even more for him. And loved him even more than before, even if I thought this was not possible.

I would never let him go, I would never give him the feeling that he needed to take care of himself and what he felt on his own or that he was unwanted for his condition, even unloved.

I wanted him to understand that he was loved and cared for, that he mattered, that I wanted him around me and that I would not damn him for the choices he had made that ultimately led me to find him.

The evening that followed to his confession did he ask me why I let him stay.

I had wanted to say: “Do you remember what I thought about, when you showed me how to conjure the weave, how I wanted to kiss you and hold you and love you? Do you remember how I sought you out at the party after we cleared the way for the Tieflings? How I wanted to be close to you and spend the night by your side? That is why. I love you, Gale, I love you so much and if I would let you go I would explode just like you. I would break apart without you! How could I ever let someone go who holds my heart and my soul and my happiness in their hands?”

But I had swallowed the confession that burned on my heart and had told him the next best thing instead.

“I would miss you”, I said, “I would miss your company around here too much and I care for you, you are not a burden for me. Instead, you are a joy to be around, my joy”, I dared to add and when I had looked up at him was he leaning close, closer than friends should and it would have needed nearly nothing to lean even closer to kiss him. He told me later that he had wanted to kiss me then and there, ‘orb be damned’ he had even thought for a moment but had used what little of will-power he had left to pull away, to wish me a good night and to hide in his tent until morning.

“It was the longest night in my life”, he continued telling me one day.

“I was contemplating my options, wondering whether I could risk going to you, if maybe the orb was stable enough. But then it was you I was thinking about, the orb could never be stable enough for you and what you did to me. Or what I wanted to do to you”, he had turned forward and had gently kissed my earlobe and my jaw, slowly sucking on the skin there until I could not hold in my moans any longer, I had felt him smile against my neck then.

“Just like that — and more…”, his voice had been low and sultry and I had been, once again, a goner.

“Show me now, make it up for the longest night of our lives…”, I had managed to breathe out between his kisses and licks and sucks.

“Oh, gladly, my love, gladly!”, and his fingers had found their ways to the ties of my tunic, where they had awaited my permission to proceed. A permission I had given eagerly and impatiently.

And as the fingers of his one hand had tied my tunic open was his other hand on the nape of my neck, weaving his fingers into my hair as I like to do with him, too.

All while his mouth had never left my skin, he was everywhere, sucking into my neck, kissing the corners of my mouth, my jaw and eventually down my neck towards my chest.

He had pushed my now opened tunic down from my shoulders and his fingers had danced over my collar bones and slowly down my sternum and I had shivered, even though his fingers had been warm and comforting.

Now were his hands laying on my hips as comforting as ever as I took him in. Everything that he was, everything that led us to this moment.

His eyes, so bright, so full of love, the soft purple lines that the orb had left on his skin under his left eye were as much part of the face that I loved so much as his meticulously kept beard.

And the curve of his lips and the shape of his straight nose and the few little shorter hairs that fell out of his windswept hair onto his forehead. And the few little strands of grey on the sides of his head, scattered like trails of silver, rivers of moonlight, painted with a fine brush over a landscape.

Oh his face, his beautiful, gorgeous face, his kind, patient heart and his brilliant, clever mind.

Gale. Gale who was all of that and so much more.

Gale, whose faith in me could move mountains and light up the darkest valleys of my heart, Gale who was the only who could urge me on like this, who would always give me the strength for my next step. However hard it may be, however far I would have to jump.

“Sometimes the only way out is through, isn’t it?”, I say with a big sigh and reluctantly let go of his hand in mine.

Gale gives me a reassuring, encouraging smile, there it was, that unfaltering faith he had in me as I climb into the small rowing boat.

“If these boots have seen everything so far, let them see an elder brain”, I murmur under my breath and watch how my friends, the ones I love, the ones I want on my side for everything that would come now, settle down next to me.

I look at them, at each of them and remember how far we have come.

Astarion, the pale elf with those deep crimson eyes that now look towards where our fate awaits us in the dark, whose eyes flicker to me for just a moment and I am once again reminded and reassured by the promise we gave each other — I’ll keep you safe when you’ll watch my back and I’ll watch yours!

Shadowheart, daughter of darkness, now basked in the light of the moon from the glaive gifted to her from the moon maiden herself sits close by me and reaches wordlessly for the second oar, prepared to join me.

She does not need words to tell me that we will do everything together, rowing, fighting, winning.

I take the oar at my feet and get ready to get the boat moving.

But before the oar can touch the water I look at Gale and our eyes get tangled for a moment. ‘I love you’ I mouth towards him and he smiles, eyes as bright and as warm, no even warmer now, as on the day we met and he mouths it back to me, I love you, too!

That is all I need in confirmation, our story is not over yet, I decide, there are still so many chapters to write for us…

And if I let that brilliant man, this prodigy of a wizard, work his magnificent magic we actually may have a fighting chance to face and to win what waits for us when we reach the other side of the shore and to get to live these future chapters of our story after our victory together!

After all, my beloved is The Wizard of Waterdeep so this must count for something!

And as Shadowheart and I start rowing and our boat glides smoothly and nearly silently through the dark green-ish waters am I seeing our camp back in the wilderness close to the Emerald Grove and the nautiloid’s crash region for a moment. But it is not as it was, when we were there. It is a party, there is plenty of the most extraordinary foods that we certainly did not had and there is everyone there, everyone is alive and well. There is love and peace and celebration!

We are fine!

And I pretend for a second that this is what waits for me of the other side of this day, that this is the dawn that Gale had pictured. That this is what I fight for. That this is what I had fought for from the beginning on.

A/N: Thank you so much for reading! I am glad you are a part of the story now and I hope you enjoyed your time here! ❤️

Let me tell you one last story: I was not lying when I said I was playing the whole game for the party, for my happy ending with Gale. Marrying that beautiful wizard and living happily in Waterdeep for the rest of our lives.

Well, what can I say, I messed up or my game is a little buggy (or most likely a combination of both) but I had not been able to talk Gale out of becoming a god. Imagine my shock and my terror when he left me at the docks after our final fight without so much of a word of love or affection to get that stupid crown. Oh, how I screamed! He left me behind after everything we‘ve been through, after he even told me that „great ambition should not come at the cost of what you already hold dear. I see that now!“. My heart still weeps!

So I ended up saving the world and everyone is happy and excited and I was cursing the universe!I was in no way in the mood to celebrate and couldn’t even enjoy the epic cut scenes. Oh what a hero‘s story, what a true greek tragedy! Which twists this OS in hindsight into an even bigger tragedy because this is the fate that waits for Tav, there is no new dawn for them on Gale‘s side, which is so much worse than the final fight with the brain. Which went surprisingly well and easy for me. And the vision of the epilogue party they saw in the distance, that I always worked towards, is just as twisted. Because there awaits them, me, no laughter, just tears. No celebration. I admit it, I cried throughout the whole party and I was am devastated since. I already started a new play through, trying to speed run everything that is necessary for my happy ending after all.

[this-is-not-a-slow-burn]

Why in my previous 3 runs did I not know that you can stop and talk to each companion after taking the boat to the morphic pool and they all have different things to say about the impending fight? And that you can get in one "last" kiss before the fight with your romance partner if applicable?

Minthara's responses are the most wordy and she is SO excited about it.

Spoiler under the cut

Also, instead of talking to the Emperor and then freeing Orpheus, I just straight up electrocuted the Emperor and he goes right into the "Fuuuuuck you dude, you're on your own!"

I do rather like the "What are you doing?!" reaction when you let ol Princey Mc Princeface out, but it was still funny.

[carryoncastiel]

[ballofbitter]

When the curtains call the time Will we both go home alive? It wasn't hard to realize Love's the death of peace of mind [x]

[wild-magic-oops]

Can't resist a kiss

[messiahzzz]

[waterdeeping]

I hope that wasn't our last kiss. I'd take a thousand more if I could.

[durgetavoc]

Also, I finally got the infamous Morphic Pool Angst™ scene.

And damn.

Durge is just… broken. She feels like she missed something, like she failed somehow. "Maybe I should have told him to stay back," she thinks, but it felt so symbolic for him to come with her to stop the Netherbrain—to finish what they started. And then, to try to start over. Thanks to her companions and her own journey, she believes in second chances. She believed in him.

But when the Netherbrain began speaking, saying it respected Durge once but never respected Gortash, Durge’s heart sank. Anxiety churned inside her, a terrible premonition taking root. She wanted to tell him to run, just to get away, but—1) She was frozen. 2) She had to keep up her role as leader, focused on her target. 3) There wasn’t time, because the moment that thought crossed her mind, he was already gone. Dead. Instantly. At her feet.

The world had never felt so silent after that. A void tore open inside her, but she kept going, kept pushing forward. She had no choice. Even when the Emperor finally saved her and the group, she wasn’t really there.

And then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw his lifeless body, carried into the Astral Plane. She followed, and it was impossible to pull her away. As she knelt there, fragments of memories began flooding back.

And then it hit her— The breakdown.

For the first time, after the shock settled in, she truly sobbed for his death and said "I think I liked you too sorry". Overwhelmed by grief, regret, and memories. Even when her friends tried to reach her, pleading with her to come back to camp to rest, she refused to move. She stayed there, who knows how long, in that dimension. Staring into the abyss, as her butler might have put it.

Then came the anger. The rage.

She turned it into her new purpose. She took Gortash’s mantle, letting it become a physical reminder of her determination.

She would save the world, as promised, symbolically with him by her side. She would repair the mistakes of her past.

And maybe. Maybe she'll be in peace.

[shaykai]

I don’t remember Gortash saying that he wants to see a Slayer fight Ketheric djdjdjjdjd I like to think him and Durge talked about it

Also fun little context to say that Gortash not only knows what a Slayer is but most likely saw Durge be one given that Orin can’t be one at that point

[animentality]

Which companions to romance as a Durge?? Used to be on team Astarion but now I just feel like he is too stupid(canon smooth brain, he is lovely tho) for my durge who was/is in into Gortash.. :(

GALE. THE ANSWER IS GALE.

[aureliaen]

they're so cute. i sure hope nothing bad happens to them

[maegalkarven]

AU where Dark Urge didn't loose memories and the events in Moonrise Towers in act 2 went a tag differently. Or very differently.

Fucking everything up in a new, interesting way.

Characters: m!Dark Urge, Enver Gortash, Orin the Red, Ketheric Thorm, Isobel Thorm, Dame Aylin, Wyll Ravengard, Ulder Ravengard (mentioned), Karlach.

m!Dark Urge x Enver Gortash.

It was a stupid fucking plan from the very beginning of it.

To go to the Moonrise Towers to – what, confront Ketheric? Confront the Chosen of the God of the Dead?

Nemo knew better than the others what an idiotic idea it was.

But Nightsong already took a flight, and harpers moved to attack – and what was Nemo supposed to do?

He was a wreck, a shadow of his former self, weak as a kitten, clumsy as a newborn owlcub. He was the failed Chosen of Bhaal going to a place what was his demise.

Swooped by the currents of events unfolding, he had no plan.

But again, Nemo was never the plan guy; it was Gortash’s forte, it was his work. He was the brain of their plan, the brain of all of their operations. He thought things through as Nemo sliced around, creating chaos, bringing havoc, painting world in blood.

But it was before. Before Orin took her swing, before Nemo’s once great abilities were reduced to dust, before he became weak. So weak he had to depend on others, so weak he required, no, needed allies.

The voice of Father dull in his head; illithid parasite had to do something with it, had to change the rules the same way it changed them for Astarion.

Funny, before that whole mess Nemo would never put himself and a vampire spawn on the same page. But now? Oh, how alike they were, the spawns of unrelenting cruel force commanding their will, puppets of someone else’s play.

Waking up on nautiloid was akin to waking up from a fewer dream. The Urge...subsided. It was pushed back, held at bay. He was almost alone in his own head, more alone when he ever was with Father’s constant will moving his hands.

But what good did this free will do if he was about to die anyway, probably in the same damn place he died the first time? Would Orin be the one to slice through him one final time?

Nemo was never the one for plans, as clever as he was. Gortash always claimed it drove him mad, for Nemo had all the intellect, but rarely put it to good use.

“You have to exercise your mind the same way you train your body,” his unexpected ally would say. “Otherwise what use is it to you? You, my dear murderer, is capable of much greater things than your father foresees for you.”

These thoughts were atrocious, they were heretical, they were...compelling. Flattering, warming some deep corners of the soul Nemo didn’t know he had.

No wonder lordling ended up luring Nemo into his bed.

No wonder Orin saw her brother’s newfound weakness and used it against him.

Clever little thing, his slaughter-kin, to shift into Gortash to approach him. He was a fool to lower his defenses, of course he was.

He paid for it greatly.

“We’re moving down,” Isobel acknowledged. She, a daughter of a man who turned his back to two gods for her sake. She, the priestess of a goddess Ketheric Thorm forsaken. She, a child brave enough to confront her father.

Nemo hated her before he knew her.

He hated her for the way Ketheric turned the world upside down for her to live; he hated her for how ridiculously loved she was.

She hated her because even after being corrupted by Myrkul’s unholy powers, she still dared to stay unstained. Holy. Good.

He hated her so much his whole body hurt.

She who denied her father’s love, she who had love so selfless, so unconditional-

Father’s love was always conditional. Father’s love was always a leash and never a caress.

Father’s love hurt no matter how much Nemo craved it.

Oh, how he wished he could stifle the light of her life; oh how he wanted to see Ketheric’s face as he would tell him, in every gruesome detail, how his precious daughter died the second time.

How everything Ketheric did, everything he betrayed was for naught.

But Nemo was not what he used to be: he was weak, and Isobel was his advantage in a fight against her father. Her and Nightsong, but Nemo wasn’t even sure if aasimar was alive; the last he saw of her was when Elder Brain dragged the woman down.

Down, down, down-

Down they went.

Nemo didn’t want to go down there. He didn’t want to confront anyone, he wasn’t ready, he wasn’t strong, he-

He wanted to go home.

Home, such a strange concept it is.

Bhaal’s temple was never his home, even if it was the only shelter he has ever known.

No, home was...

Home was a mechanical clicking of devices operating in Gortash’s workshop. Home was the dim light and the huge table covered in papers; the smell of hot iron and smoke, and the man with fingers stained in ink.

The bitter bile rose up his throat at the thought of it.

The Chosen of Bane was never supposed to be his home.

The Chosen of Bane was his enemy.

Nemo has failed his life’s purpose in more ways than he could count.

And yet he wanted to go back; to the security of that place, to the delighted glint in the other man’s eyes, the mad plans, the notes on the table, the open books, the diagrams, the warmth of his skin as Nemo dragged Enver away from his work:

"Rest, you need to rest. It’s unbecoming of you to run yourself ragged like that. Sleep, your machines will not disappear overnight."

The way he struggled, tried to argue as exhaustion overtook his body. The way Lord Enver Gortash, the tyrant in the making, looked vulnerable in front of him in a way, Nemo suspected, he never looked in front of anyone else.

The way Nemo went to bed with him and expected to wake up in a pool of blood, but never did.

Because some part of him resisted Father even then. Some part of him claimed Enver Gortash for himself.

And it cost him greatly.

Nemo wondered if returning to Moonrise Towers could be classified as ‘coming home’.

He wondered if his home would meet him with windows shut and new lock on the door. He wondered how quickly he would be discarded by a man having no use for him anymore.

Turned out, Nemo was a fucking idiot.

***

It happens faster than it has any right to be; Ketheric spots Isobel, Wyll sees his father, Karlach lurches at Gortash, and Orin...

Orin steps away from the Elder Brain and smiles.

“My poor slaughter-kin,” she coos. “Came back so I could finish what I’ve started, did you not?”

And then the moves.

And fuck, Nemo forgot how fast she is, and he is so out of it, he is but a shell of his former self; his body is weak, feeble, damaged-

Orin knows it. Orin was the one who damaged it in the first place.

Nemo is vaguely aware of Isobel reaching out to Nightsong and freeing her from the bonds, he thinks he hears Gortash trying to reel Orin and Ketheric back in:

“Orin, we haven’t finished, the Brain didn’t receive command yet, come back here- Ketheric, two stones can’t hold it down, we need the third, Ketheric, forget about your daughter, come right here and make yourself useful for a change-“

But Ketheric doesn’t listen. Orin doesn’t listen. Everyone is too wrapped up in their own issues, their own grudges, their own fights. Karlach slices through the undead servant and knocks Gortash into the ground, only to be pushed back by a force of small explosive detonating right into her face. It doesn’t damage her much, but pushes back a significant amount.

“My poor brother,” Orin taints as Nemo tries to dodge one of her slices and comes out short. Blood oozes from the new cut and his murder-kin giggles. “So out of it, so pathetically weak. I did a good job on you, brother dear. But,” another smile, another attack. Nemo barely parries it in time. “I can do better. Father knows I can do better, Father knows you have failed him. He loves you no more, my failure of a brother. He has left you.”

Nemo would love to argue what Father went nowhere, what he still haunts Nemo’s every waking and dreaming moment, what the only thing stopping the God of Murder from consuming his wayward son is the illithid parasite in the bhaalspawn’s brain. But he doesn’t have the time, he doesn’t have the strength, he is failing, and-

The next strike to come is fatal.

Or it would be, if not for a huge tentacle of the brain to come flying out of nowhere.

Sending Orin flying right into the Morphic pool.

To the Brain.

With her stone.

Fuck.

Nemo turns around and meets a bewildered stare of Enver fucking Gortash, the man who just successfully compromised his own plan - their plan - beyond any recovery.

A fool.

Nemo’s blood is so loud in his ears he can barely hear; his heart is throwing itself against the cage of his ribs with a force unbeknown to him before.

He feels elevated, he feels scared, but most of all he feels-

“What the fuck did you do?” he snarls and everything, miraculously, stills. Everyone freezes, staring between them in a mix of surprise and dread.

Everyone feels what something just went very wrong.

“I-“ Enver starts, but Nemo gives him no chance to continue.

“You just threw the Netherstone to the Brain! The Netherstone we use to control the Brain! And you just threw it right at it,” there’s indignation burning in him but also...confusion?

Why? Why would Enver do something like that? Why would he compromise everything? Why would he-

“She was about to kill you,” Gortash seethes. “I saved your life.”

“By dooming everyone and everything in the process,” Nemo shouts back. “By dooming yourself. By the gods, Ketheric, did you see that? How he just- Ruined everything?”

“I did in fact see that,” Ketheric, who is pretty much being held down at the fire point, states. The only thing stopping Nightsong from murdering him here and now is Isobel’s hand on her shoulder. “It was a very stupid thing to do.”

Gortash looks appalled at that.

“I just saved his life!” he repeats like this fixes everything. Like it explains anything. There’s a mad look in his eyes, of a man who just realized what he has done. Then he turns to Nemo. “I saved your life, you ungrateful little-“

“Why?” comes out so quietly it’s barely a whisper.

At first Nemo thinks he asked that, the question was definitely on the tip of his tongue. But no, the voice belongs to Karlach. She rises from the ground, shaken but unhurt.

“I know you; you’re an awful fucking person who only cares for his own well-being. Why would you do something like that,” she gestures at Nemo and Nemo makes a face at her. He knows how he looks, thank you very much. “For him?”

Gortash opens his mouth, hesitates. His eyes dart to Nemo and Nemo meets his gaze with just as inquisitive expression as the one on Karlach’s face.

“Yes, Enver,” he agrees. “Why?”

But Enver never gets to answer, for in that precise moment the waters of the Morphic pool part and a figure crawls out.

A figure of a pale woman with even paler eyes, dressed in red.

Orin.

She takes a step, then another.

And something is wrong.

Her movements are unsteady; her head dangles as if she’s held up the strings and her eyes-

They’re vacant, her eyes, almost empty. They’re...peaceful, and Orin has never been peaceful in her entire damn life.

Nemo makes the involuntary step forward and is immediately held back by Wyll, who, gods only know how, managed to not only teleport his father right next to Karlach, but also come back to Nemo, and is now holding him firmly by the forearm.

“Don’t,” he whispers into Nemo’s ear. “This is not your sister.”

“Orin?” Nemo calls out regardless, because this is his sister. It has to be.

Orin raises her head and looks straight at him. Then she opens her mouth and speaks:

“Praise the Absolute.”

“By the Nine Hells,” Karlach curses. “She got tadpolled.”

“And she has the stone,” Ketheric is the first one to move, ripping himself out of Nightsong’s grip and stepping forward.

“Well, shit.”

An overwhelming, overbearing horror embraces Nemo.

Orin, his little sister. Orin, his murderer, his torturer.

Orin, the perfect slayer. The puppet of the Absolute.

“Maybe I can use the prism,” he starts. “I can bring her back to her senses.”

“And then what?” Wyll argues and it takes Nemo an embarrassingly long time to realize his friend has already started to pull him away. “She’ll try to kill us on her own volition and not the Brain’s? No.”

“We need to go,” Gortash speaks up. “Quickly, now.”

“There’s no ‘we,’”, Karlach argues. “And ‘we’ are not going anywhere with you.”

“Karlach, now is not the time to argue-“

“You sold me to Zariel-“

“Father?” Isobel calls out. “Father, what are you doing?”

Ketheric unsheathes his sword.

“Atoning,” he speaks. The moves to rip the Netherstone from his armor and throw it at Nemo. Nemo, surprisingly, manages to catch it. “Keep it safe,” the man orders and oh, is this his general voice now? “Keep her safe.”

Nemo doesn’t need to ask who he means by that. Instead he argues.

“I am a murderer, you know that, right?” as if any sane argument would work right now. “A murder incarnate. I do not keep people safe.”

“This time you will,” and this is why Ketheric was so feared and respected; a single hard stare pins Nemo to the ground. “Or I will come back and hunt you down to the end of Toriel. To the end of every known realm, if I have to.”

“Not to interrupt this fine and lovely conversation, but general,” Gortash looks just as puzzled as Nemo feels. “What are you doing again?”

The man has some strength enough to smirk.

“What I should have done long time ago,” he sends Isobel a long, sickeningly loving gaze. “The right thing. Isobel.”

“Father,” the girl’s chin trembles. “Father, I don’t-“

“I love you more than any god could understand,” the old general speaks. “And I will never regret bringing you back, never. But now,” he turns his gaze back and manages to parry the quick, efficient and entirely deadly strike of Bhaal’s unloved daughter. “You have to live. And I...I have to take a stand. Go,” he says. “Go,” he commands. “I will hold her back for as long as I can.”

“The undying against the slayer,” Gortash murmurs as he already sprints towards the elevated platform.

The ground shakes as the Brain breaks out of its bonds, bit by bit, slowly but surely. The wave of psionic energy what comes their way almost knocks them all down.

“Go,” Nemo shouts as he and Wyll teleport closer to the exit. Thank fuck for the teleportation spells. Thank fuck for Wyll.

Karlach all but carries dazed Ravengard away as Dame Aylin takes Isobel in her arms and takes flight.

“Go, go, go!” he repeats as a familiar hand grabs him by the shoulder. Nemo doesn’t have time to think, doesn’t have time to act as he is dragged the remaining way to the platform by no-one but the tyrant himself.

The moment Karlach reaches the platform Wyll hits the control panel and they start to rise. Nemo is afraid it is not fast enough.

From the height of their ascend he sees the undying general fight off the slayer. Two Chosen of Gods against each other.

Even from that far away it is clear Ketheric will fall.

He sacrificed himself. He brought them time.

Fool.

***

Down below the illithid colony, amidst the Hell of his own creation, general Ketheric Thorm receives one last, final blow.

Blood oozes out of his wounds, painting the floor red. Above him a woman dressed in red stands; eyes vacant, empty, soulless.

But it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters anymore.

Isobel is safe. And Ketheric...

“Melodia,” he whispers as the last breath leaves his body. “I am coming.”

Somehow he knows she is waiting for him; what she has always waited for him, no matter how far he strayed.

Ketheric Thorm dies peacefully. It feels like falling asleep.

[cedarw00div]

redeemed Gort au....He gets tadpoled instead of durge....hregrgrggrr...

[sun-marie]

potentially a hot take but it is my opinion that open ended, non-linear, exploration-based storytelling in video games is not worth it if it comes at the expense of the story's pacing. If you have a thousand different roads for the player to take but they're all just thrown at the player at once with no rhyme or reason, then no amount of "player agency" is going to make any if them feel satisfying, they now just feel like a chore.

[sycobyte]

ooo the girls are fighting (right in front of the big powerful netherbrain)