#so yeah i'll be putting three by sleeping at last on a gale playlist shortly i think

[sky-scribbles]

I never thought I'd be grateful for a game crashing so hard it erased three hours of play. But right now, I am. Because pre-crash, I decided to have Gale talk to Mystra before his Outer Plane boat ride scene. Once I realoded, I had him talk to her after. And I am so glad to have seen the difference.

When Gale speaks to Mystra without you having talked to him in the Outer Planes first, his first response on returning is to launch straight into talking about the Karsite Weave. It's very similar to his reaction to emerging from the Mind Flayer colony at the end of act 2 - he doesn't stop to sit with how he's feeling about defying Mystra and choosing to live, despite these being enormous, world-shaking decisions for him; he goes straight into fixating on the potentials of the Crown of Karsus. He pulls away from your attempts to engage him in conversation about his choice. And after talking to Mystra, he does the same thing again. He gives himself no time to reflect on how he's feeling or what he's going through; nor to consider that you, his friend and possible partner, might want to check in with him and connect with him after such an important moment.

In this version of events, Gale is fixated on the potential of the Crown. He wonders if the reason he survived the orb was because the Karsite Weave chose him. He's fully on the 'ascending to godhood' train to an extent that my Tav found very unsettling - mostly because all she wanted was to just ask her partner how he's doing after this very enormous event. And crucially, he does not talk about - and there's no opportunity to ask him - whether he thinks this would make him happy.

But then my game crashed. My saves got eaten. And I decided I deserved nice things after that, so I ended the day right after starting it and experienced the boat scene. And my Tav got to tell Gale, quite simply, that he is enough. He is loved for who he is. He doesn't need to strive harder, become better, prove himself, be more special. No perfect godhood needed; all of him - the flaws, the mistakes, the brokenness - is worthy of love.

And when he got back from talking to Mystra this time? He immediately stops to check in on himself. He says that he can't believe that he saw her. He's able to sift through his emotions and even be proud of himself for facing Mystra. Far from feeling like the orb chose him, he's stunned that he ever thought he could control it. Because he doesn't need the idea of having been chosen anymore. He doesn't need that desperate validation. And my Tav got the chance to ask him that all-important question: 'Is this what you want?'

Both versions of this scene were great and telling, and there's definitely an argument to be made for doing it both ways around. But it really struck me to conpare the two and see it made so very clear: all Gale ever needed to be able to stop and see himself truly, to consider his own feelings and needs, to communicate more clearly with his partner, and to be kind to himself... was just for someone to tell him that he is enough. Just as he is.

Because that was what it was all about, wasn't it? The orb, the book, returning of that fragment of the Weave to Mystra - it was all about him trying, desperately, impossibly, to be enough for her.

It's not until he realises that he's worthy of love in all his imperfect mortality that he can even consider being enough for himself.