#they'd have done anything for each other AND THEY DID and that was the catastrophe

[halyorke-vampiredisaster]

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[otdderamin]

Analysis: Essek's Accent As The Shadowhand Fades

I'm watching the Essek Supercut again, and I noticed Essek's accent and when it starts to settle.

Watch the first few clips, until about about 0:4:40

Mostly this is just Matt settling into Essek's voice, but when he was first introduced, Essek had a very stern authoritative court voice. But once they were in the antichamber together, and Fjord says they need to check their underwear for accidents after that first interaction with the Queen and made him laugh, Essek slips into what we hear as his personal accent.

Essek really did just make up this version of himself to be as successful as everyone pushed him to be, and make really selfish choices to protect that act. But those personas ultimately felt like lies about himself. So what difference does it make protecting it with more lies? Which led himself down some really dark paths until Thw Mighty Nein discovered him and it all unraveled.

Essek is a dramatic theater gay who pulled off a character so well he couldn't stop playing him even when it was turning into a Shakespearean tragedy. Everything he says in these early days is so intensely dramatic and selling his vast accomplishments. Essek is giving them a list of reasons to respect him because he doesn't think his inner self is respectable. Essek always felt like it was the lies people loved and not him underneath, so what would hurt people more would be trying to stop. To be anything less than ruthless.

But this bunch of goofballs, whose very first direct comment to him was a self-depricating joke about being scared, they broke through. And what broke his heart most on that ship, was knowing he'd let them down with those lies. Because he'd let them see his true self, like he hadn't done for anyone in years (decades?), and they loved that one the most. Especially Caleb because they'd shared that instant attraction and interest Essek almost wasn't sure he could feel.

So after he was caught, even if Caleb was telling Essek he could choose to be better, he was obviously hurt and mistrustful and not calling. And feeling like he couldn't go back ate at him.

But then The Mighty Nein call on him again for help with their more dangerous thing ever. These weirdos are going to run headlong into danger not for gain or glory but because it stops someone else making a catastrophic mistake. And they want him to come with them. They want him to show them he's changed. And he has.

And even if they fight it, that attraction is still like magnets. They're so scared of hurting each other again or getting hurt, they can talk in meaningful coded riddles with each other, but not dare cross the threshold where they can hold that pull back. Where they'd have to find out if they enable or temper their worst impulses.

They didn't get there before they parted ways after Aeor. But we know that sometime in the last six months they let themselves pull together. They go back to Aeor to know what it feels like to just be together, the two of them, if no one at all was there. Caleb, down on one knee, holding a magic ring, "[Essek Thelyss], I know we're not relationship people, but will you date me for three months, and then we'll reassess?"

And it worked. Maybe being apart much of the time helps them get perspective on the world outside themselves and the freedom to lead two very different lives. The Essek who visits the man with green beans, no longer sounds quite like the Shadowhand did. He found how to use his power in the world more responsibly, when only a handful of people will hear about it, but they will listen so much closer, and see him more than any accomplishment. With the bustle and fear of the world shut out.

[yutzen]

The Events of Windchime Hill

(Another non-main crew one, this one recycled from FAR older writings than usual in fact and used for the prompt, which was provided by Making Up Monsters on Cohost)

Monster who notices people on a railway track, and has a decision to make

"Let me just paint you the picture, mm? Something of an outside picture, it seems proper, it does. Once upon a time, in a land of many Scarlet Chimneys, a train came bounding off its rails..."

"It was quite a lot of coincidences, it was. No train should've been there at that hour, for one, let alone one roaring in at such breakneck speeds. No mining charge should've been on the rails, either, rigged to go off soon as anything touched it. And most of all, the two that saw everything that followed, they should've never been there; why, they should've been locked in an old, old city over a thousand miles away, unable to even decide to get there and intervene."

"Yet there they all were, in the wrong place at the wrong time, for all the involved. And in the end, when you think about it, those who should've been there the least were the only ones to walk away."

"It all began, of course, with a distant blast. Sharp and echoing. And that was already cause for concern all by itself, definitely turned their heads. Yet the screeching, clanking cacophony of twisting metal that followed it, oh that was far, far worse, a sign of sure catastrophe..."

"And, to a couple of unliving beings, constructs that had long resorted to rebuilding themselves and each other with whatever they could find, why, it was also a grim opportunity. Anything aboard, even the very parts of the train itself, could be key to prolonging themselves just a little longer. Even the ravaged scrap metal of a hull could help, once taken apart and smelted... You have to get creative, and fairly callous too, when all you truly have is yourself. Well, yourselves, as the case would be, wouldn't it?"

"But for that, oh, they'd need to hurry. After all, it wasn't them that laid that charge on the rails. They hadn't fallen that low yet - much as scavenging the work of someone that had wasn't so much better. But it had happened nonetheless, and they were close enough to hear it, and be there, if they made things quick."

"And it was thus that two constructs, the ones you know well, marched on, thinking themselves ready to sort through a tragedy... oh, they couldn't have imagined."

"Sorry sight THAT was. Bloody armored trains like those, soon as they start derailing all that extra metal just becomes a part of the clusterf- the mess, another reason why it got so huge, and so damned bloody. But I'm getting ahead of myself there, because we're still talking about a DELIBERATE derailment and those are ALWAYS worse. The bomb on those rails was no firecracker, damn thing could've sent half a HILL tumbling down all by itself! Says something about the locomotive that there was anything LEFT from it. That was ANOTHER thing that shouldn't have been, you don't have armored wagons like that just roaming around like nothing, this was SPECIAL."

"But that's the thing with special. Someone ALWAYS takes a shot at it. And take it they did. Explosion, derailment, mess of crumbled metal, MORE explosions, and by the time all that was done not a lot was left alive. And still they got a train so loaded, JAM-PACKED with goods, that even with THAT much of a disaster they still had one hell of a payday with them. Lucky them! Except for the part they weren't alone. The part where someone else HEARD them, was coming to check, and had even MORE to gain. If you could call that a gain back then."

"...you have to wonder how it LOOKED to them. The fires going out, the outside sorted, everything's going smoother than they could've ever IMAGINED. Got the fanciest train they've seen in their lives, their biggest bomb well spent. And they're ready to go in, right until... guess one of them got a sick feeling or something, because that one turned around right before it started."

"And you have to wonder what he THOUGHT as soon as he saw... not just ANY two constructs. Not just the dull sweepers and haulers everyone knows from the Vaults. I know you wouldn't see it THAT way, but keep in mind these were raiders that never saw ANYTHING like this... You know one thing that amuses me? You and I know the truth, but I am VERY sure they found the big, hulking, BURNING mass of walking obsidian closing in to be the most TERRIFYING thing they ever saw! Kheheh~"

"Oh, I'm sure the whirring, blinding tangle of copper and silver terrified them just as much, no one is ever ready for such sparks, and the thrumming sound, and the wirework shooting towards them like snakes. But let us not get into such comparisons, shall we? That isn't the important part of the story, clearly. And, admittedly, neither are the bandits, past a certain point. Which would be the point we're in..."

"These were two battered, DESPERATE constructs that had nothing but each other right then, and had just found SOMETHING that could last them more than a week. With the only thing standing between that and them being BANDITS. The callous thought was no one would miss them. And the desperate thought was that if even ONE walked away and said even ONE thing about these two rogues? If that thing slipped to even ONE city? All those years HIDING in the wild would have been for NOTHING. Back then rogues had it even WORSE."

"Mm, yes, thank you for putting it that way, Kig, dear. And for playing along on this, I ought to say, but moving on. Moving on, because lingering upon the brief minute or so that followed isn't right for you or anyone, but especially you. What matters is, the ones that set that charge didn't get to enjoy the spoils, or anything else."

"Nevertheless, once they could get to the train itself, that's where it truly dawned on them how unusual it all was. Oh, the armor on the thing was only the start, there were strange and mangled mechanisms all over its interior; why, some of them were so unusual, so complex, even the two could hardly understand what they were looking at. They knew now this was clearly a train of terrible importance to someone, someone would very much care that it would never arrive. And this gave the constructs trouble, it did, putting a timer on all they needed to do. And that was before they even got to the passengers' luggage!"

"...ah, and the passengers themselves, of course. The outside had looked disastrous already, but the inside, why, it became clear none of the fancy things inside had been there for their safety. The more these two... fortunate constructs prowled, the more they found none of them had made it. And the more questions they had on who they all were. Most of them were Bannerbound, they were, but there was a little of every species. Every species, they even had a few from the most remote hives... Yet none of them had made it, none. And many of them had these odd bandages on them, like a Bannerbound Clan, like... one of the Clans in particular, I hardly remember which-"

"I'd say Clan Vesnor, Tee. Not that it HELPED them any when it came to ble- No, we're not going there. Not at this hour."

"Thank you, Kig, dear, though we might still need to touch lightly on that... Nonetheless, wagon by wagon they went, and they found more than enough parts to last them, to keep them ticking for much longer still. And many more that they didn't quite understand, at the time. They'd take those too, just in case; after all, when you are a construct, weight is hardly a limiting factor, isn't it? Much less than it would be for most. But they also found more... passengers. More and more, with little to be done. They tried to keep it off their minds, and they managed to, all this was necessity, and the fallen hardly needed it all anymore..."

"But then, at the back, there was... they found..."

"The thing about big tragedies is that they have layers. Sub-tragedies within them. And what they found THERE was one hell of a sub-tragedy. One that was NOT over yet. Among the casualties, there were two Q- two Troxi, both of them with the bandages. Inscribed, and dyed blue, they could see it even with the... mess inside. They had it BAD. Still had their luggage with them too. Scattered everywhere. Most of it for metalworking! Lucky them, they thought, and they almost jumped in to see what they could carry off, trying not to think about what this same heavy luggage had done to THEM."

"...then the two heard a whimper."

"There was a third Troxi in there. Hardly five years old, at a guess. And she was alive. Saved by her own size, is my guess, seeing she was the ONE kid and the ONE survivor to the whole thing... and even then, only barely. She was- her injuries... she was on the verge. Wouldn't last, if no one helped, you could SEE the life fading in her eye. And the little one was just clinging to the other two, staring straight ahead, with ragged breathing and with her tail around what back then LOOKED like just a fancy forge hammer. Slowly shutting down..."

"And the two that came upon THAT looked at each other. Suddenly it wasn't so simple. Suddenly there wasn't a lot they could tell themselves about this all. And suddenly, they were in an even BIGGER hurry than they could've imagined. And they knew it without trading even ONE word."

"They... knew each other well enough, they did. Even the most talkative of the lot couldn't find anything to say. Or that needed to be said, when faced with..."

"When faced with someone that had the WORST of luck, standing OR laying there that day. Like Tee said, of all that shouldn't have been there, this little girl should've been there the LEAST. OUTSIDE of whatever machinations were being set up in that train. AWAY from this deathtrap of a rail. AWAY from this TRAGEDY! But there she was. With NOTHING left... except for herself. And even that was sheared, and fading quickly."

"...when you are built, you worry more than anyone that breathes about how much of you is you. And how much is just WRITTEN in you. And so much of what those two did had them wondering, sometimes. Surviving is hard-coded. Violence, only SLIGHTLY less so, with the way the Vaults are. And even those two aiding one another? There is STILL the argument that this is just some linking protocol. Some drive to cover each other, TECHNICALLY on the same side that made them. And you worry with THAT, whether anything you do is actually a choice. But..."

"But, what those two thought, and decided that moment, well... they would never have to worry about it in such terms. They would never question it. And they never have."

"It would be arduous, and painful for all involved, unfortunately. Those two saved what they could; one arm, one leg, one eye, all outside their grasp, but they could save what mattered at least. They'd need to make space, leave some things behind to carry her out... with her little hammer, too, which she refused to leave behind, just kept tugging it along with her tail. So on it went, with spoils that suddenly didn't seem so important. They took what luggage of theirs they could, before making their exit someplace else. Anywhere else... because even their life on the run, away from much of the world and with no one but themselves, would be better than this. But, much as they didn't realize it fully then, now there were three."

"The rest was difficult, at first. They had much to learn that first day, and the first week, and the year that followed... and every year since. It's been quite a few since that day, hasn't it...? And still they haven't entirely figured it all out. But such is parenthood, it is, or so they say when one asks. All they could do was keep learning, keep figuring things out, and of course the occasional apology for those abundant mistakes..."

"Right now the apology we owe you is how much we blew THIS storytelling! Three sparks, I am GLAD this isn't your bedtime right now, Vi. Sorry about the nightmares, I TRIED to rein things in but the sheer MESS that was... everything, needed to be told. And maybe we should just DROP the third-person earlier."

"Kig, dear, I felt it was... necessary, at least at first, an objective look, objective as we could manage, mm?"

"Maybe, but being objective about THIS feels like we shouldn't even bother. The fact it WASN'T just the cold math we were running back then is the POINT!"

"...heh. It is, isn't it? It took me some time to figure that out, it did. But we did. Be proud of that, Virry dear, you went and melted hearts that weren't even there, mm?"

"Tee, it was- ...it's a crude way to put THAT one. But all the better that you did, Vi. Tee KEEPS joking about how hard it was, but this... it's better. It's just... better. And looking back at that day, and looking at you now... I'm glad we were there. I'm glad, and... I'm proud of you for making it, Vi. Then, and this far... with these two that can't even tell a STORY right, kheheh~"

"Kiggie, dear, don't push it so far, mm? Let's not ruin the moment... much as we'll need to split this hug soon, because I'm quite sure I heard a little growl down here."

"KHAH! Right, it IS dinner time! You're better than any clock, Vi! Let THAT be our apology then, let's make something GOOD!"

"Funny how cooking was one of the lessons we did learn quickly, mm~?"

[writingwrittenwriting]

It had been an interesting run, that's for damn sure, and now things were coming to a close. I couldn't do much about that now so I might as well enjoy the ride. I'd made my choices, burned my bridges, and nuked a few in the process. It's amazing what you can get up to with a burning grudge, a little magic and a lot of cash.

I'd had a laundry list a mile long, and just this morning I crossed off the last name while drinking the chunkiest damn coffee of my life. Grainy slop suited my last job like flies suited shit. A chaser that matched that bloody meal. Forty three names, forty three adventures, and forty three catastrophic acts of mutually assured destruction. There was no way I could go back to any kind of life now. My picture was being aired internationally, my name spoken in languages I'd never even heard of. My head was worth millions.

But that's bound to happen when you take down every corrupt official and power player responsible for what ended up being the debacle of the century. Hell, I'd say the greatest debacle of the human race. Their greed and apathy had led to the death of just under a billion confirmed. Among them, my closest friends. And not just them, countless innocent and powerless people just trying to make it day to day. People who couldn't afford to escape, and those without the power to do anything about it.

Starting my rampage, I only had six names. I didn't know how deep the rot went. But with every interrogation, every desperate attempt to shift blame, every murderously spat set of last words, more names were added. At first I'd only thought hundreds to be lost. Then thousands. Millions. Nearing the tail end of this ass of a beast, billions were exposed as victims. I was seeing red, the shit these people had done. Supplying weapons to both sides of warring factions so they'd wipe each other out. Trading human beings like baseball cards. Signing death sentences in business deals for nothing more than money. Their sins were never ending, the things I learned were endless. Every time I thought it couldn't get worse, it just got so much worse like a bad cartoon.

A never ending list of crimes, and forty three people leading the rings. None of them were easy to get to, so I'd promised my soul, tainted and dirty, to the devil himself. He gave me the skills I needed to complete my mission. The means to do the impossible and seek my revenge. The rich and unknown, the powerful and famous. All of them fell, their body guards and private armies did nothing to protect them. All the control they had, the world was truly in chaos now. But sometimes you have to burn the diseased trees for the healthy seeds to grow.

Long adventure to a close now, I was standing in front of the great devil himself, blood on my hands. Blood probably in my ass crack too with the absolute gore show I finished with.

"Well old friend, I'm done. Shows over." I let my guns fall, I'd have no use for them now. The weight of this whole venture finally fell on me, so I sank down to my knees with a tired chuckle and set my hands on my lap.

"Lets hit the road before the feds catch up." Jokes aside, I was too tired to really care anymore. But here the devil was looking down at me with something like sympathy. What the fuck, why was he dragging it out? Didn't he have shit to do? People to tempt?

"Do you know what my job truly is, warrior?" He asked in a soft sad tone, one of a man who had truly found the point of exhaustion yet had no choice but to soldier on. I shrugged my shoulders, sighing softly.

"Why ya dragging this out, man? I mean... You're the devil, you torture the assholes who end up in hell, you take the souls of the desperate and greedy. What of it?" He eyed me curiously before crouching down into a squat, his tail weaving through the air behind him like a dancing snake.

"I punish those who commit evil in their lives. Those who never repent for their horrible actions. I give an eternity of suffering to the ones who live their lives off the suffering of others. The souls I take, there are two types. Those so desperate and in such deep suffering, I give them a strand of hope. The other type are those who are twisted with evil. I give them the power that becomes their downfall so I may take them sooner. You were in the former group. Seeing what you did to those people, punishing those who lived on the suffering of others. I see much of myself in you."

Well, I coulda been speechless. The devil telling me he sees himself in me. That couldn't be a good thing, could it? But it made sense in a twisted and fucked kind of way.

"So you think we're alike, I still gave you my soul. I'm still damned. I'm done now, you might as well take whats left of me and get this over with. I aint got all day now, you know. Hah. I probably have ten minutes until someone catches up to me. I'm fucked, so let me make good on our deal." Still he stared at me, before he offered his hand.

No clue how giving a soul away works, I took his clawed gnarled hand and let him pull me up onto my feet, knees shaking like a hooker on new years day. To my surprise, he pulled my arm over his shoulder and lifted me, guiding me through a glowing red door and into the hottest driest room I'd ever sweated in.

"Our deal is for your soul. However, I'd like to offer a amendment to our contract. Only if you agree, as our contract is signed and I shall honour it if you so choose." A table with a chair on both sides appeared, like an interrogation room. He helped me into one, then disappeared to reappear in the other.

"I'm listening" What other choice did I have? Besides, you never know what you might get if you agree to a deal with the devil. I was curious, not going to lie.

"I don't want your soul, you don't deserve what would happen to you if I were to take it. Instead, I want you to join me in hell. As an assistant if you will. You're clever, you have a strong sense of justice. I want you to take down the type of people you're already so adept at hunting. Make deals with them that lead them to their deaths. Work with me."

Well fuck, I was flabbergasted. I didn't expect that. The devil recruiting me? Wasn't that a bad thing? Why did it feel like I'd be doing good, working for the devil. I stared at him like he'd just offered me a timeshare.

"What?" He waved his hand, our contract appearing on the table.

"You sign the new deal, you go back to Earth with a new face. New powers. You continue your work, taking out the people who think they can take what they want with no consequences."

"Well shit, that sounds great and all, but what's the catch?" Staring at him curiously, I frowned in thought. He took a deep breath, let out a long sigh.

"You're going to see the worst of humanity for a long time. It will never end. You'll feel such exhaustion, like you've never known. No matter how hard you work, it will only continue to get worse. You'll wish you had no soul."

The emotion in his voice... Something ancient and exhausted. I looked at the contract, already I felt so tired... Could I do something like this? Continuing to rid the world of those assholes sounded like a dream job, but the devil sounded so burnt out. Was this worth it?

"Ah hell, I've already given you my soul. I might as well. At least I'll still get all the hotdogs and chili I want on earth." I dabbed my finger in the blood that was starting to dry on my nose and smeared it on the contract. Dramatic, yes, but I couldn't hold a pen. A fingerprint would do.

"You're going to regret this. Thank you." He truly sounded as though he meant every word. I just snorted, acting tough.

"Mom always told me I could grow up to be whatever I wanted. Might as well be the devils assistant."

As the end of your deal with the devil comes to an end you summon him once more to hand over your immortal soul, you knew what you were getting yourself into from the start and despite it all you are satisfied to end it this way… only the devil seems weirdly reluctant to take your soul now

[lightdancer1]

A two part scene from the Ba Sing Se AU:

Zuko laughed at Toph's story that afternoon as hard as everyone else did. Everyone had told one, except him. Even Mai had told hers and it was an admittedly funny and kind of terrifying narrative of the kind he belatedly realized he'd never bothered to ask her.

"So what's your story, Flames?"

Zuko blinked. His would be a more serious, and sadder tale but it still had to be told.

"After everything beneath Lake Laogai," he said reflectively as he stared into the goblet he had in front of him, "Azula told me that I had regained my own honor that day, and that my honor was mine to shape. I thanked Uncle for his wisdom but I never appreciated hers. I was lost, then, to my anger."

He shook his head.

"She's dead now, so there's no risk of speaking of this or admitting some of the mistakes I know I made." His friends' postures subtly shifted at that and Mai noticed this and might have made a point to ask about it afterward had he not continued.

"I thought when she brought me home and said I killed the Avatar that she was playing some elaborate mind game besides that. Toying with me. Playing one of her little 'Azula always lies' gambits." Mai flinched at those words and her fingers rapped on the table slightly but she otherwise said nothing.

"I spent that whole boat trip wondering just what the game was, how she might play it. Father poisoned our lives to the point that when my sister, however misguided, actually did one of the nicest things she ever did for me I looked for the dagger in my back."

He gave a single bitter laugh at that.

"Not that it matters now. But...." Silence paused.

"So the stupidest thing that I did with that was spending a week terrified of how she'd exploit things, of what she would do when we returned and Father was actually happy with me, and proud of me. She was a heartbeat from the throne, from everything she ever actually wanted and she threw it all away to bring me home.

And I just couldn't see that. That first night I got restless with it, so at midnight after inability to sleep I went straight to her room and busted open the door."

The silence before had been one kind of silence. This was a different one, and he did not see the way his friends looked at each other and then at him, let alone the expression on Mai's face and her forcing her fingers to clench so hard she drew blood from her palm rather than giving away anything else she felt.

"She looked...." he sighed. That part of him that knew in the end that his father's approval was the only sign he needed of his mistake as they'd multiplied and the shadows of a greater crisis than that of Yu Dao drew around his people.......that part was in full swing tonight and he wasn't focused on anything else but the ripples in the wine from his stirring it.

"It wasn't like the last times I saw her. Not the Agni Kai, or when I sent her out of the Fire Nation." Mai's expression hardened at that and for the first time his friends saw what the expression of true anger looked like on the stone face. "Her robe that night was....normal. Not the kind of stuff a royal usually wore." Mai's look became darker.

"So I spoke to her about it and she told me the truth as much as she did anything. My sister did something good for me twice, saved my life once. And all I let myself see was the worst shape of everything she did. I was blind. None so blind as those who do not see."

Toph simply thinned her lips and said nothing while Zuko and Katara shared an identical expression and set of hand gestures.

The stories were done and the talks that followed were stilted and awkward, which Zuko detected without fully understanding why. Not until after a strangely formal set of farewells that would be the last time he'd see his friends until five years later his Uncle made a catastrophically stupid decision that would alter a great many lives forever.

That evening Mai stood in front of him in the kind of robes royals were more used to wearing.

"Zuko," her voice was cold and not at all the tone he was used to hearing. "You went into Azula's room in the middle of the night."

He nodded, blinking.

"You talked about her robe."

That tone was colder and he had no idea how she could do that and why he was suddenly nervous.

"Yes. I mean you know she loved luxury, Mai. That was.....an odd choice."

Mai went over to him and they were very close and he saw the tells of her being extremely furious.

"You went to see my best friend, your literal sister, in the middle of the night and barged open in her door without warning?"

In a sudden motion she had one of her knives in her hands, edge pointed away from him.

"If I ever find out about you doing anything like that to someone else, Zuko," from coldness to the steel of her anger, "I'll give a little prick a little prick."

She said "I'll be sleeping in my old room tonight. Good night, my love."

Only Mai could pack more menace into three words of her native language than most people did into an entire speech.

When some of her words registered on him that night at midnight he suddenly sat up with a sudden startled expression and a look of dawning shock and horror. The realities that lurked at the edges were intimidating enough that he fell on the most honored reflex of his family and refused to face them or that there was something wrong and instead went back to sleep pulling his pillow over his head.

-------

Ba Sing Se University Dorms:

Lu did not understand why, two days from the visit she had a knock at her door. She'd expected it might be her fiancee and then she saw her new friends standing there, a look on their faces she didn't expect. She looked down. No, she was dressed in normal university clothes. She looked around. No particular mess.

"Uh....hi?" Her expression flatly showed confusion.

"Lu," Toph said with a strange tone to her voice, "we just want to....visit."

Sokka coughed and she raised an eyebrow. She knew her new friends did things strangely and this presumably was one of those times. Only much later would she learn the nature of the story and the reasons that lay behind things.