#thoughts after watching inland empire

[xirae]

I've been kind of addicted to calling America / The Western World a violent and coercive schizophrenic metropolis..... how fire is this take ??????

[disco-elysium-via-polls]

It's time to do something very important that we've been putting of for a while.

We're going to buy the FALN pants from Cuno.

CUNO - "Cuno's like Cuno's dad -- Cuno doesn't give a fuck about anything."

3. "I want to buy the FALN pants."

CUNO - "Here, pig. We FALN now. Performance buddies." Cuno unzips his jacket again and pulls the pants out of the plastic wrapping.

Item gained: FALN "Modular" Track Pants

CUNO - "Cuno can already see you soaring through the air like a fucking eagle." He looks at you with pride. "Pig's in Cuno's debt now. Money-debt."

Task complete: Buy FALN pants from Cuno

+10 XP

FALN "MODULAR" TRACK PANTS

+1 Savoir Faire: Spacious crotch/liquid fit -1 Physical Instrument: Performance-unlimited

Entry level FALN Modular track pants, meant to get the urban athele started down the FALN-path. Labels say Hydrophobic 100%, SymanTec, and FALN Mirova Lab, creating an air of pseudoscientific mystery around these pants. They feel rubbery and futuristic to touch.

🎵 The Field Autopsy

THE HANGED MAN - The man is decomposing visibly now. Every hour he looks less like a creature and more like a pile of intestines...

KIM KITSURAGI - The lieutenant adjusts his glasses and takes a deep breath.

2. "Let's bag him. Take him away." (The lieutenant takes the body away -- you work alone for the rest of the day.)

KIM KITSURAGI - "All right." He takes out a shiny black body bag and starts pulling the plastic over the dead man's face.

Task complete: Send victim's body to processing

+30 XP

Level up!

KIM KITSURAGI - "I will need a little help carrying him -- you take the hands, I'll take the legs."

Bag the corpse and drag it to the motor carriage. [Leave.]

Kim is gone.

We *did* want to talk to Klaasje without Kim here, but she's turned in for the night, so that will have to wait.

🎵 Instrument of Surrender

SHIVERS - All around you, rain falls on the great city of Revachol. Rain drips from the eaves and floods the gutters, washing the filth away.

The spring thaw must be here. The snow is melting...

What am I doing?

SHIVERS - Looking up at the sky, cold water dripping from your hair.

What do I see?

Shake the shivers off. [Discard thought.]

SHIVERS - Grey sky like great battleships, clouds colliding with one another. Rain falls down on the world.

How does it feel?

SHIVERS - Humid. Your coat shields you from the rain while the city shivers around you.

What is in the west?

What's in the east?

What's in the north?

What's in the south?

"Motherfucker." [Finish thought.]

SHIVERS - Sheets of rain over the water. A flight of stairs leading into the ocean. Wave after wave washing the coast of Martinaise, with its motorboats and gently swaying reeds.

The ruins of a half-sunken seafort crumble on an inlet. Beyond the Bay of Revachol, ghosts rise into the sky.

Who are you, ghosts?

What is down the shore?

Run your fingers through your dampened hair.

SHIVERS - The skyscrapers of La Delta, the financial district. Faint golden light seeps from the office windows.

INLAND EMPIRE [Easy: Success] - Will you ever go there?

Will I?

Let go of the feeling.

SHIVERS - No. You are just one of the hundreds of thousands who watch them rise across the bay from Martinaise every day.

2. What is down the shore?

SHIVERS - Urban coastline, rain dripping off eternite-covered roofs. Cinder blocks left over from half-finished construction. A defunct research and development building once seized by revolutionaries. An old wooden church stands on stilts above the water.

And beyond that?

SHIVERS - Coal City, end of all lines.

3. Run your fingers through your dampened hair.

SHIVERS - Your hair is an oily mess flecked with ash from neighbouring coal plants. Smoke stacks rise somewhere in the distance.

🎵 Red Rock Riviera

2. What's in the east?

SHIVERS - The great gates of the industrial harbour are locked. A chill runs down your back. You shudder like an animal trying to shake water from its hide.

Clench your teeth to stop shuddering.

Shake your shoulders again.

SHIVERS - Behind the gates -- heaps of supply crates. Red and blue metal shipping containers slick with rain. The Greater Revachol Industrial Harbour is an artificial mountain range. Immense wealth resides within, and immeasurable poverty in its shadow.

And beyond that?

And before that?

SHIVERS - You -- on the Martinaise plaza. A small dot looking up at the sky. Droplets form on your eyelashes.

And beyond that?

SHIVERS - La Drisienne, King Dris's Passenger Harbour. Cruise ships flanked by dock arms. Cranes watching over the mouth of the river distributary.

What is across from the distributary?

SHIVERS - Couron, the lower middle class. Distributary after distributary cuts the city blocks in half. Seven-story buildings trail off into the rain.

What is beyond the Couron?

SHIVERS - A silvery curtain of rain over the houses. The class divide.

2. Shake your shoulders again.

SHIVERS - You shudder, looking down at your feet. Dirty rainwater runs veins into the plaza snow.

You realize you have no shoes on. Your feet are red with cold.

This is incorrect. This dialogue wasn't programmed to account for wearing anything other than the green snakeskin shoes Harry had on him at the start of the game.

3. What's in the north?

SHIVERS - Capeside apartments -- tower blocks crowd one another, 4.46 mm bullets still lodged in their war-torn stone walls.

Hallways collapsed from the mortar hits of a war that was lost long ago. Clotheslines go to waste in the rain. Radios play.

And closer to here?

SHIVERS - A yard. Rain falls onto the roof of a woodshed. The lingering odour of decomposition mixes with that of damp soil.

4. What's in the south?

SHIVERS - A traffic jam. Rain thrumming on the roofs of motor vehicles. Inside, drivers watch water streaming down their windshields. The statue of a king shudders, he too is cold. The canal bridge has been raised.

What's on the other side?

SHIVERS - The road ascends; a raised motorway loops above the ghetto. Beneath its concrete columns -- a sea of rooftops, woodwork, and tar stretches northward. Four-story buildings as far as the rain can fall. The snows melt in Jamrock.

Where the hood, where the hood, where the hood at?

Why am I not there?

Shudder, look further...

SHIVERS -

HAVE A BROTHER IN THE CUT. WHERE THE WOOD AT?

2. Why am I not there?

SHIVERS - To be in Martinaise, where no one goes. At the run-off point of a long-forgotten canal, in the whitest part of town. In the shadow of the day the Revolution failed.

White is the color of communism in Elysium, remember.

What am I doing here?

SHIVERS - Standing in the rain, looking north, where Jamrock Rock City stretches inland.

3. Shudder, look further...

SHIVERS - In the rain-swept distance above the rooftops of Jamrock, a re-purposed silk mill stands perched above the motorway exit. Precinct 41 hunches in the rain.

+5 XP

MACK TORSON - "Wonder if Vic's found his long lost boyfriend yet." He looks over at Chester McLaine and breaks into a laugh at his own joke. The rain falls outside.

CHESTER MCLAINE - "Mack, they're *hetero-sexual life partners*. It's not like that," his partner smirks. "But yeah. There's trouble in paradise for that duo, Tequila Sunset has..." The sound of the rain grows so loud it drowns out his voice.

SHIVERS - Your vision blurs. You wipe your face with your hand. The rain stings your eyes, making you look up and blink.

5. What's above?

SHIVERS - Coalition aerostatics hang like apparitions under the cloud cover. Way up there -- where rain forms -- rotors flutter silently. Your sight clears.

6. What's below?

SHIVERS - Collapsed storm drains. Old sewage systems flooded with rainwater. Hidden weapon caches from the Revolution. Doors leading down to Le Royaume -- the catacombs to which, for three centuries, they delivered the blue-blooded dead.

7. "Motherfucker." [Finish thought.]

SHIVERS - These spring thaw will not last. The winter will return to Revachol.

+5 XP

No point staying out any later without Kim here. Let's turn in for the night.

Seems the walker was either very confused or drunk out of his mind.

SHACK DOOR - It's getting cold this late in the night. Time to call it a day.

Enter the shack.

Not yet. [Leave.]

🎵 Coastal Shack

SHIVERS - A brisk coastal wind still howls against the window of the shack. Occasionally the waves crawl in under the foundation, producing a low hum...

Listen.

Shake it off. [Discard thought.]

SHIVERS - The room feels muffled, like you pulled your hat over your ears. Outside, it is cold and windy, but you're inside, and it feels safe and warm.

SHIVERS -

WHAT IS THIS PLACE TO YOU?

[transmutationisms]

saw that you finished twin peaks! do you have any thoughts you'd like to share? also, if you haven't already, i high reccomend watching fire walk with me!

ya i saw fwwm after season 2 and before 'the return'. honestly i think my twin peaks opinions are fairly unpopular bc i simply cannot read the series in any way besides as being deeply conservative lol. this becomes especially clear to me in 'the return', which is largely motivated by a narrative of the loss of american innocence (the double r subplot, the numerous instances of drugs and violence tearing nuclear families apart, the encroachment of electricity and processed snack foods and gambling, &c). but this viewpoint is seeded too throughout the first season-and-change of the original series, and fwwm; because what was laura palmer if not the series's first use of rape as metonymous for what lynch sees as a broader process of social breakdown and irreversible change? i understand that some people try to read bob and laura as a critique of the family, in the sense that the violence comes through the father, but i don't think this reading holds even in the original series and it certainly doesn't after part 8 of 'the return', in which bob is explicitly and directly invoked in reference to the bombing of hiroshima and nagasaki, here construed as an originary act of american evil.

i think in david lynch's mind, the spiritual forces and influences in the show are literal and apolitical, and frequently he seems to mean to depict them more as sources of artistic inspiration than anything else ('twin peaks' is in many ways a tv show about making a tv show, hence the double use of electricity throughout 'the return' and fwwm, in particular). but i find this really irritating frankly, because it's at best ignorant of the inherently political nature of the constructions of small-town americana, teenage innocence, violence as an act of moral corruption, and so forth—and also because, after the return, it's simply impossible to deny that the show's overarching narrative IS plugged in to political and historical lines of critique. like, i am not trying to 'force' a reading that deals with us imperialism—lynch put the show on this discursive terrain explicitly and deliberately, through not just the bomb footage and the penderecki threnody but also the inversion of classic symbols of american 'greatness' (the unlucky penny, the evil lincoln impersonator), culminating again in the violation of a young girl's body by the forces of evil. what this all adds up to is the invocation of american empire as a kind of universal moral struggle, stripped of its historical specificity or even the barest pretense of material critique or commentary. if it sounds like i'm asking too much of network television... i mean, maybe i am, but again, these were deliberate choices lynch made and specific historical events he invoked on purpose, lol. see also the jacoby trump commentary in 'the return' (cringe and yawn).

i'm not a lynch scholar but i do think there's a tension throughout his work (what i've seen) between the desire to make art about what he sees as the purely spiritual process of making art (heavily informed by his own TM beliefs), and the conservative elements that creep in anyway, noticeable especially in his commentary on american history, corruption, modernity, &c. the idea of any pure, transcendent, apolitical spiritual dimension of human existence is itself, i would argue, at best a misguided conservative fantasy, and 'twin peaks' ultimately shows these cracks more blatantly than some of his other work (say, 'inland empire') because it tries to subordinate the material to the spiritual in a kind of fantastical historical parable. but, you can see this recurring tension throughout his filmography, eg, the loss of small-town innocence ('blue velvet') and a kind of generalised modernity anxiety ('eraserhead', though taken on its own this one would permit other readings depending on how you interpreted the role of german expressionism in it).

i don't think lynch is an ideologue or even considers himself particularly political, but nevertheless his narratives do idealise a certain conservative vision of post-war america, mourn its loss, and wax nostalgic for its perceived ethos (& it's not a coincidence lynch is/has been a reaganite, lol). anyway, i thought 'twin peaks' had some really incredible moments of visual artistry (part 8 of 'the return', for example!) and i found much of it frankly beautiful and compelling to watch. so, i don't mean any of this to dismiss lynch as a filmmaker—he is, if nothing else, highly technically adept. unfortunately i did just really hate most of what the series was actually saying, lmao.

[grandhotelabyss]

Thoughts on the Lynch Dune adaption? Maybe I will be called contrarian or some crypto fascist, but I kinda vibed with the whole thing of actually subverting the subversion and making Dale Cooper be some ubermensch power fantasy that brings back the wrath of God, like some space King David - maybe because I'm tired of the now prelevant pop nihilism, especially the historic one as the chinese comunist party calls it "wow actually even in the future all religion will be used is for self destructive aims" - then its funnier to see nah it actually does pay off by them accidentally creating something sincere and not plagued by self-terminating doubt

I haven't seen it in years. I watched it before I read the book and remember being pretty lost because of how much plot and concept they were trying to compress into such a short span of screen time. The novel trades in the "pop nihilism" you mention: the libertarian author intended the saga as a warning against the centralization of temporal and spiritual power into one paradoxically anti-imperial empire, as has been, I assume he would further argue, the shared fate of Christianity, Islam, and perhaps also America. On the other hand, our whole cultural attraction to Dune depends on the glamor of what it depicts—the warring feudal houses, the immemorial order of witches, the desert psychedelia, the dream of collective emancipatory violence in a primal horde—which no merely rational critique can dispel. Therefore, Lynch, whatever his own politics[*], understood this impotence of critique well enough to create a phantasmagoric spectacle of Dune superior on its surface to Villeneuve's later version, despite the narrative's not making much sense. I respect Villeneuve's ambition, and I respect Blade Runner 2049 in particular, but he is undoubtedly a symptom of "stuck culture," since all his works subsist on what little can still be scavenged from those ruins of Jodorowsky's abortive Dune that gave us Alien and Blade Runner in the first place. (And Villeneuve's Dune fantasizes, by cannily or cynically manipulating American racial signifiers, of fusing anti-imperialism with empire into a single regime that will boast such monumental artworks as his cinema as its ornament. This kind of thing, not libertarian populism, is probably the real fascist ideology of our age.) Which is all a long way of saying that I agree with the common consensus on Lynch's Dune: perhaps the worst movie to have the best mise-en-scène ever.

__________________________________

[*] Lynch makes face-saving left-friendly remarks from time to time, but I suspect his politics are closer to Herbert's than not. He gingerly dared to say something nice about Trump back in 2018, got pilloried, and had to walk it back. Anyway, I'm a bad Lynchian. When he's good, he's good, but I never got all the way into Twin Peaks (probably my fault), and I turned off Inland Empire after an hour (definitely his fault).

[noobsomeexagerjunk]

day 7 update/reactions of my first run, semi-blind, of disco elysium. end of run.

my god. what a game. something happened to me through it all and i haven't figured it out. i am happy and can't wait to see what others discovered when they played this. i hope the twitch streamers i watch decide to play this game, even if its better enjoyed blind

details on the previous days here, apologies for mispellings, i'll get the hang of it

under the cut:

- by this point in the story my Harry can't afford getting too distracted

- Kim's room is very organized

- for narrative purposes I up my Volition, Shivers, and Espirit de Corps simultaneously. Hearing Revachol itself is a wonder.

- BLOOD ON THE GROUND! good on you Cindy. I doubt I'll light it on fire though

- after much deducing we go to Fishing Village again, with our dear Lilienne lending us her boat. her kids are sweet as always!

- that skillset perking up apparently let me know that the officers watching Harry's ass for the past few days plan to meet him

- "point of no return" what the fuck do you mean, Inland Empire

- pull up the boombox, we're boating!!!

- abandoned island creeps, open doors, and the SNIPER'S NEST. oh fuck the Sniper lives here. can't sleep in that bed yet!!!

- OH SHIT OH SHIT the culprit: M. Dros, a communist deserter from the old revolution. With can opener tactics, we fish out information that makes a confession.

- I can't believe it. Kim and Harry arguing over who gets to bring the Deserter over. To me this is the most logical conclusion after saving each other during a standoff.

- BRO THE PHASMID???? IT'S REAL! is it meant to show up just as we get the confession?????? Dros is in a fetal position and can't see it

- Kim can see it! Yes! No pics yet bestie, I need to talk to it. I get to talk to it. Why are you in awe of me you strange creature? I'm flattered you think such divinity can rest in my brain

- Okay Kim take the picture now. It's such a pretty scene and wonderfully drawn by the game!!! Goodbye insulindian phasmid!

- The Deserter being reduced into a dummy state solves our travel issue. We walk back. Kim, I think I'll take that nap now.

- what the fuck what the fuck what the fuck

- oh no. God-Wife. This is why we forget at all.

- "suggestion (92%): kiss her." i need to try but i hope this fails—"CHECK SUCCESS." fuck. and she didn't even kiss back!

- she's right Harry, your deification of your ex isn't a good idea

- must you call me poor? fuck wait, that's Harry's self-loathing. I've been playing as Sorry Copotype, this makes sense. Like, I get that we, the player, have been playing with the voices in Harry's head all game but I maxed Inland Empire so literally anything can talk at this point. The city fucking talks, why shouldn't this?

- it's tiring to make Harry like this. We need to let go, my blorbo, we've come this far.

- in retrospect, was that. was that foreshadowing. what the phasmid told me?

- Hi Kim. Let's head back to the Fishing Village. Oh shit the other cops are here too

- TRANT??? you've been helping my precinct and refused to say shit about knowing me???

- i know Jean, I'm a sorry sack of shit

- Kim 😭😭😭 you say such nice things

- "he's a [communist]" bro I was making Harry kiss everyone's ass regardless of politics! is this the game acknowledging that i didn't Forget the associated Thought or did it pick up on my dialogue choices ending up being predominantly communist? i mean, i was building up to sympathy towards that by the end but like. sympathy. idk all Harry and I care about is that Kim spoke well of me

- enjoy that picture you bastards

- Join me at 41, Lt. Kitsunagi!!! You bore with an awful man at his most awful time and you both came out better for it! WAAAAHHHHH

- We're still in, baby! The sun sets on a new chapter for everyone in Revachol, in Martinaise.

[books-of-the-great-leviathan]

Chapter 25- Enzo

***

By sunrise, he found the place they'd burned Renard Irio's body.

It was no fit place for a Lapidaean burial. This was no grand cliffside overlooking the sea, no whitebrick dais and statue of the Triune weeping ashes, but rather a rocky spit of stones and sand. Inland, its crumbling flanks licked by the tide, a ruined tower clung to the shore: a single spire of crumbling rock and empty windows.

Some old watchtower, Enzo imagined, long-since abandoned as the oncoming sea and the inevitable collapse of the isle that bore it pulled it year by year into the waves. Whether it had been built by a Belmont king-by his father, his grandfather, perhaps- or whether it was far older, a relic of the Sundered Empire, Enzo couldn't tell. The spit bore little else to mark it save the orange flare of sunlight off the rocks, the mewling seabirds, and the blackened remains of the Sparrow's pyre.

Enzo moved in from the shoreline, boots crunching on the scree. He commanded his ghost soldiers to stay back, near the skiff; behind him, down the long, tense strings of his tethers, he felt the mass of energy and slithering pulse of the soldiers aboard the dreadnought. Its engines were low, their thrum banked, but it was impossible to escape, even here on this lonely spit. It vibrated through him, a second heartbeat more powerful than his own.

Pavaloir was far behind. He'd left it, smoking and silent, the survivors watching his departure from the ash. Let the seabirds squabble over it. He was done with the place.

He'd spilled the blood that needed spilling.

To what end, Acier? Isabella's last look to him lingered, haunted, haggard, her mouth open in a scream as she cried out for Irio, even as Enzo's command drove the knife into his side.

Adele's, too, though for a different reason. He'd seen an answer in her eyes, or thought he did. Maybe he was wrong.

Don't play foolish, Acier. You always saw too much for your own good.

He shuddered, the memory slicing through him, and the wind spun a cold breeze off the water. He held up his hands, his breath hissing between his teeth, his vision pounding white, and for a moment blood slicked them, fresh and raw.

He clenched his hands. Ghosts shifted, rustling in their rotting bodies. Silver flickered in the dark behind his eyes.

I control you.

The whispers filled him, as they always did.

I control you.

They quieted, but were, as ever, far from silent.

The pyre was little more than a cairn of stones, heaped to bear a body. Only ashes remained, and shards barely recognizable as burned bone. Enzo bent to pluck one up; he brushed his thumb over it, ash sifting away in the wind.

He stood at the pyre side for a long time, the sun rising around him, ghost tethers thrumming around him, a web of silver chains tight on his heart.

Ghosts were cast from their bodies at the taste of fire, but they could linger. Enzo's mother had, poor dead Alezia, whispering her secrets to him long after her death. What did Enzo have to say to Irio? That he was sorry? That he didn't have to die? The word of the Triune spoke of all lives as having a beginning, and an end, too, written out for them. A pathway, and an end to that pathway. A relief, Enzo thought, of a kind.

But it was cruel, too. The Triune had written out Irio's end, that it would come at Enzo's hand. In that way, they were complicit. But Enzo knew it was all wrong. He had no hand to blame for killing Ren other than his own.

Is it worth the cost, Enzo? Isabella might have said, once, her gray eyes dark, her hands cool on his. Is anything?

He settled to his knees in the sand. His eyes ached as he pressed them shut, brow furrowed, head bent.

Light unfurled from Enzo's skin. Ghostlight. He saw it through his closed eyes; he saw it in the veins of his eyelids. He reached out with his mind and found what he was looking for. The ghost was a clinging, frightened thing, like they all were after their life had left them and all they had was dead meat or charred bones. The silver light brightened, spinning, coalescing into the vague forms of limbs and clutching fingers, the echoes of distant cries.

It was no effort to take hold, to chain, to pull.

Enzo shuddered as the ghost skimmed over his senses. Memories blossomed and flashed behind his eyes, thick and fast and dense enough to drown in.

An island, far and to the south. The shimmer of mist rising from dark jungles.

Running down the broad pale arc of white sand beaches, the sea so blue it burned.

Bare callused feet gripping a tightrope, a shadow like a twin thrown down across the sand far below. Fortune cards fanned over a cloth embroidered with staring silver eyes.

Raucous music, the stench of saltpeter, fireworks like strange deep-sea creatures fizzling out across an ocean of stars.

A strange city all of sky-colored stone, gulls tilting around the tall narrow spires of towers flying serpent flags. A woman bleeding out in an alley, mud and blood and small hands clutching her as if pleading for her not to go, salt from tears crusting her blue lips.

Fear, then, and blinding pain. A knife in his side, twisting deeper. Cold, though not colder than his hands as Isabella gripped them, all feeling lost save the foolish desire to hang on, for her, for the nation he knew she could make good again, bright and beautiful and free of pain.

But the pain was everywhere. It was all around him, inside him, and so was the cold. It was too strong, stronger than him, stronger than anything.

His last thoughts were of the tide, and of his name, his real name, the one no one remembered but himself.

A name, kept and treasured.

A name, whispered for the last time.

"You were so loyal, Ren," Enzo murmured. "With all you knew, how did you keep holding onto that faith for so many years?"

There was no answer. Ghost soldiers couldn't speak, and neither could ghosts, not really. He felt them, felt their memories, experienced scraps of their strongest recollections like he was reliving them along with the dead. It was how he'd realized the truth behind his mother's death. He'd felt it along with her, over and over, until he understood.

That hadn't been the first time he'd relived a death with a ghost. A fisherman from his village had vanished during a storm, and weeks later his body had washed up, white and bloated, on the beach. His ghost had still ridden it; some ghosts did, refusing to let go until their bodies were no more than bones.

Enzo had fallen to his knees by the dead man, shouts clamoring after him, and felt the choking force of the wave that had swept him off his boat pound into his skull, again, again, until he couldn't tell if he was a boy kneeling on a beach or whether he was the fisherman drowning, the light crushed by the weight of the water, the salt burning his throat.

He'd released that ghost and felt the memories dissipate, like a sandcastle washed away by a gentle tide. The last sensation he'd gleaned was one of relief. No more pain, no more fear. He'd helped the dead fisherman, he knew that, and was proud of it.

Once, that simple pride had been enough.

Silver light glowed through Enzo's closed eyelids, illuminating their veins. He felt the new tension of his tether to Renard Irio's ghost, the control vibrating between them. He had only to think a command, and the ghost would do it.

"Where is Isabella?" Enzo said. "Where were you and Lapin planning on taking her?"

He commanded an answer, a ripple of force down the ghost's tether. Irio's ghost shuddered, as if in resistance, but it was a cobweb in a thunderstorm. Answer flooded back: a dinghy on a night sea, stars reflected across the waves. A ship, sails taut with wind. The Mistfox, Captain Azare's schooner, coursing away across Bellana's Arm. Land on the horizon, the scent of cedar and humid heat, a pale stone city, birdsong in the gardens.

"Valeris," Enzo murmured. "You were taking her back to Lapide."

Of course. It wasn't like Isabella to run and hide. And to what end? To launch an attack? Besiege Pavaloir? She would do it. She'd seen it in her eyes as much as he knew the same look in his own. She would win this war; she'd see Lapide stand above all else, even if it cost her everything she and the Belmont prince had dreamed of. Peace. More than that- balance. To live as allies. To forget the past. To forget.

There was no forgetting, not for long. Sofia Valere had tried, and he was living proof of her failure. Isabella wouldn't follow in her mother's footsteps. Enzo braced to command the ghost, but something was coming. More flickers, more memories. Whispers deep in the wending halls, breathed into being by their connection.

Far from home, Irio whispered. His eyes widened, blue light dancing in their depths. Stars on the sea. A falling bird. Ending-

Enzo broke the tether.

He felt the ghost flutter past him, brushing his cheek, light as wind, and then it was gone. Ren was gone, faded into the unknown. Enzo opened his eyes. The pyre was a pyre, the ashes crumbling in the wind. Already, the salt breeze had begun to clear it away. Soon it would be gone altogether.

He stood and tossed the shard of bone back onto the cairn of scorched rocks. As he did, a ripple passed through his tethers, a chord of alarm from his ghosts.

They'd sighted something.

Enzo looked up, eyes narrowed against the brilliant orange glow of the rising sun. It splintered across Bellana's Arm, turning the waves to flame. It was cut out sharp against them: a single triangular sail.

A small boat, coming toward him at speed.

Steady, he commanded his soldiers. He stepped forward, still squinting against the light, trying to get a look at the sailor. It wasn't until it cut closer, yawing a little against the waves, he saw who was at the helm.

"Triune," he whispered.

He started forward in mingled wonder and disbelief, then all at once broke into a run, charging headlong into the surf. It broke and hissed around his legs, soaking his fur-lined crimson overcoat, Daval's stolen regalia. He didn't care. He waded through the waves, reaching for the boat's bow to help haul it in, not letting go until its keel scraped rocks.

He breathed hard, throat stinging with salt, staring up at Adele as she stared in turn down at him. She was wrapped in a fishwife's shawl, coarse and woolen, her blue eyes bright under its fringe. Her face was windburnt, her hair falling from its braid. She clutched Marin to her side, the little boy as travel-worn as his mother, clinging to her hands like he might never let go.

"You...you came from Lapide?" Enzo panted.

She nodded, tense, pale. Something was wrong. She trembled as if struck with plague. "Adele-" Enzo began, but Marin cut over him, his voice a seabird gabble.

"My mother," he stammered. "Help my mama, please-"

"It's all right. It's all right-" Enzo began forward, reaching out, his own hands shaking. Adele's eyes fluttered; her brow creased, and all at once she crumpled. Enzo caught her before she struck the gunwale. Marin let out a cry of terror as Enzo pulled Adele into his arms, cradling her, stroking her black hair from her face, from her lips. His heart hammered; she was breathing, her eyes glassy slits under her lashes, but she was so pale, shaking, lips cracked and flecked with salt.

Enzo looked up at Marin, the boy standing there, wailing like an infant, snot slick down his upper lip.

"It's all right," Enzo repeated. He stroked Adele's hair, again and again. "What happened?"

"We...we sailed all night...all day..."

Sunstroke, then, or maybe pure exhaustion. Adele had ever been prone to sickness, to turns. Enzo lifted his eyes to the horizon. Had they come all the way from Lapide, all the way across Bellana's arm? Triune. Why? Why?

That didn't matter now. Enzo looked again to Marin. "Come with me. We have to get her out of the sunlight. It'll grow far hotter than this, and soon. And she needs water."

The boy's howls had fallen to sniffles. He stared at Enzo as if not daring to look down at his mother.

"You can help me," Enzo said, and smiled, as much as he could muster. "Help her. You look like you're good at helping her."

The boy didn't resist, didn't argue, but followed numbly as Enzo heaved Adele into his arms and strode away, across the spit. She was light as a cloud gull in his arms, one slim hand hanging from her shawl. Enzo clasped it, felt the cool press of her rings against his skin, then tucked it, gently, over her heart.

The dreadnought's engines thrummed through the scree. He glanced toward the vast shadowed mass of the vessel, then toward Marin, silent at his side.

"I don't want to go there," Marin whispered, not looking at him.

"We're not." Enzo nodded toward the watchtower. "We're going there. You have water?"

"A little..."

"Fetch it. Bring it." He was already moving toward its empty doorway, listing as the tower made its inexorable slide into the sea.

"Is...is she going to die?" Marin's voice was small, barely audible above the wind.

Enzo stopped in the tower's shadow and turned back. Marin stood with shoulders hunched and eyes huge, reflecting the sunrise, bright with tears.

"Not if I can help it," Enzo told him. "You've been so brave. Now you have to be again, just a little longer."

***

Moths skittered in the shadows of the ruined tower, its lower chambers full of the hiss and boom of oncoming waves, home to colonies of barnacles and glowing night-fish, spined and goggle-eyed, hiding in the deeper pools from the day. Enzo headed upward, clambering over fallen blocks of stone and the broken arms of a statue, so worn by tide and time it was no longer recognizable. Some presiding general, perhaps. A warlord from Estara's distant past. Little matter. He made for a good enough step.

The central stairway of the tower wound upward, a whorl like the inner structure of some vast seashell, spilling Enzo and Adele out into the upper chambers of the place. Arched windows stared out across the sea, low sills nearly a meter thick and spattered white from generations of seabirds; they mewled and tilted outside, hanging on the wind as if on strings. An ancient salt-faded banner flapped from rusted moorings, still bearing the remnants of the Estaran fellfox. The rest of the furniture was rotted away, but Enzo had Daval's regalia, lined with dense, soft fur. He arranged it on the flagstones as Marin pelted up the stairs, a canteen jouncing at his side.

"Good." Enzo knelt, letting Adele down on the mantle, smoothing her hair, once again, from her face. She still breathed, lashes fluttering, fingers twitching. "Take this." Enzo gave the boy a rag. "Dip it in the water. Feed it to her. Slowly. Yes, like that. Slower. Slower. Careful."

His voice had dropped to a whisper as he watched Marin do as he asked. Without question, without fear; or, if he was afraid, he'd hidden it well. His lip was still shiny with snot but his hands were steady, his little brow furrowed as he soaked a corner of the rag in the water, as he set it to his mother's cracked lips.

Triune, he was small. Shoulderblades like bird-bones. Were all children so small? Had he been that way, once, hunting for shells along the shoreline, submitting to his foster mother's comb as she tried in vain to untangle his salt-stiff curls?

But this wasn't himself as a boy, wasn't the child who dreamed of his dying mother, who dreamed of Falcii blades and hawk queens hunting. This was Marin, fatherless at Enzo's own hand, and he was frightened, even if he didn't show it.

He had to be. He was six years old.

"Marin," Enzo said, quietly.

The boy's eyes flicked to him.

"I'll do that." He held out a hand. "You go and rest. You've come such a long way."

"I don't want to go to sleep."

"You don't need to. Just rest." He nodded down at Adele. "Hold her hand, if you like."

Marin blinked, but did as he asked once again, handing over the water and rag, taking Adele's hand between his small own. He wore roughspun, like Adele; no Lapidaean finery for them. Enzo watched him as he fed Adele, as he felt her pulse, her too-hot forehead, as her heartbeat slowed, her breathing even, her skin cooling in the morning breeze. Gull-cry, reaching sunlight, golden as honey on the dark stone of the watchtower floor.

"She'll be all right," Enzo said at last.

Marin nodded. He didn't look up from his mother.

"Are you afraid of me?"

A flicker of blue eyes. Marin's brow furrowed deeper.

"Who are you?" the boy asked him, at last. "Mama says you...you can help us, but...but in the garden, you said..."

He trailed away. Enzo let out his breath and set down the water, then settled back, resting a forearm on his knee. Joints creaked and ached, sinews pulled tight like they already belonged to a dead thing. His ghost, bruising his bones. They said that in Lapide, as if a restless spirit could harm the flesh. Maybe they were right. He only knew the dead well, after all.

He lifted a hand, letting silver ghostlight spool and flicker under his skin. It shone, reflected, in Marin's eyes. "I killed your father."

"I know."

"Burned your city."

Marin nodded. "I saw."

Enzo lowered his hand, light fading. "Your father was my brother," he said, simply. "Like how Alois is your brother. And I betrayed him. To end the war."

"My father said Alois was weak."

"That he did."

"Was my father weak? Was that why he had to die?"

Enzo was silent for a moment. Then he shook his head. "No. No, I think he could have done anything he wanted, taken anything, given his way. Anything at all. The salt from the sea, the moons from the sky."

Marin's face squinched up. "You can't take the moons from the sky. They live up there so the cloud gulls can fly up and make nests on them. That's what my nurse says. No one can take the moons from the sky."

His tone was one of pure, unassailable authority, and Enzo couldn't help but grin. "Forgive me, Highness. Of course not. Now that would be ridiculous."

"Are you really my uncle?"

"I'm afraid so." Enzo clasped his hands and leaned forward. "Tell me, Marin. Salt from the sea, moons from the sky. Anything at all. What would you want?"

Marin blinked. He fidgeted a little with the fringe of Adele's shawl. "Anything?"

"Anything."

He lifted a shoulder and mumbled.

"What was that?"

"Wanna be a fisherman," Marin said, a little louder.

"A fisherman? Seriously?"

"Yes."

"Well." Enzo gave his head an impressed shake. "Can't say I expected that, but I can't fault you, either. You have lofty ambitions, my boy. To range the deepwater, to battle sea-orks and ice tortoises and the Deepmother herself for the choicest herring...not everyone can do that."

He glanced at Marin. The boy was almost smiling.

"And your mother?" Enzo asked, softer. "What does she want?"

Marin met his eyes.

"To see you," he said.

Enzo said nothing. He nodded, a little, then, slowly, slowly, he reached out. Across Adele, through the strengthening sunlight. He paused, and, just as slowly, he settled his hand on Marin's stiff, sun-warmed curls.

"Good lad," Enzo said, a rasp to his voice. He couldn't say more.

Tired lad, too. Despite his assertion to the contrary it wasn't long before he'd curled up alongside his mother, his face buried in the thick ruff of fur at the mantle's collar. Enzo dozed, too, lulled by the cries of the gulls, the crash of the waves echoing up through the empty tower. Amplified, tenfold, but distant, strange, washing through him in his half-asleep state, depths flickering with blue light.

When he woke, so had Adele.

She sat upright on the makeshift sickbed, holding her knees. Her hair fell in ragged tangles around her face. She was watching him. He couldn't tell for how long. The sunlight slanted through the window, dense and golden, sizzling on the flagstones.

"Adele." He pushed away from the wall, coming to her side.

"You looked peaceful, like that. Asleep."

"Even abominations have to sleep sometime."

"You're not-" Adele began, then stuttered, a little, and quieted. "Once," she went on, more slowly, "not so long ago, I wondered if I might catch you sleeping so I could cut your throat. My ladies and I discussed it. But I don't think I could have done it, even if I'd had the chance. I get squeamish even seeing brushfowl slaughtered."

"Well, despite what you might have heard, witchborn blood is just as red as brushfowl's." He knelt. "Are you all right?"

"I think so." She lifted a hand to her forehead, then touched her mouth. "You...took us here? From the boat?"

"Yes."

"Thank you."

Enzo nodded. "And you came from Lapide? Back across the Arm?"

"We did."

"Isabella Valere let you go?"

"No," Adele said. Her voice was soft, weary. "I fled, in the night-"

"Triune." He arched his brows, impressed again. "How'd you manage that?"

A faint smile touched her mouth. "My hairpins were worth a servant's wages for a year. I bribed  the maid and a scullery-boy to play at being us." She squeezed Marin's shoulder, the boy still fast asleep. "I made it through the blockade-"

"The blockade."

"Valere's navy. She means to stop you before you can so much as cross the sea border. I sailed until I saw the smoke from Daval's dreadnought." She tilted her head, regarding him from under her lashes. "You leave quite the trail. Enzo."

"And that was quite the risk."

"I know. But there's nothing for me in Lapide, just as there's nothing for me in Pavaloir. I see that now." Her hand tightened around her son's shoulder. "There's nothing for either of us."

Enzo nodded. He reached for the scrimshaw charm at his throat and ran his thumb over the broken edge, worn from years upon years of handling. Worn down, but still broken. It always would be. Even if he got Isabella's half from her, the edges would never fit back together again.

Enzo remembered Isabella crouched on the ramparts, mad with grief, his magic flowing through her. She would have killed herself to kill him, he knew that. She would have impaled herself on his soldier's blades to get to him, would have torn herself apart to end him.

She wouldn't stop. She'd gather her navy, press an attack, turn the waters of Bellana's Arm red. She'd burn whoever sat on the obsidian throne, whether that was Marin or not. She'd see him destroyed if that was what it took.

And for what, Bell?

The question echoed through him, like the whispers of his ghosts.

And for what?

A ruin? The dead? Adele's eyes were on his, their color as vivid as the sunlit sea. She was alive. She remained.

So does Valeris, Enzo thought, and suppressed a shudder.

It's not too late.

Those were Isabella's desperate words, whispered through the bars of a prison cell. Another whisper that would not fade, that would never be silent.

"If you come with me, stay with me, it won't be safe for you," Enzo told Adele. "You know that. You know I have to do what I promised, all those years ago. I can't stop now. I wish I could. For...for you, for another way of living, but I can't. I can't."

"Can you protect him? Will you take us somewhere safe?"

Enzo lifted his head. She held his gaze, her eyes bright, but steady. He looked to Marin. A boy born to be king, a child born to become a conqueror, like Daval, like Etain Belmont, like those to come before and before. Another child given far too much to carry; another child born with a wound in his heart, cut there by those who sought to raise him to their holy light.

Bellana was truly all too cruel.

A boy, kneeling in the dark.

A boy wreathed by ghosts.

Had he ever had another choice? Had either of them? He had been that boy, scared in the dark, and then he was the monster that had put him there. And now his fear was Marin's, another wound cut into him by the dead.

"Can you?" Adele repeated. "Will you?"

"I can," Enzo said. "I will. I know just the place."

Adele nodded, running a palm over Marin's head. She licked her lips, and glanced past Enzo, toward the spill of light over the horizon, toward Bellana's Arm, and Lapide beyond.

She stirred. Enzo climbed to his feet with her as she stood. Slowly, gingerly, no land-legs; he held her hands, taking her weight, but she was stronger than before, and after a moment could walk on her own. She kept her hand clasped around his, her fingers laced with his.

"Sun's not so cruel yet, and I grew so fond of its warmth, when I was ill," she murmured. "Help me downstairs?"

Enzo nodded. "Always."

Together, slow, careful, they made it down the stairs, Enzo gripping her hand, then her shoulder, taking her one step at a time. The surf rushed, hissed, rising through the flanks and riven stones of the tower, finding its way in; it soaked Adele's hem as she stepped through the rush of seawater and onto sand, onto the tide of sunlight. The heat shimmered on the stones, but she was right. The day hadn't come in earnest yet.

"Here." She guided them both down to her skiff, still moored along the shore, and sat on the gunwale. Enzo sat alongside her. She hadn't let go of his hand.

"I was so ill for so long," she said, and laughed. "My mother thought I was gnawed on by salt-spirits, and made me stay indoors."

"And did that banish the spirits?"

"No. It's what made me love Daval, at first," Adele said.

Enzo lifted his eyebrows.

"Truly, I did," Adele insisted. "I was a child used to weaving in the dark, and he gave me gardens. Sunlight. Freedom, so I thought. As long as I gave him what he wanted most."

"Another son."

She nodded. "And I did. One, and never any more. He wanted more. A whole passel of Belmont children, to fill the Tower with little soldiers, to thwart the plague-pocked families who had to bury so many of their own. The families he'd grown up amidst."

Adele lifted a shoulder, a gnaw of learned shame passing over her face. "But no more children came. He said to me, once, late at night...he thought he might be cursed. All the misfortune on him, on Estara. Like he was Estara. I could have kept loving him but he didn't know himself, didn't see himself. He made his own curse. He was his own curse."

She looked up at Enzo. Her eyes were the same color as the sea, the same sunstruck blue, so vivid it didn't look real.

"I know what it is you're planning," she said quietly. "I know what it is you think you have to do."

"Do you?" Enzo said quietly.

Her brow furrowed, but she didn't look away, didn't let him go. She reached up to him, to his face. She caught a strand of his hair between her fingers.

"Cursed man," she murmured. "I know you too well."

Enzo heard her breath catch. She lifted her face, lifted it to his, kissed him. Softly, so softly, a brush of her mouth, her fingertips light on his cheek. She was crying- he tasted the salt. Her grip on his hand was so strong it hurt. A lash of her hair touched his cheek, and it stung, and he lifted his hand to her face, and the kiss hardened, desperate, edged in bitterness.

He caught the front of her shawl and pulled her toward him. His hand slid down the curve of her body, of her breast, her hip.

"Wait," she whispered, between kisses. "Wait-" She rucked up her skirt and he found the smooth heat of her leg, the softness of her inner thigh. Adele's hands lifted to the ties at his shirt, to his belt.

To him. Melting against him, drawing him in, and to her, and down.

The gulls called and circled, blinding scraps of white against the sky.

In the shadow of the boat, they were hidden from the worst of the heat. The sun climbed- a burning circle, reaching for the center point of the sky.

Bellana's light, Enzo thought, muzzy with exhaustion, somewhere amidst the rest. But they were in the shadows, and the light never reached them, never touched Adele's bare, warm skin, his own scarred body, the ghosts, for the moment, silent.

She lay alongside him, her body drawn against him; her hair tickled his chest as she breathed, in and out, slow and steady, the rhythm lulling him into calm. He couldn't look away from her, couldn't pull his eyes from her face, the faint glister of her skin in the shadows, the dusting of sand on her shoulder, her hip, the small of her back. Her lips were bruised. Her leg was thrown over his, her knee hooking around his, trapping him close.

Enzo's hand had settled on her waist, his thumb stroking down her ribcage. He thought she was asleep again, her eyelids blue, iridescent in the shadows, but as he watched her they opened, and settled on him.

"Adele," Enzo murmured.

He thought she almost smiled. Marin so took after her. She leaned in and kissed him again- slow, sweet- then pulled back, levering herself upright. She gathered her clothes, tossed over the gunwale, but didn't dress, not yet. She pulled her shawl around herself and rose to her feet. Enzo watched her walk to the shore and step ankle-deep into the surf. It reached and curled around her bare feet.

After a moment he pulled on trousers and joined her, facing the horizon with her.

"Come with us," she said.

"Adele," Enzo said again, more quietly. "Please..."

"You don't have to keep fighting."

Not enough, he wanted to tell her, even as he drew his arm around her shoulders, even as she leaned against him. Never enough. He had his own promises to remember, his own promises to keep. Resolve settled in him, that which had brought him here, had made him, had driven him for so many long years.

Heavy, hateful. A comfort like sleep to the drowning, and yet he would have nothing else. Not even her.

Abomination, the Witchhunter had choked in his face, even as he stood over her to deliver the fatal blow. She was right. He was a monster. But there would be so many more monsters after him if he did not see this done.

"I'm sorry," he said to her, his voice soft, nearly stolen by the wind.

Adele turned and studied him. He saw the understanding in her eyes, and the grief, soft and sharp. She was right. She knew him. She knew he couldn't stop. But he could help her, and maybe, when all was done, that was enough.

He lifted her hand and kissed her palm, clasping her fingers tight in his own, his pulse in them both. It was time to fulfill his promise.

It was time to sail on Lapide, and when he did, burn it down.

Like the rest.

"Cursed man," Adele told him, turning to him, folding herself into his arms. "I could have loved you."

[cloudmonarch43]

[ID: Ten rectangular panels of messy pen drawings, titled “February 1, 2023.” In the first, 9:00am shows Ruby waking up in a bunk bed, lifting a curtain away from a window, and showering behind a leaf-print curtain. A thought bubble contains lyrics from “Losing Track” by The Mechanisms: “Mile after mile cutting swathes through the sky as the void sings...” There is also a bottle of moisturizer. There is a bowl of oatmeal with its ingredients drawn and labeled below it: water, oats, walnuts, raisins, salt, and hot sauce. Second is a full-body drawing of Ruby, labeled "inside," with items of clothing identified in the style of Disco Elysium. “Red Vest” gives +1 Inland Empire (the right color) and -1 Volition (the wrong cut). “Black Button-up” gives +1 Suggestion (vampire vibes). “Cat Slippers” give +1 Perception (in touch with the ground...). “Black Jeans” give +1 Composure (they were right about this one). The next panel is labeled "10... 11... 12..." and shows a laptop open to Gmail, a four-guess Wordle score, and a phone shuffling "Liked Songs." Text says, "work at emails dot com," "I think I'm used to this uncalled for update now..." and "(also trying to decide on clothing stats...)" 1:00pm shows a small frying pan full of vague scribbles, labeled "Lunch: This is a broccoli cheese pie construction in red pasta sauce. It's good." YouTube is open to a Kaz Rowe video, number 48 out of 49 in the Watch Later playlist. There is also a surprised face peering in through a spiral, labeled "Drawing myself drawing this." The next two hours, 2 and 3, are linked, showing a sidewalk and some wispy clouds, labeled "46 degrees Fahrenheit: wandering under the wintery clouds." Smaller doodles represent dropping off a ballot, investigating a grocery store, and eating an orange and trail mix. Then the aforementioned cat slippers are kicked up behind a phone screen reading "chill out," a task captioned "watch TikToks with no sound." Next is another clothing display, this one labeled "outside," as various items of outerwear have been added to the previous outfit. "Green Hat" gives +1 Hand/Eye Coordination (better than a hood) and -2 Shivers (quiet warm bubble). "Sunglasses" gives +1 Drama (traces of Crowley cosplay). "Corduroy Jacket" gives +1 Encyclopedia (college kid in a used books store). "Gloves" gives +1 Interfacing (touch screen sensitive). "Waterproof Boots" gives +1 Physical Instrument (take on the world). 4:00pm starts with another "drawing myself drawing this" portal, this one with a winking face. There is an upper body workout and stretch session represented by very sparse doodles. There is a sketch of the cover of the podcast "Secret Feminist Agenda," a round badge with the title worn on a plaid shirt. The next two hours, 5 and 6, are combined, showing a laptop open to an Audacity project with the waveform and spectrogram both displayed and a headphone cord plugged in. This is labeled "editing Disco Elysium podfic." Next to the computer is a fancy mug labeled "spicy hot chocolate." The next panel includes both 7:00 and 8:00pm. On the left is a sheet pan of crescent-shaped pieces of squash, another indistinct frying pan labeled "curry warmed back up," the Duolingo owl, and a phone screen labeled "warm up." On the right is a messy depiction of a Reason project labeled "making music," the cube-shaped Reason logo labeled "learning Reason," and a microphone labeled "recording temporary singing." Finally, 9:00pm is a simple bullet list: "Finishing up the drawings. Up next: make the posts, drink tea, edit more podfic, get ready for bed. And then sleep :)" Ruby is shown laying down, eyes closed and smiling. End ID.]

Making up clothing stats is sooo much fun hehehe

[volumina-vetustiora]

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - "What's wrong with him, huh?"

ULFRIC STORMCLOAK - He gestures towards the man opposite. He has a gag over his mouth.

INLAND EMPIRE [Trivial: Success] - There's something different about him...

RALOF (BLOND BRAID GUY) - "Watch your tongue! You’re speaking to Ulfric Stormcloak, the *true* High King."

LOGIC [Easy: Success] - Likelihood is the Stormcloaks are named after the guy, rather than the other way around.

CONCEPTUALIZATION [Trivial: Success] - He doesn't *look* very kingly.

COMPOSURE [Medium: Success] - But he's got it together. Eyes unyielding, not giving the gag the satisfaction of trying to talk through it.

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - "Ulfric, the Jarl of Windhelm?" His expression hardens. "You’re the leader of the rebellion."

LOGIC [Medium: Success] - But if they've captured him...

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - "But if they've captured you… Oh gods!"

HALF LIGHT [Easy: Success] - OH SHIT.

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - "Where are they taking us?"

RALOF (BLOND BRAID GUY) - "I don’t know where we’re going." He pauses. "But Sovngarde awaits."

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - "No, this can’t be happening. This *isn’t* happening!"

VOLITION [Trivial: Success] - The first step to getting out of this alive is not to panic, like he is.

RALOF (BLOND BRAID GUY) - "Hey, what village are you from, horse thief?"

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - "Why do you care?"

EMPATHY [Easy: Success] - Because this is all we have.

RALOF (BLONDE BRAID GUY) - "A Nord’s last thoughts should be of home."

ENCYCLOPEDIA [Legendary: Failure] - Where *is* home?

INLAND EMPIRE [Medium: Failure] - *What* is home?

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - There is nothing. Only warm, primordial blackness. You don't have to do anything anymore.

LIMBIC SYSTEM - But what's this? An awareness creeps up on you. A jumping, juddering sensation forces your head up and your eyes open.

LOGIC [Easy: Success] - You are moving. On a cart of some kind.

INTERFACING [Trivial: Success] - Your hands are bound. This is a *problem*. With your magic digits out of action, you're helpless!

RALOF (BLOND BRAID GUY) - There is a blond man with a braid in his hair sitting across from you. He tries to get your attention: “Hey you! You're finally awake.”

CONCEPTUALIZATION [Medium: Success] - He has piercing blue eyes. Oceanic.

RALOF (BLOND BRAID GUY) - “You were trying to cross the border, right? Walked right into that Imperial ambush. Same as us, and that thief over there.”

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - He gestures towards the meek looking man next to him.

ENCYCLOPEDIA [Challenging: Success] - Imperial. Of the Empire. What Empire? *The* Empire. The great Empire of Men, centred at the Imperial City, in the Imperial Province of Cyrodiil. These guys used to rule the world.

AUTHORITY [Challenging: Failure] - Clearly they still do.

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - “Damn you Stormcloaks! Skyrim was fine until you came along!”

EMPATHY [Easy: Success] - His sudden anger is a thin disguise for terrible, terrible fear.

LOKIR, THE HORSE THIEF - “Empire was nice and lazy. If they hadn’t been looking for you, I could’ve stolen that horse and been half way to Hammerfell.” He turns to you. “You there. You and me—we shouldn't be here. It’s these Stormcloaks the Empire wants.”

ENCYCLOPEDIA [Formidable: Failure] - Stormcloaks?

CONCEPTUALIZATION [Easy: Success] - Cool name.

RALOF (BLOND BRAID GUY) - “We’re all brothers and sisters in binds now, thief.”

RHETORIC [Medium: Success] - Brothers and sisters? Like he wouldn't trample over the lot of you for a chance to get out of here.

IMPERIAL SOLDIER - The cart driver speaks up: “Shut up back there!”

PERCEPTION (HEARING) [Easy: Success] - Silence.

PERCEPTION (SIGHT) [Medium: Success] - You watch the snowflakes dance in the air.

SHIVERS [Easy: Success] - This land is cold. Bitterly cold.

[anitosoul]

tripreport.043_uncannyvalley

November 27, 2023

I write this during the live broadcast of the 43rd iteration of my mix series tripreport on November 27th, 2023. This one’s called Uncanny Valley…the main inspiration behind it is the fact that I’ve been in Portland for the past 1+ week and everyone here seems like a Sim. But deeper than that, this whole month has been generally strange. It almost feels like the month has been defined by how un-vibe-able it is. Nothing of particular interest really happened in my life besides everything being slightly off and me being in the Pacific Northwest for the first time. Before leaving for Portland, the only things that really happened were going to protests and work stuff. But everything about this month felt like a glitch, like everything was slightly off.

Part of it definitely had to do with the ongoing genocide in Gaza, and recognizing that the activism is for the long haul. I’ve still been processing what’s happening there, but now in a way that’s less immediate and emotional. But it’s definitely strange to take all of it in through social media and bear witness to the atrocities without actually experiencing them. It’s all abstracted but so real.

On a material level, I guess I’ve felt similarly. I thought Daylight Savings was canceled but they never actually passed it so I was really thrown off when it started getting dark really early again. I was feeling so tired after work every day so I started waking up early instead which has been nice. There have been random things, like having a work event on a Saturday, and being in weird liminal spaces. The media I’ve consumed this month has been equally strange, from the new Thanksgiving horror movie to The Curse to the new Hunger Games. All of it has had to do with, like, the brutality of humanity or white people acting like robots. Being in Portland only amplified that, especially since it was for Thanksgiving break. It’s the first time I haven’t had a reason to go back to Tulsa for the holidays because both of my parents moved away now and it was kind of breaking my brain coming to a completely new city for a time that I associate so strongly with familiarity. I was also with family that I am never around, including my mom’s partner and my grandaunt and uncle (who literally only speaks German). Being in a weird house and having to wake up at 6am to go work remotely at a Portland coffee shop surrounded by white people wearing Cotopaxi and doing crosswords and being suspiciously friendly while a genocide was happening on my phone was honestly difficult to compute.

I tried leaning into it and watched Inland Empire while at this house alone and it was too much for me. I got really uncomfortable. There were still good moments, of course. Seeing Nia Archives and Dazegxd at Knockdown Center was awesome. I played at this House of Elevasiya event that was so beautiful and had me feeling so connected to my kapwa, fellow filipinxs. The album Subset by Kindred came out and I had it on repeat all month. I got to see my sister and my dog and my other family. I went on a long, healing walk along the river in Portland. I watched the sunrise, a lot. I got to see Snoqualmie Falls and Twede’s Cafe (RR Diner) from Twin Peaks, and a cool Nirvana exhibit at MoPOP. So I’m grateful still. As I move into the end of the year, there’s so much for me to reflect on. But for right now, I’ll accept the liminality. 

[disco-elysium-via-polls]

"See you in the morning."

"Bye."

BED - The bed is cold and not particularly inviting, but it's yours. The sheets look awful...

TUTORIAL AGENT - The option to go to sleep becomes available every night after 21.00.

Crawl in.

No time to rest yet. (Leave.)

BED - The sheets feel at once coarse and clammy against your skin. The bed sags beneath your weight as you stretch out and finally close your eyes...

And then sleep doesn't come.

But I *want* to sleep...

Why?

BED - Obviously -- you're in bed with your eyes closed. But it's not happening.

Why?

BED - Maybe it's the bed's fault?

Check the pillow.

Check the blanket.

Roll over to the other side.

BED - Its synthetic filling has separated into hard lumps. The pillowcase smells oddly.

2. Check the blanket.

BED - It barely covers your toes, stretching over your soft belly. This is your body here, intimate and warm, breathing...

INLAND EMPIRE [Medium: Success] - Under your thrumming eyelids, you see a dizzying array of colours. You won't get off this carousel quite so easily.

3. Roll over to the other side.

BED - It's a little better... Colours, scenes, and half-formed phrases still litter your mind. Part of you is still trying to solve the case, isn't it?

Who killed him? Who?

No more thoughts. Fall asleep now...

BED - Something to do with... What was it that the lieutenant said? Union? And it's gone again, your thoughts lost between the slowing brain waves.

2. No more thoughts. Fall asleep now...

Bed - Your breathing steadies. A great silence washes over you... until your eyelids *twitch* in your sleep and images... images start forming...

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - Do you remember the scent of your childhood?

What *is* this?

I remember nothing.

I was born in a hospital where people usually go to die.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - What it says on the can, Harry. Answer the question.

3. I was born in a hospital where people usually go to die.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - You're not kidding anyone, Harry. You don't remember shit. Tell me...

Do you remember your wife's hand on your face?

TELL ME WHAT THIS IS!!! I'm not answering before you tell me who you are.

You said... who?

I left.

I was left.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - You know who I am. I am the bad day. The one where you ask her, and then later in the streets, wandering... It's the worst day of all time, Harry dear, and it's coming. She will hear about it on the phone.

Reality will turn into a grotesque nightmare. This'll be the last thing you did to her. Tell me -- do you remember the love of your life?

2. You said... who?

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - Do you remember the warmth of her thighs, between her legs and in her mouth?

3. I left.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - Oh no, funky-baby, you *stayed*. It was the rest of it that left. While you just stood there. With one hand on the bottle and the other on your dick -- watching it go.

Tell me, where are your friends? Human beings have friends, Harry-boy. Where the hell are yours?

I can get it all back.

I don't want to come back.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - They were only cramping your *descent into the abyss*. Now they're gone. Three times gone and never coming back -- all of it. You failed. You failed me.

You failed Elysium.

What is Elysium?

I've talked to you before.

I can come back from this.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - Everything. The pale and the isolas -- on the surface -- the outer magnetosphere... Burning, furious truth, eight thousand years of written history.

You really dropped the ball, Harry. Four point six billion people -- and you failed every single one of them. You really *fucked up*.

2. I've talked to you before.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - No, Harry. You were just talking to yourself. That's all you ever do. Even in your dreams. And the act is wearing thin, the spots of the disco ball fade around you...

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - You'll be back in those cold snake skins in no time, sweating up the bed...

LIMBIC SYSTEM - Stinky boy.

3. I can come back from this.

BLOATED CORPSE OF A DRUNK - You're not coming back from shit! Thrashing around in that *high-conductivity state* of yours, bumping into things and acting like a *clown*. Who are you kidding?

4. I'm trying to solve... trying to solve this case. 5. My mind is tired and broken. 6. Help me...

ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN - You're trying to what? I can't hear you, this is just a word-dream now. Jumbled up garbage. The pictures are gone, the bed rises to meet you. A thin sleep-like state. More glass than velvet, *grinding* in your head.

LIMBIC SYSTEM - So-something is *wrong*. Sleep shouldn't be this bad. This dry. This un-nourishing. There's something wrong with your thoughts. Some kind of... new type of hangover...

God... there's *another* type?

What? No!

LIMBIC SYSTEM - Oh yes, party boy. And it's *worse* than the one before! Just think of the shit you saw! Here it comes too, so soon already! A silent alarm goes off in your head, like clockwork, barely let you sleep at all... Time to get those clothes on, Harry!

Time to go to work in the shit factory!

END OF DAY ONE.

[electromelancholy]

I was so bewitched by kim's rugby thigh fantasy I--

DINGY HOT DOG CART — For as long as you can remember, this hot dog cart has graced the corner of Rue St. Gerard and Abattu Street. The awning was once a striped red and yellow: now, it is mostly covered in mud and moss. 

SHIVERS — You have been going to this cart for over twenty years of meat. You’ve only been sick twelve times. 

PAIN TOLERANCE — Not too bad, if you think about it. 

ENDURANCE — You and Kim have been up since four in the morning to get ahead of this case before it spins out of control. It’s the closest place to eat to the station, and he agreed to stop for some food before calling it a day. 

EMPATHY — His eyelids droop from behind his glasses. He’s dead on his feet. 

ENCYCLOPEDIA — You are too. To keep yourself from falling asleep you’ve been chattering on nonstop. 

REACTION SPEED — Wait. What are we talking about?

YOU — “So, she translates three-dimensional positions of amino acids into notes based on x-ray crystallography data… You can get familiar with different proteins just by getting familiar with the music of their structures… It’s so hardcore.”

ENCYCLOPEDIA — Hey, it’s better than the first randomized fact I could have talked about.

KIM KITSURAGI — He doesn’t look like he minds one way or the other about Linda Long’s molecular music or your attempts at conversation. He looks far, far away. 

PERCEPTION (SIGHT) [Medium: Success]: You turn to look behind you. Approaching is a pack of seven men: young, fit, jogging. They must be party of a rugby team; well built and tanned from the sun. 

KIM KITSURAGI — His eyes are barely open as he stands, but it’s clear to you—he’s staring. 

(Suggestion) Ask Kim to tell you a secret.

(Physical Instrument) Run with the Rugby Team. (-2, too tired even for rugby)

(Inland Empire) Stare too.

CHECK SUCCESS

INLAND EMPIRE — You watch as the men approach. Their sneakers bounce against the pavement and the rest of them follow. Their shorts move with their thighs, decorated with hair and lines of strong muscle. Their stomachs poke out a bit from their shirts, a size too small, maybe from too many rounds in the wash. A thick patch of hair there. Their arms, powerful, pumping with the synchronization of a healthy team. Chest hair grows up their neck and into their well-trimmed mutton chops, and then their long, wavy hair. 

EMPATHY — Don’t these men look… Familiar?

PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT — Been a while since you’ve had thighs like that, son. Sorry to say.

PERCEPTION (SIGHT) — You blink through the haze of your thoughts. These men don’t *actually* look like you: this one’s got short hair, that one has dark freckles, another still is six feet tall. 

INLAND EMPIRE — You blink through the haze of reality. These fantasies smell like pine and motor oil. And they all wear your face.

LOGIC — No.

SUGGESTION — It has to be.

PERCEPTION (SMELL) — This is a bona fide Kimthought.

ELECTROCHEMISTRY — Yeah, baby! Kitsuragi’s been *thinking* of *you*!

YOU – Your face goes bright red as the Harries jog past you. One’s wearing nothing but his underwear—those shorts you slept in the last time he stayed the night on the couch. 

MUCH HOTTER HARRY — He scratches the dome of his stomach as he passes, much in the same way you must have when you went to grab a drink of water in the night. 

PERCEPTION (SIGHT) — We thought he was asleep!

ELECTROCHEMISTRY — Well, it’s certainly seared into his dreams. Look at the fit on those boxers. Just tight enough for the front to gape open when you walk. 

KIM KITSURAGI — His face betrays nothing as he lets the last of the Harries jog past him and down the street. He’s too tired to turn after them. 

(Suggestion) Ask Kim to tell you a secret. (+3, Harry Parade)

CHECK FAILURE

YOU — “What’re you thinking about?” 

KIM KITSURAGI — He blinks, looking at you with a start. The tips of his ears go immediately pink. “Nothing,” he says, as cooly as he can muster it. 

YOU — The truth comes out before you can stop it. “I don’t actually look quite like that.”

KIM KITSURAGI — The pink of his ears flush dark, dark red. He opens, then closes his mouth. He turns to watch the backs of the rugby players, then back to you. “What!?”

YOU — “All your thoughts smell the same.”

KIM KITSURAGI — The Lieutenant looks as if he’s ready to be eaten by the concrete below him. “What…”

YOU — “Either way, I used to play rugby. I think. You weren’t too far off. Maybe by two decades.”

SAVOIR FAIRE [Medium: Failure] — You try to wink, but end up blinking twice.

KIM KITSURAGI — It is just gameless enough to calm him a bit. It takes him much shorter than he thinks it should to accept the reality that you can somehow smell his thoughts. 

EMPATHY — The lieutenant *truly, truly* trusts you.

ELECTROCHEMISTRY — And thinks you’re a total sex beast. Let’s return to that, right? We’re gonna get back to that?

VOLITION — Patience. For now—food, sleep, and time. 

[sleepymarmot]

I don’t know how the rest of the fascist vision quest goes, but browsing the interactions with Kim before and after Measurehead’s scene, I was surprised to see how little he cared. He doesn’t seem to take this seriously at all. 

The first scene is very short, and Kim’s dialogue is completely devoid of drama and serves to justify his absence in the following scene as well as to communicate that he is gay to the players who didn’t get the memo:

YOU - "What about the lieutenant?" (Turn to Kim.) KIM KITSURAGI - "You go ahead and have your talk," he replies, glancing over the railing. "I need a few things from Frittte anyways. We'll catch up later." ESPRIT DE CORPS - Women, racism, turning back time -- it couldn't interest him less. YOU - "But what if I don't want to do it without you..." KIM KITSURAGI - "No really," he assures you, "we're not joined by the hip. You want to talk about women with him and I want to... do pretty much anything else. Don't let me hold you back."

The second scene has more branching dialogue, and Kim exchanges pointed disinterest for deadpan humor...

YOU - "Time flies when you're in a good company -- how long was I in there?" KIM KITSURAGI - "Couple of months, a year maybe?" he replies, glancing at his wrist-watch. "What happened in there?" RHETORIC - His serious, business-like tone doesn't waiver for a second.

...open amusement...

KIM KITSURAGI - "Right..." He nods. "Did he teach you to turn back time?" RHETORIC - The sarcasm is so finely tuned it actually comes off like worry. YOU - "No, he didn't even want to share his novel techniques..." KIM KITSURAGI - "That's probably best for everyone." A smirk flashes over his face as he turns to move. "My condolences of course, but solving this case will make you feel better. I promise."

---

YOU - "It was *unbelievably* manly." KIM KITSURAGI - "Right..." He nods, covering his mouth with the back of the hand. "Did he teach you a way to turn back time?" REACTION SPEED - Trying to hide a smile. ESPRIT DE CORPS - Was it a mistake leaving him alone with that guy?

...or an ambiguous smile:

KIM KITSURAGI - "I hope you don't take offence if I don't pressure you for details. We really need to get back to work." He smiles. YOU - "I was like a blind horse when he *led* me to water and made me drink." KIM KITSURAGI - "Good good, that's very good." The smile persists as he turns to leave. "I almost feel bad that we need to focus on our investigation now. But we do. Let's go." DRAMA - His remorse is insincere. That gent's relieved to beest able to moveth on my liege.

You can even get an approval point! This branch is very telling: Kim seems to think Harry is disoriented and suggestible due to amnesia rather than actively bigoted (he reacts in a similar way if Harry fails to object to Lena’s racist remark out of ignorance):

KIM KITSURAGI - "Finally. I thought I have to come looking for you. What took you so long?" YOU - "We got into some pretty deep waters there." KIM KITSURAGI - "Really? What happened?" ESPRIT DE CORPS - Probably shouldn't have asked you this. YOU - "We became one." KIM KITSURAGI - "Wasn't that back when you became his 'race pupil'?" YOU - "I don't think I should talk to him any more." KIM KITSURAGI - "I completely agree. Your current state seems to make you very vulnerable to suggestions. And he's got a lot of them." He smiles. ReputationGrows("kim") ESPRIT DE CORPS - I hope he means it and at least some kind of an early defence system in his psyche is working.

If I didn’t miss anything, the only way to get disapproval from this conversation is to dismiss Kim as unmanly and to have met René by this point:

YOU - "Just men being men, Kim. You wouldn't understand." (Look solemnly to the horizon.) KIM KITSURAGI - "René!" he says, snapping his fingers. COMPOSURE - As if a revelation just hit him. INLAND EMPIRE - You're not going to like it. YOU - "What about René?" KIM KITSURAGI - "You are really starting to remind me of him. It's not a compliment. I don't like it." ReputationLowers("kim")

[funnywormz]

Idk which of these you've already done, but... encyclopedia, drama, visual calculus, inland empire, shivers, and reaction speed (but I use it to slip a small caterpillar into your hand)

this got kinda long so im putting it under a read-more!

ive done drama and shivers so i'll leave them out here, but i haven't done any of the others so im doing them! ^___^

encyclopedia: what's your favourite niche piece of lore?

idk if it's exactly niche bc it's pretty easy to come across it, but the little detail abt ,tzaraath", the elysium-wide pandemic of prion disease, was rlly interesting to me....... in the game it's only rlly brought up bc the economic and social consequences of it led to the revolution, but im curious abt the disease itself. iirc it was supposedly spread by potatoes, which seems like an unlikely vector for a human neurodegenerative disease?!?!?!?

i also wonder how it was dealt with/eradicated. in reality, back in the 80s/90s when bse/cjd (which is also a neurodegenerative prion disease) was more of a concern, it was mostly dealt with through testing to prevent spread from cattle to humans, and through large scale eradication of cattle. however even with modern medicine, prion diseases in general are pretty much untreatable and if you have one like cjd you're just kinda fucked lol. cattle with it can't be saved either and usually get culled. so im curious to know how tzaraath was dealt with in elysium given that it was supposedly a widespread disease that there was probably no cure for. did everyone with it just die? how have they been able to prevent it spreading again since, do they text crops for it? is it survivable, are there any survivors still around? is the disease itself still present in the population just at a lower level? idk it's just rlly interesting to me

the other little lore snippets that interest me are: 1) joyce mentioning a specialist fungal species that lives at the edge of the pale and 2) ruby knowing someone who used to work at a repeater station (possibly an ex-lover of hers, even?).......... i need to know more abt both of those too...........

visual calculus: what's your overall favourite moment of the game? your favourite line?

big spoilers, but it's this:

"Insulindian Phasmid - That must be incredibly hard. The arthropods are in silent and meaningless awe of you. Know that we are watching -- when you're tired, when the vision spins out of control. The insects will be looking on. Rooting for you.

Insulindian Phasmid - And when you fall we will come to raise you up, bud from you, banner-like, blossom from you and carry you apart in a sky funeral. In honour of your passing. (But not me, because I am just a leaf eater.)

Volition - In honour of your will, lieutenant-yefreitor. That you kept from falling apart, in the face of sheer terror. Day after day. Second by second."

the whole scene with the phasmid is my favourite overall moment in the game, but holy shit this particular series of lines always makes me cry. it's so loving and tender, and the acknowledgement that life can be terrifying and horrible and sometimes it takes a lot of willpower to keep going it so oddly comforting to me. it makes me feel like im not alone in how i feel and that it's ok to find it hard and struggle, just as long as i keep going and keep trying. and it's comforting to think abt the insects waiting for us at the end of it <3

inland empire: if video game Disco Elysium was put in a hydraulic press. if it was bundled and squeezed into a small object that fit in the palm of your hand. what would that look like? what would you do with it, then?

hm......... i thought abt this for a while and i think it would be like an iridescent little die with a glass/polished stone kind of texture, and would look mostly blueish green with sparkles of orange, but would change depending on how the light hit it and what angle you were viewing it from. it would be a bit bigger than other normal dice, but still a standard cube shape with 6 sides. it would be cool to the touch and kinda heavy, and smooth at the edges instead of sharp. i think the first thing i would do would be roll it to see what number i got

reaction speed: (i am simply giving you an ace's high)

FUCK YES. i am returning your aces high but very gently so as not to squish the caterpillar and i will find a nice green leaf for it to nibble on 🐛

[bvccy]

Alabaster | vampire!Winter Soldier x Reader

Requested by TheGreyPrincessa on AO3 ❤

She wanted the Alabaster prompt, but with a supernatural element to WS, like being a ghost or a vampire. I also took a bit of inspiration from some characters in DS3 and set it in a Hydra Victory AU, so this is a rich dark fantasy mix featuring some yummy biting and angst 😂 Hope you all enjoy it!

— PAIRING: vampire!Winter Soldier x female!Reader — PROMPT: Alabaster - saving a love from corruption, and preserving it — LINKS: Masterlist • love stones prompt list — WORDCOUNT: 5k

They'd been together on this train ride for two days, and had almost a week left to go. They didn't speak for most of it, so far, and spent their time peaceably in the darkness of their shared cabin. The sky had been overcast for weeks, fat grey clouds rolling on past, and after rumblings of the last great quake still came up every now and then. The train swayed on its tracks but didn't stop, just rolled on slowly, slowly, until it could pick up the pace again.

Things hadn't been the same since that monstrous tear in the Pacific that buried islands, ruined nations, and made volcanos burst in plumes that lingered even now, months later. The terror people had once felt melted and solidified into an eerie calm, a deathly sort of peace with all the losses that had followed, and those that were still yet to come.

In the middle of it all, Hydra grabbed the opportunity with both hands. Most of their bases were safely inland, in the heart of Russia, so they were not hit by the massive floods nor sunk into the sea. With whole governments in crisis and all the corporations too busy saving their own assets, people had nobody left to turn to, nobody to consult when they most needed a point of authority. Empires fell — political, financial, old dynasties and new pretenders — none of them were ready; and now, Hydra dominated all.

In their slowly swaying cabin, the Soldier looked toward his charge. The milky light painted half her face so tired-looking, passive, stuck in an eternal waiting that drained her flesh of everything. He thought back to the first time he had seen her: in a sterner dark and colder room, in one of the chambers at the bottom of the base. He'd been called first then watched as she walked in, and the Soldier knew already from the way she held herself what his mission was going to be. The girl didn't look at him, even as he swore himself to her in that drear ceremony, and she didn't seem to notice or to care at all how much disdain he had for being her new escort. Hers was what they named a "higher calling", and so he had to bring her to that old fort in the mountains where her purpose was to be fulfilled.

"Doesn't look fit for the task," he told the Director. "She'll be nothing but a burden."

"You've gotten mouthier lately," the old man smirked. "Besides, it's not for you to decide."

The Director was convinced she could be one of those women, simple and pure and all hollowed up inside, to help build the world anew with an everlasting flame. He doubted she even knew what that entailed — judging by how calm she kept, the girl most likely didn't.

As the Soldier sneered and stared at her lost in his reverie, her gaze suddenly went up and cut it with a pair of piercing eyes, shining from the milky light and shadows, interrupting all his thoughts.

Though they lived now in a cramped place, in that sole train cabin, in a way it was as if each was alone. She moved with ease from bed to basin, and he would let her, avert his gaze as she washed in the morning, sit across from her as she ate the food delivered by a kitchen boy, and while she slept each night on the top bunk he went outside to feed as well — on whatever distant travellers he could find in another section.

It was his sorry fate to act like such a monster, to survive after a brush with death. Hydra had sent him for a target, but in all of his planning, supervision, spying, he never caught that this old man was something else — something that didn't eat, or sleep at night, or looked into a mirror — and when the time had come to strike, it was prepared. The memory of that embrace, that bite that reached into his soul, had faded with the years, but the humiliation stuck. The Soldier wasn't sure why, but somehow being dead and yet alive was a great cause of shame. Perhaps it was his failure, or that he now drank blood, but all the time he had just one desire: to hide himself away.

It was his failure, but also his success somehow. His body healed now faster than even the serum had allowed, but his mind also seemed restored, and none of Hydra's cruel machines could dislodge his memories. He knew, like through a fog of dreams, who he once was, where he had come from, and that his name was James — but his waking self was still the Soldier and he relied on Hydra to survive, for now. They didn't have to know to what extent the bite had healed his mind, they didn't need to — he was, after all, their loyal Asset.

On the morning of the fourth day, still blissfully cloudy with volcano plumes and a brewing acidic rain on the wavering horizon, he was trying to fall asleep — what passed as sleep for him — after a pitiful night of scavenging. He tossed and turned and managed usually to sleep for a few hours before sunrise. Train rides always made him nervous, but at least now he could remember why. Right above his bunk, he spotted the girl's elbow hanging off as she clung to her pillow and stretched the little that she could. She was a peaceful travelling companion, he could admit under the distraction of his tiredness, and the ride felt less lonely with her there. A comforting, soft shadow made of pale warm light that seemed so sweet and smelled so tempting, but was gentler with him than anyone had been. Like a relentless current, she smoothed the sharp edges of the stone that was his heart.

"James?" she whispered groggily, suspecting that he was awake.

"What?"

"Could we eat in the dining car today?"

He grunted and turned his head away, though she couldn't even see him. He didn't want to tell her that it would be no use to him, but what excuse did he have to refuse her?

"You don't have to come," she added. "I'm just sick of being always stuck in here."

She didn't know it, hopeless little thing that she was, but he had to come with her. Hydra had revealed itself to the world not without some risks and now, though their military and commercial efforts were unmatched by any entity still standing, its more esoteric missions were not left unopposed. The Soldier was sent with her not just because she did not know the way, nor the fullness of her purpose, but because at any point she could be captured by some bestial opponent to Hydra's lofty plans. He knew them, had met them in the field before, though each was indescribable in his own way — a normal-looking man, at least by day, but there was a hunger within each that, when the blood ran hot in combat, burst forth to sweep that slim humanity away.

The usual clerk brought them breakfast and she took her time with getting ready, washing her face and upper body over a porcelain basin while he sat awkwardly in his civilian suit, looking out the window. The few rays of sunlight that slipped through burned him slightly, but not enough to hurt or leave a mark for long. His eyes, turned an even paler grey since the embrace that took his life, were affected the most, thin red veins growing in irritation around the edges as if he was simply tired. When he got sick of the view, or got too close to being hurt, he let the curtain fall over the window.

He served her to a walk along the coach, just to stretch their legs, and though it felt a bit too much like walking a pet the Soldier tried not to look at her that way. The girl's figure, walking just slightly in front of him, swayed lightly with the movement of the train, her long skirt showed the silhouette of one leg, then the other, and every now and then she'd stop to take in some passing view, perhaps a lone tree left standing or a flock of birds, or any sign of life in all that desolation. And as she'd turn, her fingers, clasped together, would gravitate toward a ring of metal that adorned her — brushing over its spikes fashioned like the teeth of a particularly stunted comb, the symbol of her mission.

"Do you think it's ever getting better?" she asked without turning her eyes away from the window. "No, don't answer. It's a silly question…"

The girl didn't sound all that morose, or even disappointed, and faced the front again as she began to walk. He followed dutifully and thought, with half a smile, whether she really cared about his answer. Did things get better? Could they ever? His own situation, for example, was at first glance disheartening and yet, it was not too high a price to pay to get his memories back — his favourite song, his favourite book, his old friends and army buddies, the fateful fall, the train, the war, the image of his mother's face.

"Everything eventually gets better," he replied, shocking her into a stop. He couldn't see it, but he knew she had just smiled.

Then, only a few steps later, "James?"

Not least of all, the memory of his name was worth a mention — because he liked the way she said it. "What is it?"

"Could we go for lunch soon?"

Sitting in the dining car was awkward, surrounded by all those people — seeing them by day rather than asleep, at night, his unsuspecting victims. A few were awfully pale, though they were aged as well — he never went for children. From the corner of his eye he could see last night's meal sipping on a glass of wine, and against his better judgement the Soldier cracked a smile.

"What will you have?" the girl asked him as she fingered through the menu.

"I'm not that hungry."

"You must have something."

He gave her a tired look then took the menu from her. The girl ended up ordering a bowl of black pasta and he settled for steak, the rawest one they had.

They both ate slowly, relishing their time outside however risky it might be. The overcast day was sludging by outside with a view of mountains in the distance, foggy stumps shrouded with snow that undulated like a sideways wave. The girl's plate got cold with all her gazing, but she seemed happy. The Soldier's eyes instead scanned the other travellers. Their talk was quiet, a sombre tone was something natural these days, and all of them were faultlessly polite with the meal servers — perhaps because so few were left. The tragedy that struck the world had left all industries in need of workers, and all were much more cherished now. The women were mostly frail, delicate-looking creatures, and men seemed dry and wiry but with an angry strength beneath.

His eyes fell on a lonely figure sitting at the back, more solid-looking than the rest and very rough — civilized, but like a stone only half-sculpted into something better. From beneath a pair of bushy brows, the stranger's eyes stared back, as if he'd sensed it.

At long last, the girl finished her meal. James, in turn, had cut around the edges and chewed thoughtfully on the bloody middle. He wasn't looking at that villain in the corner anymore, but his thoughts were on him. It was too dangerous to contact Hydra at this point, even by coded telegram, so they were on their own… The Soldier's eyes fell to her finger, clasped by that ring that was a shackle. She was fiddling with it again, thumb holding it still, the index gliding, counting its spires, petting them almost with a heavy sort of pity, and one glance at her frowning face made him once again wonder: did she know what fate awaited her? If she even asked, would he have the heart to tell?

With one sharp breath, she broke her gaze from the window and turned to look at him, dour downcast mouth curling in a smile. Tendrils of her tied-up hair fell to her shoulder as she tilted in a softer pose, and for a moment his real life could be a dream: they were just a couple on vacation, there was no tragedy, she knew and loved him and he was still alive, and cared for her, and she wasn't just a walking sacrifice.

"All done?" she whispered, nodding to his plate.

"I told you," he sighed, "I wasn't hungry."

"I suppose you want to leave now…"

"Not… just yet." In the back, his suspect raised himself and heaved his hulk toward the exit. "Why don't you order some dessert? I'll be right back."

The girl tried not to feel too awkward, left alone to look at strangers as she passed the time with crème brulée. Almost everyone was travelling with someone else: couples, parents with their children, or vice versa. A young man sat ahead of her with his old mother and for a moment their eyes met, and she was gripped with such a pity for him, for how worn out they both looked… She had tried to bury all of her anxieties about this trip, and keep a quiet faith in her companion, but seeing the people all around them — how sad they were but hopeful too, and taking it with dignity — all her fears now suddenly no longer mattered. The sacrifice she offered herself for was worth it.

James came back after a while, seeming more determined, agitated, but quieter even than before. Still, he took them for another walk, to a place between the train cars where they could step out between them, feel the breeze, see the horizon clearer. The sun was already setting by now, painting its red mark across the hills, and when its brightness burnt the most they made their way back in.

But then he left her once again, right after bedtime. She knew he had gone out all nights, though never asked him why. There was something more to the Asset than Hydra had revealed; he had a strangeness to him that wasn't like the other soldiers, but there was a gentler, more human touch to him as well. Perhaps that was why he seemed so sullen sometimes, sometimes soft — like when he shared his name with her and gave her permission to use it.

The train was moving slower now, weaving around the curves of a mountain as it approached a tunnel, and knowing he had never been gone quite this long, the girl got up to look for him. Wrapped with a robe around her nightgown and carrying a small flashlight, the girl went the way she'd heard him leave all those hours ago. Even the noise of the incessant wheels chugging along the tracks felt quiet, or the clinking of the chains as she got closer to the end… All the cabins she passed by were dark and silent, and outside, the passing landscape was dead as a set of theatre, with cardboard trees and a paper moon hanging up above.

It wasn't until three cars later that she heard something else: the sound of struggle, heaves and growls like animals were fighting, and bracing one hand against the wall she even felt a thudding echo through. For one second her steps stopped and she almost doubled back, but then stepped forward, and again, until a full darkness fell — they were passing through the tunnel. The girl turned the flashlight on and let the small white circle guide her, keeping one hand on the wall. The sounds were getting closer now: two men, perhaps, throwing snarls and curses, then suddenly the snapping of a door. The sound of wheels on tracks got louder, empty as it bounced around the tunnel and then back, broken through by a fleshy snap and then one far-off sounding yelp as if it passed through the tunnel at her side and then stopped dead, then silence. Opening the last door standing in her way, breath so high it got stuck in her neck, feet cold from nakedness and fright that the girl felt like she was floating, she dared move the light around until it caught a figure sitting on the floor.

"James?" she whispered, hoarse and hollow. But she would know him anywhere: dressed in his black gear, blood all around him — and what looked like wisps of fur — hair matted on his cheeks with a wetness she couldn't name. Timidly, almost in disbelief, he looked up at her, and perhaps it was the light or her still pounding fear but there was a hint of red around their grey.

"What are you doing here?" he rasped, trying not to seem too angry.

"You were gone for so long. I was worried…"

"Go back."

She almost listened, but her body moved her forward, and soon she was kneeling right beside him. "What happened?" the girl asked, looking more closely at his face — stopping dead still when she saw the fangs. She was too struck to notice how he looked at her right now. "L-let's go back together…"

Without waiting any longer, she laid one hand around his elbow and slowly coaxed him up. The Soldier felt more threatening looming now above her, but he made no sudden moves. With the edge of his boot, he eased the doorway open to let the outside wind blow some of the evidence away.

Although he wouldn't lean on her, she kept one hand around his middle, comforting and steading herself all at once.

"He was a problem," said the Soldier. It surprised her that he offered anything at all. "I got rid of him."

"Was he the one you pushed out of the train? The man you saw at lunch?"

"No normal man looks that fit anymore, unless they're working for someone. And then he attacked me… I knew what he was, met his kind before."

"He wasn't a normal man, was he?"

James just gave an indistinct grumble at that. "He was a beast."

She looked up at him as the train finally left the tunnel, and found him looking back at her. The red around his eyes was gone, but he looked with such an air of pity, and of guilt and shame — would she call him a monster now? But the girl smiled, and wrapped her arm around him tighter.

"You look horrible."

"Well, thanks."

"We'll take care of you inside."

"I don't think you can do that…"

They got back to their cabin like children sneaking in. The dark felt darker, even as she turned a little lamp on, and the quiet of their shared night-time felt stronger than before. In this moment, it felt like they were the only people in the world.

She turned the tap on and dampened a cloth while the Soldier pealed his dirty gear off. The boots thumped down on the floor, the combat vest, and a pair of guns he had brought with him. The few slices on his flesh had almost healed, leaving behind only tatters on his shirt and upper trousers. He still looked scared when she turned around to look at him, and sat deathly stiff as she washed his face.

"Is all this yours?" she asked, referring to the blood.

"Not all of it."

"Why was he here?"

"To stop us."

"But why?"

His teeth visibly clenched, but held within her hands and looking up at her, he had to answer. "They wanted to take you."

"Before the ceremony?"

"Yes. They want to stop it."

She'd never thought Hydra had any rivals, and now she didn't want to know.

"Frankly, I want to stop it too."

His words woke her from her thoughts, and now she looked at him again, with new eyes and some confusion. Something was shaken in him after that fight, and it took more than pure physical courage to go against it now that it had woken up.

"You don't know," James began, shaking his head slightly as he looked up at her, "you don't know what they're going to do to you."

"I can last a few years bricked up in a cell," she said, holding her head tall. If the old Anchorites could do it, so could she.

"No, it's going to take more than that," he shook his head. "It's going to take everything."

She didn't want him to scare her, but the terror in his eyes seemed to come from kindness, and that scared her most of all. The cloth was limp and still within her hand, her tongue was frozen in her head, and all that she could stand to move was a finger as it laid across his brow, petting back his frowns — or trying to. He was so cold, and hard like stone, and yet she was so warmed from being close to him that suddenly she wished to give him all her warmth instead of seeing it used up by someone else. With a sigh, she sat down on the bunk beside him. Followed by his caring gaze, she took the metal arm and started cleaning it up too, all to not look at him anymore. Blood and tough hair was stuck between its knuckles.

"I guess… it's worth a try," she shrugged, trying to find a way around it and justify her mission.

"Don't be gullible, it's useless. They can't stop the course of nature… and they shouldn't try."

Without any meanness, but losing to a feeling of despair, she heard herself asking: "So what can you do about it?"

"Whatever you'll let me."

His whisper felt warm rushing by her cheek. She turned to find him smiling slightly, almost to himself, but holding her within his gaze with a yearning, hopeful look.

"Do you mean to make me like… the way you are?"

"If you'll allow it."

"Isn't there another way?"

Upon her land, his hand squeezed hers just slightly tighter like a friend, a bother, or a lover. "They'll never let you live, they think you can save them — you and all the other girls like you. And you can, but not forever. It's useless but they don't want to see it. And if they find you, they…"

She could tell that he left things unsaid: like what they'd do to him, but his condition was… special. He was beyond any old threat of death, and he was offering the same to her. His lips were parted, but she couldn't see the teeth or the fangs that caught the light — only the softness of his flesh. Those eyes that so often seemed like glass, and dead behind their chill, looked more alive now as they drank her in and travelled, timidly, between her eyes and her inviting throat curtained by loose hair and that thin nightgown. Between one form of death and another, would it really be so bad?

"You look horrible," she said again, smiling teasingly.

James chuckled and tilted his head toward her. "And you look just delicious."

For a moment, he thought about kissing her mouth first. It felt right, considering what they were about to do, but as he was a breath away he stopped and felt his lips, his teeth, his tongue, too dirtied for how pure and sweet she was, and so instead he leaned down lower, to her throat.

The girl's hand dropped the bloodied rag as his arm curled around her middle. He felt her trembling palm rest on his forearm, steadying herself as she opened up to him — unquestioning, obedient, giving him everything he once thought she'd give to Hydra. It ached to do this thing to her, but he knew he couldn't save her any other way. His lips first rested on her neck, just kissing, and he felt her take in a sharp breath at this new feeling. Her shoulder scrunched up from the cold, but then she softened in his arms, and he could hold her closer. Gently and very slow, he opened his mouth to brace his teeth against that layer of skin, letting her try out the feeling, know him as he was getting to know her.

James even felt her kiss his cheek, just a touch of dampened warmth over his skin, as her head swayed dreamily toward his shoulder. Then, slowly, like piercing through an autumn fruit, he sunk his fangs in. His hands gripped her middle tighter, trying to distract her, and her wince of pain climbed higher the deeper in he bit until she buried her cries into his neck. With soothing laps, he tried to gentle her, caressing her aching flesh with his cold tongue — that got warmer as her blood flowed for him. It bloomed into his mouth like melted chocolate, like honey, sweeter than anything he'd ever tasted and sweeter still because it was her choice. The red sliver that passed beyond the puncture of his fangs into his mouth trembled with the moan he could not contain, and within his arms he felt her shiver, and move closer with guilty desire.

Greedily, he swallowed the girl down, feeling all she felt the more he did so: her quiet fears, her strength, conviction, and a genuine desire to do good, followed by a secret love and the dread that haunted it. He knew this feeling well, and shared it, and in knowing how close they had been all along — in their mutual desire, their hunger for each other, their attempts at selfless sacrifice — he moved a lone hand up to pet her, to cup her heavy head and chase her fears away. Her weakened fingers tried to cling to the tatters of his shirt, some reaching the healed skin beneath — healing even faster now, all thanks to her. It'd been so long since he had anything so sweet, so burning, and so full of life…

He was halfway done with the girl before he heard her sobbing, and feeling how frantically her heart was beating so near to his made his one break. As well as he could while he still clung to her, James cooed and pressed his lips down harder into a sort of kiss as he carried through with the secret embrace. When the caressing of her fingers turned to little scratches, desperate to hold onto to life, and then began to limp away as hope and strength left her, he moved his hand down to her neck and steadied her as he, with great regret and greed, finally lifted his mouth.

Her heart, which beat so frantically until then, was starting to slow down. James leaned her head back and tried to see her eyes, but the girl could hardly keep them open, and he held her weight as, steadily, he let her lay back on the bed, head loose around her shoulders like a ragdoll.

At first she'd seen a blinding light as blood was drained from her, but now the cold she felt in all her limbs looked and felt like darkness, all around her, like a pure void ready to swallow her up — until she felt a few warm droplets touch her lips.

"Come on, doll, you've got to drink," she heard him say, voice foggy and disturbing, as if rousing her from sleep. "Drink it, come on."

Against her will, a few blood drops slipped past her lips, and with a heavy heart she soon gave up resisting. At first she just let his blood slip into her, and then when feeling came she moved, just slightly, to willingly drink him down. That skin that bled was brought down to her, and she could taste him too — slightly salty, slightly sweet, very new, and manly. The more she drank from him, the closer he felt, as if covering her all around and coating her insides with a care so unfamiliar to her it made her want to cry. Faintly she could even feel his fingers as they brushed along her forehead, dragging tendrils damp with sweat away before he leaned down to leave a kiss.

So slowly that she didn't even notice, the girl felt alive again, yet in a different way. She almost couldn't believe it when her eyes opened, but somehow she found the strength to do that — as if the strength found her instead, like it was always there. The room felt brighter, though still dark, and she could see James clearer: so many details she had seen before but never noticed, somehow, as if she met him once again — and this time, with an honest smile.

"There's my girl," he grinned down at her, looking equal parts proud and worried.

He gave her a little more to feed and then they laid together, crowded in that bed for hours until sunrise, and all throughout the day. He only left her for a little while to feed and came back to her, letting her drink his blood again — she wouldn't even hear about biting other people.

"But darling, you'll have to at one point…"

Since when was he sweet-talking her? It didn't matter — she'd liked the way he said it. "Alright, but not yet!"

"Mouthy, too," he chuckled to himself, and rested once again behind her, holding her tightly in his arms as they were cradled by the swinging of the train.

They never completed their journey; instead, they got out at the next station along with all their luggage. It had arrived conveniently at night and they could disappear into the cold town, slipping into old abandoned homes and from there beyond, into a new abandoned world.

[measuringbliss]

I challenged @headgehug, and thus was challenged. My answer to those Disco Elysium questions that have been going around.

Who is your favourite character apart from Harry and Kim? Okay, that's a difficult first question. I did a Tier List after my playthrough and I mostly stand by it, though some characters would be different (Lilienne and Ruby would be higher since I actually got to interact more deeply with them). It's a difficult choice because I love a lot of them for completely different reasons. I think it would be between Evrart, Joyce and Gaston. Gaston is absolutely adorable, Evrart is a wonderful chessmaster I really like, and Joyce is Joyce. Maybe Joyce wins. (The Dicemaker is also very marking, oddly enough.) (Honestly going through my screenshots, Joyce definitely wins. She has a lot of great lines and she's also quirky af, going along with your weird answers.)

What is the one skill you would use to best describe yourself? If I let myself be defined by ADHD (and it is, honestly, a huge part of my being and conducts my behavior), probably Electrochemistry. I crave stimulation and I'm weak to sugar urges. I don't do drugs and that's mainly because I know if I started, I wouldn't be able to stop. Alternatively, Inland Empire and Conceptualization. Which, honestly, are still part of the ADHD umbrella, just less evidently so I guess.

Do you have a favourite Copotype and political alignment and if so, which one? Not really. I was pretty honest in my first playthrough and ended up being a Communist and a Sorry/Boring Cop. To be fair, it's hard not to apologize every five second when you see... how much stuff happened. 2nd playthrough I tried to be a capitalist but around the midway point I ended up being a Communist again. I was more of a Artful/Fancy Cop though. Next time I'll try being an idiot (fascist). I'd say my first archetype was my favorite.

What is one thing you don’t like about the story or that could have been done better? The true culprit, obviously. I've not hidden my distate for them one bit. Worst part of the game. Boring, uninteresting, they may fit the game's themes but----it's just. ugh. I've seen that kind of stuff, I got it.

What is a popular fan interpretation that you don’t like? I haven't delved into the fandom much so I don't have anything in mind.

What do you love about the game? What's not to love?

Is there any type of fan content that you wish there would be more of? See my answer for 5) but there's never enough meta. I hope my Underwear Meta contribution made a difference. DE needs more fanfic, more fanart, more everything. Gimme those sweet Lilienne/Joyce fics!

What is your favourite line from the game? Joyce before she goes away: "One last thing, Lieutenant Du Bois/nameless detective." She starts the engine. "I've given the matter much thought and come to this conclusion: You're not an amnesiac. You're *insane*. I know -- because I, too, am insane. I just hide my illness better. And I'm rich." 1. Harry: "How do you keep it together?" Joyce: "The same strict psychological regimen the eighth admiral developed when he crossed the pale and discovered this isola -- the *Volta do Mar*. It's used by interisolary travellers and other troubled souls even to this day." Volition (Easy): "You could use a little of it yourself." 2. Harry: "What do you have?" Joyce: "I'm over-exposed, baby. My travels take me through the pale dozens of times a year. I've got the longing -- and I've got it *bad*." She points to her heart. She would die to return to it. The pale. The past. Anything one can return to. 3. Harry: "Isn't *everybody* a little insane?" Joyce: "No, detective -- no one's as insane as you." +BONUS: Joyce: She smiles. "Watch out for yourselves. They will strike soon." I realize it's an entire scene rather than a line, but there's no line in particular that I can designate, it's the whole moment for me. I feel like I relate hard to this feeling of being, well not insane, but different in a lot of ways, and in ways that make my life difficult, and in ways that a lot of people simply don't/can't get. So having Joyce say to me that she not only can understand me but related to me felt very good to my broken mind. And she can't be fixed, she can only continue to live with it, like other "travellers and troubled souls". Not only that, but she's longing for it, and she has a yearning feeling of nostalgia. I'm prone to that too, or I would be if I hadn't forgotten most of my school years. "Anything one can return to." She needs her anchors. I'm still puzzled by her "on one's insane as you", but I feel like it's a compliment on Joyce's part. She's appreciating Harry (my)'s weirdness and giving it legitimacy, in some way. Appreciation with your issue, not in spite of. And then she asks Harry (and Kim if he's there) to watch out for themselves, before leaving. She truly cares, even though you're a sad excuse of a human being. She truly cares. So that whole exchange, really.

Do you have a favour political vision quest? I only did the Moralist one I think, and I couldn't succeed but it was, um, it had a very weird starting point and it was a mess, but I liked what little I did of it, though it felt really depressing.

What are your headcanons for what happens after the end of the game? Everyone is gay, gets married and lives happily ever after.

Do you want more official games and stories set in Elysium and if so, which ones? No, I think it works nicely as a single unit.

What are your headcanons for pre-Martinaise Harry? Definitely in a relationship with Vicquemare at some point.

What is your least favourite aspect of the game mechanics? Loading screens, though they got MUCH (90%) faster in the latest update on Switch. Also it's hard to be nuanced in that game. Also it's really hard to get into the Thought Cabinet because it just... isn't of much use. In my 2nd playthrough I decided to use it as much as possible, it wasn't particularly worth it.

What was the moment that touched you most while playing? Joyce's departure, as written above. It hit hard in subtle ways. It's rare that I feel understood this much by a videogame character (or even someone at all). The scene where you have to announce the death of a guy to her husband (and then, on a subsequent playthrough, finding that woman in the early days and talking to her knowing perfectly well what would happen. fuck.) is a hard scene, very memorable.

When playing it for the first time, did you go in blind or not? Is there anything you would want to change about your first playthrough? 100% blind. I just knew Kim Kitsuragi existed, and that you could die quickly or something. Wouldn't have changed a thing since my 2nd playthrough covered new stuff.

Wild Pines vs. The Débardeurs’ Union – what do you think of the Evrarts and who do you root for? Oh I absolutely love everyone in this conflict. They're all fascinating as fuck, I'm rooting for both camps at once because Joyce and the Evrarts are so interesting and charismatic.

What skill is the most fun/coolest/most interesting to set as your signature skill? Encyclopedia on 2nd playthrough was nice. I'll try a physical build next time...

What is your opinion on the Elysium lore? I don't think I really care about lore? But also the Pale is very interesting. It's a shame the one character who lived through a lot of moments in a very involving way (Culprit-san) is also awfully uninteresting. There's potential, but burying it in a looooooong ramble about how women are sl*ts and men are simps and the world is decadent and nothing matters or make sense and nobody's worth shit or whatever, I don't think it's particularly captivating. If I want to see an asshole I can just go to r/The_Don*ld or JK Terfing tweets.

Which character arc or piece of lore would you have wanted to be explored more in depths? Everything. I hate that once you've completed somebody's questioning, you don't really get more out of them. It's unsatisfying.

How would you position yourself politically in Revachol? Def Communist.

Is there something that you missed on your first playthrough that completely blew your mind and/or changed how you view the story when you found out it existed later? Not really, but the Church storyline really was an entire third of the game, huh? Spending more time with some characters was nice though. This game really isn't about blowing your mind.

What would your own stats be? Intellect: 4 Psyche: 5 (for the wrong reasons, hello ADHD) Physique: 2 Motorics: 1

What is a thing in fanworks that you eat up every single time? See above answers.

What is your interpretation of the title of the game? As a French person, Elysium immediately calls to mind the Elysée, be it the Presidential Palace or the Champs-Elysées streets full of shops. It's about opulence, grandeur, capitalism. And then you've got Disco. Disco was a major trend born not out of typical people, but from black and queer people. In this regard, Disco is fundamentally opposed to Elysium. Fire and water. The oppressed and the oppressor. And in the game, you're a cop, an official cop, investigating in a place where the locals neither acknowledge your official status nor want you there. Two conflicting forces.

Favourite piece of in-game art (graffiti, poetry etc.)? @headgehug rightly mentioned "Un jour, je serai de retour près de toi" which is absolutely beautiful. My favorite would be "Something beautiful is going to happen". I think it's an incredible sentence.

Just ramble freely about the game and let me know your thoughts.

I've talked too much already lmao.

[birdship]

Leave It In The Sun: Chapter One (a Disco Elysium fanfic)

Warnings: Full game spoilers, eventual spicy scenes, basically the level of adult content in the game itself.

General summary: A slow(ish) burn exploration of life at Precinct 41 after Harry and Kim wrap up the case and Kim makes the move to Jamrock. Mainly just about how Harry and Kim's relationship might develop, and a sort of character study of some of the employees of Precinct 41 in general.

------------

Chapter one summary: Two difficult weeks after leaving Martinaise, Harry finally reaches out to Kim. Chapter length: Approx. 4.3k words

The sun is only just setting over the streets of Jamrock, drenched in rain and neon. The city stops to catch its breath in the intermission between day and night.

PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT: And so do you. You could’ve sworn the nearest payphone was, y’know, nearer than this. Maybe that bone-shattering gunshot wound also isn’t quite as far along in the healing process as you thought either.

PAIN THRESHOLD: Brilliant claws of pain rake down your thigh as you lean against the payphone and try to center yourself.

You glance at the phone resting in its cradle, with some trepidation. Phone calls are always a bit… difficult for you. Especially these days.

SUGGESTION: You can still change your mind.

VOLITION: No. You came here for a reason.

SUGGESTION: Or… you could always just call her instead.

VOLITION: *Focus.*

You take a deep breath. The late spring air is turning chilly in the slowly setting sun. The rain drizzles lazily as it has all day, showing no sign of stopping. A handful of people are still--or already--out wandering downtown Jamrock, laughing and talking and hurrying home and running errands and entirely focused on just about anything in the world *besides* a washed up middle-aged man having a minor anxiety attack and moderate-to-severe hip pain next to a public phone at 6:04pm in the rain.

INLAND EMPIRE: The loneliness knocks the wind out of you. You thought you were used to it by now. It’s worse outside, around people.

DRAMA: The threadbare costume you created for yourself in the privacy of your dark, trash-strewn apartment doesn’t seem quite as convincing with an audience.

VOLITION: Stop the goddamn pity party and pick up the phone already.

The receiver is light in your hand as you fumble for change and the crumpled slip of paper you’ve had in your jeans pocket for the last two weeks or so. You slowly, deliberately dial the phone number written on it, as if some part of you is afraid that your fingers might just automatically fall into the patterns of *her* number instead.

VOLITION: They might. But you’re done hurting yourself.

CONCEPTUALIZATION: Well, maybe not entirely. Yet. But you’re done hurting yourself *with her* for sure.

INLAND EMPIRE: You still feel like you deserve that pain. But it’s wrong to keep using her as the knife you gut yourself with. She deserves better, even if you might not.

LOGIC: In any case, this isn’t about her. It’s about you, and it’s about--

“Hello?” Kim’s voice is muffled and tinny through the old, worn copper wiring. He sounds tired, but you guess that’s not particularly surprising. You’ve been pretty damn tired too.

“Kim, hey, it’s uh, it’s me,” you reply awkwardly.

“Harry? Do you need something?”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: This is the first time you’ve called him since leaving Martinaise, despite carrying that little piece of paper around for the last two weeks. He’s thinking, why now?

“Yeah, no, I just happened to be downtown this evening,” you ramble, “and I thought--”

“You’re drunk,” he says. It is completely without judgment. A stated fact. The sky is blue, the grass is green, and Harry Du Bois is drunk. “Where are you exactly? I’ll--”

“Wait, no!” you exclaim, a little too loudly. A nearby pigeon makes a mad dash in the opposite direction at the sound. “That’s not it! I swear I’m basically sober right now. Mostly.”

A long pause on the other end. “Alright,” he says plainly. “So what can I do for you?”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: Make no mistake, he’s picking his battles here and gingerly stepping *around* that “mostly.”

EMPATHY: He’s just relieved it’s even that much.

COMPOSURE: How embarrassing.

VOLITION: Just start over. Your first sentence was garbage, but you know you’re under no obligation to continue it, right?

You take a deep breath, then try again.

“Well, it’s really more about what *I* can do for *you*,” you say as smoothly as possible. “You know that big motor carriage exhibition in town? It just so happens I’ve got *two tickets* to it.”

Another long pause. “You mean the one that ends today?”

“Yes,” you confirm.

“And are you aware that it is currently around six o’clock in the evening?”

“Is it? I mean, yes. Yes it is,” you say confidently. “I am aware of the passage of time.”

“And you waited until now to do this?” he asks.

EMPATHY: He sounds more amused than annoyed, though you definitely detect a bit of both.

“Uh,” you falter. “Look, it’s open until 8:00, so do you want to fucking go or not?”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: About half a kilometer away, Lieutenant Kim Kitsuragi is sitting in the kitchen of his new apartment, already in his pajamas and winding down for the evening. It’s a bit early for that, but he figures he should take the opportunity to rest before he tackles that mountain of backlogged cases he was promised upon making the move to precinct 41.

Two weeks ago, he said goodbye to the strangest man he’d ever met. A man he found himself inexplicably drawn to in the week they spent together, and whom he thought about every day since. Wondering if he would take the lifeline Kim tried to throw to him, or if that little slip of paper would just end up forgotten at the bottom of a vomit-soaked trash can in some shitty bar. Wondering if the dawning trauma of everything that happened in Martinaise and the restlessness from sitting at home recovering from its aftermath would combine to pull him down into a dark place beyond Kim’s reach for good. Wondering and wondering to fill the silence. And now finally the silence is broken, but whatever this cry for help is, it is not the one Kim ever expected to receive.

But he knows one thing for sure: it *is* a cry for help.

“Alright,” Kim says finally. He takes a sharp breath. “Sounds good.”

The walk to his apartment takes a bit longer than you expected. It’s not that far from the downtown payphone, but you still wasted a good 20 minutes on the journey.

ENDURANCE: You are expecting too much of yourself too soon.

INLAND EMPIRE: It’s always one or the other with you, isn’t it? Too much or not enough.

PHYSICAL INSTRUMENT: Twenty minutes to walk a few blocks? Fucking pathetic. What kind of cop are you? Hell, what kind of *gym teacher* are you? Man up.

ENDURANCE: No. It’s a miracle that you’re still standing at all.

PERCEPTION: Beyond the apartment door, you can hear footsteps and soft humming.

You knock, and the door opens almost immediately.

CONCEPTUALIZATION: Shit. You were hoping you’d have a few spare seconds to think of something really cool to say.

REACTION SPEED: C’mon, say something fun and upbeat to prove you’re not a depressed sack of shit who’s been spending the past two weeks drinking alone in the dark.

DRAMA: Showtime!

“Howdy, pardner,” you hear yourself say.

SAVOIR FAIRE: Finger guns! For god’s sake, don’t forget the finger guns. Without them, you just look like a goddamn lunatic.

You do the finger guns.

Kim does not seem particularly impressed as he slowly looks from your outstretched gun fingers to the twisted grimace that now wracks your face.

“Please, holster those things before coming inside,” he says humorlessly.

You blow the pretend, metaphorical smoke from each of your hot weapons before stuffing your hands in your pockets. As you do this, he watches with an appraising look.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: He’s wondering if this is *regular* weird or *drunken breakdown* weird. However, he is intimately familiar with your brand of stupid bullshit at this point and it doesn’t take long for him to place it in the former category.

“We should hit the road soon,” you comment as you peek curiously into his apartment.

“Hit the road,” Kim repeats with mild amusement, “in what?”

LOGIC: Oh. Right. The Kineema is property of Precinct 57. Not Kim Kitsuragi personally.

“Shit, yeah,” you concede. “But hey, if we call a taxi now--”

LOGIC: You’ll arrive just in time to immediately turn around and go home.

HALF LIGHT: You fucked up. You’re a fuck-up. Great job, idiot.

VOLITION: Try not drinking and blacking out all day next time.

LOGIC: Yes, but then…

“Fuck,” you inhale. “Fuckady-fuck-fuck. Shit. Goddammit.”

Kim waits patiently for you to catch up. You’re almost there.

“I should’ve called earlier, sorry,” you apologize. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

LOGIC: What is wrong with you is that you drank all last night, slept off a hangover most of the day today, and woke up in a daze about 45 minutes ago. But what’s done is done. No point in bringing that up now, right?

“Nor do I,” says the lieutenant with a small smile. “But whatever it is, I am no longer surprised by it, I assure you.”

“Sorry. I’m sorry,” you repeat, leaning on the door frame pathetically, a congealed ooze of mental illness and embarrassment. “Sorry for bothering you in the first place. You’re always so nice to me, even when I’m a pain in the ass.”

CONCEPTUALIZATION: Which is to say *constantly.*

Kim says nothing. Just sighs almost imperceptibly.

EMPATHY: Your self deprecation is frustrating for him, and he does not know how to respond to it constructively and compassionately.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: He *does* think you’re a pain in the ass sometimes, but a pain worth dealing with.

INLAND EMPIRE: For reasons beyond your understanding.

“Why did you agree to go in the first place?” you sigh. “You’ve got a brain that actually works, you knew it wasn’t gonna happen. If you’re trying to make fun of me, then, well…”

You pause.

“That’s just fine, I guess. Good job, carry on.”

He adjusts his glasses and looks away. “I appreciated the intention,” he says finally, in a measured voice. “And since I hadn’t heard from you the past couple weeks…”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: ...He was afraid you wouldn’t bother trying again.

“Sorry,” you mumble. “I’ve been kind of busy. You know how it goes after cases like that.”

“I do,” he says. He hesitates for a moment, then adds, “you’re welcome to come in if you like.”

You hobble into Kim’s sparse kitchen and collapse on a dining room chair. It creaks ominously under the velocity of the assault.

“I’m glad we have an opportunity to catch up,” he says politely, pulling up the other chair and gazing at your pained expression from across the table. “Your injury is healing well, I assume?”

EMPATHY: It is obvious that he does not in fact assume this at all.

You shrug, still trying to get a hold of yourself and push back the ache swirling at the edges of your mind.

He watches you struggle for a moment, then gently says, “it will take time to heal, but it *will* heal.”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: *So please be patient and kind to yourself,* is the silent plea left unsaid. It hangs in the air pitifully. You both know it’s there.

“Time hasn’t exactly been a good salve for me in general,” you mumble.

He’s silent for a while. Opens his mouth to speak, then closes it again.

“Harry,” he says finally. “What happened in Martinaise is not your burden to carry alone.”

“I thought you didn’t like *personal issues*, lieutenant,” you say.

“I don’t,” he says with a frown, “but this…”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: This is about me too, he thinks. As much as he hates to admit it. He doesn’t particularly like his *own* personal issues either. But the past two weeks were hard for him, and you didn’t make them any easier.

EMPATHY: He was worried about you, and--although he will never admit it to himself, let alone you--there’s a part of him that selfishly hoped you were worried about him too. At least a little.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: He’s used to this line of work, and so are you despite the holes in your memory, but it never gets any easier to deal with some things.

EMPATHY: There was so much death that day. It haunts you. And now as you sit in Kim’s kitchen, the alcohol slowly filtering from your blood and leaving behind the dregs of a headache, you realize it still haunts him too. You both added perforations you never wanted to make.

ENDURANCE: It’s too much. Your head swims and your entire body aches in the throes of repressed grief fighting its way to the surface of a sea of quickly evaporating Commodore Red.

INLAND EMPIRE: Warning! Trauma containment center has been breached! Evacuate the area immediately!

HALF LIGHT: You’re going to cry, aren’t you? You’re going to fucking cry. Right here in his kitchen. Why can’t you keep your shit together for more than five minutes straight?

You are entirely unable to keep the tears from rolling silently down your cheeks, unbidden.

INLAND EMPIRE: You don’t have it in you to really cry properly, like a normal fucking person. Not anymore. Something has disconnected the wire from your “press here to begin sobbing during your emotional breakdown” button, and you’re not sure what or when.

ENDURANCE: But human beings *cry.* And despite everything inside you that’s broken and rotting, you *are* a human being. You can’t not be.

Kim’s standing next to you now, his hand resting comfortingly on your shoulder. He doesn’t say anything.

EMPATHY: That’s the point of this whole shoulder-touching business in the first place--your disconcertingly unhinged behavior has left him at a loss for words, yet compelled to offer *something.*

This goes on for the longest five minutes or so the world has ever seen. But finally, you’ve wrung it all out of yourself and the tears stop almost as abruptly as they began. His hand gives your shoulder a squeeze, then he sits back down in the chair opposite you, avoiding your eyes. He rummages in his pocket for something, then hands you a blue handkerchief.

“Where the hell do you keep all these?” you mumble as you reach for it. “Fuckin’... infinite handkerchiefs around here.”

“What can I say? I like to be prepared,” he says.

“For drunk idiots who throw up all over crime scenes and have mental breakdowns in your home?”

“Usually to clean my glasses,” he says flatly. “But at this point, I suppose it *is* fair to say that it’s also for your various crises as well.”

“Well, thank God one of us is prepared,” you say. “What would I do without you, Kim?”

He hesitates, a strange wistful expression tugging at the corners of his mouth. “I don’t know. What *did* you do the past two weeks?”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: As soon as the words leave his mouth, he regrets them.

“Sorry, I shouldn’t… That’s none of my concern,” he says quickly.

AUTHORITY: Who the hell does he think he is? You’re not a child who needs to be minded. You’re a grown-ass man who can sit alone in his apartment and get wasted if he fucking wants to. Assert yourself!

“Honestly? Drink, mostly,” you say with a self-conscious chuckle.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: He just stares at you with the bleakest expression you’ve ever seen cross his face.

EMPATHY: He’s so tired. So frustrated. So disappointed.

INLAND EMPIRE: Oh God! He’s *disappointed* in you? This is terrible. Anything but that, please!

“I thought I was doing better,” you say quietly. “Guess not.”

“You were,” Kim says kindly.

INLAND EMPIRE: Tequila Sunset hasn’t happened yet. Maybe it still will. Maybe it’s inevitable. Maybe when you took up that mantle, it was like some sort of alcoholic event horizon. Tequila Sunset is the only way it was ever going to end. What other force in the universe could begin to exert as much gravitational pull over you?

ELECTROCHEMISTRY: From the void we came, to the void we must return.

“Listen,” Kim tells you, “this is not surprising. It’s got to be harder now that you’re back in Jamrock.”

ELECTROCHEMISTRY: It’s *easy,* baby. All your old favorite haunts are here. You know all the cheapest bars, the sketchiest parts of town with the purest amphetamines… You can’t remember the names of half of them anymore, but the muscles in your legs can trace the steps there perfectly. That shit’s burned into your body forever.

“Yeah.” You swallow hard. “Anyway, what about you? How’s Jamrock treating you?”

EMPATHY: The darkness clouding his expression lightens a bit.

“Good so far,” he says. “I’ve actually only been here for a few days. G.R.I.H. wrap-up took longer than I expected.” He pauses and looks out the window. “But I’m glad to be here now.”

“Really,” you say with a laugh. “In this shithole?”

“It has its perks,” he says. “I’m looking forward to beginning work at Precinct 41.”

“You’re not working solo, are you?”

“For right now, yes I am,” he replies. “I’m fine with that. I’ve done it before.”

INLAND EMPIRE: The idea of sharing a workplace with him and yet not being at his side when he needs you… it makes you feel cold, lonely, somehow.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: You have a duty to Jean. Jean is your partner.

SUGGESTION: Fuck it, just say it. You know what you want to say. Say it and get it over with.

“You should work with me,” you blurt out. “We were such a good team in Martinaise. We could keep those good times rolling!”

“I’m flattered, but,” he says, turning his head. “Satellite-Officer Vicquemare…”

“Doesn’t give a shit about me,” you say. “Fuck him.”

EMPATHY: That’s not exactly true. You know it’s not.

INLAND EMPIRE: But the truth is complicated. It’s easier to just boil it down to *fuck that guy.*

LOGIC: Jean is bad for you, and you’re bad for him. Or, you used to be. And has anything really changed? Are you really any different? Maybe it was just the change of scenery that fooled you into thinking otherwise.

INLAND EMPIRE: Same old Jamrock. Same old coworkers. Same old bad habits. Same old *you.*

“I’m not so sure about that,” Kim says delicately.

“Forget about him,” you push, suddenly more serious about this than you intended to be. “I can arrange this shit with Captain Pryce, and I can deal with Jean.”

“I… uh,” he coughs. “I don’t know what to say.”

DRAMA: You’re in control of this show now. Pull an honest answer out of him.

You point at him and narrow your eyes. “I know what you should say: what you *feel* in your *heart*!” You pound one fist against your chest over your heart to drive home the point, then wince.

PAIN THRESHOLD: Please don’t do that.

You break the dramatic pose and lean back in your chair again with a shrug. “Or just tell me to fuck off. None of this wishy-washy noncommittal shit, though.”

He’s silent for a long time, watching and listening to the rain as it picks up outside. Then finally he gives you an apologetic smile and speaks.

“Harry,” he says kindly. “Fuck off.”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: Translation: maybe. But not now.

EMPATHY: He’s not angry, he’s deflecting. This is by far the nicest way you’ve ever been told to fuck off. Don’t take it too hard.

“Alright, alright,” you say. “Forget I said anything.”

You spend a while just making smalltalk at Kim’s kitchen table. None of it means anything, but it’s nice. It’s a nice, good, human thing to do, sitting and chatting with him. Makes your “regular well-adjusted person” costume fit a little better. The rain begins to let up a little in the fading sunset.

“You know, we could do something else if you like,” he says brightly. “Here in Jamrock, I mean.”

ELECTROCHEMISTRY: Yeah. Lots of stuff to do in Jamrock. Like speed and hard liquor. Or crying in the bathroom of a dive bar because you’re too fucked up on speed and liquor.

SUGGESTION: He probably wouldn’t go for that.

CONCEPTUALIZATION: There’s got to be somewhere else to go. Something else to do with him. Think. What do you want to do with him?

ELECTROCHEMISTRY: Oh buddy, are you sure you’re ready to open that can of worms?

The lieutenant watches you as you rub your temples in an effort to massage the awkward thoughts out of your terrible brain. Then he says, “you know what, don’t worry about it. It’s fine, we can just stay here.”

“Yeah, okay,” you say. “Sounds good.”

“I’m going out on the balcony for a cigarette,” he informs you. “You can--”

“I’ll come with you,” you interrupt.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: He pauses, wondering how many you might’ve had already. Then again cigarettes are, shockingly, by far the *least* detrimental of your *many* vices.

The two of you step out onto the lieutenant’s rather small balcony. It’s still raining very lightly, but this is probably as good as the weather is going to get tonight. Good enough. There’s really not quite enough space for two adult men to comfortably lounge around out here, though. You try to make yourself as small as possible as you fumble in your pockets for a cigarette and lighter.

PERCEPTION: You hear the soft click of a lighter and smell smoke on the gentle evening breeze drifting over from your left.

“Fuck,” you grumble. “I forgot my light--”

You realize Kim is holding out his own lighter wordlessly, still gazing out at the city sprawling out below.

“Thanks,” you say.

He nods. He pockets the lighter again once you’re done with it, then leans on the railing and exhales smoke with a sigh.

ESPRIT DE CORPS: Outwardly, he is silent and pensive. He almost seems anxious in a way. But in truth, he likes this. He’s enjoying standing out here in the rain and the dark and smoking his nightly cigarette by your side once more, just like that first night in Martinaise.

You rest your arms on the railing as well and try to map his sightline. Your arm presses against his in the cramped space, but he does not react.

“Pretty bitchin’ view here,” you comment. “Comparatively.”

“Mhm,” hums the lieutenant. “By Jamrock standards, quite bitchin’.”

PERCEPTION: His hand dangles loosely over the edge of the railing. It’s a bit smaller than yours and much thinner, bonier. Sharp and angled like a marble sculpture.

ELECTROCHEMISTRY: A work of art. Just like the rest of him.

SUGGESTION: Wonder what that hand would feel like in yours…?

“Everything alright, detective?” Kim asks, smoke escaping from his lips as he speaks. You realize that you’ve been staring at his hand for longer than is generally considered acceptable by polite society.

“Just spacing out a little I guess,” you mumble, averting your gaze.

“Par for the course with you,” the lieutenant chuckles.

VOLITION: Don’t make this too weird. Don’t think about that cigarette dangling loosely from his beautiful hands, or how soft his lips must be, or how nice it would be to just give up all pretense and embarrass yourself and hug him tightly right here on the balcony. Whatever you do, don’t think of any of those things.

CONCEPTUALIZATION: Shit.

“Well, it’s getting late,” you say, stubbing out your half-finished cigarette in the nearby ashtray. “I should probably go.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right. We’ve got work in the morning after all.”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: You do?

VOLITION: Just play it cool.

“Yes,” you say, nodding stoically. “Tomorrow is Monday. I am aware of this, and that is why I said that in the first place, and not for any other reason.”

SAVOIR FAIRE: Nailed it.

“Tomorrow is Tuesday,” Kim says flatly, his face expressionless.

“I know that!” you say defensively. “I was just testing you. Come on, Kim, you don’t think I’m really that stupid, do you?”

He starts to say something, then thinks better of it and instead takes a long drag of his cigarette before trying again. “No, detective. I don’t think that.” Then he puts it out on the bottom of his boot and drops it in the ashtray.

The two of you head back into the apartment as the rain starts up again. You pull on your tarpaulin cloak in preparation for the long walk back home. But as you reach the front door, the lieutenant stops you.

“You know, you could just stay here if that would be easier,” he says abruptly, looking tense. “It’s late, and it’s raining, and…”

ESPRIT DE CORPS: ...And the route from here to your home features at least a dozen bars along the way.

EMPATHY: He’s worried you might not be able to resist the siren song of their garish neon signs and blaring dance music spilling out onto the streets like a red carpet unfurling.

“And your injury,” he adds quickly. “It was causing you some pain earlier, wasn’t it?”

HALF LIGHT: You don’t need his *pity.*

INLAND EMPIRE: Maybe you *do.* He knows you too well already.

EMPATHY: And, for whatever reason, cares about you a little too much. A terrible decision on his part, really.

“Yeah, good point. Plus your place is closer anyway,” you reply. “Thanks. Sorry to impose.”

He gives you a little nod. “It’s no trouble at all.”

Soon, you’re settled in on Kim’s couch under a small pile of blankets that still smell like artificial flowers, cloying and too sweet, freshly laundered.

He says good night and disappears into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him. It’s strange somehow, lying here in his living room alone in the dark. Like you’re somewhere you shouldn’t be. Like sneaking into a museum after it closes.

PERCEPTION: In the hazy twilight of impending sleep, you notice a calendar on the wall across from you. You can just barely make it out in the dim light, and you realize something.

“Son of a bitch,” you shout, “tomorrow *is* Monday!”

Just before you retreat into the blanket nest you could swear you hear a muffled apology from the next room.