Empire E2 2015, Livia Cascade
Some prompts! If there's anything else you'd like me to write, please do comment here or on the prompts post.
Fake Liao Visions, for nocturnalhippy and roisie
It is hilarious, that’s the problem. It’s pitched just right for someone who’s now heard years worth of these - making light of it but taking it seriously enough that all the motifs are funny, and maybe even making people less terrified of the real thing. (Serious is good. Terrified, though? That’s exhausting for them, and for whoever’s trying to reassure them.)
Adam, when he hears about it, laughs so hard he can barely speak for five minutes.
I find the man responsible, who’s sitting a few feet away, and congratulate him, offering suggestions on how to do the Nicovar special for more entertaining effect.
And then… and then. And then it isn’t funny anymore, not without caveats, because this is my friend’s life’s work -
(and possibly entire life, thinking back to what state Haros is still in -)
and I try to explain this to Balthazar when we meet later, that it’s nothing personal, that part of the Civil Service take this very seriously because it’s their job to -
(and that’s another few years before I am even thinking of taking the oath -)
and I still find it funny, I realise, joking about it with Ed later while copying out tedious prophecy.
It just can’t be funny for everyone.
Tears, for loopymushroom
Oh, Clarice.
I remember our conversation at Bronwen’s Rest, and I would offer you a hug, but Catalina’s there to do the job much better than I could. I would offer sympathy, but right now I am writing down everything you say, thinking through what details you’ve mentioned out of order, trying to put together the narrative, and so I hear your tears, I do, and I understand them, but I’m not the one to help you with them.
(Your guide has not had the best of times in the vision - once again - and is lucky to come out just with a headache and something that looks minor and will only be serious the next morning.)
Better to feel sorrow over this one now, to cry when it’s still new, I think. Better to have it clear why it hurts. Better that than have it come back to you again and again each time you learn more.
Infodump, for duckbunny
So there are two ways to go about this - Insight to start with and delay the account, or start with the account and delay any Insight until you’re done, or until whatever is wrong with the visionary gets in the way so much that you have no choice but to diagnose and exorcise it.
(Solas is patient - all he asks is that I actually explain what’s wrong with them, and he’s got Maximilian and me to hand - and he is reliable to work with, even if I sometimes just want to fight the man until he stops being so smug. I don’t think I’ve seen him not under Chasuble of Majesty for over a year.)
Mari tells her story, but it’s out of order and she’s obviously struggling - and she’s quiet and the Hub is noisy, and I am tired and need to lean very close to her to hear what she says, and I can’t read her lips and write at the same time - and so once I’ve got enough of it to put together the story, we check her soul, exorcise her, and then restart...
And the account is full, and in order, and exactly what I was looking for, and if she has missed any small details we can go and get them from her first account, and my only problem now is I can’t write quite fast enough to keep up.
'What do you want from me?', for nayela (IC dialogue paraphrased somewhat as I don't remember it exactly)
I get dinner at Tykes with a friend - just the one - and a treacherous part of my mind is thinking this is almost a date as we head to get food, the same part that knows it’s not, the same part that doesn’t care because it’s good to have time with friends when they’re not busy with other things, other worries. Or other people.
We eat, we talk, I make a few jokes, and it’s not the same, his sense of humour is more serious. (He’s not a replacement. Don’t be stupid.) Back to scholastic matters. Safer topics.
And the conversation gets more personal, and one of us has said something that’s reminded him of sadder times.
And in an attempt to reassure him, I reach out a hand to pat him on the elbow -
- and he freezes, nervously. Of course - he has other good friends in Urizen, he knows what these things mean, he read that letter from me over the winter and yes, of course now things are significantly more awkward.
He makes apologies and attempts to leave - I counter with a request that just makes things worse - it comes to nothing and he gets up to leave while I sit and wonder how, and why, I managed to fuck everything up so comprehensively.
Something in me prompts me to follow while I still can, scrabbling to collect my things, and keep sight of the black-and-silver robes rounding corners just ahead of me. I catch up to him just short of the Urizen camp.
"I’m sorry about that, I don’t know what I was thinking, I just..."
"What do you want from me?" he asks me. Plaintive. Almost panicked.
Too many things I could say. Most wrong, or too hard to explain. Even the true things - I want you as a friend, I want to be able to help you, you’re not even from Urizen so how are you twitchier than I am - barely come to mind. All of them are worse than the silence that stretches out after his question.
"...I don’t know," I say, finally, sounding - and feeling - helpless.
"Once you have an answer to that question, perhaps we can move forward. Until then..."
He leaves for Phoenix Reach, again.
This time I do not follow.
Fragment
No, you don’t understand, you think this is just an interesting piece of historical writing. At least Ed knew how I might react, knew what he might see on my face when I read it.
I am annoyed, almost angry at those to whom I read this who I thought might be interested, and yet don’t react, or seem to care.
It’s an almost physical relief to read the fragment to Iulian and hear a quiet "...oh." of understanding, that sense I fear only we share of living - and losing - something important that has been dead for centuries.
(It’s the same place! The same phrasing! How can I not care? How can it not be calling back? To something I’ve lost, to something I cannot find in Highguard now, surely, they’ve changed too much, and this is not the Way, this is earlier, but it’s mine...
If I were lineaged, perhaps they’d say I was going mad, thinking about this so much.
That would be a good excuse, wouldn’t it?)
Fake Liao Visions, for nocturnalhippy and roisie
It is hilarious, that’s the problem. It’s pitched just right for someone who’s now heard years worth of these - making light of it but taking it seriously enough that all the motifs are funny, and maybe even making people less terrified of the real thing. (Serious is good. Terrified, though? That’s exhausting for them, and for whoever’s trying to reassure them.)
Adam, when he hears about it, laughs so hard he can barely speak for five minutes.
I find the man responsible, who’s sitting a few feet away, and congratulate him, offering suggestions on how to do the Nicovar special for more entertaining effect.
And then… and then. And then it isn’t funny anymore, not without caveats, because this is my friend’s life’s work -
(and possibly entire life, thinking back to what state Haros is still in -)
and I try to explain this to Balthazar when we meet later, that it’s nothing personal, that part of the Civil Service take this very seriously because it’s their job to -
(and that’s another few years before I am even thinking of taking the oath -)
and I still find it funny, I realise, joking about it with Ed later while copying out tedious prophecy.
It just can’t be funny for everyone.
Tears, for loopymushroom
Oh, Clarice.
I remember our conversation at Bronwen’s Rest, and I would offer you a hug, but Catalina’s there to do the job much better than I could. I would offer sympathy, but right now I am writing down everything you say, thinking through what details you’ve mentioned out of order, trying to put together the narrative, and so I hear your tears, I do, and I understand them, but I’m not the one to help you with them.
(Your guide has not had the best of times in the vision - once again - and is lucky to come out just with a headache and something that looks minor and will only be serious the next morning.)
Better to feel sorrow over this one now, to cry when it’s still new, I think. Better to have it clear why it hurts. Better that than have it come back to you again and again each time you learn more.
Infodump, for duckbunny
So there are two ways to go about this - Insight to start with and delay the account, or start with the account and delay any Insight until you’re done, or until whatever is wrong with the visionary gets in the way so much that you have no choice but to diagnose and exorcise it.
(Solas is patient - all he asks is that I actually explain what’s wrong with them, and he’s got Maximilian and me to hand - and he is reliable to work with, even if I sometimes just want to fight the man until he stops being so smug. I don’t think I’ve seen him not under Chasuble of Majesty for over a year.)
Mari tells her story, but it’s out of order and she’s obviously struggling - and she’s quiet and the Hub is noisy, and I am tired and need to lean very close to her to hear what she says, and I can’t read her lips and write at the same time - and so once I’ve got enough of it to put together the story, we check her soul, exorcise her, and then restart...
And the account is full, and in order, and exactly what I was looking for, and if she has missed any small details we can go and get them from her first account, and my only problem now is I can’t write quite fast enough to keep up.
'What do you want from me?', for nayela (IC dialogue paraphrased somewhat as I don't remember it exactly)
I get dinner at Tykes with a friend - just the one - and a treacherous part of my mind is thinking this is almost a date as we head to get food, the same part that knows it’s not, the same part that doesn’t care because it’s good to have time with friends when they’re not busy with other things, other worries. Or other people.
We eat, we talk, I make a few jokes, and it’s not the same, his sense of humour is more serious. (He’s not a replacement. Don’t be stupid.) Back to scholastic matters. Safer topics.
And the conversation gets more personal, and one of us has said something that’s reminded him of sadder times.
And in an attempt to reassure him, I reach out a hand to pat him on the elbow -
- and he freezes, nervously. Of course - he has other good friends in Urizen, he knows what these things mean, he read that letter from me over the winter and yes, of course now things are significantly more awkward.
He makes apologies and attempts to leave - I counter with a request that just makes things worse - it comes to nothing and he gets up to leave while I sit and wonder how, and why, I managed to fuck everything up so comprehensively.
Something in me prompts me to follow while I still can, scrabbling to collect my things, and keep sight of the black-and-silver robes rounding corners just ahead of me. I catch up to him just short of the Urizen camp.
"I’m sorry about that, I don’t know what I was thinking, I just..."
"What do you want from me?" he asks me. Plaintive. Almost panicked.
Too many things I could say. Most wrong, or too hard to explain. Even the true things - I want you as a friend, I want to be able to help you, you’re not even from Urizen so how are you twitchier than I am - barely come to mind. All of them are worse than the silence that stretches out after his question.
"...I don’t know," I say, finally, sounding - and feeling - helpless.
"Once you have an answer to that question, perhaps we can move forward. Until then..."
He leaves for Phoenix Reach, again.
This time I do not follow.
Fragment
No, you don’t understand, you think this is just an interesting piece of historical writing. At least Ed knew how I might react, knew what he might see on my face when I read it.
I am annoyed, almost angry at those to whom I read this who I thought might be interested, and yet don’t react, or seem to care.
It’s an almost physical relief to read the fragment to Iulian and hear a quiet "...oh." of understanding, that sense I fear only we share of living - and losing - something important that has been dead for centuries.
(It’s the same place! The same phrasing! How can I not care? How can it not be calling back? To something I’ve lost, to something I cannot find in Highguard now, surely, they’ve changed too much, and this is not the Way, this is earlier, but it’s mine...
If I were lineaged, perhaps they’d say I was going mad, thinking about this so much.
That would be a good excuse, wouldn’t it?)