RP: Hawke (hawke_groundzero_fadewalk)

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders moved through the guest wing, heading for Hawke's room.

Neria wanted him back. Of all the things that might have happened when he got dumped in this shithole away from the people he cared about, that was not one of them. It was a small comfort when he was not nearly as confident as she that they would ever get out of here, but a comfort nonetheless, a tiny warm feeling in the center of his chest that he clung to, afraid it might gutter and go out.

Nevertheless, she was preoccupied with Alistair, as it should be after their time apart, and this place, for all it apparently had half-crazed templars running amok, was entirely too quiet for his liking. It made his skin crawl and Justice uneasy. The spirit almost never stopped his muttering when they were alone, preferring to lurk in the back of Anders' mind and keep up a steady diatribe against the wrongness of this place and his longing for the real Fade, just out of reach as it was, and now of course his anger against Meredith. Combine that with Anders' own loneliness, and he really felt he might go out of his head if he didn't find something to distract him. That, or he would go on a hunt for Meredith and not stop until Justice's fingers were wrapped around her throat, and Neria had made it clear she had good reasons for not wanting that to happen, as much as it gave him pause.

So. Here he was, outside Hawke's door. It was his duty as a healer to check in on her recovery anyways, right?

He knocked.

Comments

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders stretched one gangly arm out and tipped his chair forward at the same time to flick her knee.

"Yes, that much I had gathered," he said, nodding.

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

Hawke caught the rung of the back of the chair with her foot, nearly pulling him over as she leaned forward to flick his nose in retaliation. She unhooked her foot to let the legs of the chair thump back into the floor. "So? You could at least talk to her about it, what she thinks the risks are. Maybe that would help Justice be a little quieter?"

She huffed, staring at the ceiling. "It's easier to help you jerks when you come to my house and say, 'hey could you kill this guy?' or 'please Hawke just steal this one little thing for me!'."

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders let out a squawk of surprise as his chair clattered back to the ground. He rubbed his forehead and conceded. "You may be onto something there."

Still, the mention of houses and simplicity made him look pained and guilty again. He looked at the floor.

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

"Sorry." Hawke grimaced, running her hands into her hair. Years since she'd had a house, but there it was, still etched in her mind, home. And knowing the man sitting there he blamed himself for his Hawke having to flee hers.

"I just meant I wish I was more help." She wet her lips and reached out tentatively, patted his arm lightly over the coat before letting it fall into her lap. "Anything you need, though, okay?"

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders looked up at her through his lashes.

"Honestly, you help by existing, Hawke. You may be the most normal thing I've encountered here."

He colored lightly and looked away again.

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

"Normal! Now that's something I've never once been accused of before..." Hawke grinned at him from under her fringe, and shook her head. "I'm actually not convinced you'd know it if you saw it, this--" she brought her hands up, wrapping the word in air-quotes, "--'normal'."

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders wrinkled his nose at her. "Perhaps my definition differs from most everyone else's, but I hardly think that makes it less valid, Hawke."

He stretched out a boot to nudge one of her feet.

"Normal is your sardonic jokes and your weird acceptance of me no matter whether or not I deserve it, and maybe I doubted you - her - once, but my constant for three years has always been her regardless of all else. That's normal. And clearly I'm a great mess if I'm latching on to you when you're not even-" he exhaled sharply through his nose. "But it does make it better, somehow."

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

Hawke's pale skin blushed a soft pink as she listened to Anders insist on saying nice things about her. She shrugged, looking down at where her bare foot rested on top of his boot, ears turning pink as well. "Champion of Kirkwall making something better for once. I wish Varric was here to write that down."

She shifted, looking back up at him. "You know I was angry. About the Chantry. For weeks I didn't speak to you - him. I mean I dragged him onto the boat, made sure he didn't throw himself overboard, made sure he ate. But I wouldn't speak to him. Bethany was in the Circle and I couldn't believe you'd - he'd endanger her like that without telling me the truth."

She let out a long, ragged sigh. "Eventually I stopped being so furious and by then we had to split up, all of us. And I was sure that I wasn't ever going to see that stupid coat ever again, or that stupid hair, or your idiot face." She squinted, hiding tears. "But I'm really glad you're here too, and I'm glad it helps you, even if I'm not the right Hawke."

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders winced. He looked down at where his arms rested on the back of the chair.

"I expected that of her," he admitted. "Well, I expected to be dead, but after - when I wasn't - I expected her anger. And she was shocked, yes, but she - she refused to give it to me."

"We were on the ship when I got pulled here." He lifted one hand and flexed it. "One moment, her hand in mine, and Fenris right behind me, the next..." He shrugged, and the grief in his eyes was incalculable. He looked like a man who'd lost part of his soul, and after all he had been willing to give up for the sake of his cause only to have it gifted back to him against all hope and then torn away again cruelly and without reason, perhaps that wasn't too far off.

After a moment, he said, "You know why I didn't tell you, right? We couldn't let you stop us, and the thought that you might actually want to help instead - that was even more unbearable. The blood had to be on our hands. Not yours. I couldn't let anyone else do that for me."

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

"Love can make any woman an idiot, I guess." Hawke sniffled through her smirk, watching Anders look so desolate. The part of her that wanted, always, to help wanted to pull him close and hug him, pet his hair, but she wasn't sure Justice would let her, and she wasn't sure it would help, or only make the things he'd lost more apparent.

She waved her hands at his explanation. "Yes, yes. Heard it. Still think it's shit logic." She snorted. "To go with an explosive made of shit, right?"

There was a moment where she hesitated, and then shrugged. "I'm tired of arguing the right and the wrong of it. There's just what is, and what isn't. I thought I was done with that too. But, here we are, and no reason for you to justify it to me. You get to do that with her when you get home."

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders looked up, meeting the intense gaze she was giving him, and getting a small furrow between his brows. He wasn't entirely sure how to read that look, for all he'd thought he was getting pretty good at reading all of his Hawke's moods, but something flip-flopped in his stomach at it, so he had to figure it was probably not a bad thought, whatever she was thinking.

"Pfft," he said, getting a smirk of his own. "I think it's safe to say it will be Fenris wanting to know the logic and the morality of it. Cosa is far more likely to want to know why it took me so long, now I can stop and think about it." He shrugged, then grinned wider. "You know she once threatened to burn the Gallows to ashes to Elthina's face."

A woman now dead by Anders' hands, which was a thought sobering enough to wipe the grin from his face. He shook himself slightly. The Divine had tried to get Elthina to leave. She'd had ample opportunities to actually do something that would make a difference in that city. If he started allowing himself regret over what he had done, he was likely to finish what Hawke should have done that day in Lowtown, and then she'd be angry enough to drag him back from the afterlife and murder him again, so that probably was unwise.

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

"No throwing yourself overboard." Hawke's tone was stern as she watched Anders grin fracture, the hollow expression behind it. She'd seen enough of that on the boat when they were fleeing Kirkwall to know what it meant.

She poked him with her toe in the shin. "No one here to snog you back to your senses if you start circling the drain. Unless there's something you and Varric want to tell me?" She couldn't even keep a straight face at that as she waggled her eyebrows.

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders covered his face with both hands.

"Oh, Maker, you did not just say that. I'm going to pretend you didn't say that. The horror. Ugh," he shuddered violently. "I'm never going to get the images that conjures out of my brain."

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

"What is that? Varric isn't-- you can't just-- Maker's balls! What's wrong with Varric?" Hawke sounded actually affronted, the blush fitful and high in her cheeks. "Oh, you prefer your men actively threatening your life, maybe, hmm?"

[thecryoftheseagulls]

"No, I prefer men I don't have to bend in half to kiss," he shuddered again. "And men who aren't going to write fiction about our exploits in bed," again with the shuddering, "and just men who aren't Varric, okay, that's just weird."

"Nothing against Varric, I'm sure he and his crossbow are very happy, I just...ew."

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

Hawke's mouth had twisted into a deeper scowl as Anders talked. When he mentioned Bianca, she looked away, face blank for a brief flash, until she was all lazy smirk again. "Yeah, Varric and his crossbow, fighting for the Inquisition, writing stories about the Herald of Andraste. Exciting things, important people." She stretched, arms over her head, in a slow, long arch.

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders blinked several times as he picked up on this array of emotions on Hawke's face, and then he peered rather intently at her for longer than was entirely comfortable.

"....No," he scoffed, amber eyes widening. "You - what. You didn't."

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

Hawke's eyes grew huge and panicked and she shook her head vigorously. "No! No, sweet baby Andraste's shitty diaper, Anders. He's my best friend." Her throat worked as she swallowed around the way that caught in her throat. "Friend. Friiieeeend. I can spell it if you want."

She rolled her eyes, trying desperately to stuff this back down. She had never even kissed Varric, had never admitted to him that she had dreams about his hands, would probably never tell him that when she'd been wandering through the Fade, hearing his voice in her head had given her something to hold onto so she didn't lose herself entirely.

She huffed. "And even if I was going to go there, Varric isn't into human women. Too tall, maybe?" She shrugged, and waved a dismissive hand.

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders said, "Uh-huh," in a highly skeptical tone of voice.

He rested his arms on the back of the chair again, making a fist to plop his chin down on, and mused, "Yes, friend. Best friend. Varric and my Hawke are practically the same person. It can be a little freaky, to be honest. I've known them to finish each other's sentences, tell the punchlines of the same jokes at exactly the same time in exactly the same tone of voice...hm." He stroked his chin. "Yes, entirely possible they could have been soulmates in another world. Of course my Hawke has this thing...where she likes to feel needed? Like she can help us poor damaged sods. Don't tell her I know about it, if you meet her. Anyways. That leaves Varric out because he's entirely too well-adjusted. But you..."

He squinted at her and looked dangerously delighted with this turn of events.

"And you should have seen this Varric before you showed up. Moping in his cups, he was."

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

Hawke had never been this red before. Probably. She put her hands over ears and buried her face in her knees. "You're a horrible man, I hate you, and I'm going to strangle you with that stupid bloody bandage you wear on your boot." She tipped her chin up to glare at him. "Don't, Anders. Please don't. I-- you--" She let out a sharp exhale through her nose.

"If - if - what you were saying had any basis in fact on my end, Varric doesn't deserve the shit I pack around in my pockets any more than he's already had to deal with." She tilted her head, wincing at something that she thought, or heard, or felt, and then shook it away. She sounded near tears, the thought of Varric feeling guilty over her presumed death in the Fade strangling her.

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders looked rather smug at the threats and totally unperturbed. He did, however, give her a thoughtful look, his eyes gentling.

"Frankly, sweetheart, that's nugshit. You don't carry around anymore shit than the rest of us, and you're the first one to go about declaring we all deserve happiness and whatnot, so I don't buy that. At all."

"Also, there is the fact to be considered that Varric appears to rather like that sort of thing. I always thought the flawed hero type appealed to him the most. Why do you think it's always been you he was friends with?"

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

The fringe falling over her forehead hid the worst of Hawke's consternation, but she widened her eyes in mock-affront. "Flawed hero type? Who are you calling bloody flawed?"

She sighed, expression turning sad, and slightly distant. "I'm happy. Fairly thrilled to be here, even if I'm sure I shouldn't be." She smiled, wan and lopsided and ran her fingers through her hair. "So, see, no reason to go rocking any boats or tipping any apple carts. Just being... happy. Really, really happy."

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders merely gave her a cheeky grin and nudged at her foot with his boot again.

"Mmm," he said, giving her a stealthily considering look, and notably not agreeing to not tipping over apple carts and what have you.

[hawke_groundzero_fadewalk]

Hawke just sighed, long-suffering as any doting, underappreciated mother, and shook her head. "Now I have a headache. Some healer you are." She wrinkled her nose. "You want to be useful, bring me something to eat and stop worrying about impossible things."

She made a shooing motion and picked up her journal, burying her nose in it, eyes glaring over the edge at Anders until he left.

(OOC: Close this thread up so Anders can go be tortured about Fenris and Hawke can bother Varric?)

[thecryoftheseagulls]

Anders wiggled his fingers and summoned enough magic to heal any headache she might have and then slunk to his feet, putting the chair back against the wall.

"Right. Food. Coming right up."

He paused right at the door to say, "You know worrying about impossible things is our specialty, though, right?" The grin he gave her that time was decidedly unrepentant, but he quickly ushered himself out the door and shut it behind him before she could respond. Or throw something at him.

(OOC: Sounds perfect!)