#but my immediate response was 'no! callum would Never torture someone' | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

iwillhaveamoonbase · 4 years

Text

Replay ch. 1

Did I start yet ANOTHER AU? Yes, I did. Callum, Ezran, Soren, and Claudia run a popular YouTube channel while Rayla is a lawyer that Callum asks to model for him. Plans for the fic to be rated E down the line.

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

Callum smiled as he sat in front of the camera, Ezran, Soren and Claudia to his side. “Hello, everyone and welcome to the first video of our new channel. My name is Callum Evans.”

“I’m Ezran Williams.”

“Soren Ricci,” Soren winked at the camera.

“And I’m Claudia Ricci.”

Callum nodded. “And we are going to be trying spicy snacks.” Soren and Claudia immediately paled. “We saw the video the Try Guys did and me and Ezran said ‘there’s no way half of that is that hot.’”

“Nope,” Ezran shook his head.

“And I know what you’re thinking, ‘what do you four know about spice?’ Well, first, Ezran and I are actually half-siblings. Our mom and aunt are half-Thai and half-Korean, and if you know anything about Thai or Korean food, it’s really spicy. My dad was mostly German and Irish, but he spent a lot of summers in India and the Sichuan area of China due to his parents’ work as translators. So, there’s that spicy food again.”

“And my dad is half-Jamaican and half-African-American. If you’ve never had Jamaican food, it uses a lot of herbs and spices to make everything on the flavor profile. My grandmother, in connecting to her roots, started getting really into traditional African cuisine which tends to involve a lot of chili and warming spices. Also, our aunt is married to a lovely woman from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, so we’ve had lot of Congolese cooking as well. The ultimate comfort food in our house is probably a West African spicy peanut soup.”

“If you’ve never had it, go make some right now,” Callum nodded.

Soren gulped. “Claudia and I are terrible with spicy food. I am also mildly lactose intolerant so I really hope there is no cheese here.”

“Hate it,” Claudia said. “I like a good cake or ice cream.”

“Clauds is super into dessert.”

Ezran smiled. “As am I. My favorite flavor profile is sweet. I got our mom’s sweet tooth. While Callum’s got a thing for spice.”

Callum nodded. “My step-dad, Ezran’s dad, not only grew-up on Jamaican and traditional African dishes, he also grew-up with Brazilian neighbors who would bring traditional Brazilian barbeque, called churrasco, to all the neighborhood cook-outs. Well, let’s stop talking about it. Let’s get down to this. We have all ten items the Try Guys used-”

Claudia gasped. “Please tell me you didn’t get those rock candies!?”

“Of course, I did!” Callum set all the items on the table in the box he had put them before pulling out the candies.

Soren groaned. “NOOO. We’re gonna die.”

Ezran sniffed. “No, it’s a psychological thing where your brain is saying it’s on fire.”

“That doesn’t make it better.”

Callum smiled. “Let’s do this! First,” Callum took out the Cheetos, “Flaming Hot Cheetos. The Try Guys didn’t use the chili lime ones, which I find a shame, because there’s more flavor in those even though they aren’t quite as spicy.”

“I agree,” Ezran said as he opened the bag. “Chili lime is a classic flavor combination. Put it on mango and I am pretty happy.” The bag was passed and they all tried one. “Not spicy at all.”

Callum ate another. “Nope. They’re good, but there’s no real heat there.”

Soren groaned. “This is perfect for me. It’s got a bit of heat, but it’s not overwhelming.”

Claudia nodded. “I agree. I don’t want to go hotter.”

Callum shook his head. “For those of you who are wondering, Soren and Claudia are siblings and childhood friends of me and Ezran. Their dad and our dad are best friends. But, when they come over for dinner, our family has to seriously downgrade the spice level or else these two freak out.”

“And,” Ezran interrupted, “when we go to their place, we have to bring our own hot sauce. Well, that’s mostly Callum. He carries hot sauce in his bag.”

“That’s because mango chutney doesn’t travel well.”

“See, mango chutney is almost going into too hot territory for me. At least, the brand Callum buys is.”

“That’s because I buy authentic and get it shipped directly from a company that makes traditional chutneys here in the States. Next snack; Takis Fuego.” Callum held up the bag. “This time, we got the chili lime!”

“Chili lime!” Ezran pumped both his arms up.

Callum opened the bag and took one, passing it to Ezran before moving it on to Soren and Claudia. “What I taste most is that lime flavor, which is fine with me. I want it hotter, but I love lime, so I’m not complaining.”

“It’s not bad,” Claudia affirmed. “I actually do like this. Like you said, that lime is what’s really hitting, but the spicy is there.”

Ezran hummed. “Can I have the rest of the bag when we’re done?”

“Sure.”

Soren blinked a bit. “I think it’s spicier than you guys are giving it credit, but it’s pretty good. I would take that lime flavor over the chili.”

“It adds to it Soren.”

“Chili is pain!”

“Life is pain!” Callum retorted.

Claudia rolled her eyes. “Not another ‘Princess Bride’ reference. You watched it once and you wouldn’t stop quoting it.”

“Inconceivable.”

Ezran raised a brow. “‘You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.’” Callum laughed, high-fiving Ezran as Soren and Claudia watched on.

“Nerds,” Claudia and Soren sang out.

“Proud of it,” came Ezran and Callum’s reply.

“OK,” Ezran said. “What’s next?”

Callum looked at his notes. “Pulparindo! Tamarind candy.” Callum handed each of them their own packet. “It’s kind of like a fruit leather.”

They went through all the snacks, Soren and Claudia progressively begging for milk as they went. “MILK!” Soren gasped on the Carolina Reaper jerky.

“You’re lactose intolerant, Soren,” Claudia coughed.

“MILDLY.”

“You guys got soy milk?”

Callum nodded. “I keep some in the fridge in case Aunt Amaya comes over.” Soren ran for the fridge in Callum’s house. They weren’t planning on saying anything if the channel continued, but they were currently in Callum’s father’s childhood home. His grandparents rented it out to him for school because they had moved into a retirement community. He had completely renovated it and now had this room designed just for these videos. “You OK, Soren? We’ve got one last item, the Sonoran Spice Company’s Carolina Reaper Pebbles.”

“NOOOOO!” came Soren’s scream from the kitchen.

Ezran started laughing, taking a handful of the leftover Takis. “Come on, Soren! You’ve come this far.”

Claudia looked close to sobbing as she looked at the snacks on the table. “It’s so hot. I can’t taste my own tongue.”

“You can’t taste your tongue, Clauds.”

“SHUT UP.”

Ezran laughed at the two as Callum snuck a few Takis for himself. “For those of you at home, there is no denying that that jerky is hot. Callum and I just crave the heat while Soren and Claudia do not.”

Soren finally came back, sighing as he looked at the camera. “I’m gonna die.”

Callum opened the candy, pouring a few into his hands and passing it over to the others. Ezran took more while Soren and Claudia each only took two. “That’s all you want?” Callum asked.

“YES,” came the combined response from Soren and Claudia. The four put it in their mouths together. Immediately, Soren and Claudia freaked out, reaching for the white bread Callum had brought them earlier. Callum and Ezran coughed a bit, but, for the most part, they had built up a tolerance that didn’t make it as painful as if they had gone right to the candy.

Ezran nodded. “It’s hot. No denying it. But, I think the jerky was hotter.”

Callum nodded as well. “No doubt, jerky was a bit hotter. But I picked the candy last because of how the Try Guys reacted to it. I was wondering if maybe it was the hottest thing.”

“It’s too hot,” Claudia said around a mouthful of bread. “It’s like torture.” Soren whimpered in response, gulping more of his soy milk.

“Well, I guess that’s all the time we got. Please subscribe to our channel as we continue to, most likely, eat food or, maybe just do whatever we want. ‘Til next time.”

Soren turned to Callum. “Why do you get to do the sign-off?”

“Because this was my idea.”

“You almost killed me!”

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

Rayla snorted as she walked into the cheese shop with her coworkers. Maybe it was Runaan’s influence, but she was a bit of a cheese snob. Scottish food was mostly friend, but Runaan had grown up in England and spent a few years in France, leading to strong feelings about what made a good cheese, but she had not been impressed with any of the cheeses her coworkers considered ‘good.’ “I’m telling you, you have to go to an actual cheesemonger. The grocery is not good enough. At least go to a delicatessen.”

“Rayla, we’re lawyers. We don’t have time to go to a cheesemonger and have them select a variety of cheeses for us.”

“We do blue sky, fraud. We have time.” Rayla walked in, making sure her suit was still well-pressed. She didn’t like a wrinkled suit when she paid good money to get it dry-cleaned. When they looked around, they saw a group of four at a table, several cameras around them and a few people also there. Her cheesemonger, Marcos, was talking to them. She saw a jar of one of her favorites, Meredith Dairy Marinated Goat, on the table. “The kind they have on the table? It’s really good. Spreads amazingly on bread.”

One of the guys at the table, a young man with green eyes looked over and did a double-take. She made eye contact, slightly startled by just how green his eyes were. The rest of the table looked over at the group, a few jaws hanging open. Marcos smiled over at her, walking over. “Rayla! Sorry, we’re filming a video right now. Did you want to get your usual?”

“That’ll work. I was hoping to convert my coworkers to actual decent cheese because if I went to one more office party where someone brought an unaged cheddar and no other options, I was going to lose my mind.”

“Got it. Let me go get that cheese for you.”

Rayla’s coworker raised a brow. “Now what?”

“We go back to the office and try it. Because once it gets home, it’s not leaving my apartment unless it’s part of my lunch.” Rayla walked around the shop, ignoring the video going on until she heard some hissing. She turned her head, making eye contact with the boy from before again. He gulped, walking forward. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of her coworkers, Kasef, glare at him. “Back off, Kasef,” she muttered to herself.

“Hey,” the guy stuttered a bit as he made it to her.

“Hello,” she answered. His eyes went wider, probably at her distinctly Scottish accent. “Yes, my accent is real. I grew up in Aberdeen, Scotland. Can I help you?”

The boy flushed. “Yes, actually. My name is Callum Evans. I’m an artist and I would love to paint you.”

Rayla tilted her head. It was a unique come-on. “What’s that video your doing? Art?”

“YouTube. It’s a thing I do with my brother and my childhood friends. Being an artist isn’t the most lucrative thing if you don’t do graphic design. I do commissions and try to sell my art, but there’s always low points. YouTube helps off-set that.”

“Fair. YouTubers don’t really have a good reputation.”

“I know. We’re not involved in any of that drama or crazy stuff going on. Claudia does make-up, but, she mostly sticks within our circle of food YouTubers.”

“Mostly food?”

“Mostly food.”

Rayla nodded. “How do I know you’re an artist?”

Callum reached for his phone. “Here’s my Instagram and a couple of my sketches that I haven’t posted yet.” He handed her the phone for her to look through.

“You sure you trust me with your phone?”

“Not really, but I’m a stranger asking to draw you. Some level of give and take has to happen here.”

“I agree.” Rayla went through his art, humming as she saw the variety of subjects, though he tended to focus on people. There were a lot of pictures of the same three women. “You like drawing women?”

“That’s my mom, my aunt, and my aunt’s wife. You’ll also see pictures of my grandmothers and Claudia.” Rayla looked closely at a few of the pictures. She could see the family resemblance between him and some of the women, particularly in the jawline and cheekbones.

She paused on a picture of one of the women he looked like and another one of the three he drew often. They were smiling at each other, flushes on their cheeks. “This picture is beautiful.”

“Thanks. That was at their engagement party.”

“I’m sold.”

“Really?” Callum asked, looking like he couldn’t believe she would say yes. She couldn’t believe it either.

“I have four parents. My biological parents are bodyguards for a member of the royal family and were travelling a lot so I was raised by their best friends, Runaan and Ethari. I got a lot of teasing as a kid for having two dads. If you can draw these two as unabashedly in love as you do, I’m sold on you as a person. I’m Rayla Burrows.” She stuck out her head, giving a slight smile as a he took it. “You have a decent grip.”

“My step-dad taught me how to do a good handshake. Can I have your number so we can plan this?”

“Do you have a studio?”

“Yes…in my house.”

Rayla paused. “Would it bother you if I asked someone I know to come?”

“Not at all. Whatever makes you comfortable.” They exchanged numbers and Callum walked off, looking back at her every few moments. Marcos finally came back with her cheese, smiling. As she walked out of the shop with her coworkers, she cast one last look at the group. Callum Evans…interesting.

#rayllum #rayllum fanfic #tdp #the dragon prince #au #moonbase fanfics #replay

17 notes · View notes

rosalind-of-arden · 4 years

Text

Sword and Pen Reread, chapter 16

Time for things to get stabby! Long post. Some discussion of a canon torture incident (y’all know which one).

We left off last chapter with Dario making his dramatic entrance. We pick up here with Wolfe lecturing Jess, Morgan talking to Dario, and Glain sending Codex messages. Who is Glain messaging? Her squad? Santi? Khalila?

Jess admits he’s dying, and Wolfe shows a flash of emotion - Jess can’t tell if it’s anguish or anger. I think Wolfe is seeing himself in Jess here. Jess’s “Getting killed for something worthwhile is better than dying alone” echoes Wolfe’s death letter from Ash and Quill: “I hope I died for something, as I lived for it.” Wolfe in Smoke and Iron, too; he’s not afraid to go into the Colosseum and probably die fighting, but the thought of dying slowly and helplessly in prison terrifies him. He understands exactly what Jess is thinking, and that hurts.

Why did I go back and reread that whole letter? There’s something in my eye now.

Second page of the chapter, here’s Jess thinking that his friends have made him a better person, while his family’s influence makes him worse. His impulse to kill the Archivist comes from his family, and he expects his friends would disapprove. Interesting parallel with Dario later in the chapter.

Wolfe’s discomfort with violence again? He neither agrees nor disagrees with Jess’s argument about killing the Archivist. He just shakes his head and gets on with the scheming.

But this isn’t just a moral “is it ok to kill the Archivist” thing, necessarily. For Wolfe, especially, there might be a lot of vindication in seeing the Archivist formally and publicly accused and tried for his crimes. Obviously, he’s not going to admit that outright, but it could very well influence his stance on what to do with the Archivist (and co-conspirators).

And why isn’t Wolfe getting into this argument with Jess? He knows how much vengeance means to Jess. With Jess dying, Wolfe doesn’t want to have an argument that would hurt Jess unless it’s absolutely necessary. Wolfe might also know just how much of the “we need to kill the bastard” talk is emotion talking, too. After all, in the end, Jess is surprisingly compassionate toward the dying Archivist. And Jess wasn’t completely on board with assassination when Anit first brought it up earlier in the book, either. If anyone can recognize angry bluster, it would be Wolfe. Echoes there of Wolfe in Ash and Quill telling Jess how well he knows him.

Wolfe goes to talk to Glain and Dario (there’s the planning team), leaving Morgan with Jess. He’s giving those two a private moment - does he know they broke up? Probably not? But also, keeping his distance from Morgan after the energy draining incident?

Morgan and Jess, bonding over their mutual decisions to sacrifice themselves for the people and cause they care about.

Dario’s first response to being asked to lure the Archivist into a trap: “I’ve had enough of intrigue.” He’s still deeply hurt by the betrayal. He doesn’t want to do anything like that again. But here’s Glain trying to talk him into it. What message is Dario getting here? That his friends need him to be a bad person. Ouch. Guess what this pushes Dario toward?

Lose Wolfe’s trust, never get it back. He immediately and aggressively rejects the idea of working with Callum because he expects Callum to betray them. Very similar to his reaction to trusting Zara again in Ash and Quill.

Dad Wolfe holds Jess up when Jess just about collapses coughing. Wolfe’s hands are shaking while he holds Jess, which is interesting, since that’s always been a PTSD thing for Wolfe up until now.

Wolfe very much wants to be there to catch the Archivist.

Dad Wolfe, quietly checking in with Jess: “He glanced at Jess, just briefly, but Jess understood that to mean something.” This is a nice moment of understanding between these two. There’s the nonverbal communication, which itself shows how well they understand each other. But then there’s Wolfe, knowing very well that Jess might not want his vulnerability openly acknowledged, keeping this little check-in quiet. Jess does choose to explain, but Wolfe’s not demanding that. I suspect he would have accepted just a nod.

Jess says he got a new mask and stronger meds “on the way out”. Intercepted by a Medica? (Medica: ugh, you’re all impossible. Fine, have meds if you’re going to insist on sneaking out.) Or lying?

Magic ring restrictions: no harming anyone unless they’re harming the wearer first, no taking away choices from people.

“My clever father,” Wolfe muttered. “Trust Eskander to find yet another way to make this more difficult.” At this point, Wolfe’s talked to Eskander what, once? On page, at least. And hasn’t exactly had a lot of opportunities for off-page conversations. So where is this coming from? Keria, I’m guessing. Wolfe doesn’t know his father, but I’ll bet he heard plenty about Eskander from his mother, whose view would be... biased, to say the least. Rumors from the Archivist and Artifex, too, maybe - he might have been close enough to either of them in the past to hear them griping about Eskander making trouble in the Iron Tower.

Dario-Wolfe parallels: Wolfe doesn’t want to die in a graveyard because that’s embarrassing, Dario doesn’t want to die like a commoner.

“We’ll make sure everyone knows how royally you bled to death.” Glain gets all the best lines.

Also, though. Here’s Dario saying he doesn’t want to kill the Archivist. He says it’s because he doesn’t want to be killed in revenge for that, but is that it? Or is this another hint at conflicted morality? Or devotion to Khalila, knowing she definitely wants a fair trial?

“Their old dormitory must have contained postulants for the upcoming year.” So, by my guess, this is happening in November. I really, really cannot think of a way this could be happening at the beginning of the school year. It would be hard, even, to push the date into December and say Jess means the new year not school year. So... Alexandria isn’t using the same calendar as us? (Where would that be on the ancient Egyptian/Greek calendar?) Or the Library starts school years irregularly? Or Jess is just out of it and not thinking that this group of postulants would already be pretty far into the program. Eh, let’s go with that. Jess is unreliable.

More Dad Wolfe moments: playful slaps on the head for Jess and Dario. @thegreatlibraryfangirl this is it. The closest thing to a sweet dad moment Dario gets.

I’m kind of sad we don’t get any more Morgan POV. I’d like to know how she’s feeling about Jess when she hugs him here. Questioning her feelings again? Wanting to part on good terms? Just needing a bit of physical comfort and knowing he’ll give it?

So did Callum really set the trap like Jess asked? Or did Callum actually tip the Archivist off, leading the Archivist to send the Elites? I can see him playing both sides.

Also, is this happening before or after Zara shoots the Archivist? Who knows.

““Any last words, Scholar? I’ll be happy to record them and add them to your journal... Oh, sorry, the Archivist has ordered your journals burned.” That’s just vicious. The Archivist didn’t just send his captain to kill Wolfe, he sent him to taunt Wolfe with an extremely sensitive subject first.

Ok, ok, another tiny little Wolfe-Dario moment: “I don’t have followers [...] Do I?” “No, sir [...] I’m afraid not. You’re too unlikable.” So we have some very small signs of affection between Wolfe and Dario, but they’re wrapped up in mock hostility. Fitting for both of them, since neither likes to show emotion or vulnerability, but still. Poor Dario.

“Make it between adults, if you can manage that.” Wolfe, snarking at gunpoint again. And trying to draw the enemy off the kids. (Unconventional patronus/animagus/daemon for Wolfe: a fucking killdeer.)

Interesting parallel here between Wolfe and Morgan tricking the Elites with Morgan’s illusion and Wolfe and Khalila in the Welsh general’s tent. Wolfe and kid tag teaming an enemy. But also parallels with the Philadelphia planning - once again, Wolfe and Morgan plan to save everyone at the cost of overusing Morgan’s power.

Wolfe tries to spare the Elites’ lives, but when he fails at that, he doesn’t hesitate to shoot the captain. But that’s while the captain is still grappling with Jess and Dario. Once the captain surrenders, Wolfe won’t shoot. How much of Wolfe’s thinking on when it’s ok to kill someone is influenced by all his work with Santi in war zones? This seems like a very military code of conduct. Give the enemy a chance to surrender, fight if he doesn’t, stop when he does.

So, the stabbing. It’s easy to see how Dario gets here. He’s spent the whole series characterizing himself as ruthless and willing to make hard choices, and in this book he’s just been told by the people he cares about that he can only help them by doing the dirty work. Over and over, he feels bad about what he has to do (or thinks he has to do), and over and over, he’s told it’s the only way. Add in whatever fucked up family backstory, and this is where he ends up.

This actually reminds me a bit of what @eli-wray said about Jess and Dario’s plan in Ash and Quill. This is an act of self sacrifice for Dario, much like that plan. He’s doing something he feels is wrong but necessary so that other characters don’t have to. In Dario’s view, the only way to get the information is to torture the captain, and his friends are good people so they shouldn’t have to do it. He’ll be the bad one for them.

“I want this to be done, for all our sakes.” Here’s Dario’s main motivation. Dario is tired of this fight. He was tired of it after betraying Spain. He was tired of it at the start of this chapter. Dario just wants to get all of this over with.

Dario’s grinning and threats have Jess freaked out, but we already know Dario is a good actor. I don’t think he’s having as much fun as he pretends he is. Will he feel as bad about this as the betrayal? No. But this is definitely adding to the list of reasons Dario does not think of himself as a good person or worthy of Khalila.

And where does Dario’s act fall apart? It cracks a bit when Wolfe asks him to stop, and he sounds more exhausted and frustrated than gleefully murderous. It shatters when he learns Khalila’s in danger. Genuinely murderous Dario isn’t grinning or taunting anyone. He’s just putting the knife right in the captain’s heart.

Anyway, enough Dario. I’m supposed to be rambling about Wolfe here. So, for obvious reasons, this isn’t going to be comfortable for Wolfe to watch. Jess is oblivious as usual, but we get a couple hints. First, Wolfe’s dialogue. We get “Dario, stop”, then nothing until he checks on Jess as they leave. Short sentences, basic word choices. Twice, Jess notes that “not even Wolfe” said anything. Wolfe gets quiet when he’s triggered. And then there’s the “bleak look in the Scholar’s eyes” at the end of the chapter. There’s more than enough to cause that - Khalila is in danger, Jess and Morgan are dying - but trauma is another cause. Pretty sure his expression has been described as “bleak” before when he’s triggered and/or remembering Rome. This is far from the worst trauma response Wolfe has had, but he’s definitely uncomfortable.

Wolfe might have more pragmatic reasons to object, too. He’s been tortured himself. He probably has a pretty good idea of how likely the captain is to give them true and useful information. This may not even be his first time in this kind of situation - there were those 10 war zones, after all. And sure enough, while the captain does point everyone in sort of the right direction, what he says is as much a taunt as an answer, and it’s leaving out quite a bit - possibly, the captain didn’t even know about the final plan to destroy the Archives. Wolfe would probably expect those problems. Dario doesn’t.

#the great library #sword and pen reread #sword and pen spoilers #canon torture #stabbing

1 note · View note

privilegc-blog · 7 years

Photo

( » » tasks | 018 ; chance encounters. )

“Chance encounters are what keep us going.” — ( x )

a l e x i n i k o l a y e v i c h —

Blair wanted to die. Nine months of torture and never had he thought he wanted to be killed in that entire time. But now, now he was holding a strip he had torn off the bottom of his shirt against the bleeding stump of his arm, and he wanted to be gone, to let go of the cloth and just bleed all this hurt out of his body and finally perish from this painful and mistake ridden thing called life. He could feel the shards of his forearm bones under the fabric, through the blazing pain of it all, and it was a thought that made him want to throw up. A parking lot curb caught at his feet and he nearly screamed at the jostling of his arm, the way fire raced up his ruined limb. Then he was in middle of the street and couldn’t remember how he got from the parking lot to the there.

Up ahead, he could see an intersection filled with four or five shambling undead corpses drawn by his screams and he distantly wondered if that’s where he could die. Instead, his numb mind dimly comprehended a pair of living humans cutting down the danger, his easiest chance of escaping all this pain. He wanted to whine, to mourn the loss of that easy way out. The flashing of their machetes made him shy like a nervous horse and he shuffled backwards, unsure of their intentions, if they wanted to cause him more pain on top of this unbearable pain. His mind and feet stuttered to a stop and he closed his eyes to think, it had been so much easier to think in the dark of his series of rooms.

Before he could process what he had seen and evaluate the threat of it — it was so much harder without the dark he had come to find soft, so much harder without being able to place these people among the numbers of the ring by breathing patterns and voices, maybe it was Tiger coming to guide him — there was a voice addressing him.

“Сын чертовой сучки... You were screams, no?”

Blair tilted his head, chin against chest, they hated him looking like he could see them, it was easier to concentrate that way— none of them had spoken, what was that? Russian? none of them had spoken Russian and while this man’s breathing patterns were elevated from the exertion of killing some of the undead, he didn’t match anyone, why didn’t he match? — and he responded automatically — they hated when he didn’t answer questions immediately outside of interrogations, if he didn’t answer during interrogation he could take it, he could take anything they threw at him — with a cracking voice from the pain.

“Yes, they —”

“It had, no, is happening right now?”

The question confused him, the conflicting tenses of it — yes, it is happening right now, this pain that dominated his senses and rung in his teeth, and yes, it had happened, and yes, it will continue to happen — and he involuntarily looked up, catching random details of the stranger. A spider tattoo crawling up his neck, tattoos covering his hands, icy blue eyes, that was all he caught before his own eyes closed again. Blair filed away all that information — Spider, maybe Tats, no, Spider, he was thin enough for Spider to be true, all knobby long fingers and jutting angles, that’s what he would call him, Spider, was he a new member? but wait, none of the ring spoke Russian — and found his thoughts were interrupted again.

“Why are you closing eyes?”

Blair didn’t open his eyes, pressing his face harder against his shoulder to resist looking. His panic thoughts flitted along — they took away his blindfold, was this a test again? did they want him to make a mistake again? to reinforce a rule he had been breaking? — and his right elbow cradled his face, to block out any visuals as he tried to stem the flow of blood from his other arm.

“You don’t want me to know your faces, that’s why, you told me —”

“I am not them.”

The words were spoken so forcefully that Blair felt like he should be kneeling, and his knees buckled a little — whether from exhaustion or blood loss or need to obey the rules the ring had set out, he was wasn’t sure. Suddenly Spider was ducking under his good arm and the familiar movement unmoored his mind from the present moment.

Tiger was walking him to the next hideout, he’ll be safe for a while with Tiger’s gentle prods and support when he got too tired or a hand to help him when he stumbled. Tiger wouldn’t mind him talking. There was someone else’s hands tying the rag around his arm, but the pain of that wasn’t that bad and Tiger would protect him from the others hurting him too much.

“Tiger, my arm hurts. How much further?”

“Not far.”

“Thank you Tiger.”

“Name not Tiger, am Aleksey Nikolayevich Alexandrov.”

The response brought him back into the present. This wasn’t Tiger, this was Spider. But not Spider, he gave his name, Aleksey Nikolayevich Alexandrov. Aleksey, Aleksey, Aleksey. Blair clung to that name, none of the rest of the ring had ever told him their names, not even Tiger. He felt them turn, his foot caught on a leg of one of the corpses — was Aleksey even part of the ring? was he released from the ring? yes, yes, he was released, they told him that he was carrying a message, yes, he must remember the message, it was important, or was this another attempt at capturing someone? — and Aleksey propped him up more.

“Clear path better, Callum.”

Another name. The other man, the one he hadn’t paid any attention to. His closed eyes made the walk feel like a forever in hell, he wanted to open his eyes but he couldn’t break the rules. A door opened, and noise washed over him, he must be back in the ring’s current hideout or something. Aleksey’s arm tightened around his shoulder and Aleksey’s voice rose, along with another voice behind him.

“Gwen!”

Another name, another blessing of knowing a name. Callum, the other man who was outside and now inside calling out the name from behind him, and Gwen, who they were calling for now. Was Gwen the one he knew as Ice coming to bind up his arm properly? Aleksey’s supporting arm left him, and Blair sunk down to his knees, tired and ready to be shoved in room somewhere so he could open his eyes at last, unbothered by the presence of the ring. The noise around him dropped in volume, and Blair’s brain caught up with him as he kneeled in the silence and darkness behind his eyelids. It was like being back in his rooms.

He realized, in a sudden bolt of clarity, that this must be one of the camps the ring had wanted him to carry the message to. His thoughts were careening around his head with the shock of it — none of the ring would be so careless with names, by now he would have another blindfold if he was recaptured by the ring, why would they release him only to recapture him? these were the first ‘normal’ free people he had encountered, but wait, maybe this was all just an elaborate test, seemed something Major or SS would come up with for fun — and he wanted to curl up on the floor, overwhelmed. Someone knelt next to him, there was another person standing behind him, and another body was in front of him judging by the breathing around him, a flurry of movement that made him stay still out of fear from the unknown. Aleksey spoke from right next to him, placing the breathing beside him to a source.

“This Gwen.” His good hand was brought up and laid on a woman’s shoulder, the body in front of him, her hair brushed his knuckles. That left Callum or some other unnamed member of this camp or the ring behind him. “She is nurse, will take care of you.”

“I’m a healer here, I use to be a nurse — uh, let’s take a look at your arm here.”

By the time he realized he could open his eyes without punishment, Aleksey had disappeared from his view. A spider on a silk strand, gone into the wind.

s h e r m a n d o y l e —

Blair still thought better in the dark, still closed his eyes to think. He was trying to figure out how the man in front of him had been able to survive this long. Words written down, or communicated through hand signs, existing on an entirely visual plane, the opposite of what he had been. Blair tried to imagine his captors having deprived him sound. He thinks he would have gone insane, more than he was had been on an average day. Instead of continuing down that path of thought he turned back to survey the room.

And today was an average day, or at least an average day in his new world. He was on a trading mission with the Capitol, and he was still surprised at the way people took up space. They were standing in a large room, every corner occupied by people free to move, what use to be the state senate. Standing in front of him was one of those such free people, who had never been tied up or locked in a room.

Yet, this man was like him in some ways. He was different. Blair might have a more apparent disability, but this man was deaf, so he knew the feeling of not being ‘normal.’ Blair focused his attention fully on the man. Sherman, was his name ( names were so freely given now, another thing that amazed him ), and he was pointing to his little pad of paper, handing over his communication life line to those someone couldn’t speak his language of hand signs. Him, who couldn’t speak Sherman’s native language, unlike the woman he signed towards who was sitting next to the Capitol’s leader, an entire conversation without a word.

‘Do you have any painkillers?’

The scribbled question made him pause. He did, a bottle of probably expired Advil, it was a part of the load he had packed in the bag on his back. When he loaded his backpack, he hadn’t even thought about the pain relievers, they were just another object in his haul. They weren’t the demon they were to him in the past, no longer a promise of escape in a pill, no longer a wicked temptation. He didn’t feel any of the ugly feelings he use to have when he thought about pills. There were just another good now to trade.

Blair nodded yes, deciding the rest of his response shortly before he wrote it out, neat small capital letters in contrast to the large scrawl of the Capitol’s deaf hunter.

‘What do you have in return?’

And that was that. The day moved on normal, two survivors in a world that didn’t want them to survive. Two men with impairments they overcame and adapted with, one born with and one forced upon, that never would fully dominate who they were.

#hst:task #( » » tasks. )#( » » tasks | 018 ; chance encounters. )#torture mention tw #gore tw #abuse mention tw #first time i've ever described alexi as an animal not a wolf lmao #but i'm publishing this cause it explains a lil backstory of when blair first came to cheyenne #yep he was here for a while at the atlas

1 note · View note

raayllum · 2 months

Text

Time to be wonderfully self indulgent and talk about a scene comparison I've wanted to for a hot second (while pointing very decidedly to This Post for posterity's sake).

So let's talk about the hostage exchanges for Callum and Rayla in 4x09 and 5x08, shall we?

First, let's look at the scene setup.

In 4x09, Rayla is very much the aggressor and pursuant, and the one who — initially — has more power. She has her sword up to Terry's throat, neither him nor Claudia have strong reason to think she wouldn't go through with it, and she explicitly threatens Terry's life precisely because of his importance to Claudia. This is similar as to why Finnegrin threatens Rayla (though there are differences, which we'll get to in a moment), so both elves start out as the aggressor in each scenario.

However, there is soon a shift. Callum's "deal" happens because he escalated violence against Finnegrin (the infamous punch), a tad more similarly perhaps to how Rayla is only threatening Terry because she believes Claudia and co. are a threat to the whole world. Now to be fair, Claudia is only threatening Rayla's parents because Rayla is threatening Terry, but we can assume she had the realization of their connection to Rayla a while ago and has been sitting on it just in case she needed leverage, given that she doesn't seem to need a second to consider. I also think we're inclined, typically within the show, to see the person offering up Options / a choice to make as the one who holds more power in the immediate situation (i.e. Karim's whole sun seed for Janai debacle) even if it may be 60-40 the way it is here.

Not a huge power imbalance, but enough that people are being pushed into corners, and that's exactly where Claudia and Finnegrin attempt to do, and arguably do more successfully, to Callum and Rayla respectively.

We've talked a fair bit about Claudia, so now I want to talk about Finnegrin, simply because he gets a whole episode of corner backing, and therefore there's more stages.

The first stage is Finnegrin attacking Callum as an individual — "Look at you: slave to your friends, your loyalties, your pride. I can give you your freedom though" — and it's the least effective, as Callum never budges or shows any real hints of budging even under torture. However, Callum's admission that he has indeed done dark magic before ("I did one spell. One. I had to, to save my friends") gives Finnegrin the tools he needs to create the next prong of his approach.

Stage two is attacking Callum through his friends, and is far more effective. This is why he sets the hand cutting challenge, and Callum buys into it, i.e. the idea that he has to choose, over the idea that Callum could conceivably offer up his own hand instead. This is not to say that he wouldn't — there's little doubt in my mind that Callum wouldn't have seriously considered if not outright done the chain spell up on deck if Rayla hadn't tried to intervene, since as Finnegrin correctly assesses, "They would do anything for you, so clearly you'll do anything for them" — just that his own hand didn't occur to Callum as an option the way it might've to someone like Rayla.

The third stage, of course, is the one that's most interesting to us, simply in how Callum's "hostage deal" differs from Rayla's in both its construction, their assumptions, and their responses.

Claudia: One thing I don't know though — if I threw the coins in the lava, would it release your spirits? Or would they be trapped in some kind of eternal burning agony? Let's trade. You let him go... and I'll give you the coins.

Finnegrin: The cave is for his protection. This way, he lures us a leviathan but doesn't get eaten. The one getting thrown into the sea serpent's hungry mouth is your elf girl.

Claudia's offered deal is different from Finnegrin's in a few ways.

1) Claudia's deal is explicitly stated in not just the text, but the scene itself ("Let's trade") meanwhile Finnegrin, unlike the two stages prior, does not offer Callum any notion of freedom this time around. Even though neither ends up being a fair deal regardless, the setup of said deal is different. Rayla is being legitimately offered; Callum is making a (desperate but understandable) assumption.

2) Exemplified in a drabble I wrote in which Finnegrin was bluffing, I think it's worth noting that the peril Rayla's parents were in was much more apparent. They were completely defenseless, Claudia was already holding them over the lava, and just one quick throw would be enough to potentially leave them in an "eternal burning agony" (which sounds worse than death by sea leviathan to me; at least that decidedly ends at one point). Rayla could see and hear all this. Callum, by contrast, did not see Rayla tied up, or in distress, and Finnegrin had no proof other than his word. That's not to say Callum was wrong to believe him — he'd just watched Finnegrin torture her, and Finnegrin was very much not bluffing in canon — but that normally Callum is a bit more skeptical and wants a bit more proof in regards to things, and this was a time where emotion really pushed him forward. The immediate consequences of however Rayla responded would be seen with her own eyes, where it's unlikely Callum would've even known precisely when Rayla had died/been eaten with any of his senses or knowledge; it's arguably the one 'mercy' that Finnegrin provided him.

3) And as stated, both Claudia and Finnegrin end up being disingenuous. It seems likely that Claudia always intended to trick Rayla, even if she'd let Terry go, given that while we don't see her slight of hand in general on screen, it doesn't seem like it would've been possible for her to take the coins back out again and switch them before tossing the pouch. That seems like a one and done type of thing earlier on. Finnegrin, of course, takes Callum to task for his assumption ("Oh my poor lad; that deal was no longer on the table") and given his choice to feed Rayla to the sea leviathan anyway, I don't think Finnegrin was ever telling Callum about his plans in order to get him to give up the info. I think it was just supposed to be a punishment, plain and simple, for the literal blow to his pride.

But now for the difference I think everyone clicked on this meta for, realistically, are the choices that Callum and Rayla made in response to the offered Deals.

When Rayla's parents lives are on the line, she considers, but ultimately refuses.

She does not partake in the deal. Rather, she escalates her own refusal of it by pushing Terry to his knees, says so outright — "I'm not making a deal with you!" — and looks up at Claudia, watching and waiting to see how she responds. Claudia as wholly tossed the coin pouch, and Rayla is seeing it arc down towards the lava, before she finally releases Terry to go and try to save her family.

Rayla does not fold the second her parents are verbally threatened, or when there is a possibility of getting them back. Despite her wanting to stop Claudia and Viren, the bigger issue is ultimately letting Claudia escape > actually keeping Terry away from her as an ally/helper. It is only when her parents will burn to death in front of her eyes that she relinquishes her stalemate in an attempt to save them.

You can argue that Rayla going back on her refusal means she made the same choice as Callum in 5x08, and that's fine; it's your prerogative, it's your interpretation, it's cool beans.

However, that doesn't ignore the character beat that Rayla at least refuses upon the first possibility of a threat. Claudia directly threatens three of Rayla's loved ones, and Rayla doesn't budge and verbally/physically refuses to give Claudia what she wants.

And Callum does the same with Finnegrin under torture... until Finnegrin threatens Rayla. The second Callum realizes that Rayla is in danger, that she will or might be killed, Callum folds.

The parallel response here would've been Rayla letting go of Terry the second that Claudia said she might throw the coins into the lava, but Rayla doesn't. And Callum does, even though as he said earlier ("I'm not going to help you murder the Archdragon of the Ocean") this makes him complicit in murder.

And this is where Callum's assumption really bites him in the ass, because he assumes that Finnegrin is still operating under the terms of their previous deal ("Told me something I wanted and now she's free as a bird") even though Callum isn't asking for his freedom, but Rayla's. But Finnegrin's pride is wounded — this was always meant to be a straight up punishment, not enough form of coercion — the wick of his anger lit, so it makes no difference.

Rayla refuses Claudia's deal when thinking it existed, only to find out it didn't. Callum agrees to Finnegrin's deal only to find it out it no longer exists. He gave Finnegrin what the pirate wanted and it isn't even going to save the person he gave it up for.

Both failed exchanges — or in Rayla's case, a failed rescue — end in defeat and devastation: Rayla sobbing and letting out a scream of anguished frustration, and Callum laying on the floor in despair, totally sideways from how much he's pulling at his chains.

I don't think I have to say much else as these scenes and comparisons basically speak for themselves. Neither choice these two make is necessarily the right or wrong choice — for Rayla, her inability to put what she wants first could've resulted in her parents' deaths and has caused herself and others a lot of suffering; for Callum, he understandably wanted to protect a loved one at all cost, even if that left him exploitable and unsuccessful amid Finnegrin's ire, and gave the pirate a dangerous piece of information.

However, I do think that although Callum's choice spells an ominous future (and that Rayla's foreshadows the uncertainty of what she may do when Callum is, inevitably, possessed again, and their futures collide), it's worth examining it as his biggest, more positive difference from Viren, and that's what my next post will be about — so stay tuned if you like.

84 notes · View notes