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gardenerian · 10 months

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thoughts on ian’s face in the “sorry im late” scene in 5x8 (i think it’s 5x8)

my thoughts are that i am going to start crying and never stop. my additional thoughts are:

so he's in bed, right? he's been trying mickey all day, meanwhile mickey has been going through his own process at home. but ian is thinking that he might have finally pushed mickey away for good - or scared him away. so he's in bed, eyes shut - probably not sleeping, but just laying there. shutting out the rest of the day. he hears someone behind him and his eyes kinda open. it's when he hears mickey though that his breathing picks up and we go from this:

to this:

like it's so slight, but like. the little flutters and the way his eyes start to move 😭 there's life left there. i feel like...... in moments like this, it sometimes feels like you might just lay there until you're dust. it's all over. the life you knew, the life you wanted. and yet - here he is again. and i think ian is genuinely surprised. this is where is starts being surprising to ian that he could be someone to come back for.

anyways. he turns around as fast as his medicated body will let him. we don't see his face when he first sees mickey, but we see it when he says "sorry i'm late." and it reminds me of the scene in 4x11 where mickey says "what you and i have makes me free." like it makes me insane. in both of these moments, his face just drops into something so young and so vulnerable.

like???? he's a little boy! and here is someone standing in front of him - someone he he has ALWAYS WANTED to stand in front of him - promising to be there. that he knows ian needed him. that he's here now for whatever might happen. reality is so warped these days but here he is.

and you see it land??? you see ian exhale and settle in a way he probably hasn't in a while. things are not okay. they're not okay!!! and they won't be for a while. but in this little moment together in this room where he grew up, he can breathe out the grief. he can share it.

mickey moves to get in bed and ian just makes room, like he always has. but he never blinks. doesn't dare take his eyes off of mickey. it's like he's scared mickey might change his mind, or dissolve right in front of him. is he even really there?

and there's another layer of disbelief here. another layer of grief. mickey milkovich is crawling back into his bed to hold him, and it's like this. it happened like this. everything he's done and suffered and been made to face comes down all at once. he's tired, he's scared. he's sorry. mickey has finally seen the worst of him.

he looks away, and mickey chases after him. i think it's important to mickey here that he lets ian feel him. something about that tactile, grounding comfort. and mickey won't look away either, it's too precious. ian's safe, even if nothing is the same.

and it's here, in these quivering lips and drawn eyebrows...... this is the release. his body and his mind have been through a lot in the last few days. it's as close to cathartic as ian really gets for a while. it's not long before the walls go back up and he's angry. but right now, he brings his hand to hold mickey's wrist, and he lets himself be held.

now.... this face:

this face fucking haunts me. i cannot name this face. what is he seeing here? i imagine it's so hard to see past this moment, into a future he can't name. it's like he's simultaneously feeling mickey there and also completely isolated. i can't explain this face. can anyone else explain this face???

either way, he closes his eyes against it. and you can assume that rest is coming.

with mickey keeping watch.

#i am legitimately in tears #i think......#our focus as a fandom has shifted in a lot of ways #to our beloved himbo husbands and the silly slutty soft snarky future they share #and like! yes! yes let's! that's what they deserve!#don't mistake me i fucking love it #but the farther away we get from THIS #the harder it gets to come back to it #it becomes this abstract thing #and we end up saying things like #their history or what they overcame #or everything they've been through #it almost softens it #not saying that we need to be harping on the tragedy #it just feels so distant to the point where it's memed and convoluted #we've kind of desensitized ourselves?#i know we've probably said a lot of what we need to say #i don't think we need to constantly relive it or anything #i'm not making any sense #i don't know #this can be such a lonely way to live is all #i'm tired #ily anon #mel answers #5x08 #bipolar ian

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blackjackkent · 3 months

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In-game, Hector got the killing blow, but realistically, story-wise... we give it to Karlach. :D

This scene is so brutally, heart-obliteratingly sad that I don't know if I did it any justice. But I tried. There's a video at the bottom.

--------

She stands over him, covered in his blood. Enver Gortash, erstwhile usurping Archduke of Baldur's Gate, lies sprawled on the marble floor where he fell when Hector kicked his legs from under him, and his face is convulsed in a rictus of agony. Karlach's blade has gone through his throat, pinning him to the stone. A puddle of crimson spreads slowly out from his body.

For a long time, no one says anything. The room is silent as a tomb except for harsh breathing and the soft sizzling sound of Jaheira's wildshape melting off her. Even Minsc is silent - though Hector can see, out of the corner of his eye, what it is costing him not to leap towards the ceiling in a victory cry. Even Minsc, oblivious as he often seems to nuance, knows this moment has not yet run its course.

Karlach stares down into the dead man's eyes, leans on the hilt of her sword. "So..." she says hoarsely. "Gortash is nothing more than a pile of flesh, same as the rest of us."

Hector slowly, methodically wipes the blood from his knuckles and watches her in silence. He knows every line of her face, every subtlety of her voice; he can see the storm of emotion working behind her eyes, too complex to name. He doesn't speak, but shifts himself slightly so he is standing next to her - at her elbow and slightly behind, within easy reach for when she wants him, but not intruding.

You can sense she's working something out; say nothing.

(A/N: I love this as an option so FUCKING much for Hector; thank you, game.)

"I feel like there should be a sunset to ride off into," she goes on after a little while, a low mutter. "Or an orchestral swell... or *something*." She turns slightly to meet Hector's eyes, and the bitter grief in her expression strikes him like a blow to the stomach.

"But there's nothing, is there?" Her voice is louder now. "I killed the bastard who ruined my life, and my prize is that I get to crawl into a corner and die." Louder still now, a roar of pain and anguish. She rips the sword from the dead man's throat, sending a splatter of blood across them both. "Am I FUCKING missing something?!"

She screams it at him, and he has no answer. Hearing her in such pain is like a physical thing in his chest, ripping at his heart, but he has no answer to give. The whole situation is agonizingly, brutally unfair and her rage is the only reasonable response to it.

He wishes he could take her in his arms, hold her and soothe her as she has held and soothed him through so many nightmarish moments, and somehow make it all go away, all the pain she's gone through and the terrible fate lying ahead.

But he can't. All he can do is listen; if it brings her any peace to expend her rage at him and the dead body in front of them, who is he to deny it?

But gods, it hurts him to hear her hurting.

Say nothing.

"I can't do it anymore," she snaps. Spinning, she slams her gauntleted fist into the wall; the shrieking clang of metal on stone makes Hector's ears ring. "Ten years, man! It's enough. It's ENOUGH!"

She catches her breath in a short harsh gasp, stares down at Gortash's body again, and then lashes out with a sharp kick at his skull. "He's dead!" she snarls, like a wounded animal. "And he's no *fucking* sorrier than he was before."

She rounds on Hector, her eyes wide, demanding an answer now. "What was the point?" she cries out. "I'm still dying!" The reality of it seems to sink through her even as she says the words; the deep red of her skin pales and she sways a little on her feet. "I'm dying," she repeats, a desperate wail of despair. "I'm going to die!"

He swallows, holds himself still with a force of will that is painful. Every time she says that, every time she reminds him of it, all he wants to do is sink to his knees and weep, but he can't... he can't. He has to be strong for her, as she has been for him.

But what can he possibly say, what can he possibly do that would make any of this all right? He can't say they will fix it, because she'll know it's a lie. He can't say she can go back to Avernus, because she'll know it's a dismissal of everything that's most important to her, and he won't do that to her. But what else can he say?

"But you're not dead yet," he says haltingly, forcing himself to hold her gaze, not to look away or try to hide from the moment even though he desperately wants to. "I'm here with you. And I will be until the very end."

He hesitates, reaches out a hand cautiously towards her arm, but she flinches away.

"Don't say that!" she snaps. "Say you found some way to fix me! That now Gortash is dead, I'll get my heart back."

Her voice cracks, and in that breaking he hears the shattering of a hope that was still lurking in her, so deep she didn't even acknowledge it to herself, let alone to him - the feeling that somehow if Gortash died it would make everything better, that some solution heretofore unseen would present itself.

But Gortash is dead. And nothing else has changed.

She sags, her shoulders slumping, and closes her eyes. "My heart..." she whispers brokenly. "It was mine... and they TOOK it!" He can see the effort with which she is trying to hold onto her emotions, but it's a vain attempt; her voice begins to rise again, into a strident scream of desperation and misery.

"I'm going to be as dead as Gortash any day now. Any *moment*. And what then? Off to the City of Judgment to waste into oblivion? Into the dirt to get eaten by maggots? Is that it for me?! IS THAT FUCKING ALL?!"

The flames rise again, bursting across her skin, consuming without destroying, all the rage and pain manifesting itself in the coruscating eruption from within, from the engine that is killing her.

"And you!" She roars it in his face and the words are like a curse, like a slap. "You'll just keep going, won't you?! Watching the stars. Warming your hands on the campfire. Dancing, eating, making fucking love all night - all of it, all of it!"

He flinches. He knows she doesn't mean it, that she is lashing out at anyone within striking distance, and yet the blow still strikes home as if she's cut out his heart. No, my love. No, when you die I will be a shell of who I was before; there will be no one and nothing else...

On some level she must know that she's cut him to the quick, but she is too far gone to rein anything in right now. The flames are turning to an inferno again, a raging ball of heat causing the very air to boil around her; he can feel the skin on his forehead and cheeks pulling, but he refuses to step back, to look away.

"That's my reward for everything I've suffered!" she roars in his face. "That's why I survived TEN YEARS of torment! The fighting, the clawing, the loneliness-- the *fucking* loneliness-- all of it, so I could ROT! Because the person I trusted the most gave me away to the devil!"

He can't bear it anymore, the pure pain and screaming rage in her voice, in her eyes. Without hesitation, without even thought, he raises his hands and reaches out towards her; as he moves, the pale gold light of all the protection magic he knows rolls up and over his body and he hurls himself into the flame, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her savagely against him.

It's a risk-- perhaps nothing will calm her and the heat will simply consume them both...

But his guess - his instinct - holds; at his touch, his embrace, she flinches, and for a moment the heat burns through the magic and he feels a wave of searing agony... and then less...

The flames start to calm, and her whole weight, armor and all, sags into him, and he staggers with the effort of holding her up. The inferno fades, replaced by the heavy thundering pulses of heat that are her usual heartbeat at twice its usual pace. Her face presses into his shoulder and she sobs bitterly, brokenly, muffled by the cloth of his tunic.(*)

"It isn't fair... I don't want it like this..."

He steadies himself, finding balance with her weight, and presses his face against the top of her head, the fingers of one hand burying themselves in her hair. Blue light mixes with the gold as healing magic pulses from his palms. He wishes it could heal more than the burns, that it could do anything to soothe the ache in their souls.

But in a terrible way... it is good to hear her cry. So many months she has known she is dying and he has never seen her break down. Even he-- notoriously and often unhealthily self-controlled-- has broken down in her arms more than she has broken down in his.

"Let it out," he whispers. His voice trembles and for once he doesn't bother to try and stop it. "It's about time..."

"I don't want to die..." The words are broken and clipped off by frantic, staccato gulps of air between sobs. "I want to live. I want to *stay*..."

Her fingers fist into the back of his shirt, pulling him tighter to her. Her voice drops to a shattered, hollow whisper, pleading for some answer that isn't there. "What the fuck am I supposed to do now...?"

He has no answer. He asks himself the same question, many nights lying awake beside her, watching her sleep and wondering how in all the hells he will manage when she is gone...

He has told himself, so many times, that he will not demand that she make her decisions for his sake, and yet it is still so hard not to throw himself on the floor at her feet, beg her to travel with him into Avernus, to save his heart at the cost of her principles.

But he will not. He will not. He respects her too much, loves her too much...

"That's... for you to decide..." he says unsteadily.

With a sudden harsh jerk, she pulls away from him, steps back; her face twists with bitter regret. " I ought to just end it all now," she mutters, looking away from him, examining a long crack in one of the stones in the wall. "On my terms."

A long silence. Hector's arms fall back to his sides and he watches her, not bothering to hide the anguish on his face now.

She lets the silence stretch, then shakes her head and laughs harshly. "But then who'd save this godforsaken town?"

She reaches out and runs her fingers along the crack and lets out a heavy breath. "Let's get out of here," she says, her voice suddenly curt and sardonic, the pain shoved back into hiding again. "I've always hated this place. Stupid fucking gigantic bridge or whatever. I... think I need to go to camp for a while. Be alone. Scream at the sky." A slight pause. Her tone softens almost imperceptibly. "You can... come and find me later, if you want to."

With visible effort, she turns and meets his eyes again. After studying him for a moment, she lifts a hand and presses her palm against his cheek. "Thanks for listening." The ghost of a smile, here and gone in an instant. "For existing." A pause; she swallows tightly. "Love you."

Without waiting for an answer, without giving him time to say it back, she turns and walks away, her boots leaving bloody prints along the marble floor.

-----

"Are you all right, cub?" Jaheira asks gently.

Hector stirs, startled. How long has he been staring at the place where she stood? "I-- what?"

She snorts softly. "Nothing. A foolish question. Of course you are not all right." She lays a hand briefly on his shoulder, jerks her head to indicate the body on the floor. "We have stripped him. The stone is here, of course. A key. Some letters. Little else of interest, unless you take interest in clothing more concerned with finery than function."

"Yes. Of course. Good," he says hollowly. "You and Minsc are-- not too hurt?"

"Burns. Scratches. We will mend in time," she says with a slight shrug. There's a pause. He can see her wrestling with the urge to speak again, uncertain in a way he is not used to from her.

"What is it?" he asks.

She draws a slow breath, lets it out in a careful hiss. "I lost my husband, you know, cub."

His head lifts slightly. Yes, he does know this; the histories he read in the monastery spoke of Khalid, Jaheira's husband - at her side in the battle against Sarevok... and then killed by Irenicus in Amn.

"I... do not say this to offer any pleasant platitudes that time heals all," she goes on. "But only to say that you are not as alone as you feel, just at present."

He swallows. "I would not wish this feeling on anyone. I am... so sorry," he mutters.

"Nor would I," she agrees. "But there is more comfort in being of a pack than being a lone wolf, I think." A pause. "I lost Khalid almost at once, a flash; you are granted the knowledge in advance. I will not speculate on which is worse, and in any event it does not matter. What comes after... I can tell you only of my experience."

He searches her expression, looking for any scrap of comfort. "Did it fade, in time? The pain?"

She looks back at him steadily. "Some days it is far away. Other days it is as if it happened yesterday. There were many days when I was not sure how I would go on without the knowledge that he was standing by my side. But I have found ways to live, nevertheless. And..." She hesitates, considers her words. "I am glad for the pain, because it means that the joy was also real. If it meant nothing, it would not hurt."

He manages a slight, shaky smile. "Wisely spoken. You would make a fine monk."

"Mm. I think not. But I know you mean it as a compliment. So thank you." She sighs. "You will be all right, cub. I know it does not feel like it, and I know perhaps you do not even want to be, right now. But you will be. And Karlach..." She trails off, smiles sadly. "She is strong, far too strong to deserve such a fate. But she will be the stronger, to have you beside her - of this I am sure."

He swallows, reaches out and grabs her hand in a sudden, fierce grip. "Thank you," he whispers. "I will try to remember..."

-----

* Terribly self-indulgent artistic license, obviously. Pretty much everything other than the dialogue is from here, to be honest.

-----

A/N: So anyway, it's 3AM and I've been trying for two and a half hours to write about this scene effectively. If I'm honest, I'm pretty proud of the writing I've been able to do about Hector and Karlach's relationship specifically, but goddamn. There's only anything to write about at all because of the in-game dialogue being so extraordinary and this scene has torn my heart out. And there's a followup one in camp that is almost equally sad but that's going to have to wait until tomorrow I guess.

Anyway, here's a video of the scene itself because, as usual, the voice acting is what really sells all of it and I just... yeah.

Anyway thank you for reading. <3

youtube

#bjk plays baldur's gate 3 #hector carlisle #karlach #karlach x tav #tav x karlach #drabble #karlach cliffgate #karlach bg3 #long post #jaheira #i was not emotionally prepared for this scene and legitimately teared up a couple times at my computer #i've been promised at least a semi-happy ending to this questline and i hope it's true #but the tragedy that it is at present is still a hell of a story #and i hope i am doing it any justice in my particular interpretation for hector #Youtube

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