Video 01

[killedwithlove]

Who: Cole and anyone
Broadcast: Fleet-wide
Action: Marvisa
When: Now until the next shuffle?

[Cole doesn't usually sleep, so waking up is very unfamiliar. He doesn't usually feel the cold or heat much, so the deep coldness in his bones is alien.

He jerks upright with a gasp, hands scrabbling at the back of his neck and then he vanishes in a puff of black-green smoke and reappears in the corner of the room, pressing himself back into it, staring around with wide eyes.]

Whispering, watchful, wakeful, wondering, where?

[He then spends a while patting things around him like the floor and wall, whispering under his breath.

In all honesty, he'll stay in that room until someone convinces him to leave and go elsewhere. It's not like he has to leave for any reason.]

Comments

[killedwithlove]

[Cole is not buying that change of view, and it is clear by his expression, but he's going to let this slide because he's not close enough to pick at the hurt.]

Cheat?

[unconfines]

[Confirming:]

Cheat. How else do you expect to win a proper game of Wicked Grace? That's why your friend Josephine is so good at it, I'll bet.

[killedwithlove]

I don't mind if I win or not. I just like spending time with people and seeing them be happy and having fun.

Josephine is very good at convincing people to bet their clothes. And then Cullen and Blackwall have to get back to their rooms without clothing.

[unconfines]

Ha! I think I'm beginning to like this Josephine. If she ever happens to drop by here, you'll have to introduce us. She'd wipe the floor with everyone.

[killedwithlove]

She doesn't do the cleaning and if she did, she wouldn't use people. That's just really not nice.

[unconfines]

Not— literally. [Bless your heart, Cole. He loses momentum, which is probably good for the purposes of this conversation.] Maybe we should back up a touch. What I meant to say was that she'd beat everyone here at cards.

[killedwithlove]

Oh. Maybe. She's very good at playing cards. Varric says it's because she's Antivan.

[unconfines]

That would do it. It's in the blood, I think. [A small, wistful sigh.] The rest of us just don't have any chance to measure up.

[killedwithlove]

How can it be in the blood? There's magic in the blood, not playing cards.

[unconfines]

Ah, but isn't Wicked Grace a kind of magic?

[Yes, this time he's doing it on purpose.]

[killedwithlove]

No.

No. It isn't.

[unconfines]

[He clucks his tongue, shaking his head.]

We have so much to teach you, my friend.

[killedwithlove]

Yes. I have a lot more to learn about this world. I've been in the physical world for a few years, but there's so much to it.

[unconfines]

[A pause, not quite so much hesitation as thoughtfulness. He debates whether he really wants to know, how far down this rabbit hole he's willing to go.]

So it's true, then? You being... [A vague hand gesture.] Not quite of this world.

[killedwithlove]

I'm a spirit. Or I was. Now I'm a spirit but also not a spirit. I was Compassion before I was Cole.

[unconfines]

Is that so? Odd place for a spirit, if you don't mind me saying so. Most spirits I've known are a bit put off by our world.

[By "most spirits" he means... Justice, pretty much, at least to start.]

[killedwithlove]

This world is painful, confusing, enraging, engaging and enamored. Spirits don't belong in this world. They shouldn't be here.

But I can't go back. I have too many people to help.

[unconfines]

[Justice had been coming to adore their world, he remembers. He talked frequently about the beauty of it, the confusion in it, all the injustices that he'd wanted to see righted.

He doesn't want to think about it anymore.]

That would be what Compassion does, I suppose. How are we defining help here, exactly? Help them with their love lives? Their financial struggles? Petty squabbles over which of their sisters really took the last cookie from the cookie jar?

[killedwithlove]

Help is making hurts hurt less. Sometimes, people just need a warm meal, someone to tell them that it wasn't their fault.

I can see hurts. Hear them. Confinement, choking, crushing me from all sides, I need to breathe, I need to be out, I need to not be in this place that's crushing me out of myself.

Sometimes all I can do is feel it and slowly pluck at the knots.

[unconfines]

[Another lapsing silence, uncertainty flickering over his face. It strikes too close to home, that, and in the context of the conversation he's suddenly unsure if Cole is talking about himself.

He shouldn't be having this conversation, he realizes belatedly. With everything else that's been going on with people from their world, talking to a spirit of Compassion is maybe not the wisest choice he's ever made.

But his mouth gets away from him, as it does.]

Some things are bigger than one person is able to fix, you know. Helping, it— doesn't always help.

[killedwithlove]

[Cole stares at the screen, like whatever Anders just said was spoken in gibberish.]

I help people. Sometimes that means getting other people to help too.

[unconfines]

It isn't always that simple, is what I'm saying. [He's speaking a little more earnestly, a little more seriously.] Our world isn't like the Fade. Some things just are and they always will be, no matter how much hurt they cause.

[killedwithlove]

I know this world isn't like the Fade. I've lived in this world for... a while. A few years?

[He's not great with time still. And he has no idea how long he haunted the Pit.]

But I can try. One person at a time, I can try to help people. You can't make hurts vanish, I know that. But you can do something to let it start hurting less.

[unconfines]

[He's quiet for a moment, rubbing his face. Then he shakes his head, seemingly willing to just leave the disagreement there.]

Well. That's... awfully noble of you. [As if spirits could be anything else, constantly chasing a higher virtue mankind doesn't have any hope of achieving.] It was Cole, you said?

[killedwithlove]

No. It's not noble of me. Noble is a title and telling people what to do and looking after them because of it.

I want to help people. I don't have to, not like Compassion did, but I want to more than ever.

Yes. I'm Cole, now.