... It's a weird request and they know it, about as much as they know Abby wouldn't have asked at all if she could have come up with an alternative. She wonders what could be going through Ellie's head as they make their way, not speaking; her room is quiet, and small. That's good. It helps, a bit.
A distraction in the form of Ellie's drawings presents itself before she takes her seat. Abby nudges an open book out of the way to better appreciate the arching sketch of a large, double-breasted ship-sail. Ellie's really got an eye for this kind of stuff, huh. It's cool.
Frown. She looks down at her fingers on the paper, and opens her mouth.
"Got back from Starkhaven this morning. We were raiding a Venatori encampment full of researchers and–" a thick swallow, one hand gesturing to the softness of her throat, "Ellis got stabbed right through. I saw him die."
Abby has seen a lot of people die before. It always happens faster than you think, and then it sticks with you for an indeterminate amount of time. You remember it when you're least expecting it. Of everything, a gurgling, wet death-rattle is stuck in Abby's head. Her brow knits again, and she feels weightless and strange when she adds, "But– Dickerson was with us, and he brought him back to life. With my blood."
It takes long enough for Ellie to question her own judgment in bringing Abby here to talk. Each step they take seems fucking insane, when it's really a steady continuation of what's come before. They talk, now. They get each others' perspectives, now. And what's more, they value them.
No. This fits whatever weird thing they are slowly building together.
Still. Nothing prepares Ellie for what Abby says. Ellis, dead- it takes a second to slam through her brain, the shock and grief of a friend not coming home, something that they've both been through countless times-
Except that she saw him walk in with the others. She saw him alive and breathing.
The air presses out of her lungs in a rush.
"What the fuck?" she whispers. It's caught between horror and disgust and naked relief.
Maybe that's what fucked her up upon closer consideration. Never got someone back from death before. No sane version of someone, anyway. Ellie's expression mingles perfectly with what Abby is feeling, and the eerie ringing in her ears. She clasps her hands tightly between her knees.
"I think he was dead for five minutes, right at the end of the whole thing. Somebody caught him up in a spell and he couldn't get out of it in time." Not before the wet shlock of a blade, plunging into skin. Abby's expression shutters, disturbed. She swallows. "I felt his heart start again."
Because he was under her hands. Because she was holding the tatters of his throat together, while Dickerson worked.
Ellie trusts Abby when she says that Ellis died. They both know what death is. Intimately, utterly. They've seen it, they've dealt it. They know what it is to watch someone's eyes lose their soul.
Ellie wasn't there. She can only imagine. She never once questions the idea that Abby volunteered, or that Richard would have done it. It's Ellis. How could any of them have hesitated?
"Jesus Christ, Abby," Ellie whispers, because it's all she can say. Her heart's going a mile a minute. Her palms feel clammy. She wasn't even there, and she can't imagine it, but Ellie understands exactly why seeing that would fuck someone up.
"Yeah," she says again, and this time her voice breaks ever so slightly on the low syllable. Suddenly her palms are busy ironing her knees, a grounding motion. She looks away from Ellie, over her desk, out the little window set into the wall of her room. She didn't say any of this to get sympathy, but it helps that she can tell Ellie is horrified. It did fuck Abby up, and there wasn't time to deal with that. She had to press on, but at least she's used to doing that. Right?
Eventually she clears her throat, and breathes again, and her hands slow down.
"Dickerson- told me that if I reported it to anybody, we'd be imprisoned." Obviously she's not going to do that, but- yeah. That's part of the story.
It takes Ellie a moment to put it together, that this magic definitely wouldn't have been the kind that anyone approved of.
Blood magic.
A shiver crawls up between her shoulder blades, and Ellie smooths her hands over her arms, pushing all the breath out of her lungs.
"What fucking choice did you have?" she asks, because obviously there wasn't one. They couldn't just let their friend die. Not when it was possible to save him. If Ellie had been in that position, she wouldn't have hesitated either.
But she understands, now. Why Abby would struggle with it, and why she would need to tell someone. Later, she'll be a little fucked up over the fact that it was her. Not because she disagrees; but because they both know that Ellie will never, ever breathe a word to anyone. And Abby knows that about her.
"Exactly." Yeah she had no idea what she was being asked, but even if she had Abby would have said yes. She doesn't regret any part of what they did, only wishes it wouldn't linger in her mouth like a bad taste.
At least she can trust that Ellie won't talk about this, to anybody. She doesn't know how she knows that, she just does. And admittedly, it feels better to have talked about it.
She leans back in the chair with an almighty sigh, her eyes closing. "... I didn't know he knew how to do that. The healing, yeah. The- blood magic? Not so much."
Abby snorts. "The first thing. He said he needed blood."
She opens her eyes, and sits up, rolling one sleeve up to her bicep to better show Ellie the thin, seam-like scar behind her elbow. "There's a matching one on the other side." Both healed, now. Added to Abby's collection; nobody will ever notice, unless she tells them.
Abby's eyes track that half-movement, catching it for what it might have been, and it calls to mind something that Dickerson said to her in that moment. Shucking her sleeve back down with careful motions, she thinks to glance back over her shoulder at Ellie's desk, and the sketch of the ship that spans it.
Hmm...
Without asking, she lifts the corner to check underneath of it for anything else. Don't mind her. "Yeah, I think if it were ever something demony, you'd hear about it long before I could mention it."
Underneath there isn't anything else of interest- just a charcoal drawing of a fawn curled up in the grass, doing its best to blend in with its environment. It's nothing worth hiding, but Ellie gets up anyway to slap a hand down on the edge of the paper, half standing over her.
She's bristling, but far less than they're used to. It's more a grumpy vibe than an imminent warning.
Aw, the fawn drawing is cute- she's in the midst of lifting the paper higher to check past it, when Ellie cuts her off with the flat of her hand. Abby huffs, looking up at her, and-
"Dickerson." She really doesn't have to say it slowly and clearly, but being an asshole to Ellie is the most normal she's felt in the last 24 hours so, "He told me you're fascinated with my eyes."
So she didn't tell him about it or accidentally leave the sketches where he could have seen them... the plot thickens. Abby straights in her chair, greatly amused; her heart is beating quickly again, an anxious thing.
Oh, she remembers. And she can guess at exactly why sketches of her would exist in an old notebook of Ellie's from back home, and why she would be remembered enough to be drawn there. She really doesn't need to hear Ellie say it.
They aren't close to snapping but everything is tense in a way it hasn't been in a while. Abby didn't forget what it felt like, but it comes as a surprise.
She stares until the nape of her neck starts to prickle.
"No."
And, relenting, "I'm just fucking with you. Relax."
The tension snaps between them, a hint of something old and painful, and Ellie almost regrets it- it doesn't feel nice to fight with Abby, even if it's just this. They've been doing better with each other. Not gentle, but- enough.
Her expression settles inwards from the fighter Abby knew to the somewhat awkward young woman she's still learning, and Ellie bites the inside of her cheek. Try.
"... if you want to see it you can. There's just- some writing in there too."
Things that are more personal. But the drawings are of Abby, and that- well. That makes them hers too, in a way.
She reaches out to gather up the sketchbook, thumbing through the pages. Abby will get glimpses of things. A shambler in profile. Joel, with his eyes crossed out. Dozens of scribbled moths, over and over. Jesse, the man Abby had shot in the face in the theater- and finally Abby.
Ellie puts the sketchbook down on the desk, on top of the rest of her work. She places her hand across the text, but it can't hide all of it. The picture of Abby floats over a broken watch, scribbles of moths. A dozen shots of her eyes.
The words are crossed out in some places, like a draft. But words peek out, the end of each line, sneaking along the side of Ellie's cupped fingers.
When does it get quiet? heavier harder to breathe cut the cordrope cord?
Ellie doesn’t reply right away, and Abby finds that they’ve fallen back into that same, old rut of not wanting to say anything more to each other, but not being able to leave just yet. Surprise surprise: she still hates it. The air between them gets thick.
So she’s noticeably surprised when Ellie actually… relents.
Saying nothing, she cranes her neck to watch her page through the book. It’s encased in grubby leather, with a well worn spine. She can imagine Ellie creasing it in earnest to make the page lie flat, and then while she’s looking, Joel’s fucking eyeless face jumps out of a new page at her; she stops paying attention for a numb and buzzing moment.
She goes for the tail end words first when she looks back, absorbs them with what is, hopefully, a neutral expression even though this has swiftly become intimidating and deeply unnerving. Ellie’s fucking pocket sketchbook of ghosts; cool. Well, she asked. She makes herself keep looking.
A lot of her. A lot of moths.
“This is fucked up,” is her verdict, gaze flicking back up to Ellie.
It is unnerving. Intimidating. There's a deep sick feeling in her stomach, an itching that's spreading across her skin, digging in like bugs. She doesn't feel right inside of her own body, and this is just an echo of it.
There's nothing like looking at a glimpse of what she used to be, to make her realize how far she's come. To make her realize just how lost she was. How twisted, and angry, and desperate.
How close to the edge.
Looking back on it makes her feel closer.
"Yeah," she answers, unflinching. She's looking at the page, not Abby's face.
"I was fucked up."
With a sharp twist of her wrist, she flips the journal shut.
Ellie doesn’t say anything for a moment and Abby falls silent, tracing the outline of her own face and braid, fingers tucked underneath of her lip. She couldn’t contain it. Abby was starting to burst at the fucking seams by the end. She had a clenched jaw sitting, aching in her skull and the nightmares were completely out of her control, killing her people off left right and centre. Maybe writing and drawing was helpful. A way of putting it all out there.
She won’t know for sure, she can’t bring herself to ask.
The sharp snap of the book startles her, and she sits up straight in the chair, hands dropping to her knees.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cw blood, description of a fatal injury
A distraction in the form of Ellie's drawings presents itself before she takes her seat. Abby nudges an open book out of the way to better appreciate the arching sketch of a large, double-breasted ship-sail. Ellie's really got an eye for this kind of stuff, huh. It's cool.
Frown. She looks down at her fingers on the paper, and opens her mouth.
"Got back from Starkhaven this morning. We were raiding a Venatori encampment full of researchers and–" a thick swallow, one hand gesturing to the softness of her throat, "Ellis got stabbed right through. I saw him die."
Abby has seen a lot of people die before. It always happens faster than you think, and then it sticks with you for an indeterminate amount of time. You remember it when you're least expecting it. Of everything, a gurgling, wet death-rattle is stuck in Abby's head. Her brow knits again, and she feels weightless and strange when she adds, "But– Dickerson was with us, and he brought him back to life. With my blood."
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It takes long enough for Ellie to question her own judgment in bringing Abby here to talk. Each step they take seems fucking insane, when it's really a steady continuation of what's come before. They talk, now. They get each others' perspectives, now. And what's more, they value them.
No. This fits whatever weird thing they are slowly building together.
Still. Nothing prepares Ellie for what Abby says. Ellis, dead- it takes a second to slam through her brain, the shock and grief of a friend not coming home, something that they've both been through countless times-
Except that she saw him walk in with the others. She saw him alive and breathing.
The air presses out of her lungs in a rush.
"What the fuck?" she whispers. It's caught between horror and disgust and naked relief.
And then:
"Is he okay?"
cw description of a fatal injury
Maybe that's what fucked her up upon closer consideration. Never got someone back from death before. No sane version of someone, anyway. Ellie's expression mingles perfectly with what Abby is feeling, and the eerie ringing in her ears. She clasps her hands tightly between her knees.
"I think he was dead for five minutes, right at the end of the whole thing. Somebody caught him up in a spell and he couldn't get out of it in time." Not before the wet shlock of a blade, plunging into skin. Abby's expression shutters, disturbed. She swallows. "I felt his heart start again."
Because he was under her hands. Because she was holding the tatters of his throat together, while Dickerson worked.
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Ellie trusts Abby when she says that Ellis died. They both know what death is. Intimately, utterly. They've seen it, they've dealt it. They know what it is to watch someone's eyes lose their soul.
Ellie wasn't there. She can only imagine. She never once questions the idea that Abby volunteered, or that Richard would have done it. It's Ellis. How could any of them have hesitated?
"Jesus Christ, Abby," Ellie whispers, because it's all she can say. Her heart's going a mile a minute. Her palms feel clammy. She wasn't even there, and she can't imagine it, but Ellie understands exactly why seeing that would fuck someone up.
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Eventually she clears her throat, and breathes again, and her hands slow down.
"Dickerson- told me that if I reported it to anybody, we'd be imprisoned." Obviously she's not going to do that, but- yeah. That's part of the story.
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Blood magic.
A shiver crawls up between her shoulder blades, and Ellie smooths her hands over her arms, pushing all the breath out of her lungs.
"What fucking choice did you have?" she asks, because obviously there wasn't one. They couldn't just let their friend die. Not when it was possible to save him. If Ellie had been in that position, she wouldn't have hesitated either.
But she understands, now. Why Abby would struggle with it, and why she would need to tell someone. Later, she'll be a little fucked up over the fact that it was her. Not because she disagrees; but because they both know that Ellie will never, ever breathe a word to anyone. And Abby knows that about her.
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At least she can trust that Ellie won't talk about this, to anybody. She doesn't know how she knows that, she just does. And admittedly, it feels better to have talked about it.
She leans back in the chair with an almighty sigh, her eyes closing. "... I didn't know he knew how to do that. The healing, yeah. The- blood magic? Not so much."
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Ellie pauses.
"So was it like a magical blood transfusion or did you... I don't know, make a pact with a demon, or what?"
She's half kidding, half devastatingly serious.
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She opens her eyes, and sits up, rolling one sleeve up to her bicep to better show Ellie the thin, seam-like scar behind her elbow. "There's a matching one on the other side." Both healed, now. Added to Abby's collection; nobody will ever notice, unless she tells them.
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This one is of relief. It seems like a little thing, a couple of scars, being a little woozy. What a small price for saving a life.
She half reaches up as if to touch, pulls her hand back.
"Well. If any demony shit comes up... let me know."
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Hmm...
Without asking, she lifts the corner to check underneath of it for anything else. Don't mind her. "Yeah, I think if it were ever something demony, you'd hear about it long before I could mention it."
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Underneath there isn't anything else of interest- just a charcoal drawing of a fawn curled up in the grass, doing its best to blend in with its environment. It's nothing worth hiding, but Ellie gets up anyway to slap a hand down on the edge of the paper, half standing over her.
She's bristling, but far less than they're used to. It's more a grumpy vibe than an imminent warning.
"Anything else?" she asks.
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makes a decision: she wants to know!
"Yeah." Challenging, "Where are the ones of me?"
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Ellie pauses for just half a second too long.
"The fuck makes you think I have drawings of you?"
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Then, "Wow," Abby says, eyebrows flying to her hairline, "Kinda thought he was lying just to throw me off."
No elaboration, only, "Where are they?"
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No point in lying now, she rolled a 12 on that bluff check.
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"And anyway, I'm not."
And because that's obviously not true-
"It was from before here."
Mostly.
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"What were you drawing me for?"
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"Do you really want me to answer that question?"
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They aren't close to snapping but everything is tense in a way it hasn't been in a while. Abby didn't forget what it felt like, but it comes as a surprise.
She stares until the nape of her neck starts to prickle.
"No."
And, relenting, "I'm just fucking with you. Relax."
cw: suicidal ideation
Her expression settles inwards from the fighter Abby knew to the somewhat awkward young woman she's still learning, and Ellie bites the inside of her cheek. Try.
"... if you want to see it you can. There's just- some writing in there too."
Things that are more personal. But the drawings are of Abby, and that- well. That makes them hers too, in a way.
She reaches out to gather up the sketchbook, thumbing through the pages. Abby will get glimpses of things. A shambler in profile. Joel, with his eyes crossed out. Dozens of scribbled moths, over and over. Jesse, the man Abby had shot in the face in the theater- and finally Abby.
Ellie puts the sketchbook down on the desk, on top of the rest of her work. She places her hand across the text, but it can't hide all of it. The picture of Abby floats over a broken watch, scribbles of moths. A dozen shots of her eyes.
The words are crossed out in some places, like a draft. But words peek out, the end of each line, sneaking along the side of Ellie's cupped fingers.
When does it get quiet?
heavier
harder to breathe
cut the
cordropecord?Can I leave it all behind?
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So she’s noticeably surprised when Ellie actually… relents.
Saying nothing, she cranes her neck to watch her page through the book. It’s encased in grubby leather, with a well worn spine. She can imagine Ellie creasing it in earnest to make the page lie flat, and then while she’s looking, Joel’s fucking eyeless face jumps out of a new page at her; she stops paying attention for a numb and buzzing moment.
She goes for the tail end words first when she looks back, absorbs them with what is, hopefully, a neutral expression even though this has swiftly become intimidating and deeply unnerving. Ellie’s fucking pocket sketchbook of ghosts; cool. Well, she asked. She makes herself keep looking.
A lot of her. A lot of moths.
“This is fucked up,” is her verdict, gaze flicking back up to Ellie.
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There's nothing like looking at a glimpse of what she used to be, to make her realize how far she's come. To make her realize just how lost she was. How twisted, and angry, and desperate.
How close to the edge.
Looking back on it makes her feel closer.
"Yeah," she answers, unflinching. She's looking at the page, not Abby's face.
"I was fucked up."
With a sharp twist of her wrist, she flips the journal shut.
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She won’t know for sure, she can’t bring herself to ask.
The sharp snap of the book startles her, and she sits up straight in the chair, hands dropping to her knees.
“So was I.” She still is. Sometimes.
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