Aid And Abet

sooo i realized yesterday not everyone is aware i have an original fallout story that takes place in new orleans. i have talked abt it some on here as it relates to leon, but i haven’t posted a lot of it on here only bc it’s a large and deeply personal project. it’s a story about home set in my home that i’ve been working on for a long time. a way to express my own complicated feelings on what home is. the love for it and anger towards it. feeling like an outsider in your own home. identity. family. homesickness. a requiem.

i do wanna share more of it on here eventually. when i feel ready to share more. lol. i’m shy.

Fallout NOLA follows my Lone Wanderer, Leon Nollette, leaving the Capital Wasteland after he’s fed up with his stint as a doctor in the Brotherhood. It’s a little over a year and a half after the events of FO3, and Leon has decided to start his new career as a traveling doctor instead. His first stop—one that he’s dreamed of visiting for a long time—is the birthplace of his mother Catherine: New Orleans, Louisiana.

Originally just hoping to learn more about the mother he never met, Leon becomes entangled in a larger plot involving a long-since-defected Brotherhood patrol, prewar religious con artists, and a community of Super Mutants who live out of an old military base. And all the people in-between.

Along the way Leon learns more about who Catherine really was and the way her impact is still felt in the city decades later. He comes to understand the good and bad, the nuances that could never come through in his father’s stories of her. The memories she left behind when she set off for D.C.

1. What does your Lavellan understand about Solas that makes forgiveness possible without excusing what he’s done?

For Leilah it always comes back to his heart. She sees him, the parts of himself that no one else truly ever has. She has done terrible things and she understands more than anyone that sometimes only terrible choices remain. She never excuses what he's done because she never excuses what she herself has done. She understands why he made the decisions he made, understands that they were terrible but also knows had he any other choice, any better option. He would have chosen it.

So, knowing his heart is what allows her to understand him. She never grants him forgiveness because she doesn't feel he has done anything towards her that requires her to forgive him.

2. Is there something your Lavellan fundamentally misunderstands about Solas, and that Solas fundamentally misunderstands about your Lavellan? What finally allows them to understand each other more clearly and how does that understanding come?

Leilah pre-trespasser could never truly understand the depths of the pain she would glimpse in his eyes. She knew he had suffered, knew how lonely he was, knew he must have a lot on his shoulders but even with her perceptive eyes she could never have guessed just how much. Even though she had guessed he was an ancient elf, she could have never guessed who he truly was even if she wasn't entirely surprised by that reveal.

Solas overestimates just how strong Leilah is. To him, she could take on the world and never waiver. In that sense he has her on a pedestal. And she is strong but a lot of it is a front, she doesn't let anyone, not even Solas see the broken parts of herself that are damaged beyond repair.

The Regret Prison is what allows them to finally understand the parts of the other they never could have otherwise. It was needed for both of them. Without it they would have continued to keep everything bottled up. It forces them to face their demons. It's painful, it's raw and there's a lot of hurt and maybe they don't completely overcome their traumas, the path to healing is never an easy one. But it's a start and they have each other to lean on.

3. What is the dynamic between your Lavellan and your Rook?

Leilah is an advisor to my Rook, she actually stays and operates out of the lighthouse traveling between there and Skyhold frequently. Rook respects her, even has a crush on her in the beginning. Leilah thinks he is immature and hotheaded but he seems to seek approval from her and in turn that makes him easy to guide.

I think he feels as if they're closer than they actually are. Leilah is very good at the game even if she doesn't necessarily like it and she uses that to her advantage around Rook and his team. Especially with the negative opinion they all seem to have of Solas and the inability to see things from different perspectives ensures that she keeps them all at arms length.

4. If your Rook comes to know Solas primarily as an adversary, while your Lavellan’s experience is coloured by their love and history together, where do their interpretations of him overlap - and where do they differ?

Wisdom, they both agree on that one thing, that he is wise.