The conversation between Essek and Fjord is the emotional core of 140, in my opinion, particularly Fjord's short speech. It also bridges the Raise Dead failure, and all its griefs, into the Divine Intervention success in a way that, without knowing what is about to happen, lays a groundwork for that success in a way that's thematically resonant.
Fjord: Are you all right?
Essek: It's not fair. It's not fair.
Fjord: No.
Essek: We've all come so far. It's just not fair.
Fjord: It rarely is. You did more for us, and for him, than most anyone we know.
Essek: I spent my entire life studying the intent to not let things like this happen to chance. That can't be it, can it?
Fjord: I don't know. But if you were to ask my wise friend, Caduceus, I'm sure he would tell you that life continues on. It changes, it evolves, and it grows. I don't think there's an end. You just might not be able to see the next trip. But you have more time. You have more time to study. You have a talent that I don't understand. Use that anger, that frustration. Let it fuel you. If you have any regret or grief over what you've done in your life, I see nothing but good, and nothing but an opportunity for you to turn it around. You've shown me all I need to see.
Fjord articulates clearly, perhaps more clearly than any character, what has been one of the major thematic threads of the campaign. Fjord's is a speech about growth, rising from disappointment and failure, making sure that these injustices and losses do not happen again to others.
(As an aside, despite attributing Caduceus, this is really very Fjord. Fjord is very much about change, about growth, about making it so that misfortune that befell you never comes to pass on others. It's more that Fjord, through Caduceus' guidance that Fjord has more answers than he thinks, has finally found it in himself to trust his own wisdom and confidently impart it to others. But, that's another post.)
Beau and Fjord do this in Zadash, Fjord does this with the children in Hupperdook, Caleb does this with Trent and the Assembly, Jester seeks to do this with bringing the Traveler to others, Fjord does this with destroying Sword of Fathoms, Yasha does this as she stands again after Obann, and on and on—the Nein do this collectively in the wake of Molly's death. So many times, they have risen out of their grief and suffering and loneliness and loss and pain, and they have vowed keep going and to grow and to change, and they have vowed to use that to put some good into the world.
So much of what the Nein has done, repeatedly, in many ways, across the campaign is rise to their feet and say: never again shall someone bear what I have because I will become someone who can make it right.
When Fjord says this to Essek, who is explicitly stated to be among their number now, it is both a solace against grief and a charge of responsibility. It's not fair—so, work toward becoming someone who can make it fair for others. This is what the Nein have done, and so it is something that Essek too must do, now that he has borne this frustration and grief and anger, now that he is one of them. There is nothing he can do for this, for right now, but that doesn't mean that there isn't anything to do ever again. Become someone who can one day make it fair for others. That's victory, in the end.
And, off that, despite it all, Caduceus does. Fatalistic Caduceus who has so much believed in the plans of fate and the purposeful turning of the world. His friends' stubborn refusal to accept that this is how the world must be and we must all accept the hands we are dealt, unfair as they are, seems to be something he has also learned here at the end of things. In the way that Fjord is telling Essek that he must become someone who can make things right for others, Caduceus understands that he has that same exact chance to do so for his friends—and he does.
With frustration and grief, the fuel to insist that things be made right and whole again.
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