#scamall

Sleep is in such short supply. Since finding the sapling with Vhan, I feel it always. The claustrophobic press of wooden walls around me. Daylight brings focus to other things, but in the night I’m vulnerable. Memories come back through the passage of sleep, memories that feel as real as they were when they happened. They’re memories that hurt now.

I wake screaming and afraid. Scared to close my eyes again and unable to calm enough to return to sleep. Elzy has become used to it. She no longer startles at my cries.

I go back to Revilion for respite. When it’s too much, I have to. I try to find other ways, others who might let me be quietened by their presence in the night, but there’s a trade required. So few are amenable to the prospect of someone in their bed who won’t allow sexual intimacy. I’m not so moral that I won’t give that, either. But a woman gets a reputation when she seeks too many partners—and my sense of attachment to those I’ve been with makes it difficult to accept when they are done with me. I am not done with them. I can never be done with them.

That’s not how it works for me.

I tried to explain as much to Gin. That on some level I loved him deeply and always would, though the love was not romantic in nature. Nor is it sexual. It’s far more basic, more primal. A driving desire to protect and be near him, as I feel for Keiranon and Scamall and Revilion as well. As I feel for Vhan and Lyn, despite their rejection of me. I tried to explain to him that it was possible for me to occupy his bed and not fall deeper for him, for there is no deeper level. It isn’t romantic. It never will be.

I was looking for an answer. I was willing to trade my body for comfort. Like Lyn and Vhan, he rejected that. And with that, Revilion became the last one to whom I could turn.

The menders have finally left me alone. It’s got to a point where they don’t know how to handle me and just threaten to call for Vailynt or Mnostovo because somewhere along the line one of them worked out that I don’t want to bother them. What’s the point? They can’t fix this, all they can do is what the menders have been doing for the past few hours—watch me through various stages of hysteria and see what threats will shock me into a calm state again. None of it works. Except for the prospect of bothering people that matter to me. 

I know they’re going to find out that I lost it again, I know they always do. I know it’s there in my file and the Forerunner will read it and shake his head and probably groan to the nearest person, ‘FUCKING SADRIENNE’, and I know that I have officially become that person who is liable to freak out at the smallest thing and that as much as I hate people tiptoeing around me I’m not exactly acting in a way that inspires people to treat me normally. I’m trying to keep my breakdowns as out of the way as possible. Like the stumps and the scars, I don’t want them out where they can disturb others. They shouldn’t have to deal with this. I may not deserve to be dealing with it myself, and I’d give anything to not have to. I don’t want to put them in a position where there is literally nothing they can do for me—I know how that feels. 

The breakdowns are scary. It’s like being back in that chair, so helpless to do anything for the girl that my instincts took over and Virtuosity had to sedate me to make it stop. All the screaming and the thrashing, pure desperation and a burst of strength that I shouldn’t have in my emaciated state, I’m near blind with it. I don’t hear, I don’t see, I just feel terror and isolation and the overwhelming need to fight for any sort of freedom. There’s no rationality to it. 

That’s not to say that my good moments aren’t genuinely good. I don’t feel secure anymore. At all. I’m bored out of my mind with so little to do, my body aches all over with the effort of healing, I can’t take two steps without keeling over exhausted. None of that makes me feel good, but in spite of it all I still laugh. The others come to see me, joke with me, help me out. I love them all for it, and they do make me proper happy—even if I have to keep checking my way out, even if it bothers me when they burst in unexpected, and even if poor Scamall has had the shittier end of this fall out. It’s not a lie when I laugh or smile. They make me laugh and smile.

I smile even more because against all logic, Keiranon and Vailynt seem to be treating me differently. More honestly. Especially in the case of Keiranon, it doesn’t feel as much like he’s looking down on me. Despite the fact that he’s had to hand feed me, and basically function as a nurse at times, when we talk it’s close and friend to friend. Not exasperated boyfriend to idiot girlfriend, or tired man to crazy ex. I still feel like I can tell him everything (more to the point, I can’t not tell him pretty much everything—a few things excepted) and it feels so much less like he’s going to rub at his face and shake his head, add more idiot points to my ever-growing total. This is what I wanted to start with. I think we’ve finally reached our perfect point. It still hurts a little when I remember that we’ll never be together, but it’s hard to describe how or exactly why. I guess I just wanted to make him happy and complete, the way he felt in his dream, I wanted him to have found the last piece he needed for a perfect life and in that respect I suppose I feel like I’ve failed him. And it’s never pleasant to feel that you aren’t enough. Now that we’ve established ourselves in a comfortable place though, I don’t long for him. Not like I used to.

My relationship to Vailynt has shifted significantly as well. He doesn’t crush me anymore. I know he’s actively trying not to, but I don’t think he could if he worked the other way. Time in Virtuosity’s control broke the chains, and I never really let Virtuosity be my master—which makes me at the moment masterless. Finally. I’ll need to be careful about how I hold that, but for the moment it’s freeing enough to just be able to joke with Vailynt and not be worried that my actions are disappointing him. 

I might be masking the worst of the pain, hiding my scars and keeping my breakdowns to the shadows—but all of what they are seeing of me at the moment is me. That’s me making morbid jokes about my hands. That’s me taunting Revelin with a prosthetic boob. And yes, that’s me trying to kiss Scamall because I’m lonely and concerned that everyone is finding someone else. The good and the bad, and the utterly crazy. I’m a mess but my actions are genuine, and I need to look at this in more detail soon. This may be my base self, but whether I like it or respect it is another thing entirely—though I think at this point, I’m proud of how I am handling the whole ordeal. I’ve kept my humour. 

I could love that about me.

I’m going to conduct a survey among those I know. I got a bit excited after Dhaedre therapisted me. I need to learn to love myself, which isn’t going to be easy. There’s a lot I already know I hate. Still, I need to try. First step is finding what I believe comprises a person I can be proud of and love. I’ve got a few attack plans for that—one is to critically examine those that I respect and tease out what it is about them that inspires those feelings. I want to compare that to a list of what they believe is special and loveable about them—there may be things I didn’t consider, and I think the difference in results will be enlightening. I will be conducting the same process on myself, critically analysing my behaviours and supplementing it with observations from those around me. From all of that, I should be able to decide what things are already present within me that I ought to keep, and polish, and what things ought to be cast aside. 

Quite a project.

The loneliness is less today though. Revelin took me out. We went to Metrica and played with the robot toys, which was excellent, and then we almost died when one of the big golem fights got out of control and spectators had to run in and help disable it. I nearly started screaming, but Rev calmed me down and took me to Rata Sum where I think he bought just about everything to make me feel better. I have a piece of jewellery that does absolutely nothing, and my corner of the infirmary is covered in these very pretty but pointless holographic flowers, and there’s a little tube aquarium that has bobby fish toys inside it that is just there to look pretty. I’ve never had things that were just there to look pretty before! He also got me a bright pink tiger pelt blanket for my bed, and a data cube that is recording all of this for me so I don’t have to write, and this neat crystal dagger that he attached to my chair so that I can flame things in front of me. Then he went to the Reach and got a prosthetic boob made (even though boobs really seem to bother him) so now my clothes don’t look weird and have to be padded with bandages or paper. Vailynt fitted it for me, and we all sat around and laughed and when I got a bit sad (because Vailynt was teasing Oriaen about Keiranon) when everyone went to do other things Vailynt pulled me in for a cuddle and told me a story and made me feel better.

I have the most amazing friends. I really do.

Revelin is also going to find me a hobby. If anyone can do it, he can!

Later, Ralich came to visit me. Soon as he walked in he was poking fun at my fuzzy happy hat, and teasing me. We talked crap for a while, like we usually do, until I finally got the guts to ask whether the whole thing was just business or not. I want to say I wouldn’t have minded, but I would have, even if I wouldn’t have stopped supporting him. Apparently it was never just business. He’s just in a position where he can’t turn down money when it’s offered, and the whole reason he never took advantage of the times where he could have had me (and this was as confusing as hell) was because he didn’t want me to think it was all just business. He told me that he thinks I’m cute and wants to touch my butt on regular occasions. He’s really sweet, even if he’s a bit of a dick about it sometimes. But what was it that Keiranon said? Find another arsehole, but one that will feel for you the way you feel for them? I don’t know if that’s going to be the case yet, but it’s certainly fun and the worst that can happen is that I get hurt again. 

Let’s be honest. I just had my hands cut off and fed to me.

I’m pretty sure I can survive whatever happens if this thing with Ralich doesn’t work out.

It put me in the greatest mood though, which lasted right up until Tiargeth mailed. And I went to therapy. I wish I could say that I showed him that his bullshit pseudo-mending was exactly that, but no. He closed the door to keep our session private which would have been fine except I don’t like being closed in like that anymore. Still, it’s stupid, right? Then he starts talking about paralysing me and how he’s going to break me of the control of the commands and I don’t remember much. I remember magic creeping into me, trying to soothe me and calm me down, but mostly it’s just screaming. Screaming and hitting my head against the door—ripping the IV out with my teeth, desperate to escape. He called a mender to get me out and that was the end of our session.

I don’t want to go back.

I’m scared.

Of a fucking therapist.

(Monologue. Torture references again. Ark--consider yourself warned.)

Sick and full. That’s how I feel. I ate a man to his death—and while that would sound hilarious in a lot of circumstances, this one isn’t. He lay on the table dying while the guards fed me forkful after forkful of his brain. The other bag, the one Virtuosity hasn’t opened yet, just sits there and squirms and taunts me. No matter where I look, I see it in the reflections in the mirrors around me, and the reflections of the reflections, a thousand squirming bags surrounding me and my hideous rough-cut fronds. 

I don’t know who is in there.

To be honest, I don’t know who I was eating last night.

I’m afraid that it was Oaken—but how is it more awful if it was? He was alive. He had thoughts and feelings and a future ahead of him, and I took that away bite by bite. I try to tell myself that I did the right thing, that by demanding more and more I ended his suffering faster. That’s not the truth. That’s not how things are.

I ate his brain.

I killed him.

Perhaps if I had taken smaller bites, he would have got bored. He would have spared the poor man. Oaken or not, I can’t forgive myself for that. 

Virtuosity is succeeding. He’s found the monster I always was, and he’s slowly unleashing it. I’m losing my control. I don’t know what to do—and I don’t know what’s in that other bag. Another sylvari? Scamall? Vilathara? What if it’s human?

Fuck. 

What if it’s human?

Just the thought is enough to spike that feeling, the insistence, the need. Break free of the chair, open the bag. Set the human free. That drive is so much stronger than anything I felt seeing the body on the table—even if I’d been sure it was Oaken, it couldn’t have been stronger than the possibility of a human’s fate being in my hands. It doesn’t consume me yet, but it will. It would. 

I know it would. That’s the monster that I am.

One that cares more for humans than my own kind.

More than those I call friends and family.

It may not have been real, but the vision was as true as anything. I pride myself so terribly on my physical appearance—for what? To prove that I am good. To cover the fact that I am wicked, to leave no trace of these thoughts and actions that have been with me since the day I awoke. To lure others into a sense of security and have them love me. To get the things I want in this world without care of others. Inside I am covered in those boils, I break and I burn others, and I still demand their affection.

No matter what I do, it’s always in the wrong.

Keiranon tried to help me in the vision, I turned him away. I’d rather die than let you save me. But he wouldn’t leave, so twisted in the web of emotional entanglement I weaved around us, he couldn’t. I trapped him there and held him, wild toothy vines spewing from my head, I turned him to a statue because he could not escape. I didn’t even allow him the peace of trying to help me.

I am wicked.

I am a monster.

And I am helpless before Virtuosity. Completely. In the ways I never wanted to be again, and perhaps this is all that I deserve—a lifetime of servitude at the hands of the court. 

He commanded me to sleep. And I slept.

I am a noonbloom. I’m stubborn, impatient, direct, quick to temper, resilient, and I really like to hit things when I’m angry. I say stupid things before I think. In lesser moments, I do stupid things before I can run them through a logical process. Since finding people to care about, I act more often on what my heart tells me than what my logic should. I make a mess of situations by charging in to try and make them right. I am driven to fix people and won’t stop until it’s done.

Noonblooms are the worst. Scamall is a noon. Keiranon is a noon. We’re explosive when put in the same place, and I don’t like stubborn people. They’re too hard to make see reason. 

This journal really should be more about Ruinali's wedding than anything else that happened today, so I'll start with that. She looked wonderful and happy, and he looked absolutely fantastic, and they're obviously made for each other, and the things they said to each other were so sweet it almost made me cry, and the cake! I could almost have married that cake on the spot, but I think you've got the gist of the wedding. It was extremely nice. Once again situations have occurred that I'd rather not put down so bluntly in text (hello Vailynt, I assume), but all the same situations too dizzying to not be recorded. As much as I would like to record it in minute detail, there's a large chance I would require frequent breaks of an insistent biological nature, which would be counter-productive in the recording and not to mention utterly damning if my suspicions are correct and my journal, no longer safely nestled beneath Scamall's bed, is as compromised as I fear. So this will have to suffice.

The day was hot to start with, the wind lazy and warm, passed lightly over the sea--gently as it could, and careful not to disturb it. A perfect tropical retreat, a single island with a river winding slow beneath a canopy of palms. Beneath the leaves it was darker, secluded, heat trapped between the already warm waters and the warmer winds, and as the heat of the day rose, so too did the humidity. It pulled the water from the river into the air, suspended as the tiniest breathable droplets. Where the river ran over rocks, water jumped into the air, reaching for it, pulling it back down in bubbles that surfaced seconds later only for the process to repeat. The wind followed the path of the river from its mouth to its belly, where the banks had swollen until the water spilled into a flood zone--flushing the tropical paradise with ripples of warmth and life. Here the air dipped and swirled, hidden from the sea by the tall palms all around, humidity rising further and clouds beginning to form above. Below the water churned, the surface choppy as it moved, the line between air and water blurred as bubbles frothed to the surface. The wind, now thick and heavy with water, raced at the excitement of an oncoming storm, its edges electric and wild. Rain started in sudden torrents, pelting down from heavy clouds, through the wind and into the river, agitating both further. The wind swirled, circular current whipping at the water below, pulling it up, encouraged by the raging storm. A whirlwind and whirlpool combined it rose out of the river, thrashing wildly. The duelling forces of wind and air had ceased to fight, and now they wrought a mutual path of destruction, powerful and exciting. The river crashed in waves, the air sang in a thousand changing currents, but all for a singular purpose as the storm intensified. Lightning cracked, forking through and splintering the sky into fragments--the wind left reeling from the electricity, and still recovering as the river surged one last time and the combined spiral of air and water scattered to the wild storm. The clouds cleared slowly, the air still humid but calm, the river once again gentle waves lapping against the sky.