#so...that happened

📢 It’s time for the second completely unexpected major event that took place in my game - if the whole scene seems like it came out of nowhere, it’s because it did - I barely had time to change Vernoraxia’s facial expression to something appropriate - which mirrored my own, really. 🤯 😳

Note: I have lazyduchess’ autonomous engagement mod, but this is the first time I’ve seen it in action - in fact, before this I suspected some conflict was preventing it from working properly, but nope, it turns out it works just fine. 

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Eleanor couldn’t claim she approved of Jacob dating Roman Turner - she was still of the opinion that the guy was trouble - yet had no choice but to respect his decision. Sometimes, what the brain knew to be right and what the heart wanted were two different things - and, sometimes, they were one and the same. 

She and Oliver had been together going on four years, and they were closer than ever. They had even begun discussing their post-university living arrangements - whether they would live in Walden or the nearby town of Mistvale. No matter where she ended up living her life, Ellie knew who she wanted to share it with.

It was time to make it official.

Vernoraxia: “Ummm....what...”

Eleanor: “Oliver: four years ago we were just two college kids dating, not knowing if it would last, if it was meant to be. Well, we passed the test of time. You’re more than just my boyfriend, you’re my rock, my best friend, the man I want to grow old with. You’re the one for me, now and always - marry me?”

It took a lot to throw Oliver completely off balance, but this certainly did it. He recovered quickly, though - there was no doubt in his mind about what he wanted.

Oliver: “Ellie! You...Babe - hell yeah I will!”

Oliver: “I was going to propose to you! Had it all planned out, after the graduation ceremony I was going to ask you in front of everyone, but I guess you beat me to it!”

Vernoraxia couldn’t stop goggling - she was utterly shocked! Her sister hadn’t even hinted that she was planning to propose, this was all so sudden, so...massive.

Eleanor: “Aww, I’m sorry, I got impatient! Are you mad?”

Oliver: “I could never be mad at my future wife!”

Eleanor: “Be careful, or I’ll hold you to that!”

It was a wasteland, dust swept up at Lucas’ feet and harsh winds threatened to blind him. Every intake of breath he took would have choked him, the polluted air that was strung with the sickness filled his lungs, infecting everything that it touched. His skin should be hurting, should have been licking fire across his skin freely as he stood centrefold to what used to be his city. 

This wasn’t Grimstone; it wasn’t even close, it was what was left of his former home. It was what every horror movie dreamed to capture on the screen; buildings had fallen to crumbling remnants of the monumental structures they once were. Vehicles were abandoned, hollowed out to metal shells and scattered haphazardly in the roads. There was no sign of life, no greenery; trees were gone, withered to dust and debris. Fires roared in the distance, capturing the last of the flammables in desolate structures.

It was Lucas’ definition of the apocalypse. 

As his eyes moved, more chaos appeared, the dystopian ruin was littered in ashen bodies; disfigured; unrecognisable; dead. He hadn’t realised he’d been breathless, that panic had invaded every fibre of his being, it shouldn’t have been there either. None of it should have been, but even as he slowly turned to survey his surroundings, it was everywhere. The chaos and ruination of the place he’d once known so well - his vision was blurred, or perhaps it was the world that was, he couldn’t quite tell in his haze. 

What he could figure out was that he’d heard the announcement. He’d seen the news and he’d been cut off from technology in the same instant. Much like this world that he was now gazing upon; everyone was gone. The shaking of Greenman’s body was a cross between fear and anger; two things that weren’t ever part of him, but what had just happened; the crushing disappointment, the pandemonium that it promised had made Lucas’ imagination, and ability flow into a state of overdrive. It was the feeling of hopelessness, grief and loss. 

Hence why he was standing in the midst of the decimation of what the announcement promised the outside world would eventually look like. Grimstone had been the apparent safe haven and they were powerless - for the first time, to do anything about it. They were to hide and allow what Lucas’ illusions were speculating and he’d never lost the grip on his ability like he had now, he’d never taken images from the news reports, fictional movies and the town he was standing in and formed the terrifying false reality that was surrounding him right now. If he didn’t know better and he hadn’t spent years honing his ability to what it was, he’d say it was real. Real enough. 

The only reminder that it wasn’t real was that he wasn’t choking on the sickening air that was floating poisonous particles past him, that the blood and dust weren’t staining his black boots and that he wasn’t able to truly touch the dead that covered the floor for miles. He couldn’t determine if they were strangers or his closest friends; he couldn’t do anything but stare at the powerful illusion that he’d formed for everyone in the nearby street he was standing in to be consumed in. 

The pressure on his mind reminded him that there were limits to how far he could project the realistic portrayal of the future outside the walls and despite the silver lining that he was ‘safe’ within the walls of Grimstone, everyone outside wasn’t. Lucas wasn’t used to feeling the way he was but he couldn’t bring himself to stop crafting the false reality around him. He needed to do something and he already knew that if he’d heard the announcement, then so had everyone else. 

And there were far more dangerous and unstable individuals in Grimstone than him; his own friends that had been thrilled to leave the place were likely taking it out somewhere - or on someone and instead of using rationality and forward-thinking when told that a superflu outbreak had plagued the outside. All that was likely running through their minds, was the same thoughts running through Lucas’; they were prisoners to Grimstone again. 

“We can’t let this happen,” he murmured, crouching down to hide that his knees wanted to buckle at the sight of every new detail his mind had formed. He could feel a migraine pushing at his skull, warning him to lay off the complexity of the illusion he’d created. But he wasn’t ready to let it go yet, it wasn’t scorched into his mind enough yet that the consequence of ten years time if the superflu was left untreated. Grimstone could help; they were gifted, someone must be able to help whilst offering the freedom and transition back into the real world. “They’ll find a cure quickly, right?” he added with a little of his own venom; a little gravelly and uncaring for the ones suffering out there. He did care, a lot. But he also cared about the stability of his own friends at Grimstone. 

Even if Greenman knew what fictional plain he’d surrounded himself with was farfetched, the result was just the same. If the superflu was fatal in all of its hosts, then the world would cease to function; there would be no one left for the residents at Grimstone to meet with. They would be as alone out there as they were now. “We cannot let this happen.” and this time, when he repeated the words, they were almost growled as his fists slammed into the ground beneath him, it didn’t kick at the dust that wasn’t there. It hurt like hitting concrete, but Lucas didn’t let himself feel it, he just stayed crouched, calming himself down enough so he could disassemble the illusion without damaging his mind in the process. 

The expatriate Garlean Medicus speaks in a quiet and soft voice, yet her words are startling nonetheless.

"Alright. We'll get you some pain relief and then... you know...if you want alone time with Para, I can sleep upstairs."

Despite the fact she had rushed back to the Solace after the confrontation in the canyon, despite how upset she had been over the fact he had been attacked, she hadn't had time to consider how those around her were taking it all. Before she had returned to the hidden alcove where her brother had been stabbed, her guard had given her some rather strange looks, along with some words about how while he wasn't happy that the attacks had hit so close to home. He was happy that she was willing to take more direct action after they had - and even that had not caused her to consider how everything looked to everyone else.

"You two seem close, is all," the Medicus mentions after watching her eyes go wide. "Roll up the sleeve of your right arm, please."

The Medicus finishes giving her an injection, a strong painkiller from Garlemald, smiling at her as she gave a short series of instructions, followed by an apology for how unpleasant she had been earlier. Her arm stung from the pressure of the medication pooled into her muscle, but it wasn't unfamiliar to her, and she was grateful that the pain across her throat, around her wrists, and on her cheek would subside soon.

"I'll get all this disposed of and rest upstairs. Come get me if you or Para need anything," the Medicus adds, before packing up her doctor's bag and heading out of the room, leaving the two redheads alone. She waits until she hears the door shut entirely, before standing up from the bed the Medicus had moved her to for inspection and treatment, moving around the half-wall that separates it from the bed Paradyme is sleeping in.

It has been perhaps the roughest twenty-four bells she's had since arriving in Eorzea, if not the roughest twenty-four bells of her life since the day she thought her twin brother died. It had started with her and the Captain having a fight in his yard, which led to her heading to the Solace in the first place. Within a bell or so, the Yellowjackets had arrived with Paradyme, explaining that they had found him unable to move on the road between the Mists and Limsa Lominsa, a stab wound in his back. It wasn't all that long after that the Medicus had arrived, requiring her to become a surgical assistant as the doctor worked on healing the partial severing of his spinal cord.

When the Yellowjackets brought him back to the shelter, a faint roar had begun to fill her chest, amid the panic and guilt. While the young lioness had been trying to find a solution to the Shikari's attacks, she had kept a level head, clear of emotions, thinking of both their current situation and of the future for their entire movement.

Upon finding out the Shikari had attacked him, the lioness stirred from her serenity, growling rage beginning to form. As the surgery to repair the damage to his spine wore on, the growling grew louder, filling her chest with a pressure she couldn't place. Upon the arrival of the Captain and his personal physician, the growling had turned into a roar, one that initially was released at the knight as the Solace's proprietor began to regain his ability to move and speak.

She became a lioness rampant, all her caution was forgotten. Citing the need to retrieve something from the library upstairs, she had excused herself from the commons room while the proprietor saw through her ruse, he was in little position to rat her out immediately, which gave her enough time to cast the forbidden spell that whisked her away to the canyon.

Everything didn’t go well after arriving there and announcing herself. She was nearly knocked off the cliff-side into the water, which gave the Shikari the opportunity to capture her. Before he could escape with her, the Captain and their Raen friend had arrived, along with the flashy Highlander pirate. Somehow, the Captain managed to talk the Shikari into fighting him one on one, with their fists, but before disarming himself, the Shikari had sliced her throat with his coated blade, leaving her paralysed and silent.

Ultimately, the round of fisticuffs went to the knight, and the end result saw the Shikari being pinned to the ground primarily by the sheer weight of the man's axe. The Raen had given her a small antidote that began to purge the poison from her system, healed her as best as he could in the field, and bound up the slash across her throat. After a bit of ice cream to help with the pain, she'd rushed back to the Solace.

Shaking her head to chase away the memories, she slipped up onto the bedside that the proprietor was facing, climbing the short way up the bed before settling beside him. He was covered with fresh sheets, the bloody ones from the surgery having been changed while she was away, and he was deep asleep now. The guard for the Solace had taken out his morin khuur while the Medicus had worked on her throat, wrists, and cheek, the soothing sounds of the stringed instrument allowing the proprietor to rest at last.

Fingertips trace along the contours of the sheet as she watches him breathe, though she avoids letting them stray down his back too far, not wanting to cause him any more pain than she already has. Although it hurts to do so, she speaks as her fingers trail along his shoulder, arm, and side, tears beginning to line her lower lids, her voice soft and filled with warmth.

"...sorry, for all of this..." she rasps, voice hoarse from the wound and lack of speaking for two or three bells. "...warned you...you didn't listen..."

Her voice trails off as her emotions get the best of her again; the lioness is still rampant, not assuaged by what they had learned in the canyon. Someone had intentionally misguided the Shikari, and that someone was still out there, still able to hurt those she cared for, and the thought of the man beneath her fingers being harmed again was overwhelming.

She reaches up to brush his hair from his face, fingertips sliding through his now short locks, her touch faint upon his scalp so as not to wake him. He stirs lightly in his sleep, causing him to wince as his spine reminds him it's healing, and she withdraws her fingers from his hair, letting them drift back down his shoulder and arm.

It's not long before the painkiller begins to make its effects felt, causing her eyes to flutter shut. This chases the rest of the tears from her eyes as she dozes, her fingers again returning to his hair for a brief moment. Half asleep, she shifts her weight, stretching her legs out towards the foot of the bed as she lowers herself to her side, curling up along his front side as she too slips into sleep.

Not long after she curls up against him, his arm drapes across her, holding her well into the morning.