“Good.” There’s a faint smile at the corner of his mouth; he’d been waiting for this. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained. I’ll speak to Niehaus once we’re back.”
And they keep going, forging into the Planasene as the day wears on. Eventually the well-traveled paths fade away, so they have to push through the undergrowth; whenever they reach a particularly difficult impasse, Strange summons up magical energy to brusquely whisk it aside, or Tav draws on nature for a gentler manipulation to make the branches lean away for them.
Tav’s bag fills with herbs and roots and seeds where they can find them, and the light drains from the sky. The sorcerer eventually calls it when twilight’s close (he’s just an ordinary human, he doesn’t have darkvision), and they camp out in a fairly large glade to set up their individual tents and bedrolls, with a low fire between the two tents. Hopefully they’re far enough from the front that there aren’t any Tevene forces nearby. If any wild animals get any hungry ideas, he’s certain they’ll be able to take care of it between them; having already fought an alien invasion and no end of demons and other sorcerers, the doctor is terrifically blasé about the idea of danger. They eat a simple dinner; they bid each other a polite goodnight.
Strange lies on his back, hands folded over his chest, restless, the mouth of the tent open so he can see the stars. It feels odd, not feeling the faint movement of water underfoot, not having the weight of someone else on a mattress beside him. It turns out he’s gotten awfully accustomed to sleeping next to Gwenaëlle on her houseboat, and he didn’t even realise until now how much that’s become home —
Still. It’s just one night away. It’s not going to kill him.
Tav doesn't need a tent, but he sets one up for himself regardless. He drags his bedroll out near the fire, lying on his back and gazing up at the stars. Sure they aren't the stars he recognizes from home, but they are stars nonetheless. The crackle of the fire, the presence of a companion just across the way, the stars overhead. It feels so much like home his eyes begin to sting.
How long has it been since he listened to the bickering of Lae'zel and Shadowheart? Or listened to a lesson on magic from Gale? Perhaps the quanderings of Astarion as he considers whether to kill Cazador or not.
Months. Seven long months, most spent in an isolated room, only allowed out under guard. He's so painfully homesick in this moment that he can't help but reach out to the sorcerer across the way.
There’s something in it which is a little like a sleepover: an adventure away from home, staying up too late and getting punch-drunk with tiredness, teenagers whispering to each other in hushed voices. Not something Strange has experienced in far too long,
(perhaps not since he and his younger siblings shared a room, staying up far too late despite their parents’ protests, Stephen and Donna and Victor hissing at each other and squabbling to see who could stay up the longest)
So. Strange is still awake. He’s a restless sleeper, and certainly an insomniac, and he doesn’t even sound groggy as he answers: “Yes, Tav?”
It takes Tav more than a few moments to gather himself. For such a chatty elf, he's struck for words in this moment. How does he convey such a profound level of gratitude to one who may be his only friend in Riftwatch. If Strange had not stuck by him through his frustrations, then maybe Tav would be back in the Gallows, sleeping on his familiar cot.
"I wanted to say 'thank you,'" Tav replies, counting the stars to reign in his emotions. "I cannot express just how much this night means to me."
Strange is bad with sincerity; allergic to it, sometimes, the way he skittishly sidesteps matters of substance and deflects them with humour, with sarcasm, with his habitual barbs. Humour is easier than real connection, no matter if he could (and should) foster more of the latter. So Tav struggles to express his gratitude and then Strange struggles to accept it in turn, feeling himself flood with a kind of self-consciousness. At least he’s spared having to see the elf’s facial expression; instead they can simply stare out at those same stars and chew over the sentiment.
“I didn’t want you to snap and fling yourself into the Waking Sea. We’re low on mages with healing magic,” he says. It’s yet another deflection, an excuse, a mild joke.
There’s a pause which drags on perhaps a little too long, then: “You’re welcome, though.”
Tav turns his head to look at Strange through the dimming fire. It's a very practical answer. He hopes that one day he can spend more time in the Infirmary without guards, that perhaps this journey into the Fade will seal away that Dark Urge for good.
What a life that would be; all he would need is a few friends from home to help him re-warm to the Riftwatch.
When the pause rests between them, Tav thinks that will be the beginning and end of the conversation, but Strange continues and Tav can't help but give a proud sigh.
And hopes the rest of the night will be uneventful as he settles into his bedroll.
And if they were luckier, or fate had less of a sense of humour, perhaps it would have been dull and uneventful. A few hours’ sleep on uncomfortable earth, waking too-early with the sunrise and perhaps an animal snuffling through their supplies, then another quick meal and back to the hike.
But they are unlucky, and Stephen Strange’s life has a habit of being so very eventful, and Tav has been stuck in the Gallows and fraying at the seams for weeks—
So instead, the sorcerer finds himself abruptly awake in the middle of the night, uncertain what roused him. Some small noise. Some crack of twig underfoot or the shift of air or rustling of fabric. Some movement.
What Strange hears is Tav groaning in his sleep, tossing and turning as his stomach churns. He wakes with a start and for a moment expects to find Astarionc Gale, Karlach, or anyone he can turn to. However as he looks over the faint glow of the coals, he sees Stephen Strange.
Tav is dripping with sweat, his vision blurring as he crawls around the fire pit. He fights with himself as he opens his mouth to ask for help when his arms slip out from beneath him and the darkness takes him.
The Urge wakes up instead and sees the barely awake sorcerer before him. An easy target. And maybe he'll get to slice the sorcerer open and see just how he ticks. The Urge doesn't have a blade, but he doesn't need one right now. No, he straddles the sleeping sorcerer, hands closing around the sorcerer's neck.
In that span of a heartbeat, Strange goes from barely awake to oh, someone is trying to strangle me.
His reflexes are quick — quicker than they once were — and so his paranoia instantly latches onto instinctively fighting back, even as the Urge’s fingers dig into his throat and Strange’s scarred hands scrabble and shove ineffectually at the elf’s arms, feeling his windpipe closing and his air suffocating. This is oddly familiar. He’s been choked before. Like, to a surprising degree of frequency, why is this always the bad guys’ go-to—
A rapid list of options scrolls through his mind, a set of tools. He could summon a spectral knife and bury it between Tav’s ribs, he could send a burst of fiery energy against him, but no, his hands are metaphorically tied because he doesn’t want to outright kill the elf, just—
What eventually comes is a roiling explosive wave of telekinesis, blasting outward from the sorcerer and sending the druid flying several feet away. The tent collapses as Tav-slash-Urge is flung through it, and Strange finds himself tangled up in the fabric, needing to scramble his way free of the now-clumsy construction. Gasping for breath, he comes stumbling out, searching for the other silhouette in the half-darkness and already reaching for more magic.
The Urge goes flying, but as familiar as the Sorcerer is with choking, so is the Urge with killing with improvisational weapons. He rips one of the tent stakes free of its ties and stands hunched over in the moonlight. As soon as he spots the Sorcerer, he charges with the stake in hand.
It’s been a while since he’s been in immediate combat like this: not facing grandiose spellslinging Venatori on the back of a dracolisk, just an elf brandishing a sharp stake. But a companion. One he doesn’t want to harm.
Strange’s arm whips up with a glowing golden shield snapping into place: the stake slams into the magical barrier and skitters off. The sorcerer keeps the shield up as the Urge comes barreling at him, swinging wildly, and Strange has to desperately meet each strike with a deflect of his own. He has to occasionally sidle backwards and give way, not going on the offensive yet, shouting instead:
“Tav! Tav Whatever-Your-Unknown-Last-Name-Is— Tav, for the love of god, stop this. Snap out of it!”
The Urge growls as he continues his onslaught. When the stake glances off one direction, he swipes in a low squatting motion, only to be rebuffed again. He knows he can't keep at it like this, so he reaches out for the shield itself, to try and grab onto the edges (if they are corporeal) and wrench it to the side to make room for another attempted swipe.
Any words the Sorcerer says make little difference to the Urge as he continues to go for blood.
The shield is only half-corporeal, touching it like a burning pain as the Urge latches on, but the move is so unexpected — and the Urge’s tolerance for pain evidently so high — that it surprises the sorcerer. The stake gets past Strange’s guard, slashes a rip into his shoulder. He hisses, feeling the warm blood ebbing out into his robes, hot and sticky. It distracts him enough that the rest of the shield vanishes.
An illogical thought, sparking: Isaac is going to be so annoying sealing that cut.
It’s his first time witnessing the Dark Urge first-hand, only ever having heard it described to him. Any dreams of talking some sense into Tav and dramatically, cinematically, heroically shaking him out of his murderous stupor start to vanish as the elf takes another swipe, the stake slashing through Strange’s sleeve and cutting another thin line into his arm. Strange is quick on his feet, constantly pivoting backwards with monk-like agility, but he’s bleeding and the pain dulls his reflexes. He can’t keep dodging this forever.
So finally, with a muttered “Sorry, pal,” he hauls on the Fade again, and this time it’s some eldritch glowing flame-like ropes, lighting up the clearing, flying through the air and starting to slither around the Urge like snakes, tightening and constricting.
The Urge fights through the pain in his hand, a smile forming at the sight of the Sorcerer's blood. All he needs is to get closer, to strike in a critical location to properly lay the Sorcerer out and begin the true cruelty.
However, before the Urge can move in closer, ropes begin to curl around him. No. He's not to be bound again, not after finally breaking free. The Urge tries to cut away at the ropes as they climb up his body.
He growls in the Sorcerer's direction, stake still gripped tight in his hand until he's properly disarmed.
The Urge saws and cuts at the ropes, but they’re made out of pure force, their fiery edges fizzing with heat and light; more and more tendrils appear until they force the Urge down to his knees, immobilised.
Doctor Strange had once held the Mad Titan in place this way, despite all of Thanos’ brute strength. The elf is still thrashing and squirming and gripping the stake, but there’s another tidy, precise flicker of Strange’s hand and the stake goes flying off into the undergrowth. (Which also means there goes his shelter if he wanted to rebuild the tent, but whatever. There’s bigger problems to hand.)
He rummages through his bag and then sits down on the nearby log where they’d had dinner just a few hours ago, and starts working on unwinding some bandages, as slow and measured and unhurried as if he’s unpacking after a picnic. The magical restraints flex and tighten whenever the Urge tries to thrash out of them again.
“Really would appreciate it if you snapped out of it, Tav,” Strange says, conversational.
The Urge is forced to his knees, but that doesn’t stop him from snarling like a wild animal. After failing another wisdom save When the sorcerer sits down to bandage himself, the Urge struggles harder, only to be held in place by the ropes around him.
“I will bathe in your blood before the night is over!” The Urge snarls.
As far as first words go, and his first time hearing anything from the Dark Urge, it’s quite interesting. Strange doesn’t seem to instantly react at first with any visible shock, instead working on attending to his injuries first.
There’s a certain kind of zen calm which has settled over him: adrenaline washing away, leaving that crisp mouthy Marvel confidence in its wake.
“Is that the general goal?” he asks as he glances up over his unrolled gauze, lightly curious, as if the Urge has merely announced an intention to go apple scrumping. “Cut people open and bathe in their blood? Broadly?”
"I'll pluck your eyes out and wear them on your ligaments like charms," the Urge growls at the Sorcerer, continuing to struggle against the ropes.
If he had his way, the Sorcerer would be on a table, ready to be dissected, already dead with his eyes torn out. Then the Urge would use any sharp object-- horn, knife, mirror shard-- to cut out the other organs.
For now, the Urge tries to bite the Sorcerer on top of his threats.
As the Urge flings his body forward to use his teeth as a weapon, the magical restraints tighten again and yank him out of the way before he can collide with Strange. Which unfortunately leads to the elf tipping over and thrashing on the ground, like some quarry lassoed and hog-tied, to be slung over some horse’s back.
Christ, getting him back to the Gallows is going to be difficult, isn’t it? They don’t have a horse or a griffon with them. Maybe he’ll call Clarisse, get her to fly one out to them in the woods.
Strange finishes wrapping his shoulder and then starts packing up their supplies, still calm and business-like. Tav had always named this (personality? psychosis? magical possession?) with capital letters, clearly a proper noun: Not until the Urge is defeated.
Now that this is the sorcerer’s first time meeting it, he can’t help seizing this opportunity to ask, to try to get more information, anything which might give him more context and help them all make their way towards a cure: “Do you go by the Urge? Is that the name you’d prefer to be called? Do you truly have no other?”
"I am Bhaalspawn," the Urge snarls at the Sorcerer. "I am heir to my father and he requires blood, sacrifice. I am no Urge, I am the true form. My bloodkin is responsible for this idiot."
Talking does not slow down the Urge in the slightest as he continues to fight against the ropes, tearing at his own skin and flesh if needed to get free.
"I have killed many stronger than you," a sick sneer stretches his mouth. "Put their organs in jars and bled them out for my father."
The flippancy isn’t unearned. He has been tortured. He has been impaled, cast into flames, crushed, ripped apart, tied up in Ebony Maw’s grasp, a thousand needles hovering centimeters from his eyes, burrowing into his skin, into his brain. Pain, agony, dying over and over, dying and dying. His organs in jars is practically an everyday threat by now.
He rubs absentmindedly at his throat and what he expects to be faint bruising later — but Tav’s fists are not Thanos’ monstrously oversized hand, so there’s that small favour.
With the equipment packed up, he shifts to redo Tav’s restraints, prepared for when the magic will fade, replacing them with tightly-cinched everyday rope and some shackles they’d both seen fit to pack beforehand (this trip was a gamble, yes, but not a completely unplanned one).
“Well, Bhaalspawn,” he says, “I’m looking forward to getting my friend back, one way or another. We’ll see you back to the Gallows.”
And thus begins the long haul of dragging that howling seething monster back home.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2024-07-31 01:29 am (UTC)And they keep going, forging into the Planasene as the day wears on. Eventually the well-traveled paths fade away, so they have to push through the undergrowth; whenever they reach a particularly difficult impasse, Strange summons up magical energy to brusquely whisk it aside, or Tav draws on nature for a gentler manipulation to make the branches lean away for them.
Tav’s bag fills with herbs and roots and seeds where they can find them, and the light drains from the sky. The sorcerer eventually calls it when twilight’s close (he’s just an ordinary human, he doesn’t have darkvision), and they camp out in a fairly large glade to set up their individual tents and bedrolls, with a low fire between the two tents. Hopefully they’re far enough from the front that there aren’t any Tevene forces nearby. If any wild animals get any hungry ideas, he’s certain they’ll be able to take care of it between them; having already fought an alien invasion and no end of demons and other sorcerers, the doctor is terrifically blasé about the idea of danger. They eat a simple dinner; they bid each other a polite goodnight.
Strange lies on his back, hands folded over his chest, restless, the mouth of the tent open so he can see the stars. It feels odd, not feeling the faint movement of water underfoot, not having the weight of someone else on a mattress beside him. It turns out he’s gotten awfully accustomed to sleeping next to Gwenaëlle on her houseboat, and he didn’t even realise until now how much that’s become home —
Still. It’s just one night away. It’s not going to kill him.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-01 11:51 pm (UTC)How long has it been since he listened to the bickering of Lae'zel and Shadowheart? Or listened to a lesson on magic from Gale? Perhaps the quanderings of Astarion as he considers whether to kill Cazador or not.
Months. Seven long months, most spent in an isolated room, only allowed out under guard. He's so painfully homesick in this moment that he can't help but reach out to the sorcerer across the way.
"Strange?" he asks, his voice quiet.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-02 12:31 am (UTC)(perhaps not since he and his younger siblings shared a room, staying up far too late despite their parents’ protests, Stephen and Donna and Victor hissing at each other and squabbling to see who could stay up the longest)
So. Strange is still awake. He’s a restless sleeper, and certainly an insomniac, and he doesn’t even sound groggy as he answers: “Yes, Tav?”
no subject
Date: 2024-08-02 12:57 am (UTC)"I wanted to say 'thank you,'" Tav replies, counting the stars to reign in his emotions. "I cannot express just how much this night means to me."
This freedom, these stars, it's everything.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-02 06:57 pm (UTC)“I didn’t want you to snap and fling yourself into the Waking Sea. We’re low on mages with healing magic,” he says. It’s yet another deflection, an excuse, a mild joke.
There’s a pause which drags on perhaps a little too long, then: “You’re welcome, though.”
no subject
Date: 2024-08-03 01:36 am (UTC)What a life that would be; all he would need is a few friends from home to help him re-warm to the Riftwatch.
When the pause rests between them, Tav thinks that will be the beginning and end of the conversation, but Strange continues and Tav can't help but give a proud sigh.
And hopes the rest of the night will be uneventful as he settles into his bedroll.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-03 09:57 pm (UTC)But they are unlucky, and Stephen Strange’s life has a habit of being so very eventful, and Tav has been stuck in the Gallows and fraying at the seams for weeks—
So instead, the sorcerer finds himself abruptly awake in the middle of the night, uncertain what roused him. Some small noise. Some crack of twig underfoot or the shift of air or rustling of fabric. Some movement.
Something.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-03 10:05 pm (UTC)Tav is dripping with sweat, his vision blurring as he crawls around the fire pit. He fights with himself as he opens his mouth to ask for help when his arms slip out from beneath him and the darkness takes him.
The Urge wakes up instead and sees the barely awake sorcerer before him. An easy target. And maybe he'll get to slice the sorcerer open and see just how he ticks. The Urge doesn't have a blade, but he doesn't need one right now. No, he straddles the sleeping sorcerer, hands closing around the sorcerer's neck.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-05 02:40 am (UTC)His reflexes are quick — quicker than they once were — and so his paranoia instantly latches onto instinctively fighting back, even as the Urge’s fingers dig into his throat and Strange’s scarred hands scrabble and shove ineffectually at the elf’s arms, feeling his windpipe closing and his air suffocating. This is oddly familiar. He’s been choked before. Like, to a surprising degree of frequency, why is this always the bad guys’ go-to—
A rapid list of options scrolls through his mind, a set of tools. He could summon a spectral knife and bury it between Tav’s ribs, he could send a burst of fiery energy against him, but no, his hands are metaphorically tied because he doesn’t want to outright kill the elf, just—
What eventually comes is a roiling explosive wave of telekinesis, blasting outward from the sorcerer and sending the druid flying several feet away. The tent collapses as Tav-slash-Urge is flung through it, and Strange finds himself tangled up in the fabric, needing to scramble his way free of the now-clumsy construction. Gasping for breath, he comes stumbling out, searching for the other silhouette in the half-darkness and already reaching for more magic.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-05 12:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-08-06 08:58 pm (UTC)Strange’s arm whips up with a glowing golden shield snapping into place: the stake slams into the magical barrier and skitters off. The sorcerer keeps the shield up as the Urge comes barreling at him, swinging wildly, and Strange has to desperately meet each strike with a deflect of his own. He has to occasionally sidle backwards and give way, not going on the offensive yet, shouting instead:
“Tav! Tav Whatever-Your-Unknown-Last-Name-Is— Tav, for the love of god, stop this. Snap out of it!”
no subject
Date: 2024-08-06 09:42 pm (UTC)Any words the Sorcerer says make little difference to the Urge as he continues to go for blood.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-07 03:00 am (UTC)An illogical thought, sparking: Isaac is going to be so annoying sealing that cut.
It’s his first time witnessing the Dark Urge first-hand, only ever having heard it described to him. Any dreams of talking some sense into Tav and dramatically, cinematically, heroically shaking him out of his murderous stupor start to vanish as the elf takes another swipe, the stake slashing through Strange’s sleeve and cutting another thin line into his arm. Strange is quick on his feet, constantly pivoting backwards with monk-like agility, but he’s bleeding and the pain dulls his reflexes. He can’t keep dodging this forever.
So finally, with a muttered “Sorry, pal,” he hauls on the Fade again, and this time it’s some eldritch glowing flame-like ropes, lighting up the clearing, flying through the air and starting to slither around the Urge like snakes, tightening and constricting.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-07 03:18 am (UTC)However, before the Urge can move in closer, ropes begin to curl around him. No. He's not to be bound again, not after finally breaking free. The Urge tries to cut away at the ropes as they climb up his body.
He growls in the Sorcerer's direction, stake still gripped tight in his hand until he's properly disarmed.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-07 03:26 am (UTC)Doctor Strange had once held the Mad Titan in place this way, despite all of Thanos’ brute strength. The elf is still thrashing and squirming and gripping the stake, but there’s another tidy, precise flicker of Strange’s hand and the stake goes flying off into the undergrowth. (Which also means there goes his shelter if he wanted to rebuild the tent, but whatever. There’s bigger problems to hand.)
He rummages through his bag and then sits down on the nearby log where they’d had dinner just a few hours ago, and starts working on unwinding some bandages, as slow and measured and unhurried as if he’s unpacking after a picnic. The magical restraints flex and tighten whenever the Urge tries to thrash out of them again.
“Really would appreciate it if you snapped out of it, Tav,” Strange says, conversational.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-07 01:40 pm (UTC)After failing another wisdom saveWhen the sorcerer sits down to bandage himself, the Urge struggles harder, only to be held in place by the ropes around him.“I will bathe in your blood before the night is over!” The Urge snarls.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-10 01:53 am (UTC)There’s a certain kind of zen calm which has settled over him: adrenaline washing away, leaving that crisp mouthy Marvel confidence in its wake.
“Is that the general goal?” he asks as he glances up over his unrolled gauze, lightly curious, as if the Urge has merely announced an intention to go apple scrumping. “Cut people open and bathe in their blood? Broadly?”
no subject
Date: 2024-08-10 02:02 am (UTC)If he had his way, the Sorcerer would be on a table, ready to be dissected, already dead with his eyes torn out. Then the Urge would use any sharp object-- horn, knife, mirror shard-- to cut out the other organs.
For now, the Urge tries to bite the Sorcerer on top of his threats.
no subject
Date: 2024-08-12 01:58 am (UTC)Christ, getting him back to the Gallows is going to be difficult, isn’t it? They don’t have a horse or a griffon with them. Maybe he’ll call Clarisse, get her to fly one out to them in the woods.
Strange finishes wrapping his shoulder and then starts packing up their supplies, still calm and business-like. Tav had always named this (personality? psychosis? magical possession?) with capital letters, clearly a proper noun: Not until the Urge is defeated.
Now that this is the sorcerer’s first time meeting it, he can’t help seizing this opportunity to ask, to try to get more information, anything which might give him more context and help them all make their way towards a cure: “Do you go by the Urge? Is that the name you’d prefer to be called? Do you truly have no other?”
no subject
Date: 2024-08-12 01:27 pm (UTC)Talking does not slow down the Urge in the slightest as he continues to fight against the ropes, tearing at his own skin and flesh if needed to get free.
"I have killed many stronger than you," a sick sneer stretches his mouth. "Put their organs in jars and bled them out for my father."
potential 🎀
Date: 2024-08-16 10:08 pm (UTC)The flippancy isn’t unearned. He has been tortured. He has been impaled, cast into flames, crushed, ripped apart, tied up in Ebony Maw’s grasp, a thousand needles hovering centimeters from his eyes, burrowing into his skin, into his brain. Pain, agony, dying over and over, dying and dying. His organs in jars is practically an everyday threat by now.
He rubs absentmindedly at his throat and what he expects to be faint bruising later — but Tav’s fists are not Thanos’ monstrously oversized hand, so there’s that small favour.
With the equipment packed up, he shifts to redo Tav’s restraints, prepared for when the magic will fade, replacing them with tightly-cinched everyday rope and some shackles they’d both seen fit to pack beforehand (this trip was a gamble, yes, but not a completely unplanned one).
“Well, Bhaalspawn,” he says, “I’m looking forward to getting my friend back, one way or another. We’ll see you back to the Gallows.”
And thus begins the long haul of dragging that howling seething monster back home.