147 - Book 3: Chapter 12: Interlude - Xothok - Inward Spiral

147 - Book 3: Chapter 12: Interlude - Xothok - Inward Spiral

Mercy was something that could only be afforded by the powerful.

That was the lesson Xothok had taken away from the fight between his team and the four adventurers that had utterly overwhelmed them. Derivan, Vex, Misa, Sev the names were practically burned into his head. They could have killed all of them, and as far as Xothok was concerned, they would have been justified in doing so.

They hadn't. But they could afford not to; they were never in any danger. His team had never had that option. He'd thought that they'd moved beyond that, with all the progress they'd made, but...

It was clear that it wasn't enough. The same logic he'd once used on the caravans they preyed upon overwhelming force, because they couldn't guarantee that they would win if they showed one iota of mercy now reflected back on him in the death of his oldest friend.

He wondered when Byrrhon had changed so much, and he wondered when he'd made himself stop looking.

"We should hold a funeral," he said absently. It felt cold, the way he said it, like there was no real emotion behind his words; the truth was that Xothok didn't really know how he felt. His other self stared at him with something like sympathy in his eyes, and didn't say a word.

Xothok normally hated it when Kothos spoke, but now he found he missed having his input.

"Fer that scumbag?" Morkar snarled. "No offense, boss, but he was tryin' to kill you. Almost did, too."

"Not just for him," Xothok said. He didn't finish the thought. Instead, he walked over to the pile of wood still lying in the field. Byrrhon's body could wait; they had a catapult to build.

Though he did send a quick message off to the Guildmaster first, just so she knew what had happened.

His men followed his lead, though they gave each other strange looks. The quests and working with the Guild they were fine with; though many of them bore a grudge against the Guild for rejecting them in the first place, they were starting to understand that those were the actions of rogue members, rather than a general principle of the Guild in the first place. In their time here, a few of them had managed to make friends, both with other adventuring teams and with the staff at the Guild.

They were, in other words, starting to fit in.

But this other project Xothok had? None of them could make heads nor tails of it. They knew, intellectually, that Xothok had explained what he was trying to do a number of times. They'd all seen the piece of paper onto which he'd drawn a picture of the night sky, and they all felt the same strange sense of odd familiarity.

That more than anything, perhaps, was the reason they all followed him despite not knowing exactly what all of this was for.

The work took hours, even with the help of a skill; in that time the Guildmaster had responded and sent someone to collect Byrrhon's body, so Xothok didn't have to look at it. Didn't have to think about it. He kept himself focused on the work instead, until the final nail had been hammered into place, and he stared at what they had constructed.

It was a piece of shit. It was clear everyone else felt that way, too, considering the dubious looks they were all giving the thing. But it didn't need to be good. So long as it had a bare minimum of functionality...

"You will need to remember how to navigate," Kothos murmured, standing beside him. "Targeting is not enough. Space is complex, and reaching a star safely even moreso, even when the star is dead. Perhaps especially then."

"The fuck is complex supposed to mean?" Xothok asked. "It's space. The whole thing's empty."

"You'd think that." Kothos chuckled. "The planeshifted thought that. Turns out space here is a little different. You'll find out when you get there."

"Or you could fuckin' tell me."

"Now where would the fun in that be?" Kothos smiled.

Infuriating ass. It was made all the worse by the reminder that Kothos was just another iteration of him, and he could absolutely picture himself acting that way in another life.

"You know what to do?" Xothok turned to Two. He was the only one that Xothok actually trusted to aim and fire the thing. He'd been surprisingly amenable to changing his class, too.

Two nodded, but stayed silent, as he always did. Morkar folded his arms, staring skeptically at the catapult.

Once more, a small field of brilliant points of light appeared behind his eyelids, in his mind's eye.

"Oh," he said, though the word was lost quickly to the wind.

But it was strange, wasn't it, that there was wind at all?

That realization made the wind around him die down. He'd already arrived, he realized; the idea that he was still traveling was just another layered illusion, built by the expectations of his mind.

He recalled the response Misa had sent him, startlingly fast. [Be careful,] she had said. [You're going to go out of range of the anchors that way. We're not sure exactly what's there, but it's probably not going to be what you expect. If we're right about where you are, then you might be in a liminal space don't ask me what that means, Vex used the term, not me where direction of thought influences direction of movement. That might not make sense until you're there.]

He had, of course, replied with [I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about.] and left it at that.

Now, though, the meaning of her words were a little more clear. Whenever he focused on one of those points of light, he found himself drifting closer toward it

[Are you okay?]

The message pinged, unexpected, from Two. Xothok blinked at it, surprised, then answered [For now.]

It was the first time any of his men had checked up on him, even Two. How strange.

Xothok dismissed it for now and reached for the drawing he kept in his pocket, and let the image mentally drag him in; allowed the aching familiarity to suffuse his being. It served as a reminder that he'd once been someone else

"They're waypoints," Kothos said, appearing as a strangely well-lit phenomenon in the void. He sounded wistful. "Not stars. Just markers we left for each other, exploring... whatever this place is. Every one of them should be near a star."

And yet it all looked so empty. Kothos hadn't needed to say the words; Xothok could see could feel it for himself, how achingly empty the space felt, even filled with light like this.

"Might as well give it a try," he muttered, mostly to himself; Kothos nodded beside him, but he ignored him. He had his own storm of emotions to deal with without having to deal with the infuriatingly calm other version of himself. Something like fear, anger, some guilt he was certain he wouldn't have felt if it wasn't for the damn Guild

He was moving, he realized. One of the waypoints was darker than the others, and unlike most of the others, there was something next to it. Not a star nothing like a star should have been.

The corpse of a star, perhaps. Except even that descriptor was insufficient. He saw burnt and desiccated ruins made of crimson flesh, and as he directed his mind towards the thought of it, he felt himself drift closer.

"I don't think you should go there," his other self told him. Kothos sounded, for once, nervous.

"Fuck you," Xothok answered.

Part of him knew it wasn't the best response. Kothos had a point. There was something about this place that repulsed him. But he couldn't have pulled himself away if he wanted to. Even when he tried to cast his mind to other waypoints that seemed like they might have something next to them, Byrrhon's hate-filled expression jumped back into his mind. The way he'd stared at him as he died stuck in his mind.

And those thoughts, too, drew him ever closer to those ruins.

"Navigators need clarity of mind," Kothos said. "You can't dwell on your emotions"

"I said fuck you," Xothok repeated. He wasn't explaining shit to his copy. What right did he have to say anything? Kothos had experienced none of the hardship he had; he'd lived a cushy life as a fucking noble.

Some small part of Xothok recognized the spiral his mind was in, maybe.

But not enough to break out of it.