#end-hyphen | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

fruitsofhell · 2 months ago

Text

Why is "Magical Mental Illness" ft. Spamton G. Spamton

It's honestly a shame that my delay in playing Deltarune has led to me not making an essay about Spamton already. There are so many things to be said about that wretched little man on every level from character writing to the narrative and gameplay mechanics. And while I would love to be an expert on most of these in order to give a great opinion, I am only a semi-expert in one thing - and that is Psychology in character writing. Even with finally playing the game, it took a few things beyond pure brainrot to get this essay out of me that are important to keep in mind. One, was a video essay I was watching about this very topic which was not sitting well with me. At times the essayist seemed to deliberately negate the in-universe readings of Spamton in order to blunt force certain labels onto him, and at others they hastily stepped over grounds for interesting psychological insights. This then reminded me of the other important aspect, that being some advice my Abnormal Psychology teacher gave my class on what can only be described as an actual blorbo diagnosis roleplay assignment. She advised us to avoid characters from stories too stepped in fantasy because it can at times be near impossible to seriously put a scientific label on that which was meant to be magical through and through. We're not playing Matpat here.

As an avid lover of both fantasy fiction and psychology, I have run into this paradox plenty, to the point I even once had a name for it - "Magical Mental Illness". It is just a fact of the medium that you will often run into characters who express traits discernable as real psychological dysfunctions, but with entirely magical logic behind them. Spamton, in all his spastic glory is a perfect example of this, to the point it is barely even worth pointing out. But what is worth pointing out is how that line between the clinical and magical does not have to be the end of the conversation. My gripe with that essayist is not that they chose an incorrect, haphazard way to look at Spamton, but that it did not provide the most satisfying synthesis. Especially with a game like Deltarune which subtly revels in blurring the line between the real and imaginary for characters and players alike. It is very concerned with how we relate to fiction through how its fiction relates to its own meta-fiction, creating new layers of meaning to explore. Humans have been relying on stories as windows to our souls as long as we've been writing them, and especially as reference for when our souls become troubled. It's only natural that in that legacy, we begin to read about what it even means to read a story.

Kris and the Player: Hand in Unlovable Hand

Before getting too thick into the weeds, it's important to explain what I mean by this double layer of fiction and how it connects to us. In almost all popular stories you have a perspective character or presence to serve as the audience's middle man, and for Deltarune that character is Kris. But Kris is not as passive as the usual protagonist, as they appear to be acutely aware of and tormented by their role as the player's vessel for peering into their world from outside the game. Somehow, this poor 14 year old within their own world has fallen victim to some sort of possession facilitated by a third party beyond them and the player, and the mystery surrounding this predicament and what meaning the story will find in it is one of the pillars of the narrative intrigue. One that ironically draws us into being active participants in this torment of Kris as we seek to understand how to break it for them.

I was actually watching a different video on Kris' backstory when I stumbled across another magical mental illness blunder in analysis that also inspired this essay. The essayist was explaining a part of Kris' backstory told by an estranged friend, Noelle, who describes how Kris used to have a habit of suddenly freezing and staring off into space for some time before coming to again and quietly reorienting themself. As someone watching the video to comprehend the in-universe and meta-narrative implications of this, I was very surprised when the essayist interjected by declaring this evidence of Kris suffering from absence seizures. Unlike the dramatic spastic seizures that typically come to our mind, absence seizures are as Noelle described, where people lose consciousness and freeze in place for periods of time. This interpretation was not useless. It did hint that Kris may have suffered extreme stress during that time in their life, and more importantly, it was a comfort to the essayist who made the connection from their own experience with the trait, but it does cut off discussion on its own. At best absence seizures may have been an active reference Toby Fox used to write the behavior, especially to make it something that people around Kris could attribute to a non-magical source, but in this world of possessions and mysteries that cannot be an answer in itself. Kris is a magical character in a magical context, and no matter what their behavior looks right now, it is more than likely magical mental illness.

Frustrating as those two essayists' reasoning can be, I can't fault the instinct. Honestly as I was watching that video beforehand I was sussing out in my mind a headcanon diagnosis of Kris that could contain the metaphorical strengths of their character and maybe speak some spiritual truth to that disorder and its humanity. One of my first instincts was Dissociative Identity Disorder, but I cringed away from it aware that it is a negative trope to portray alters as adversarial or invasive. But that trope, or more the language of it without the direct clinical label - magical DID - has never stopped being attractive to me, because even if it doesn't align with the psychological truth of the disorder, it does still with a broader metaphor. Maybe its selfish, but when I read of DID, an inevitable theme or story of it arises in my mind that reminds of my personal struggles with identity. How parts of me sometimes felt foreign and cancerous, and how learning to carve parts of those out of me was a silent triumph I longed to express or see expressed in stories around me. In Kris, I see my own middle school age self who lost the superficial childish dreams which defined her and moved through life in a daze as she tried to understand what truly ran her before finding it and taking back control. That thinking can come off as medieval or psychoanalytical, but as a writer I think it can be important to recognize it as a tool of empathy as well. A way for an unafflicted soul to find a root in themselves that at least emotionally blurs the line between themself and this clinically defined "other".

As we'll see with Spamton, this exercise in relatability between players and Kris goes deeper than just the initial experience of struggle, but into that wish to see oneself reflected elsewhere. Deltarune is not a story that needs to have specific discernible labels to its characters' internal struggles, because its not about the answer as much as it is about carrying a question with oneself into another realm. As I or another player may carry insecurities about control of the self into Deltarune, Kris carries their own into the dubiously metaphorical Dark World. As of right now, it is somewhat hard to say whether the Dark Worlds are as real as the life of Kris and their fellow lightners in the Light World, and I doubt this boundary will cease to be toyed with anytime soon. At the end of the first chapter we can see the hint that the card and board game themed Dark World was related to a closet of alike toys, and the connection was made explicit when Kris is told to bring the characters - the darkners - of that previous session into a new ground established in chapter 2's computer lab. But, at the end of each chapter, just as the player could begin to say to themself it may have all been a dream, Kris tears the player's will out of their body and reminds them how willing this game is to confuse the borders of reality inside fiction and out. Making Deltarune a rather inappropriate choice for attempting to draw clean borders between a clinical and magical character psychology.

Spamton Don't Seem Too Well, Does He?

Exploring the Dark World with a focus on Kris is what finally leads us to the one and only, collective delight of millions, Spamton G. Spamton. He is beloved for being a masterclass in how to lead players into the depths of a stories machinations (1). From pithy lore to fundamental existential questions, Spamton's rich character arc encompasses it all brilliantly, but it's not where to begin, as it is not where Kris nor the player begins. First impressions are critical after all, and Toby Fox has pretty much never let looming implications get in the way of a damn funny character. From his very first textbox after bursting out of a garbage dumpster, Spamton is equal parts incomprehensible and memetic. Players will literally freeze up in utter bafflement as they take whole seconds to comprehend the gaping blank space in his dialogue, with may just giving up on understanding its intention and filling in the gaps either way (2). Uniformly capitalized text, keyboard smash-esque grammatical errors, odd meter, and most famously, randomly bracketed text abound. Yet somehow by the end of the first bossfight, most players walk away thoroughly engaged in trying to translate his quirks into YTP impressions or an otherwise stilted and manic tone. He disappears after this first encounter till the final area of the game, but its nearly impossible for a player to not be thinking about him after.

(1) See a great, and highly inspiring breakdown of his character construction in Designing For's video on him!

(2) For examples of what I mean...

These unique mannerisms of Spamton's are where we find Toby Fox's employment and mastery of one of the most common tropes used to convey insanity and instability in a character. It is a tell-tale example of disorganized speech, specifically through a pattern resembling loose association where the words of the subject are strung along by superficial rather than descriptive content. Usually loose associations sends oblivious sufferers on a chain of associations far beyond what anyone but them can understand, but Spamton's writing seems to marry the idea with concentrated dialogue by way of the system of bracketed text. Spamton will splice tangentially related sales-themed slogans and phrases directly into his sentences before picking back up. Trying to say something along the lines of, "Why be a little whelp who hates its pathetic life," becomes --

> "WHY BE THE [[Little Sponge]] WHO HATES ITS [[$4.99]] LIFE"

-- A real life loose association phrase meanwhile would likely have taken "little sponge" and began starting a string of words related to the kitchen sink. The genius on display here, is that Spamton succeeds in getting his very important deal-making scheme across while also reading as utterly insane to the player. It's a careful balance of chaos and conscientious use of the player's time, which adds a character-rich twist to this common cliche. As players acclimate and move on from the encounter, they will likely begin to put together more and more patterns in Spamton's speech which fuels the intrigue.

By the time players return to Spamton's shop and spend even more time delighted and/or terrified by his erratic personality, it begins to become clear that 'crazy' in its more dismissive reading is not the whole picture for him. Really it started with his referencing of Kris' "[[HeartShapedObject]]" in the first scene, which may have been lost on disoriented players, but not on the character themself who visibly, autonomously flinched away from Spamton at the mention of this device which binds them to us. But these revelations are still for a time buried under another mountain of equally well-written quirks that have players continuing to second guess Spamton's legitimacy. At his shop, away from the eyes of Kris' fellow party members or surrounding darkners who have already declared him crazy, Spamton unveils the roots of his madness to them and the player. His catchphrase "[[BIG SHOT]]" begins to take form as an analogy for some kind of higher state of being related to Kris' world, or possibly even the player's, and it is self-evident why he seemingly can't shut up about it --

"> I'LL GET SO. > I'LL GET SO. > I'LL GET SO. > I'LL GET SO. > I'LL GET SO. > I'LL GET SO. > [[Hyperlink blocked.]]"

-- he sputters like a broken, creepily aware toy. What would in a clinical sense be a delusion is the main drive behind Spamton's entire character, a delusion of control that something or someone above him is pulling the strings of the world, and perhaps one of grandeur at his unflinching certainty in his ability to rise above it.

A new quirk in his disorganized speech also emerges in his shop dialogue which goes from a diet loose association, to abrupt breaks in tone and subject mid sentence. One of the chilling examples is triggered when Spamton tries to discuss some "knight" character - a focal point of fan theorizing - but breaks into frantic apology as soon as the words leave his mouth. Before a player could even suspect if this was a reaction to Kris, he screams --

> TOO MANY EXCESS VACATION DAYS?? TAKE A GOD DAMN VACATION STRAIGHT TO HELL

-- Most definitely alluding to some other confrontation. In another, bringing up your fears (which could be related toward God knows how many aspects of this sidequest) leads Spamton to a sudden departure from his unending award-winning grimace, as he solemnly asks, "… can anyone hear me? Help…", before immediately springing back to life--

"> HUH??? WHAT?? NO, I DIDN'T HEAR ANYTHING JUST NOW!!! > … BUT IT SOUNDED LIKE THEY WERE TALKING TO YOU."

-- Both can be read as a new flavor of break-down in speech content, and the first one especially as some sort of traumatic flashback, but to keep consistent I believe they could be best read as hints of otherwise unreferenced hallucinations. Perhaps trying to speak of something forbidden triggered accusations in his ears causing him to panic and lose his train of thought, or he accidentally parroted a line out loud (echolalia) and tried to deflect as in the last case.

Leaving the shop, as with the first bossfight, is another crucial point where Spamton has sold a second layer of himself to the players as a personality and character^1^. While the full glory of the former won't crystallize until his final confrontation, the latter has been established well enough by now players are choosing to buy tickets to however all this insanity comes together. That insanity is very clinically and unsurprisingly diagnosable as Schizophrenia. Disorganized speech, paranoid delusions, and possible hallucinations are all hallmarks of the disorder and especially its archetype in fiction. His constant smiling affect could even be lumped in with motor dysfunction too if it weren't for the fact that his kin, the adisons display this naturally too. From the backstory the adisons tell of him as an easter egg, a broader picture of Spamton's life as this living corrupted computer ad comes into focus, in a way which could thematically be read as mood disturbances. A life of never-ending career failures perhaps the result of a persistent depression, only to be broken by a psychotic mania in which brute force of personality and ideas - hallucinated from phone static - sent him soaring into the heights of unsustainable success. But that requires more assumptions about him than are necessary, and in the end the core takeaway here is that Spamton presents with highly readable psychotic symptoms.

So there you have it. A clinical, psycho-pathological reading of Spamton G. Spamton from Deltarune. Satisfied? Hopefully not, because I ignored nearly everything about him that is relevant to the story being told. As Spamton becomes more psychotic to the player, he also becomes more comprehensible in parallel. At the same time players can begin to read him as a paranoid schizophrenic, they realize that his paranoia in all its bracketed glory is directly on the money. He recognizes a power dynamic between the worlds of this story that most others are oblivious or apathetic to, and accurately implicates Kris' role within it while soliciting their favor. His associations are less loose and more censorious, and from their syntax-breaking nature, likely not by the volition of him or anything related to his plane of reality. Even his grossly broken text I attributed to hallucinations may be displays of the raw power some of these characters carry in the narrative, and the fear and disorientation they strike in its subjects. While he is doubtlessly still mentally unstable, he is by no means out of touch with reality as the diagnosis of Schizophrenia defines. Spamton is explicitly speaking arcane truths, not the psychological noise that makes up the real disorder of Schizophrenia, no matter how much his mind is struggling to carry that truth's weight.

Garbage Noise

One of the connections that always chilled me in the Spamton story was the notion of the "garbage noise" which the adisons report coming from the speaker of Spamton's phone. I was sure to make this period in Spamton's life where he communicated with a mysterious benefactor over the phone a psychotic one in the mood disorder model for that fact. It is on very purposefully ignorant surface-level evidence that a player could say Spamton's insanity came from nothing, but there is a very fun detail in how they themselves can come to hear this garbage noise. If a player opens Kris' phone and tries to make a call, a shrill mechanical tone tears through the receiver instead of a simple text-description of static. Toby Fox wanted the player to understand what "garbage noise" was, but he also wanted the player to understand exactly where it comes from - any line from the Dark World into Kris' Light World. I can't get enough of obfuscations like this in storycrafting, especially here where it simultaneously combines two ideas at once. We only know of nonsense coming through the phones of the Dark World, but we have heard that it is a divine, higher plane nonsense for Spamton. Whether it once gave way to a clear voice or not does not change its deeper content, and in a way, as much as it may invalidate Spamton as a rational subject, the idea it never sounded any different is revealing and chilling.

Why is it that Spamton presents so bluntly as psychotic when we know he is truthful? Even the source of his madness or genius can't be determined as of now as anything but the darkner equivalent of cosmic background radiation! Well, this is because Toby Fox, deliberately or subconsciously, is drawing on centuries to millennia of fictional ideas to shape this character, not our beloved scientific labels. Without a doubt the most modern framework applicable is that of lovecraftian knowledge and memetic hazards, where the world hides are cosmic facts to be learned that tear the psyche of its learner asunder. I could write an entire other essay on how Spamton is quite possibly the most creative and delightful take on this trope ever created, but sadly, claims like that require substantiation. But, with my pre-existing knowledge of psychology and capacity to wax philosophic, I would like to go beyond that thesis as a historical statement, and more so as a theme or story. The story Deltarune is getting out of this reference to the Schizophrenic archetype, the way I could infer the story of DID out of Kris. What the platonic ideal of this human experience means to Deltarune for Toby Fox to write Spamton as such, and what Deltarune intends it to mean for us.

Throughout human history, we have, frankly speaking, not understood a damn thing about what was happening to or around us. When humans saw the subset of ourselves who ranted and raved about things no one else could see, hear, feel, nor touch, there was a natural mix of apprehension and fascination towards them. We are pattern-seeking animals, nonsensically so even at our healthiest, so of course when our kin passionately speak of patterns found in that which we cannot begin to comprehend, we are drawn to the idea of novel and potentially revolutionary knowledge. But routinely, even in superstitious societies, many have tried to follow the patterns drawn by them only to come to naught. Even those afflicted, once in better health, may reflect and find nothing but psychic noise. But every now and then the pattern leads to something, whether that be a religion, a theory, or just a spark of imagination. Imagination for a world where we create the patterns, and tell the characters within and ourselves which to see and which to ignore. For as harmful as many portrayals of schizophrenic and psychotic behavior based on this fossil of reasoning can be, like those distortions of DID, I can't help but see an attempt for empathy in them. A wish to create a world where the disorientation, isolation, and exhaustion of the psychotic mind we see can find a form of radical acceptance.

The product of this story holds true for Kris and Spamton within the broader narrative of Deltarune, with its open look into how reality becomes fantasy and how that fantasy reinforces reality. Spamton is a character with a shocking amount of impact on Kris, despite them being more aware than any other lightner of the falseness of the Dark World. It is more than just the flinch at Spamton's mention of the player's soul inside them, but their desperate striking of the shell in the basement during the Spamton fight fakeout, and being so emotional after Spamton's defeat that it elicits concern from their party-mates no matter what words the player puts in their mouth. To Kris, Spamton - this ridiculous embodiment of a spam email thrown in the trash - should be no more than an overly interactable and self-aware cartoon. Spamton's words, his actions, and his ambitions have no reason to matter to them, most of the insights he gives are into Kris' own vision. But they nonetheless highlight something in it that shakes Kris to their core, and causes them to look down on this speck of a man from their higher plane, and squirm in empathetic agony. Spamton's struggles speak to their own; speak to freedom, captivity, choice, autonomy. Things that Kris has been struggling with silently since the player opened a save files, and which Kris is for the first time hearing put into words. Passionate, direct yet censored words. Coming from a 3ft tall spam email, but coming from something nonetheless.

Spamton's struggles do not fall on deaf ears for players either, no more than Kris' do, drawing them deeper into every moment of every interaction between these scheming characters. When a man in the real world speaks of being tied to metaphysical strings and reaching a new plane, others in their superegos understand this to be baseless, but still feel something metaphorical to hold on to. All of us feel patterns which cannot be measured as materially as we would wish on a daily basis. Ones we can connect partially to tried and true philosophies of science, even religious doctrines, but which we strain not to turn into something too cosmic, for fear of chaining ourselves to unreason. An abstracted, diffuse lack of control in life has inspired everything about the human condition down to the delusions of that hypothetical man. But when this intangible captivity is molded and sculpted into a lower reality, into a story, it can become more real, it can become comprehensible and acceptable. So when we are insecure about feigning more knowledge than we could ever truly know about our own cosmos, we create miniatures and have them discourse with us about the patterns we have brought into pseudo-existence. And crucially, for all the pity or fear we cast upon those sick with societal and psychological superstition, we imagine a world where people like them can speak a real truth. Where listening to them and indulging in their passion through all the insanity is not just unashamed but objectively correct. Where the story - not the reality - of psychosis makes sense.

Watch Me Fly [[Mama]]!

But at the same time, knowing that we cannot truly grasp past our own cosmos anymore than a fictional seer can be rewarded with realness for his insights, we often can't help but write a bitter ending. Deltraune puts Spamton within a unique position, where by being from a world within a world, there was at least that one plane for him to jump to. There is a version of Deltraune where Spamton became a "[[BIG SHOT]]" and entered the Light World. But that is not the version of Deltarune that Toby Fox wanted to tell, because that would be about a hypothetical less real, less true to existence for the player than a spam email coming to life and begging them for money. If Spamton's schemes had succeeded, it likely would have been too unreal for that anyone to even consider trying to diagnose him with a real world sickness, because his failure is what gives him that tangibility. That fantastical caricature based in a true story of human existence allows us to explore our dreams and to blur the lines between ourselves and those we deem a simultaneously wretched and idealized other.

Like Kris cutting the strings of Spamton's big but not "[[BIG]]" enough body, we cut the strings of these dreams to allow sobriety to wash over us, reminded that no character nor person can move past their dedicated realities. Spamton then resigns himself to being an aspect for Kris to carry throughout their adventure, offering: "Let me become your strength." A silent passion once again, after the bombast of his performance that reminds us that it was a truth at one point, spoken by something, by someone. Spamton's lust for freedom, control, and understanding will stay in Kris' heart throughout their own character arc, and once they have succeeded or been cut down in parallel, we, the players, will have an aspect of them with us as well. A reminder that someone out there, some artist named Toby Fox, recognized a truth that we resonated with for all its potential absurdity, and spoke it long enough for us to dream and wake again. Hopefully with a clearer image of the world around us, in all its utter incomprehensibility and infinite meanings. A few of those meanings we hold in our back pocket just became a bit clearer thereafter.

That is why we have magical mental illness. Some of it is ableism and people wishing to assert an arbitrary boundary between sanity and reason, some of it is patronizing misplaced sympathy for struggling people, some of it is a profound meditation on the power of knowledge. It all gets a bit jumbled together after so many years, so many iterations, so many countless voices contributing to the noise that forms into what we would call a trope. But that history of meaning-making is beautiful and it is present in Deltarune. In amazing crystal clarity before the game is even a third of the way finished, may I add. The piecemeal nature of this story is perfect for letting ideas like those of Spamton get as much room to breathe as they can, as I can only imagine the game has more knockouts like him in store, but it would be a crying shame for them to all drown each other out in one single release window. Perhaps because Deltarune is a story about characters digesting stories, it makes most sense too for there to be delays - no matter how asynchronous - between adventures. If people want an excuse to understand why Kris reopened a Dark Fountain at the end of Chapter 2, just think about how hungry we all are to get another bite out of this game and its resonant characters this June!

#spamton #utdr #deltarune analysis #shut the heck up #media analysis #im tired of being normal its time for another 4000+ word essay on cartoon guys #this one was really really rotisserie-ing in my head since a bit ago #it started as a misunderstanding of someone elses thesis (that video i mention at the start) but became very beautiful to me #i have a lot of opinions on this all if you cant tell #also tumblr deleted all my damn whitespace-indents grrr #now i had to clumsily add hyphens between blockquotes so you can tell im not ending paragraphs #this will be up on my site eveeeeentually #and im gonna bring the kirby essay here too maybe this weekend #tag talking

17 notes · View notes

ehlnofay · 6 months ago

Text

my tes secret santa for @anotherclassicpretence! truth be told I've been having a tad bit of writer's block lately but some of your prompts were VERY interesting (I liked the idea of writing delphine before the main quest a lot... this more or less counts) so I hope I've done them justice. hope you're having a splendid holiday season!

...

“Steady on, Hilde,” Delphine says with a brusque, manufactured sort of calm. “You’ll do yourself a mischief.”

It's a relief, she thinks, that the day Hilde has elected to barge in with world-upending news is a convenient one; it isn’t as though Riverwood is the kind of place to attract crowds, most of the time (part of the reason she chose to live here at all) but the inn is unusually quiet now. Orgnar is nominally organising something in the cellar, which means that he’s spending an hour swapping two bottles around and calling it a day, and the dining hall is warmed to a swelter with the ever-going hearthfire, and utterly empty. No-one’s come in for lunch yet. No rooms rented out last night, either, so it’s all silent on that front; it’s just Delphine and her wet cotton cloth, wiping down the stained tables till they shine, and Hilde with her hair wrapped and her string of beads tangling round narrow, hard-knuckled fingers. She’s sat herself on the chair with the wobbly leg; it needs fixing soon. Ordinarily, Delphine would herd her onto another, but right now she doesn’t think there’s anything in the world that would get Hilde to listen.

“Hark at her!” she complains to the bead-string - all marbled glass dyed blue and red and yellow, clinking together on their leather cord. “Do a mischief - do a mischief - it’s as if she can’t bloody hear me -”

Delphine swipes the cloth over the chip in the corner of the table. “I hear you,” she replies (does she ever hear her). Hilde’s hands are white where the necklace bites into her skin; her lips are pinched into a puckered line. Her eyes are red-rimmed and fierce. “Hilde. I’m going to get you a drink to calm your nerves, and then we’ll talk it over properly, all right?”

“Talk it over,” Hilde repeats, high and scornful, and then her face screws up quite suddenly as if all the fight has fled it - the wrinkles in her cheeks deepening to uneasy valleys, knuckles pressed to the thin slat of her mouth, beads digging hard into her cheek. “Nine have mercy… thank you, Delphine.”

The inner corner of Delphine’s lip snags, near imperceptibly, between the blunt ends of her canines. She nods once, and she ducks behind the bar, folding the cloth with damp precision as she goes. The cask of ale is near empty, the mugs lined up on their shelf, sparkling clean, cutlery rattling around in its tin. It's not fancy - Riverwood is a small, old town, built on the bones of an older one, and no matter how well-run the inn has been since she bought it it's not exactly a prime destination, but it's a good sort of a place. And innkeeping is decent work. Keeps you busy. Keeps your ear to the ground. Gives you something to focus on, in the meantime -

When Delphine grabs a tankard, she notes with some incredulity that her hand is trembling. She stills it. She pours the ale until the cup rim is flecked with froth.

(Gives you something to focus on in the meantime, in between real work, while you're waiting -)

(There is a feeling rising in her body, foaming like the ale; a sour, stomach-turning excitement, as if she's in her twenties again and wet behind her ears, biting back all the intrigue. Like she has an unlined face and fresh armour and is standing again in line for her induction ceremony. Like she's staring something in the face and thinking, finally.)

Delphine caps the cask. She is not in her twenties, and she is not staring anything down; bar Hilde, a seventy year old woman with tannin-stained hands and the latest in a line of tall stories. Delphine didn't get this far (how far?) (still alive, isn’t she) through credulity. She's a pragmatist through and through - won't believe anything she hasn't seen evidence of with her own eyes; and yet.

And yet.

She sets the mug down on the table; a pale and lukewarm drop slides down the pewter, just next to the handle. She'll need to wipe it all down again, after this.

Hilde takes it, absent-minded; the beads slither from where they’re strung around her hands to rest in a smooth curve over her chest. Her hands are shaking - she doesn’t seem to notice, or if she does, she doesn’t stop them. There is a look about her, all of a sudden, that seems dreadfully, fixedly haunted, like a woman looking down the barrel of a cannon, some rapid-rigged explosive, something to level the town. Like she’s caught the apocalypse’s eye. Delphine reaches out, perfunctory, and pats the back of her hand; Hilde grimaces and downs half her tankard in one long, desperate swig.

Light’s coming in through the window-slats up by the rafters, dull and gold, dust motes in the shafts of it. It makes the white wimple of cloth swaddled hastily around Hilde’s head shine in places.

“Big as the mountain,” she mumbles into the lip of the tankard, fingers wrapped tight around its handle, “black as night - flew right over the barrow like something fit to block out the sun.”

Delphine’s teeth scrape over that spot at the corner of her lip. She can’t help but say, “Are you sure -”

“I know what I saw,” Hilde snaps. Her knuckles and lips are blanched and colourless. Liquid sloshes over the edge of her cup with her sharp, abortive gestures. “I saw a dragon.”

Delphine is very careful not to let her face do anything at all, there.

(It’s adrenaline, she knows; the pointed, muscle-coiled readiness to move - to act - to make a plan in service of a solid end and carry it off perfectly; the comfort of seeing possibility roll out before her like a long many-doored hallway, like a road she might be able to walk instead of these four walls she’s circled for too many years. Innkeeping is decent work - keeps her ear to the ground - keeps her busy in the interim, but it’s not what Delphine does, not what she’s been trained to do; not a purpose, not something to strive for, and oh, Divines -)

(None of this is substantiated. Delphine is not a rash and green youth, not anymore and not again, and she will not start running away with silly fantasies before she’s checked anything at all; she has had her fill of disappointment, and should know better than to invite it - should know better than to start spinning grand plans, before she’s even sent out some missives to the pale cobweb of contacts she has left - over the barrow; west, then - is there a significance, to the barrow? Does she have anything about it in her side room? Nine, it’s times like this she misses the old library and the mad old codger that kept it, and, no. No.)

(Yes.)

“It’ll come back,” Hilde’s saying with fearful certainty; lips flecked with spittle and beer-foam, hands still shaking. “It’ll come back, and it’ll kill us all, and then you’ll believe me -”

“I believe you,” Delphine tells her, and it is inexplicably, regrettably true. (She’s thinking about the library. She’s thinking about the dragonlore. She’s thinking that if dragons are back, someone will have to do something about it - and oh Divines how she has missed being the one to do something about it.)

Her hands are still, but only through some effort.

She feels like she’s been dozing for twenty years and only now has been shocked awake.

Hilde looks at her, white-mouthed and white-scarved; she frowns, a tense, sour thing, and she says doubtfully, “You look like you need a drink.”

Delphine laughs. It’s a short, gruff bark of sound. Her hands are flat on the tabletop; her hair is coming loose in thin wisps from the tight knot at the base of her skull. Sunlight trickles through the windows, golden-fresh. “No,” she says. “No, thank you, Hilde, I'm good."

#i would have liked to edit this one a bit more but fussing over it was just making it turn to GIBBERISH BEFORE MY EYES so.#it's polished enough!#will go back and fix the hyphen/em-dash situation later. im using google docs atm and it's giving me HELL #this one was fun to write bc it made me laugh to think about how drastically differently these people are reacting #delphine (intelligence agent that thrives in high stress situations. desperately bored traumatised lonely and searching for purpose)#vs hilde (random old nord woman whose culture draws a direct unambiguous line between Dragon = The Literal End Times)#hilde has SEEN THE HARBINGER OF DOOM and NO-ONE BELIEVES HER. except delphine - against her better judgement - and she #is saying FUCK YES #(even better than it's literally alduin. she saw the god that will consume all the world and nobody care)#(this is what HAPPENS when we don't listen to women!)#tessecretsanta2024 #tes #fay writes #my writing #skyrim #delphine #my beloved... woman of all time

20 notes · View notes