#I'm so sorry for how unhelpful this is I truly was winging it

[essektheylyss]

Hi! I love your Caleb cosplay it's so cool! Out of curiosity do you have a pattern for the Caleb knit scarf? Have a good day!! 💜

Hi, thank you!

I will be super honest, the scarf is very basic because it was the first thing I've knitted, and it only has multiple colors because I got overzealous about how wide I wanted it and ran out of my first color. (I forget who commented I probably wanted a second skein but they were correct.) So it's about 200 yards of bulky yarn with 26 stitches to a row in a basic knit stitch, with about 8-inch blocks of the same thing in a different color on either end.

I genuinely have no idea how many rows any of the sections have, but if you started in one color, switched to the second after you've got about 8 inches of scarf, then knit the second color off of a 200-ish yard skein until you run out and then go back to the first color for another 8 inches, you'd get a good approximation of it!

#I'm so sorry for how unhelpful this is I truly was winging it #can you tell I have not yet learned to reliably read a pattern? it is probably very obvious #tbf I was working off a page that suggested like... 13 stitches in super bulky yarn? #but I didn't like my super bulky yarn options and then got to deciding stitch width and was like '.....I want it wider than that' #i probably would've had no issues with yarn amount if I'd stuck to under 20 stitches but alas. here we are #on an unrelated note if anyone has good recs for learning to reliably read a pattern they would be GREATLY appreciated #(narrator voice: this note was very much related)

[electrivolt]

@rockheadcd asked : "I'm okay."

The first thing to come out of his mouth despite such striking cobalt staring so fearfully at his wounded state. More scars would inevitably overlap the ones that haphazardly scratched along his skin, although most of it was hidden under the layers of bandages that concealed, stitched gashes. Roark remembered something about broken ribs, something else about mortal wounds, and certainly the labor it was to even breathe. His chest felt heavy, every inhale sore and every exhale stuttered.

Roark at least knows better not to keep Volkner away, not when he's littered in bandages as these places are so apt to leave shrapnel everywhere like spikes, unfortunate and dirty punctures for the unsuspecting collapse. This might he the worst he's sustained, at least ever since he contracted oripathy, and ever since that moment he was fighting to keep breathing before transferring to Rhodes. But, as he looks fondly, tiredly at the feline that refused to leave his side, he remembers those moments weren't ones Volkner was there for—luckily. This was the worst, for him, at least, even if he doesn't remember anything except the stench of fried skin and the haze of the lightning strike that saved the archosaurian's life. "..Sorry about all this, I'm not much of a fan of infirmaries myself, but.." Ah, it's tiring to talk when the sutures and bandages do a wonderful job in behaving like a corset. "We made it back, and that's…all that really matters."

The arm slung around the other's shoulders bears a little more of his weight, Roark's pace set by the cadence of pain set in his ribs. They would heal on their own, but it certainly wouldn't be a passive process. Beyond that, there was the only the partially concealed bruising that colored him under the comfort of his Rhodes-issued jacket. In other words, things Volkner couldn't do anything about except fret over, among other things. Being a defender primarily meant this was the risk an operator took every time they were dispatched.

"Thank you, though.. I mean it. You saved my life. I owe you…" An understatement, really, given he would have been down for the count if he wasn't as stubborn as he was. Still, tuscan falls solemn as they make their way slowly back to his room ( although half the time it was really their room, with how little they kept to themselves ), meager attempts to be careful thwarted by unhelpful pain from…somewhere different every time. "Don't try to blame yourself for any of it, though, okay? They surprised me as much as anyone. But we did our job—that's…good enough. We can rest."

It takes him all he has to hold back from the immediate response born from panic. You’re not okay, this is not okay have you looked at yourself and how you’re barely hanging on— and yet he somehow still manages to stay quiet through the fear and the worry, still looking him up and down and trying to hope this was it and he’d just recover from here and forward. 

( he doesn’t say anything else, doesn’t mention how the fear is still lingering there, how he can’t look away, almost expecting to find the same scenario unfolding before his eyes if he does, to find roark bleeding out again and all he can do is let go of whatever scrap of sanity and lucidity he held onto just to— )

Static charges his tail enough to make fur bristle. Volkner has to force himself to focus, push those spiraling thoughts away and keep the little sparks away from Roark. He can't hurt him after all he just got through. He has better things to focus on right now, anyways. Like helping Roark get back to his room ( theirs by now, really, with how he hardly ever returned to the one Rhodes had assigned him, curled up on Roark's bed and in his arms the one and only comfort he was ever offered, and still the best he could ever ask for. ), making sure he'd be truly alright resting there instead of staying in the medical wing under the watchful eye of actual professionals. And trying to smooth out that knot of anxiety that makes it hard to breathe at times and keeps his heart going just a little faster in his fear bordering on paranoia.

( he's not doing great, is he? )

Even as he keeps insisting over and over that he's fine, that the worst has passed and they're all home now... that isn't really enough for Volkner, is it? Not when part of his mind is still trapped in all the what ifs after such a close call. Thinking of what could have been. That's going to be something to confront in his own nightmares for a while, he can tell that already.

( no more— he can't keep lingering on those thoughts while roark is right here and needs him more than ever. he has to pull himself together already— )

He doesn't really notice his own hands trembling, just a bit as he refuses to let go.

And caught up as he was in this constant effort to pull away from his own head, he almost doesn't hear Roark speaking up. Kind of sad, isn't it? When that is one of the things he needs the most right now, the reminder of the present. Least he does try to reply, even when his voice fails him and he needs a moment longer just to compose himself enough to get the words out in anything more than a little whisper.

"... You shouldn't have gotten this hurt in the first place. I... should've helped you more than this." No matter his role or what he believes he has to do. No matter the amount of gentle words and reassurance Roark could ever offer him, this could never be in any way an acceptable outcome. ( and maybe roark should know better than to expect volkner to ever be okay with this. ) Finally, Volkner at least lets out some sort of shaky sigh, just another effort to compose himself that doesn't quite work, ears dropping, puffed tail not really settling in his lingering distress. "Please... please be more careful. I— I can't lose you, okay? I just— I can't. Not you."

( he needs him that desperately, doesn't he? maybe roark should know better, too. )

#〔 ask . 〕 ϟ i will not fall ; i will not fade ; i will take your breath away . #〔 ic . 〕 ϟ i will shut the world away . #〔 arknights . 〕 ϟ and we hate the way this world has become ; but there ain’t no cure for it . #rockheadcd #// the cat is dying roark look at what you've done