#no but seriously falling alseep directly on the keyboard

[c-is-for-circinate]

c3e34

I never stay up for the whole ep any more, so I am so tired, but my heart is so full of love and pain and it was very worth it.

Ugh the fact that it was Laudna, who walks so close to death, who is Imogen's first and most beloved, who's dead now. That Orym and Fearne both survived (and I'm so so glad and relieved to have them back! But Laudnaaaaaaaaaa), but Laudna who was still hanging on by a thread at the end of last week who's gone now.

My heart for the misery and desperation and horrible choice of who to rez, but also for the complete lack of recrimination afterwards. It would have been so easy to bite at each other, to turn on each other, but they have been so so firm and stubborn. (And there's this pervasive awareness throughout the entire group that we're treating Imogen like a grieving widow, that Laudna was her person. Laudna belonged to the Hells in the way all the Hells belong to one another, but she was Imogen's person, and everybody there knows it, and every single soul in that group would go down on their knees on broken glass rather than utter a single syllable to suggest this is Imogen's fault. That it's anybody's fault.)

Ashton, so goddamn dead-set on fixing this. Looking for a thing to do. Ashton who spent all of last episode from the edge of stress to the edge of panic, because chaos was unleashing around him and there was nothing he could do. (And we get that backstory story NOW, after all that, the story of a small, soft-bodied child surrounded by primeval chaos and horror that tore through everybody they knew and loved, that's the story we get after last episode. But Ashton's not even thinking about their own issues right now. Just living in them. Just steeping in those issues, determined to find control, to take control, to make things right by force, to not be held helpless to the murder done by an uncaring universe.)

Fearne, Fearne who broke my goddamned heart, because Fearne is always, always, always okay! Even when her parents show up out of nowhere and her whole backstory comes crashing in, she has a smile! It's a smile of murderous frustration, but it's still a sweet little smile and an unpredictable Fearne who nobody knows what she'll do next. Fearne who is not smiling, Fearne who is on her knees, who's shocked, who's sad, who's scared. Who's panicking on her knees, "I don't know what to do, Imogen, I don't know what to do." Fearne loves Orym so, so, so much. She loves this group, collectively, even more. She loves so easily and with such genial gaiety but it goes so, so, so deep and she was so scared and over her head.

I am thinking about Orym's survivor's guilt and I am thinking about Orym wanting to be done but having more work to do and more love to give, and I am thinking about Orym stabbing the point of his sword through a man's foot and saying, "I'm the nonviolent solutions guy". Thinking about a 26 intimidation check and a very tired, very very unhappy halfling, who could definitely be a powderkeg if he wants to be.

(Orym saying, the de Rolos. Keyleth. Orym who is the only person in this group who's gotten the story of the Sun Tree on camera, the only person who could possibly have the context for just what reparations, exactly, Vox Machina might feel they owe this woman. Imogen thought Delilah Briarwood was a minor evil deity. FCG seems to vaguely think she's still ruling Whitestone. But Orym knows, as much as anyone who wasn't there. Orym's seen the Sun Tree. He's heard the stories. His father-in-law was there, the last time Delilah Briarwood died.

In conclusion:

I think I'd love to see Keyleth being the one to rez Laudna. Becaue of poetry, yes, but also because of the spell. Druids don't get Raise Dead. Druids get reincarnate.

I want to see what becomes of Laudna, when her age and species and body's history unfolds itself into a new shape. All those things she thought could never change again, even if she wanted them to. Does Delilah back off, if Laudna's new body is not undead? Does she get worse?

#cr spoilers #c3e34 #no but seriously falling alseep directly on the keyboard #gonna go pass out