sixthiterationlogs | One | Altaïr Can't Swim (it's a trending tag on AO3)

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One | Altaïr Can't Swim (it's a trending tag on AO3)

WHO: Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad
WHERE: South Village fountain
WHEN: Beginning October 28
OPEN TO: Anyone who wants to find a half-drowned and confused Assassin.
WARNINGS: Arabic cursing. (Both cursing in Arabic and an Arabic man cursing.)

Water.

It would permanently be his bane.

He had expected his afterlife to be anything but that, if he was to have one at all. After all he'd seen, he'd more suspected that after death came nothing. A lack of existence. An ending, and nothing more. If he ascribed to the Christian notions, he would surely be relegated to their hell for the lives he'd taken, and for a moment, it occurred to him that this was it. A form of eternal torment by the water filling his lungs, his hands finding no purchase. Was he to spend the rest of time dying over and over again in water?

But his body had panicked for him. Fighting against the water, struggling, flailing wildly and completely without skill. He could feel his lungs burning from what he'd inhaled before he'd begun to hold his breath, the ache of a cough wanting to break free but he knew that if he opened his mouth, only more water would rush in--

He coughed. His lungs filled further, and fear took hold of his heart. No. No, he could not spend eternity this way, dying again and again with what looked like sky past the water's surface. Again, he coughed. His lungs were getting heavier, his vision dimmer. No!

And then--

And then, even in the depths, he could breathe, except it... it wasn't breathing. Water was still passing into him, but his vision began to clear and his limbs felt less sluggish and his mind slowly climbed away from the base reactions of survival toward true and rational thought.

He was breathing water. How?

His mind sought reasons, but with his calm came buoyancy. He began to rise toward the surface, a hand reaching out toward the nearest wall, touching stone, able to use it to push upward, and when he broke free and took hold of the stone with his entire arms, he bent over it. He coughed once, twice, water pouring from his mouth and nose in a painful rush, but then he was breathing air. Clear, cool air.

Willpower pulled him over the edge, onto the ground, where he laid on his stomach and relished the simple act of breathing. He'd been short of breath for years, coughing with any exertion, but never had it felt so horrible as that. "Al'ama," he groaned, head turned sideways to rest on the ground before, with excruciating slowness, he pushed himself up to sit. "'Ana kabir fi alsini lihadha."

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"Thank whatever gods may exist."

It's less a statement and more of a mutter as he pushes himself a little farther, up to his hands and knees. It helps with getting the last of the water from his lungs - but then he slowly sinks back down to one hip. He feels breathless. Dizzy. There are golden motes before his eyes, and he's uncertain as to what to do about them except hope he won't lose consciousness. And after a few moments, everything seems to stabilise. Even the gills that had formed below and behind his ears on his neck faded away to make it all the easier for him to breathe.

Still, he feels sore - and that is when he motions to her, a hand extended. "Please. Help an old man off the ground."

Hawke springs back up and takes his hand without question. She's both lithe and sturdy, strength in her arms from carrying a bow and callouses all over her hands. "You? Old?" She laughs. "I have a few friends who would grimace if they knew you considered yourself an old man." It's not that he looks young precisely, but she knows old folks. She can almost hear Varric's droll commentary on the matter. Somehow Hawke herself manages to look young, or vaguely around her age, but the scars and eyes tell a different story. Survival against all odds has a way of wearing on anyone.

"You'd think the people behind whatever this is would pick a nicer way of introducing us. Hello, welcome to this giant lush cage we've put you in, make friends, stay alive, watch out for the drowning and the wild weather and monsters." Hawke read up at the inn. Mostly she skimmed and got bored, but she does have an eye for the dangerous notes. "Oh! I'm an idiot. Also I'm Hawke. Hello."

She was a fount of words, he was finding, one subject after another in rapid succession, and though he listened, he also thought - because a few things weren't quite coming together.

He had lived for many years. His hair and his beard were both white, he knew, and yet she declared he didn't look old. When he stood, drawn by hands that felt like a fighter's rather than the hands of a woman whose days were usually spent cooking or washing, he found that parts of him that he had grown used to hurting simply did not. And that was what possessed him to look at his own hands - five fingers and four, as expected, but he could no longer see the bones at his knuckles or have wrinkles across the backs. His fingers didn't look too long anymore, and his arms, where his sleeves were too short, had muscle instead of paper-thin skin.

His brows drew together, and though she introduced herself, he held up a hand once he was standing of his own power. "A moment, Shabbah." And then he took the single step over to the fountain, to look at his own reflection in the calming water, and what he saw had his eyes going wide. He lifted a hand to his cheek, finding his beard black, his hair black. In the water, he could see no lines around his eyes, his mouth, none across his forehead.

He extended his arms, looking at them, seeing the muscle there, the idle strength waiting to be used that he had taken for granted until fighting the Mongols-- "Ya Ibn il Sharmouta," he muttered, shaking his head. "The Apple has outdone itself."

But then, exhaling a deep breath, he turned to his new acquaintance and gave a nod of respect, hand at his chest. "I am Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad. And until I found myself in this fountain, I was a man of ninety-two years, all of which showed."

Hawke does have a tendency to chatter on and on without fail. In part it's because her friends are also chatty, or they're silent and grumpy like Fenris. She talks to herself when no one is around too. It's a stream of consciousness. She does pause though when he asks; he looks confused. He's looking at his hands and at his reflection, and she raises an eyebrow questioningly and waits. Odd fellow. "The apple?" She can't help echoing that one. What in the world could an apple do that would lead to this?

"You're kidding!" She's openly shocked. "I've never heard of a magic like that." Magic could do all kinds of things, but if it could completely alter age, no one would grow old in her land. They'd keep using mages over and over, so it was probably for the best in that case. Hawke eyes him, tapping a finger against her chin. "Maybe they figured a ninety-two year old would have a hard time in this place. It does require you to be a bit spry." She assumes he'd find a way to keep up, he has the look of someone who at least knows the motions of survival. But you could be the healthiest person in the world and still be relatively useless in your 90s, in her opinion. She can't even imagine living that long. Her thirties was hard enough to get to.

Right, he said his name. "Nice to meet you young version of Altaïr. You must feel like a million gold pieces."

How rich was her nation that they counted their money in pure gold? But then, Masyaf had never been poor - at least, not under his leadership, or even Rashid's. Abbas...

Best not to think about the ruin he brought them to.

"I feel strange," he said instead, "and like I've cheated. If this is my afterlife, how do I deserve youth? My wife, my son, my dearest friend - all of them deserve this more than I, but here I stand. Young." Altaïr shook his head with a strange mix that turned his insides in an odd way; no man should feel both wonder and resignation at once. He sighed. "But if I am needed here, so be it. I am no stranger to duty."

But he would have to practice. He would have to recall the old motions, the ease with which he'd performed them. He didn't have his weapons, his equipment - but he still had most of what the Apple showed him. Perhaps there was someone here who could work metal. What he would give them for their quiet on the matter, though, he wasn't sure.

That was all much too sincere for her. Hawke would rather be punched in the face with a fist than with feelings. The discomfort shows; for a few moments she seems off her guard, dark eyes wide. "I...." Does not compute. "I would say this isn't the afterlife, but it could be. I was about to die myself, before I came here. But not everyone else, so. Probably not." Sweet Andraste he is not what she expected. It isn't nice to come out of a fountain and be all real and serious!

"Don't know if it's a duty either. They haven't really seemed to ask anything of us outside of live." Hawke shrugs, starting to gain back her ease. "You can't change back to an old man, so you might as well enjoy being fit again. No sense dwelling." Yes, no sense dwelling, please. She picks out one of her knives and slings it casually around her fingers, no threat in it, just something to do with her hands as a distraction. "There's an inn and houses nearby you can live in, if you want. Food in there too, group items to share, some vague explanation of what goes on here that I looked at for a few minutes."

The knife, and some of the rest she mentions - that gains his attention. Despite his age, he had never given up wearing his hidden blades and now there was some strange band there instead of the bracer and familiar weight he'd lived with for most of his life. "All of that will be useful," he agreed, "though I wonder. Are there more blades such as that? I am used to defending myself and to be unarmed is unnerving at the least."

And the idea of at least having access to some sort of weapon would give him more confidence. Where he'd strap it on in these clothes, he wasn't yet sure, but he knew his own resourcefulness: he'd find a way. Especially now that he knew there was the possibility of being armed. He couldn't put anything beyond this place, especially not Templar meddling.

"Like these? Yeah, I stole --- borrowed them from the group supply. There's some weapons in there, nothing really impressive but that'd be too easy." It's not that they're bad, just not necessarily made for the type of warriors who fight daily. And she's very fond of her own things. Hawke sighs mournfully. "I lost my bow and knives, coming through that thing. Now my armor I do miss, but those were practically limbs." Armor was to be kept clean and helped her not get stabbed to death. Weapons were personalized. It probably only made sense to her and her people.

Hawke waves her hand at him. "C'mon, old-young man, follow me to the inn." It's the least she could do, all things considered. And having some company is better than none. She starts heading in that direction, handing him one of her knives. "So you don't feel naked without one." A playful wink, but she really does understand. It's why one of the first things she did when she got there was find something sharp.

He followed - and when he was handed a knife, he automatically weighed it in his palm, giving it a light toss, a swing, finding its balance. It was a practiced hand on the blade, even if the movements were a bit rusty. And the conclusion he came to was the same as hers: good enough, but not ideal. "I have lost my own weapons as well. For years, though, I have only carried two, but when I was as young as I appear to be now..."

There was even a faint laugh at that. "Throwing knives, a short blade, a sword. Whatever weapon I took from those who attacked me. I can use a bow, but it isn't my preferred weapon. My son was more capable than I. A born marksman."

Darim. Whose eyesight was still keen, even in his seventies. Darim, whose hair was now more white than black. (Why couldn't he have come - why couldn't he have arrived here-- But. No, that thought would only hurt.)

"I understand, believe me. We all were armed to the teeth no matter where we went. There was the blight outside the walls, but then Kirkwall itself as a dangerous city. Trouble lurking all around, especially for the Champion and her merry band of rogues." Hawke got used to having a bullseye on her back. Expecting that was smart, but it blinded her too to the things she couldn't control, like her mother or the Circle or bloody Anders. People trying to kill her, that made sense. The rest, not as much.

Oh Andraste he is talking about family again. Being separated from a child was probably difficult. Hawke never had any interest in them. It was an unwise idea, for someone ready to die young. "I'm sorry," she says awkwardly, "about your son not being around. Maybe he'll show up, I don't know." It seems like a bad idea to give him that hope, but she really doesn't know how to talk to people about anything that's not a joke. She pauses before continuing, hating that sincerity is on her tongue. "I've been by that fountain hoping one of mine will. It seems selfish, to want them here. My sister would hate it here. She's a mage and she loves her magic, being stripped of it would strip away a part of her heart." And yet, Hawke knows she'll never get the chance to see her again otherwise.

There were two things in that he wasn't sure of. One was her use of the word 'blight'. The second was the mention of magic. He'd seen enough of what had been considered magic of late that he was unsure what others would see as true magic - or even that real magic existed. The Apple had seemed magic, but though he didn't understand the entirety of how it worked, Those Who Came Before had shown him, through its visions, that it was far from inexplicable. It was simply an explanation that his mind didn't have the framework to understand.

More than that, he could see her discomfort when he mentioned his son. His family. There was something in it of loss, and something in it of a lack of acceptance. He'd dealt with that in his own way - badly - and had eventually come through. Perhaps in time, she would be ready to do the same, or, at the least, find a peace within herself that, just then, was only starting to exist. It had taken him two decades. He only hoped it didn't take her as long.

"You speak of magic as if it is real to you," he said, rather than touch on anything else. "As if it's something you have seen. That's something I cannot claim."

Hawke's relationship to family and emotional connections are all bound to the reality of deep personal loss. It wasn't long ago her mother died in a gruesome fashion, a fact that she blamed solely on herself, and she knew in some way her sister blamed her for too. Bethany would say otherwise, when pressed, but it was Hawke's duty to protect them. She failed Carver and their mother both. For all her cheery attitude, a heavy weight is on those shoulders, of loss and guilt and regret, but it's her choice to shrug it off as much as possible.

She nods in understanding. "Yeah, I've met a few people here who aren't used to magic or thought it was a fantasy. It's quite odd to me, it's such a major part of our world." Especially for Hawke, whose entire life (and some of her failures) surrounded the tense subject of magic in Ferelden. She's still growing accustomed to this whole 'other realm' possibilities. It's not like the Fade, she knows that much, but it's still above her head.

"My father was a magic user and so is my sister. A few of my friends are too. Mages where I'm from can do all types of things. Control the elements, destroy organic material with a touch, heal grave injuries, control the blood in your veins, raise the dead, although that's typically forbidden or frowned upon." She had to deal with Merrill and blood magic. It still is an issue. "They have an extraordinary amount of power, which can scare others." It scares her, sometimes, but she tries to control that for the sake of the people she loves.

"Understandably," he said. "Power in the hands of a few can lead to great mistrust. It is often abused, used for ill instead of good. Consistent goodwill must be established before trust can be given - otherwise all that can be counted on is fear. Yet, if you establish that goodwill, others will see you not as someone powerful but a friend to offer aid and and stability."

Despite the topic, he was careful to keep judgement from his tone. After all, he had been one of the ones wielding that great power, holding the Apple as the only one who could use it without it extracting some of their life as payment for some perceived debt. He had had to work against its pernicious ways, to show others that he would harm none with it did they raise no hand to him - and even then, only in times of grave danger. He had seen too much harm come from the artifact. And he felt some peace from knowing it was still locked away.

"In some places this is true," Hawke agrees, although there's a glimmer of sadness in her eyes. She knows too many mages to believe it's that simple, and in comparison to the truth of their existence, that is simple. "Where I'm from, life for mages is so bad that they can spend their lives trying to run and hide. But in other countries they are treated well. It all depends on the people, I suppose." She thinks it's for the best she never had the magic. She's too combative to play it safe.

Hawke hates lingering in those unfortunate truths and she's not certain what it is about this man that keeps bringing out real parts of her, but she's still deciding if she likes it. Earnest people were the worst. She's never been good at denying them. "But that's another world, and here there's no magic or special abilities, so the issue is moot. You might run into people who grumble about it, though. I don't blame them, if I came here suddenly unable to shoot a bow or hold a knife, I'd be pretty panicked myself." It's not quite the same since they can learn how to defend themselves in other ways, but that takes time and energy. Powers are extensions of selves, more than limbs, less than souls, as far as she knows.

He gave a slow, thoughtful nod, taking in her words. There was much to it for which he lacked context. Her world was not his. Magic, as she knew it, was not the concept that he had learned from the Apple. What he knew was how people reacted to such things - but he was ill-informed. And so he nodded, accepted, and decided to listen more before he spoke on such things again.

"I have lost a bit of myself upon arrival," he said instead. "An ability that I relied upon more than I thought. One that, even in my later years, never gave me bad guidance. I feel its loss - but as you say, I've arrived here once more able to hold a knife. It would not be the same for others, I agree."

"Powers can be crutches, whether we know it or not." She thinks about the mages she knows, and her concerns for their sanity here. Because being without magic would be that crippling. Hawke will do fine in comparison. She studies him curiously. "What ability are you talking about? Please don't tell me it's the ability to be vague and not answer my question." Hawke can't help but joke even when she shouldn't be. Especially then.

"Who knows, maybe you'll get a new power you like better, in whatever way they say we've got them now. I want to fly. I wonder if I can put in a request for that."

"The ability I had was rare even amongst my Brotherood. I believe I was the only one in recent knowledge to have it," Altaïr said, having to weigh his words. What she'd said had its merit: He did tend to take care with his answers and his words, and for good reason. His position was precarious at best. Here, he didn't know if he was surrounded by Templars or if the situation was brought about by a Piece of Eden. He didn't have enough knowledge to judge.

But she seemed honest and earnest in her way. He would give her a small amount of trust, prefaced by, "I ask that you tell none of this. I don't doubt they will learn in time if they show themselves worth the trust. But for now, I tell only you: I had the ability to judge others' intentions toward me by sight alone."

Hawke does love hearing secrets. She's excellent at keeping them too. She has a treasure trove of secrets she keeps for her friends and from them. Varric knows most of her own, her only real confessional of a sort, but that's how they are together. She would still not share with him what was told to her, nor would he ask her. There's been a few exceptions to that rule, when someone's life was at risk. So she understands he's trying to let her in on something and nods, somberly, to indicate she can take it.

The ability is a fascinating one, and her eyes widen and then narrow. "So you looked at someone, and you could tell if they wanted to kill you or not?" So he could strike first in that case, although Hawke stops from saying that just in case he's not someone who likes taking advantage of something so helpful. Sometimes she's aware that the way she talks about fighting makes it seem like she's a psychopath. "That is a handy power. Was it just toward you or toward anyone?"

"Only toward myself or the cause I fought for," he clarified. "I could see if they intended me harm or help, or if they needed dealing with directly. I could see if I could trust them - and that, here, I miss." But then, after an exhale, he shook his head. "I will have to learn to cope without it.

"But for now, the air grows chill and my clothing is still wet. Is there a place I might dry? Perhaps change clothing into some that haven't been soaked?"

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One | Altaïr Can't Swim (it's a trending tag on AO3)

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