thecapitol | (no subject)

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Who| Dorian + OPEN
What| Dorian is quite determined to distract himself, and luckily, the Capitol provides ample opportunity
Where| District 7, out on the streets, a random bar somewhere in the capitol
When| spanning a week from the end of the arena on
Warnings/Notes| none yet, possible spoilers for Dragon Age: Inquisition but I'll keep it to a minimum

DISTRICT 7 SUITES

It had been a hectic day, racing around to find those he knew from home, but it hadn't ended as sweetly as he would have liked. The depression had settled on him like a heavy blanket, pulling down the edges. He was already trying to compartmentalize it away, to shut it somewhere deep and dark and not touch it again. He knew it would happen eventually and now it had, and the last thing he wanted to do was deal with it.

So he stepped back into his suites (having finally, finally figured out the 'elevators') and decided to do a thorough inventory of what was actually available to him here. He started with the common room. Turning every screen on (once he could figure out how), fiddling with the windows (if they were windows), slamming through the kitchen and opening and shutting the fridge with a frown (some kind of ice magic?).

There was only one thing that was bothering him incredibly deeply about it.

"But where are the books?"

OUT ON THE STREETS

He'd fallen asleep on the couch of the District 7 common room, having not been able to quite face his own quarters. When he woke he didn't want to be there at all, so exploring it was, and after a shower (which took him an hour and two avoxes to figure out), he strode out of the Tribute Tower and into the streets of the Capitol, determined to distract himself. And maybe find a bookstore in the process.

However, he stood out like a sore thumb - one shoulder bare in the middle of winter - and he had not expected it to be COLD - and he kept getting stopped by strangers asking to touch his mustache.

DOWN IN THE BAR

Inevitably, night after night, Dorian found himself in one of the bars in the Capitol. He was still having a difficult time facing his quarters, and nothing was better for distraction than a bar full of people who were at once utterly inane and completely irreverent - who could not see the world for more than four feet in front of them and those four feet were devoted to hedonism. It was completely natural to pretend that he was completely devoted to hedonism as well.

And a nice bottle of Brandy.

That, and the locals were very generous with their free drinks.

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"Hope for what?" Dorian asked with a slight smile, though it didn't reach his eyes.

"A vain hope that somehow everything will go back to normal when I close my eyes? Why torture myself? I knew I would have to leave, eventually. I'd planned Tevinter, planned to make a difference, if I could- but it seems that decision was made for me."

Cullen is, frankly, rather surprised by the other man's words. And, well. A little angered by them too.

"So you're just going to - give up? Accept this as inevitable without fighting it? Without even knowing for sure? And yet you clearly care about him - your Inquisitor. You'd give him up for dead? Just like that?"

Dorian bristles, but keeps it in check. Clearly care about him, indeed.

He case a sidelong glance at Cullen, the humour gone from his expression.

"Do you have a better idea?" He said, crisply, each word carefully enunciated. Because no, of course he wasn't. It was going to keep him up at night for weeks, as it had already for the last three days. He was going to waste countless hours fretting and trying to come up with a way to at least test the hypothesis. But part of him didn't want to know, if he was right or not.

"I thought you wanted me to have some hope," He added after a moment. "What good would confirming his death and my complete inability to home do?"

He was not even going to address the caring about him bit. Wasn't even going to acknowledge it. Where his heart lay was his business - especially when it lay in tatters.

"My idea involves finding out what actually happened, and working to fix it instead of simply accepting the worst-case-scenario," Cullen says, ever the staunch and hopeful one.

"Did you just accept it when you and the Inquisitor got sent to the future?"

"That was completely different. That was something I was responsible for, at least indirectly, and something I knew I could fix. Had to fix."

"I'm hardly not going to do my research, Cullen, but I'm not going to fool myself either. The likelihood of him being alive is... too small, to pin any hope on it."

His head dipped, looking down into his glass. "I am not sure I could cope, otherwise."

"I know what it is to do too little, too late," Cullen says firmly. "I'm not going to let that happen again, and I for one am not going to lose faith. If we don't have faith, or hope, then what do we have?"

Dorian sighed, and then offered him a bemused smile. "Good fashion sense, I suppose? No. I-- of course you are right."

Or at least, Dorian recognized that Cullen needed to be right. Dorian's grief, as always, would have to be his own.

"Unfortunately my study is somewhat limited, but I'll do what I can to ascertain exactly how they brought us here."

"As will I," Cullen says, mollified for the moment. "I suspect we'll have to work together to figure this problem out, confusing as it is."

Without the Inquisitor here, to mediate, he's not sure how well that will work, though.

He nodded. A project. Yes. He could very easily bury himself in a project right now, and all the better if Cullen was buried in it as well. They could both use a distraction.

"There must be something," He mused, "And if not, I'm sure I could at least research a fantastic way to destroy time and space altogether."

"Let's try to avoid doing that to Thedas," Cullen mutters. "And while I would die if necessary - I really would much prefer to find a way back home."

Back to her, back to his duty, back to everything he's promised himself to do. Back to a future of possibilities, if they can only defeat this threat. A future he's only just started envisioning for himself very recently, and which he's not ready to give up on.

He had been joking, of course, but seeing the look on Cullen's face and the tone in the man's voice... the humour dropped from his completely, and he reached out, putting a hand on the man's shoulder.

"If there is a way to return you there, I will find it. That, at least, I can swear to you."

Cullen has to reflect for a moment on the strangeness of the whole thing. Dorian is a mage from Tevinter, the last person he would have ever expected to be an ally, let alone a friend. And yet, he has proven time and again to be a good and principled man, despite his outward flippancy.

The Inquisitor - whichever Inquisitor they might be thinking of, he supposes - does know how to choose their allies well, for the most part.

"I - thank you. We will both find a way back, if possible," he adds, stubbornly. Dorian shouldn't despair. He deserves a future, too.

"Of course," He agrees easily, though he has absolutely no hope for himself. If he's right, there's no home for him to return to. Cullen's time obviously already had him there, with a different fate.

He wanted to ask: Do you love her? He wanted to ask: Am I alone? But neither of these questions were ones he was able to face, at least not tonight, so instead he said:

"Now, what do you say to drinking ourselves into a complete stupor and then teaching some of these barbarians Wicked Grace?"

Part of him is ready to object immediately - in a strange place like this, is it really wise for the two of them to get blind drunk?

But then he thinks again about home, how much he misses it, how much his chest aches, how afraid he is for what might be going on there -

"Yes, alright, that sounds like a plan," he mutters after a moment's thought. Drinking might not be safe, but Maker's breath, it might be better than sitting around fretting.

"Thank the Maker," Dorian says, relieved, gesturing to the bar tender for another round. "And here I was afraid I would have to make a complete ass of myself alone."

He finished off his old glass and when the bar tender came with new ones, he raised it in a toast.

"To the Inquisitor never coming here," He said, cheerfully.

He's going to embarrass himself, that he knows already. But there are worse things. Far worse things.

"I'll drink to that," he mutters, and does so, waving the barkeep down for another round.

He drank. In fact - he drank more than he knew was likely good for him, and soon lost count of exactly how many glasses of brandy had been put in front of him. Soon enough he was flirting with the bartender every time he passed by, and had launched into a story about Varric and Cole, and a very sincere if ultimately slightly deluded young woman, and the life lessons it had provided.

However, the story ended up just making him incredibly homesick, and as he nursed his brandy his expression turned sorrowful.

"Maker, but I miss home. Strange, isn't it, that when I think of 'home' I think of Skyhold?"

Cullen, for his part, drank too. Perhaps not as much as the Tevinter, but certainly more than was wise, considering the circumstances. Everything was feeling a bit fuzzy around the edges, and when Dorian spoke again, a pang went through his chest.

"It's not strange," he muttered. "I feel the same. I'm sure a lot of people do." There's never been a place he considered his home more than Skyhold, frankly. But he deflected instead: "Can you imagine Sera anxious to return to Val Royeaux?"

He scoffed, fingers playing idly with the rim of the cup before him, as if trying to make it sing but forgetting how. "No. I imagine not. But then I can hardly see Sera anxious to return anywhere. She doesn't exactly sit still."

He sighed again. "I miss my books," he said miserably. "I miss feeling whole," he added, a little more sternly. He meant his magic. Or at least he thought he did. Mostly. Partly.

For his part, Cullen assumes it's the magic he's talking about. That's what his mind goes to first, and he shakes his head a little, mouth twisting in distaste as he orders another round for them.

"I'm sorry," he says honestly. "I'm sorry I can't be more help with that. I mean - I will, if I can, if you want to learn to wield a sword, I can help. I know it won't make up for the - for what you've lost, but."

"I will have to do something," Dorian grumbled. "But it won't- be the same. Nothing here can be the same, can it."

He raised his glass, taking a sip, and set it down again, frowning at it. "I appreciate the thought, of course, but I don't see what you could possibly do about any of it. As far as I recall, Templars usually aren't about giving magic back," it's said a little teasingly - that was the only way Dorian ever referred to Cullen's templar past.

"No, but if I could discover what they were using to nullify your magic, then perhaps it could be reversed," Cullen points out, logically he thinks. He may be drunk but he still has sense. "Obviously they can't just take it from you. It's being suppressed, somehow..."

"I would have thought that would have been obvious, but I-- am not so sure what to think, anymore. I have never felt quite this hollow in my entire life. I- It terrifies me, I'm willing to admit." He laughed, but it was a strained laugh, and he would never have admitted it if his tongue wasn't already loosened. "I think to myself - this must what it feels like to be Tranquil, if one still had the feelings to care about it."

"You are not Tranquil," Cullen mutters darkly. "You will not be made so, and we will find out what's hampering your magic so it can be returned to you."

So, he's perhaps come full circle - so to speak.

"You are- very kind," Dorian said, frowning, the words coming out rough. Oh god, had he really drank this much? He cleared his throat and tried again. "You're a very kind man, you know. Underneath all that- fur and orders and sword swinging." There, that came out much much better. He turned on his stool so he could look at Cullen squarely.

"Though I would not wish this place on anyone, I am thankful that you are here."

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WOW AND I THOUGHT I WAS WAITING FOR YOU THIS WHOLE TIME

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