multiversallogs | (no subject)

Who: Kalenedral, John, and Jacqueline
What: hi welcome to Baedal here's your complimentary fruit basket
Where: the Valhalla Inn
When: some time after Njoki lets Kalenedral out of the arrival room
Notes: n/a
Warnings: does not actually contain a fruit basket

Well, that was definitely a day. Checking out schools and places to live near those schools is sort of tiresome to begin with, and having to drag Jacqueline with him isn't fun for either of them. She misses her mom, and John misses Ana's competence. They both have strong independent streaks, but John is used to being on his own and only taking care of himself, while Ana had to raise her younger sister and is actually a good parent.

Something from lunch today made Jacqueline feel sick. She had to go barf in a women's restroom while John tried not to wring his hands, and now they're back at the Inn early; fortunately, Jacqueline had perked back up on the way and seems fine again. John is trying to tell himself that you can't take a kid to the doctor every time they throw up, then wondering if that still applies in Baedal, where there could be fifty million new diseases. But everybody's a transplant and the city isn't overcome with a new disease every other month, so there must be something at work, here. But what if! But that's ridiculous, calm down —

He has to stop short to not run into Jacqueline, who was walking ahead of him and had just passed the common room.

"Dad dad there is a thing in there," she hisses with exactly that lack of punctuation, and John has had a careful talk with her about xenians and people who look different from the people she's accustomed to seeing, and she knows about mutants anyway, so a 'thing' must be something very unusual indeed.

"Not a thing," he reminds her, taking her hand. "Let's go see. We can say hi."

Still, he's cautious in escorting her into the common room, prepared to see a non-humanoid entity of some sort — a thirty something, scruffy-looking man with a neck tattoo and a solemn-faced seven year old girl with red rain boots.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

She observes the ghoul's attempt to mimic her with a face that is both impressed and concerned. It doesn't feel polite to point out the potential problems in not being able to undo one's lego progress, however.

"It must be a really big home?" Now her questions are finally tilting up at the end the way questions should, because this situation is just strange enough to merit it.

There are places for John to sit, but even though he's spent half of the day walking, he doesn't, perhaps because of Kalenedral's formality. Perhaps because he doesn't want Jacqueline to play with this 'minion' for too long. He makes a sort of you don't say sound to Kalenedral. Imagine, armored knights and their walking corpses not having lego.

"Yeah, they're considered good toys for child development. It usually takes a lot of force to break one —" But clearly that could still happen right now, which is. Great. "— and they can be endlessly reconfigured into almost anything."

"That is why I have purchased them," Kalenedral's tone is mildly agreeable, "I have done my best to foster intelligence, fine motor skills, and spacial awareness in Limbface over the years," as well as the ability to think non-linearly, etc. "These items seem to be of excellent use to that purpose."

And Limbface likes them, because they're small and colorful and shiny. And now that he knows they're so tough, he likes them even more! The ghoul makes a pleased sound at Jacqueline and begins staggering the legos, width-wise, to rebuild a wall on the 'Necropolis'.

"Acherus big," he agrees, "many Knights. Many ghouls!" He likes Acherus, he gets to flail around and be stupid with the other ghouls while Kalenedral stands or rides his patrols or assists Corvus, either of which tend to last for days on end.

And if he occasionally eats his new ghoul friends, well. That's just how they roll in ghoul-land.

Limb. Face.

Later, in the privacy of his room, John is going to stand there and mouth that name to himself a few times. Well, it fits, he just can't get over it. For now, his expression doesn't change at all. It is the neutral, halfheartedly polite face he'd use while talking to a neighbor he doesn't know well, which is more or less apt for the situation. They really need to move out.

"It's fascinating to watch them develop," he says, continuing the deadpan interpretation of minions as children. Jacqueline observes the pattern the ghoul uses and begins to copy it to help him. "I'm sure you're very proud."

In truth, Kalenedral thinks of his ghoul very much as a living man would think of their son... or as close as a creature of the Scourge can get. But it is not the way of Death Knights to show affection, and certainly not their way to call ghouls anything more personal than 'my minion' or 'my servant'.

Off the field of battle, he looks after his ghoul in a rather fatherly way, from periodically re-tying the ghoul's topknot for him to keeping the bandages wrapped around his limbs clean and securely-tied. Showering him with 'toys' is perhaps the natural progression, even if it's for reasons besides simply entertaining the creature.

But on the field of battle, he does not hesitate to destroy his minion -- however temporarily -- to gain an edge on his opponent. He will never flinch when Limbface is cut in half, or his skull is bashed in, or the ghoul is lit on fire.

It's a fairly unique dynamic they have. Even among their kind, since few Knights are as invested in their ghouls as Kalenedral is. Thassarian and Munch are the only real examples he himself knows of.

"Indeed," Kalenedral says, although he eyes John for a moment as though he's finally detected the snark. It's not like he's dumb, he just doesn't understand the living.

He would be surprised to find most of that out; John is rarely as insightful about other people as he could be, and there's not much to go on here other than Kalenedral's decidedly detached manner. Still, he can tell that the armored man has come to understand the nature of what he was saying, if perhaps not the specifics. As is typical for him, John is unrepentant, and keeps the same expression as if unaware of it.

"Jacqueline, you probably need to take a nap. And drink some water, too." He suggests, reverting to parental obligations now that Kalenedral has caught on. His daughter gives the first suggestion a withering look, but has to concede she's thirsty, thanks to throwing up earlier. She places one final lego on the structure.

"I guess I have to go," she says to Limbface. "Thanks for letting me help build Acherus. I hope they don't put it in the bucket when you're done."

Also she hopes he won't run out of legos before he finishes, but she doesn't want to mention that in case it distresses him.

Such is the problem with dealing with Kal; Death Knights keep their cards close, and those who know nothing else keep them closer. Some of his brethren still struggle just to remove their helmets in the presence of others... the fact that Kalenedral has given his ghoul toys is almost boggling!

Short of dealing with him for an extended period of time, or perhaps the use of Empathy or mind-reading, this is just one of those things that rarely comes to light.

Limbface blinks and cocks his head, his topknot swaying almost comically on his head. "Me happy," he tells the small human, "you good!"

Kalenedral just watches all of this for a moment, and then goes back to reading the CiD.