Story OC Shorts

[bastion]

I'll be sharing short stories featuring my various OCs here. Some will be based on moments from various roleplays, while others will be stuff that happen outside them. Feel free to comment and share your thoughts, but please don't post your own writing here.

 

[bastion]

Context: El left home in his late teens after developing doubts about the religion his (all female) family preached. He traveled far, transitioning to male and taking on a new name as he came into himself without the restrictive teachings of his mother and grandmother. In the end though, the past always finds you.

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“I was beginning to believe there were no other followers of Eldath in this land…”

El turned at the words without thinking, instinct taking over. Hearing mention of Eldath was like hearing his own name, as much as he’d come to resent his relation to the goddess. His mind finally processed the words and his charming smile dropped before his eyes even landed on the one who’d spoken them.

El recognized the young man standing behind him -a human two heads shorter and at least five years younger. He’d begun his cleric training not long before El had left home. They’d spoken on occasion, although there had always been a distance. What was his name… Daniel, wasn’t it?

No, that couldn’t be right. El had to be mistaken. No one from El’s home should have traveled this far. They were an entire ocean and a county away. How could he encounter one of them here? The one thing he’d been able to trust was that the people of his village never left, never traveled… That life was behind him now.

Daniel had been speaking this whole time, but El had heard none of it. He finally focused on the young man’s trembling voice as he noticed Daniel was crying now, drawing the attention of those passing by. El glanced around, a sense of panic building in his chest. He couldn’t let anyone else know about his past, not even the strangers on the street.

“What has happened to you? Your halos are shattered and your skin… No-”

“Do not say that name,” El cut him off, voice sharp. Daniel flinched, staring up at El in shock. El took a deep inhale, glancing around once more, before looking back at Daniel. The cleric watched him silently, still crying.

“Are you staying in the city? I’d like to talk in private,” El finally prompted, voice gentler this time.

Daniel took a moment to process, before he nodded his head. “Yes, I’m staying nearby with two other Eldathians. We were sent to find you. Oh, it’s horrible, No- I mean- Well, the Holy Grandmother… she-”

“Not here,” El shushed him, holding back a grimace at the mention of his grandmother. “We will talk in your room.”


“I apologize for the poor accommodations, Holy Daughter,” Daniel said, as he held the door open to a cramped attic room. He’d been babbling the entire trip to the dockside house, mostly about his dismay over the lack of Eldath worshippers in Waterdeep. It was exhausting. None of it had been as exhausting as hearing that wretched title though, even if it was only because El had stopped him from using his old name.

“Do not refer to me by title,” El sighed, entering the room. “I go by El now… El e’ Therai. He/him pronouns.”

El turned around, bracing himself for Daniel’s reaction. The cleric stared at him in confusion, hand still on the door he’d just shut, unable to make sense of what El had said. El had to look away, a sense of shame washing over him. How could he have abandoned everything the way he had? Abandoned his purpose, the people who respected him.. Abandoned even his identity.

Anger quickly replaced the shame. He had nothing to be ashamed of! He was living his life true to himself! He had never been the Holy Daughter, or a holy anything for that matter, nevermind his gender. He was happy now. What did it matter if it shook this foolish worshiper of his ancestor? In fact, wasn’t it good for this man to get a shock? That entire village needed to be shaken up a bit-

“I do not understand,” Daniel finally spoke, voice soft and beseeching. “You’ve changed your name and… you’re referring to yourself as if you are a man? What has happened to you, No- …What has happened to you?”

El sighed, leaning against a table. His anger was quickly slipping away, leaving behind exhaustion. Daniel didn’t deserve his anger. He was just another fool who’d been manipulated by El’s family.

“Daniel… that is your name, correct?” El paused long enough to confirm before continuing. “Okay, Daniel, this may be hard for you, but the truth is the whole Holy Grandmother, Mother, and Daughter thing is utter bullshit. The only reason my family has been having magic births is because they perform a ritual for it, not some blessing from Eldath. It’s all fake.”

Daniel frowned, still hovering at the door. His hands shakily grasped at the pendant of Eldath he wore on a chain, as if it would provide him some guidance. El focused his gaze on those hands, partly because he didn’t want to look at Daniel’s face, but mostly to ensure he wasn’t casting a spell. There was no sign of magic though, just a trembling hand seeking reassurance.

“I… I don’t know if I understand. Why does it being a ritual change anything? You are still the descendants of the Green Mother. You still carry her message and her will.”

El groaned in frustration. “It matters because everything else is as artificial as my birth! As this fucking body! I was only given a female body because one of my ancestors decided that we must all have a female body to resemble Eldath! That’s why we all look identical and… Ugh, I don’t even have genitals? How fucked up is that? All because my family decided we must maintain this perfect holy image!”

Daniel stared at El, heart aching at the tears in the aasimar’s eyes. After a moment he finally spoke up, voice still weak. “Is… Is this why you’re calling yourself a… him now?”

“No!” El snapped, wiping at his eyes angrily. “Well, maybe? I don’t know… When I left home, I started realizing I didn’t need to live the way mother and grandmother taught me to. At first I think I began living as a man to spite them, but I realized it felt right. I’m hardly the first person raised as a girl to realize I’m actually a man, you realize. Well, maybe you don’t. That wasn’t really a thing anyone stopped to consider back home…”

El trailed off, not knowing what more to say. Daniel finally moved away from the door, slowly approaching the table. El watched him, hands gripping the edge of the table tightly. Finally, Daniel stopped beside El, leaning against the table as well. He gazed at the floor, expression thoughtful.

“I don’t fully understand, but if you are happy as a man, then that must be correct… When you left, the Holy Grandmother said you had been called away by Eldath to undergo a journey-”

El snorted in disgust, but Daniel continued. “Maybe you didn’t even know it, or maybe you’re right that it’s all a lie. But if the Holy Grandmother was right, then the insights you’ve had are right as well. Eldath wanted you to see what was wrong with the village so that it could be fixed.”

Daniel looked up, eyes no longer filled with doubt. “El, please return to the village. We need your guidance, now more than ever.”

El tried to hold Daniel’s gaze, to refuse with all his hatred for his family and their teachings. He tried, but he failed. He dropped his gaze, voice weak when he spoke.

“I… I’ll think about it.”

 

[bastion]

Context: Some free-form poetry exploring Giggles feelings on their childhood. Giggles was literally born laughing as a result of having elder god heritage, unbeknownst to their parents, and behaved a bit oddly growing up. Honestly though, a lot of it is just autistic vibes. Which was a problem for the tiny, backwaters village they were born into.

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They didn’t like my laughter.
They didn’t like that I giggled while I cried.
They didn’t like how I smiled when I was upset.
They didn’t understand why I never stopped laughing.

They didn’t like my eyes.
They didn’t like the way I stared without speaking.
They didn’t like how serious my gaze was.
They didn’t understand why I never stopped staring.

I asked too many questions.
I liked the wrong things.
I said things they didn’t want to hear.
I moved the wrong way.

They didn’t like the way I was different.
They didn’t like me.
They didn’t understand me.
They’ll never understand me.

All because they didn’t like my laughter.

 

[bastion]

Context: One of Giggles' party members, Lain, literally reshaped a newly born being's brain, with the intent of protecting it since it had stopped modeling itself after sentient beings and started modeling after a predator. Lain is the same type of being, and felt this was the best path to ensure its survival. When this came to light, the arty members all had different reactions and it caused another revelation, in that another party member, Sludge, not only saw nothing wrong with this, but saw themself as basically attempting the same thing with the gods they were bound to.

Giggles is having a rough time handling all this and needs to take time seperate from the party to process it all and figure out what she wants to do from here. Unfortunately, Lain and the remaining party member Giggles was on good terms with, Cordia, tried to convince to stay with. During this, Cordia mentioned needing Giggles to protect the group, right after Giggles had explained she needed time away to figure stuff out because she was hurting. It's all been an emotional mess that's really fucking good storywise, but ffffffuck. So here's some letters Giggles wrote to each party member instead of seeing them off.

P.S. Spelling and grammar mistakes are left where it feels approriate for the character without sacrificing the readability.

---

Letter to Lain: 3 pages, each growing increasingly more tear stained.
I’ve always been strange. I told ya how I was born laughing and just never stopped. My brain was different from everyone else’s. Most people didn’t like that.

Hearing about how claypeople learn is strange for me, because it’s a lot like how I was backas a kid. I didn’t really know how to be a person right. So I watched people to try and learn. I would just stand in doorways and stuff, silently staring as people did stuff. Oh, I guess the laughing thing was an exaggeration too. There was a time when I didn’t laugh. I always laughed as a baby, but once I started watching people I stopped. I stopped making any sound at all really.

People don’t really like when someone’s just silently staring at them and won’t explain why. They got angry a lot. I didn’t really understand that though. It was hard to remember what different expressions and tones meant. Sometimes they threw stuff and attacked me. I didn’t understand that either though, not even when I was bleeding.

I was lucky to have my parents and grandpa, for the most part. They’d always find me and bring me home, tend to any wounds. They also explained to me why people reacted the way they did. They would talk to me while they did stuff and explain what they were doing and why. They told me when they were feeling things and all about the way those feelings worked.

Being a person didn’t come to me the way it did others, but my family were kind and patient with me. They taught me how things worked and why people did stuff. I started talking and laughing again. Most people still weren’t happy with me, but I was able to interact.

It took time though, so much time. Years. My grandpa made a speciaal embroidery to remember the day I started talking. I was 10 rings old by then. It took me 10 rings to learn to be a person. Well, I still wasn’t like anyone else, but at least I could communicate then.

If they could, do you think my parents would have made me like everyone else by changing my brain? Would that have been better? I don’t think I would have my brain changed if I had the choice, but it would have made things better for my family. The village didn’t like me, so they didn’t like my family much. Maybe it would have been better if I could have been made normal.

I wouldn’t exist if they had though… That would be someone else. I’m me because I was taught and experienced so much.

I don’t know who I’d be if someone could have just changed my brain… Would it be better if they had?


Letter to Sludge: Three pages, the handwriting careful in the beginning but growing increasingly messy towards the end.
I’m not really sure how to start this, honest. Controlling the gods you are bound to never seemed like a bad thing to me, but hearing you say you want to control their minds is scary. Was that why you bound yourself to them from the start? Was it always about taking them over?

I don’t really know much about gods. They’re not really a thing talked about on Topside. Solas is the one we worship, but at least in Homestead, we’ve never thought of Solas as a god the way yours are. Solas is something beyond our world, that brings us light and gifts us with bounty, but also brings hardship and challenges us so that we can grow. You don’t talk with Solas though, it’s just an impassive presence watching over us, something far removed from this world.

The gods you work with seem more like people though… The Unknowable was definitely a person, even if they tried not to be. The one I saw in that portal seemed like a person too…

People are their minds though, aren’t they? Our thoughts are what makes us who we are. If we can’t be our thoughts, then we can’t be people…

If someone were to just change the way you think, you wouldn’t be Sludge. You’d be something else. Wouldn’t it be the same if you did that to the gods? You’d be taking away their ability to be people and turning them into… tools or puppets or something.

Maybe that’s not what you meant though… You think in ways I don’t know of, so maybe I just didn’t understand what you said the right way.

I hope I didn’t understand…

Because it didn’t seem like it was just the gods. You seemed okay with anyone having their brain taken over. I don’t like that. I don’t like thinking that you don’t care about people at all…

I’m not gonna ask you to change the way you think. You wouldn’t be Sludge if you did. I just… I don’t know if I can be friends with you, if you don’t care about people being people.

But that’s probably not it, right? You just think differently, and I get confused easily. Maybe you just don’t think people are their thoughts? Maybe changing someone’s brain like that isn’t changing who they are.

I hope I just don’t understand right.


Letter to Cordia: Two pages, covered in tears stains and shaky writing.
Cordia, I’ve always felt like you understand me better than anyone else. That you see me as a person, even when others don’t. Today was the first time I doubted that.

When you asked me to come with to protect everyone, it really hurt. I told you I was hurt and needed time to work things out. For you to ask me to come with after I said that, it felt like you cared more about me being a protector than a person.

I’ve always felt wrong and like I don’t matter as a person. Since coming to Agria and meeting everyone that started to change, a little. I started thinking people might like me. I’ve been scared though, because I started staying there after killing a beast, so I could keep people safe. If I stopped fighting, would people still want me around? Am I only good as a protector?

You’ve always seemed to see me as a person though, and care for me when I needed it. I thought I could always rely on you for that. Was I wrong? Am I only a protector to you?

I don’t think you’re that kind of person. You know I’m a person too.

Sometimes people just don’t think about their words. You’re usually really good with them, but you’re injured so thinking is probably hard. And a lot happened, that probably doesn’t help.

I forgive you for hurting me. I trust you didn’t mean to.

 

[bastion]

Context: Not actually an OC short, but instead a scrapped intro to oneshot that I wanted to share. It's scrapped mostly because I'm not actually running it, I'm just revising the notes on it for my betrothed. Also, it kinda ended up long.

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The Adventurer's Guild gets multiple requests every day, ranging from “please clean up the spilled potions in my shop” to "there’s an actual dangerous creature that’s been coming up into the city and needs to either be relocated or eliminated". Despite how wild and varied these requests are, there still manages to be the occasional request that stands out among the rest.

The words, “Lend me some people to scare off my fool sibling,” certainly make Mardred Rockheart's request stand out. It helped that she made sure to include, “Don’t need your best or brightest.”

This is how you come to find yourself in Stonecask Tavern late that night. Given the time, the tavern is full with patrons looking to relax after a long day of work. Every table is full and there isn’t an empty space at the counter. There aren't many taverns in the trade ward, which means the Stonecask thrives once the shops close for the night. Those that actually do, that is.

Staff moves through the crowded room, carrying trays of drink and hot food. In the thick of it all is your client and the owner of the tavern, Mardred, attending to the patrons right alongside her staff. Her hair and beard are braided tightly out of the way and she is dressed in simple clothing, the very image of practicality. Yet despite the unimpressive appearance, she is impossible not to notice. Her smile is radiant, her laugh loud and genuine.

It takes a few minutes for her to reach you by the door, only after she finishes attending to the tables she was helping. Once she realizes you're from the Adventurer's Guild that bright smile is gone, replaced by a sour grimace.

"Ah, it's a relief you came. Come to my office. I'll explain it all there."