"Dorian!" the Bull shouts the moment he makes it around that bend, not sparing an instant to glance back but trying to listen, trying to hear Dorian over the shrieks of the darkspawn to know whether he's still alive. "Got a lift back here! Move!"
Because it doesn't matter, now, if the thing works or not. Green light shines off exposed gears, jagged chunks of rubble and broken stone, and that lift is the only thing that this path leads up to. Either it works and they both make it up together, or it doesn't and they go out together, shoulder to shoulder. He doesn't like the idea of going out like this, like he is now, running away while someone else stays behind to cover for him. There's not any time to explain any of that, even if any of it really mattered.
He steps wrong, foot landing crooked on a rock, and he goes down. The noise he makes is pain, not surprise, and the moment he lands hard on the ground he hurls Dorian's staff onto the platform ahead of him, teeth gritted, and drags himself closer.
Still no point in looking back. The part of him that needs to know if any darkspawn made it past Dorian is the same part of him that wouldn't shut up back in that tunnel, the part that reacts, doesn't think, except this time he already knows the threat's right here behind him, able to put a stop to everything he's ever been with just one lucky hit. That makes it easier. Might sound weird if he tried to explain that out loud, but it's true.
This might be up there with the worse fights he's been in, but that doesn't matter much. What matters is that he can still move, that he doesn't waste any time.
He stops trying to hear whether Dorian's still fighting. He stops thinking about anything. If this thing doesn't move them in time nothing else is going to matter so he lets the threat behind him be what it is and turns his mind forward, watching that eerie green gleam off the pieces of the lift ahead while darkspawn howling fills his ears. He heaves himself forward one more time onto the edge of the platform, reaching out for one big, exposed gear and leaning his whole weight onto it, waiting for a still, endless moment until he feels it start grinding against something.
Only then does he try to focus on Dorian. If he didn't do everything he could to get this thing moving, how Dorian was doing wouldn't matter. But if Dorian took too long to get back here, or didn't come at all, or gets back with that bare, uncovered face coated in darkspawn blood because the Bull hadn't been able to watch his back-
He has time to look now, just for an instant. He'll decide what to do from there.
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Because it doesn't matter, now, if the thing works or not. Green light shines off exposed gears, jagged chunks of rubble and broken stone, and that lift is the only thing that this path leads up to. Either it works and they both make it up together, or it doesn't and they go out together, shoulder to shoulder. He doesn't like the idea of going out like this, like he is now, running away while someone else stays behind to cover for him. There's not any time to explain any of that, even if any of it really mattered.
He steps wrong, foot landing crooked on a rock, and he goes down. The noise he makes is pain, not surprise, and the moment he lands hard on the ground he hurls Dorian's staff onto the platform ahead of him, teeth gritted, and drags himself closer.
Still no point in looking back. The part of him that needs to know if any darkspawn made it past Dorian is the same part of him that wouldn't shut up back in that tunnel, the part that reacts, doesn't think, except this time he already knows the threat's right here behind him, able to put a stop to everything he's ever been with just one lucky hit. That makes it easier. Might sound weird if he tried to explain that out loud, but it's true.
This might be up there with the worse fights he's been in, but that doesn't matter much. What matters is that he can still move, that he doesn't waste any time.
He stops trying to hear whether Dorian's still fighting. He stops thinking about anything. If this thing doesn't move them in time nothing else is going to matter so he lets the threat behind him be what it is and turns his mind forward, watching that eerie green gleam off the pieces of the lift ahead while darkspawn howling fills his ears. He heaves himself forward one more time onto the edge of the platform, reaching out for one big, exposed gear and leaning his whole weight onto it, waiting for a still, endless moment until he feels it start grinding against something.
Only then does he try to focus on Dorian. If he didn't do everything he could to get this thing moving, how Dorian was doing wouldn't matter. But if Dorian took too long to get back here, or didn't come at all, or gets back with that bare, uncovered face coated in darkspawn blood because the Bull hadn't been able to watch his back-
He has time to look now, just for an instant. He'll decide what to do from there.