Author's Notes: Disclaimers, this story will be bloody and bloody violent. Otherwise, it'll be pretty tame, no lemons and I'm one for happy endings (even if I haven't figured out an ending). I'm looking forward to seeing how this goes. I'm not looking forward to seeing how long it takes to put out a new chapter every time. This has been waiting for almost a year.

I do not own Dragon Age, and this'll be the only chapter I say it.

Templar

Chapter One - 9:27 Dragon

The moonlight softly illuminated the rough surfaces of Lowtown as one of the night's typical entertainments slid down the alley wall before falling forwards unconscious, blood flowing heavily from her newly broken nose. Hawke huffed slightly, still quietly incredulous that anyone, especially this little woman, would dare the streets of Lowtown at night without even a knife's worth of protection. Leaning down she wiped her bloody hand on the working girl's clothes as she began rifling through her bags for anything worth taking; as always muttering the quiet prayer for a wayward sovereign. Finding a coin-pouch with a faint jingle, she dropped out a few coppers, smirking slightly as a silver followed; the girl must have already been paid once tonight, and paid surprisingly well. Hawke wouldn't have any more money problems for a while, if nothing went wrong. Straightening up while idly remembering how attractive the woman had looked in the brief glimpse in the moonlight - not the same now with a broken nose of course - Hawke offhandedly wished she had the equipment to take advantage at a moment's notice like one of the more common street toughs would've. Nothing for it though, she supposed; probably would have caught a particularly virulent disease by now if she did anyway, she reflected as she began trawling for another target; the night was still fresh after all.

Hours later, and Hawke still hadn't found a particularly enticing mark for the night, having bypassed beggars sleeping with one eye open (no sense making trouble for little gain), a mugging already in progress (Not a Hightown noble, not worth the fight), hidden as a Guard patrol passed, responding ever-so-late to the long-finished mugging, and watched silently as a particularly suspicious mark turned out to be bait for a gang's trap, catching two would-be muggers unawares. Figuring she'd search out one more street before calling it a night and catching some sleep for the day, she sidled into an alleyway to get a better view without being seen in the expansive shadows. Watching and waiting, she noticed a dwarf trying to sneak off in the direction she'd come from - Carta? Probably not worth the risk - and watched him finally turn the bend onto another street before vanishing quietly behind it. Shrugging to herself slightly, Hawke turned back to her impromptu stakeout, hoping she hadn't wasted the entire night after the prostitute when she could've just spent the night sleeping.

As a few more minutes passed, she was resigned; she didn't expect anyone worthwhile to turn up before sunrise and safer hours. Just before she shuffled off grumbling to herself, though, she froze as she heard heavy footsteps pounding from the bend around the corner she'd come from. Her nascent fears were confirmed when a band of dwarves bearing weapons and wearing armour, mainly leather, - oh, and there's that dwarf from before -, started to spread out into the street she'd marked, as she shrank back into the alley she'd hidden in. The one she took for the leader, who was hauling a surprisingly large axe for his size about, had a rather smug smirk on his face. "We know you're here, missy. You've stolen from the Carta! Nobody steals from us and gets to live." he finished, his smirk gaining a sadistic touch. Hawke was incredulous. All this for a silver and seven coppers? Or was there something she was forgetting? Yesterday? The week before? Her confusion had distracted her enough that she'd forgotten to duck down behind a crate, and the particular dwarf staring into the alley gave a "There! She's Here!", shocking her into action. She quickly took stock of what she had as the dwarves rushed at the alley: Her battered sword, a good thick Ferelden blade, her armour, leather, covered occasionally in bits of steel plate she'd found, her dagger, which she probably wasn't good enough with to use in battle, and… she took a glance back, briefly, and the alley opened up into a space around a drain cover. She had room for That. But dwarves? She didn't know. It was probably her only chance, however.

Unsheathing her sword as she retreated into the open space around the drain, she felt a tinge of exhilaration at what she was about to do, there wasn't any other option, there was no rationality to be had, she'd finally be able to use it for the first time since… she couldn't remember at the moment, and she'd just been interrupted by the dwarves flooding into the opening. She was prepared to start when they suddenly stopped at a 'hold!' from behind, confusing her again before she saw their leader come through to the front. He still had that infernally smug grin on his face. "No way out, missy. We have you now." he proclaimed with a lot of arm-sweeping grandeur, as his men gave a few barks of laughter. She never let any of them out of her sight. "You've stolen from the Carta, and we've come to collect." he continued. The confusion from before hit her again. "What, that silver? All this for a bloody silver?!" She replied before she could catch herself. His grin widened. "Ah, a silver. And she was right, you'd be worth a lot more than a silver, wouldn't you? Might even be a few sovereigns, whether we sell you to Tevinter or keep you ourselves." he finished, leering as his men laughed more. She had no delusions of what he was talking about. "I will never be a slave, you bastard." she spat out, pulling together her rage. "Now see here-" he started, but was cut off with "I've always wondered," she cut him off suddenly, she had to stall - "what it would be like to toast a dwarf alive? I hear they have a...resistance." she finished speaking as she'd secretly collected enough of her power. Her eyes lit up along with her sadistic grin. "Let's find out." she said as she forced out a blast of power from her left hand, crushing dwarves into walls in a burst of concussive force. Before they could recover, she dropped her sword onto the ground, and brought her hands together and raised them, channeling the rage she'd gathered along with no small amount of sheer power into them. Her grin widened. The dwarves had finished pulling themselves together, and were starting to charge.

She was ready for them.

"Burn." she stated simply, bringing her hands forward to meet them. And then there was fire, roaring through the dwarves, calling forth screams of agony. She remembered what it was like before, when she'd done the same to the first who'd tried to enslave her, who took her from her family and dragged her to Kirkwall in chains. They'd been human, and they'd died quickly. She watched the dwarves, compared. "It seems the legendary dwarven resistance is true! You're still screaming!" she called with a sharp laugh, as she finally burned through the power concentrated in her hands, and panting slightly, dropped them to pick up her sword, in case one of them got back up. The screams started tapering off into groans, and some became silent altogether. Hawke waited as the flames died down. There'd been six dwarves, two of which, which satisfyingly enough included their leader; bag of hot air he was, had died to the heavy burns already. All of them were still on fire, but at this point they probably couldn't feel it, and Hawke suddenly realised her new problem. Large burst of fire, easily visible at night. The Guard, and maybe even the Templars would be coming. She cursed, and set about stabbing the remainder in the throat; she couldn't risk them being healed and telling them about her. Once the last was done, she quickly wiped off the blade, and rushed out into the street and in a direction reasonably away from home. She suddenly realised she hadn't gotten the chance to loot anything, and started cursing like a sailor as she ran.

Hawke had woken up bleary eyed, having spent the morning hours beforehand running vaguely away from her home's direction to throw off a search, and then trudging back halfway through Kirkwall before collapsing on the block of wood and hay she called a bed, and then suffered through having to push off a particularly insistent demon for long enough to get a good morning's sleep. After having stared blankly into the ceiling for a while, she'd been loudly notified of the fact that she was hungry, and gotten up to fix the only thing she had ingredients for.

Fish with a potato.

Chewing through that, Hawke started thinking. How much Templar interest had she attracted? How close would they be? Was it time to move? How much did the Carta know? Would they still be hunting her? She didn't know, but she could guess: A lot, Not too close (the running in the wrong direction had to be good for something), Move where? What she looked like and the fact that she'd burned a group of Carta already? Probably, but not for the original reason. She groaned, leaning back on her stool into the wall. She had no idea what to do; no idea if she should even do anything. The Templars might pass her over and she might have scared the Carta out of the trouble of hunting through all of Lowtown for her. Thinking about it, she smiled slightly, figuring it was probably true. She'd still need to stay far away from any Carta, though, so Darktown was completely off-limits. The Templar search wouldn't even know she was a she, actually; moving would probably attract attention if anything and with the silver's worth in coppers she could pay for a few week's food if she dug into her reserves a bit, and she'd stay indoors all the time otherwise; long enough for the search to hit a dead end and for the Carta to stop bothering if they did take the trouble. Hawke nodded, her course decided, she'd go up near Hightown to trade the silver, visit the market to get the first week's food, and then bring it all back home and stay in for the rest of the week. Leaning forward again, she found that everything was only lukewarm now. Serves her for ignoring it.

It wasn't often Hawke haggled, but when she was going to be spending most of what she had she was going to make it stretch. For the short time she'd spent bargain hunting, she figured she'd done rather well, anyway. Hawke was honestly surprised (and quite a bit satisfied) that everything had gone off without a hitch; no pickpockets, no Templars, and no angry dwarves had interrupted things, and she got more from the market than she figured she would've. Keeping the basket where she could see it - no point tempting fate and hungry hands - Hawke ambled homeward, content to people-watch for the last time until she ran out of food and had to leave the house.

She spared a glance to the rare group of children playing off to the side of the street, under the watchful eyes of a few mothers. Her eyes swept over a shop that sold arms; The shields in particular. She really needed to get one of those at one point, but had kept procrastinating. And selling loot for the occasional silver. The next shield she found she would try to train with to finally get used enough to fighting with one to use it worth a damn; the last time had been embarrassing, and almost fatal. Walking past, she spotted that old deadbeat gambler, Gamlen. She snorted quietly. Once, in a tavern, a younger and more idiotic Hawke had been considering taking the risk of gambling her way to riches, and had overheard a conversation about Gamlen - who was present, which was probably why they talked loudly enough to be overheard - and how he'd inherited a great Hightown estate, started gambling and had his wealth drop all the way down to a Lowtown chamberpot. She'd shakily dropped the idea completely when she'd realised that all she had she could never afford to lose. Hawke gave him a little credit, now; at least he had been smart enough to quit before he hit the Darktown sewers. Seeing the obvious debtors about to administer a beating next to him however, it seems he hadn't been smart enough to quit entirely. Hawke looked away as she passed him and came to a darker alley, obviously used as a sewage tunnel access point. Something felt vaguely off, aside from the fact it was a dark alley in Kirkwall, but even at night it was generally safer than most due to the fact that nobody ever wanted to wait for victims next to open sewage. Hawke really didn't feel like wasting too much time going around, either way - it was situated right before a ravine that blocked the way between home and the closest market, and the next alley was even darker but not nearly as uninhabitable - and decided to suffer through the smell to get back home faster.

As she passed into the alley, the vague feeling of wrongness intensified - along with the stench - before abating suddenly. Disturbed, Hawke shifted the basket to her left hand, opening up her sword hand as she watched the shadows, clueless about what the feeling had been. As she came to halfway through the alley, suddenly the wrongness came back and spiked into an outright air of malevolence. Hawke had choked slightly, absently dropping the food basket as her hands opened to grasp for her blade, when a door ahead of her opened and two people walked out. Hawke stilled.

Not people. She could never have mistaken those for people, not after all her father had taught her; all he had taught her to run from for both her life and soul.

Before her were two of the most feared creatures of Thedas, two of the single biggest reason there were Circles and Templars in the first place. Hawke knew this. She took in every detail she saw, every mutation she instinctively recoiled from, as she stood there shocked. Both were heavily cloaked, with hoods thrown back. The one on the left was - had been - a woman; luscious black locks accentuated with flowing black horns, framing a face that could only be described as beautiful, lips just as violet as the glow in her eyes - oh, those eyes - Hawke shuddered as she threw off the beginnings of the compulsion, just as her father had taught her. She recoiled again at another look; The thing had changed, it's skin now tainted with blotches of purple and it's eyes now black aside from the violet glow, bright in the shadows as the thing frowned in irritation. The one on the right seemed not to have bothered trying to hide anything; it's mutations were obvious, flesh warped and twisting under a mop of grey hair and a single, baleful eye, it's hands visibly ending in very large claws, it's mouth conspicuously absent. Hawke had been stumbling backwards when a crash sounded behind her, shocking her into finally drawing her blade and swinging to the left halfway round to see, her heart in her throat; where it subsequently crashed into her gut as the crashing was followed by another of those things bursting through a door she'd passed, flickers of flame and smoke trailing from what was left. Hawke suddenly realised that the terrible feeling had come from her magic, which she'd never felt in such a way, and she knew she would never forget it, even as she came to another crushing realisation as the abominations - such a fitting name - stopped before her, the last one visibly straining to keep itself still.

She was going to die in this sewage-stinking alleyway.

Her hands shaking around her blade - the good thick Ferelden steel her only lifeline - Hawke jerked back slightly toward a sewer opening - could she? No, not even desperate smugglers use those - as the first - Desire, she figured - suddenly moved, but her fear was suddenly mixed with confusion as it only reached down into the basket she'd dropped, picked out an apple - she'd gotten a few as a treat, even as expensive as they are in bleak Kirkwall - and took a bite, resuming it's staring as it chewed. Hawke couldn't figure out what to do - couldn't (didn't want to) figure out why they weren't just attacking, ending her life oh so easily - and kept on standing, blade still shaking and swaying. She flinched back as the lone abomination on her right - Rage, probably? - roared out suddenly. "Get this over with!" it thundered, still twitching as if to rush forward. Desire sighed. "So impatient. I don't know why I put up with you." it responded in a mellifluous voice, idly floating the apple above it's hand. "It is a good point, however, so I shall begin. We mean you no harm," it said to Hawke's immense disbelief and shock, "so do not worry, little mageling. Harming you would in fact essentially be harming ourselves." it continued. Hawke still couldn't believe her ears. "What? Why?" she spat out, looking for something to make sense. Desire's stare gained a hint of annoyance. "I was getting to that." it muttered loudly. "We three have been searching for a mage free from that damnable circle who possesses something even resembling power for some time now. I'd almost given up hope of ever finding someone worthy until we felt your own considerable power being...exercised the last night." Hawke still didn't know what to feel, but she couldn't help feeling a tinge of smugness. Desire continued. "The reason we require your power is simple. We were summoned to this accursed city by pitiful weaklings who tried and failed to use us to compensate for their own weaknesses...among other things." it gave a snort. "While breaking free of their control was no trouble at all, well, breaking free of this world to return to where we belong simply can't be done by ourselves alone. We require an outsider, and you alone can fit the bill." She stated, her unblinking gaze never having left Hawke for a moment.

"Of course," Desire said suddenly, "I can hardly expect you to attempt this without any kind of recompense." Hawke shivered slightly. Did she forget something? "It is within our power to grant many things. We could give you power, but what need have you for more, shining brightly as you did before? I could bring you someone who would love you, but love is transient to you, isn't it?" she mused in a pleasing lilt. Hawke couldn't help but think of her past, before Kirkwall. Desire's gaze sharpened suddenly, and she took a step forward, while Hawke jerked her sword back up. "Oh, I might know what it is you seek. Do you seek an escape from this place as well, this Kirkwall?" she questioned as she continued slowly approaching. Hawke couldn't take her eyes off those violet glows. "Maybe what you seek is outside Kirkwall. Your family, maybe?" Hawke took a sharp intake of breath. "It would be well within our power to bring you to your family, Hawke. You'd like that, wouldn't you? Like the chance to see Mother and Father again," Father? "You'd like the chance to see how little Carver and Bethany have grown, wouldn't you?" What had Father said, once? It bugged her, but she opened her mouth. "Yes." She said, hoarsely. "I want that more than anything." she admitted. Desire's eyes gleamed and her mouth twitched into a smile. Beautiful. "As I have said, bringing you to them is well within our power. Before this can come to pass, however, you must perform us our service, and assist us in creating a Tear in the Veil so that we may...return home. Of course once we are free of these damned bodies we will be able to transport you to almost anywhere in the world, so…" Desire giggled lightly, taking Hawke's chin in her hand's soft touch, her violet gaze never breaking contact with Hawke's. She began to drift around Hawke, her touch slowly drifting away no matter how Hawke leaned after it, eventually drifting off completely as she sashayed around Hawke far enough that Hawke couldn't maintain eye contact. Hawke shivered again, as she felt her finger drawing a line along her neck. But what had Father told her? It must have been important. She felt like she could remember now for some reason, if only...Hawke flinched as she felt Desire's touch leaving her skin, and gave a slight plaintive mewl, trying to find it again. Hawke's searching was suddenly disrupted by a roar shaking her world, knocking her off balance, before she suddenly felt a vapid calm. Desire walked in front of her with a flash of irritation on her face, staring angrily away. "I apologise, but I must deal with this interruption. Do not worry, I will return soon." Hawke's fear of losing her had instantly been relieved, and so as she walked away to something vague Hawke turned her mind back to whatever Father had said. She could remember it much more clearly, for some reason. It had been about Desire? How had Father known about Desire? She finally found it, and latched onto the memory with glee.

- "A Desire demon's promises are a lot like a chocolate cupcake. It might let you have a bit of the great frosting before you decide, but it'll make you eat the whole thing in one go and it'll turn out half of it is made out of druffalo shite. Never trust a demon of Desire to tell you the truth." -

Hawke's mind stilled. What. Just...Why? Wait, not telling the truth? She looked to where she was, but could only see something hazy. Why couldn't she see her? Hawke suddenly had an idea. She could feel her with her magic, couldn't she? She needed to see her. Hawke closed her eyes briefly, tugging at her link to the Fade. Something irritated her for a moment, and disturbed, Hawke focused on it completely, and pushed at it. Suddenly the world opened up to her senses for a moment, and with it returned the almost crushing malevolent feeling of abominations. Abominations. Hawke noticed her - it - facing down Rage. It was cowering before Desire. She - it (Hawke already felt the compulsion returning) - changed mood suddenly. "Although I do admit that she seems particularly delicious, just the right amount of resistance and could be rather charming cleaned up a bit. After the veil is broken I think I shall keep her as a pet, before making her bring her family to me." It openly considered.

As the compulsion began attempting to fog her mind and her senses again, this time it didn't quite take hold. Hawke understood now. Pet. Slave. It would make her enslave her family. Hawke knew what to do.

She would die in this alleyway, but she would be taking her soul along with her.

Softly shattering the compulsion and being careful not to move too suddenly, Hawke brought and crossed her hands together - Where was her sword? - and closed her eyes, reaching deeply through her link to the fade, bringing forth power that she quickly channeled into an opening space between her hands, instinctively moving them to stabilize and contain, to shape it into what she knew best. Having brought forth almost all the power she could muster, Hawke's eyes snapped open with a look of determination. Whatever the abominations had been arguing about, they'd certainly stopped now. Hawke couldn't let them take the initiative. "I am nobody and nothing's slave, foul abomination!" she shouted, "Burn in whatever hell you came from!" Hawke finished in a roar, throwing her hands forward. "Oh, bother." the unknown abomination finally spoke in a languid tone, as an almighty firestorm of the kind Hawke never knew she had in her exploded into life in almost every part of the alleyway, reaching open sewage and detonating it suddenly, damaging the walls and cracking parts of the ground in it's fury as it rushed over the abominations, engendering roars of pain and vicious anger. Hawke let her hands drop as she started quickly searching around her for her sword - oh, right next to her - panting heavily. As she brought it up she heard one of the roars coming closer and looked up to see Rage charging through the flames, ignoring the fact that it was on fire itself, hands extending forward as if to wring her neck. Half dodging and half jumping to the side as it came too close, Hawke bit out a curse as she failed to get in a stab and only managed to slash it's arm, only succeeding in pissing it off more. She knew it wasn't the only one, though, and as the flames were beginning to die down due to lack of air - Hawke herself could attest to this, sucking in painful breaths - she could see the other two surprisingly only lightly harmed, frost faintly visible in the air around Desire whose face was a blackened mask of fury even as it trailed smoke, and the other who seemed to have simply taken the flames and put them out afterward, although it's cloak still had the occasional flame licking from it.

As they began advancing and Rage had swung around to face her again, Hawke tried to think of a way out of this, but had come up empty when a reverberating horn blast sounded faintly, almost completely covered by the high alley walls and the flames and roaring of abominations within them. She'd just about convinced herself she'd imagined it when it sounded again as she swung her sword lengthwise into Rage's outstretched claw-bound hand, cleaving through halfway and receiving another roar of wrath before she had to pull out the sword. Hawke suddenly remembered: It was one of the City Guard's emergency horns, spread throughout the city to call more guardsmen. They were coming; they'd seen and heard the explosions and fire. The Templars would have still been looking for her, too. These were abominations. They would help. Would they make it in time, though?

Not as it is, Hawke reflected as Desire finally arrived in the fight, pushing forward a harsh blast of ice that Hawke instinctively jumped back from, forgetting to stop herself from retaliating with a blast of fire from her offhand and almost completely exhausting her power. As she swung wide at Rage (why wasn't it on fire anymore?) to force it away for a moment she noticed the other abomination still ambling towards them from her side - it was probably a Sloth demon, actually - and the end of the alleyway behind it. She was already tiring holding off two abominations and she couldn't possibly last against three, so she made a split second decision. Gathering all that remained of the energy that leaked to her from the Fade, Hawke compressed all of it into her offhand and immediately released it again in a concussive blast that forced back both Rage and Desire, pushing them out of her suddenly open path as she stumbled into a run even as she blinked away stars from the total lack of the energy she'd always felt before now. Even as Desire let out a scream of fury behind her she completely locked her focus on Sloth and made to sprint widely left around it, her gut clenching as it abandoned it's easy amble to try to intercept her. Seeing it about to catch her side she swung wildly at it and was rewarded with a sort of grunt as her blade caught and cut into it's arm as it hadn't stopped fast enough to dodge. Finding her path completely open now, Hawke kept sprinting towards the homeward alley entrance, ichor-like blood gleaming almost proudly from the blade bobbing in front of her. She wasn't sure how far she'd be able to run before they caught her. She wouldn't, - couldn't - believe they wouldn't follow her out onto the open street, now that they'd almost certainly be exposed anyway.

Sprinting the fastest she'd ever been, Hawke had almost made it to the street when an intense heat flashed across her back, and in distraction she didn't notice the raised slatestone until she tripped on it. In confused terror she threw her hands and sword forward, catching her fall as the intense heat turned blazing before roaring overhead. Hawke looked up quickly enough to see a fireball exploding in the street ahead as she stumbled up and spun around as quickly as her bruising hands allowed, seeing the trio almost on top of her. Knowing with a fatalism she'd never had before that there were no more chances, was no more escape, Hawke brought her sword around to swing heavily against the closest; Rage. Abandoning defense almost completely as she brought the blade around, cleaving deeply into it's chest as it howled in pained rage. Hawke felt honestly surprised before she saw it's hand reaching at her face. Trying to jump back but finding her sword caught in the abomination, she screamed as burning hot claws pulled across her jaw; across her eye. Still screaming as her sword finally pulled free - her left eye was red why is it red - she slashed wildly at the monster she could barely see past the blood and felt it catch as the howling in front of her suddenly choked off. Did she kill it? Trying to blink away the blood to see and moaning as the pain in her left intensified she'd just managed to see the hand coming at her before it caught her in the neck and lifted.

Choking, Hawke felt her sword pulling away and brought her hands to her neck, trying to fight it off. Her eye snapped to the end of the arm holding her and she caught sight of burning violet eyes. The tainted face they belonged to was vexed. "You really should have taken the offer, you know. Much better than death, don't you think?" it spat at her. Hawke hacked out a giggle - it was too tight to laugh - and as the death grip softened enough for her to speak, she replied. "Death is so much better than slavery, and I'll always die before letting you hurt any of them." she choked out before the grip tightened inexorably. "It's too bad you'll die now before truly keeping me away from them, isn't it? If your sister is even half the mageling you are, she'll be well worth the effort." it offhandedly replied in it's lilting voice, as Hawke redoubled her struggling. Hawke couldn't get it off - too tight - but it was in arm's reach wasn't it? Dropping her right to grasp wildly for her dagger, she pulled and swung only to have her hand caught and crushed and she screamed anew. "Good try, good enough I think I'll give you back your little knife now." This hit Hawke's dismayed and fogging mind just before the dagger stabbed deeply into her gut. She whimpered, no longer able to summon anything more. "Goodbye, little mageling." it said as it tossed her off to the side, where she slammed into the wall head-first with a heavy crack. As she fell sideways, she knew no more.

"Knight Commander!" one of her men called, attracting her attention away from the corpse they hadn't had to fight. "This woman - She's still alive!" he reported. She looked at her - she certainly didn't look alive - wearing leather armour with patchwork metal, bloody and blackened claw marks scratched across her face, seemingly having lost a lot of blood from a wound on her head somewhere and the dagger almost proudly resting in her gut with the bloody splats on the wall behind her. She has to be tough to survive still. She looked back at the sword that had cut halfway through the abomination's neck. Strong, too.

Her decision made, she called the healer away from her men's comparatively light wounds, and those of the dead could wait. Looking at her again, she certainly couldn't.

Author's note: I think Abominations actually lack magical attacks in the games but if so that's bullshit and I'm ignoring it. A few coppers will probably, realistically, buy you enough to eat if there's enough to eat.

Finally; I expected to have a backlog of chapters to take second looks through before putting out before releasing this as a story. Turns out this took so long I figured I should just put this out now. Don't expect anything for a while, I'll be honest, but do expect something, eventually.