Title: Oblivion Walker (though it has nothing to do with the achievement)
Genre: Humor/Drama (though more humor than drama; maybe later the drama will properly show up? I really don't know)
Character: kind of Dragonborn, more just OC. Both are labeled because of reasons.

Chapter One

Salthjofr sighed as he leaned against a building. The sky was overcast and actually seemed to reflect his mood for once. He wasn't happy, to say the least, though he wouldn't go so far as to say he was mad. Annoyed, maybe, but nothing so extreme that he did anything more than brood, unlike some of his fellows would have.

If any of them had been given what was essentially a glorified retrieval mission, they would have pitched a fit and leveled a village or something. Probably not on purpose, but maybe so; especially if they'd been dropped off in Windhelm.

Just look at Winterhold. Gunhild definitely had a temper tantrum over her placement. But then again, she'd been young, and if the same were to happen now, Salthjofr liked to think she'd be able to contain herself. Possibly. She was still a brat to him, so he could just be being unreasonably hopeful.

But he was distracting himself. Of course, he knew that, which was part of the reason he was distracting himself. Salthjofr glanced around the village he found himself in instead of following that train of thought.

It was miserable little place, but that could have just been the weather. Or the recent death. He knew about that death, of course, since the first thing he'd done when he appeared here was catch and send on her soul. It'd been an instinctive act, done in the blink of an eye, and he'd been confused afterwards. That had been because he recognized none of his surroundings and because that soul had the feel of something different. Something he hadn't encountered in millennia.

In that moment, he'd understood where he was, even if he didn't recognize the town he was at the gate of. And he'd felt his gut sink as the implications sunk in.

Why the hell else would he be in Tamriel, if it wasn't because of him.

Salthjofr groaned again, ignoring the blacksmith frowning at him, and dropped into a crouch. He threaded his hands into his hair and tugged, fighting down the urge to curse. Why? He didn't understand. He thought he was finished with that, that that chapter of his career had been closed all those years ago. The beast had disappeared, been sealed away or something. His soul hadn't been collected, but he was gone, so the Order had assumed him chained and considered it over with.

So why was he here? Was he back? Why?

The goat wandering the streets started nibbling his hair.

Salthjofr absently started petting it, though he did push its head away and direct it towards the much more tasty patch of grass by his feet.

He supposed he could understand the Order's decision to send him back, if Alduin really had returned, or been unsealed, or whatever happened. He just didn't like it. Especially since he'd just finished another long-term mission and he's expected time off. Like usual.

But no. He couldn't even have that.

Why did Alduin have to pick now? Why not wait another decade or something, let him rest a little before Salthjofr had to chase after the loitering bastard. Of course, that was unreasonable. Why would a malevolent dragon out to destroy the world (as he knew it) care about the holiday time of a being he most certainly didn't know of? Not that Salthjofr cared that Alduin couldn't be expected to care. It was his time off damn it!

Salthjofr resisted the urge to sigh. He'd done that already and he had a feeling that if he did it again, the guard eying him (not very) discreetly would come over and tell him to "stop lollygagging".

The goat tried to eat his ear. He leaned away.

The town was miserable and small – he'd made that point already, hadn't he? The smell of death lingered and calmed Salthjofr somewhat, which was one of the main reasons he hadn't left the second he sort of realized where he was. The Apothecary he'd passed had been creatively named – Grave Concoctions – and he suspected the other establishments were as well, though he hadn't had the chance to look at them before he'd stopped by the side of the aforementioned Apothecary. He'd spent a few blank moments just watching the town goat orbit the rotten tree stump some four yards in front of him before his situation had really hit him.

He was in Tamriel. Probably Skyrim, since that was the last place he'd seen Alduin. But, still, Tamriel. The horrid place that didn't seem to have electricity yet, but had magic and monsters instead. It had to be one of the worse worlds, and coming from him that was saying a lot. He'd been to many worlds, after all, as souls are everywhere and the Order doesn't focus on or care about particularities like specifying an agents "standard domain". You were sent where you were needed and that was that. It didn't matter to them if it was an entirely different reality than the one you were used to dealing with.

Tamriel had been the third world or reality or plane of existence (he wasn't one for specifics either, really) he'd been to, as part of one of the five year shifts that cycled through particularly hostile worlds. It had been during a civil war, one of the many that Tamriel found itself in, and he'd been sick of the place once he'd been relieved.

Then Alduin had taken up the mantle of "World-Eater" and Salthjofr had been "given" him, for lack of any better term. Alduin was his to deal with, as a high profile soul, and it was his job to collect it, and any like it.

So, basically, to his disgust and resignation, Salthjofr had been assigned the task of processing dragon souls. And guess which horrible, miserable, insane world had dragons?

He hated this world. Loathed it entirely.

The goat returned to nibbling his hair.

Salthjofr hated this goat too. Too bad it had at least another six years to its aura, or he'd have sent it away by now. Though, the guard probably wouldn't like that. The blacksmith either.

Damn goat.

A note of Salthjofr's name. It's old Norse: sál "soul", þjófr "thief". So, Salthjofr. Good luck pronouncing it. (It's [Sailth-yo-fer] or something like that.)
Gunhild means "battle in war." Also old Norse. (because that's a thing in Skyrim isn't it?)

A/N: I never actually came out and said anything concrete about this character. Oops.
Um, so he's a demony-thing-Idon'tknow-being whose job is sending deceased souls onto wherever they go. Every Reaper (that's pretty much what they are) can send on any type of soul. Each Reaper has a specific soul type they process (kind of absorb and keep until the soul is able to go back into the cycle) and this guy drew dragons. Processing is the roundabout way of sending, where the Reaper keeps the soul as energy (they gotta eat something) then, eventually, actually send it. So he acts like the Dragonborn in canon, but isn't. Everyone just thinks he is. But we'll get to that later. Also, yes, he's a bit insane.

Any questions? Send a review! (Please? I have no idea if this is even good enough to go anywhere, so I'd really like to know what you think. Even it's just "good!" or "nope!")
(Also, it seems this account has turned into the dumping grounds of my incomplete stories that I actually kind of like a little but only have so much motivation for. Oh well. Enjoy them, I guess.)