Disclaimer: We own nothing save our wicked little brains and a bit too much time on our hands; no one's yet been able to put a copyright on that.
A/N: This is a collaboration between Wolf-Kin and yours truly. We were bored. We also can't stand badfics. And we are particularly fed up with cliché romance badfics. We also believe that characters themselves are even more fed up with it then we are but poor sods can hardly do a thing about it. Thus, the Character Protection Society was born.
The prologue and the first chapter might be considered relatively… tame, so to speak. Later on… if you happen to suspect via subtle and not so subtle hints that it is your story that gets picked apart, chances are you're probably right.
Reviews are public. Therefore, review replies will also be public. We will answer them at Shadows Unabated forum (you can find it among NWN forums or via my profile page) Both flames and laughs are more than welcome. We aim for the latter; we really won't mind the former. Above all, we hope you'll have some fun either way. ;)
There is some humor, there's lots of parody; in reality, it is a tragedy.
Character Protection Society
Prologue
(by Wolf-Kin)
"…And I just feel so…so…" the tiefling warrior searched in the air above his head for the correct word; across the small coffee table in front of his couch, his githzerai therapist – zerth, actually, the githzerai approximate equivalent to a priest – waited in patient silence, expression unreadable behind her veil. "I feelhelpless," he finally decided. "Forced to always be something that I am not, forced to feel what I don't feel…I cannot fight them, cannot even refuse to love them. At times, it is like…like only watching myself obey the commands she gives me; like a golem I must obey, but my mind is free to watch as my body goes through the motions."
He sighed, and bowed his head, staring down at the coffee table. "And what's worse is that no sooner than I am freed from one, then I am sucked into another!" His sharp blue eyes were bleak with despair as he looked up at the zerth. "They all feel the same, lady," he whispered. "It is like an endless cycle, always repeating the same horrors. I feel that I will never be free of them."
At last, the planar spoke, her voice calm and soothing as she addressed him, "Know that you will taste freedom from them. Know it deep in your heart, so fully that there are no doubts, and it will be so."
"I am a planar," he reminded her with a hint of his old fire. "I know the power of belief."
"But you do not yet know the power of doubt. And you do notknow that freedom is in your grasp; you are as my People were under the illithids, before Gith rose to give us the knowing of rebellion and freedom. A fair analogy," she continued, just a hint of censure in her voice, "for as we did not know any hope of freedom, so do you now. But we did know freedom, as, in time, so shall you."
"But…"
"No," she said, voice firm now. "Doubts create holes in the wall, and thus bring the fortress down. There can be no doubts in your mind: you will be freed. Know this, hold it to your heart, and it will be."
Before the scarred warrior could answer, there came a quiet tap on the door, and the zerth's secretary stuck her head into the room, mousey tousled hair more rumpled than usual, a sign of agitation. "Ms. Zhjaeve – " the title wasn't particularly correct, but the secretary didn't seem to care, considering that she'd actually learned to pronounce her mistress's name – "They've returned."
"Ah." Graceful as any of her race, Zhjaeve stood and gestured to the tiefling. "Here I must leave you for today: contemplate these truths and let them fill you, until you know them, until even the shadows of doubt are cast from you – especially the shadows of doubt, for they can be the most dangerous. There is a room prepared for you, just down the hall, if you care to rest."
He nodded as he stood; there was a certain grace to his movements as well, kin to Zhjaeve's but not quite the same. She moved like a piece of silk ripping in the wind, all fluid dancer, even the smallest move beautiful to watch; he moved like a warrior, every move precise, nothing wasted, nothing extraneous. Catlike and deadly, even and perhaps especially in armor, it was occasionally hard to believe that this same man had been coming in for extensive mental and emotional therapy for several years now.
And so it wasn't surprising that he hesitated, the wary look of a hunted rabbit flickering into his eyes. "Do you really think I'll have time to rest?" he asked bluntly. Memories of being dragged back here, shaking, after one, being quickly stabilized and returned to himself, only just in time before he was sucked into another, clawed at his mind.
Zhjaeve smiled…though he couldn't quite say how he knew, given the veil over her mouth, but there was certainly fond warmth in her voice as she told him, "It is too soon to know, but I believe you will be given a small reprieve from the usual wheel – a new cycle has begun, and so they have latched onto two new pets. Perhaps now we can make true progress with you."
He bowed, grateful for her reassurance, and turned to head towards the door, leaving her by the fireplace. He had to admit, this wasn't a bad place to spend considerable about of time in; it did manage to radiate a healing aura, subtler than the fireplace radiated heat. Half-office, half-sitting room, the place was about as comfortable as it looked, especially in the morning and evening, when light streamed in through the windows, and with the windows, through the bright stained glass suncatchers. The fireplace along one wall with its intimate setting of low coffee table between the opposing couch and wing-backed chair counterbalanced the more formal desk and chairs on the other wall, and "sessions" were just as likely to take place in either arrangement.
He was just reaching for the handle when the door flew open of its own accord, an odd trio framed on the threshold. Two women flanked a taller man with a wild look in his eyes; each of the women held an arm, obviously half-steering, half-dragging him where they wanted him to go. Probably for good reason; he recognized the frantic look, the shaking, the fear, and his sympathies went out the stranger – obviously, here was one of the new "pets" Zhjaeve had spoken of.
One of the women – dressed in skintight brown wools – seemed to be keeping up a one-sided conversation in an attempt to reassure the man in question. "…two of you, so they'll split over who to pursue and you'll only have to deal with half of them. Granted, that's still a considerable number, but at least you might get some consecutive sessions in, unlike poor Valen, who kept having to turn around right after – oh, speak of the tanar'ri!" she, having just noticed him, grinned up at him and gave him a fond wave. "Good to see you again, Valen! You're looking better than I've seen you in years."
He bowed to her and her partner; a complex tangle of emotions always rose up within him at the sight of the pair. He was, of course, always grateful to them for pulling him out of the stories; at the end of every plotline, when he got to return to himself and thus was a shaking wreck, they literally pulled him here. But of course, there was always the vague embarrassment that they had seen him as such a wreck, that anyone had, and the residual memories of particularly bad stories that the very sight of them triggered…
Still, the fact that they did rescue him, occasionally not even waiting until the story was complete before pulling him out, could not be denied; and he did like them, on the whole…
"I do feel…better," he admitted. "Perhaps in time…" he trailed off, recognizing the fragile hope that had been planted.
"Ah." Zhjaeve had come up behind him, her attention focused on the women's companion. "I had feared it would be you first, Bishop. Know that I shall do all in my power to help you through these dark times."
"Zhjaeve?" the man's voice was soft and shaky in disbelief. "Normal? Not…" his eyes roved around the room, looking for hidden foes – or worse, lusters. Somewhat convinced of its relative safety, he shook off his escorts – they were too willing to let him – and took a few more steps towards the githzerai, legs as shaky as a colt's. Behind him trailed his wolf companion, looking as whipped as he did; that was different. Valen raised an eyebrow, and the woman silently shook her head, smile fading: no, he probably didn't want to know, all things considered.
"Love interests" were bad. Love interests with pets were worse.
"Know that this first session is the hardest of them all," Zhjaeve announced to the company at large, words directed not to Bishop, but the women.
"That would be our cue," the other woman who'd been silent up until now informed her companion.
"Yeah, call up the next one… Oh!" She raised her fist to her forehead as the three of them exited the room, as if to knock sense into her. "Almost forgot – Valen, the Seer wants to speak with you as soon as possible. And while you're there, could you give her this for me?" She dug in her pouches, and came up with a folded piece of parchment, the flaps secured with a misshapen blob of wax. "Just a 'thank-you' for that tea-set she enchanted for me; I can have a hot cup of tea wherever I am within minutes!"
Valen grinned as he took the letter and pocketed it: her obsession with tea was legendary throughout this branch of the CPS. Then again, seeing as the department only had the two agents, the overworked secretary, Zhjaeve, the Seer, and whichever characters were currently staying here, that wasn't that hard to do. No one was quite sure if the small category was a blessing or a curse – they all knew each other, unlike the massive Harry Potter branch of the CPS, but there were only those two agents to handle bringing in the various characters. On the other hand, it was generally a very small rotation of characters.
"Oh, no, look at this…"
She leaned over to read the tiny display screen of her partner's wrist-mounted computer, which generally only worked long enough to get them their next assignment. She gave a low whistle. "Well, now…" she trailed off miserably, then gave a small wave to Valen as their paths parted; the Seer's quarters were just down the hall, and they were heading down the staircase to the Portal Room. "Duty calls. See you around."
The tiefling just had time to call his own farewells, and then they were gone down the stairs. He shook his head to himself, and continued on his own way: just another day in the Character Protection Society…