My first and so far only Oblivion fanfic :3 Involving my two favourite characters, of course. Even if one of them is basically a non-character, haha.
Rated For: It just fits, idk. Blood and stuff, I guess.
Disclaimer: Don't own, whoo. Everything belongs to Bethesda Softworks.
Edit 18/04/10: Rewrote parts, especially the ending. Changed a few locations, ect.
My first memories are fuzzy, like any beings'. I can only vaguely remember the warmth of my mother's belly and the mad scramble to reach one of her life-giving nubs. Some of my siblings died because there were too few of those nubs and too many of us. I killed some of them; I pushed them away so I could live. As young as I was, I couldn't comprehend what I was doing. All I knew was that I was hungry.
As I grew older, we began to leave our mother one by one. She drove the last of us away, myself and two of my sisters, when we stayed for too long. Of course, we did not feel betrayed; we were only acting on instinct and so was she.
My sisters and I stayed together, for it was much easier to scavenge and hunt for food in groups. We could drive off anything that threatened us as we grew in size to become adults. Even wolves were no match for our combined might and on the good days we could kill a bird together or sometimes even a sickly deer. The three of us took to sleeping in the strange white stoneplaces that littered the forests. It was rare for anything to visit us there; even deer generally stayed far away from them.
But occasionally things did visit us as we slept, and it was a putrefying, desiccated Twoleg that claimed my younger sister's life one night. My elder sister and I fled as only someone in absolute terror can flee; we were not built for speed and yet we somehow managed to outrun the living corpse as it chased us.
After that night we never slept in one of the stoneplaces again.
Some distance away we found a cave in the side of a hill and made that our territory. We had only lived there for no more than five sunrises before a passing male caught our scent and came with every intention of siring kits. It was me he approached first; I was not in heat and rebuked his advances with tooth and claw. I gouged his skin and tore his fur and shredded one of his ears to ribbons before he gave up on me and tried to woo my sister. She, unlike me, was in her receptive phase and she accepted him. Within two sunrises he had left and she was far more aggressive than she normally was; a sure sign that she now carried the male's kits within her.
For nearly twelve sunrises I stayed with her, but in the end she drove me off like my mother had when I was younger. Alone now, I wandered from place to place, searching for somewhere I could call my own. There were many caves I explored, only to be evicted from them by other creatures more cunning or powerful than I.
And so, when I first stumbled upon the notwhite stoneplace that I later learned was called Fort Hastrel, I thought it was a place I could call my own.
When I first squirmed my way into its halls, I could detect nothing living. There were many corpses strewn about in various stages of decay; I ate what I could from the less rotted ones. Most of these corpses belonged to Twolegs, each of them wrapped in a strange, dark aroma that I did not like. I avoided eating from those for a time, but I eventually became accustomed to the scent and thought nothing of taking a few bites from those bodies.
Three days after eating those strange, dark corpses, I began to feel... different.
I began to see glowing auras around the living, and my sight itself became far better than the murkiness I was accustomed to. I began to see more than just vague splotches of light and dark... colors made themselves known and I could see as well as any cat or bird. Hunting became far easier; a curious aura emanating from my prey made itself known. I found myself sleeping through the daylight time and shunning the sunlight - my skin felt as though it were melting when there was too much light shining on my pelt. And though there was no way I could have known then, my appearance was changing as well. Though my fur retained its pitch black color, my skin became deathly pale and my eyes began to turn scarlet, pupil and all.
Within ten sunrises, I began to feel something different from my ordinary instincts. I could create plans and traps for catching my prey; I was becoming smarter, more aware of the world around me. Instead of a 'just do it' there was now 'how do I do it, and why am I doing it?' to every action I took.
Over the span of four seasons, I gradually became different from the creature I once was - I became sentient. I could wonder, I could ponder the whys and hows of any situation, and I could call upon more than instincts to aid me. I realized that I was no longer aging. Something in those rotted corpses had changed me absolutely and irreversibly; it was a terrifying and utterly exhilarating thought at the same time.
My newfound intelligence demanded that I seek out others of my kind, others that had gone through this same strange transformation. And so I left the place called Fort Hastrel and traveled and traveled and traveled for another four seasons.
It was purely by chance that I stumbled upon a living Twoleg with the darkscent, a Twoleg I eventually came to know as Vicente Valteri.
He was traveling under the protective blanket of night like I did, and far from the path that the Twolegs normally traversed. His aura was different from that of the other creatures I had seen; it did not waver with the beating of a heart or the inhalation of air. He seemed to sense me only moments after I had sensed him, and he called into the forest in the strange sounds the Twolegs make. I did not respond, of course, having no idea how to speak the language in those days. I simply approached, ready to attack if he proved hostile. To my surprise, he knelt down and greeted me, not with words but with a simple extended hand.
From that moment onwards I became his companion. We traveled together, ate together, and slept together, and when he needed my help in fulfilling the deeds given to him by a robed Twoleg I would gladly aid him. He taught me how to keep myself alive as what I was and how to feed on unsuspecting Twolegs. He taught me the language of the Twolegs, both spoken and written, and when the time came he helped me gain entry into the colony he was a part of... the Dark Brotherhood.
He even gave me the thing that I had been lacking all of my long fifty years... a name.
It was a name given in the heat of the moment, but I've come to associate myself with it. When I joined the Brotherhood - officially, as a sentient being - I did not want to be known simply as "Rat"... and Vicente gave my name as Schemer. He told the then-Listener that it was a normal name for one of my kind, though he was fully aware that we do not have names as Twolegs know them. Later, when I asked why he had chosen that name for me, he replied that it fit my personality well, and would say nothing beyond that.
I can understand his logic, though it took me some time to ponder it out. Cunning is something my kind is known for; and with my enhanced intelligence comes an enhanced ability to scheme. It has served both myself and the Brotherhood well over the decades.
And even now, as I launch myself forward with the power of desperation, I find myself plotting a thousand different ways I could bring this battle to a close. His armor is light; it may be possible for me to bite the artery in his leg that will cause him to bleed out in minutes. Or a poison, perhaps; if I were to flee, however briefly, I could easily coat my fangs with a venom powerful enough to cripple him. A poisoned apple would work just as well, for I am immune to its deadly toxin...
But I cannot leave Vicente. I refuse to leave my companion to the mercies of this Traitor; for he has eaten food laced with garlic, and he can barely stand even as he parries blow after blow with his blade. I am but a minor distraction, an irritant, but perhaps that will be enough. It has been many times in the past, during my contracts. I've learned to use it to my advantage - but I've no planning, no plot to be set into motion, and there is no scheme on Nirn that will save us now.
There is a moment in which the scarlet eyes of my companion find my own, and he wordlessly says goodbye even as he fails to parry a powerful blow, and the sword sinks deep into his chest. This is a wound that not even a vampire can survive, and I know this - and in an instant my desire changes from one of protection to one of revenge, and I renew my attacks, my fangs completely extended. I no longer care if I infect the Traitor with my disease, and in fact I hope I do, for I am familiar the difficulties the Twolegs have with it -
The Traitor has had enough of me, and he pulls the blade from his victim's chest and guts me from shoulder to hip. The pain is shock enough to leave me limp; for the first time in decades my blood flows, pooling on the floor around Vicente's body - he offers me a shaky, bloodied smile, one that I strive to return -
'Goodbye, my old friend.'
And I welcome the Night Mother as she lifts me away from Tamriel with her cold embrace.