[The sounds of Nathaniel packing still for a moment. Children, children like his nephew or Zevran's baby, cut open and implanted with...anything. Let alone red lyrium.]
I'm coming to you as quickly as I can, all right? I'll be there soon.
This isn't the same as what you did before. Not at all. But I know why you feel this way. And it's good that you do. It means you will never do it unless there is no other choice, and not in the way Templars claim they have no choice. There really must have been no other choice.
[He breathes in shakily. If Nate's saying that, he believes it, and Anders needed to hear it.]
He set, set Herian and myself on fire. And his eyes, they'd changed. The humanity, his humanity, was gone. We lost him to Rage and I could see the moment it happened, the moment it was all over.
It could have been me. It could have been, except I had you, and Bethany, and Adelaide, and so many others, and he had no one. He saw them kill his parents and he had no one.
[It's not about Anders having to see it, then. It's about the fact that it happened. And Anders was right in front of it, and could not stop it. Anders isn't just a bleeding heart.]
You know you're not to blame. You know you couldn't have done anything.
[He wants to argue that, but can't come up with any arguments. He'd done all he could. He hadn't turned the boy into an abomination. He hadn't angered the boy. He'd just not saved him.
Another exhale.]
I know. I know I did all I could. But I'm never going to forget the way he cried out for his parents, or the way it felt to help Herian cut through his neck. But he was in pain and I couldn't let the pain keep getting worse.
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[The sounds of Nathaniel packing still for a moment. Children, children like his nephew or Zevran's baby, cut open and implanted with...anything. Let alone red lyrium.]
I'm coming to you as quickly as I can, all right? I'll be there soon.
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[He wishes he wasn't so weak, but at the same time he doesn't think anyone is doing well after this.]
I... I didn't want to kill another innocent. We didn't have a choice, but I wanted to never... never again.
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He set, set Herian and myself on fire. And his eyes, they'd changed. The humanity, his humanity, was gone. We lost him to Rage and I could see the moment it happened, the moment it was all over.
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And I couldn't even be there for him.
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You know you're not to blame. You know you couldn't have done anything.
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Another exhale.]
I know. I know I did all I could. But I'm never going to forget the way he cried out for his parents, or the way it felt to help Herian cut through his neck. But he was in pain and I couldn't let the pain keep getting worse.