From a game where I had people on Twitter give me a number 1-100 and I made a doodle based on the corresponding song on my Spotify Wrapped Top 100 Songs (2021) playlist! having some fun with the binary brush (click for full resolution, ids in alt text)
The week after they leave Aeor is the worst week of Caleb’s life.
Well, that’s not quite true. He’s survived much worse weeks–his life has been nothing if not full of pain–but the week after Aeor is among the worst he’s experienced in a long time.
He’slonely.
The townhouse he’s moved into in Rexxentrum is sparse and empty and yet too crowded at the same time. He can’t go anywhere without knocking a foot into a pile of books or stubbing his toe on a misplaced piece of furniture. At the same time, the silence in his home is deafening–there is no cat to play with his feet, no Frumpkin on which to cuddle, no Fjord or Jester or Veth with which to argue with.
No Essek, period.
No Essek to share breakfast with. No Essek to ask his opinion on. No Essek with which to discuss whatever random arcane theory comes to mind. No Essek to ask what he’d like for dinner this evening, and no Essek to complain to about his aching back.
Essek finds a diary of an Aeorian teenager, and it causes him and Caleb to discuss their first kisses.
Essek’s laughter is what finally broke the silence between them. It was a quiet thing, gentle and under his breath, but in the silence of the Aeorian ruin it was the thing that drew Caleb’s attention first. The next thing that drew his attention was how lovely Essek looked when he laughed, his eyes crinkled shut, but he kept that thought to himself.
At least Essek had the courtesy to look embarrassed when Caleb turned to look at him. “Sorry,” he whispers, ducking his head back into his book.
“It’s alright,” Caleb says, a little bit louder, his voice echoing in the empty chamber. “What was so funny?”
Essek squints at his book, holding it up for Caleb to see. “It’s a diary,” he confesses, like a teenager who has been caught reading smut. “A young girl’s life, locked in a book. I had thought it was something more serious, given the level of enchantment, but, ah, it seems she was just a young lady who valued her privacy, and was a decent spellcaster.”
In spite of that, Essek had continued to read the book. Which made sense: they had learned not to discount anything that might have been of use. They found an incredibly useful map in the back of a recipe book, for example, and so they kept an open mind towards the books they found.
[ID: A digitally illustrated two panel comic of Essek Thelyss and Caleb Widogast from Critical Role. The first panel shows Essek wearing Caleb’s scarf and casting Sending, a magical purple soundwave held between his fingers. He says"Hello Caleb, I miss you. Hopefully my business will be wrapped up soon, and I can return to you and the cats. I love you". The second panel shows Caleb with an orange cat laid across his shoulders, Caleb responds to Essek “Hallo schatz, I miss you too. The cats are quite unsatisfied with only one pair of hands to pet them all. I love you too.” End description.]
I like to think when Essek vanishes for a while he still makes sure to send messages home
honestly liam’s explanation about his attraction to essek is so well thought out and makes a lot of sense but it’s also soooooo funny that he basically saw him and went “can’t make that mistakeagain”
