Korvanjund is where everything changed.

 

I had killed people before. Not very many, if we subtract those portions of my past where I wasn’t really myself. Only four, in fact, if we’re being stringent about the “wasn’t really myself” part. My body has killed hundreds, but I take no personal responsibility for Molag Bal’s handiwork – I had no control at that time.

 

The parts with Dibella’s gifts are a little more iffy. I was more myself then, especially before Molag’s influence entered the equation, but I honestly felt nothing when I was chopping people down with those swords. Well, not nothing – it felt…right. Good, even. It never crossed my mind at the time that I was ending human (and elf and orc) lives with every swing of the Graceful Swords; I just reveled in the act of it.

 

Looking back on it, I don’t think I was completely myself when I was imbued with her powers, either – I think a sort of drug-like euphoria from killing in her name hides in the shadows of that “gift.” But perhaps I am just trying to justify all the murder I committed. I don’t know.

 

What I do know is, there had been only four times that I had killed someone when I was completely myself with no mitigating circumstances.

 

The first, the bandit boy who chased me halfway to Whiterun, had been a shock to my system; a shock that had been erased by the far greater shock of the gang rape that soon followed.

 

The second...well, I don't know how much of myself was left in that mine when I murdered the poor ore thief. Certainly I was numb to all feeling, at the time.

 

I didn't feel even the slightest bit bad about giving the attempted rapist in the mine in Shor’s Stone a pickaxe head accoutrement. The only thing I felt at that moment was fear of being caught and accused of murder.

 

The impact of the fourth had been at least partially deflected by the moment, e.g. the panic of losing my sword, then the head-patting afterstory.

 

Korvanjund was different – it was the first time I partook in something akin to war. The first time I knowingly and deliberately killed, not as an act of survival or self-defense, but as an act of aggression; of intent.

 

We met the Imperial squad, as Rikke had said, and that is a story in and of itself. Suffice to say, I was not greeted with open arms. Or, rather, I was greeted with very open arms and many catcalls, especially after I took off my rug so it wouldn’t encumber my movements during the fight. They did not seem inclined to believe I was anything but a stripper even after I demonstrated my Shouts. It is hard to blame them, I suppose, but I did anyway, the lecherous bastards.

 

Anyway, we headed for the crypt, only to discover the Stormcloaks were already there. There weren’t many sentries posted outside and the scouts were able to take them out quietly, but things got interesting once we entered, because they had left an entire squad behind. A squad is only five or six people, so it could have been worse, but still, numbers-wise, it was about an even match, moreso because neither Kellan nor Lane had been allowed to join since this was an “official action.”

 

We had surprise on our side long enough for our archers to take out two of them, then it was a full-pitched battle. I used the same tactics I had on Rikke during my trial – whispering the Ghost* “shout” under my breath over and over, switching to Force Push when I had the chance, then following up with my sword.

 

Now, here’s the thing – we had brought only a squad because fucking General Tullius hadn’t really taken the crown seriously. The Stormcloaks had – it turned out they had an entire fucking company. I’ll be honest, I never bothered to learn how many squads are in a company are in a legion or whatever the fuck it is, but the point is, they had a LOT more people than we did. Fortunately, they were not all in the same place – we came upon them in groups as we progressed.

 

Somewhere in the middle of these bloody battles, with the clanging of weapons, the shouts of men fighting and dying, the smell of blood and sweat and shit, all of it far more visceral than I was prepared for, as I grew more and more panicked with each opponent I faced and cheat-won against, all the time trying not to think about the fact that I was taking the lives of men who were just doing their jobs and to whom I held no personal enmity, I lost my fucking mind. I heard a voice, and I swear to whatever god you prefer most, it came from outside, not from my head.

 

It said, “Kill.”

 

Then it added, “Kill for the love of killing. Kill for a thrill."

 

Then a bass started a heavy rhythm, drums kicked in and, a moment later, the sounds of battle were mere accompaniment to Al Jourgensen’s industrial machine known as Ministry playing a song from an album released ten years before I was born but that I knew well from my short-lived Goth period (being properly Goth requires WAY too much time putting on makeup and styling your hair so it looks like you didn't style it, it just happened to fall perfectly) when I was fourteen and found the A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste CD buried on a dusty swiveling rack in my parents’ bedroom between U2’s Joshua Tree and Billy Joel’s Greatest Hits Volumes 1 & 2. It is filled with a lot of yelling and semi-coherent lyrics that don’t make much sense if you sit down and inspect them closely but sound like heavy philosophical nuggets of wisdom when you are trying desperately to find an outlet for all the pent up righteous anger of the sort only a pampered American middle-class teenager can generate.

 

Scum suckers! Debility divulged

 

Anal fuckfest, thrill Olympics

 

Savage, scourge, supply, and sanctify

 

“So what?!” I shouted, or at least, I thought that’s what I shouted; the Stormcloak in front of me stumbled back as if I had used Force Push instead. I followed him, still shouting with the song as I swung my sword at anything that moved. “So what?!” and again, “So what?!”

 

There were no more enemies in the vicinity, so my feet carried me forward on the beat of the song into another room with another group of enemies.

 

You sell us sedatives

 

Supplied become laxatives

 

My eyes shit out lies

 

I only kill to know I’m alive

 

“So what?!” we Shouted together, again and again, as the wall of Stormcloaks wavered and dissipated. I stalked on as the song’s beat seemed to blend with my heartbeat.

 

It’s your problem to live with

 

Destroy us or make us saints

 

We don’t care, it’s not our fault

 

That we were born too late

 

A screaming headache on the promised age

 

Killing time is appropriate

 

To make a mess and fuck all the rest, we say, we say

 

“So what?!” The song had become part of me, or I of it; there was no more distinction between “out there” and “in here;” all there was was the anger, with my body providing the catharsis it screamed for. We entered a last room, larger than the others, and found a pitched battle between the remaining Stormcloaks and the most massive draugr I had ever seen up to that point. There were a dozen soldiers but the single draugr seemed to be winning anyway. It didn’t matter to me – the song carried me forward, and the bodies peeled away in front of me from Shouts and blades as Al finished up.

 

No one, no one is right**

 

I’ll kill them all if I like

 

Only time will decide

 

No one listens to reason it’s too late and I’m ready to fight

 

“So what?!”

 

And then, things turned strange, because the draugr looked at me, opened his mouth, and Shouted right back, “So what?!”

 

I stumbled to a stop as the force of his Shout stopped my momentum in its tracks. It did not stop Al, though.

 

Now I’m ready to fight!

 

“So what?!” I Shouted at the monster.

 

“So what?!” it Shouted right back.

 

Now I’m ready to fight!

 

“So what?!”

 

“So what?!”

 

Now I’m ready to fight!

 

“So what?!”

 

“So what?!”

 

Now I’m ready to fight!

 

“So what?!”

 

“So what?!”

 

I’m not sure how many times we went through this. The draugr’s Shouts matched my own; we were locked in an impasse, so-what-ing each other without either able to make progress, all while Al kept screaming he was ready to fight, until finally I thought, if you’re so damn ready to fight, stop singing it and get in here and do it!

 

And, to my vast surprise, he did.

 

Well, no he didn’t. Al wasn’t there, of course. But in that moment, an axe swept through the air from somewhere, the draugr’s head flew from its shoulders, and the music cut off just as abruptly. The return to the normal sounds of the room – cheering of men, clanging of metal, voices chattering – was so disorienting, I fell to my knees, closing my eyes to fend off a sudden wave of dizziness, only to snap them open again when the closing of them only doubled the effect.

 

Hands patted my shoulders and back and voices called out to me:

 

“That was impressive!”

 

“I admit, I doubted you when I saw you. No more!”

 

“I’m glad you’re on our side, Naasektenti!"

 

I didn't know what that word meant, but the others around heard it and took it up, and soon the entire room was chanting, "Naas..ek...tenti...Naas..ek...tenti...Naas..ek...tenti..."

 

It was all so overwhelming. I just wanted silence, a quiet place to parse though what had just happened. My body started to shake, then I dropped from just my knees to my hands and knees and vomited all over the giant draugr.

 

 

Don’t feed the bastards. To quote the Lich King: kill them all.

 

 

 

*The list of Shouts is only going to grow as this story progresses, so I am going to call them my personal names for them from now on, just to make things easier on all of us.

 

** I looked up the lyrics, back in the day. There is much disagreement on this phrase. I hear “no one, no one is right” and that fits the lyrics (inasmuch as these lyrics make sense in the first place). Someone else translated the line “Now that I know what it’s life,” and “life” is not a typo. That line makes no damn sense. In this case, I am right and nothing can change my mind (which is, indeed, a terrible thing to taste).

 

Also, yes, I know the title is an allusion to an Alanis Morrisette album, which is not the farthest from Ministry, musically speaking, as you can get, but it is a handful of ballparks away. However, the title fit so well I used it anyway. Isn’t it ironic? You oughta know I see right through you, but all I really want is to stand here with my hand in my pocket as we smoke some Mary Jane at your perfect house while you fall head over feet for me so when we wake up and you learn I am not the doctor, I shall be forgiven.

 

Is that too much to ask?

 

 

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