The Uthvelor was satisfied with the answer. He pondered his good fortune, thankful that what as first appeared to have been a monumental waste of his time was looking up. He had companions and a solid lead. Hoping he would be able to attain the companionship for the entirety of his travels, he looked over to the cambion and the baribur, "Would it bother you to make a minor detour so as allow me to question the olgog in question before continuing on to your final destination?’
At that moment, another would-be patron entered the bar. Yohai, at first, thought nothing of the new patron. It at first appeared to be a smaller olgog; while uncommon in these parts, not overly rare. However, Yohai quickly realized the new patron was not merely a traveller from Tla’loc’al, but rather a bastard. Yohai thought he recognized the bastard, but couldn’t place from where he would have recognized him. Before Yohai could ask him a question, the bastard quickly proved why their kind had the reputation they did, lack of self-preservation. Only a bastard would walk into a bar and immediately crack a joke in the presence of an Uthvelor.
Yohai had found the comment was amusing, especially since it was indeed true: a cambion, a baribur, and an uthvelor would never otherwise be companions unless they were in a bar together. The irony of such a statement was palpable. In fact, if Yohai had been a member of any other race, he might even have cracked a smile. Yohai, however, restrained the action. All it took was remembering the last time he had the occasion to laugh. He was fighting alongside the strange creature who referred himself Lord Roan. They were among mixed company and he was in the service of protection the scion of Uth. Somebody had mentioned that Lord Roan was mean and had no friends. Lord Roan intimated that he didn’t know how to have friends. Uriel, the Tyrianni, gave him a book on how to be friends with others. On the next occasion when Lord Roan was accused of crassness, he offered a bunny in friendship. The idea of a feared tyrant and deathly warrior who wore a mask to hide his emotions doing something so blatantly out of character was too much for Yohai to bear.
He laughed… and then the first memory hit: a young K’iorn girl leaning into a young K’iorn boy, ready to kiss for the first time in her life. She was so carefree, her heart was beating… and then a big flew up her nose. She sneezed into the boys face, completely ruining the moment. As only teenagers could, they laughed at their awkwardness. Simultaneously he experienced an Earther child seeing a heavy set Earther fall, with arms flailing, landing on their face and breaking their nose. Yohai also felt the amusement of a K’iou belching so loudly he farted, loosing his bowels in the process. An assailant laughing as he raped his victim; a Quall warrior, laughing at the despair of an entire race being extinguished by her hand; the Vampyr laughing at the fear they were causing as its victim cried as the Vampyr stroked their blade across a whetstone; the bandit stealing a child’s favorite toy; a mother laughing at her child’s garbled speech; the jester laughter at his own quick wit… every emotion that had ever caused someone to laugh throughout all of history had flooded his mind.
Tapping into the stream of consciousness held its power, but it was not without it’s cost. Powerful as his race made him, the living vessel his powerful mind inhabited was not meant to handle the raw power contained within the stream of consciousness. His body and instinctively sought out a way to break the connection, no matter the cost. The cost, of course, was the extinguishing of life force. Despite the madness it caused, the feeling of this rush was exhilarating. Laughter, masochism, eroticism, virility…these were the vices and addictions his kind fell victim too. There were those among his kind who purposely went to see jesters perform so that they could purposely tap into the stream of consciousness, irrespective of the cost. Having to kill someone in order to feel that emotion often made partaking in emotions all the more attractive to many. The worst were Uthvelor orgies, a thought that Yohai only gave a fleeting thought to and quickly moved past it as his disgust may cause him to accidentally trigger his gift.
Emotion was an Uth’s worst enemy; the one vice that was easiest to partake in, particularly when in the company of other speaking race. Baribur, of course, were the worst offenders. They wore their emotions on their sleeves and were so damn jovial it hurt. Sometimes, Yohai wished he were Ng’tai. That way, he could merely cause himself pain instead of repress the emotion… it’s easier to improve the threshold of pain than to control your emotional responses.
Yohai, however, knew better than to fall prey to vices. He would not be like his first commander of his legion, who purposely made the most junior member of the legion stand next to him, just so that he could relish in the emotions caused by battle and have an easy victim to kill in the process. Emotions were a luxury among his kind … and a luxury that Yohai could ill afford at the moment. So instead of laughing, Yohai awkwardly contorted his face, but failed to smile with any sense of genuity and said to the bastard, “Especially since you’d most likely be the punchline.” Yohai tried to appear as if he were being jovial, but the comment instead came out dryly, much in the manner of Uthvelor and Pelebor. Knowing there was not enough sincerity of emotion behind the statement, Yohai contorted his face further in the hopeless attempt of smiling, waiting the response of the bastard before him.
