Allen + Ravi + Vati: Aromatherapy

[fixed_distance]

Who: Ravi, Vati, and Allen
When: Wednesday, 7/6
Where: Allen's borrowed office in the World Library
Before/After: N/A
Warnings: N/A



Ravi went into his therapy session this week feeling incredibly anxious about it. He knew what they were going to end up talking about it, and even though he'd tried to prepare himself for it, he really didn't want to do it.

That was what he'd brought Iravati for, but...still, even listening to her talk about it would be bad enough.

He asked her to wait outside while he spoke with Allen, intending to call her in if and when he said it was fine for her to be there. He went into Allen's office alone, trying not to look as nervous as he felt and probably failing.

Once the standard introductory exchange was made, he dug out the sheet of paper he'd written his descriptions on, but didn't hand it over quite yet. He looked down at it--three different descriptions, all of them brief--without focusing his vision enough to see the words instead of blurs of ink. "Is it all right," he asked, his voice soft and hesitant, "if my sister comes in to help explain this?"


Given the nature of Ravindra's homework assignment, this promised to be a more challenging session, emotionally. Allen was as yet unaware of what triggers Ravindra wasn't able to talk about aloud, but it was clear that even skirting around them using writing would be dicey -- but important. To help smooth the process, Allen went into the session attempting to channel a reassuring level of patience and calm -- not greatly different from his usual demeanor, but more deliberate.

"That's perfectly all right, as long as you're okay with it," Allen said. "It sounds like a good solution if you're not comfortable explaining it yourself."


He let out a quiet breath, relieved. Not just to be told it was okay, but to be told it was a good solution on top of that. That made him feel like he was doing this right, and maybe that meant he was making progress, or that he really was serious about trying to fix himself. He'd worried that having Vati talk for him was taking the easy way out somehow, but it would have been easier to avoid the subject entirely and pretend it wasn't a problem. And wasn't that how he usually handled difficult things? So, this must be progress, even if it felt like this wasn't how he was supposed to handle this problem.

He handed the page over to Allen and then waited, unable to meet Allen's eyes and not bothering to try.

He'd written out three incidents. They were all brief and succinct, because he expected to be answering about the details during the session. 1) A fellow member of the guard confronting him over something in front of a large group of guardsmen; a wrong answer would've gotten him into a lot of trouble, so the pressure to give a right answer in front of that many people had overwhelmed him. 2) During a fight, a choke-hold he couldn't break himself free from. 3) At a pub in the Saghar, a specific mix of smells had made him freeze up and caused a switch.


Allen read over the three scenarios on the sheet, trying to find the common thread between them. The first two sounded sufficiently stressful in and of themselves to have potentially triggered a personality switch, but didn't explain Ravindra's reluctance to speak about them. The third one -- smell -- provided the clue.

"Did these events draw on a specific set of memories?"


He still didn't look up, keeping his focus on the edge of the desk between them. "The last two."


Allen nodded, looking over those two again. A chokehold. A distinctive set of smells. And there was the fact that Ravindra wanted his sister to help explain...

"Was there trouble in your home when you were younger?" he asked.


Nail on the head, Allen.

Ravi's breath caught, with a sudden tension through his shoulders. His eyes went out of focus, staring at the middle-distance between himself and the desk. He ignored the tightening in his chest, and the dread sinking through his stomach, and forced himself to give a nod in answer.

He didn't have to talk about it. This was what he'd brought Vati for. That was a small comfort, but it was enough to keep him grounded.


"Have you ever heard of something called post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD?" Allen asked. It was possible Ravindra's player had discussed it with him already. "It's the name for when a traumatic experience in your past sets up a fear response in your mind that can be triggered when you're not in danger, sometimes by mundane or seemingly arbitrary things."

It sounded familiar. Maybe that was one of the things Heimdall had listed when he'd given Ravi the names for the things that were wrong with him, but that was so long ago now that he couldn't remember what those names were. He shook his head and looked up (his eyes still didn't quite hit Allen's face), listening to the explanation.

...Yes, that sounded like exactly what was wrong with him. It was part comforting, part distressing. He wrapped his arms around himself, letting his eyes settle on the desk again. "Can you fix it?" It was mumbled, almost like he wasn't sure he wanted to be heard because he didn't want to risk hearing a no in answer.


"The strong fear responses related to those memories can be reduced or eliminated with treatment," Allen confirmed. "The memories themselves can't be erased, but you can take control of your response to them. The method for reducing symptoms does require you to confront both the memories and the triggers, but it's not something you need to do all at once. The idea is to approach it bit by bit so that you can lessen its impact on you."


Ohhh wow that sounded really daunting.

He would've preferred erasing the memories, but Allen was right, that wasn't possible. If the next best thing was getting rid of the fear that came with them, he would take it. It wasn't like he had any other options, really.

Confronting it, though. He didn't want to confront any of those memories. He wanted to keep them locked away and never think about them again.

But that wasn't doing him a lot of good right now, was it?

If he had to confront the spectre of his father to get rid of Akhilendra, then... Then that was what he would do.

He swallowed down his anxiety, closed his eyes for a moment to focus on breathing, like Allen had told him. After a few seconds to get himself under control, he opened his eyes again and gave a nod. "Okay."


"That's great," Allen said. "It takes courage to make that decision."

He considered for a moment. "You said that your sister was able to help explain? That actually sounds like a good start to me, if you were to listen to her talking about it as well -- if you think you're ready for that, that is. We don't want to actually trigger a shift for you, but to gradually reintroduce you to those memories and the associations that go with them in a safe context where you feel like you have control."


The reassurance did make him feel better about it. It didn't completely erase his anxiety over it, but it settled somewhat.

He listened, keeping his eyes down. A safe context where he felt like he had control--maybe that was why he could only talk about it with Vati, in private. Would this feel safe enough? He didn't know. He couldn't say. Maybe he just needed to try.

"We can stop if it's too much?" he asked. It would help to have that as a safety net.


"Yes -- it's important to, in fact," Allen said. "That's where the part about you having control comes in. A lot of what we'll be doing will push your comfort level, but it should always be deliberate on your part. It won't do you any good to give up your control because you feel like you 'should' be able to handle something."


That was a relief to hear. Especially to be told that he didn't need to live up to any external expectations about how far to push himself. If they could stop any time he wanted, without him feeling like it was wrong to ask, then he could handle this, he thought.

He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying to settle his nerves. "Okay," he said. "She's waiting outside, should I bring her in?"


"Oh, is she?" Allen hadn't realized she'd come along with him. "Yes, then please do."


He nodded, stood, and went to the door to call Iravati into the room.

After throwing a glance over his shoulder, he also directed her to bring in a chair from one of the library tables.

Once everything was settled, he introduced them simply, with, "Iravati. Allen." Gesturing to each of them in turn. Introducing people to each other was always awkward, but he'd found that to be the simplest, quickest way.


Iravati had been left outside long enough to get nervous. She jumped a little with Ravindra's voice and followed him inside, and wasn't as graceful grabbing and dragging a spare chair as she could have been. It got stuck in the doorway once before she righted it.

She wasn't the one getting psyguy'd, and even if she was, it was something Ravindra willingly subjected himself to. But it all seemed so... precarious.

"Hello," she greeted, waving with her fingers before she sat down and cleared her throat. She gave the room a careful glance around. "I'm going to go ahead and say I have no idea how this works."


"Pleased to meet you, Iravati," Allen said. "It's actually not too complicated -- mostly just talking about different concerns. One thing that came up, though, was that something bad happened when the two of you were younger. Ravindra said you might be able to help explain. Would that be all right?"


'Something bad.' That was certainly one way to put it.

Ravi threw a glance toward Vati out of the corner of his eye, apprehensive. Allen's wording implied a single incident. He hoped Vati understood what he was actually asking for; the fact that they'd discussed it yesterday should help, he hoped.


"You mean the entirety of our childhood?" she blurted before stopping to think to glance at Ravindra. She did afterward, and frequently after, trying to use him as a thermometer for whether or not she was moving in any of the right directions.

Their conversation last night did help her find a place to start. "The ones that cause Akhilendra, right? How much detail do you need?" The question was to them both, because Iravati wasn't sure who she was supposed to be asking.


"Ah, I'm sorry, I should have specified. I do mean the memories behind the triggers that cause Akhilendra. But if you need to talk about other things to put it into context, that's all right too." Allen paused -- the three-way communication was a bit tricky. "You don't need to go into a lot of detail, it's just to establish a place to begin working on the reactions that cause Akhilendra."


Ravi didn't want to discuss the choking trigger right now. It was too specific to distance himself from and he just wasn't comfortable approaching it because of the memories it would dredge up. And that was okay, it was okay to not want to talk about it yet, that was what Allen had assured him.

"The basement," he mumbled, glancing briefly askance at his sister, prompting her with a direction to go in.


Iravati hung on an uncertain silence until Ravindra mumbled to her. She nodded to herself, then wondered if she should get up and plug his ears. Or his nose? If she caused Akhilendra to happen in a space where they were trying to not make Akhilendra happen, she might scream.

"The basement," she repeated. She spoke slower than she normally did, and softer. "We spent a lot of time in the basement. It had a unique... scent to it because of our father." If they needed more detail than that, they would have to ask. "He wasn't kind to us."

That reached uncomfortable levels of understatement, and Vati winced. She kept her own mental distance from the situation, but that kind of description didn't paint an accurate picture.


Because the choke hold had been another trigger, Allen could already surmise that she was talking about physical abuse, and likely emotional as well.

He nodded. "I'm sorry you both experienced that. The betrayal of trust from someone you depend on that much is a tremendously difficult thing to cope with." He paused, considering.

"Ravindra, is it all right if I ask you a few questions? Not about the memory itself, but about what happens when you encounter the smell, before you switch."


It was exactly the kind of understatement Ravindra would've used to describe the situation. Coming from anyone else, it would've been minimizing and offensive. Coming from Iravati, he understood perfectly why she'd chosen to say it like that instead of any other way.

The response from Allen, sympathetic and understanding, was a little bit validating. Ravindra hadn't coped with it very well, and it was reassuring to hear from an outside source that it wasn't strange to have trouble with that.

"It's fine," he answered softly, keeping his eyes down. He did tense slightly, as though bracing himself.


The more sympathetic and well meaning a statement, the more Iravati wanted to shove it off, change the subject, and pretend none of the conversation had taken place. That defeated the purpose of the visit, but the visit was about Ravindra. Iravati could safely ignore the comment as never meant for her.

She turned her attention to him instead and frowned. If she was supposed to be helping, it didn't quite feel like it.


"What goes through your mind when it happens?" Allen asked. "Does it call up specific images and associations? You don't have to describe them right now if you don't feel comfortable doing that yet. Just give as much detail as you feel like you can."


She was helping, just by being there. Having the moral support of her presence was enough to make him feel a little more comfortable talking about these things. She was someone who'd shared the same experiences, and who would always be on his side if anything went wrong while trying to discuss them. Allen had said Ravindra's comfort levels were important; that was what she was helping with.

"It calls up..." He trailed off, his brow furrowing as he considered the question, trying to remember exactly how he'd felt in the bar after the smell had hit him. "...It feels dangerous," he continued. "Like... Like he's close." He swallowed, one hand gripping his opposite elbow. "Too close."


Iravati lifted her hand and hesitated, but finally resolved herself and set it on Ravindra's shoulder.

It might have been a little for her, too.


Allen considered that. "Then we'll work toward a method that you can use to reassure yourself that he's not. Are you able to identify the smell?"


He relaxed slightly with Vati's touch, raising his eyes to where Allen sat behind the desk.

"It's, ah..." He glanced toward Vati like he was asking for help. "The tobacco he smoked, and the poisons..." But he couldn't remember what kind of poisons they were; it was something specific that escaped him at the moment.


"Hem--" She started to say it automatically, but stopped herself, glancing to Ravindra for that confirmation she needed. With a nod, she looked back at Allen. "Hemlock."


There was a small reaction to the mention of poisons, but Allen quickly controlled it. "Do you know if those individual scents will trigger you by themselves?"


Right, hemlock. He gave a nod to confirm Vati's contribution.

He shook his head. "I don't think so. The tobacco, at least." He'd been fine in the bar until the hemlock had hit him, and the place had been practically saturated in the smell of smoke.


"You don't want to test that do you?" The question was for both of them, but she was staring at Allen.

It was something of a problem because of the three of them, she was the one who could get hemlock-- who had some hemlock. Not on her right that moment, but back with her supplies. Maybe she could burn it.

Wait that caused a different problem.


"Ideally, in this situation one would acclimate oneself to the smells individually to prepare for combining them. But given the... sensitive nature of the ingredients involved, it may not be feasable in this case," Allen said. "It might be possible to ask an alchemist to distill the scents for you, or at least a convincing facsimile of the poison. I'm unfortunately not aware if hemlock can be purchased legally in Zenderael."


His brow furrowed at Vati's question, and he glanced to her, eyes slightly wide, before turning the same look on Allen. No. No he did not want to test that at all. That wasn't what Allen had been getting at...right?

"Ah... That wouldn't be a problem..." he said, a little mumbled, with a very brief, very guilty flicker of his eyes toward Iravati. "The tobacco I think would be harder."

Ah, there were those cigarettes Virelai had sent him from Pakerion. He'd smoked one and found it distasteful for reasons he couldn't pin down and hadn't touched the rest. But...they were back in his room in Bastan... And no dragonmail running for him to ask her to send more...


"Alchemists," she said, immediately following up Ravindra's statement and scooting the realm of thought away from things like illegal and assassination. Alchemists had uses for everything in some form or another. Some of them were probably even innocent uses. maybe.

Her brow furrowed with the mention of tobacco, and for a second, she was trying to consider that until nope wait still sounded like a bad idea.


"If you're able to safely obtain them, that's one route we could take with your therapy. In case you find that you can't, or would prefer not to try, I have a different homework assignment for you this week -- I'd like you to write down a description of a memory from your childhood that doesn't involve your father. Something that feels safer to think about. But with as many details as you can. You won't have to share it with me if that's too uncomfortable, but we'll talk about it in the abstract. So a description of a memory that feels safe, and a decision on whether you'd like to try exposure therapy with the scents. Does that sound all right?"


A memory that didn't involve his father.

Ah--killing cockroaches for Iravati. Some of the few positive memories he had of his childhood. They were very personal, private memories simply for the fact of how precious they were. He didn't know if he'd be able to share them with someone else. Maybe he'd ask for Vati's input again, including her permission.

Then again, she'd gone and told Nova about it without asking for his, so maybe she didn't care quite as much about keeping those memories close.

Regardless, he had something to draw from for that specific assignment, and he was being given a week to decide whether he wanted to go through with this idea. "That sounds fine," he answered, though a bit tentatively. "If..." He paused, organizing his thoughts into words. "If I can find them, should I bring them? If I decide to try it."


Iravati had just enough wisdom to keep herself quiet instead of blurting out something about maybe not ritualistically summoning Akhilendra with aromatherapy.

That was Ravindra's choice, and Iravati had come to support him in whatever he did with his psyguy. She couldn't turn her back on that now.


"Actually, since this office is an enclosed space," --and a borrowed one, at that -- "I think it would be difficult to keep the smells from combining. I was going to make it a homework assignment next week, if you have them by then." A pause, as he checked his phone clock.

"It looks like we're running close to time -- is there anything else you wanted to discuss today?"


"Ah. Alright." Halfway relieved, and halfway uncertain. A homework assignment for next week meant he had all week to fret about what it was going to be. But it also meant he didn't have to be prepared for whatever it was as soon as he walked into the office.

He shook his head at the question. "No, that was it."

So his assignment this week was to get some hemlock-based poison and some Pakerion tobacco, and to write out a detailed description of a positive memory from his childhood that didn't include his father. He could handle that. Maybe. Maybe ask Virelai for a favour...