The finale of Vox Machina’s adventures aired today…7pm on Thursday for them, noon on Friday the 13th for me.
Critical Role isn’t over: there will be a series of one-shots over the next few weeks, and then in the New Year the gang will start back with a whole new campaign, set in the same world but a couple of decades down the line. They’re not gone forever. It’s not over.
It still felt like my heart got curb-stomped.
Spoilers for episode 115 of Critical Role below the “read more”.
The good news is that the world is safe, for now. Vecna was defeated, sealed away behind the Divine Gate, and hopefully stuck in a demiplane as oppressive as the Force Cage he created around Devo’ssa.
The good news is that Zahra and Kashaw survived their fall, thanks to Death Ward…as did their baby. Possibly babies. Apparently Zahra’s family has a history of twins…
The good news is that Velora was resurrected. Kash used Raise Dead, and Vex, Vax and Zahra aided in the ritual to restore her.
But Vax is dead. And even though I expected it, even though I knew it was coming, a part of me was still scrabbling for any way out, for any chance that Vax could stay, could grow old alongside his sister, could live in Zephrah with Keyleth and love and cherish and support her and her people.
I…I don’t think Vax wanted to go, necessarily. But I think he wanted to honour his word, to keep his bargain. I think he would’ve loved to stay with Keyleth and Vex, to tease Grog and drink with Scanlan and hang out with Pike and pester Percy, but he’d said he would bow out when Vecna was gone.
And now the world-shattering, era-ending threat of Vecna is no more, and his family is safe. So Vax can lay down his armour, and visit his mother, and wait at the right hand of the Raven Queen for his family to come to him. And it’s sad, it’s fucking heart-breaking, because Vax was only 28 or 29 years old…fuck, he may have been my age. But his family is safe, and I think to him that was worth it.
So as sad as I am for Vax, I am absolutely devastated for Keyleth, and Vex, and the rest of Vax’s family. I’ve seen the people who’ve been left behind…I’ve been a person left behind. I’m the granddaughter and daughter and niece of people who’ve lost spouses and siblings, and it’s something you never really get over. It’s something you endure, something that lingers forever, and slowly dulls, but never fades. But the person I’m most heartbroken over is Keyleth.
Keyleth had a slow burn of a character arc…I think she might have had the most gradual progression of growth of all of Vox Machina. One of the big shifts was her attitude towards relationships, especially romantic ones. When we first met Keyleth, she was closed off to the idea of close relationships, particularly romantic ones, and for good reason: her protracted lifespan on completing her Aramente meant she would always outlive her loved ones. Her friends, lovers, and even children would grow old and die, and she would live on, leading her people.
But then Vax asked to be let in, and eventually she decided to try. And slowly but surely she grew comfortable in loving someone and having them and having a happily ever now. Through dragons and deities and krakens, and a year of peace. And now he’s just fucking gone, taken just as they were starting to live their lives together, and it’s just…like the justification of every single fear she had. Every reason for every wall, reaffirmed.
And OK, maybe I’m projecting a little (a lot), because I too am a socially awkward redhead who loves animals and plants and doesn’t really get people, and so I was fucking ecstatic that Keyleth found love and I was really, sincerely, fervently hoping that she’d get to keep it…and then.
And fucking then.
Time all wounds heal. And Keyleth has time. So eventually, the hurt left by Vax’s death will fade enough that she can bear it and the weight of another love. I know it. Keyleth is strong, and wonderful, and kind.
I just…I fucking wish it had gone differently.
So here’s to Vox Machina. To Vax. To those left behind, those who will carry on. I love you all. I carry you in my heart. Thank you for everything.
