The Real Reason You Won’t See Aggra in Warlords of Draenor

by JR Cook - 10 years ago     show comments

News of Garrosh’s mysterious escape from prison spread far and wide across Azeroth in the days following the caper. Citizens everywhere, from Darnassus to the gilded shrines rising out of the ruined Vale of Eternal Blossoms, huddled together and whispered of what this would mean for their safety; in his tyrannical reign as Warchief of the Horde, he had nearly destroyed the lives of all, regardless of the colors they chose to cloak themselves in.

But nowhere, perhaps, did the fugitive weigh so heavily on the minds of the people as it did in a modest hut on the plains of Nagrand, where Thrall and his new wife, Aggra, had settled after Deathwing’s grand defeat.

“I blame myself,” Thrall sighed and kicked his feet up onto the stone coffee table. “I should have seen Garrosh for what he was. Oh, if Grom were here to see the state of things…”

“Yes, dear, it’s all very unfortunate,” Aggra repeated for the five-thousandth-and-fifty-second time (she’d been secretly keeping count) since they’d returned home from their impromptu marriage ceremony at Nordrassil, frowning as she shoved her husband’s sandals, caked in clefthoof dung as usual, off of the formerly clean furniture.

“Because of my choices, the world is in danger yet again.”

“Absolutely.”

“I… don’t think you’re supposed to agree with me on that point.”

“Well, what do you expect me to do?” Aggra asked, crossing her arms in exasperation. “Years of assuring you ‘oh, no, dear, you did the best you could’ and ‘don’t be so hard on yourself’ have amounted to nothing but an hourly retelling of the same story for the past… how many years has it been?”

Thrall let out another dramatic sigh and slumped down in his armchair. “Would a little bit of sympathy kill you?”

And there was the straw that broke the elekk’s back.

“Sympathy? SYMPATHY?” Aggra flung the cleaning rag in her hands to the floor so hard that a small cloud of dust raised up around the impact site. “Like the sympathy everyone showed you when you abandoned your duties to have an existential crisis that would put young Prince Anduin to shame, instead of reminding you that you were the World Shaman and leader of the Horde, not an angst-ridden teenage human?!”

By this point, Thrall had fought many formidable enemies and seen – as well as caused – atrocities that would make even the hardest veteran tremble. But now, seeing the rampage that was unfolding before him, he was suddenly filled with a fear he had never known, and doubted he ever would know again.

“I endured the pain of childbirth not once, but twice! And where were you?! Moping about the hills and valleys looking for a way to fix the Garrosh problem, which I should point out was resolved no thanks to you! Now you lay around the home of my ancestors dishonoring them with your self-pity and your incessant, aimless questioning of everyone but yourself on how to solve this latest plight? Let me save you some time: GO OUT THERE AND FIND HIM!” Aggra roared these last few words with such volume and ferocity that even the empty cups strewn around the base of Thrall’s chair seemed to tremble.

“I will!” Thrall snapped back, then softened a little. “But come with me. Together, I know we can stop the Iron Horde. It’ll be like the old days.”

“The old days?” Aggra repeated quietly… a little too quietly for Thrall’s liking.

“The OLD DAYS?” Her voice was rising in pitch and timbre once again. “Like the old days in which I fought the very elements themselves to save you from your own carelessness?! While you were wallowing in your own insecurities, I was the one finding entrances to the elemental planes and gathering armies to bring you back! Do you know how many adventurers I went through to break you out of there?! And then you want me to hold your hand through yet another episode of The Oversized Green-Skinned Child Dooms the World? Forget it! Send messages to your friends and make a boys’ trip out of it! Maybe I’ll finally get a moment’s peace after all I’ve done for you!”

I guess the honeymoon is over, Thrall thought to himself as he quickly gathered a satchel of supplies and exited the hut, only just dodging the filthy sandals that whizzed past his head.