caughtinanetwork | 07 - Grain - 8th of the Human Category

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07 - Grain - 8th of the Human Category - Dreampost

Dream option one; interactive dream
[ It almost seems like Duke is younger. Maybe. Perhaps it’s the armored uniform. Perhaps its how wide his eyes are at the moment.
Perhaps it’s because he's obviously hurt, half thrown on the ground, and clearly not able to do anything about it on his own. It is Duke, after all, and he does tend to look nearly the same whether it was now...
Or a decade into the past, scattered with dirt and splattered with blood.

The reason for his distress is clear; a white and yellow winged creature – for it's clear it's not a normal beast, scaled and furred and feathered, more chimera like than anything, but somehow fitting far better together than many chimera – bellows, lions roar and eagle's scream in one, wings spread out, facing... away from Duke as it plunged to drive back attackers.
It wasn't working, somehow. The creature is massive; the humans attacking and Duke still injured, still more or less immobilized, unable to aid.
The creature falls before Duke can even manage to push himself up to nearly kneeling, a flash of light later and there is a gemstone half the size of his torso on the ground.
A moment later and there's a blonde woman standing there, casting with over powered light aligned spells. ]

No. This is not..

[ Duke's aware that he's dreaming, now, as Zelda tries to beat back the humans. He's lucid enough about it to protest this, but not enough to change it. It's furious tears and sparks of magic that don't manage to do anything beyond light up his spot on the ground as Zelda falls.
Then a dark haired woman with long ears and antennae, one who turns into a scaled dragon like creature before another glowing stone.
Then a dark haired man, flamboyant with his sword skills. Not particularly skilled with his defense, as he falls as quickly as the rest.

Whoever is dealing these blows seems to make it a point to splatter as much as possible on Duke as he remains unable to help. Unable to so much as get a novice spell off, unable to make light flare bright enough to distract from landing blows.

And it repeats... and repeats...

But somehow Duke's state never resets. He remains stained red with the blood of those he called friend. ]

Dream option two; video dream

[ Rather disorienting, it's like someone played a film backwards. Flicker of a redhead and a blonde on a couch, glowing jellyfish from the party, working on magic, gardening, being a sphinx by the shadow, a pinkette reading, fireworks from a far, the plaza. A column of light and moving closer, fighting that began – ended – with the view on the ground, a blue-white wall and chirping, a tower descending into - ascending from - a mountain range.
All sorts of walking, everywhere, forests and canyons and caves lit by green light that looked like it should have been water. Flickers of dark haired and clothed man, pinkette girl, blue dog, brunette man in purple, young woman with dark hair and light pigtails – antennae –, girl in red with goggles, a boy in many colors – the group of them, first in a canyon, then in a room with just the dark one.
A structure like a ring, a gem receiving light from - firing a beam of light into - the sky. The group without the purple coat or pink haired, a glowing read blocked door. Sands and a dragon's back, a cliff side and a gravestone, interior of a house with the group and a small whirlwind of light that became a faintly glowing stone - a stone that was erased by that light -, a dark cave lit by stones – crystals? – in the water. The dark man on a stone staircase, the group without the brown haired upon a bridge, seeing the group upon a large gear below, the brown haired standing back to him, leaving a forest where monsters appeared at a whirlwind of light - fled from the light - protecting the group without the dark and light haired young woman.
A pool with the dark haired, pinkette, both children and the dog. A forest with a fallen pillar that gained glowing with his whirlwind - lost its light. A wall above plains watching monsters move and try to pass, the pinkette and dark.
Woods, forests, canyons, remains of cities, caves lit from within.
Hallways of a castle, following a trail of bodies to leave.
A crystal, large and shining, amid stained ground and feathers, replaced by a large mismatched creature, white and yellow, furred, feathered, and scaled. Incorrect, the creature had become –

This is where it pauses.
Suddenly this isn't a first person dream, flying out of a pale haired form to view down upon the human who tried to soothe the injuries of the creature. It rewinds again – a conflict that was clearly taking its toll upon the large being, despite that it was humans who attacked, dolls compared to the grounded creature's side.

This is where the moving forward doesn't match the rewind. All the strange little clear details that hinted at not-quite-a-dream are no longer there, the somewhat indistinct people remain as a hint as to the sight abilities of the dreamer.
The pale human does move in rage, but this time he doesn't make it to the creature's side. He falls, far too red, and the creature finds anger as well. The pale body is snatched by the large creature, and then flight.
Inconsistent after this. There is a clear hallway, serving-men and guards moving about as usual. Only not. A hazy figure of a man reaching for a strange sword, then sounds of warning. Alarms?
A dark haired figure with dark antennae leaving, somewhat unnoticed in chaos as knights and mages by their robes seek to fix a sparking machine while white rings in the sky spark and then fade.
Humans begin running for a different reason, monsters kept out now allowed in, slowed by knights and walls that barely were high enough.
That dark haired, sitting on a rock and talking with a creature large, but not close to the size of the white and yellow one, close to a phoenix with dark armor and a scorpion's maw at the tailtip. Beside him, the dragon of the rewind. Sketching in the dirt with a stick, nodding and waving them off, pulling an antennae over his shoulder. A red string with a pair of gold beads on the ends looped about before the tuft.
But there's no ring structure in the water, to shoot light at the heavens.
There's no tower rising from a mountain range, to crush a city.
Just monsters and humans struggling to survive. ]

[ Strangely, Dream Two leaves him a lot more calm when he wakes. He sort of blinks at his ceiling, a little... not sure if he should be wistful or concerned for his own mental state that he didn't mind that one.

Dream One has him fighting his tangled blanket nest to get to his bucket of water and shove his face in it. Hide the tears, that would, even as he drips over the bucket, trying not to be sick.
He shouldn't have friends... ]

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[She's at his side just in case, holding his considerable amount of hair out of his face. She has a lot of questions (Who were the other people in the dream? Why was she in it? He doesn't have prophetic dreams, does he?), but they can wait.

Or perhaps not be asked at all, she thinks as she looks at his face.]

[ Duke, fortunately, does not get sick. It sounds like a very close thing for a couple of moments, but he eventually shifts to put his face in his hands.

Give him a couple more moments to get breathing under control.Maybe he can get his shaking under control too. ]

....Thank you. ]

[Her usual "we should all look after each other while we're here" bit doesn't seem appropriate right now, considering the fact that he doesn't want to be looked after. She lets go of his hair, running her fingers through the damp strands briefly before resting her hand at her side again.]

It's no trouble.

.... doesn't that sound familiar... [ He likes to say that.

Just going to try to get these trembles under control somewhat curled up. He doesn't mind the running fingers through hair, but he's not going to say anything. Whether Zelda realizes it or not, she's seen why he's so easily freaked out by having friends. ]

I apologize. I don't mean...

[To make him uncomfortable? She certainly doesn't mean to do that. To be friendly with him? Well... she can't say that's entirely unintentional. He's interesting, he's easy to talk to, he knows so many things she doesn't - and really, she just likes him in general.]

.... am aware, by many definitions, we are... friends. [ It's slowly said, directed at his feet. ]

And.. perhaps, if you think a little further... you may realize, with your recent experience, ... why... I do not wish to have any.

[Her face darkens as she glances away as well.]

Death... is a terrible thing. That is why I hid here for a little while, you know. A dear friend of mine arrived in Vatheon, reporting that he has died back in our homeworld. It's hard to face him without...

[Zelda bites down on her lip before continuing.]

Having him here made me realize something, though. We have such a unique opportunity here - even those lost to us may one day arrive in Vatheon. It's an ephemeral state for now, no one understands the nature of this place yet. But to know that it's possible... I will uncover the secrets of this place so that he can continue to live here in peace. So that everyone who wishes to can. So that the cause of the curses can be discovered and neutralized. So that those of us who want to go to our homes won't have to forget everyone, won't have to be separated from the people they meet here. I know it can be done.

[Finally she looks back to him, extending her hand towards him.]

You can join me if you like.

[ If they can figure out how to - He could see - but what if - he doesn't know - he could be left here alive, whether he still cared or was -

Duke spends a moment just.. staring at Zelda and her extended hand as his brain tries to go places and meets his fears and turns in knots and tangles and

His biggest problem with this place, as death was not permanent, was the going home. it was close, but could be more painful; if he grew close, felt the loss, and then they returned only to not remember him? He doesn't know if that was better or worse than dying for good. ]

[ He blames the dream. Normally this would never happen but he realizes he's crying - again - when tears make it off his face to his legs and..

And acknowledging that your crying just.. tends to make tears fall faster, doesn't it? There's a moment where he sits there like what is this even, staring as the number of damp-spots grow, before...

Duke is ridiculously capable of folding in on himself for someone as tall as he is, and he covers his face as.. welp, he might as well not have tried to control his shaking, because its back.

Zelda, he's broken and does bad things. Why... ]

[It's unlikely that asking her "why" would gain him an answer he'd consider satisfactory. It may not even be something that the princess can put words to herself. She kneels down in front of Duke, close enough that he can feel the warmth coming off of her but not directly touching him, both out of a desire to not invade his space if he really doesn't want it and simply because she's not as bold in the waking world.]

Edited 2012-04-28 03:05 (UTC)

[ He's really busy trying to figure out which feels started this stupid flood of tears and if he can just turn the feels off so he can stop all this tearing ... stuff then. That. that would be good.

Only he's Duke and he barely understands feels and there is no off switch and yeah. Just crying quietly here. ]

[She can't simply sit there while he's still so obviously upset. His current hunched over position makes it a little awkward, but she scoots over to his side and wraps her arms around his shoulders as best she can, gently pulling the ball-of-Duke towards her.]

[ He doesn't pull away or anything when she pulls him over, but he doesn't exactly take it as an invitation to turn and get her shoulder soaked with tears. He does.. lean a bit against her, but other than that...

He's mostly waiting for feels exhaustion to hit. It takes a couple minutes. He hasn't had a good physical cry in some time, and.... yeah. It sort of builds up all over the place.

So a little while later, there's just some dull trembling going on as he moves his hands away from his face to find his shirt to dry them. ]

[Thinking that he probably doesn't want her to continue to hold on quite this much, she releases one of her arms, now just having one over his back. She has no idea what it was she said that brought this on, but she's going to blame it on the nightmare rather than try to make sense of it. She squeezes one of his shoulders gently, trying to soothe the trembling.]

.... apologies... [ He's just trembling because his emotions have gone explodey. And doesn't he sound tired.

Scrubbing at his face now to get tears off. ]

I apologize as well. I didn't mean to upset you.

[Truthfully, she's not even sure if it was her words that upset him in the first place, since no matter how she inspects them, she can't find anything that would trigger a flood of tears.]

I... [ Words. He can use them, right? ]

Situation.... awkward. Do not wish for harm to come to, thus should push away, as... [ His friends... ]

However if push away, uncertain if...

Why would harm come to me simply as a result of being near you?

[She's honestly curious. Whatever happens in Vatheon certainly isn't Duke's fault, and he has no enemies here that she's aware of.]

Because that is what happens to those I call friend. [ The.. pathetically small number of friends he's had, at least. ]

As a result of your actions, or the actions of others? Would that dream even be able to take place here? I am quite capable of defending myself, I assure you.

[He can't possibly think he's cursed or something, can he?]

... [ It sounds like he tried to say something in reply and his voice just... squeezed off. Give him a moment. ]

Part .... very close. He.. did not die there, but... [ another shudder. ]

Both Elucifur and Khroma could also defend themselves. Elucif... Elucifur did not meet... as the dream showed, but it was near the same. [ He.. doesn't like to touch these memories, they hurt and remind him and... ]

I ... don't know why... Khroma... but... she too and...[ It hurts ]

[For once, Zelda can't even begin to unravel what Duke is trying to say. He's leaving out more words than usual, it's a total mess. She works out the gist of it after a minute of thinking, though - he wasn't at fault for their deaths. But he doesn't want to be close to people anyway? Because... why? Because there's a chance they might be separated someday?]

...I am sorry. I would say that I will leave you alone, but...

[But she won't, will she? She cares. She'll worry. So many things happen in Vatheon.]

I would worry if I did not see you.

[ Close. Mostly because his friends keep dying on him but he's enough of a mess, and she didn't mention she didn't quite get it so there's no clarification. ]

Aware. Part of... [ That friend feel he was trying to avoid. ]

[Try though he might, it's there now. May as well give up!]

I suppose it is, isn't it.

[She lets out a small sigh, squeezing his shoulder lightly before drawing her arm back to herself and resting her hands in her lap.]

Would you prefer it if I left...?

...... [ He needs to think on this.

A weak, tiny, not very often used amused noise. ]

Would have preferred if had not seen me as such a mess. [ No, he doesn't want you to go, Zelda. Maybe give him a little bit of space to get over these feels, but ... yeah, friends. He's stuck with one, at least. ]

Edited 2012-04-30 01:35 (UTC)

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