15; rising sun

[asea]

[A peach-colored waterway stretches on for many yards, overlapping here and there like a labyrinth. With nary a crack in the walls, the lighting is dim at best, casting a purple hue on the enclosed environment. The floor is wet; it's been used mere minutes ago, and the smell of sea water blankets the faint odor of blood.

Frantic footsteps.

Clad differently from his usual whites and blues, Walter runs into view. Shirley and Fenimore flank him.

Wordlessly, Walter falls into a battle stance, sliding his dominant side forward and readying his fists.]

You two go on ahead. I'll stay here and slow them down. [Shirley protests, but he persists:] There's a hidden room off to the side up ahead. Go hide there. I'll catch up soon.

They're here. Go. Now.

[Fenimore is obviously a victim of torture. Bloodstains climb her body, and her dress is torn at the hem, though bandages indicate a crude treatment prior. The fear of being caught again is apparent in her hasty reaction as she bids Shirley to do as their alleged savior says.

The girls run away.

Melanie and Stingle appear. The woman has a sadistic look about her, her superiority coming off of her in droves as she addresses Walter mockingly.]

Looks like there's a new knight protecting the princess.

[Walter raises a hand, his fingernails glowing.

Then, looking past his pursuers, he stops. His eyes widen briefly, and the glow vanishes. The memory seems to come to a complete pause while he stays rooted to his spot and points—past Melanie and Stingle; to you, an unwelcome spectator.]

You. Why are you here!?

Comments

[asea]

[If that's guaranteed to work, he really would stand around all day. But no, he doesn't have the luxury of that guarantee.

Then Melanie moves, completely and totally unexpectedly, and his choices are sealed, one chosen for him by the force of his dream.

Walter turns and flees, following Shirley and Fenimore's path. Should Dhaos stay behind long enough, the images of Melanie and Stingle would distort before they suddenly take off after him with a number of soldiers at their back.

He just skipped the fight, and the memory is fast proceeding to his own pursuit as he vanishes into the turns and loops of the Waterway.]

[fistfullofmagic]

[Dhaos would have stayed where he is well beyond the beginning of the pursuit in an effort not to further intrude. However, he fully suspects that if he does not follow, he will not be allowed to wake. And... a small part of him is somewhat curious, even if he's not about to acknowledge it.

And so he walks, tracing the steps of those that hurried along this path. There is little point in rushing; the dream will play out as it wishes, with or without his presence in the thick of it all.]

[asea]

[At some point, Melanie and Stingle brush past Dhaos before fizzing out of plain view.

Walter has run off-course, going about everywhere except where he should be headed, to stretch out the pursuit as long as he can in hopes that the dream will end in its midst. So the memory continues to reset, with his pursuers passing Dhaos more than once, always vanishing a little ways ahead.

Yet that can only last so long.

Eventually, Dhaos would come upon Walter, alone, with a hand shoved against a wall to keep himself upright. As the memory of the dream dictates, where he had in fact fought, he's in poor shape. As a girl on the other side would say, it's a surprise that he can move.]