A Day Late and a Dollar Short

[applesaucemod]

As far as dreams go, this seems surprisingly...normal. True, the dreamers of Manhattan and beyond will find themselves stranded in the middle of the ocean on a fairly deserted rocky island, but it's nothing so unusual as the labyrinth from last time, and no one appears to have become an animal or reverted to an insane past (or future) version of themself. Besides, well, rocks and grass, there's nothing here but an abandoned lighthouse, the doors and windows broken, and the spare furniture worn by the weather. You can go up the spiral staircase to look at the view, but there's nothing to see but the endless ocean. One might almost think tonight was a night for simple socializing via the telepathic current.

As if anything to do with the rift is ever that simple, you silly bumpkin. How quickly each person realizes what is unusual about tonight's dream will depend in large part on their personality. Some might go the entire night without noticing (except from the distress of others, naturally), but some will find out the instant they open their mouths to converse with another dreamer. You see, each and every dreamer will be completely unable to tell a lie for as long as the dream lasts. The truth might be evaded by omission, but any attempt to say that which is untrue will result in the corresponding truth emerging instead.

Good thing it's just a dream and everyone's going to forget in the morning, right? Right??


[Mod note: As usual, players can choose to have their characters remember or forget anything that happens in the Dreaming. As per usual party rules, both members and non-members are welcome to play any character in this post, regardless of whether that character is currently in the game. Unlike usual, tonight's theme is not optional; all characters will be subject to the enforced truth-telling. Have fun!]

Comments

[brink]

Topher is extremely cagey about being here today. It's barely been over a week since he had his mind rather brutally invaded and then his side just as brutally stabbed, only to be locked up inside a room and his own head for, well, that entire week actually. But the fact he's been deprived most human contact and the dreaming for so long makes it impossible not to be drawn to the beacon that is this shindig.

Still, he's going to lurk quite a bit, and pay an awful lot of attention to shielding his mind from the more telepathically aware people around. And there's something off about this particular dream, but he can't put his finger on it. Perhaps it's just cause he hasn't been able to access the dreaming much recently.

[stronglikebear]

Yuri shuffles along the shoreline, eyes mostly on the ground in his efforts not to trip over the many rocks. He hasn't seen anyone else yet, but he has an inkling this isn't real life, having been in the Dreaming often enough recently to remember what it feels like. Glancing up, he spots another young man not far away, and offers a smile. "Hi!" he calls. "Do you know where we are?"

[bluesuit_handy]

Just because there's not a lot to explore doesn't mean Andrew won't go exploring. He does a bit of bounding over hill and dale rock and...rock...before spotting the lighthouse and making a beeline for its weathered walls. He displays all the caution and conservatism of a kitten fresh from a nap as he pokes his head in for a look around, then strolls right in to get down to the serious business of poking at things that don't belong to him. One might catch him downstairs examining the furniture or, if one comes by a little later, on the top deck by the old, burned-out light.

[essentiallyharmless]

Oh, joy. Rocks.

First shared dream in ages - although it takes her a little while to realise it is in fact shared - and they give her rocks. She hasn't been to one since the whole animal thing (well, not to her knowledge, anyway, though others may have seen a version of her at a later party), and was hoping something interesting would turn up. But no. Rocks.

She's just going to be wandering the path around the small island. These posh clothes don't lend themselves to rock-climbing.

[i_jones]

Ianto is wandering amidst the rusty shipwrecks strewn across a particular stretch of the shoreline where the crags briefly give way to a rocky beach, nudging detritus aside with his boot. There's a chill wind coming from the ocean, pushing him toward the interior of the island, but somehow it feels safer by the water. He scans the cliffs when the ships offer nothing of interest and squints at a blurred shape that seems to hover among them, coming around the bend of a path.

He abandons caution to the wind and waves one arm, then both. "Oi!" he shouts, bracketing his mouth with his hands. "What the hell is this?"

[stronglikebear]

If Yuri realized what was different about tonight, he would likely find a place to hide and/or concentrate all his efforts on waking up immediately. It's not that he has a lot of secrets, but the few secrets he has are pretty big ones. If he's lucky, perhaps nothing like that will come up in conversation.

Yuri's not a very lucky guy in general.

He stands by the shoreline, staring out at the choppy sea. Stooping, he grabs a rock, hauls back, and throws it as far as he can out over the water.

[rae_of_sun]

Well, then. It seems Sunshine is not the sole resident of this run-down island of mystery. She watches Yuri in silence for a few moments, trying to figure out if he's anyone she knows. There's something vaguely familiar about him, though nothing she can put her finger on. He almost looks like he could be Special Other Forces, but his posture's all wrong for SOF.

And now she's been watching him for long enough that she'll feel like a creeper if she doesn't say something. "What did that rock ever do to you?" she asks, squinting at the water and regretting it immediately. The shifting, silver-edged shadows in the water are a bit much for her not-actually-vampire brain to handle. Ugh. She flinches back as if someone's shoved a dead rat under her nose, then realizes she probably looks certifiable, and compensates by needlessly flapping a hand in front of her face as if she's chasing off gnats or something. Get it together, Sunshine.

[powerdealer]

Well, this is a rather uninspired place for a dream. But at least it's peaceful. Possibly also very boring. Seth's just going to wander around, skipping across rocks, looking for something actually interesting. If he realised the significance of this dream, he'd be out of here in flash. But that probably goes for all the dreamers.

[wildmage_daine]

Hey, watch where you skip those rocks. Daine pokes her head out of the water and barks at the shoreline in an indignant sort of way - some people are trying to have a swim, here - but hesitates when she realizes she's scolding a complete stranger. Well, there's nothing un-sea-lion-ish about complaining when a little rocks clips your ear, is there? He's probably none the wiser.

[rae_of_sun]

Sunshine looks down at the white bakery bag in her hand, then back at her surroundings, her face set in a suspicious frown. This is not where she'd meant to be going - and okay, she could make do, but as spartan picnicking grounds go, this ranks pretty low. The lighthouse, in particular, earns itself a long, dubious glare. If it wasn't for the general exposure here, she'd wonder if this was some sort of surprise epilogue to... no. She's not thinking about it.

Wait, is she dreaming? Is that what this is? The trouble with being her father's daughter is that it makes it sort of hard to tell, sometimes. Lines get blurred. Especially the line between reality and... everything else.

Mostly turning her back on the lighthouse - mostly, but not completely, because she's not that dumb - she settles herself down on a rock that looks marginally less uncomfortable than the surrounding rocks. The ocean view isn't that bad, and there's some sporadic sunshine through the cloud cover.

It really could be a whole carthaginian hell of a lot worse. Really. And will be inside the next five minutes, for all she knows.

But five minutes pass without much of anything happening, and she turns her attention to the bag in her lap. You're not supposed to eat in dreams, but that's never stopped her. Besides, it'd be a shame to let even a subconscious representation of these leftovers go to waste. Sunshine opens the bag and fishes out a Killer Zebra - something small to occupy her while she waits to wake up. Or to figure out what's really going on.

If you're nice, she'd probably be willing to share.

[watchesthebeans]

Oh God, he's outside. Aglet is outside, and he can't remember how he got there, and he can't see any buildings, and there's this crashing sound from behind those rocks and there's grass and boulders and probably snakes and cats and owls and he's going to die, he's very very sure he's going to die. The Borrower presses himself into a hollow under a rock, practically hyperventilating as he keeps a strained, anxious eye out for attackers. This being a dream, his powers have been amplified to no longer require skin-to-skin contact, so anyone who chances to step too near his rock might find themselves suddenly size-swapped.

[ginormotron]

'The fuck!'

And that would be Sam, stepping too near his rock. The world, alarmingly, is suddenly huge, and Sam, quite out of instinct, has dropped down into a fighting pose, whipping around as if someone's about to come at him.

[alwaysalright]

Ten manages to arrive at the top of the lighthouse. At least it gives him a good view. But given there's not really anything exciting up here but the view, and he can see the shapes of people wandering around in the distances, he makes his way downstairs and out to find someone to talk to. Always much more fun to have someone to talk to. And he could really use some fun.

[erratic_hematic]

There happens to be a curious vampire at the bottom of the lighthouse when the Doctor makes his way to the bottom. He'd been looking in the window, so when the Doctor comes bounding out, it gives him a bit of a start. "Who are you?"

[wildmage_daine]

It's been far too long since Daine has been to the beach - or visited with the sort of wildlife that frequents beaches. If anyone wants to chat, they'll find her knee-deep in the surf, listening for dolphins.

[ginormotron]

Sam's pretty sure he's dreaming. It's the kind of landscape a dream would conjure up for him. Either way, the girl standing in the water gets a blink; strangers in his dreams don't usually crop up more than once. He's also pretty sure he wasn't standing so near her before, but it's in the way of dreams that he suddenly is, down on the beach a few feet away.

'You're that girl.' The words tumble out before he can stop them, a stupidly obvious observation, and he winces slightly. 'Er. Diane?' He thinks that was her name.

[fucking_ebay]

From the shoreline, there's a loud splash and a shout of "Shit!" as Peter appears on a rocky outcropping and promptly falls in the ocean. Fortunately, it's not very deep and he can simply wade right back out. More fortunately still, it's (probably) impossible to catch pneumonia in a dream.

[has_a_horn]

Gabriel is a little concerned. This all seems a little too normal for anything the rift might spring on them. Call it paranoia, but he'll definitely be on his guard a little more than usual.

He feels Peter's arrival not long after his own, so he makes his way down the rocky beach in his direction. "Peter!"

[essentiallyharmless]

Lucy comes across Peter a while later, happy to see him here too. Perhaps she wouldn't be quite as happy as if she actually remembered the theme of this dream, but it seems to have slipped her mind. Convenient, that.

[erratic_hematic]

Spike materializes into view at the bottom of the lighthouse. For a few moments, he just looks around, trying to guess at where this is. After a few minutes he's guessing it's a dream, because he's never been here before.

He peers into one of the lighthouse's broken windows, wondering if this is his own dream or someone else's. "Hello?"

[rae_of_sun]

Despite having caught on to the fact that she is not the lone resident of this weird frigging island, Sunshine still starts when a face appears in the window and starts talking to her. 'Starts' might be kind of an understatement, and a bag full of assorted baked goods makes for a pathetic shield, but at least she refrains from shrieking.

Once it registers that the speaker isn't anything horrible like a vampire, she lowers the bag and recovers herself a little. Enough so for it to occur to her that she might be in a far more mundane kind of trouble.

"You don't own this place or anything, do you?" Because if so, she loves what you've done with the decor. Such an artful use of tetanus.

[ginormotron]

His dream shifts fluidly from one in which he's being fired from his job as a magnet salesman into the rocky island. He shivers; he can taste the spray in the air as much as he can feel it, a fine film over every inch of him. The whole scene is like something out of one of those paintings-- Winslow... Homer?-- all bleak and New England, with iron-grey seas and rocky shores and soaked old seadogs hauling in nets.

It's when he turns around he notices the lighthouse, not tumbledown but pretty clearly abandoned. The door's open, half hanging off its hinges. Well, that's an invitation if ever there was one. With another shiver, zipping up his jacket, Sam heads up towards it; he can climb to the top, try to get his bearings.

[has_a_horn]

Near the top, Sam will find Gabriel resting on a rock, looking out to the sea. He's not all that pleased to feel Sam's arrival, especially since he's realized the trick to this dream. There a great many things he'd rather Sam not know. "Sammy."

[ohgodcrocodiles.livejournal.com]

Lucie finds herself on the beach, with a lighthouse looming in the distance. She peers out into the night, but only the lighthouse stares back, and what little of the island is actually visible appears to be completely deserted. She shivers and zips up her jacket, then after another moment of looking around, stuffs her hands in her pockets and trudges towards the lighthouse. It doesn't look very inviting, but it's the only shelter in sight.

[bluesuit_hoofy]

This isn't the first time Handy -- this Handy -- has visited the rifties of Manhattan in his dreams. The last time was a few months ago for him, though, and the memories faded away during waking hours. Now it doesn't occur to him to think he might be sharing a dream with the denizens of another universe. What does strike him is how unlike Ponyville this place is; after living half a year in a world populated by pastel equines and other colorful life forms, this stark, uninhabited rock is something of a shock to his system.

"Blimey," he says to himself after climbing the nearest hill and perching all four of his little hooves on a boulder there. "Bit of a fixer-upper."

[semioticallyspeaking]

'It is kind of a mess, huh?'

If she wasn't dreaming, Cosima would certainly be much more curious at the appearance of what seems to be a live-action My Little Pony. She'd probably want to do genetic tests on him. But as she is dreaming, she takes him, and the bleak landscape they're in, in cheerful stride.

'Wanna check it out?'

Because, even though she believes firmly in the empirical and real, and not in the kind of nonsense a lot of people claim dreams can tell, she's pretty sure any psych student could tell you that the best thing to do in a dream is explore. That's her psyche laid out before her, and if her psyche wants to conjure up My Little Ponies to explore it with her, have at it, she says!

[ceciiil]

Oh goodness, would you look at the non-existent calendar, is it Thou Shalt Not Lie Day already? Cecil is used to sensing minute differences in the ability to perceive and discuss reality. But, well, again, is anything really ever your own? Including the ability to obscure the truth? Maybe especially that. The ocean though. That's so weird. How it's all big and made of water. How can there even be this much water? Cecil is enjoying boggling at the ocean.

[semioticallyspeaking]

There is a girl standing unexpectedly next to Cecil, wrapped in something drapey and knitted under her dreadlocks and over her leggings and cute boots. She follows his example and stares out to sea, but cocks her head in his direction in a friendly fashion.

'Never seen the ocean before?'

Cosima's just guessing, but the bogglement on the guy's face would seem to suggest as much.

[i_jones]

Ianto can be found on a beach, leaning cross-legged against a rock, collar turned up against the ocean breeze. He has exhausted the supply of rocks at hand, having tossed them into the surf. Now he's etching designs into the sand with a stick, scuttling back as the waves encroach on his scratchings.

[theoldgirl]

The TARDIS is wandering the beach with increasing disinterest, not finding it a pleasant diversion from her recent troubles at all. Normally she likes a good seaside, but it's too chilly and empty here, and she doesn't feel like trying to make significant changes to the dream herself.

She is just about ready to leave when she spots a mind she's been worrying about for days. It only takes a moment to locate it in the dream and then she's clumsily climbing down a small dune to join him by the surf. "Ianto! Where have you been?"