And the Boats Drift On [Open to All]

[applesaucemod]

The water is calm, and the night sky is filled with stars. The only light is natural: a patchy, bioluminescent glow coming from the water below, and the bright swath of the Milky Way above. It's not much, but it's more than enough to see by.

The dreamers will find themselves sitting in their own little rowboats, each stocked with two oars, a length of rope, some cushions, and a little picnic basket full of snacks. There is no visible shoreline, but it won't take the dreamers long to realize theirs are not the only boats in this shallow sea. Anything stirring in the water, be it fish or paddle, causes phosphorescent plankton to glow a bright blue, so there isn't really anywhere to hide.

Feel free to paddle around and visit the other dreamers, perhaps tying your boats together and sharing your snacks in an impromptu picnic. Or you could go for a swim - the bioluminescence makes it difficult to see the bottom, but it's not too terribly deep, so the risk of drowning is all but nonexistent. This setting, unlike the last one, isn't actively out to kill you. Or you could simply lie back and look at the stars.



[ooc: Same drill as always, folks. All are welcome, regardless of whether or not your character is in the game. Characters may remember or forget dream shenanigans at the player's discretion.]

Comments

[johnny_truant]

Johnny hesitates at the little murmured thought. He's not going to follow up on it, but... leave. Like going back through the Rift. Is that what happened? Then who are they even looking for?

"Uh..." He peers at the sandwich. "Looks like... chicken salad maybe?" He investigates the others. "There's... ham and swiss... this one looks like avocado and something. Cucumber. Oh hey... there's beer, too." He holds up a bottle with a half-smile. Getting drunk in a dream can't be as fun as the real thing but it might be worth it.

[bluesuit_handy]

"Avocado," decides Andrew immediately, holding out a hand for it. He could normally take or leave avocado, but vegetables generally sit better. It's only a dream and only dream food, but isn't aversion all in the mind anyhow?

...Can babies suffer fetal alcohol syndrome from imaginary beer? It's a ridiculous thought, and he dismisses it instantly only to shake his head at the bottle anyhow. "Let me see what I've got in mine," he says, hoping for a thermos of tea and discovering one as he opens his own basket. The Dreaming, it seems, is cooperating tonight. "Tea?" he offers.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny hands over the sandwich and takes chicken salad for himself. "Suuure," he says hesitantly, tucking the beer away, for later maybe.

"Can I ask you something?" he says between bites; then asks anyway. "Are you with one of the factions?" Anticipating that this might be a tense question, he raises his hand placatingly. "I'm unaffiliated. Just... curious, I guess." Gabe doesn't put any stock in either group - none of the people he's gotten to know seem to have anything to do with them. Andrew's been here for longer than anyone he's met, so, seems as good a time as any to learn a few things, if he can.

[bluesuit_handy]

Party successfully ruined. Enjoy your tea, Johnny.

Andrew glances up as he's digging out some mugs. This is the second new acquaintance in not so great an amount of time to jump to wary questions about alliance, though nowadays he's inclined to agree with those who have managed to remain unaffiliated. "With is a strong word," he says, pouring a mug and handing it over. "Let's just say I'm fairly well acquainted with the rebels."

[johnny_truant]

"Okay," says Johnny hesitantly. He sips the tea and gives a satisfied little hum. "I mean, nobody even reached out to me. I would have been homeless if I hadn't met Jodie."

Oh. Whoops, that slipped out. He'd taken to actively not mentioning Jodie, knowing her desire for secrecy, but... Well, just saying her name isn't anything, right?

He waves a hand. "Just a friend of mine," he says. "So... are the rebels not worth it, or what?"

[bluesuit_handy]

"I met someone they'd been keeping prisoner in order to force him to use his powers," says Andrew, explaining things plainly for once in his life. He doesn't feel like he's in great personal danger from them, but he's no longer in the habit of pointing homeless rifties their way. Speaking of homeless rifties....

"I know a Jodie," he adds thoughtfully.

[johnny_truant]

Well that doesn't sound good. Gabriel had never been so specific, just airing a generalized distaste. Johnny frowns and sips his tea contemplatively. When Anderw makes his addendum he perks up in surprise.

"Really?" he says. "Another rifty? Is there..."

Ooookay, hold up boy. Better not mention Aiden just yet, in case it's not the same Jodie. Or in case it is, and she doesn't want this guy to know about Aiden.

He clears his throat awkwardly. "Is she like... shortish, long brown hair? White girl?" How do you even describe white people? Johnny shrugs haplessly.

[bluesuit_handy]

Andrew tilts his head back, giving Johnny a thoughtful look as he tongues the roof of his mouth. The description is accurate, but sparse, and he goes through roughly the same thought process as Johnny. His Jodie is quite easily identifiable, but if they are talking about her she (and Aiden) likely won't appreciate him revealing that she's tethered to an incorporeal entity.

"She is," he says. "Rifty, hasn't joined a faction?"

[johnny_truant]

"Yeah!" says Johnny, sitting up straighter, now reasonably sure they're talking about the same person. "Yeah, she was my first friend here. I met her when she came through and we kind of shacked up in a hotel together for a while. They - uh, she -" Great, good job Johnny. God. He clears his throat. "She saved my life a couple times."

He presses forward, eager to cover that weird pronoun slipup. "Have you seen her recently? Is she okay?"

[bluesuit_handy]

They. He caught that slip, Johnny. Andrew suppresses a grin and decides not to show his hand. "Did she now? She seems to do that fairly often, then."

He gives Johnny a thoughtful look. "She was alright when I saw her," he replies. "I take it you parted ways."

[johnny_truant]

"Yeah," says Johnny. "I mean... just out of necessity. Couldn't keep living in a hotel. I know she got out of there but I don't know where she moved to. We're... sort of bad at keeping in touch." Something he really wants to get better about. As prickly and odd as she is, Johnny really likes Jodie, and Aiden too, he supposes. It's hard not to feel fondness for someone who's done what she has for him. He doubts he's as important to her.

The rest of what Andrew's told him catches up to him then. "So what, did she save you too?" he asks, only half-joking.

[bluesuit_handy]

"Would you believe me if I told you she did?" grins Andrew. He leans back and takes a bite out of his sandwich. "I'm not sure if it's a hobby of hers or if it's only people she's met in dreams. Being crushed under an air conditioner would've been a terribly embarrassing way to die, so I've got to give her credit for stopping it."

[johnny_truant]

What? Johnny almost laughs outright, barely manages to hold it in. "An air conditioner," he repeats dubiously. "Holy shit. She's a superhero." He grins. He's reasonably certain it was Aiden who saved Andrew, but does Andrew know about Aiden? It's killing him and he can't figure out how to ask without giving the game away.

"You met her in one of these dreams?" he asks, picking up from there instead.

[bluesuit_handy]

"Originally," confirms Andrew, growing cautious again. The dream in which he met her is not one to be shared. All the same, perhaps he now has an oblique way to ask the question that's been bothering him since they got on the topic of Jodie. "Met a good friend of hers that time, too; it was a regular sleepover. Dunno if she'll've introduced you yet; I get the impression he doesn't get out much."

Not exactly an accurate way to describe it, but maybe Johnny will get his meaning...if he should get his meaning.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny peers at him for a moment. That is... oblique as hell, but the awkward way he phrased it makes it impossible to interpret as anything other than code.

"So... Aiden," he says after a minute. "You know about Aiden. Right?"

[bluesuit_handy]

Well, either Johnny was going to get it or he was going to think Andrew was just an awkward bunny. A grin breaks out across his face at not having to be the first one to come out and say it. "And so do you," he confirms. "Here I thought they were keeping it a secret."

[johnny_truant]

"They do," says Johnny wryly, relieved that they can talk more openly now. He decides he'd still rather not reveal he can see Aiden just yet - Jodie seems to find that so unnerving, maybe she doesn't want people to know it's even possible. "Except Aiden kind of beat the shit out of me when I first met them." He chuckles, remembering it with fondness now that it's so long ago, and Aiden's saved his life a few times since. "They'd just arrived so they were all stressed out, and... I just wandered out in the middle of the park at night... not the best approach. He's just so protective."

He leans back and counts on his fingers. "So Jodie saved me from him, and then they both saved me later from this tweaked out mugger, and then..." Less humor this time. The other two were more in the "rogue air conditioning" department of life-saving. The most noteworthy occasion, not so much.

Hesitant, he continues, "The first time I had one of these shared dreams, I had no idea what was going on really, and Zagreus... you ever crossed paths with him?" For Andrew's sake, Johnny hopes not. "He yanked me out of the... like, the shared space, and trapped me in his... lair, I guess? I don't really know how dream shit works, but yeah. He tortured me and probably would have killed me eventually if Aiden hadn't gotten into my head and pulled me out."

He's grown a little more grim and sober-voiced throughout his. He sips his tea. "They're good friends to have."

[bluesuit_handy]

So Aiden isn't always the sweet little entity that saved Andrew from a falling appliance. Andrew tries not to be prejudiced against differently corporeal beings, but he's perhaps less surprised than he'd like to admit. Still, attacking Johnny doesn't cancel out everything else Aiden's done, right?

Andrew sobers, sitting up and giving Johnny an intense, disturbed look at the first mention of Zagreus. "I know him," he says darkly. "Bollocks. I should have done something about him a long time ago."

Not that he can, really. The TARDIS and the Doctor haven't been able to wipe him out, so what hope does a meta-crisis have? "Sorry," he says. "I didn't think he could even access the dreaming, much less...has he come after you again?"

[johnny_truant]

Johnny suppresses a sigh. It seems everyone knows about this guy, but no one can stop him.

"From what I understand he basically lives here," he says. "This is like his domain, or something. And yeah, he has. Does. Frequently." He looks down, fiddling with his teacup. He doesn't like to go all sob story on people with this, but... he almost can't help it, either. It's so hard to forget him, what he feels like - Zagreus has made sure of that. "Most nights."

He glances up and forces a weak grin. "I'm one of his favorite toys," he says with the air of a joke, but it comes out a little sick-sounding.

[bluesuit_handy]

And yet Andrew hasn't encountered him. Accident? Oversight? Zagreus avoiding old acquaintances? He probably ought to be grateful, but mostly he's ashamed of himself for knowing that thing was loose in Manhattan and not doing anything about it while Zagreus has gone about torturing human bystanders.

"I'm sorry," he says again. It's my fault, he doesn't say. He has enough sense to override the guilt and know that's not entirely true. Zagreus was defeated twice before Andrew even came into being, and his survival since his reappearance a few years ago hasn't been for lack of trying on the part of certain others. "That explains where he's been," he says mostly to himself. "Is Aiden helping you still? It's not safe for you to sleep alone."

Yeah, safe to say Johnny's probably got that one figured out.

[johnny_truant]

"Not your fault," says Johnny with a shrug in response to the second apology. Andrew seems to feel really bad about this, which is kind of endearing. Johnny appreciates the concern.

"I think the first time was different," he says. "Because like... he pulled me from one dream into another? I guess that displaced my... consciousness or something." He laughs softly. The whole thing is so sci-fi it's absurd. "But I think Aiden could only get into my head because of that. It's a shame, because he was a real badass. Fought him off like a pro." He smiles faintly. He hopes, not for the first time, that Zagreus isn't ever going to seek retribution for that. It's bad enough being the prey without getting his friends involved.

"I've got other people helping me, though," he says. "Gabriel and the TARDIS, mostly. They do what they can."

He doesn't mention that it's not enough. Why bother? It's not their fault. More often than not, it's his.

[bluesuit_handy]

"Funny she hasn't mentioned you," says Andrew too lightly. "The TARDIS, I mean."

It's not odd at all, really. Andrew's hardly talked to the ship in recent months, and it's been made clear enough to him that she doesn't want him endangering himself -- that is, endangering the Doctor's memories -- by going up against more telepathically inclined beings. That he should be out of the loop when the TARDIS doesn't see him as a viable ally and he's repeatedly pushed the Doctor away the Doctor sees him as a responsibility at best shouldn't (and doesn't) surprise him. It does sting, though.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny can't help but misunderstand this remark as thinly veiled territorial jealousy, and it catches him off guard. Is he trying to make Johnny feel like he's less important to her? Maybe he's reading too much into it, but it makes him a little nervous, and he hesitates before changing the subject.

"You said you were a duplicate of the Doctor?" he says, tilting his head curiously. "How does that work?"

[bluesuit_handy]

It's insecurity more than territoriality, but of course Johnny isn't to know that. Andrew lets out a little sigh as the conversation turns to the age old question (or okay, three-years-or-so old question) of just waht he is. There's no need to hide it, though, even if he could.

"Sort of a mishap," he admits with a dismissive flap of his hand. "I got most everything copied over. New hardware, old software."

[johnny_truant]

"Um." Okay. That's not much of an explanation, but something tells Johnny he wouldn't be able to follow a more detailed account anyway. "Sooo like a clone?"