The Shavings Off Your Mind are the Only Rent [Open to All]

[applesaucemod]

Picture a house. Actually, picture two houses. They're (almost) identical structures that share an uneasy coexistence, tangled together on a quantum level. One of the houses is Good: bright, cheerful, full of comfortable furniture and a pervasive feeling of safety. The other house is Evil: dingy, dilapidated, and haunted by the dreamers' greatest fears.

The good news - and bad news - is that travel from one house to the other is as simple as passing through a door. All a dreamer has to do is walk through a doorway, any doorway, and they'll find themselves in whichever house they weren't in before they crossed the threshold. Perhaps they'll step out of a beautiful library and find themselves in a threatening hallway - or perhaps they'll flee a menacing kitchen and find themselves in a perfectly safe dining room. That is the nature of the houses' entanglement: every door is a portal between the two.

There are, of course, complications. Dreamers in one house can't perceive the other; if you're in the Good house and looking through a doorway, the space beyond will look as nice and inviting as the space you're in now (until you step through that doorway, of course). Dreamers also can't really perceive one another if they're in the same room, but in different houses, though they might see a flash of movement out of the corner of their eye, or think they heard something.

Perhaps the greatest complications are the houses themselves. They have rather strong personalities, and they aren't very fond of one another. Each house will want to keep you if it can (keep you safe, in the case of the Good house, or keep you for itself, in the case of the Evil one). Dreamers may attempt to cross a hall and find the door that looked open and inviting a moment ago is now barred shut, leaving them trapped in the hall - or have doors suddenly close in their faces before they can end up anywhere unpleasant. Still, there's only so much either house can do, and even a locked door can be jimmied open or busted down.

Escape from the houses is possible, but the formal gardens beyond are similarly entangled, with neatly trimmed lawns and expertly plotted flower beds becoming overgrown tangles of nettles and algae-choked reflecting pools. An archway is as good as a door, as far as the gardens are concerned, and there are plenty of arbors and arches over the paths. Of course, dreamers may find that a sound arbor in the Good garden has collapsed in the Evil one… and heaven help anyone who dares to explore the hedge maze.





[ooc: y'all know the drill. ALL characters are welcome, regardless of whether they're in the game. Characters can remember or forget the events of the dream at the players' discretion.

Also, this dream party marks the aforementioned calendar freeze. For the next three weeks, the IG date will sit on July 3rd. Posts dated July 3rd or earlier are allowed and encouraged. The calendar will resume forward motion at a 4:1 ratio on Saturday, July 26th.]

Comments

[johnny_truant]

By this point Johnny's so used to dreaming about horrible, fucked up houses that he can almost do nothing but stare blankly around himself. Right, so the windows are all barred, the doors are locked, there's bloodstains and claw marks on the floor... whatever, right? He exhales slow and heavy and wanders to one of the windows, looking out at a choked, overgrown garden. He pulls away from that, and-

-something crunches under foot, like dry leaves. He looks down. It's paper. He bends down to pick it up, and peers at it.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

He drops it, lets it flutter down from his hand, his heart in his throat. He lets his gaze move around the room. Pages are everywhere now, covering every inch of the floor, taped up and down the walls, papering the ceiling. He can't move without shuffling through them. And they're all his. His pages.

Here's one that says:

Ken Burns has used this particular moment to illustrate why The Navidson Record is so beyond Hollywood: "Not only is it gritty and dirty and raw, but look how the zoom claws after the fleeting fact. Watch how the frame does not, cannot anticipate the action. Jed's in the lower left hand corner of the frame! Nothing's predetermined of foreseen. It's all painfully present which is why it's so painfully real."<sup>216







216</sup>As you probably guessed, not only has Ken Burns never made any such comment, he's also never heard of The Navidson Record let alone Zampanò.


And another:

After my father died I was shipped around to a number of foster homes. I was trouble wherever I went. No one knew what to do with me. Eventually—though it did take awhile—I ended up with Raymond and his family. He was a former marine with, as I've already described, a beard rougher than horse hide and hands harder than horn. He was also a total control freak. No matter the means, no matter the cost, he was going to be in control. And everyone knew if push came to shove he was as likely to die for it as he was to kill for it.

I was twelve years old.

What did I know?

I pushed.

I pushed all the time.


Now, he pushes this away, tearing it up with an angry, desperate yell, turning his aggression on the walls and ripping down page after page. No, no, no, no. He left this all far behind. He doesn't want it anymore. No one can see it. No one.

[i_jones]

One roughly door-sized section of one of the walls gives in a little, then recedes, the mass of papers breathing slowly. After a moment, they ebb and flow again, and then they strain against their adhesives. One page yields, ripping in half, and the rest quickly follow, making a jagged border for the door that Ianto barrels through, having clearly just shouldered it open.

He pulls up short, skidding a little on the loose paper. This looks... a bit odd and private. "Er, sorry," he starts, hands held up half defensively. "This... isn't the loo."

[johnny_truant]

Startled by the sudden entry, Johnny blinks up at the guy, caught in the midst of ripping up several pages at a time. Feeling a bit stupid and somehow guilty, like he's been caught doing something he shouldn't, he haphazardly finishes the current job and lets the halves drop around him.

This guy's a lot taller and better built than him, looks nice enough but Johnny has learned long ago not to trust looks. He has to be careful in case this turns hostile, can't just kick him, doesn't want to arouse unwanted curiosity, inadvertantly invite the stranger to take a look at his fucked up past life, strewn as it is all over the room. Johnny stares at him, steadfastly not acknowledging the oddness of his surroundings.

"Who are you?" he says bluntly.

[i_jones]

Ianto shakes his foot a bit, then leans down to remove a page that's gotten stuck to his shoe, folding it up into a neat if ragged rectangle and tossing it onto the floor in a minor act of defiance against neatness. The stranger doesn't look as if he cares much for the sanctity of the papers anyway. He looks rather skittish, actually. "Jones. Ianto Jones. Didn't like the wallpaper?"

[johnny_truant]

Johnny tenses when Ianto picks up the paper, but forces himself to relax when he doesn't actually look at it.

"Not particularly," he says after a moment's hesitation. "I, um. I'm Johnny."

He doesn't move forward or extend a hand or anything, staying firmly on his side of the room. "You're a rifty?" he asks, not even sure what the alternative would be, other than some manifestation of the house. Ianto doesn't seem like that, but it never hurts to check.

[i_jones]

So he is anxious - protective - about the writing. State secrets? Regular secrets? Teenage Star Trek slashfic? Who could say. Not Ianto, certainly, he appreciates the comfort of a well-kept secret. "Yup." He feels along the wall to the corner, then the perpendicular wall, kicking through the sheaves of paper like leaves in autumn, until he feels the trim around a window. "Or I was." He takes a multitool from his pocket (it's so easy to be well-equipped, in dreams) and flicks out the knife, slicing off the paper around the window. "I'm not sure..." he trails off, clearly unsure about what he's unsure about. "I'm not sure," he repeats, reluctantly decisive. "I've had flats with worse views," he adds, looking out through the bars into the garden, crumpling the window cutout into a medium-sized ball. The view leaves something to be desired, but it let a little more light in.

[johnny_truant]

The hell? Johnny frowns at him as he wades through the book, dealing contradictions. At least he's leaving the pages well alone. Either he has no curiosity at all, or he can see it's not for him.

It's not. It's not for anyone. Crap, where's the dedication page? Johnny should find that, and keep it with him, as the only useful page in the whole fucking book.

"Uh, okay," he says, finally venturing a little closer to the guy. He peers out the window - same view as before, different angle. "Me too. But I lived in LA, so."

Just gonna make light conversation until Ianto goes away. Or they both go somewhere? Doubtful - Johnny's had enough previous experience to know you don't go places with strangers in dreams. Especially not in places like this one. Anyway he feels a strong need to continue destroying this room.

[i_jones]

"Mm," Ianto hums absently, resting the wadded up ball on the windowsill. It must be nice out in the garden, as horridly in need of a weeding as it is. Fresh air. Fresh... er than inside. He only has a few rooms of the house mapped out so far - some were impassible, for supernatural or practical obstacles, and he hasn't yet found a door to the outside.

"This would go faster if you burnt it," he points out. "Could imagine it away, but... more fun to burn it."

[johnny_truant]

"Wh-what?" Okay, Johnny officially does not know what to make of this guy. Just casually suggesting arson. Who does that? This room would go up in an instant - but then, it is a dream. It's not like anyone would be hurt. Well, not permanently.

"I'm not very good at imagining," he murmurs. "Or making it stick, anyway. In my experience." He looks around at the mess, considering. Part of him - a very frustrating part - wonders if he'll be able to burn it now, when he was never able to before. Doubtful, really. Even after everything, it still has such an intense hold on him. Even destroying it, he wants to touch the pages, remind himself that they're there, or something. Burning it would almost be too easy.

"I don't know," he says ruefully - he does know, he just feels like a chickenshit. "Something tells me the house might not like it."

[yfeltihtend]

One hears... things, when one is in Doctor Unthank's business. Of course, he works primarily in the service of those who are willing to pay, but he's a curious man, and it's always worth looking into the mysterious and the unknown. Lost secrets are his favourite kind. One never knows when they might come in handy.

So certain things have passed into his awareness over the years; a film called The Navidson Record, a house: 1 Ash Tree Lane, a manuscript, a young man with the rather telling name of Johnny Truant. And so, having recently completed with great satisfaction his task for Sir Roger Widdowson, and with nothing else pressing, he goes looking.

Walking in dreams is a less precise art than time-travelling in the corporeal world, but he is unsurprised to find himself in a house. Not the house, but a house. And a most peculiar one, at that. It's not hard to discern the pattern, and if he is unsurprised by the grasping shadows that swim from the corners of every other room, uncoiling and swamping and insinuating, that does not mean he's unafraid of them. Nothing in dreams can harm him, he knows that well enough, but there are... things waiting after death for a man like himself. He is in no hurry to meet them.

But something is here, he can tell that much; some answer, a signpost to point the way to the next best path; he only need try enough rooms. And so imagine his delight when he opens the door from a pleasant, warmly-panelled study and walks through to find himself in a room papered, littered, with the pages of a book, and a young man howling like a Bedlam inmate and bloodying his fingers on the walls.

The door shuts behind him suddenly, sucked closed with a vacuum draught of air, and Doctor Unthank lets out a pleased little breath. 'Ah.'

[johnny_truant]

Here again. Always here? Never left? Was the fire in his head? He wouldn't fucking be surprised.

He spins around, staggers like a wild thing on the relative frictionlessness of the pages, staring at the intruder.

"No," he says in response to nothing. "Get out. This is not for you."

[yfeltihtend]

'Perhaps not,' he agrees mildly, 'but I find intent is such a slippery beast when it comes to matters of belonging. Do you want to get out, Johnny? It is Johnny, isn't it?'

There he stands, apparently unfazed by the macabre horror of the room, perfectly innocuous in reading glasses and tweed, his gaze taking in with interest the rent and crumpled pages, the grime of blood on Johnny's fingers where he's torn his nails from their beds.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny stares at him, suddenly cold and still.

"Who are you?" he whispers. "How do you know about me?"

Maybe it's a ridiculous question, when his life is spread out all around them and beneath their feet. But he hasn't looked at any of it. He's just looked at Johnny.

[yfeltihtend]

'Well, we are in your head; I should think it'd be more surprising if I didn't.' He glances around the room, eyebrows up and mouth tugged down at the corners in a curious, assessing look. 'Bit of a tip, really, isn't it?' But, his tone says, he's just judging, he promises.

Turning back to Johnny, he offers a small smile, an expression that might easily be comforting or engaging, were one of a mind to take it that way. 'But I don't know much about you at all, really; just your name.'

[johnny_truant]

"That's not how it works," says Johnny softly, eyes narrowing as the still-unnamed stranger casts a glance around. "There's nothing to know. In fact I'm thinking of setting fire to the whole thing."

He feels unhinged. Been in here too long, reverting. Or maybe it's this new presence. Pressing in on him, making him feel cornered (which he is, really, here in his rat's nest). He forces a cavalier smirk and it comes crooked.

[yfeltihtend]

'Wicked,' murmurs Unthank appreciatively, a little growl behind the word. The boy is beautifully on edge; really, it's practically an invitation for someone to take him in hand.

'And do tell, what d'you think that'll accomplish? Other than burning you to a crisp along with it.'

Doctor Unthank, of course, won't allow that. It may not be the physical manuscript-- and perhaps that's a good thing, given the rumours he's heard-- but both it and Johnny contain valuable information; it'd be a shame to let all that go up in flame when he's only just found it.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny's lip curls at the counter, and he turns away, angry at having been called out. Who the hell does he think he is? He doesn't know. He couldn't.

"It's only a dream," he mutters, somewhat petulantly, and without heart. He's died enough in dreams to know how much it still hurts, how much it still fucks with you, crawls into your head and sits there, reminding you in the night when your body trips over nothing and you jerk awake.

He looks at his hands, hesitant, for lack of another action. "I'm bleeding," he says, almost surprised by it.

[powerdealer]

At the sound of his yell, there's a rustle from a pile of papers over in the corner.

Seth sits up, having just woken up and found himself covered in pages upon pages. He is considerably confused as he looks around, a page stuck in his hair, and one trying to crawl down the back of his neck. Every time he shifts, he feels paper in a new place. He's pretty sure there's at least three underneath his shirt, actually, and one stuck down his sock. What the hell?

He turns to look at the rest of the room, which is pretty dingy, and -- hey. "Johnny."

[johnny_truant]

Johnny whips around, momentarily wild-eyed and dangerous, braced against the wall like he expects an attack and is preparing to launch himself at the assailant.

When he spots Seth in the corner he relaxes only slightly, no longer beastlike and defensive, but still thoroughly guarded and edgy. Seth knows plenty about him already without getting to paw through it.

"Seth...?" He takes a halting step forward. "When did you..." There was no sound of a door opening - he looks like he's been napping or something, half-buried under the pages. Johnny feels a quick surge of panic at the thought that Seth might already have read something, and he takes another, more aggressive step. "How long have you been here?!"

[powerdealer]

"I have absolutely no idea," he admits, plucking away the page from his hair and giving barely a glance at it before throwing it back into the pile.

"Where exactly is here?" he asks, looking around. Doesn't look like somewhere he'd be willingly. "And what's all of this?" he adds, reaching back down his neck and pulling out the page from there too.

[johnny_truant]

Fuck, they're in his clothes. What, did he roll around in it all before conking out? Johnny doesn't bother answering, crossing quickly to him and kneeling down, pulling pages away from him without any regard for Seth's personal space, tearing and crumpling them as he goes, tossing them aside.

"You need to go," he says tersely. "You need to get out of here right now."

[powerdealer]

What the hell? Are the pages like.. dangerous or something? Cause that's how Johnny's acting. He gets to his feet, and hello yes, he himself can get the one that's trying to crawl down into his underwear, thank you, Johnny doesn't need to help.

"Seriously, man, what's going on?" he asks, frowning with concern.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny gets up with him and grabs his arm, maneuvering him awkwardly toward the locked door.

"It's nothing," he says, not even listening to himself, what a stupid and obvious deflection that is. He's just desperate to get Seth out of the room. He presses his hand against the papered wood (oh god, those are the letters from his mother, oh god) and tries to force the door open.

He can't.

"Fuck," he says with increasing panic. He tries to force the handle again with no luck. "My power's not working. Can you get through here?"

[powerdealer]

Though it's definitely something, Seth decides to just go with it for his friend's sake. He nods and takes Johnny's hand, ready to pull him through alongside him, and is confused when Johnny doesn't seem to want that.

"What, you're not coming with?" he asks, now even more worried.

[johnny_truant]

Johnny shakes his head distractedly. "I have to stay here," he says. "You go, get out. Get somewhere safe. You'll be fine." He ives Seth a little nudge toward the door and turns back, surveying the sprawl of his life. He crouches down and starts pulling up pages like weeds. Some of them are nailed to the floor. He picks one up that just says "screen" in the middle, and nothing more, and crumples it up angrily. His hands are bleeding a little, he realizes. Too many paper cuts. He didn't even notice.

Seth's still behind him. He turns his head to the side without looking. "Go," he snaps.