applesaucedream | Encampment Under the Sea [Open to All]

photo encampmentunderthesea_zps98ceddce.jpg

Since the dreamers of Manhattan had such a lovely time at the last vaguely-nautical-themed party, the Rift has decided to step things up a notch. Tonight, the dreamers will find themselves in what appears to be a city very much like the one they inhabit in the waking world, full of towering skyscrapers, neon signs, and heavy traffic. But there is one rather crucial difference: this city is located deep underwater, and the aforementioned traffic is mostly whales and fish, with the occasional submersible thrown into the mix.

The walls and windows are heavily reinforced to withstand the pressure of the water outside, and the people who dwell in these buildings seem to be doing rather well for themselves, for the most part. Buildings are connected by enclosed walkways, so barring any horrible accidents, the dreamers should have no problem getting around without getting too wet.

Much like the city they inhabit in the waking world, some areas are more obviously affluent than others, and the dreamers are as likely to stumble upon an upscale club as an underwater pub. But while the chances of a full structural breakdown are slim, there are definitely some areas that are on the leaky side, and a general sense of claustrophobia pervades the city wherever you might find yourself.

Explore. Or, if you're feeling particularly ambitious, attempt to escape. Either way, take care - it's hard to say what might be lurking in the darkness just beyond the city lights.

[ooc: Y'all know the drill. All characters are welcome, whether they are in the game or not. Characters can remember or forget the events of the dreaming at the player's discretion. And the party never stops - backtag into infinity!]

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Daniel laughs a little at that, pained and high-pitched and self-mocking.

"Ah, no. Me, I've been in Manhattan for, what? A week? Probably less. Hang on." He turns to Daine sharply. "We're not in Manhattan now, right? I mean, it doesn't look like Manhattan, but..." He lets the speculation taper off, scanning the area nervously.

"Well…" Daine furrows her brow, confused. "It's a dream." So it hardly matters if this is meant to be a strange, flooded version of the city they're from, right? Unless he's suggesting that they could make their way to more familiar territory, but she rather doubts she'd be so lucky as to find her room intact, even if it was here and she worked out a way to get to it. She shrugs. "Does it matter?"

And oh dear, no wonder he's so green at this sort of thing. "It's been a little over half a year for me," she says. She still isn't pleased about that, but it's getting easier to sound matter-of-fact, and not as if her continued presence here is some sort of personal failing. She almost adds, 'you get used to it,' but she doesn't want to discourage him overmuch. The length of her stay is probably discouraging enough all on its own.

"Oh," she adds as they slog into a section of tunnel that isn't flooded half so badly as the one where she found him. "I think this is where I started out. So if we keep heading this way…" she trails off. 'This way' concludes in a y-shaped intersection, and there's nothing obvious to recommend one branch over the other. Daine frowns at the fork in consternation, than looks up at Daniel. "Any ideas, or shall I ask for directions?" From one of the People, obviously; there aren't any other two-leggers down here.

Half a year. Yikes. He says nothing about it, though privately he's a little spooked. Not to mention how he can't remember how he got here or how long he's been in the area which, considering this is apparently a dream, isn't too surprising. Time never behaves properly in dreams.

They reach a fork in the tunnel-like area, and Daniel sighs a little. Oh, great. An ominous choice. Lovely.

"Directions?" He glances at her, puzzled at that. "What, like...you ask one wall and I'll ask another?" He's not sure if he meant to come across as joking or sarcastic or a mix of the two, but either way his unease skitters a little too sharply off the words for him to convey any emotion aside from brittle anxiety.

"No, nothing like that." Goddess, but he's jumpy. Daine turns to him and gives him a reassuring smile. Maybe if she spells it all out for him, he'll calm down a little. At the very least, he'll be able to meet one of her friends without screaming or something.

"Look, taking an animal's shape isn't all that I can do," she explains with the patience of someone who's been through this particular speech (or variations on it, anyway) many, many times. "I can talk to them, and understand them. And I'm sure there's someone out there who can help us," she says with a gesture toward the gloomy expanse of water on the other side of the glass. "A whale, maybe - if I can find one who isn't too busy."

Okay, so not the weirdest thing he's heard of. Not entirely, anyway. Daniel's essentially given up on trying to apply logic to any of this; dreams that start with shape-shifting tigers have that effect.

"Well, if that's, uh, if you think that'll work." He shrugs helplessly. She seems to know what she's doing and, hey, if talking to a whale gets them out of this intensely creepy place, Daniel is very much okay with it. Sentient whales - also not the weirdest thing he's heard of.

It's a dream. Daniel's decided he can roll with it.

~~Just wait until he meets her in the waking world. They can do this all again!~~

"Couldn't hurt to try," Daine says, her gaze already going a bit unfocused as she turns her attention outward. It doesn't take her too long to find a little group of whales that aren't very far off (not by a whale's standards, anyway). "All right," she says absently, holding up a hand, "I think… yes, someone's coming. She's big, just to warn you." Daine looks up at Daniel, her gaze more focused than it was a moment ago, and adds, "We're perfectly safe, though."

The first hint of the whale's approach is a percussive series of clicks, louder than even Daine expects them to be. She looks up past Daniel, eyebrows creeping up her forehead and a grin spreading across her face as a very dark, very large shape appears out of the gloom. For a moment, it almost looks as if it might plow right into their tunnel (which feels a lot more fragile than it had a minute ago). But then, with easy expertise, the right whale turns aside and floats a scant few feet away from the glass ceiling, peering down at them with an eye the size of a cantaloupe.

"Oh, you are beautiful," Daine enthuses under her breath, beaming up at the creature.

"Oh." His head tilts back to stare at the sprawling, slow-moving shape coming at them. "Wow."

"Wow," indeed. It's a whale, it's right outside, it's enormous which, as whales go, makes perfect sense but still. Wow. And Daine seems downright pleased to see it. He watches wonderingly as it maneuvers itself to stare right at them.

Daniel has to remind himself to breathe, dwarfed by this animal of questionable reality - generating a distracted tangle of fascinatingly abstract questions, of whether or not other beings in dreams are sentient, are they drawn from memory, how would shared dreams affect the properties of reactivity? - and takes a step back for good measure. He swallows, hard, and tries not to look directly at the massive eye that feels like it's x-ray-ing him.

Daniel's reaction isn't lost on the whale, and Daine can feel the creature's gentle amusement. Glancing back at her two-legger companion, Daine says, "Don't worry. She likes you. And she says she'll help us."

She turns back to the whale, speaking aloud for Daniel's benefit. "We'd just like to get to a nicer part of the city, but we can't tell which way to go. You can see so much more of it all than we can; I thought you might be able to sound us in the right direction. If you're not too busy."

The whole corridor buzzes with the whale's hummed reply. Daine can feel it in her feet about as strongly as she hears it in her mind. "Thank you!" she says as the whale carefully backs away from the glass and wheels off to the left. In case that isn't answer enough, Daine turns to Daniel and says, "It's that way. We're to follow her for a bit."

Daniel's mouth works for a minute before he's able to relocate his voice.

"Okay," he says, breathlessly and in no way freaked. He keeps watching the whale dubiously as it moves off.

"Thanks?" he calls after it, tentative. Is politeness a conceptual societal practice between whales? Or between whales and those-who-can-communicate-with-whales? He figures he'd might as well play it safe. This is no different than adhering to different planetary cultural norms and, barring conflicting moral circumstance, he has a policy to treat those with respect. That is what Daniel is going to continue to tell himself.

Encampment Under the Sea [Open to All]

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