applesaucedream | Tender Lumplings Everywhere, Life's No Fun Without A Good Scare [Open to All]

The woods are dark and deep, but not particularly lovely. If anything, they feel dangerous, as if something terrible might come lurching out from behind any given tree and tear into the nearest warm body. What that terrible thing might be is anyone's guess. A cat with hands? Slenderman? Stegosaurus? Actual cannibal Shia LaBeouf? All of the above in a horrible mob? It's anyone's guess. But every dreamer will be absolutely convinced that there is something unspeakable out there, and that it's after them.

The dreamers have two things on their side. The first is that there is actually nothing dangerous lurking in these woods (with the possible exception of other dreamers). The pervasive terror the dreamers are feeling is just that: a rift-given feeling, nothing more and nothing less. That snapping twig or rustle in the undergrowth is almost certainly just a squirrel or something else equally harmless.

The second is that no dreamer is alone. They all will be reunited with - or introduced to - their dæmons, a source of comfort in this dark, intimidating wilderness. However frightened the dreamers might be, at least they have someone with them who definitely doesn't want them dead.

[OOC: as ever, any and all are welcome! You don't have to be in the game to join the fun. Dreamers can remember or forget the events of the dream at the players' discretion. And the party only stops when you want it to; feel free to backtag forever.]

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And they're off again, he really keeps one on one's toes. That's a good thing, she thinks, it's a relief that he is taking the lead and her hand fits reassuringly into his. Mainly though, he keeps startling her out of her negativity. She noticed that he didn't have any kind words to say about her letting down her friends, but before she can feel even more miserable about that, he's pulling her along and admitting to being thousands of years old. For a moment she's in awe thinking he must be a highblood, but she quickly reminds herself that he isn't any sort of troll. Still, perhaps he's right... he must have been afraid of something at some point in all that time, as difficult to imagine as that is. What might it have been?

She doesn't get a chance to think on what scares him any more than she gets to process the truth in what he's saying about time and intention, before he takes a hairpin turn right back into her disgrace. Though his tone isn't mean-spirited or repulsed, and that helps a little. "No, all ghosts have those. Although they are usually white, not such a gloomy black." Just another way in which she is cursed to look different and more ghastly than everyone else. She sighs. "I have always admired humans, and trolls even more so, for their beauty and grace. Among other things, of course! Their appearance is not the only laudable thing about them, their cultures and social dynamics are so fascinating and complex too." She doesn't feel like she is explaining well at all, but she presses on anyway. "But I think they look so... gentle, peaceful. Nary any claws or fangs or bald skulls in sight." This time when she sighs, it's much closer to a shaky, self-loathing sort of sound. "They have stories about things that look like me. Those are never good stories."

The Doctor makes an involuntary little sound, not quite a fully fledged hmph, more a hatchling really, the remnants of a carefully held back tirade. There's another portion of his hoard of common sense used up, who knows when or where that will be replenished. Humans? Really? "Well. Looks can be deceiving, can't they. Humans are anything but gentle and peaceful, as often as not. And gentle and peaceful isn't all it's cracked up to be, either." He sighs testily. "Do you know, I've met people in my travels who were terrified because of my species. Or just bitterly hateful." To the point of dying, rather than accepting his help, in fact. "It wasn't unjustified. Can't say I wouldn't trade that for claws and fangs." He squeezes her hand, reassuring, humorous, like a conspiratorial wink. She needs it, and he can drape himself with brooding like an antisocial bat in a cave on his own time. There are stories about him, too.

He doesn't ask about her relationship with her own species--her fixation on humans and, what, trolls? Doesn't bode well for that line of inquiry, as he well knows. Wonder which one's the more typical example, her or her brother? He thinks he could guess the answer to that, if he tried. "I promise you, there are places where you wouldn't cause so much as a batted eye. I've been to most of them, been run out of a few. So I know."

His opinion of humans sounds rather cynical and she has to wonder what he's seen to think of them that way. Humans may not always be the best at kindness and cooperation, but they handle many challenges admirably. Though that isn't really the crux of her self-disgust anyway. And it seems she isn't as alone in that as she had thought. Her heart grows even heavier to hear that he has encountered the sort of reactions she has so far only dreaded but never experienced herself.

"For what it is worth, and I know it may not be much...," she offers, squeezing his hand in return, "you have been very kind to me. I find it hard to imagine that treating you with fear or hatred would be justified. And whoever did so missed out on a lovely friend." At least, others shouldn't be afraid of him unless he means them to be. He did seem rather imposing earlier, when she told him about her brother. And he broke his promise, but that turned out much less awful than she'd anticipated and he has done a lot to make up for it.

She knows there isn't much else to say, and that she isn't likely to make a difference to him, but she had to try. Next she wants to ask about those places he's been to; they sound quite unbelievable and hearing a story or two would distract her a little. Perhaps he'd like telling them, too. There is something else she's been wondering about for longer, though. "You said you aren't the species you appear to be. Do you perhaps choose a different appearance to be less frightening?" That suddenly seems like a very forward thing to ask and she hurriedly amends, "I don't mean to pry! Only, that is what I did when I met another soul here before. I wish I knew why I am unable to do so this time."

She can't possibly know enough about him or about his universe at large in so short a meeting that she can say that with any certainty, but it's a nice thought. Very charitable. Hard to imagine she'd keep that outlook if she knew any better. Which, if she weren't a ghost, she might get to--she certainly falls into the dispossessed category, someone whose life probably can't get much worse. Sadly she's on the wrong side of doomed now.

Her next question nearly startles a laugh out of him, despite his gloomy thoughts. If he chose this appearance to be specifically less frightening, he grievously miscalculated. Not that it's as straightforward as all that, it isn't like he picked it out of a catalogue and got the eyebrows as a complementary gift. "I am exactly the species I appear to be, just not human. There are differences, if you know what to look for, quite a lot of them actually. But not obvious. There's a lot more to being frightening than physical appearance." That's not even an aspect of it, generally speaking. The universe is vast and diverse, and for all that she has some awareness of other cultures she's still very insular in her outlook. But enough about him, problem-solving is more interesting. "Perhaps the representative animals are forcing us all to represent ourselves truthfully," he offers, though it's not exactly a hypothesis he can test.

Tender Lumplings Everywhere, Life's No Fun Without A Good Scare [Open to All]

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