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

The woods are full of soldiers. Melanie knows it. There's no obvious sign of them, of course, but there wouldn't be - light and sound and smell and heat are all things that attract hungries, so any well-equipped group of soldiers would have ways to avoid all of those things. They'd be wearing e-blocker and night-vision goggles and special clothes that keep the heat in, and they'd be very, very quiet.

Melanie is being quiet, too. She's crouched between the roots of a sprawling oak with twisting branches, listening for the tell-tale scuff of a boot in the undergrowth, when a quiet voice beside her says, "They want to do experiments on us again."

It's so familiar a voice - and so familiar a thought, one that just ran through her own mind - that Melanie is more startled than afraid. She half expects to see another hungry child when she turns toward the speaker, perhaps one of her old friends from class. But the speaker isn't a hungry child, or a child at all. It's a small, red fox. A talking fox.

Dr. Caldwell would probably want to slice up a talking fox's brain, too. Melanie doesn't blame him (it sounds like a him) for being frightened. She's a little surprised to find any animal so close to her, though, and she cautiously holds out her hand so the fox can sniff it. (That seems like what Dickon would do. Melanie herself is a stranger to befriending animals.)

The fox doesn't sniff her hand. Instead, he presses the top of his furry head up against her palm, and then climbs into her lap as if it's the most natural thing in the world. Melanie wraps her arms around him automatically, astonished as she is. It just feels like the right thing to do.

There isn't even the faintest rattle from her box. Eating this little creature would be so incredibly, obviously wrong that even the hungry part of her doesn't dare to float the idea.

"What's your name?" she whispers, even as she lifts her head to listen for soldiers.

The fox swivels his ears, listening as well. "Nikolaos," he whispers back. Then, after a pensive beat, "I think we're meant to look after each other."

Melanie nods, and strokes her palm down the fox's spine. "I think you're right."

At least this time Peter isn't being a complete ass about it and trying to ditch his daemon or something equally idiotic. He and Cascia are sticking close together -- even if the memory of her hadn't resurfaced the moment they saw each other, both can sense in the other the need to stick close and take care of one another. Peter can hear both their -- both his -- breaths as they peer into the darkness, stumbling through the woods in a hopeless search for somewhere safe. What's stalking them can see them a mile off, and they'll never see him until he's on them, until he sinks he fangs into Peter's neck. Peter has no hope of hiding from him, no hope of outrunning him. He can practically hear the monster chuckling to itself as it watches, toying with him, waiting for the moment when it will finally pounce.

A twig snaps, and Peter and Cascia both jump. Peter twists around to face the source of the sound, breathing fast. Cascia, on the other hand, falls right over, muscles stiff and legs sticking straight out.

Edited 2014-10-31 06:32 (UTC)

Under other circumstances, Sunshine would be really, stupidly glad to see her bee again. It's just hard to appreciate the reunion when she's terrified for her life. And when said bee is, at best, completely frigging useless.

"It's not my fault I'm diurnal, Rae," Modomnoc mutters balefully from her shoulder, where he's clinging tightly to her shirt. "I can't see shit out here."

"You don't have to see shit," she pants back at him as she runs through the trees. "I can see plenty. It's just that if that thing comes after us, you're not going to be able to do anything but, what, fly blindly into the nearest tree and--" she dodges around one such tree, "--knock yourself unconscious?"

There's a huff from her shoulder region. "I could sting someone."

Sunshine ducks behind a mossy boulder to catch her breath. "More than once?" she asks dryly.

"… Probably. I don't know, I've never tried it."

"Of course you haven't." Sunshine shoves herself away from the boulder's rough surface and breaks into a run once again. She makes it about ten yards before she collides with another person. Modomnoc is jostled off her shoulder and tumbles gracelessly into the leaf litter, and Sunshine lets out a shriek.

Vince Noir is not especially surprised to find himself in a dark and mysterious forest, nor indeed particularly alarmed, despite the fact that it's a right proper skin-prickling sort of place with all sorts of creepy shit lurking in the shadows. He grew up in the jungle, after all! (at least he's pretty sure he did) And he can talk to animals, and he's pretty much used to wandering into strange places. How boring would life be if he didn't sometimes wander into mysterious magical shops, or accidentally find himself down the Amazon, or shift into the astral plane? You've gotta roll with these things.

He's definitely not dressed for foggily ominous forests, though, and he hitches his thin brocade jacket (embroidered with Stevie Nicks' actual hair, how cool is that?) a little tighter around his skinny chest. 'Wish I'd brought a scarf, at least,' he mutters to himself.

Or not to himself, as it's at that point that he catches sight of a whirring point of jewel-brightness in the dim, and grins widely. A hummingbird! 'Awright,' he greets it with a little jerk of the chin, feeling somehow quite cheered by its presence. 'What you doin' here? Doesn't seem like the sort of place you'd like to hang out, all this doom and gloom.'

The hummingbird comes to a halt in front of him, hovering about in front of his face, bobbing up and down, never quite still. 'It's not,' they agree. 'Like a cheap haunted house; tacky.' Flicking their little needle of a beak, the hummingbird darts up for a moment, looking about. 'Chuck a few strings of them fairy lights around, maybe a few drapes, liven up the colour scheme; cheer the place up no end.'

'Genius!' Vince exclaims, grinning a megawatt grin. 'You're right and all.'

But before he can expand further on the subject, the hummingbird gives an alarmed cheep, and divebombs his shoulder. 'Shit! Vince, get down!'

'Oi!' Vince protests, but drops anyway, dead into the bracken and leaf-mould of the forest floor, landing flat on the chest with his hands braced on the ground. He is gonna go spare if this jacket gets dirty. 'What?' he hisses.

'Dunno,' mutters the hummingbird. 'Thought it mighta been that mad green geezer again with the box, but... nah, 's nothing there.'

Green geezers or not, Vince's attention is now thoroughly occupied by the hummingbird, and he frowns at it. 'Hold up, hold up, how'd you know about that? Come to that, how'd you know me name? Pretty sure I've never met you before.'

If a hummingbird were capable of furrowing its brow, this one would be doing so. '... Huh,' they say after a moment, 'I dunno. Now that is well odd. 'Sawright, though, innit?'

And, because Vince does somehow feel like he knows this tiny, exterior-decor-minded little bird, it is. Flat on his stomach in the undergrowth with the damp soaking through his t-shirt, he gives them a little grin. 'Yeah, I reckon. You got a name, then?'

'Slightly,' the hummingbird announces after a little pause, like they've got to think about it, and Vince nods decisively. Slightly. He likes it.

((Note: Vince's daemon is genderless and takes they/them pronouns, for reference. They're a sort of nonexistent mashup between this and this))

Edited 2014-10-31 03:08 (UTC)

There is something watching him.

He knows there is. He knows it. Something - beyond the range of peripheral vision, beyond what he can perceive - is behind him or above him or on some different plane, prickling at the back of his neck and chilling his lungs. It's watching him.

There are too many places to hide here and too many ways something could leap out at him. The trees are all too tall, too wrong, with thickly spread-out canopies that block out any means of celestial navigation. There's the occasional breeze, the hiss of leaves and twigs rustling, but none of it does anything to put either of them at ease.

There is something watching him.

Daniel doesn't like being watched by things he can't watch back. Aliyah doesn't either, but she elects to say nothing about it other than to emit a low, nervous rumble in her chest. The glare of her white fur is at least highly visible even in the trees' long-cast shadows, a constant and reassuring reminder of her presence.

She stiffens for the third time in what feels like the last few minutes, prompting Daniel to do the same, but nothing confronts them, no great and terrible monstrous thing comes bowling out at them from the underbrush. For a minute Daniel's tempted to relax - as much as he can in these circumstances, anyway. But immediately after, Aliyah's ears flick up and her already dilated pupils widen even further. Daniel sucks in a tense breath and holds it. He can't hear anything.

Aliyah can.

Something's coming. Possibly something bad.

Two wolves pass between the trees at a brisk, mile-eating trot. Daine and Coromotto are on the move.

It's hard to keep to a trot when they both want to run, but until a clear threat presents itself, it makes the most sense to keep to a pace that they can both keep - all night, if necessary. Still - in part because Coromotto's legs are longer than hers - Daine occasionally has to lope a few paces to remain by his side. At least they're both here, together. That's some comfort.

A twig snaps, and Daine and Coromotto halt in unison, ears swiveling toward the sound, noses scenting the air. Anything? Daine asks silently.

Coromotto doesn't answer. She's close enough that she can feel the low rumble of a growl in his chest. Flicking her ears back, Daine wrinkles her muzzle in a snarl, ready to either bolt, or fight.

Something doesn't sit right, exactly, the sudden terror, the dislocation, just what are these woods anyway, where did they come from, all that. If the terror were less pronounced, he might take time to consider these other factors and realize that no, no, this is just a dream, there is no danger here.

"Don't just sssstand there," flicks a voice (and tongue) in his ear, a sinuous, heavy presence making itself known around his shoulders.

"Ohmygoodgracious," he yelps softly, jerking a bit as she coils around to face him. He blinks at her in the dark; a long, intricately patterned royal python. A talking one at that. And actually, now that he considers her properly, not a proper python at all. Something else. Not Daine, certainly not Crowley - something he's never seen before.

"What," he blusters at her. "What are you?"

"What an impolite quessstion," she practically sneers. "Get a move on, you great bloody moron, d'you want him to catch you?!"

"Oh." He doesn't question 'him', or how she knows for sure they're being chased, because there's a great deal of assumption they're both already operating on, and who is he to argue with his snake comrade? It's not like this isn't uncomfortably familiar territory, in a way.

He breaks into a sprint, or as close as he can get to one in the dark and treacherous woods, with a giant snake tangled around his upper body. She squeezes a little tighter around him to hold on, and he finds, curiously enough, that he doesn't mind it. It's like they know each other, have known each other, for lifetimes.

"I'm Aziraphale," he tells her, already out of breath.

"I know," she sighs. What an extremely put upon snake. "I'm Orisa. Keep running."

"Who's out there?" He throws a look over his shoulder and doesn't see anything, but that doesn't matter, not with the relentless dread pressing in on him.

"Who do you think?" she hisses.

Lucifer, of course, is the first thing that comes to mind. He doesn't like the idea of running, but there's something that makes him feel he must, that press of fear and danger. He has to keep moving. Has to find Crowley.

His body drags to a halt; out of bloody shape as usual, and he doesn't want to draw attention to himself by using his powers to move around. Especially not flying blind, so to speak. He braces himself on a tree to catch his breath while Orisa winds impatiently around him, hissing and peering around them.

"Aziraphale," she says urgently.

"I know," he pants, "I-"

Something snaps just near them and they both freeze, lifting their heads in unison to stare. Someone's out there. Someone's coming towards them.

It is not yet the Day of the Dead, but on All Hallow's Eve the veil is thin enough that La Muerte can pass through these woods. Carefully, she scatters marigolds and sugar skulls, adding brightness and beauty to such a foreboding place. High in the clouds above her, a resplendent quetzal flutters above her. In the thickest part of the woods, he comes down to roost amongst the candles of her hat.

"Ay, so dark," she murmurs. With a flick of her wrist, the candles on her hem perch in different branches, offering a glow of safety for weary wanderers.

La Muerte hears a whisper and smiles, shaking her head. "Don't be afraid. I won't hurt you. Come here in the light."

It's easy enough for Aly to adjust her Sight so that her vision is as good as a cat's. The darkness worries, but doesn't frighten, her. No, it's what's out there in the dark that Aly is concerned for. The woods whisper and skitter in ways that remind her of spidrens and gryphons, all sharp and foul. She's clever enough and deadly enough against normal humans; it's the Immortals that worry her. The beasts are big and deadly and she's only one small mortal.

At last Angeron, dear dear crow, is on her shoulder. Reassuringly, he preens her hair and whispers contingency plans into her ear with Trick. Between the three of them, she knows, they're clever enough to find a way. If only Angeron could fly away without making them feel ill, then they'd truly be able to get a lay of the land and learn how to proceed.

"Angeron, my dear," Aly whispers, running a finger down the back of his glossy wings, "I do not like this place."

"Nor do I, Aly-child," Angeron agrees, tucking a lock of hair behind Aly's ear with his beak.

It is pitch black and Julian is alone in the woods, and yet neither of these things explains the pure terror that is running through his being. He is afraid, deathly afraid, but he can't remember of what, and that might be the worst part of all. He has no weapon, no comm badge, no landing party team... there was no memory of arriving here, of a 'before.' All he knows is that his heart rate is elevated, his breathing erratic, and that he has an intense desire to hide. But where?

"Just keep moving. Makes you harder to catch, harder to find, harder to kill. Just keep moving until we find someplace that feels safe," a voice whispers near him. Something brushes against his leg, and Julian reaches out a hand to run his fingers through the soft fur as if it were second nature. "Agamede," he murmurs, the name coming. "It's you." Even though Julian can't quite remember how he knows her, the dream in which they met floats somewhere in the back of his mind and along with a sense of calm. The fennec fox snuggles up closer to him, and he doesn't question her company with him here in these strange woods. He is whole with her. "Run," Agamede reminds him. "Or they...it? Will find us. I don't think we have any more time. They're close."

Edited 2014-10-31 05:20 (UTC)

These are not the woods at Thornfield. These are no woods Jane remembers. She is alone, and afraid, and without a cloak to guard her against the cool, bitter mists. She wraps her arms around herself and stands stiff and straight, staring into the pale dark. Where is she?

Something else is here with her, she realizes, very near, just behind her. Her breath shudders to a halt, then slips out between her lips, a haze disappearing quickly into the air.

"Jane," the voice rumbles out slowly, giving her a start. She presses a hand to her breast but does not turn. There is something ethereal, unhuman about it, low to the ground, deeper and greater than the voice of a man. And yet, she is not quite afraid, at least not of the speaker. Once she's over the initial fright, it's rather a relief to have someone at her side.

"Who's there?" she murmurs.

"My name is Adeodatus," he says. "I believe we were meant to meet."

Something presses into the palm of her hand, the one hanging at her side; cold and wet, like the nose of a dog, surrounded by a matching muzzle of thick hair. She tenses but does not flinch away. The creature is not here to harm her; in fact, touching him feels quite safe.

At last, Jane turns around to face him.

Adeodatus is a beast, as she had suspected, though not a dog, but a bear, medium-sized, coming up just to her hip when on all fours, his fur so deep a brown it is almost black.

She knows she should be afraid to see him so close, but still, she is not. It is everything else in this foreign wood that frightens her; not Adeodatus. He is her companion; she is almost willing to say a part of her soul.

"Adeodatus," she says softly, crouching down to put her arms around his head. "I'm so very glad to meet you."

"The pleasure is mine," he says. "Only I think we had better keep moving. This forest is not safe." He presses his snout against her shoulder. "You must get on my back. I will be able to carry you faster. Hurry, dear Jane."

Quiet and grateful, Jane nods and pulls herself up to the bear's back, sitting behind his jagged shoulder blades. She grips his fur in little fistfuls as he takes her swiftly through the woods.

The woods seem to go on forever, and Dana is hopelessly lost. There's something out here in the dark with her, and part of her suspects that her double, that thing with her face, is waiting and armed and ready to destroy her. She can't know this for certain, and she wants to calm down and try to reason her way through this, but Teotimus isn't helping.

Every little sound, every crack of branches or crunch of leaves sets the little galago off, and he leaps from her shoulder to a nearby tree, to another tree and back to her again in the space of two seconds.

"We should keep moving!" he urges in a whisper, looking around in the dark for a way forward. His pupils are huge now, able to see well in the gloom, and his ears are in constant motion trying to identify the sounds of danger. "It's not safe to stand still, we have to go!"

"Teo, wait," Dana hisses, but he takes off anyway, springing up into the branches and forging ahead too fast for her to keep up. She staggers after him, panic rising in her chest because she knows, somehow, that it's dangerous for him to go too far away and that it will hurt, it will hurt more than anything. Dana can't see in the dark but she can feel the distance growing between them, and she grows more and more anxious as a few yards stretch towards that invisible barrier that should not be passed, and then--

Nothing.

It's so confusing that Dana stops abruptly and peers up into the trees. "Teotimus?" She asks, daring to raise her voice. He comes bounding back from several yards away and lands softly on her head. They are both of them unharmed. "But I thought..." Dana wonders, and Teotimus leans down to look in her eyes and lay a tiny hand on her forehead.

"I don't know," he replies. "I don't know why, but that's not important right now. Come on." And with that he leaps away again.

"Just don't go too far!" Dana protests, setting off at a jog to follow him.

((OOC: I'm taking a page out of this excellent Night Vale/HDM AU fic and assuming that Dana's temporal-dimensional displacement means that she and her daemon have a witch's range, just go with it))

Johnny knows he's dreaming, barely, but that doesn't make it any better. That almost makes it worse. Whether or not anything is out there, something can hurt him. Something very likely will.

"Fuck," he whispers. Ordinarily he prefers dreams that are outside, but not this place, this place is awful. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

He takes several strides forward, feeling a horrible itch like he's forgotten something, and then a dull ache in his chest which suddenly solidifies into a familiar pang. He catches like he's caught on a string, doubles over, clutching at his chest. He gasps, staring around himself. He remembers this feeling, and as much as it hurts, he's almost glad to feel it. He crawls back, feeling blindly through the leaves and twigs.

"Nova?" he says, a little hopefully. What was her full name? "Novatiana?"

"Johnny?" whispers a tiny voice near his hand. "Johnny!"

"Hey!" He feels the little rabbit nosing toward him, and he scoops her up and hugs her to his chest. "Hey, hey, I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were-"

"I wanted to say something but I was so scared," she babbles, pressing her soft little head up against him. "I couldn't move!"

"Yeah, I know." He gets to his feet, a little unsteady while he holds her. "It's okay. I've got you." He looks around, trying to find any sign of where to go, but every direction feels dangerous. There are no good goddamn options.

"We can't stay here," she urges. He can feel her little heart beating wildly against his, and he strokes her fur as soothingly as he can. "Please, Johnny, we have to go!"

He starts walking, partly just to calm her, but walking doesn't feel any better, it feels like they could heading for danger instead of waiting for it to come to them. He has a feeling nothing is going to feel safe here.

"I don't like this dream," she whispers.

He rubs his finger gently between her ears. "Me neither. But I'm glad I get to see you again."

"Yeah." She twitches and freezes, causing him to stop short. "Did you hear that?" she hisses. "Something's there!"

Johnny presses back, flattening himself against a tree as best he can, as if this will help. Nova shudders in his hands, both of them endeavoring to be as silent as possible. Please, please, don't let it be something awful, not now, when he finally gets to see her again.

Whose woods these are, Lucifer doesn't know.

As he stands under the heavy canopy-- how did he get here?-- the whole forest seems to be holding its breath, waiting. Like there is something hiding in the shadows that isn't the Devil, something that looks at an archangel and thinks, well, maybe. Something with enough power and cunning on its side to maybe take a stab at something like him, if it has a good opportunity.

There is nothing on Earth or in Heaven than Lucifer fears. Heaven and Earth are not the only places, though, and there are things that can make him wary, especially when all of his senses beyond the mortal ones are muddled and just giving him feelings of vague unease.

Is this Purgatory? Has he just not recognized it?

The thought is interrupted by a shiver in the low branches above him, followed by the prickling sensation of small claws on his vessel's shoulders; there is the sound of creaking wood and he feels a weight slink itself across the span of them, feels the smooth slide of scales against the back of his neck. He turns his head, and in the low light sees a reptilian profile.

"The woods aren't empty," it says. Lucifer finds that he does not mind its heavy warmth or its woodsmoke voice. "Something here is hunting us."

"Us?" Lucifer's head tilts in a quizzical avian gesture. The dragon on his shoulders ruffles its wings in a returning gesture that he recognizes as impatience.

"They call me Rahab," it says, and the name sounds fitting, sounds like something that's his. Lucifer nods and steps quiet through the underbrush. He only knows one way to respond to a threat.

"We'd best find it first."

Peeta's alone in the woods, and there is something out there in the dark after him. He isn't sure what - bmuttations, other tributes, Capitol agents, something worse. Immediately, automatically, his hand drops to his leg, but there's no wound and no pain. His clothes are unfamiliar and clean, not the muddied and torn outfit he'd worn in the arena. This isn't the Games, and he's in a different kind of danger.

And there's something behind him.

Even as Peeta starts to turn, something brushes across his back. At the touch, the terror that has been building inside him melts into a feeling of safety.

"Nilakshi," he breathes, staring up at her in wonder and relief.

"We must move," she tells him, her voice a low rumble.

Peeta nods, the unease he felt before reasserting itself through the momentary comfort he gained from finding Nilakshi here with him. He starts off, having picked a direction at random, with Nilakshi by his side.

Theodore Roosevelt rides his daemon through the woods, and for the first time in his life, he is afraid. There is one bison left on earth, and it is somewhere in these woods, and if he doesn't act soon, someone will kill it before he himself gets the chance.

His mission is clear. He is a hunter, he is at home in the dark. He will be the master of his fear, and he will find and kill his prey. This he knows.

The wind rises, setting branches creaking against each other in a hoarse moan. Theodore suppresses a shudder. He will not be afraid.

"Come on, Sanoba," he says, patting the moose's mighty antlers. "Let's go."

"Zounds! What unspeakable horror from deepest space could be lurking behind the next tree?" The intense whisper comes not from Spiff, but from the creature at his feet. Its name, he has learned, is Ushindi. Under normal circumstances, Spiff would not join forces with a near-stranger, but times are desperate, and he's making an exception.

Spiff double-checks his blaster - already set to 'incinerate' - and mutters, "Whatever it is, it will soon regret tangling with the indefatigable Spaceman Spiff!"

"And the unflagging Ushindi!" the creature agrees, teeth bared.

It's a dangerous place. Or, at least, it feels like a dangerous place. Gabriel stands still on the spot and looks over his shoulder. The only thing he finds is Venia, padding behind him, their head lowered so as to be closer to Gabriel.
He slows and settles a hand at their neck, digging fingers down into brown fur.

"Nice to see you again." He knows this is a dream, but there have been plenty of dreams where terrible things have happened. This may be another of those. He doesn't sense anything out of the ordinary. Other dreamers nearby. A group dream, then.

"Come on, on me," Venia says, nudging him back with a large sharp beak. "We'll be able to run if things get dangerous."

Gabriel obliges, climbing up onto Venia's back, hands gripping onto folded wings as they continue to make their way cautiously through the forest.

Edited 2014-11-01 03:10 (UTC)

[This is Ryslig CRAU Peter. His monster description can be found here.]

Something terrible stalks these woods. A dead creature almost in the shape of a man creeps along the forest floor, his antlers now and then brushing the bare branches of the trees, his hooves sinking into the dead leaves of autumn. His keen vision pierces the night and his ears stand upright, alert for sight and sound of something living. There's stillness within him; his heart does not beat and in the dark of night he does not breathe lest he be heard.

And he's absolutely terrified. His mind keeps conjuring images of the hunters and hellhounds in that doctor's dungeon. He died there and he still doesn't understand how or why he came back, why he had to go through that and couldn't even be set free from his current existence as a result. His ears swivel as he listens intently for the sound of a gun being cocked.

Behind him stalks...a goat. She hasn't spoken to him once since they awoke here together, and for some reason he can't fathom that seems weird to him. He's not feeling chatty right now, though, as he freezes once again to watch and listen in response to some small sound nearby.

It was not her intent to travel here.

This world is dark, full of trees and small and scuttling things. The God-King, the Merciless, the once-legendary ruler of the Primordium, turns slowly and sifts through her surroundings, evaluating the atoms with their simple construction, each molecularized life-thing, the make and build of the tall-arching trees clad in their thick, blackened bark. The silence, evaluated with rigid disinterest, makes no claim of what might be here, only that there are presences here, many and with different purposes.

All of which disinterest her.

Illyria chooses her pathway and walks, unhurried, Pancakes at her heel. She does not recall when her pet materialized beside her, but she pays it no further thought. Her translocation was not achieved by her own doing. This was, incredibly, inconceivably, abominably, done to her.

She will not listen to tree-whispers or tiny things that hide behind her in the dark. She will find what has done this to her. And then she will rend them.

Where the fuck is she? Where the fuck? She looks around sharply, aggressively and helplessly freaking the fuck out. She's on her stomach on the ground, which is all moss and leaves and twigs and dirt, and everything is dark as shit. She scrambles up, breathing heavily, looking around. Okay. Okay. Calm down. Why is she not calming down? She's fine. Everything's fine.

Fuck, no it is not. She's terrified, and she can't figure out why. She wraps her arms around herself and stares around at the endless press of trees, all the way around. Fuuuuck.

"Did we cross over again?" says a voice just above her.

"Holy fucking shit!" she shrieks, jerking to the side, looking up. "Who the fuck was that?!"

"Calm down, god." A bird - a bird - flutters down and settles on a branch opposite her, looking at her. It opens its beak and talks. "My name is Aqil. I'm here with you."

"You're a bird," she says, supremely unimpressed.

"I'm a crow," he replies. "Obviously not a proper crow. But your guess is as good as mine beyond that." He fluffs his wings up. "So, we should probably go somewhere, see if there's anyone around."

Iman stares at the crow. This is it. She's finally lost it.

"Take a picture, it'll last longer," he says dryly. "Are you just going to stand there?"

"Fuck off," she says, turning away sharply and marching stubbornly deeper into the woods. She doesn't look back, but she knows - somehow - that the bird is following her.

"Charmer," he comments after a moment. Iman flips him off and continues walking, sullen, and still very, very afraid.

Being stuck in a dark and mysterious forest quite possibly filled with danger is not new to the Doctor. In fact, he absolutely relishes it. Things are usually too quiet for him, so these kind of dreams let him stretch his legs a bit, even if only his metaphorical, mental legs, and run around a little and get in trouble and meet new people.

Especially considering the TARDIS has been very prickly about letting him out after that little incident with a certain violent archangel. Honestly, he'd barely even broken anything, and had gotten out of it with something as simple as pretending to drown. It had been a lot worse for quite a few others, and he's pretty sure he saved a good amount of lives from merely providing a distraction. He's been keeping a close tab on Lucifer related news since then, but thankfully there seems to have been no more murders or that sort. Either he's cooled down and acting perhaps a little more rationally, or he's had to stay low for his own safety. From what he could tell, there were some who'd been putting up one hell of a fight.

But all those worries are relegated to the back of his mind now. It's time for an adventure, he's pretty certain. And his companion is...

Oh, he recognises them. That shape is actually very familiar, even if it doesn't really exist, at least not in his universe. Which means...

Both him and the winged cat jump a little as they realise they can link telepathically. Ah! Well. He's seeing himself, then. The reflection they see in one another leaves no other possibility, really. He crouches down to pat the cat, which presses up against his touch, so they can communicate more properly and directly.

This must be some kind of dream where a person's essence, their soul for lack of a better word, is made tangible in the form of an animal. The Doctor can tell without having to investigate that while the cat may look cute and cuddly, it's a dangerous and dark animal, a lot more vicious and resilient than appearances would have it. Good.

And while this cat, Theta as it wants to be called, appears to have what most closely resembling a female body, it is, like him, not overly attached to that kind of definition. But since it seems to be the appropriate thing for the dream, might as well call the cat a she, just as the Doctor goes by 'he' out of convenience.

"Well," the Doctor says, once that's all settled and explored, and straightens up.

"Yes," Theta agrees, stretching her wings a little. "Let's explore."

"Agreed," the Doctor answers, and they head off in a random direction, looking for other dreamers, or perhaps something suitably menacing. The dream itself seems very intent on intimidating, but neither the Doctor nor Theta lets it bother them terribly.

So something about this world is just all sorts of creepifying and wrong.

Suppose it could be nothing more than a feeling. After all, most folks would find it more than a little unsettling, being lost in some dark forest where the trees are so thick Mal couldn't even properly make out the sky above so that's absolutely no help in figuring where he might be. Hell, just the whole situation alone would be enough to send certain types into a fit of fright, but Mal spent plenty of his life in far worse places. At least here he is alone, seems to him it's usually people themselves that make most worlds dangerous places for a man to set foot, not a bunch of trees no matter how tall and looming they might appear.

No, it's something more than that. Something 'bout this place just seems naturally unquieting, that's for sure, but what precisely it is Mal can't pin down. Then again, sometimes a man doesn't need more than a gut feeling to know when things are off, and Mal's developed a pretty healthy sense of knowing when there's danger about. Course, suppose it's possible it's nothing more than a feeling. Could be that Mal's just so use to trouble finding him that wandering around some calm, still Forrest is troubling him precisely on account of the fact that no one's trying to cheat, catch, or kill him.

The entire situation is just wholly unnatural, that much is clear.

That would be just about the only thing that is, meaning more than just the general fogginess that seems to have settled over the forest floor creating something of a gloomsome nature and making it hard to see much more than a foot or so in any given direction, not that the scenery seems to have changed much sense he's been walking. And there would be one of those details that Mal's feeling somewhat fuzzy on. When exactly did he start walking. Part of him feels like it must have been days now, that he's just been wandering about endlessly since well before he could remember but then part of him figures that, no, he must have only just gotten here. Not sure on the precise happenings surrounding that, either. Didn't seem to recall Serenity landing anywhere recently, but then she must have because how else did Mal end up with solid ground beneath his feet? And where the gorramn hell is Zoe and the rest of his crew, surely they must be around. After all, ain't like a man can just magically appear planet bound while the rest of his crew is still out in the black. 'Specially seeing as he's the captain and, well, that just ain't right, separating a captain from his ship.

Now Mal might not be the most thoughtful type, but he ain't so absentminded to lose sight of what he's done with his own ship. Yet any attempt made at sorting the mystery out and Mal's thoughts scatter like dust under a ship's engine as she takes off for the sky, and it'll be a while longer before Mal comes back around to them all over again finding himself getting no where at all.

Much like his trekking through these woods, really. For all he knows could be that he's walking around in circles, and how is a man even to know? Hardly be the first time.

It's in one of those moments that Mal's thoughts have all gone drifting that he first realizes he might not be as alone as he thinks.

For a while now the only sounds really breaking the stillness of the forest have been Mal's own footsteps, and who is to say how long his heavy boots crunches leaves up under his heel with every step must have disguised the sound of someone else but while he might be an old man, Mal's got enough solider in him that eventually he hears it; that slight crunch just out of time with his own steps. There is definitely someone else about.

Mal goes completely still, save his hand which lingers right over his gun while he strains to listen for more. If he's lucky than whoever it is hasn't noticed Mal over the sound of their own walking, and in such a place as this it would be easy for the two to pass right by one another without ever having to meet. Now it could be someone from the crew (well, not just anyone. The steps are a bit too careful and sure, and if it were Simon or Kaylee or one of them he's sure they'd be doing something foolish like tripping about making as much noise as they could as to go attracting any bad attention that might be about) or an otherwise friendly face, but Mal's had plenty of learning not to ever go trusting on his luck. What kind of folks settle in a place like this, somewhere so dark and eerie and with that unsettling atmosphere all around; Mal's thinking that whoever chooses to reside here might not be the type who likes social calls, that is all, and no point in trying to make friends were there are none.

The footsteps are definitely closing in, but Mal ain't about to go running off trying to hide. In a place like this such an act would come off sounding like a panic animal in flight and, well, Mal's giving no reason for anyone or anything to hunt him down. No, don't matter what it is coming out of those trees, Mal is going to stand his ground no matter how stupid that choice might end up being, and experience tells him it could very well end up plenty stupid.

Mal's hand stays right at his pistol as a large, familiar shape starts to take form through the fog, and maybe Mal should have drawn by now but before he knows it the figure is closer and closer and then it, too, comes to a stand still, staring Mal down in the few feet left between them.

Maybe it's just all the time he spent growing up on the ranch, but Mal feels like he knows this horse. You could just sort of tell by the way it held itself that it was an old, stubborn stallion, the sort that you had to break in young or you'd never manage at all. He ain't wild, but he's got that shine in his eyes that let's you know that part of him remembers, deep down, that his ancestors use to be, and that while he might be domesticated now it was against his will and nature, at least in part, and he'd never take to being properly fenced up. He might stick around, might even prove to be one of the hardest workers on the ranch when you needed him, but he'd always jump any gate you tried to put up, he'd just resent it too much to be locked away, told where he could roam, and if you wanted him to stay and work you had to learn how to respect that.

Strange, that, Mal considers, how you could just sort of tell that sort of thing about a horse.

"Hey there, old boy..." Mal cocks his head, waiting to see if his voice spooks the horse back off, but he don't expect it to and sure enough the stallion holds his place. Got the feeling, too, that whoever his master might be the old boy is alone for now and in much the same position as Mal. After all, a forest ain't the most natural place for a horse, certainly not a big, powerful one like this. Probably trying to find his way out, looking for a field where he'd be better suited to run free.

The horse snorts, scratching a hoof against the ground in a way that comes off aggressive, Mal recognizes that much, but he ain't exactly posed to charge. Just keeping his guard up, but then Mal can hardly blame the animal. Slowly, not sure if what might go setting him off, Mal moves his hand away from his gun, and just like that the muscles of the horse seem to relax up some, or at least he stops giving Mal such a harsh glare. "Don't suppose you know the way out?" Mal asks, and he could swear on the good Shepard's book that the snort and shake of his head, perfectly natural things for a horse to do, is some kind of actual answer. "No? Well, then, I suspect you're just as lost as I am, ain't ya?"

It ain't so much that the horse nods, but he definitely has an expressive way of moving his head, and just like that he's taking steps forward. Not charging Mal, not even really approaching him, but walking beside him, or at least making the offer. Seeing as Mal is as lost as any man could be, he doesn't see how it could hurt, and honestly he thinks a horse would probably be better company than most of the folks when it came right down to it.

As nice as dark black forests are as metaphors, the practicality of one leaves much to be desired. Not that he's on bad terms with darkness, though trees are another matter altogether; it's just a question of visibility, and ease of travel. And when was the last time Zagreus ever felt...pursued? Hunted even? That's a new one, even for all his paranoia, with some notable exceptions. What lives in woods in his dreams? He could hazard a guess. He gives the woods a disgruntled scan, until his eyes alight on something monstrous, sitting silently where his blind spot had just recently been, and he tenses a bit before recognition sets in. Visual recognition, yes, but also--yes, the spirit creature again. How odd.

"Hello again, Frightful," he says, not unpleasantly, for all the insouciance of refusing to use its name. Truthfully, though it's attempting to be a distressing number of things at once, and not presenting a good facsimile of any, he likes the thing, however begrudgingly and surreptitiously. Even if it is a walking identity crisis, threatening to tip him over into discomfort any minute. The creature greets him with a rough exhaled rumble, the closest any big cat can get to a purr, even a mythical abomination of one. Could be resignation, affection, threat, displeasure--it's a little limited in its expressiveness that way. Otherwise it refrains from any commentary; perhaps having existence sprung on one unexpectedly is offputting.

His identity crisis is currently looking just as uncomfortable and uneasy as he feels, goat ears flicking nervously, otherwise preternaturally still, expecting the worst. Zagreus feels much the same...and yet. Forests are for exploring. No one just stays put, that's not how it goes. And the devil you know is always preferable--time to find it and get to know it, right? With unspoken agreement, they set off, wary and alert.

Well, the Doctor would be holding out for a stegosaurus, personally. Then all he'd have to do is find another person and he could talk about stegosaurus brains, with an actual stegosaurus to point at. The issue of the scary forest would be purely secondary. Yes, it's unnaturally frightening and yes, that's probably something he should be investigating. At least this time he didn't start out in a nightgown. Wait, another telepathically structured dream!

The Doctor is halfway to carelessly kneeling in the loamy dirt, eager to examine anything he can find up close, when he hears loud and somehow impatient wingbeats nearby. Not something in flight, something resettling, or even trying to get his attention, like a throat clearing. It has to be deliberate, an owl like that can have wingbeats so silent they almost wrap back around into being sound again.

Dirt inspections hastily shelved, he approaches the owl on its low branch, feeling compelled, feeling strangely like he should recognise this owl, which is not a common feeling, usually it's people that make him feel this way. Always with these dreams and shoving bits of something very large and complex into a smaller and outwardly simpler package, why is that? Because that's certainly no proper owl, no matter how disgruntled and feathery it looks. Cautiously the Doctor extends his hand to the bird, though it feels quite safe. What an odd thing to dream, putting part of one's self into a bird. The bird steps onto his hand, like it belongs there, like something he'd only set down moments before, intending to pick it up again. Surprisingly light given its size, but then under all the feathers and ferocity it's just bones, after all, and hollow ones at that. "Hello, I'm the Doctor." Very politely he offers the bird his other hand; rather than shake it, the owl gives it a quick nibble, and he pats its head, very carefully, in the way of someone unused to patting things. But this is an okay thing to pat, he can feel it.

"My name is Sraif," the bird says matter-of-factly. Her voice is melodious, though he can hear the potential for raucousness in it. Very incongruous, coming out of an animal that looks so angrily intent. And indeed, the owl seems done with socialising. "Hadn't we better get started?" Fair enough. He lifts the bird on height with his shoulder, where it settles quite impressively, claws only a little uncomfortable. Oh well, this shirt was in terrible shape anyway.

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