Can't Stand the Distance, Can't Dream Alone [open to all]

[applesaucemod]

The sleeping rifties might have a difficult time realizing they're dreaming this evening, in part because tonight's dreams are atypically vivid, even compared to the rift's usual efforts. Perhaps that is because it's drawing so heavily from the memories of the dreamers, themselves, and using that information to recreate their home worlds in stunning detail. And that is the real reason the dreamers might not be eager to accept the unreality of the situation: the situation is one that many of them have been hoping for for months or even years. In their dreams tonight, the rifties are going home.

Perhaps they arrive in the same moment that they left. Perhaps months have passed at home, or they might even find themselves arriving before their departure point. But those are small details when compared to the overwhelming realization that they're back where they belong.

They're not alone. Many dreamers will find the rift has given them a companion for the return trip. Well, an uncomplicated return home is probably more than anyone could have hoped for, anyway. And for the unwitting visitor, perhaps another universal displacement will be easier to bear with the addition of a local guide.

[ooc: usual dream party rules apply; all are welcome, and dreamers can remember or forget the events of the dream at the players' discretion. Also at the players' discretion: when their character arrives in their 'home universe,' and how many (if any) locals they'd want to run into.]

Comments

[wentdowntogeorgia]

"I am here because Heaven has fallen."

Apparently, Daniel has forgotten their conversation about how Lucifer is here for family matters and to solve family problems.

"I am here because the only other angels who might still be alive are Michael and Gabriel, and I have no real evidence that they are. I am here because I may very well be the only angel left in existence, and there is someone who is responsible for this."

Someone did this. Someone with power and knowledge destroyed his family, and even if that family had cast him out long ago, he still loved them.

"So no, I'm not here to smell the roses. I'm here to find the person who turned Heaven into a tomb, and I shall take recompense for my dead brothers and sisters from their flesh."

He will do terrible things and feel no guilt for them.

"This is the only justice that they or I will ever receive."

[peacefulexplorer]

"No that, that doesn't follow." He takes a step back despite the crushed vehicle between them, then another. "I know the story. You're an enemy of heaven, of God, of, of whoever else it is left up there. You were thrown out." And maybe he shouldn't be reminding Lucifer of this.

Lucifer. The Devil. He showed him how to take a shower.

Daniel does not want to think about that. He doesn't understand any of it. He doesn't understand his life.

[wentdowntogeorgia]

"Yes, I know the story. I was there for it."

He remembered the war, he remembered standing on the opposite side of a battlefield from his beloved brother. He remembered that brother taking up the sword against him and casting him down and locking him up in Hell.

"Do you think that I didn't love them? Do you think that it would give me joy to see my siblings' corpses? They cast me down and threw me out, Daniel, but they were still my brothers."

Michael betrayed him most and Lucifer still loved him. Gabriel took up a sword against him, and he still loved him, too.

"There has been a genocide in Heaven and someone has to answer for it. As my Father no longer seems to care what happens to us, they will answer to me."

[peacefulexplorer]

"No," says Daniel, stupidly, before he can decide whether or not what he's saying is a smart thing.

(It isn't.)

"No. Whatever destruction you have planned, I'm not letting it happen."

It's laughable, it really is, because what is there he can do against the Devil? But he's evidently pretty near powerless, and Daniel's running on enraged, embittered, caffeinated self-righteousness.

[wentdowntogeorgia]

"As I said before, this is not about you. You have no right to dictate what I can and cannot do."

This is about his family and Daniel has no right to interfere in it. When it's Daniel's family that's just been completely wiped off the face of the universe, then he can decide what the proper course of action is.

Lucifer turns from the wreckage of the car, then; this conversation is over.

"Thank you for the coffee," he says, "and you're welcome for the use of everything below your neck."

And he starts walking. He made it this far on foot; he can go a few hundred miles more.

[peacefulexplorer]

Daniel realizes distantly that he's shaking. He's shaking, and Nick - Lucifer - has decided he's not wasting further breath over. Does Satan have breath? Daniel doesn't want to know the logistics of that.

He sinks to the ground, breathing heavily, pressed against the crumpled side of the car. It takes until Lucifer is little more than a darkened dot on the horizon for Daniel to remember his phone and grope for it. Dispatch. He needs to call dispatch.

And then Daniel wakes up, shivering, panting, the image of a body splayed against the floor seared into his mind. And also - a bag. There's a little fist-sized bag in his hand. This doesn't make any sense; why would he have a bag. It's not like he makes a habit of sleeping with bags in hand. And it's not even a normal kind of bag, it's a, a weird-smelling bag with - are those bones in it?

What.