applesaucedream | Ark Awaits [open to multiple]

Current Music: September 21st - 28th

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Ark Awaits [open to multiple]

He is awake.

He doesn't have a body, and he remembers dying - again - he remembers slipping out, Tim unable to keep him there in spite of his hardened insistence that he wasn't going to let it happen, he remembers all of that, but he can't account for himself now. All he knows is he's awake.

Jay clings to that awareness as hard as he can. He doesn't know where he is, if it's a where at all, if he's alive or if this is just the suspension of afterlife, but he's still conscious, he's still him. Formless and adrift in the void. No arms to reach, no hands to grasp, but he tries, tries to stretch out fingers and hold onto something, even if it's just the continued knowledge of self, of me, Jay, I am Jay Merrick, and no one is going to miss me.

Even as an abstraction he can't escape his bent toward bleak self-deprecation.

There's something pulling at him - or maybe he's the one pulling, hauling himself into a defined space, someone else's space, still abstract, but not formless. He knows this sensation. A dream. He's dreaming. Or someone else is dreaming. He's just a stowaway.

Easier to hold a shape in a dream, though, and it doesn't take long before the memory of a body fills in the gaps, and there he is again, eyes that see, senses more or less intact - looking down at his arms, his hands, his legs and feet. Hand over his face and through his hair. All here. One piece.

He looks up, focus drawn naturally to the dreamer.

[Jay is free-falling through the dreaming, and if you want, he can get scooped up into your dream! The 21st is the current IG date at the time of post, but feel free to date your entry later as that changes. Will add a closing date at some point, when I have that figured out.]

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Jay is frozen, pinioned where she reaches out to lavish these little maternal affections on him, what is happening, what is this. He wants to resist, push her hand away, correct his name and demand what the hell is going on here, but he keeps himself steady. He lets her guide him, watching the little boy scamper off with wide, darting eyes.

She's dreaming, and it's a real dream, a regular dream, where you remember people wrong, recast them in your head. She thinks he's her - her son.

He wants to run, not after his apparent brother, but away, he wants to claw his way out of this. This is awkward and awful and he can't play this part, he can't.

But there's nowhere else to go, he got pulled in here and he can't just leave again.

"I, um..." he says softly. Should he shatter the illusion? Should he play this part? What does he do?

Lying comes naturally, even if he was never good at it. "I'm not... feeling very well," he mumbles.

He's being unusually subdued, and Greta's brow is already furrowing in concern when he makes his excuse. "Oh." Oh, dear. She hopes he isn't coming down with anything - and not just because one of his chief household contributions is entertaining the little one, and woe betide the rest of them if Jack's not up to the task.

"Well, you can have a lie down when we get back," she says, resisting the urge to check for a fever right there on the street. That, she suspects, really would be too much as far the lad's dignity is concerned.

At least it's not a long walk back to their shop. Greta keeps half an eye on her son, who is the very picture of exaggerated dejection as he maintains his half-block lead, and half an eye on Jack. A few friends call out to her, and she does spare a smile and a wave for a woman in a green headscarf engaged in animated conversation with the smith. Then her son is dragging his feet into the shop, fully rebuilt after the Giant's rampage, with the addition of a small barn for Milky White (who, since her reanimation, doesn't show the least inclination towards dying again).

The lot next door spent a year or two in conspicuous, stubborn neglect before the Girl decided someone ought to do something with it, and that she wasn't afraid, and it has since become a stolidly normal vegetable garden. The Girl's working there, now, and Greta's son soon appears out the side door, flings himself onto her back, and proclaims, "Jack's boring today."

Best leave them to it. Greta steers Jack into the cool, sweet-smelling interior. "How are you feeling?" she asks, checking for fever or any obvious signs of ill health now that they're out of public view. "Could you eat something?"

He walks with her because there's nowhere else to go. He feels a slow compression on his chest, tightening with every step, the encroaching domesticity feeling like little more than a trap he's sinking into. Why is he letting this happen? Why is he letting her believe this?

How does he explain that he's dead, that she should just forget him, that he's not the son she probably left behind?

"I - I'm okay," he stammers as she fusses over him, once they're inside the strange little cottage. "I'm just really tired."

He hesitates, looking at her, eyes searching hers. Surely she'll figure this out. She has to, somehow. He can't be that much like her son. He's not a good son. He lost touch with his parents so quick after college, never answered their calls (it wasn't safe) never went home for Christmas (it wasn't safe). He doesn't deserve this now, this affection that isn't rightfully his.

"I could eat," he murmurs, because it seems simpler.

The look he gives her pulls her up short. She meets his gaze just as searchingly, a little baffled by its intensity, uncertain of what it means. She knows what he looks like when he's fibbing: he can never meet her eyes. This is different, like he's waiting for her to offer him something else, something specific that she can't guess.

She's forgetting something. What is she forgetting?

There's a faint shriek of laughter from the garden, and she shakes her head, dismissing the thought. He's hungry; that's the important thing. If he didn't want food, she'd be more inclined to worry. "Come on," she says, leading him through the shop and into the little kitchen beyond, setting her basket on the counter and pulling out a chair in passing. "Sit down, and I'll make you something."

For a terrifying moment he thinks she's gonna figure it out, he's going to shatter what is clearly a very nice dream, and he'll have to explain that he's dead now, for good this time. But she seems to recover, and then she's back to leading him around, lulling him along. This is better. Just let this happen. It won't last forever.

He sits where invited, pulling the chair in and sitting stiffly, uneasily. He can't stop looking around the kitchen, taking in how absurdly real it is, the smells and textures, everything perfectly rendered - the shared dreams he's experienced before are no different, but this feels different somehow, this is a private dream he's just invaded.

He refocuses his attention on Greta, his stomach twisting, questioning his conviction to keep the truth from her almost as soon as he's arrived at it. Which is crueler, to break the illusion, or to let her have this temporary peace? He's not a good judge.

Soup, she thinks. That's what you give someone when they're not feeling well. She looks down at the bowl of soup in her hands, and she doesn't entirely remember preparing it, but that's how it works, isn't it? You lose track of what you're doing, and find it done. That seems typical. She sets the bowl and a spoon before him, gives his hair an absent pat, and goes to carve him a slice of bread.

Once Jack's all set for food, she starts to put away her shopping. "Have you been sleeping all right?" she asks, a little cautiously. She doesn't want to interrogate the lad, but he's never had trouble sleeping before - well, not since those first few months, when everyone had been a bit unsettled, and he'd been missing his mother so keenly.

This is weird this is weird this is so fucking weird, but he manages to cram all that down, just play along, how much harm can this do really, surely less than the harm of breaking it all down. He eats the soup slowly - it's surprisingly good for a dream construct, warm and nourishing or whatever, maybe lost souls get hungry, maybe it's all psychosomatic, who cares.

The question is a bit of a problem, because he can't keep himself from looking up at her, hollow-eyed and dead inside (dead outside too now ha ha).

"Not really," he says. He doesn't know what the real Jack would say. He was never a good actor.

Greta's brow furrows as he looks up at her, his expression haunted. Jack's never looked like that before. He and the Girl both seemed to recover from the whole ordeal with comparative ease. There were occasional sad spells, of course, but they'd tapered off as time went on. Why should he be having troubles now?

Is she forgetting something?

She crosses back to the table, slow and uncertain, feeling his forehead for fever again before pushing her hand up through his hair, a gesture that should feel familiar and instead feels experimental. Should she be doing this? There's a lingering echo of the worry that Jack's getting too old for such active mothering, but there's something else, too. A concern, growing into a conviction, that she's got it all wrong, somehow.

How can it be wrong, though? Everything's just as it should be. They're all here, everyone's healthy and as happy as can be wished. Except for Jack, looking up at her as if he knows things too terrible to speak of, as if he's just returned from a war.

As if he's not Jack at all, or not anymore, because when would her Jack have looked at her like this?

Not that Jack was ever hers to begin with.

Greta's stomach drops, and she jerks her hand back as if she's been burned. "Oh," she says foolishly, glancing around the kitchen and then back down to the boy in the chair. She's forgotten everything, but it's coming back to her, now. Maybe if he'd been standing in a different sort of market, she would have caught on, sooner. But he was here, and she'd just... she'd just wanted...

She sits down heavily in the nearest chair and buries her face in her hands. "I--I'm so sorry."

Aw fuck, what did he do? He sits up a little straighter, bewildered by her sudden shift into distress, and it's a moment before he lets the spoon drop against the edge of the bowl, reaching out tentatively.

"Um," he says. "Greta?" Should he be calling her mom? He can't bring himself to do that. "It's - it's fine, I'm okay. Are you?" After a long hesitation he brings his hand to rest awkwardly on her shoulder.

The reassurances are a bit too late, and she huffs out a mirthless laugh. Perhaps she should be grateful he's been such a good sport about all of this, but for the most part, she's mortified. What must he think of all this - of her?

"Jay," she says. She can't bring herself to look up from the familiar grain of the table, but she gives the hand on her shoulder a pat. "We're, um. We're dreaming, aren't we?"

Fffffffff. His hand stiffens under hers. Well so much for not breaking everything. He always breaks everything.

"I'm sorry," he blurts. "I didn't mean to, I mean - I'm not supposed to be here, I didn't want to-" He shakes his head, his free hand going up to dig through his hair. It was kinda nice when she did it, even if it was weird. No one's been that gentle with him in a long time.

"I didn't mean to mess up your dream," he murmurs. "I know it's private, I shouldn't... I'm sorry."

He's getting so good at apologizing. Tim would be so proud.

"No," she interjects wearily, because this isn't his fault. Where would the fault even lie, with dreams? Her, because this is her head the poor boy's stumbled into? The Rift, because this wouldn't be happening at all if not for the Rift? She makes herself sit up, takes his hand from her shoulder, keeps it in hers. "It's not your fault." She won't have him thinking otherwise.

She looks around the room again, this kitchen that isn't really hers, that never even really existed. "This isn't real - it never was, I mean," she says quietly. "My son," she indicates the garden with a slight incline of her head and a wince, "was only a baby when the Rift took me. I'd been trying to find Jack - we promised his mother we'd look after him - but..." she trails off and hitches her shoulders in a little shrug. Maybe this is how things would have been, if the Rift hadn't taken her and they'd found the lad and defeated the Giant. But there's no way of knowing, and there's nothing to be done about any of it.

Well, that's nice of her to say, but convincing him is a tall order. Everything is his fault - and more often than not all it takes is him showing up.

"Oh," he says awkwardly, not knowing how to respond to any of that. So the Rift took him from death, Tim from a shit life, and Greta from a newborn fucking baby? That seems disproportionately cruel. "I'm sorry."

What can he say? What is he supposed to do? Should he tell her he's dead now? What would the point be?

Well, maybe to practice that whole thing where we don't lie anymore. Maybe that.

"Listen, Greta..." He sighs, looking dully at his half-finished soup. "I have to tell you something and I, I'm not sure how, um... I'm kind of dead. I mean. I was already dead. Like the Rift brought me back to life." He extracts his hand carefully, wrapping his fingers around the back of his neck. "And it just killed me again. Like for no reason, I just woke up and felt like I was dying, and then I... did." He peeks up at her, trying to gauge her reaction. "I don't know why I'm still here, I definitely shouldn't be in your private dreams, but I... I dunno, I thought you should know... that."

Or something.

Like this won't be even more upsetting on top of what she just told him.

Way to make it all about you, Jay.

... What?

All she can do is gape at him at first, because it seems like such obvious nonsense. How could a dead person come through the Rift in the first place? If it's like falling through a tear, wouldn't there have to be someone to do the falling?

That's to say nothing of the way his little story makes her hair stand on end, or how awful it would be if another of the Rifties she met in her first few days here was taken away - not just sent home, but killed.

"That..." she shuts her eyes and gives her head a dismissive little shake. "No. That can't be right." If Andrew's gone, and Jay's gone, who's next? The Balladeer? Iman? No. "If you're here, then you're not--you can't be dead." She reaches across the table to lay a hand on his arm. He feels as solid and real as anything ever does in dreams.

Perhaps that isn't saying much - this is her dream, after all, so he might only be as real as she wants him to be - but she wouldn't dream this. She wouldn't just come up with such an idea all on her own. This has to be Jay, and that means he has to be alive.

"Well, I..." Her reaction isn't outlandish, in fact it's pretty basic as reactions to death go, but he's still not sure what to do with it. "I'm sorry," he says, ridiculously. "I did die. I felt it. I mean, I felt it... before, and it was like that, again." He reaches out and gives her hand a supremely awkward pat. "I mean, yeah, I'm still here and all, but this isn't... I'm not alive. I can't wake up. This doesn't feel like dreaming, to me, it just feels like... drifting. Like I'm out at sea or something."

Or something. He doesn't know how to explain it. Not really his forte.

"I'm sorry," he murmurs again. "I wish you didn't have to find out like this, or..." Or at all. "I just wish I hadn't made a mess of everything."

He doesn't just mean her dream, of course. But it's that, too, and since that's all she'll have context for presently, it'll do fine as a scapegoat.

So, he's some sort of shade, haunting dreams instead of some real-world location? That's quite a departure, though not a senseless one; the city is too loud and bustling for a ghost to be heard there, she thinks. But it's still not right. He almost sounds like the Balladeer, offering explanations with the awkward simplicity of someone who doesn't appreciate how weird they are.

Greta gives his arm a gentle squeeze, as if to anchor him, or to defy the idea that he might become insubstantial and vanish before her eyes. If this is all that's left of him, it's still something.

"You haven't made a mess of anything," she insists, albeit gently. It's probably just as well that he interrupted this particular dream, anyway; it only would have made her ache in the morning. So will this, of course, but at least it will be on someone else's behalf instead of her own. "There's nothing to forgive." She might add that it was only a dream, but if that's all Jay has anymore, she won't dismiss it.

She pulls in a considering breath - is this a good idea? - before adding, "Listen. I don't know if you can--can control where you're drifting, but if you can find me again..." she ducks her head a little, searching out his eyes, "you're welcome here." If this was a story, she'd think herself a complete fool for inviting a ghost into her head, but he's already here and she doesn't think she's come to any harm. Jay's a good lad. Besides, what's the alternative?

If some part of him is still here, maybe the Rift will restore him again. And if it doesn't, she won't have him adrift and alone forever.

Well he has made plenty of messes, nothing but, but he's willing to accept that this doesn't have to count as one of them. He sighs tiredly and looks at her, managing a nod. She's so damn nice. What does someone so nice want with him?

For a moment he's tempted to take her hand or something, would that be weird? but it turns out to be moot. He feels himself starting to get pulled back, away, somewhere else, or maybe nowhere.

"Shit," he hisses. "It's happening. Uh. If I - I don't see you again, uh, thank y-"

Mid-syllable, he unravels and is gone.

"What?" She sits up a bit straighter, her hand tightening on his arm. What's happening? Is he leaving? For where? "Jay--"

And then he's gone. There's no art to it, no sound, no dispersement into mist; he just blinks out of existence, and her fingernails tap against the wooden table top as her fist closes on the nothingness he's left behind and drops.

She freezes, waiting for something - for him to find his way back, perhaps. But moments pass, and he doesn't. There isn't even any sound from the garden. The house is dusk-dim and quiet, and she is alone.

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Ark Awaits [open to multiple]

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