What's Stopping Us From Breathing Easy [Open to All]

[applesaucemod]

Dreamers of Manhattan, you've lucked out. Rather than finding yourselves in some kind of dystopian nightmare, you'll end up in a series of formal gardens on a lovely day, the air filled with birdsong and a cloud-scattered sky arching overhead. Some of the gardens look a bit wilder than others, in an artful sort of way, but it's clear that all of the gardens are well kept and frequently tended. Aside from each other, dreamers aren't likely to run into any creature larger than a rabbit. True, there are no actual exits - every doorway or arbor leads to another garden - but that's hardly a problem. It's beautiful, it's safe... what could go wrong?

Well, that depends on the dreamer's honesty. No uncomfortable truths will drop unbidden from anyone's mouths like last time, but the dreamers will find that any time they attempt to lie or prevaricate, they'll be beset by a sneezing fit. A tiny lie by omission might only prompt that uncomfortable feeling of an impending sneeze; a larger, more significant (or more stubborn) fib will lead to a sneeze attack so crippling that the dreamer might just need to sit down for a minute.

You could try to pass it off as allergies, if you could get the words out without making everything worse. But while telling the truth is not compulsory, lying is punishable - and pretty well obscured - by sneezes.

[OOC: Usual dream party rules apply. All are welcome to participate regardless of whether they've been apped in the game or not. Dreamers can remember or forget the events of the dream at the players' discretion.]

Comments

[grabme]

"Not really," he says, almost wistfully, then fearfully because, yes, he remembers, he did get to see outside, quite a vast ways outside from the most spectacular aerial view anyone possibly ask for - from space. He sneezes.

"I - yes, all right, maybe a bit towards the end there I got a nice view of the outside but it was vague and they were vague and it was all very - I didn't want to be there at the time, really."

He pulls his arms around himself in a tight hug, hunching his shoulders in an attempt to shrink himself down with a body height that simply doesn't allow any such thing. He'd wanted out, hadn't he, and he'd gotten it, hadn't he. He'd gotten out. He'd been launched out through a portal and sent careening through space - only it hadn't been how he'd wanted out, not at all, and if only he could have apologized to her, told her how utterly and miserably sorry he was maybe, maybe they'd've both gotten out and gotten clean away from Her and could be having a grand old laugh about the whole bloody thing.

"Suppose this is better," says Wheatley faintly, looking down at the flower clasped tight between his hands. "Better than being out there, properly."

[wildmage_daine]

Daine's brows furrow for a moment. She doesn't much like to think about the Capitol, from what Peeta's told her of it already. He doubtless likes to think of it even less. It's a pity that such an outwardly nice dream would remind him of it.

Then again, it reminds her a little of Carthak, too. Maybe it doesn't matter what realm you're from; folk in power like to show it off by twisting wild things into neat shapes and orderly rows. Or by putting them in cages.

But there are no cages here. She's fair certain of that; she'd have felt their occupants, elsewise. It's just a garden, not a menagerie.

Still. "I think I'd like things a bit wilder," she admits. As if in response, the end of the tunnel deposits them into a high-walled garden. The stonework on all sides is overgrown with ivy, and the path winds through beds of high-growing wildflowers and the occasional fruit tree. It still looks unmistakably kept, but it's a fair sight less organized than the other gardens she's passed through or flown above. "Like this," she says with a grin, letting her palm drift over the tops of some grassy stems.

[peeta_mellark]

Peeta agrees; wilder reminds him of home - of the District instead of the Capitol. It reminds him of -- but he doesn't go there. An itchy twinge rises in his nose and he rubs it once, absentmindedly. When they emerge in an area that is more overgrown, if only deliberately so, he feels a tension he hadn't realized he'd been carrying fade away.

The garden they've found themselves is encapsulated in green, as if they're in a green-walled room. A soft smile on his face, he steps over to one of the flowerbeds. "Much better." He bends to sniff at a flower he doesn't recognize, but that clearly has not the results of any tampering. It's scent is very faint and clean, and his smile widens.

[wildmage_daine]

"That's called betony," Daine says, dropping into a crouch beside him and gently touching her fingertip to its stem. "At least, that's what we call it in my realm. We used to grow this--" she hesitates, not wanting to say on our farm, and a faint tickle in her throat holds her up for another beat before she concludes, more vaguely, "back home." She sniffs once, absently, as if to goad that near-sneeze into happening. The urge has passed, though.

"Good for headaches," she adds with a little smile. "And nerves."

[centralcore]

Oh well that's no fun. It's pitiful, she can log that away for later, but there's no shock or horror, just grim acceptance. The human has so far eluded Glados' every attempt to unbalance her, and Glados is beginning to tire of it.

"I died," she says curtly. "And I came back. That's the joy of being a machine that feels. It's easy to bring us back. It wasn't even on purpose. Someone flipped the switches by accident. Because he was a moron." She curls her lip in disgust. Still minutely aware of every little facial twitch, even though this is not physically happening. "Humans are very good at being temporary, until they're permanently dead."

There's an itch, somewhere, not like the Itch, but something all the same, pressing around the edges of her awareness, something hard and sharp and painful. Getting into her voice and her - feelings. Ugh. She does not like it. This woman must be causing it somehow, so Glados backs away.

"I should be going," she says coolly. "Other humans to taunt. I'm very busy, you know."

[driftseeker]

To create a machine that feels. It sounds like some kind of sin of science, something that should not be allowed. She is sure Glados would not appreciate the acute spike of sympathy that darkens her gaze, but she finds it difficult to contain regardless.

Perhaps the liminal nature of humanity is a blessing in its own right.

Mako keeps looking at the water.

"Of course," she says quietly. "I'm sorry to have kept you."

[centralcore]

"What a pity," she say breezily. "Ripping holes in things was sort of a specialty of mine - or my facility, I suppose. Now I'll have to build from the ground up. Not like I haven't before, of course. Just usually not this drastic." She heaves a somewhat exaggerated sigh. "That's just how things go."

Distantly it occurs to her that she is making small talk. She should not be able to do this so naturally. It's been a long time since she had to.

She looks at Zagreus and wonders how difficult it would be to kill him with this body. Would it be worth it? Would she be able to gain anything from it? Would it be permanent?

Well, there's a thought. Sort of an experiment. How does death work, in dreams that aren't quite dreams?

"I don't suppose you'd mind holding still for a moment?" she says, and casts about for a sharp stick. "I have a little test I'd like to run. There'll be cake after, remember, I did promise."

[theoldgirl]

"This is a manifestation of the humanoid body I occasionally occupy in the waking plane," she explains patiently, in the practiced tone of someone who has recited this bit of information plenty of times, or someone who is perhaps just in the habit of dispensing information. "I like to interact with linear beings and reality, sometimes. In the telepathic network, of course, I can choose any appearance I wish, or none at all." And sometimes she's a unicorn, but that doesn't seem especially relevant right now.

But now for one of her questions. "You did not seem as surprised by my dimensional transcendentalism as most people, when you came to visit. Is that common in your universe?"

[singthesong]

That explanation makes actual sense! The TARDIS is alien enough that he's not terribly thrown by much of anything she says; why shouldn't she be able to use a human body sometimes in the waking world? The Balladeer wonders vaguely if the box one turns into the human. Like an underwhelming Transformer.

At the question, he shrugs. "Not exactly like that, but time and space get a little fuzzy back home. It wouldn't be the first time a door opened to somewhere different - somewhen, even." He was actually more impressed that the outer doors opened to the same room in the same ship every single time. "Anyway, I can get a sense of people when I'm near them, and you did not sound like a small inanimate phone booth."

What she did sound like was something that might make his brain run out his ears if he tried to listen too closely. So he's been avoiding that!

[singthesong]

You don't have to be a genius at reading people to get the picture here.

The shrinking's not making Wheatley any less of a beanpole, but it's effective in that the Balladeer gets the message. Outside is a sore subject. Ordinarily he prods at those, and it'd be a lie to say he isn't a little tempted. What did happen? But not now.

Instead he shrugs airily, pretending not to notice the depths of misery Wheatley just suddenly sank into. "True. It's better than where I came from too. Once you get used to it, you'll have fun." It seems like something he can promise. That's how it worked out for him. Manhattan is a utopia compared to back there, even with the Rift and ROMAC and all of it.

[grabme]

"Fffffun," he says, stretching the word out experimentally like it's a concept foreign to him. It is, in a manner of speaking. Fun. Fun. Shooting up through those tubes riding the way to Her chamber had been fun - at least up until the point the slope changed and he came bouncing back down again. He can't imagine fun being a thing that one has all the time.

"Right," says Wheatley sheepishly, scratching the back of his head with one hand. "All part of a proper adjustment routine, is it? Can't be that difficult, can it. Adjusting's my middle name. Ol' Wheatley the Adjuster, they called me - " He sneezes, and hastily amends, "or, well, they didn't, actually, but they would have if they'd known, I'm sure - " And he sneezes again.

[theoldgirl]

Hmm, she supposes that's a reasonable explanation, and she wouldn't mind hearing more about this universe of his, apparently operating rather a bit differently from her own. But she likes the part where people are amazed and speechless by her interior dimensions, what a pity.

Her slightly dubious expression turns decidedly more surprised by his additional revelation, eyebrows rising in confusion. Hadn't she just met a human with a sort of advanced sense that offered them more information on her existence than they ought to be able to handle? This is highly unusual. Or perhaps more usual than she'd like, if she finds any more of them. "And what was it you... heard about me?"

[singthesong]

"Nothing too specific!" he hastens to assure her. "It's not really my business. I just knew you were alive, and...old, I think."

It doesn't occur to him not to guess at a lady's age; to him, being old is hardly a bad thing. Her song must be long and beautiful. In the end he suspects it might be more than he could handle. Yet another good reason not to pry! "I only get impressions most of the time, unless I try for more."

[theoldgirl]

Privacy concerns weren't really why she was looking slightly perturbed just now; it's a concept that hardly ever occurs to her, neither for herself nor for those whose minds she reads and whose lives she observes. So his reassurance is met with a somewhat blank look, but his guess at her age is endearing in its naivety and an amused smile tugs at the corner of her lips.

"Very old," she confirms, "Which is why you had better not try to sense more. My existence has been very very long and highly complex, and I would hate for it to cause you harm." One painful situation like Johnny's is bad enough.

[theoldgirl]

Ah yes, that resigned disappointment is a very familiar mark of everyone trapped in this wretched little spot of spacetime. The TARDIS nods in sympathy.

"I'm called the TARDIS. I have been here for several months." And thoroughly sick and tired of it. "But my pilot and I will find a way to manipulate the rift and return everyone home," she adds dutifully, though with slightly less conviction than she used to proclaim this. The more time spent in this universe and the more vexing the rift's effects are getting, the harder it is to hold onto hope. But hope is all the Doctor and her have ever had, so it will do now, too.

[ecks]

"No," she says, not particularly bothered by his objection to the concept. No one else has yet proven willing to use her book, but once it's complete things will be different. "It can't be. There have always been rules; we only need to find the right rules. If I write rules that are good and complete, then I'll always know what I should do."

[omnomnom_feels]

"N--shyuu!" Rashad frowns at the resurgence of his inexplicable reaction to something in the air. It passes as quickly as it came, apparently done as soon as he stops speaking. "At times," he says cautiously. "Dependent on circumstances and one's own abilities."

He pauses now at then as he speaks, expecting the sneezing to start again. It does not. "I have not learned it," he admits.

[biscuit_powered]

"Will you?" Asmodia's attention is sharp enough that she forgets for a moment to be self conscious. "Only -- I shouldn't be here. I know none of us should be here, but I -- I really shouldn't be here, and you're the first person I've met who hasn't already given up."

Don't think she didn't pick up on that 'I'm called' and 'my pilot' business, TARDIS. Something's not quite normal here, but she'll give it a moment to shake out on its own.

[deadeyedchild]

"I..." Jay narrows his eyes slowly. "I don't think that's..."

Is this really a fight he wants to pick?

He raises his hands slowly. "Look, good luck with that," he says flatly. "I should probably go. Okay?"

He's not quite sure why he's asking permission.

[centralcore]

How utterly unsatisfying. She huffs softly, looking around as if hoping to see someone more helpful. There is no one within the mediocre radius of her eyeline.

"Spectacular," she sighs, rolling her eyes intensely and finally plopping down next to him in moderate defeat. "What, then, are we meant to do? Just SIT here and WAIT?"

[singthesong]

The Balladeer chuckles wryly. "Trust me, I know better than that." It's not malevolent, if one could use that word for whatever crawls around in Johnny's skull, but it's big enough that he's sure he doesn't want to deal with it. No sense in being reckless.

"Besides, it's much better getting to know people by actually talking to them. I didn't have too many chances to do that before the Rift took me."

[ecks]

"Okay?" she parrots back at him, unsure of the meaning. If he must go, he must go, though it's disappointing to lose a new friend so soon. He doesn't even appear to be a murderer. "Can you tell me how to return home from here before you go?" she asks.

[omnomnom_feels]

"I usually do so," he admits. "It is highly unlikely anything irreparable will happen to my body while I am away. Did you leave your body in a safe place?"

Her body, he thinks, is much more capable of sustaining irreparable harm. He keeps that thought to himself. He also keeps to himself the thought that this dream was much more pleasant before her arrival. "This dream is unusually pleasant," he says cautiously.

[deadeyedchild]

"I..." He hesitates. "I don't kn-"

He feels the sudden intense itch of a sneeze and cuts himself off irritably. "You just have to wait," he says, "until we all wake up."

Well. Apparently that's the truth. Comforting.

[ecks]

"Oh. I can do that." It's a pleasantly simple instruction, if somewhat unsatisfying. And harmless, as far as she can tell. She glances around, then back at him. "Where should I wait?"