It's a Waste of Time, Chasing in the Dark

[applesaucemod]

Tonight, the dreamers will find themselves in a forest. Or an office. Or a suburban living room. Or a castle tower. Or a grocery store. The dream is a patchwork of assorted settings, each one blurring inelegantly into the next, most of them only claiming half an acre or so. The hodgepodge makes for quite a sight.

Or it would, if the dreamers could see anything. Natural light is in short supply. In fact, there isn't any light at all, not even a faint twinkle of starlight; you might as well be deep inside a cave. No matter how good their eyes might be, the dreamers won't be able to see their own hands in front of their faces - not unless they can fashion some sort of light source out of whatever they might manage to find. The dream isn't inclined to make things easy; any appliances or electrical light sources the dreamers stumble over won't be plugged in, and any walls, however solid they might seem, won't contain any wiring. A small fire might be the best bet - presuming you can find any means of lighting one.

But there's good news. Each of the dreamers will find themselves with a second set of dubiously useful eyes, because they'll be joined - again, or for the first time - by their dæmons. Granted, said dæmons won't have much more luck seeing in the total darkness than anyone else, but at least no one will have to feel alone.

Just… move carefully. You wouldn't want to trip over someone else's dæmon by mistake. Imagine how awkward that would be.

[ooc: y'all know the drill. Characters don't have to be apped or in the game to show up, and dreamers can remember or forget the events of the dream at the player's discretion. This particular dream isn't a power nerf - a character with the ability to create light could still do so - but the range will be extremely localized, as if the darkness is a solid thing that doesn't want to be pushed back.]

Comments

[rae_of_sun]

She didn't really expect the question to throw him. Probably because, at least in her universe, it isn't that broad. Sure, there are countless varieties of small magics that come with things like having peri blood - pouring coffee that's always hot, stitching a seam that never unravels - but those are more like singular quirks than full-blown magic-handling (no disrespect to Mary, who is everyone's preferred coffee-pourer for a reason).

But if you have enough magic in your veins to be worth getting registered, the practical applications are pretty much just Other-related. It's amazing how quickly the field narrows when 'whatever you want' amounts to 'not suffering a messy, horrible death, please and thank you.'

Castor's universe, from the sound of things, isn't operating under those... constraints.

"Yeah." She drops her gaze to her hands, and her bee. "That answers it."

Dom looks up at her, as if waiting to see if she's going to offer anything interesting before taking it upon himself. "We're from more of a gritty, war-torn magical dystopia," he deadpans, which earns him an incredulous snort from Sunshine.

"Dystopia?" she repeats. "Gods and frigging angels." Since when did her bee develop a flair for the dramatic? To Castor, she adds, "It's not a damn dystopia, and it's not gritty." Well, some of it isn't. It's not gritty as a rule.

"War-torn, though. You gotta give me that one."

Sunshine briefly entertains the idea of flicking her smug bee right off her lap, but she knows it would hurt her as much (if not more) than him. Instead, she deliberately shifts her focus up to Castor. "We have Others, in my universe. Vampires, weres, 'ubis, ghouls, demons. That sort of thing. Most of our magic-handling is about... dealing with that."

for this tag I'd like to thank Big Al, who also says dogs can't look up

[boneshaker]

He perks up, ridiculously, at the bee's very grim pronouncement.

"Hey, I'm from a dystopia!" he says. He might as well be saying they both own dogs. "And it's definitely gritty."

Persis nips at him, and he flinches and looks down at her, utterly affronted. She doesn't have to speak for him to know exactly what she's trying to communicate. War-torn, asshole. This isn't an oppression pissing match.

He clears his throat and looks back at Sunshine.

"It's, um, mostly just class warfare," he says. "Secret police, government spying on the public, that kind of thing. We, uh, don't really have..." He shrugs. "Well, we got a few, I guess you'd call 'em 'Others'." Who started calling them that? It's so unabashedly, well, othering. He supposes that shouldn't surprise him. It's not like he hasn't seen his share of that. "I mean, there was a genetic mutation a few decades back where people started growing horns. Everyone calls them minotaurs and treats them like second-class citizens, but they're just regulars. And I guess maybe ghosts exist."

"According to some guy you know named Three-Finger Dave," says Persis, sounding and feeling appalled that he is continuing to talk.

"He was right about the last Ikea being a drug nest," says Castor.

"Because he was a dealer!" snaps Persis, and jumps up sharply on his head, digging her little paws into his hair and leaning forward to stare at Sunshine. "I apologize for my dumbshit outer self who can't seem to stop babbling. He is actually extremely curious about these Others. Like 'ubis, what the heck is that?"

Okay then. Persis is taking the reins, which is possibly for the best. He slouches, looking sullen but feeling only mild embarrassment.

[rae_of_sun]

Sunshine could add that her universe has her share of horned people, but that doesn't seem as noteworthy. Being a partblood - to whatever degree - is so commonplace that it only becomes worth mentioning if it actually manifests in some noticeable-in-public kind of way. Like that poor kid who grew tusks in high school; his family wound up moving to another town. It was an extreme response, as they go. Usually it's just a matter of some clandestine plastic surgery, and no lasting harm done. You can only get so worked up about something that's probably lying dormant in the majority of the population, whether it manifests or not.

As far as the real Others go, Persis sure knows how to pick them. Actually, of all the options, Sunshine's probably most comfortable explaining this one. "Oh, like... incubi, succubi. They're kind of, um, subtle. You don't really notice them so much as you notice whoever they've targeted, because thing-thralls are... less subtle. Like, suddenly your neighbor is sleeping eighteen hours a day and spending the rest of their time looking like they just had fantastic sex." She shrugs. "They aren't even that dangerous if you catch them before too long, but the science types say that your IQ drops about ten points for every month spent as a thing-thrall, so."

[boneshaker]

Castor sits up a little straighter at this explanation, which is both fascinating and incredibly creepy. His eyebrows twitch. It sounds - well. No point going down that road.

"Yikes," says Persis. Nudging Castor's head with a paw, she says, "Kinda reminds me of Jack."

Okay well apparently Persis is going to go down that road for him. Thank you, Persis.

Well, he spared Sunshine the trial of drudging up old things once already; perhaps she'll do the same for him.

He makes a derisive, dismissive sound and ducks his head down, quickly so Persis has to relocate to his shoulder. He rubs a hand over the back of his neck and looks back up.

"I can see how having non-humans would make it extra complicated," he says. "Still, though. Fuckin' vampires and everything." He lets out a weak laugh. Fuckin' vampires indeed. Lamest of the movie monsters, in his personal opinion. "Are they the whole shebang? Can't stand garlic, wither in sunlight kinda shit? I guess that'd be good news for you, huh."

[rae_of_sun]

Sunshine snorts. She doesn't know who Jack is (obviously), but she doesn't need to; the comment pretty well speaks for itself. Castor doesn't seem keen on elaborating, and pressing for all the dirty details would be a pretty sorry repayment for the way he graciously let her own brief freakout slide.

Not that she's thrilled to shift the subject back to vampires. "Um. Well." With her bee-free hand, she absently fiddles with a fold in her jeans. "I don't know what the 'whole shebang' consists of in your universe, but back home, they're... pretty deadly. I mean, they can't go out in the sunlight, but everything else is wishful thinking. The garlic thing is a myth--"

"--a desperate one," Dom cuts in derisively.

"--and they can compel people to say anything they want, so the whole 'needing an invitation' thing doesn't slow them down much. Once you look into their eyes, you're toast."

"Usually."

Sunshine gives Dom a look, but he ignores it. Instead, he trundles off her lap and up to the knife, as if basking. "A sunlight affinity is an advantage," he says. "SOF's frigging desperate to put Sunshine on their payroll."

Yeah, there's one thing she doesn't miss. "Special Other Forces," she elaborates. "Sucker cops. They, um... found out about my affinity, even though I wasn't registered." Gods, how's that for a heavily-sanitized summary. "I'm not sure I'd call it good news," she dryly adds. "I'm a baker. I didn't want to spend my off-time skegging vampires." That's without the added complication of being bound to two of them, to varying degrees.

[boneshaker]

Castor listens to her explanation with raised eyebrows and an increasingly dubious expression. It's not that he doesn't believe any of this, it's all just so... foreign. He appreciates her colorful slang as much as anything, which gives the whole story a realistic flair he ordinarily wouldn't expect from something involving vampires.

"Damn," he says helpfully, once she's finished. "Yeah, I kinda know what you mean." It's not like anyone's tried to recruit him for anything like that, but there sure are a lot of dark-tier organizations out there, and a lot of people who'd hire magic-users for just about anything. Some of the jobs he's even taken.

"Baker does sound a lot better than merc-work," he says, settling back a bit and stroking Persis' fur idly. She seems a little bewildered by this at first, but doesn't really object. It's kind of nice. "I wish I ever had claim to a steady job. Or, like, a talent."

"Other than free manipulation of garbage," says Persis airily.

"Mmhm."