Falling [Open to Multiple]

[wildmage_daine]

The last time Daine so thoroughly exhausted herself was during the siege at Pirate's Swoop, so it's no great surprise that in her dream, that's where she wakes. She sits up on the cot they've set up for her in the stables, where the ponies could keep an eye on her. Her head swims, and she grips the edge of the cot until the sensation passes.

A familiar gray nose enters her field of vision, and Daine smiles as Cloud, her pony, sniffs her over. "I'm fine," she reassures the mare, reaching up to give her neck a pat.

You're no such thing, Cloud replies tartly. You've drained yourself again. I won't always be there to lend you strength when you need it.

"Good thing you're here now, then." Daine steadies herself against the pony as she rises to her feet, ignoring Cloud's irritated snort. "Where's Numair?"

It's trouble enough to keep an eye on you, let alone the stork-man.

Daine sighs. "Fine. I'll find him myself."

She makes it to the stable doors before the scene begins to disintegrate around her. Daine whirls about to look for Cloud, but the stable is gone, replaced by nothingness. Within moments, nothing remains but the planks below her feet - and then they, too, crumble away. Daine drops into the Dreaming with a cry of dismay, not knowing where she'll land.


[OOC: Daine's taking a two-day nap after the events in this thread, giving her enough time to drop into the minds of a good number of people. Go nuts!]

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[wildmage_daine]

Daine lifts her head and frowns at the change of scenery. Even the Coldfang's body is gone, though she's too focused on the labyrinth of books to appreciate its disappearance. She knows they had been heading for somewhere specific, but her memory is more sluggish than usual. The answer finally comes to her with an accompanying surge of relief: "Book drop."

[bluesuit_handy]

"Book drop," agrees Andrew, spurred into remembering. The scenery solidifies -- it really is a labyrinth. In some places the 'walls' are still shelves covered in books, but in many places the barriers are walls literally built of books laid atop each other like bricks. It does not strike Andrew that anything has changed; if anything, he just failed to notice their surroundings earlier because they were running.

He slips his hand into hers and gives it a squeeze. "We need to stay together," he tells her firmly.

[wildmage_daine]

Daine had been considering the possibility of a bird shape: she could get over the walls and get a better idea of where to go, or, at the very least, spot dead ends well before they actually hit the end of them. But the ceiling isn't quite high enough to allow for much in the way of a bird's-eye view, and she doesn't like the thought of losing sight of Andrew, even if it's only for a moment. Not with the Master still about the place.

"All right," she agrees, getting to her feet and using her hold on Andrew's hand to pull him up after her. "I could take bird shape, though, to scout a little." It might not be the best idea, but she thinks it's still worth mentioning.

[bluesuit_handy]

"I don't want to lose you," replies Andrew reluctantly, making a half-hearted effort to un-rumple himself. He cranes his neck to look at the tops of the 'walls,' considering it. Ahead he can see twisting passages; he knows that they could wander a long time in here. "If we make all right turns, we'll get out eventually," he offers, knowing that they could traverse every passageway in the maze before they do.

[wildmage_daine]

"Don't want to lose you, either," Daine says with a pensive little frown. "We might as well try it your way, first. I can always shift later if it'd help."

The Coldfang's body might be gone, but the bow remains, a quiver of arrows conveniently resting beside it. Daine shoulders the quiver and grabs the bow. There's no sense in leaving it behind, and Mithros only knows what else might be in the labyrinth.

[bluesuit_handy]

Aside from his fear that they'll be separated -- which he assuages, naturally, by holding Daine's hand -- Andrew is currently failing to show any fear of the labyrinth or anything they might find in it. He runs his free hand along the spines of the books beside them, offering Daine a little smile.

"I don't think he can find us in here," he says blithely.

[wildmage_daine]

Daine isn't so sure of the maze's safety, but Andrew's good mood must be catching, because she's finding it difficult to feel too worried about it. She has her bow, after all, and Andrew can throw books. "We'll be all right," she says, cheerfully swinging their joined hands as they walk. "Can't imagine there'd be much else to trouble us in a library."

[bluesuit_handy]

Especially not one so brightly lit, supplies Andrew's brain glibly. He doesn't say it out loud, though -- this place really is nice when they're not being attacked by a Coldfang or made to stamp books, and surely nothing's going to go wrong. The Vashta Nerada are worlds and worlds away, after all.

"And if we do run into him, I'll throw a book at his head," he says cheerfully.

[wildmage_daine]

"And I'll -" she realizes just before the words leave her mouth that 'shoot him' probably wouldn't be well received, given how upset Andrew had been when she'd swatted the Master before. "... Help," she finishes. Well, she can throw books, too, if need be. "Pick a big one," she advises with a grin.

[bluesuit_handy]

No. No, it really wouldn't have been.

"Encyclopedia Britannica," he decides. "Volume thirteen, I think." He turns when the wall opens up to their right, tugging her along the new walkway.

[wildmage_daine]

She could shoot at him so long as she didn't actually harm him, she supposes. If he starts waving that little weapon thing at them, she's confident she could shoot it right out of his hand. That can be the plan, she decides.

"Strange to see so many books in one place," Daine says as Andrew pulls her along. Books aren't a rarity in Tortall, but they're not so easy to produce there as here, it seems. Her anatomy book is a prized possession, and Numair had had to argue with her to even get her to accept so valuable a gift. Seeing them stacked atop one another all higgledy-piggledy is a bit unnerving, now that she thinks about it.

[bluesuit_handy]

That might still alarm Andrew rather a lot. He's a bit attached to his captor for a few reasons, some of them more unhealthy than others.

He looks at her in mild surprise. "Is it? Would you believe me if I told you I've been to a library that took up an entire planet?" Because yeah he needed to bring that up.

[wildmage_daine]

Alarming him would be a fair trade for keeping him safe.

Daine gapes up at him, wondering if he's being serious or pulling her leg. "A whole planet?" She shakes her head; that must be nonsense.

[bluesuit_handy]

"A whole planet," Andrew confirms agreeably. "They've got teleports to whisk people around so they don't spend their whole lives just trying to browse."

[wildmage_daine]

He doesn't seem to be joking, and Daine frowns. She doesn't see how it's possible to have a planet that's nothing but library - not without destroying everything else, anyway. "But what about everything else that was on the planet: plants and animals and stuff?"

[bluesuit_handy]

Andrew blinks, giving her a baffled sort of look. "It's artificial," he explains, speaking the word slowly and looking at Daine as though she's just dribbled down the front of her shirt. "They built the planet to be the Library."

[wildmage_daine]

Daine can feel her face grow hot as she pointedly tugs her hand out of the Doctor's grip. "Well, pardon me for being from a realm where folk don't just go about building planets," she snaps.

[bluesuit_handy]

Is she angry with him? Yes. Yes, she's angry with him. Andrew stops walking and gives Daine a wide-eyed look of hurt puzzlement. He wasn't that rude, was he? "I was just saying," he says defensively.

[wildmage_daine]

Daine doesn't break her stride. Honestly, she's no stranger to not always understanding what folk are going on about - Numair in particular - but at least Numair had the decency to never treat her like an idiot because she didn't have the same sort of background as him. "You were just talking down to me as if I'm a half-wit," she fires back, walking backwards for a few paces so she can scowl at him before turning away again. "Sorry we haven't all spent the last ten centuries traveling through time and space in a magic box."

She comes upon an intersection and glances both ways before obstinately taking a left, not bothering to wait for Andrew to catch up.

[bluesuit_handy]

"I didn't mean it like that!" protests Andrew. It's a lie, of course; he knew exactly how he'd sound. Why had he done that? Why did he always do that sort of thing? "Daine, come on, right turns!"

He jogs to catch up, rounding the corner after her. When he gets there, though, Daine's nowhere to be seen -- there are only branching corridors, all of them devoid of his friend. "Daine?" calls Andrew, frozen at the point where they all fork off from one another.

[wildmage_daine]

She doesn't believe him for one moment, and with an exasperated huff, she turns around to tell him so... and finds herself staring at a wall of books that couldn't possibly have been there a moment ago. It's as if it sprang up out of nowhere to block the passage behind her. "Andrew?" She places her palm against the book-wall and gives it a little shove, but it's distressingly solid. "Andrew!" Can he even hear her?

[bluesuit_handy]

"Daine!" Andrew can hear her, but it's like she's...muffled. A long ways off, perhaps. He spins on the spot, listening, trying to figure out what direction her voice is coming from. "Daine, keep talking! I can't see you!"

[wildmage_daine]

Okay, she heard that, though he sounds a good deal quieter than he ought to, considering how close behind her he was a moment ago. She scowls at the wall in front of her, wondering how thick it is. "The maze is changing itself," she calls as she draws an arrow from her quiver and sets it to the string. Best to take precautions if the labyrinth is up to mischief. Or is the Master doing this, somehow? "There's a wall here that wasn't here a moment ago!"

And since there's no chance of Andrew getting through said wall, she edges down the corridor. Maybe there's a parallel corridor leading back the way she came. "I'm going to try and double back," she shouts.

[bluesuit_handy]

Andrew trots a few steps down one pathway, changes his mind, doubles back, and goes down another. "No -- stay where you are!" he demands, hurrying along to where he thinks he might reach her. If anyone's going to be doing the exploring and the finding, it ought to be him.

[wildmage_daine]

"No, thank you," Daine breathes to herself as she creeps down the corridor. There are several good reasons not to plunk herself down in a dead end: if the Master (or something else nasty) shows up, she'd have nowhere to run, and it'll be harder for Andrew to find her if he has to track down the one specific corridor she's at the end of.

And, given the way Andrew's just treated her, the last thing she feels like doing is staying put and waiting for rescue like a child who got lost at the market. She's perfectly capable of getting herself out of trouble, thanks ever so.

"I'm not sitting in a dead end," she calls, unable to keep from sounding indignant. There - an opening in the wall leads to another corridor running alongside the one she was just in. She steps through and turns right. "I'm heading back your way!"