applesaucedream | Falling [Open to Multiple]

Current Music: January 28th - 29th, 2013

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Falling [Open to Multiple]

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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A flash of irritation lances through her at his admission that he was looking for her, though she's not sure why she should find that fact so bothersome, or why she should wonder why he just had to go looking for her. It's not as if she has anything else going on at the moment, and Edgar's her friend. Frowning deeply, she rubs her forehead as if she can scrub some sense back into her brain.

His question helps to draw her out of the bizarre little pet she'd been in, and she nods. "Yes, only it was as if you were really speaking with it. It's back to normal now, though."

Edgar feels a ghost of Daine's irritation, and is confused by it. However, behind his confusion float hints of fear and shame. They don't make sense to him, so he allows himself to be distracted by her answer. Deliberately, he releases her hand and signs again.

/Where you headed somewhere? And where is everyone?/

Again, he hears the voice. This time, he tries to recognize it as "his," as something familiar and identifiable as himself, but it sounds as foreign as a stranger's.

Daine shakes her head in response to his questions and glances uneasily at their surroundings. "It shouldn't be like this," she murmurs, wanting to add again, but stopping herself because when has this happened before? He'll think she's mad if she starts going on about the empty base as if it's a regular occurrence. They both know this is new.

"Maybe everyone is outside." She doesn't sound particularly confident, but she also doesn't like the idea of wandering around the base if it's going to be eerily empty save for Edgar and herself.

Edgar nods. It's possible, if not probable. At any rate, it's a good excuse to get out of the creepily silent base. He has no idea which way to go to get out of the base, but decides to start walking in the direction from which Daine approached.

It seems to take no time at all before he finds himself surrounded by trees.

The trees are a pleasant enough change that Daine doesn't give much thought to how abrupt or senseless the change was. They'd meant to go outside, and now they're outside. It doesn't even trouble her overmuch that the forest isn't familiar to her - it's close enough to the Ramble, but she doesn't recognize the trees.

It's the silence that really troubles her. Where are the People? She listens hard, and for a moment she thinks she can hear familiar minds - Quickbeak, Sarge, Molly - but they slip away from her, and she frowns. "This is strange. I can't hear anyone - not properly."

For some reason, that concerns Edgar more than anything else that has happened so far, and he frowns at her. Then his frown deepens.

/I can't hear anything at all,/ he signs, "his" voice sounding again like narration for his hands.

He glances up at the trees. The branches are swaying as if in a breeze, but he doesn't hear any rustling of leaves or creaking of wood.

Daine blinks, then realization dawns. She's been in the Dreaming long enough, now, that her lucidity returns with a bit more readiness than it might have, otherwise. "This isn't real," she says with certainty. "We're dreaming."

As her memories filter back into her mind, she frowns at Edgar, her earlier irritation suddenly making sense. "You shouldn't have gone looking for me."

Edgar blinks at Daine. What?

/What do you mean we're dreaming?/ he asks. But even as he signs the question, he knows she's telling the truth. Everything around them seems just a little off. There's no sound, and he gets the impression that the color of the scenery fades into nothing at his peripheral vision.

Memories start to come back to him, but they're vague and piecemeal. He rubs his forehead and frowns.

/You... were in danger? I... we were in the base./

"I wasn't in any danger," she says, planting her hands on her hips. Well, she was, but. "Not until after you barged in on us, anyway."

She can see that he's still confused, and she tries to clamp down on her annoyance. No sense in getting huffy with him if he's not lucid enough yet to know what she's talking about. "Do you remember what the date was before you went to sleep?"

Edgar shakes his head slightly and closes his eyes before answering.

/The 8th?/ he says, questioningly, not quite sure of himself and still trying to gain his bearings.

Daine echoes the gesture. "That can't be right. It was the 28th when I passed out, and I can't have been out for more than a day or so." She sinks down onto a conveniently located tree stump, wondering if she really could have been asleep for weeks, and decides it's impossible. Andrew would have found her in the Dreaming - or sent the TARDIS after her or something. Edgar must still be confused, so she waits.

Edgar opens his eyes and squints in the light of the imaginary sun.

/No, you're right. I was thinking about--/ He was thinking about when he'd fallen asleep at home, before all of this. /You're right./

He reaches back - or is it forward? - in his memory and recalls edging along an unfamiliar corridor in the base. There was silver and Daine and...

/A bear! You were with a bear!/

So he is starting to remember. Daine presses her lips together, then sighs. "You really shouldn't have been there, Edgar." She wonders if he knows what happened to her after they left the base, or if he only knows she was gone all night. Rubbing her forehead, she asks, "What happened after you left your hiding place?"

/I - I found help and then I--/ Edgar hesitates, feelings from that night coming back to him all at once.

/I wandered the base at first, but there didn't seem to be anything I could do to help there. So I went out into the park with Almondine to help with the search./

"You what?" Daine stands, glaring at him. "Do you have any idea how dangerous that was?" And he'd brought Almondine - as if a fourteen-year-old dog would have stood a chance against what amounted to a rabid bear. What was he thinking?!

Edgar feels his own anger rise at Daine's response.

/You were in danger!/ he signs, his hands flying in his irritation. /And it was my fault! Of course I was going to go help! Almondine could hear you, she could smell you - it was because of her the main search party knew where to go!/

He drags a hand through his hair and plops down on a nearby stump.

"I was handling it!" she snarls back. She might not have had a long-term plan, but at least she was keeping him distracted while staying out of harm's way. "And much good your search party did us," she adds, voice shaking. "Romac found us, first."

But maybe that's just as well, if Edgar and Almondine would have been leading the rebel group. She doesn't want to think about what would have happened if they'd appeared before Gabriel knocked Yuri out - or before Gabriel showed up at all.

Edgar's own irritation fades and he rises to place a hand on Daine's shoulder.

What happened? he asks. He's sure she won't tell him, but a little afraid she will.

Some of the fight drains out of her when his hand touches her shoulder. "We escaped," she says flatly. Honestly, there's not much more to tell than that. "It was... draining. That's why I've been asleep so long."

Edgar ponders her words for a moment, what is said and what isn't. He's still not entirely convinced that what she was doing was smart - or safe - but he understands now why she didn't tell him. And why she was so angry.

I'm sorry, he says finally. I didn't realize you were keeping someone else's secret.

She sighs again, more wearily this time - then reaches up to cover his hand with hers. "It's all right," she says - lies, more like, but she can't get into just what isn't all right about it without delving into Yuri's business. "We got out safely, anyway. Could've been worse."

Edgar wants to ask more, but decides against it. If Daine wouldn't tell him before, she certainly won't tell him now, dream or no.

Instead, he glances around. So we're dreaming. What should we do now?/ he asks, a hint of mischief under the curiosity in his voice.

"I think it's mostly up to you," she says, shrugging. "Pretty sure this is your dream, not mine." Belatedly realizing that Edgar might be new to the whole Dreaming thing, she adds, "The rift does this, sometimes - puts folk together in dreams. Sometimes it's just you and someone else, and sometimes it dumps you in with a whole mess of people."

Of course it does. Edgar thinks, somewhat bitterly. The rift can apparently do anything - but send them home.

Home is his first thought when he thinks about where to go, but he quickly turns away from the idea. It wouldn't be home, not really, and he'd rather not cling to a pale shadow of the real thing.

Instead, he thinks about New York. If this is a dream - his dream - they could go anywhere.

The next thing Edgar knows, he's staring out at the sea from the top of the Statue of Liberty.

She hears his bitterness and sympathizes, but there's nothing she can really do about it. The rift could certainly do worse, so getting too huffy about the Dreaming feels like tempting fate.

The change of scenery is a welcome distraction, and she blinks in surprise at the new view. "Oh! Where--" she starts to ask before she realizes exactly where they are. She's never been to the Statue of Liberty due to never having been off the island, but she's seen it before - there are pictures of it everywhere. A breeze off the sea ruffles her hair, and she grins. "Good choice."

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edgar_sawtelle - 2013-05-26 17:46 (UTC) - Expand

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wildmage_daine - 2013-05-26 18:14 (UTC) - Expand

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