Dreamwalking [open to multiple]

[brink]

Topher is dreamwalking. It's a trick he picked up when he came through the rift in San Francisco, and he's gotten quite good at it since then. He's not quite able to pick a specific dreamer's mind yet, but he's learnt how to visit only those who've been significantly affected by the rift, either by coming through it, or being changed by it.

He jumps from one mind to another, looking for rifties he hasn't met, at least not in dreams. These days he barely sleeps at all without jumping from mind to mind, perhaps because he's lonely. Christmas hadn't exactly helped.

Some people will barely notice he's there, but there are those who do, who recognise him as an outside element rather than a figment of their own mind. Having a certain amount of control over his avatar while in dreams, he chooses to appear as a hooded ranger, straight out of a fantasy novel. Mostly because he thinks it looks badass, and stops him from being recognised easily.

[OOC: Anyone feel free to make a thread with their character asleep and dreaming, and suddenly having Topher appear in their head. Whether they'll be lucid or not, or what they're dreaming about, is up to you.]

Comments

[fucking_ebay]

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck." It's become a sort of mantra as Peter dodges through the dark, earthy maze that was a house when he first dreamed it up. He's not lucid enough at the moment to question how he could go hunting a vampire in its lair alone and forget his weapons -- he just knows that here he is, the dank walls closing in and scuttling, hungry things behind and probably ahead, and the way back up into the sunlight has disappeared. He wills himself to go faster, but it's like running through molasses.

He turns a corner, and BAM -- there in front of him is a hooded figure. With a gasp of dread, Peter turns tail and darts down another branching corridor, feeling the floor slope downward under his feet, but helpless to turn back and go another way.

[brink]

Topher recognises immediately that he's stepped into a nightmare. He feels the adreanaline rush, the terror pressing in from all sides, and he has to take a moment to make sure it doesn't affect him.

Then the dreamer comes running up to him, and Topher doesn't recognise him. Definitely a riftie, he can always tell in dreams, but not one he's met before. Better not let him slip away. He's not going to get any answers while in a nightmare, though.

He concentrates, trying to dispel the horror and the feeling of being hunted. He makes the surroundings shift, to a sunlit and serene wilderness setting, though he lets the dreamer's mind make up the details.

[fucking_ebay]

Good luck dispelling the feeling of being hunted; he feels that way all the damned time.

It's not like emerging from a tunnel into the open world. Peter doesn't find the way out of the maze or come to an opening -- instead, it just shifts around him, grass springing up beneath his feet, walls fading and falling away to be replaced by gently rolling hills in every direction. The grass is vividly green, and though the clouds are sparse enough to let the sun shine through, a fine rain mists down on them. Peter's steps falter and he slows to a confused stop. For all the change in scenery and the effort to dispel his fear, he's still breathing hard (or imagines that he is) as he looks about, as if he expects some monster to still come charging out at him.

[brink]

"Don't be afraid," Topher says from behind the dreamer.

Probably he could do a much better job at not being frightening, but he kind of relishes being a bit impressive and mysterious in the dreaming. He's not so good at it in the real world, but in here it's much easier to control someone's impression of him.

[fucking_ebay]

"Shit!" Peter startles visibly and spins on the spot. For a moment he looks poised to run again as he sees the hooded figure from before -- he certainly stumbles a step or two back -- but it doesn't feel the same now. As bad as it was only moments before, there's little here that's outright threatening.

"Stay back!" he demands.

[brink]

"I do not intend to hurt you," Topher assures him. In fact he looks rather relaxed, neither defensive nor aggressive. He still keeps his face hidden, though.

"May I ask you your name?"

[fucking_ebay]

If Topher knew him, he might note that Peter looks younger and a good bit better groomed than he does in waking life (especially lately). He hasn't thought about what he's wearing, so it's nothing particularly spectacular, but it is all black and flowing.

"Peter," he replies, brow furrowing as he gives Topher a very distrustful look. "What is this?"

[brink]

That's the trouble with the dreaming - you can't always expect people to be recognisable. Topher certainly isn't, not unless he chooses to be. Playing both sides means he's got to be subtle, which is admittedly not his greatest strength.

"Peter, who dreams of vampires, and comes from far away. This isn't your world, but now you're here, where do your loyalties lie?" he asks impressively. He's trying to sound as if he already knows much about him, in order to trick him into speaking plainly. It wasn't exactly hard to feel what was hunting Peter. And the rift thing was a given.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter's really not sure what's going on, but with the adrenaline and the vampires gone, he's starting to get an inkling that things are not what they seem. He'd not really one for lucid dreaming under normal circumstances.

"Who says I have any loyalties?" he scoffs. "And what are you supposed to be, anyway? You're not a vampire."

[brink]

"Everyone has loyalties. And you tell me. It's your head," he answers, the smile apparent in his voice. "Who do you think I am?"

Yeah, he's just having fun playing mind-games now. Forgive him.

[fucking_ebay]

"...My head?" Peter gives him a puzzled look at that, then looks around the landscape for clues. It slowly, finally dawns on him that this is not where he should be -- that he hasn't been anywhere that looked like this in years. With an uneasy laugh, he turns back to the mystery man and asks, "You're not supposed to be my conscience, are you?"

[brink]

Topher laughs at that. "Oh, you have plenty to feel guilty about, but that's not who I am. Try again."

Wild stab in the dark, of course. Everyone has things to be ashamed of. Basic psychology. He didn't sit around rewriting minds for nothing, after all.

[fucking_ebay]

Frooown. Confirmation of guilt not appreciated. "Something nasty I ate before bed -- this is a dream, isn't it?"

Were he more cultured, he might quote from Dickens at this point. But no.

[brink]

"Either that or your life has become even weirder than it used to be," Topher answers, the smile evident in his voice.

And Topher's more likely to appreciate a good pop-culture reference than Dickens quotations.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter considers this. He considers the fact that he was just in the middle of a fairly typical nightmare, and that now he's not. He considers the hooded man in front of him, with his irritatingly enigmatic ways. He considers the fact that he can't remember ever having a dream like this before.

"...Fucking boring dream; I'd've thought I'd come up with better. More tits, at least," he comments after a few long moments of such consideration. "Not you, anyway."

[brink]

Topher decides to make a point, and the surroundings shift around them again, this time to be replaced by a strip-joint, again letting Peter's mind fill out the details itself. The people there seem more distant though, unreachable. Not as undeniably present at Topher.

"Like I said. It's your dream." Yeah, he won't stop being enigmatic, though. That's too much to ask. Tits, yes, but let Topher have his fun.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter blinks -- a long blink, where he squeezes his eyes shut before looking at the sudden new surroundings. "Alright, who the fuck are you?" he asks impatiently. "I've never met you before, so if there's supposed to be some sort of significance to a git in a cape, you can enlighten me now."

[brink]

"I'm the Dreamwalker," he answers impressively. And it actually sounds fairly impressive here too, not as silly as it would in the waking world. That's an advantage to being able to manipulate dreams, he can tilt impressions in his favour, subtly plant ideas and emotions. Only to a certain point, of course, but Peter is hardly putting up much of a mental barrier.

[fucking_ebay]

Gears are slooowly turning in Peter's head. He looks at the ranger Dreamwalker with a sort of mixture of dread and awe.

"You're not from my head."

[brink]

"Indeed I am not," he affirms, sounding amused that Peter's finally gotten it. "But just because I am not from here, Peter, does not mean I can't influence it."

He proves his point by letting the strip-joint fade away, but not to be replaced by anything this time, just white fog. Peter's mind might still be trying to fill the place will details, but it will only manifest as things glanced out of the corner of his eyes, impressions immediately gone if he tries to focus on them.

Topher's trying to scare Peter now. Probably getting a bit carried away with his role, if he were honest with himself. He watches too many movies. It's slightly less cruel than bringing the vampires back, though. But so far Peter has come across as a bit of a dick, so he doesn't feel too guilty.

[fucking_ebay]

Peter looks around a bit frantically, catching visions of familiar things out of the corners of his eyes, only for them to disappear as soon as he tries to focus on them. Gone are the green hills and the strippers, and he's unable to take comfort in the fact that the vampires are gone as well due to the fact that he's starting to spot hints of those out of the corners of his eyes, too, now that his adrenaline is spiking once more.

"Stop it," he says, meaning to sound demanding and harsh, but coming out sounding worried. He fixes his gaze on Topher once more, and tries harder to dredge up an imposing air. "Get the fuck out of my head!"

[brink]

"Oh, don't worry, I will. I'd just like the answer to few questions first," Topher answers, clearly not intimated whatsoever. "Answer me honestly and I'll be out of your hair. Well, head. Where are you from, Peter? Before you came through the rift?"

[fucking_ebay]

"The land of none of your fucking business," growls Peter in reply, trying to concentrate and bring back the wilderness -- or maybe the strip club. He can make flashes of...something show up in his peripheral vision, but the white fog still overcomes everything.

"Las Vegas," he snaps after a few moments more of that. His accent doesn't match Vegas even in his dreams, but Topher did ask where he'd come from before the rift, not where he was from originally.

[brink]

It's not so easy, manipulating the dream environment without practice. And a normal human (currently assuming Peter is one) probably won't get as good at it as Topher is, even with some experience. He can tell that Peter's trying, though.

He can also tell Peter isn't lying, feeling it like an energy in the air, or what passes for air. Lying in the dreaming is different than lying in meatspace. There's other things you have to fake besides body language, and Topher has gotten used to picking up on the tells, and it doesn't seem like Peter would be used to having to hide them.

He takes the opportunity while Peter is thinking about where he's from, and makes the surroundings change to the location in Peter's mind. A posh, roomy apartment of dark stone and glass materialises around them.

"It's quite nice," he comments, looking around and nodding appreciatively.

[fucking_ebay]

What's frightening is that it's so hard for him to control what's in his own head when this stranger can show up and apparently do whatever he likes. He scowls at the other man, trying to hide the wave of self-pity and longing that rises in him at the sight of his old place. It would be convincing in meatspace.

"Yes, very clever," he spits, not realizing that his clothing has changed to the lounge wear he was accustomed to wearing in this place. It doesn't leave much to the imagination. He's more relieved than he'll admit to be out of the fog, though now he's trying his hardest not to think of other things from home.