Caught In the Buff (Sira, Hadrian)

[Ricky Maze]

Unbelievable. To see such a grotesque beast take shape here and now, the nightmare Sira feared now beginning to form within the dream. The Ravarisk. It was foreign to Ricky and very unnatural, such a beast of pure evil by its occurance. When Sira had nested herself in Ricky's chest, he wrapped his arms around her in an attempt to comfort her. To shield her with his arms as he wanted her to feel safe, safe from the dangers she felt in this god awful nightmare. Hadrian seem to be searching for answers, answers that were in the past he dwelled in. Maybe he came across it in another dream, or faced its threat in the real world. Ricky knew not the history behind the Ravarisk and them, but he wasn't going to allow anything to happen. He coupd feel it now, the sensation of waking up being paused; like he was being locked here with them. Three caged birds singing for freedom, freedom from the nightmare this dream had become. "Damn thing is ugly that's for sure, I won't let em hurt ya." He spoke in a low voice where Sira could hear him, her name vaguely still existing in his mind. Would he remember her after this was all over? Would the dream end before they all experienced the terror this monster would bring? He wanted answers but when he searched for them only more questions took their place. All the faceless people around intimidating them, Ricky was still quite unsure where this would turn. It was like the end of the world, the last days of time as all life would release it's final soft breathe. Such a feeling was one that Ricky had not expected, and it was no doubt similiar to Sira's as well; though her story probably ran deeper than the sea he was in. Hadrian seem to be reaching out for something else too, something more then just a recolletion. Was he trying to find an escape? A way out so that they would no longer deal with this nightmare? The barrier that contained them was unusual as well, all of the dream was heading there now it seems. Ricky wasn't able to tell if it was to protect them or cage them, but he didn't like what his instincts told him. His heart would pound fast and hard, loud enough for Sira to hear. Though he was still naked as was she all passion has died the moment the dream shifted, and when the Ravarisk had made its appearance known. Ricky could feel the tension in the air with the followed by the sense of despair; the twin of fear. Yet he may stand now feeling the fear and despair grow within, but courage was his ally in this moment. He wanted to protect these two from what ever was to come. "Sira...listen to me. I ain't lettin this monster near ya. I will do anythin to keep it at bay." He spoke humbly as he felt a fire burn within his heart, the sea that still resided in him churning a tempest of pure heat. Faith was the big part of this ordeal they were in, faith that they wouod get out; faith that they would be safe. Ricky had faith in Hadrian and his abilities, he had faith that Nysel would help them. Yes he remembered before what Hadrian said, about being a dream walker and Nysel was the god that gave him his gift. It was all buried deep like the memories they were, unable to tap into them at will but only able to see them when they chose. These were not ordinary memories at all, no these memories of his dreams were involved in a deeper part of him. Deeper then he actually knew. As he held Sira close in his arms to shield and comfort her he looked to Hadrian, eyes full of hope and faith. 'I believe in ya Hadrian, ye can pull us out I know it!' His thoughts echoed in his head, while his heart yearned to keep them safe.

[Sira]

Ricky was right, faith was the key, at least in the real memory. And Hadrian was right as well, they had survived. It was Sira who wasn't seeing things right anymore, it was Sira whose mind created a nightmare from which she could not escape. And this time her mind was not alone. It wanted Sira there for a reason, though she could not fathom what that reason might be, but Sira didn't want to be alone with her nightmare either. When Hadrian tried to escape, the subconscious part of Sira that she had no power over retaliated. Sira thought he was leaving her, and her mind wasn't going to let that happen.

Much like when she had helped Aidara and Sairque build the barrier that kept their minds apart, Sira's mind did that now in an attempt to keep Hadrian in. Though the barrier was nothing truly physical, it manifested as a physical wall of thorns appearing in the air before Hadrian where he tried to reach out and open a hole to his own dreamscape. The thorns, technically, could do no harm to Hadrian, especially since he was a dream walker and had more power over their current reality than Sira did, but it all depended on how he reacted to them. They were a mental barrier, something that he would actually have to work to get through, but Sira was not so powerful that she could contain anyone that really tried to get out.

While Hadrian dealt with Sira's subconscious attempt to keep him there with her, the dream continued to play out around them. The ooze that was pouring through the cracks reached the floor of the disk and began to spread out, moving almost as if it had a mind of its own, heading for the nearest person. All around the outside of the disk the faceless people began to go insane, attacking one another, grabbing others and hurling them into the ooze. Anyone the ooze touched seemed to go insane and begin attacking one another. It wasn't exactly as it happened in the real memory, but in the dream the disk suddenly became pure chaos. The faceless still kept their distance from the three dreamers, but they were the ones who had yet to be touched by the ooze.

It was closing in from all sides, slowly covering every inch of the disk. It wouldn't be long before the ooze reached their small circle of peace, and then there was no telling what would happen. Sira, for her part, was having a mental break down. She was mumbling, most of it incoherent, though Ricky could perhaps make out a few words.

"Don't.. don't let it touch you. Don't.. they want her, they want Natalie. My baby. Don't let it touch you, or you become its slave."

The faceless people didn't seem to want anything, truly, and they were just fighting among themselves. But Sira was certain they had only one goal, and that was to come for her child. The Ravarisk demanded it, and they had no choice but to obey. But Sira's dream didn't quite work that way, and everything was just pure chaos. The ooze continued to close in, and more and more fighting broke out. The faceless were doing impossible things with it, throwing each other around with inhuman strength, summoning powers of magic to destroy one another, and doing things that no human should do to another human. It was horrible, it was terrifying, and it was all a part of Sira's nightmare.

[Hadrian]

He thought he felt his fingers catching on something other, something real underneath the glamour of dreaming. But as soon as he tried to focus in on it, it skittered away as if a thinking thing, and thorns nearly impaled his hand. He pulled it back with all the speed his reaction could muster, and backed into Ricky and the redhead. But Hadrian could see himself past the Ravarisk, past the thorns. He was standing beside the Konti magicienne, using as much of his djed as he thought he could spare to maintain the dome that was no longer holding the air in.

And praying. He had been praying as desperately as anyone else that day. But what had worked that day might work within this dream reenactment.

He slipped his arm around Sira and Ricky to pull them close; now his mind was in problem-solving mode, their nakedness and proximity ceased to cause him any discomfort. It would be easier to maintain a smaller shield, though in dreaming he would have to use the grace of Nysel rather than true djed. But he held his hand out and imagined that dome on a smaller scale, not keeping air in necessarily, but keeping the Ravarisk and its ooze out. It was smooth and translucent, stronger than skyglass, strong as his will.

After some time and concentration, they became encased in a crystalline egg. That done, he turned to his fellow songbirds.

"Ricky... and I don't know your name... This is a dream. It already happened. It's over. You just have to remember that it's a dream, and relax. I'm a dreamwalker. I won't let it hurt you, but you have to calm down. Your fear is fueling this."

[Ricky Maze]

"Don't let...touch...my baby....they want her." These words were all that Ricky could register in his mind as she mumbled incoherently, his mind now filled with an earnest desire to shield her. When the red ooze seem to begin closing in around and the faceless figures fought, Ricky wasn't surw what to make off the madness he witnessed. Hadrian had drawn back away from his plan of escape as thorns seem to block his attempt. Bumping into the two as he flinched back, he had another plan take action; one that would substitute their exit strategy. Creating a barrier to hold off the ever growing madness that covered their barrier, burying them under as they were now encased in a shell. What he had done was held off what this madness was, or so Ricky surmised, and now they had to change the dream once again. When Hadrian stated to them that fear was the fuel of this dream, Ricky felt himself full of courage as he attempted to calm Sira. Gently he lifted her chin so her eyes would meet his, so she could see the promise Ricky would make. "Hey listen now," He spoke softly and humbly to her, "They will not hurt ye or yer child, I won't let that happen. Believe me when I say this, that thing will not come anymore close to ya; but ye have to believe in us. Ye have to be unafraid and know we will stop it." He confirmed her with a firm expression, swearing to her that nothing would happen. In this very moment of the dream he still felt alive like he was in the real world, but slowly that feeling was unraveling. He was on a time clock now as he could feel parts of his mind slipping. Precious knowledge of this dream fading into the hidden memory it was bound to be, forever preserved in the reaches of his mind. He was not yet ready to go as he had an obligation, but if he could not stay then he would have to leave it up to Hadrian. He looked to the man with the same look as before, the one he had when he was aware of his time running out. What ever was to come next he was prepared, his only wish was to see her wake up before him. Yes her. Sira was her name but he could not remember it now, for that part was lost among the knowledge. He wasn't going to forget her though, somehow he would still remember something important about her. It was up to Hadrian to see things threw entirely, should Ricky no longer be able to stay within the dream.

[Sira]

What Hadrian was doing felt right. It was as close to what actually happened as they were going to get in the twisted nightmare that Sira had created. With his shield erected, Sira grew visibly more calm, and even more so at Ricky's encouraging words. Hadrian spoke of a dream, he said that what they were witnessing had already happened, and Sira nodded her head slowly, though there was still doubt plain on her face. She knew it was a dream, and yet she still did not, and accepting the truth was much harder than it sounded. Her mind wanted the dream to play out, yet it terrified her and Sira could not let it. It was the reason she had the nightmares every night, because she never let them finish. Hadrian was helping, but he was also hurting, and he had no way of knowing it. Sira's fear was subsiding, and though the dream still raged around them, Hadrian's shield remained ever strong. Even as the ooze reached them and the faceless began to pound on the barrier protecting them, even as the ooze filled up the dome and rose to cover them entirely beneath the thick, red, sticky substance. They were safe beneath the dome Hadrian had created.

"A dream," Sira questioned, her voice filled with doubt as she looked around the little bubble she now found herself in.

Sira considered Hadrian's logic. It did make sense to her that all of it had already happened. In fact, she knew that she had already been on the disk, that the Ravarisk had tried to get to her, and that she had somehow made it back to Wind Reach alive. It all made sense.. maybe she was just dreaming. Which meant.. that what happened before, with Ricky. Yes, that made sense as well. How else would she have ended up on a random pirate ship at sea? Why else would she not have just killed anyone in her path and escaped into the sky? Certainly Ricky was an attractive man.. but when Sira thought about it, there was no way she would have slept with him unless it somehow aided her in escaping. Not in that situation, anyway.

As Sira finally began to believe what she knew to be true, the rumbling they felt before returned. They all would feel it, though this time what they were feeling was the nightmare tearing itself apart. First the outer dome collapsed, and all the ooze was quickly sucked out into the vacuum of space. For a brief instant the Ravarisk remained, or at least what Sira imagined the Ravarisk looked like. It was vast, and grotesque. Covered in oozing ink, it was a wriggling mass of tentacles with a single large eye in the center. That eye stared at them for just an instant, and then the Ravarisk too vanished. In mere moments they found themselves floating alone in a black nothingness, though there was no feeling of fear anymore. The nothingness was simply the calm of Sira's sleeping mind, and if Hadrian tried, he could easily pull them all into his own dreamscape if he desired. Sira's mind was at peace again, and it wouldn't try to stop her. Or he could simply let it end, and let them all return to their slumber and their own dreams. He was the dream walker, he had all the power, and it was all up to him.

[Hadrian]

Hadrian saw that look in Ricky's eyes, that he was losing him to the waking world even as the woman seemed to be coming to her senses, or such senses as were available in dreaming. The rules were different here, and although he felt an innate sense of what ought to be and what ought to work, it was intuition rather than knowledge and he was only sometimes comfortable with his own intuition.

The things that played out beyond the protection of his barrier seemed vaguely familiar too, and he would have to later work through the mess of his own chavi to remember what had happened during that time in Ravok. The monster might belong to the Ebonstryfe, and yet he had survived if only with fragmented memories of that time. Even as it all faded out and yet they could see without a visible source of light, he knew he had questions.

Without knowing how exactly, he touched the edge of his barrier and it swung open like a door onto his dreamscape, an idealized version of Zeltiva, perhaps. More of the pre-Valterrian architecture was erected, and the sea breeze kept the welcome heat in check. They were on a terrace overlooking Mathews Bay. It was more detailed than the dream Ricky might remember in his heart of hearts, though that might have been his dream as much as Hadrian's.

"If you stay," he said to them both, "you will eventually wake up. The nightmare, I think, is over. If you come, you will be safe, but we can talk. I leave it up to you."

He turned to leave them or lead the way, no longer even aware of his nakedness or theirs, but on the back of his shoulder, they would see the fractal bloom of Nysel's mark. Whether they followed that white rabbit down the rabbit-hole was their choice entirely. Hadrian wondered if some fragment of Kendall would be waiting for him.

[Ricky Maze]

Without Hadrian to be there really there was no telling what would have happened, or how this dream would have actually turned out. When he would continue through the door it was clear he was allowing them to do as they wished, Ricky knowing that the talk would be the more better choice then sitting around waiting to wake up took Sira's hands and began to guide her with him. He wanted her to come with him so they could talk, whatever it was Hadrian had to say would indeed be important. Yet he also wanted to be able to remember her once he awoke, and any information in their talk could be key for him to seal away should they ever meet in the real world. When Sira would take Ricky's hands she would find that they would be soft like a cloud now, the process of him awaking still taking a slow and steady pace. He couldn't hold it off forever though, and his will to stay asleep has been greatly drained already. The transition was only reaching it's halfway mark though, for now his limbs couod feel the slight tingle of being real. Or at least that one of ways it usually happened,this was the longest he has ever managed to try and sleep. So there really was no way of knowing how much longer he had, there was just a certain amount of time left; and that's all he knew. When he would guide her humbly to the door he could see the familiarity of the dream from before. The city of Zeltiva was out before him in a different look then what he was familiar with, but in the dream world the dream could take any reality the dreamwalker saw fit. Maybe this was something Hadrian felt was part of him, part of a Zeltiva that had been long passed. He was about to enter now knowing they all were still naked, but that no longer mattered in this moment; their purpose was for one final talk before Ricky would wake up. Before entering though he turned to Sira, still gently holding her hands he looked in her eyes. Her golden wild eye's, those were one of the things he would never forget seeing. "Ya don't have to follow through with this, it's yer decision whether ya wanna go through or not." He assured her humbly as his hands now began to feel like liquid, he wasn't giving up just yet. He left the decision up to Sira though, and he was going to stick close to her before waking up.

[Sira]

As they floated in the nothingness of Sira’s non-dream, her body in the real world grew calm once more. Her breathing steadied, and Sira was at peace again. The nightmare was indeed over, and they were safe from Sira’s demons at least for the time being, though her dreams very well could have awakened a whole new set of problems for them all down the line. When Hadrian stood and opened the door to his dreamscape, Sira followed him through. She wasn’t ready to wake and she would much rather have a peaceful dream with Hadrian, and Ricky if he chose to join them, rather than be alone and risk the nightmare returning. It was strange, choosing to dream. But she understood now that she was indeed dreaming, Hadrian and his gnosis helped her in that, and now she wanted to see where that dream would lead. There was something vaguely familiar about Hadrian, the man whose name she did not yet know, and she wanted to investigate that feeling. A even if she found nothing out, it would be better than being alone. Of course, with Ricky there, who knew where the dream might lead, but at the moment, Sira’s sexual desires were in check and she was filled with curiosity of a different sort.

Seeing Zeltiva reminded her vaguely of Thunder Bay, though the architecture was far more grandiose and unlike anything Sira had ever seen before. Sira did not really know anything about Zeltiva. She had probably learned something about it in her history classes as a Yasi, but Sira’s education had been at a much more rapid pace than the other Inarta, due to her growing up so fast, and on top of that she rarely paid any attention to the classes that didn’t involve the things she was interested in. Learning about the history of some distant city that she would probably never visit was of little interest to the kelvic. Her focus had always been on hunting, fighting, and other physical things like that. Only recently had she ever willingly read a book, and that book wasn’t exactly educational, nor was it something they would allow in any yasi class.

Sira did notice Hadrian’s gnosis mark, though she had no idea what it was. Again, her lack of interest in that sort of education limited her knowledge of the gods and their gifts. She only knew about those marks that she was intimately familiar with. She knew of Healing because of her lover Aidara, who was a Healer of Rak’keli. Luminance, because of her own gnosis mark, a glowing vortex of light on her hand that was gifted to her by Priskil after the battle with the Lavak beneath the mountain. And she knew of the Azenth, not only because her lover was now technically one of them, but because before Ivak returned to the world every wind eagle in Wind Reach had been taught to recognize the Azenth, and any other threat that might aid the World Destroy in escaping. Not that it helped, in the end.

After she walked out onto the balcony Sira, guided by Ricky’s hand, and paused on the balcony to appreciate the view. Sira did not at first respond to any of their words, her mind taking it’s time, processing what was before her. She was dreaming, that much she knew, but what was real and what was not. Sira knew next to nothing about the true nature of dreams, other than that once Aidara had visited a woman who could manipulate them using her own gnosis mark. Was that what was happening to her? Was one of the people with her such a person? She assumed if they were, then it was probably Hadrian. Ricky did not seem like the type to manipulate dreams, or have any mystical powers other than getting her to sleep with him. But the other man, the one whose name she did not know, he was certainly a mystery to her. He wanted to talk, and Sira wanted to listen to what he had to say. Ricky seemed to think it was a good idea as well, and for some reason she felt that she could trust him.

”So,” she started, not really sure what to say. ”..if this is a dream.. then am I just talking to myself, or are you real?”

[Hadrian]

When the others followed him through, the door closed behind them, the nightmare a million miles away now. He could have wished the power to banish it with his will, but he was only a nascent dreamwalker yet. He had no mentor in this, and had done little to travel outside his own dreamscape. If it was all nightmares and sexcapades, he wasn't sure it was wise to do so without a particular agenda.

Her question made him laugh, and he sat down on the balustrade, back to the moon and the sea, facing those who had weathered the nightmare with him.

"Am I a man dreaming I am a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming I am a man?" he asked rhetorically. "I am Hadrian and I'm a dreamwalker by the grace of Nysel. Not a very good one, obviously, but, well..." His ankles hooked together and his heels bounced gently, nervously on the baluster behind them. "I can tell you that this is my dreamscape, a world fashioned out of my own chavi, and that I, at least, am real. You are too, I think. I have met Ricky before, but I don't know you. I should, though. We have shared that nightmare before, I think. I just... It's blocked."

He frowned, wondering why he couldn't find it in the threads of his own chavi. There were limits to this gnosis, clearly.

"I don't know how much you will remember when you wake up," he said truthfully. "Whether you will remember me or this or in what detail... Like I said, I'm not a very good dreamwalker. Lord Nysel didn't share any great secrets with me, I don't think, just gave me enough rope to hang myself."

[Ricky Maze]

OOC : I dunno how but I somehow registered it being Sira's turn. XD My bad!! Sorry to keep you two waiting. Ricky took a seat and looked out to the view of the ocean, aware that any moment now could be his very last in this dream. He felt pieces of him slipping away into some vast unknown of his conscious as he listened to Hadrian. Nysel was the lord he mentioned in their first encounter, the one whose domain was that of dreams. Sira was no doubt intrigued by all of this, but Ricky wasn't sure what he thought or felt anymore. He was tired of fighting to stay asleep, if he didn't use his most of will during their intercourse then surely he had used what was left to stay within. The clock was reaching its final ticks in his countdown. "Her name is..." It slipped away completely from his being, a crease in his forehead as he thought hard to recollect it. He felt bad that he didn't have the capacity to recall, even more so thinking it probably reflected upon his good nature and made him seem rather chummy. "I swear I know it, I just can't remember I just haven't the strength to remember..." He trailed off as he looked to Hadrian, thinking of what things he could say before the departure happened once more. One question did come to mind though, one that felt rather important to ask. "How goes yer quest?"