OPT-OUT EVENT LOG: DREAM A LITTLE DREAM

[asgardmods]

Who: EVERYONE that stayed in Asgard
What: the Dream a Little Dream mingle log
When: Day 515 ( Sept. 25/26 )
Where: all across the city!
Rating: PG-13. Anything higher than that should be taken to a private log, please!

Day 515 ( Sept. 25/26 )

Progress through the ice blockade will be slow and narrow, as they can't possibly hope to clear the entirety of the forest that has been buried under Thiazi's black ice. Now that they know the source of her magic's corruption, it might not come as a great surprise when cracking open the ice unleashes a strange burst of magic.

At the halfway point between Utgard and Asgard, a pulse of energy will move through the entire city, immediately putting every mortal it touches to sleep. This part of the curse is mandatory and your character must fall asleep; the dream effects of it are not mandatory, and can be played with at your discretion. During this first wave, Travellers will be granted a brief dream - that does not belong to them. They will see, from the dreamer's point of view, every hope and goal and aspiration that the dreamer wishes to complete before the end of days. Whether it's simply confessing their love to an old friend or saving their home planet or perfecting an Asgardian pie, your character will see someone else's ideal resolution before Ragnarok. More on plotting this below!

Upon waking, the Travellers will be plagued with the indistinct whispering of several voices overlapping one another and a slight headache. Both symptoms will gradually increase over time until it reaches incapacitating pain and nausea. The only way to assuage the symptoms is to find the owner of the dream and either maintain physical contact for an hour or discuss the subject of the dream until a full confession has been made. After that, the symptoms will fade and the Travellers will be free to carry on with their day.

There will be other pulses of magic at random throughout the day; these are not mandatory and you can feel free to have your character experience as many or as few dreams as you wish. All dream-sharing will cease by the end of the day, as the blockade progresses past that centre-point of magic.

[ OOC NOTES: This is the mingle log for the Dream a Little Dream opt-out event! Random pairings have already been sent out, but you guys can still feel free to plot with each and pair up anywhere you like. Please remember that these dreams are meant to be positive; details can be found here. Please put [OPEN/CLOSED] along with the time and location in the title of your comment. Let us know if you have any questions! ]

Comments

[tonsofpun]

It's an effort not to grip his arm, to dig her fingers in and make him stop talking. Has Riley told him? Has she broken the news? Hell, if he doesn't know, the look on Ellie's face might straight up give it away.

"... this place isn't all bad."

[robosnack]

It makes him stop, and he bites back a sigh. He doesn't know what to do. He doesn't really understand Ellie, and he knows she wouldn't be talking about this at all if they didn't have to. It just makes him feel even more like a stranger; this isn't for him to hear.

"Yeah," he agrees lamely, managing a shrug.

"Hey, are you feeling a little better?"

[tonsofpun]

"... yeah."

Surprised, she looks up at him.

"Hey, look, I'm not going to be the only one to spill their guts." She tries for a smile, but it ends up strained around the edges. Still, she's serious. And curious.

"I saw a... dark place, I guess. Filled with dead things. Haunted."

She says the word as if she knows the feeling instinctively. She does.

[robosnack]

He scowls at first, but the more she keeps talking the darker the expression gets. If it wouldn't hurt to let her go, he'd have pulled away.

He's not sure what she'd seen, exactly, but he has dreams like that sometimes, and none of them are fun. Usually, he doesn't care that much; it's easy to brush off. But it feels like an invasion of privacy that somehow Ellie ended up seeing inside his nightmares too.

"So?" he shoots back, shrugging.

"What does it matter? It was a dream."

[tonsofpun]

"... I saw Gon."

She says it quietly, every instinct telling her not to pry, but he probably feels like ass, and it's not going to get better until he talks about it. At least a little.

"He's basically- to you, what Riley is to me."

[robosnack]

The frown deepens, instantly, a dark and almost threatening kind of look. To anyone who knows what to look for, it's defensive, vulnerable more than angry and trying not to show it.

"How do you know what he is to me? What does that have to do with anything?"

He wants to ask what she saw in the dream, exactly, but isn't sure he wants to know. This isn't fair. This is personal, and this weird magic or whatever's happening is showing his dreams to strangers, and he's getting really upset.

[tonsofpun]

"Why is that a bad thing?"

Ellie still hasn't grown out of wanting to push back, getting defensive when challenged, especially when she knows she's right. She leaves her hand where it is, but only barely.

"Geeze. I just felt it, same way you got inside my head and just. Borrowed my feelings."

[robosnack]

"Okay, okay-- I get it. Neither of us are happy about it," he huffs back, jaw still tight.

It takes a moment to calm down.

"Tell me about it," he demands instead. "I don't understand what you saw. What did it have to do with Gon?" He hoped it was nothing bad, even if it was just a dream. It hadn't sounded like a very good one.

[tonsofpun]

"It was just... him taking you by the hand. Pulling you out of that dark place."

Ellie shrugs, slowly. "And you were thanking him. It was like you weren't alive, like he gave you something you wanted to fight for. Something to live up to."

[robosnack]

Killua stiffens at her words, throat tightening up. He has to look away.

"He's my friend," he mutters, as if that explains it all.

He doesn't know what to say. If Ellie felt his dream like he'd felt the emotions in hers, she'd know if he tried to protest or brush it off that he's lying. And he has no reason to. It's not even that he minds so much if people know, but it's just- it's so personal, and it means so much to him, and he hates the feeling of being laid bare like this so much. Ellie doesn't even like him. Ellie doesn't deserve to know these things about him.

He's embarrassed, and a little bitter, and he can't even pinpoint why. It's freaking him out how she hit the nail on the head so precisely.

[tonsofpun]

Again, she feels something on the back of her tongue, coming up her throat, and swallows back the urge to be sick. It's more than the feeling now. She wants to say this, wants to talk about it, because she knows this feeling.

"That's... the best kind of friend."

She picks at the sleeve of her shirt, since she can't rub her hands together, one of them firmly planted on his arm. Warm, human.

"It's more than knowing how you felt. I just... I get it. That feeling. That everything's fucked up and you don't have a place, and maybe you don't even like yourself, and then this person comes into your life and for no reason at all, they care about you and they want you and-"

She has to stop. She has to stop right now, because there are tears in her eyes.

"They make you feel like you're living, not just surviving."

[robosnack]

Killua feels a little sick too, and it's not just what's happening with the magic. His throat keeps getting tighter and tighter, and it hurts to swallow. He can't meet her eyes. He wants to pull away, hands clenching in his lap hard enough to hurt the insides of his palms.

What the hell does she understand? It's not fair. How dare she talk to him like this, like she just knows? She doesn't know anything.

"Shut up," he snaps, but it's quiet, just under his breath. "You don't know anything about me, you don't even like me, and now you think you have me figured out from one stupid dream? This is ridiculous. This whole place is ridiculous!"

[tonsofpun]

Ellie's hand twitches, as if she wants to pull away too, but reminds herself that if someone had ever tried to tell her the same thing about Riley, especially if it was Killua, she'd never have listened.

"Not you," she insists, snapping back, but only a little. "Just the feeling, that's all. Anyway, you can tell me to fuck off all you want, but this isn't getting better unless we talk about it."

[robosnack]

She might be right, judging by the way his stomach suddenly, violently protests. Killua's jaw goes tense, and he's starting to look a little green on top of everything else. He feels awful, and he hates being lectures, hates how Ellie's such a nosy know-it-all and he has to be stuck with her of all people.

"What the hell am I supposed to talk about?"

[tonsofpun]

"Focus on the dream," she suggests, half-snapping at him. It might be the pain, or it might be worry. Who the hell knows.

"Talking about that seemed to help."

[robosnack]

"I already told you what I saw," he snaps right back, curling up a little, almost involuntarily.

"Why is this happening? What kind of magic is this anyway?"

[tonsofpun]

"Why are you asking me? Do I look like a library of useful Asgardian facts to you? Sheesh, get a grip."

She doesn't push him more. But Jackson chooses that moment to push his head into Killu's lap and whine softly. He doesn't understand why they're so upset, but he doesn't like it.

[robosnack]

The dog is a welcome distraction. Killua makes a soft tch sound between his teeth and looks away, but his free hand goes to Jackson's head, petting slowly despite his agitation.

His stomach keeps clenching, twisting uncomfortably. Killua takes a deep breath.

"Gon was the first friend I ever had."

[tonsofpun]

Was that so hard? She thinks, borderly angrily, but tries not to remember that that was exactly the way she was with Riley. She'd never had a friend, a real friend.

Fuck. They're in deep, aren't they?

She listens quietly, while Jackson licks Killua's fingers.

[robosnack]

He stares at the dog, not looking at her, sticking his fingers gently in Jackson's mouth to play with him a little bit, ruffling his ears.

"I wasn't allowed to have friends."

It's slow going. He still feels sick, but the headache lessens slightly, the sharp digging ache behind his eyes fading into a dull pressure instead.

"I wasn't allowed to want anything like that. Or anything at all, really. Just do what my family told me to do. Keep up the family business and all that..."

[tonsofpun]

He nips, stinging, but he's been taught well and doesn't break the skin. He might have a few red marks, though. And slobber.

Ellie slowly tucks her feet under her on the couch, listening and putting things together.

"Assassins, right?"

[robosnack]

Killua doesn't seem to mind. He nudges at Jackson until the dog starts wagging his tail a bit, as if to make sure he's really okay.

"Hm?" Finally, he looks up at Ellie, nodding.

"Yeah."

[tonsofpun]

"So, how'd you guys meet?" she asks him. There's none of her usual self-assured attitude. Her voice is soft. Thoughtful, almost gentle. Like she's deep in her own memories, herself.

"What made you want to be friends?"

[robosnack]

"I ran away from home so I could take the Hunter Exam. It seemed like fun..."

He shrugs, knowing none of this means anything to Ellie.

"Gon was one of the first people I met there. And he was my age. I was bored, so I stuck around."

Not that he'd realized he'd been making a friend.

[tonsofpun]

"He seems like a happy guy," she hedged. They hadn't met for long, but he was unbelievably tough, and cared a lot about his friends. He reminded her of Riley, that same weightless smile, perhaps without the cocky self-assurance.

"I guess he'd be easy to like."