revenance_rpg | Every Time you Close Your Eyes

Who: North and Luna
What: North had nightmares and Luna attempts to solve all the Freelancers' problems.
Where: Hotel in Traverse Town
When: Night
Warnings: Mentions of AI Torture, death, and generally not happy things.

North has started having dreams again.

Although this time the dreams are more like nightmares compared to the confused wanderings of before. He's not sure if he's himself, or Theta, but there's mentions of security failure, and someone's died and he couldn't save them. He's not sure if it's South or Wash, or even himself who's died and that scares him. It scares Theta even more, and the dream continues with worries of things falling apart, the project, Maine, his friendship with Wash. There's the sense that it can all be fixed but Cactus usually wakes him up with a chomp on the arm before he can get any further. After that he's wide awake, and has to walk the halls of the hotel to offer Theta some measure of comfort.

Tonight, however, is one of the worst nights. The dreams are there with a vengeance, amplified due to Theta's anxiety. He tries to calm Theta down, calm his own thoughts down, and remind Theta that things can be fixed, that that's what happens next in the dream but Theta is too scared to respond, and North can't seem to wake up when he usually does. If Cactus is chewing on his arm, North has no idea, and his focus is split between Theta and waking up.

And he's terrified.

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By now, Luna's not terribly surprised to encounter frightened Freelancers in the dreamscape. There's something strange about Agent North's dreams, though, something she can't quite put her hoof on. Perhaps the presence of the AI? She's never ventured near enough to the sleeping minds of York or Wyoming to compare.

Ordinarily she prioritizes children in her rounds. Adults, in her mind, can handle the occasional nightmare every now and then. Here, though, her duties are much lightened, so upon sensing North's distress, Luna turns her power to him. Manifesting in his dream, she finds herself in unfamiliar surroundings. Well, that's quite typical for a non-Equesrian dream. Fluttering her wings at the almost-palpable sense of anxiety in the air, she starts moving forward, looking around. "Agent North? Art thou near?" Surely she couldn't have manifested herself too far off?

It's hard to tell exactly where he is. He thinks he's on the Mother of Invention, or it's somewhere else. It's familiar, but he's pretty sure it's Theta's memory. He's not sure how to deal with that, since as close as they are, Theta doesn't really share memories.

He wonders if Theta's in the dream even, or if he just needs a way to wake up, so he can confront the hologram.

He pauses when he hears Luna. Was she here to? What kind of dream was he having?

"Luna? Is that you?" he calls out, looking around. "I'm over here!"

Fuzzy dreamscapes aren't exactly new to Luna, but she doesn't need too much to go on. North's voice is plenty; she pricks up her ears and follows until she sees him. "Ah, Agent North!" Quickening her pace, the alicorn approaches. "Is all well with thee? Thou seemed in some distress." Also, this is the first time she's seen a dream quite so oddly defined, but there's hardly any sense in telling him his subconscious is strange.

"Hey," He says, a weak smile appearing on his face. He's tired, even in the dream and it shows. "Didn't expect to see you here, Luna."

But he's glad he's not alone.

"I guess you could say that. Theta...hasn't been having the best time with these dreams, and well, that has an effect on me. Usually I can get him to calm down but tonight..."

Tonight that doesn't seem to be happening.

"We had wondered if the AIs could affect thy dreams. They feel...different, from other human dreamscapes, even from some distance." Luna turned, looking about in some surprise. "Is he not here with thee?" She had thought the AIs were always with their partners, and even though dreams could theoretically allow the two to part, she couldn't see that being something Theta would desire.

Perhaps this was his nightmare.

"He can. Theta's pretty much a part of my subconscious now." While he didn't mind, he was still getting used to it, and this was one of the worst side effects.

"And yeah, Theta's here. I know he is, but I think he'd hiding. He does that when he's scared. He doesn't like the theme of these dreams very much."

It reminded him of how he became a fragment, a process North was still trying to figure out from the dream.

"How...interesting." It was pretty clear from Luna's tone that what she really meant was something more along to the lines of 'disturbing', but then she was hardly familiar with any good kinds of magic that added new members to one's subconscious. Theta was hardly a threat, though, so she pushed those feelings away to focus on the problem at hand.

"Well! It should not be too terribly difficult to locate him!" She stamped a hoof, sending a ripple through the dream's surroundings. "We shall not dissolve the dream whilst he is lost, 'twould likely only frighten him more, but 'tis not a terribly large space. We shall seek him together!"

"That's a good idea. I was having a pretty tough time on my own," North replied. Theta's anxieties got to him easily, and seemed to remind him of his own, and so he had to stop get those under control before continuing his search.

"I think I might know where to find him, if the landscape manages to stay stable." If if stayed with the Mother of Invention, instead of anywhere weird.

Luna focused, stabilizing the ripples around her and even filling in a few of the gaps as well as she could. Agent Washington's dreams were far too fractured to get a proper look at anything from them, but this looked similar enough to a few pieces that she thought she had a sense of what it should be like. Agent North's subconscious could follow her cues, anyway. "I believe I can mange that. Do lead on, Agent."

North nodded, trying to focus on the familiar hallways, hoping that that might help in some way. He started off down the hallway, heading towards the barracks, taking the route he usually did when Theta needed to be calmed down. If he wasn't anywhere on this route, there was a chance that the AI was hiding in his room.

Luna followed, horn glowing faintly as she maintained the landscape around them. It took rather less effort than changing it would have, especially with the dreamer (or one of them, anyhow) already lucid. "This is a place familiar to you both?" she asked, though she already had seen the location in other dreams. It was more an effort to divine where Theta might be...and perhaps to get some of North's perspective on matters of the past.

"Yeah, it is," North replied, keeping a hand on the wall, if only for the sake of familiarity. "I guess you could call this place home. It's the ship I'm stationed on, the Mother of Invention. It's basically freelancer headquarters for the time being."

There were other bases, but it was easier to react to incidents from the ship. North turned the corner, noting that they were almost to the barracks.

"I think Theta might be hiding out in my room."

"'Tis a sensible notion," Luna commented. "Familiar locations will often recur within a dream." The AI seemed the type to take comfort in such things, certainly. At least the dream had provided them this time...

North nodded, stopping in front of a blank door.

"It's here," he said, as the door slid open automatically.

Theta was curled up into a ball on the bed, sitting with his head between his knees. It was weird to see him like this, as a separate entity. North usually saw him as a hologram, or that weird feeling in the back of his mind. It might have been hard for Theta now, since it was North who was actually dreaming.

"Hey Theta," he said, moving into the room and motioning for Luna to follow. The AI looked up, confused.

"North? Luna?"

Luna slipped easily into the room after North, keeping her wings tight against her sides; human buildings weren't quite designed for a being of her size. "Good evening, Theta," she greeted in return, moving closer to the bed. "How dost thou fare?"

Theta looked worn out and dim, if a bit more solid than he did in the real world. His dimensions were that of a kid, even though he still wore the armour. North vaguely wondered if there was anything under the helmet, as he sat down beside him on the bed.

"I dunno. I'm scared. How did you get here?"

"It's okay, Theta. This is a dream, and we're here to help."

Every Time you Close Your Eyes

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