Event - Untimely

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Untimely

➥ Reality Check

(cw: hypersomnia, coma, supernaturally induced metaphysical hunger, psychosomatic pain)

"We all dream," the representative from Copernicus explains, directing attention to a powerpoint slide projected onto the wall beside her. The seminar in one of the conference rooms is ADI's latest effort to combat Ava's influence and take the fight to their foe. If she's going to put them all to sleep, then so be it. Let their ranks be ready for battle there. "My boss, Zyrian Steel, is a big dreamer. Copernicus started as one. We-" She pauses as her eyes seem to catch on someone at the back of the room. "But that-that's another presentation! Suffice to say, Mr. Steel heard you were having some sleep troubles around the office and wanted to help.

"Hello, everyone. My name is Luna, and I'm here from Copernicus' Augmenting Reality group to talk to you about lucid dreaming. Now, I see some of us are here in our Halloween outfits." She smiles and poses in her 50's-style poodle skirt. "Some of you have very impressive make-up and prosthetics, I might add. I was told there might be some stiff competition for this mid-Halloween get-together. Glad to see they weren't having a little fun with me." Any non-human in the audience is given an appreciative nod. "I can see we have a few dreams brought to life here, but what about shaping the dreams we have while we're in them?"

"We're going to go through a few exercises today. The key tricks for inducing lucid dreaming include:

"One, assess your reality regularly. Even if you can't remember falling asleep, take a moment every few hours to test your reality. Dreams might look very familiar, but there will always be inconsistencies and distortions you can catch. This should help you to recognize when you're dreaming.

"Second, the MILD method or Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams. This is a method where you'll set an alarm for 5 hours after you go to sleep. Once awake, you'll tell yourself, 'The next time I'm dreaming, I will remember that I'm dreaming.' You'll also try to imagine yourself in a lucid dream as you go back to sleep. Silly as it sounds, just having that intentionality can be highly effective.

"Third, tell yourself when you go to sleep that you are going to have a lucid dream, that you will be shaping your reality, even if it seems outside of your control. Convince yourself. Convince others.

"And fourth…" Luna pulls out some high-tech looking eyemasks. "You can try one of our patented Lucidio Eye Masks. These devices help to unlock your mind and provide it with a few extra cues that you're dreaming once you enter REM sleep. We'll be handing out a limited number of samples, courtesy Mr. Steel. That's for the end of our presentation. Now, let's go through the stages of sleep…"

Whether you can stay away for the rest of the presentation, everyone will be chivved awake with increasingly harsh prods if they've fallen asleep during the presentation. There are more seminars throughout the next few days, always similar with Luna offering her guidance on lucid dreaming. Maybe it's enough. Maybe it isn't.

The music doesn't stop. As with last October, the haunting tunes extend their grasp from the graveyards and out toward the rest of Gloucester, ringing through ADI's halls, along with the Flophouse. The music induces intense sleepiness, and you might find your coworkers slumping down while they walk or you might fall victim to the music, yourself.

You awake… somewhere. It might be a place that's familiar, or one that's utterly alien. What you know is that there is something in this place that calls to you, sings in your blood and burns to be away from. And yet, you're terrified. There is something here that wants to consume every part of you, suck the marrow from your bones and leave you a husk of what you once were. You need it. You want it. You are hungry for it. For the fear it both brings and demands. This place seems to be some sort of pocket dimension, a personal hell built just for you and the things that sink their teeth into your bones and claw at the back of your mind. This is a terrifying place.

And you're not alone.

If you've been paying attention to the seminars, perhaps you'll be able to recognize this as a dream, something that isn't real. Sensations that aren't real. A world that isn't real. But with that realization comes a choice. You could try to break free of your personal hell, rip it to shreds, make it less horrific. Or… or there is something that calls to you in this place, a thing that sounds the death of who you once were, perhaps. You could call back, reshape this reality to terrorize the others trapped here with you. They'll never know if you were aware or not, will they? They don't need to know you did this to them consciously.

Just this once, what if you gave in? If someone dies in the dream, it's not like they die in real life. Right?

➥ Knead Help

(cw: blood, unsanitary food, supernaturally-induced existential dread, supernaturally-induced suicidal thoughts, isolation, dissociation)

Deathbed Bread is off the market. Thanks to a timely tip, the Health Department has finally made a slightly less timely visit to Better Loaf than Never, and were forced to shut the storefront down when their inspectors were unable to gain entry to the kitchen. The lights are still on behind the boarded-up windows, though, the smell of sourdough still permeating the air as loaf after loaf is delivered through a slot from the kitchen through the day and night, bread piling up on the counter and floor behind the register. They come at regular intervals, still warm from the oven. ADI has taken over the little storefront now and set up a tiny field office there, the higher-ups having pulled enough strings for law enforcement to look the other way and not ask too many questions about the people coming and going as efforts to break into the kitchen intensify...and as ADI staff truck away loads of Deathbed Bread to incinerate back at headquarters.

Someone has a bright (or maybe desperate) idea: if they can't get in, maybe they can at least stop the bread from coming out. Boarding up the bread slot, by all accounts, works for perhaps an hour or two as those present can still hear more bread piling up on the other side. Then there's a soul-wrenching cry of anguish followed by a violent attack on the barrier from inside the kitchen that ends with an ADI agent injured by flying debris and a cascade of sourdough loaves stained with bloody handprints. It's enough, though. Whatever supernatural seal that made the kitchen blockade impenetrable has broken, and within the day ADI is able to break down the door.

A thick, unnatural fog is all that can be seen inside the doorway. Rather than the cool of an early morning, though, the damp air is hot and cloying; those who venture inside will soon find themselves drenched with a mix of sweat and humidity from the air. They will also soon find themselves alone, regardless of what companions they might have had with them when they entered. Did you have someone with you? You must have; it would be foolish to enter alone, and yet it rapidly becomes difficult to remember their face, their voice, the touch of their hand. Perhaps you imagined them. Perhaps you've always been alone.

Dark shapes in the fog resolve into tombstones as one nears--no, into huge, upright loaves of bread jutting up from where they've been sunk into the soft ground of this strange graveyard, dry and cracked and dead. There are names pressed into them, dates of death spanning the last few weeks…and the next few. Perhaps you'll spot your own name and today's date. And why shouldn't it be today? Everyone dies, and everyone dies alone. Any action other than laying down on the soft dough of your own grave and letting it swallow you up is only delaying the inevitable.

The spell of deathly quiet over this place isn't complete, though. Keep moving, keep trying, keep hanging on to thoughts of those you love and the clear sky beyond this little world, and you might find a friend who needs your help as much as you need theirs. One or both people encountering each other may feel as though they're in a dream, unable to see or hear the other–but with persistence, with feeling, it's possible to reforge the connection. Love and friendship may shine a light on what was invisible–but so will shared anger, joy, or disgust. Any strong, shared emotion beyond the fear and sadness that permeates this place renders would-be ghosts visible, solid, and real to one another, able to move forward or turn back to escape together–or to begin tearing up the tombstones in fierce denial of their portents.

This hellish graveyard is as far as most will go. Somewhere deeper in what was the kitchen, Bryn still labors and the bread still piles up. It will be up to those few lucky (or unfortunate) enough to stumble across him to put a final end to this.

➥ Never Sleep Again

(cw: child death, body horror, violence, potential injury or character death, nightmare dream logic)

Are you dreaming or are you awake? It becomes harder to tell as the music flows through halls and streets, rooms and parks. It’s dangerous out there, people falling asleep where they shouldn’t, or finding themselves face-to-face with what shouldn’t be when their eyes close unknowingly. Perhaps you planned it, your practice made perfect and your mind set to confrontation, maybe this time you sat down with the intention of stopping this. Or maybe it was simply an accident, but you’re here now. What else can you do but fight to survive?

The hellscape of your mind's torment might be familiar or maybe it’s a new flavor, but there’s something different this time. This time, there are seams; the dream around you is sewn together and you hold the scissors. Fight your way or will your way through, and you can pass between the swatches of your dreaming landscape. Maybe you find a friend or maybe you spot the retreating form of a little girl, turning a corner that isn’t there. Except you can see it now, the corridors of this place. You can follow her.

She leads you on a chase, her laugh a ricocheting titter of joy for the game. If you listen closely, however, there’s more to hear. The further you chase her, the more snatches of sound and sensation follow you as well. Grim melodies and snatches of song, searing heat, the taste of ash in your mouth, the sound of screaming that isn’t quite familiar. Your parents? Someone’s parents. Whispered voices. Snatches of words. ‘Amber.’ yelled, called, pleaded. Hide and seek was always fun.‘Ren’ a name that holds fondness, a feeling of a hundred tiny legs across skin- Stop! A command like a pick through your mind filled with anger and fear. Maybe it isn’t just your nightmares in here…

If you catch her, when you catch her, the game is over. Cornered and angry, Ava skitters up the wall, and across the ceiling to hang above you, neck at an impossible angle and clearly broken for it. “What’s wrong? Not having fun?”.

➥ Mod Notes

• GENERAL - Bryn and Ava will both be available for NPC interaction and threading. Players who want to talk to ask Luna anything should respond to the Questions section of the OOC post. The mods will provide her answers to specific questions. Characters who die in the dreams will not die in real life, but they will experience severe fatigue and pain, and may retain scarring in the waking world from whatever killed them in the nightmares. Characters who die in real life… well, they're dead. Please bear this in mind as the game does not have an easy resurrection mechanic.
  
  
• REALITY CHECK (16-25 October) - Everyone will be encouraged (but not technically required) to attend the lucid dreaming seminar. There will be a few of them over the course of three days. Characters can also pick up one of the Ludicio Eye Mask devices that will assist them in being able to enter a lucid state while dreaming. They don't always help, of course; they're mainly augmenting someone's abilities, provided they're following the guidance provided about how to enhance your lucid dreaming capabilities. Luna is clearly unaware that any non-humans are actually non-humans. She believes everyone is just really into Halloween around here.
  
  The nightmares this go around seem to be specifically focused on the Entities that your characters fear most and/or the ones they might be drawn to. You are welcome to make up a personalized hellscape for your character with anything you'd like in it. These are dreams! Go wild! Characters will fall randomly in and out of each other's dreams and personalized hellscapes. Those who have mastered lucid dreaming will be able to traverse dreams with more purpose, aiming to go to specific people's dreams or get themselves out of ones they don't want to be in. Lucid dream experts will also be able to shape the dreams that are meant for them. In their own nightmares, characters will feel a definitive pull toward one (or more over different nights) Entity and experience an intense fear of that Entity along with the desire to feed it, even if you want away from it.
  
  Feeding the Entities in the dreams and using the dreams to torment others will not necessarily lead to an Entity alignment… but it can do. Or it can set a character down a particularly destructive path in that vein. We would just ask that players remember that ADI is very anti-magic/Entities and anyone who is caught displaying powers/Entity alignment is liable to be mistrusted, watched, and potentially killed by the NPCs if they make themselves too much of an overt problem.
  
  
• KNEAD HELP (18-25 October) - Characters may find bread gravestones with their own names, the names of people they have lost, and people they fear losing, as well as names of locals who have been confirmed dead due to eating Deathbed Bread. Some gravestones will bear the names and correct dates for people who are actually dead; others will refer to people who are still alive. Gravestone engravings may include characters back home in player characters' worlds, as well as player characters that have been dropped from the game. OOCly, the appearance of a person's bread gravestone is not a reliable indication of whether that person is actually dead or going to die. ICly, characters may or may not realize this fact at players' discretion.
  
  
• NEVER SLEEP AGAIN (20-25 October) - As characters begin to gain control over their dreaming, they will find they can begin to track down Ava the Lullaby Girl. Confrontation can occur within the dream or, with enough willpower, a character can pull a piece of Ava into the waking world to try and kill her. Upon bringing her to the waking world, characters will find themselves faced with a teenaged version of the girl they were following, Ava’s actual body. She's not a little girl at all, but someone who's just entering into adulthood. Fights are likely to result in injuries ranging from mild to severe and can include death, please keep the setting’s death rules in mind for this. Threads with Ava can start in the dreams or already mid-fight in the waking world! It will take a concerted group effort to actually kill Ava. No one person will be able to do it themselves. Only a piece of her is pulled through or fought in the dreams that any person encounters.
  
  The morning after the last pieces are killed, Ava’s mangled corpse will be found on ADI’s grounds shortly after dawn, clutching a bloody, stuffed lamb in one hand.

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[edalyn]

Eda is, perhaps, the person who would be least surprised or upset by the mere fact she's in a gigantic skeleton. Her own nightmares have been set in the isles, too, though she hasn't quite realised that this is a nightmare. While she's been starting to get the hang of the lucid dreaming, that's been within her own. This is the first time she's found herself in someone else's domain.

And so the first thing she finds herself wondering is if she is, somehow, home. Something that would have been a good thing a few weeks ago, when she thought there was still hope for anyone there. Now... now she needs to know, but she doesn't want to.

She starts walking, pushing her way through the cobwebs and grimacing a little as they begin sticking to her. Eda doesn't mind spiders, she thinks they're cute, but she she doesn't enjoy the texture, the cloying feeling of the webs themselves. Nor does she enjoy the feeling of being watched, especially when she doesn't know if there's anyone left that she would want watching her.

The unease gets worse as she finally steps into the cavern, given the last time that she was in the Titan's skull. She looks up and--perhaps it's luck, or perhaps it's the fact that this is a nightmare, but the first body she sees confirms a very recent fear.

"Hunter--!" Her voice cracks as she rushes toward the limp body of the Golden Guard--of the kid she'd been trying so, so hard to keep safe in the ADI's world until he disappeared.

He's out of reach, but she doesn't need to touch him to confirm he's dead. The boy's pink eyes are sunken and unseeing. His face is twisted into an expression of betrayal and terror that makes her heart ache with anguish and guilt. Tangled in the webs next to him she spots chunks and splinters of wood that look like they may have once belonged to a carving of a cardinal.

She swallows thickly, feeling sick. She doesn't want to look at the rest of the cavern, but she can't stop herself, either. There are a few bodies she can't make out, too rotted and covered in webs, but the next one she does recognize... she wishes she didn't. "Lily..." Eda makes a small, choked noise in the back of her throat.

Her sister looks more decomposed than Hunter, and more obscured by webbing, but parts of her clothes and hair and painfully familiar, as is the staff hanging loosely in her hand, only held there by strands of cobweb. The white raven atop it is cracked down the center, as lifeless as everyone else.

She barely notices the tears welling up and then spilling down her cheeks. They just get worse as she notices other bodies she can't help but recognize. Darius, Eberwolf, the Coven Heads who were part of the rebellion after all. Their other childhood friends. So many witches she knows, or used to know.

"No, no, no..." Eda sinks to her knees, hands tangling into the cobwebs in front of her, as she starts to sob. There's no point in trying not to. There's no point in anything. It was bad enough to know, but seeing it breaks her.

At some point a small part of her realizes there's one person in particular she hasn't seen. Maybe they're safe, maybe... she doesn't want to know, but she has to. She blinks back tears until she can see and looks up, scanning the bodies for--

"Raine...?" Are they alive? They are--they're breathing--right? Eda tries to struggle to her feet, but the webs are making it difficult. "Raine!"

[rainewhispers]

Raine's face doesn't move, their eyes still stare forwards blankly. As Eda tries to move up closer to them the lights on their skin start glowing brighter, the lines start branching out slowly, etching further into their skin the more she tries to reach them. Their face started to knit in pain but they didn't move.

As Eda would speak she’d hear another voice overlap over hers, drowning it out.

“Come, Sprout. Did you really think you’d get away with it?”

Slowly descending from the darkened, web strewn roof of the skull was a large spider. It’s legs had jutted spikes like thorns and the smell of rotten leaves filled the air. As it crawled over the web closer to Raine it was evident it had a humanoid head. One with large, wilted leaves for hair and curling fern horns. Her face was sunken and wrinkled beyond the years they’d have last seen of her.

Terra Snapdragon.

”All that work and for what? Paradise awaits us, you would really take that away? Of course not, you couldn’t really do anything so cunning, could you?”

The sparse webbing around Raine’s arms and legs began to slowly weave over them more, smaller spiders crawling out around them to drag it over and start bundling them up more before vanishing.

“You’re right.. I just wanted to do something good… be brave..”

Similarly, as Eda watched this she’d feel crawling around her feet and legs, more of those smaller spiders skittering around the ground and up over her to try and weave their webs around her legs and hold her in place.

“I suppose I wanted to- to be like Eda, in a way..”

They didn’t seem to notice she was there yet.

[edalyn]

Eda manages to tear her hands back out of the webbing, but then she hesitates once it seems like… she's not sure if it's just coincidence that Raine is getting worse as she reaches for them.

Either way, her chest tightens painfully as the lights branch across Raine's skin and she can't do anything to help. But she doesn't get long to agonize over that before she hears a voice she very much wasn't expecting. Terra shouldn't be alive… right? Did Belos actually spare one of the coven heads?

Things certainly don't make any more sense once Eda sees her Terra in her monstrous new form. It hasn't fully, consciously clicked that she's in a nightmare, but the spider is stretching even the limits of dream logic close to snapping.

Of course, nonsensical or not that doesn't quell the bile rising in her throat. Terra may have kept her from being expelled from Hexside thirty-odd years ago, but Eda's never liked the woman. Especially not how she always spoke to Raine.

…And she really doesn't enjoy hearing Raine agree now. Maybe the dream logic is a factor, or maybe she'd just prefer to draw Terra's attention herself, but she can't help speaking up.

"You are brave, don't–don't listen to her."

She makes another, more desperate effort to break free of the webbing, doing her best to brush off and crush the spiders crawling up her body.

Even as distracted as she's getting trying to keep herself from being trapped further, there's a twinge in her chest at the next thing Raine says. Then again, she supposes it isn’t news.

Actually, she's the one that inspired me to make the group.

A great witch once told me… something about punching fears in the face?

She's not quite sure how she feels about all that now. It's not like everyone would be less dead if they hadn't rebelled… is it better that they tried?

“Leave them alone,” she growls, trying to get the newly arachnoid Terra Snapdragon’s attention this time.

[rainewhispers]

You ARE brave, don't listen to HER.

Raine's brows furrowed a bit, face knitting together in consideration. Their hands curled in and arms shifted against the webbing. Their eyes flickered around where Eda was, like they couldn't focus on her but they were trying to.

At the same time Eda would find it easier to pull herself free, the webs weakening around her feet and legs. She'd be able to spring out if she persisted hard enough.

The spider snapped its head to Eda and narrowed its eyes, before a grin crossed its face, oddly segmented teeth, almost appearing as some form of folded mandibles visible in its mouth.

Suddenly it crawled around Raine to the other side of them, the face shifting, and moulding over itself as another face appeared in its place. An older man with shorter pointed ears, long dirty blonde and greying hair, as well as a ghastly green gash over his face.

Belos.

"Your admiration for the Owl Lady is misplaced. What has she done for you besides give you this foolish false hope?"

He chuckled darkly and Raine's face twisted into one of pained despair. Their gaze slowly drifting away from Eda again. Belos was not looking to Raine either, but down at Eda now as he spoke.

"After-all, she pushed you away, did she not? Why put so much faith in her when she hardly did the same for you? Did she not refuse to confide in you? Even lie to you. If I had to guess, I'd say she was using you."

"She wouldn't.." Raine's voice sounded meek and small.

The webbing under Eda would suddenly give way and she'd fall down the small pit of silk. She'd meet resistance when she was down up to her waist. She could feel it was flimsy around her, but more in the sense struggle may cause her to fall deeper.

[edalyn]

For a moment, Eda almost felt just a tiny bit more hopeful about things--she was able to struggle to her feet, the webs snapping and tearing as Raine at least looked in her direction.

She narrowed her eyes back at the spider, and began patting at her pockets, at her hair, looking for glyphs or for Owlbert or for any way to feel less painfully useless in this particular moment.

But she didn't find anything, and then she felt a little nauseous as she watched the spider's features twist and change. She glared up at the manifestation of the man she desperately wanted to tear apart with her bare hands.

She wasn't sure if Belos's words hurt more or if Raine's meek attempt at an argument did. Either way, she felt a flash of anger start to bubble up because after all they lied to her too.

And she'd certainly never been trying to use them. If anything a good part of the problem had been how hard she'd been trying not to. Not letting them help at all in case knowing how badly she was doing made them feel like they had to. Made them stay around her more, put themselves in more danger--

"I was trying to keep them safe--!" The frustrated words cut off abruptly an her stomach lurched as she felt the floor drop under her.

She struggled briefly before realizing that was only making things worse. Going still for the moment she made a little noise that sounded a lot like trying to choke back a bitter laugh.

"...We need to stop doing that." She said this part quieter, mostly to herself. They really were similar people. Funny how that just made things between them worse instead of better. It was starting to click that this had to be a dream, though the implications of that didn't necessarily make her feel better.

[rainewhispers]

As Eda shouted that she was trying to keep them safe- as the floor dropped out from under her, the words sort of overlapped with another echo of her voice. It was coming from the spider as it scuttled above Raine and it's face shifted into that of Eda's. Though younger, with long ginger hair with that shock of lighter streaks on the side. Her eyes though pitch black with sprouts of feathers around the sides of her face.

The voice warbled as it spoke more in a crass shouting volume.

"I wouldn't? Oh please, Rainstorm don't kid yourself."

The floor under Eda was dragging down her arms and the rest of her slowly as Raine was being slowly engulfed by the smaller spiders.

"If I really wanted to keep you safe I would have told you about the curse, about everything. Make sure you could do something if anything went wrong, but pushing you away was always easier. I mean- after all, how could you help me if you couldn't help yourself? Or help anyone else for that matter?"

Then it all gave way, Eda was falling through darkness and the last thing she'd hear was the echo of her own voice above, overlapped with Belos and Terra, though faintly it almost seemed to sound like Raine was under it all.

"What good are you anyways?"

Then something grasped her arm and pulled her up. She'd fall forwards on the dais of the coven heads, the eclipse hanging in the sky overhead with the pools of light from the covens all leading up towards it.

Around the dais were cocoons where each of the coven heads were supposed to stand, only their arms with their sigils somewhat visible through them. Raine was on their Bard spot, knelt down with their hands on the platform and their head hanging low.

They slowly looked up to Eda and shook their head, a vacant look in their eyes.

"We can't win."

[edalyn]

The realisation that this was a dream was getting less comforting by the second. She already knew she fucked up, of course. She'd been putting all the blame on herself for a long time now. And it's not like she'd ever forgotten what they said when they left.

But hearing this, seeing this version of her, the idea that Raine saw her that way... sees her that way? Because this wasn't her own dream, was it. That was the part her mind had been trying not to accept.

She didn't try to argue this time--or maybe she just didn't have time. She took a sharp breath as the webs gave way and she felt tears stinging at her eyes by the time she fell onto the dias, bracing herself on her hands.

"We... this isn't real. Maybe we still can. Somehow. After we save the human realm. Time's weird." It was the hope she'd been clinging to lately, but it still rang hollow as she said it. She couldn't quite meet Raine's eyes. She didn't want to look around, either.

TW: Body Horror, Transformations, Arachnophobia

[rainewhispers]

In Eda's peripheries where Raine's eyes tried to meet hers she'd see the emerald of their eyes start to dull and roll over to black, passing over the white's of their eyes into a full darkened sclera.

"We can't win, Eda. No matter what we do. You'll just get hurt as well."

Their voice chattered in their throat as the corners of their mouth began to split. Revealing folding out skin into mandibles as little divots by their eyes began to open into smaller ones, three more on each side making a total of eight. The spider-like features continued to grow and morph on their body.

"I can't let you do that."

Their voice warped as horrific cracking sounds filled the air, spidery appendages bursting out of their back and sides, lifting them up as they flourished their hands slowly. Weaving webs out of thin air to form a violin and bow. Before Eda could do anything else they played a note but the music was wrong.

It rung hollow and stung in the ears as webs shot out from impossible to comprehend angles and places to wrap around her wrists and ankles.

[edalyn]

Eda wanted to argue--the time angle, the idea of going back with more people, any number of things--but she sees where they're coming from, as depressing as it is. At least, at first she does.

But watching Raine twist and warp into this thing. Her guess had already been the Web, of course. It had been since they'd shoved her with that whistle, when she was chasing them. But this... it's not even the physical transformation that bothers her, not really. Not like she can say much when it comes to that. It's knowing what the spider form embodies, here.

And as if the idea didn't already make her feel sick, she feels the strands catch around her limbs and tries to struggle, to keep some control.

"Raine stop! Just--just snap out of it, this isn't like you!" Except for... things like pretending they have amnesia. After all, it wouldn't be scaring her this way if it wasn't a little like them.

[rainewhispers]

Their fingers pointedly pressed to the strings of silk as they continued to play in spite of Eda's begging. The bow of the violin seemed to be made of forearm bone, the neck of the violin a spine. As they played Eda would feel more strings wrap around her, digging into her skin, into the wings she didn't bear but could feel all the same in this moment.

"This is what I am." They spoke, voice layered and warping like something else was speaking with them. "What I have to be. To protect you, to protect everyone." Eda's limbs would be pulled in close to herself as she'd be dragged onto her knees, looking up at Raine's perverted form of what they should be, now horrifically morphed with Spider-y appendages and features.

"This is what I'm good at, right?" Their voice wavered a bit, like doubt crept in but they hissed over themselves and strung a loud note as the strings began to flurry around Eda, forming a cocoon around her. The last thing she'd see as they wrapped over her head was Raine doubling over and the spider-ous form overtaking them completely.

She'd hear their voice close the distance up on her blinded, bound body.

"Maybe you don't really know me anymore after all."
"Maybe I don't know myself either."

Something stung, sharp and hard biting into her neck and back from behind-

It's time to wake up.

[edalyn]

To protect everyone... well, that motivation was like them. And sometimes like her. But the fact she understood it didn't make her feel better about Raine going down this path so much as it just made her feel worse about herself.

"It's not... the only thing you're good at." She could tell arguing wasn't exactly doing any good, but she still found herself trying not to sound as defeated as she was starting to feel. She grit her teeth and tried not to whimper as she struggled against the webs.

It was hard to look Raine in the (many) eyes, but she did her best--until she suddenly couldn't do it at all.

What happened to honesty huh? Wasn’t that kind of your thing or do I really not know you anymore?

She hadn't stopped to regret that when she'd said it. But she was regretting it now. Even if they'd said much the same when they were young, it still hurt.

In some ways, it hurt more than the fangs piercing into her flesh.

But that sharp sting was enough to wake her up all the same. She sat upright in her nest with a gasp and looked around frantically for a moment before things settled into place. She took a deep breath and swiped the back of her hand across her eyes, trying to ignore her feathers coming away damp.

It was a little while before she forced herself to get up. After all, she didn't have proof it wasn't just her own nightmare. And even if it wasn't, they could just not talk about it. That always ended well.

He hesitated outside Raine's door before knocking. There was no answer, but her feathery ears twitched as she caught a sound from inside. She opened the door to find the other witch in what appeared to be extremely restless sleep, looking about as miserable as she felt.

She moved to sit on the edge of their bed, putting a hand on their shoulder and squeezing lightly--although being careful with the claws. "Raine...? Rainstorm? Come on, wake up. It's just a nightmare." She hopes.

[rainewhispers]

Raine's forehead was beaded in sweat, their head tossing and turning too and fro on their pillow as they struggled to keep their wits about them in their dreaming state. Hands bunched up in the sheets covering them. They were mouthing something wordlessly in desperation, only making pitifully soft, sad sounds.

As Eda walked in and put a hand on their shoulder Raine's eyes snapped open and they launched upright in the bed. Their hand grasping her wrist as they stared her down. For a brief terrifying moment their eyes were glowing. Bright and feral as their whistling wheezes seemed to hiss and shriek around the room like the soft cries of a banshee. Things in the room seemed to rattle and lift slightly with the panic noises they were making.

Then, they blinked. Once .. twice.. And things began to settle. Raine let go of Eda's hand and stared her down as the maroon-red bardic glow began to die down into their normal green hue.

"Eda-" They started but it choked up fast and they lurched forwards, arms wrapping around her and burying their face in her shoulder, but there were no fangs this time. "It was horrible- a nightmare, a terrible nightmare and I couldn't stop it.."

[edalyn]

Normally the idea of being afraid of Raine--of them, like they might actually hurt her--not just afraid they were lying to her or doing something stupid... normally that would be ridiculous.

When they'd fought in the alley, back at the parade, even when they had hurt her she'd been more worried for them than anything else. Normally the glowing eyes and a little stray bard magic would be nothing. But there was enough of the nightmare lingering in her mind that she couldn't stop herself from flinching when they grabbed her wrist.

There was a little pause as they hugged her, too, breath catching in her throat at the feeling of being constricted again, when she could still practically taste the cobwebs filling her mouth as she tried to scream--

But it was Raine and they were upset and they needed her. She wrapped her arms around them and squeezed, hard, in a way that always used to ground them when they were kids. Only now she could fold her wings around them, too, for good measure.

"I know. I know. I was there. It's--it's okay now. It's just a nightmare. It's just this place." She did her best not to sound like she was trying to reassure both of them.

[rainewhispers]

Feeling her hold them tight, that pressure around them and the curl of her wings adding protection against everything outside of them, everything they couldn't control. It wasn't exactly one to one, the wings were new, the feathers were new, she was taller and stronger and they weren't just kids anymore! But... but it was familiar enough that steadily Raine's choked breathing started to find some kind of rhythm.

"I couldn't stop it I- I wanted to.. but-" They went ragged for a moment though, Eda could feel them tense but they didn't move away from her, only lifting their face up enough to talk clearly just off her shoulder.

"What.. what do you mean you were there..?"

[edalyn]

It was familiar enough that it didn't take Eda too long to relax, either. She didn't stop hugging them, but they could probably feel the muscles in her back slowly loosen up. She doubted she'd be forgetting that dream any time soon, but... it wasn't real. The version of her friend she was holding was.

She started to murmur another soft I know, probably once again for both of their benefit, but then she blinked.

"I... I guess I thought you realised. Sorry." Because she could have just, you know, not told them that was actually her. But maybe talking was for the best. She squeezed them a little tighter again. "It's okay."

[rainewhispers]

Raine didn't pull away, part of them wanted to but they were afraid that.. if Eda let them, they'd run away again. They'd run and try to protect her and get everyone hurt more and more in the process of trying to be some hero only that this time?

They'd be protecting Eda from themselves. They weren't sure if it made it better or worse but their breathing went ragged again as they gripped her like a lifeline.

"I'm sorry- I'm sorry Eda. I didn't want to hurt you again, not like this- not in any way but like this the least!"

They choked up and tears began to pool at their eyes and trail down their cheeks.

"I should have listened to you, I could hear you but it..."

It felt good to be in control.

"I couldn't stop myself."

[edalyn]

Eda let out a little sigh as she felt tears start to drip into her feathers. She just kept holding them, both to try and lend comfort and because this might be easier if they weren't quite looking at each other's faces right now.

She wasn't alright, but... she wasn't about to take that out on Raine. Hearing them apologize just made things worse. Just made her think of herself--and of someone else, suddenly. The first time her sister hurt someone while she was the raven beast.
Mom, I heard you but I couldn't stop myself. I... I couldn't do anything.

Everyone was good at blaming themselves, weren't they?

"Raine... Raincloud. Don't. I've spent enough time beating myself up over things the owl beast did to watch you do it, too. And it doesn't even feed off fear like these things."

[rainewhispers]

Raine didn't say anything for a moment. Softly crying against her as they thought to the horrible voices of Terra and Belos and-... And Eda. Not the one who cried out for them to stop listening to them.

The version of Eda they thought they knew years and years ago.

Slowly the tension started to pool out of them into an exhausted weight against her.

"How do you do it..?" They asked, quietly and sombrely, "How do you cope with.. that. The things you can't control?"

[edalyn]

Eda, meanwhile, was trying very hard not to think about that part of the dream. That part nagged in a way that was harder to explain away. But it wasn't time to deal with that yet.

Instead, as Raine relaxed against her, she stopped squeezing them quite so hard and instead moved a hand to start stroking their hair, being careful not to scratch them.

She opened her mouth to give a serious answer, and then paused. This might be a good time to break the tension. "Well, it used to take a lot of apple blood. But... you could try feeding the Web some mice?"

[rainewhispers]

They leaned their head against her hand somewhat, the feeling of long nails gently raking against their scalp was nice, they had to admit. Familiar too.. they missed this.

At her response they let out a soft, choked up laugh. Slowly and steadily they pulled back, staying close to her and keeping a hand on her shoulder to stay steady while the other wiped at their eyes.

"Is- Sorry.. is mice more or less effective than drinking?"

[edalyn]

Eda let them pull away, but kept her hand where it was for the moment, continuing to gently run her claws through their hair. They'd be able to see that she'd also teared up a little bit more than she'd be trying to let on, but at least she was laughing now. Awkward, but genuine and a little relieved to have made them laugh.

"...More actually." She moved to bury her face in their shoulder this time, but that was more to do with the fact she'd just admitted to eating mice than genuine distress. (A stray thought briefly wondered if she'd managed to make her chances of getting them to kiss her any time soon even worse.)

"Pretty sure that part won't be the same for you, though."

[rainewhispers]

They couldn't help but continue the soft laughter as she admitted the mice helped more. Which was honestly a bit surprising if her drinking habits are still anything like what they were back in the day. They couldn't help but even snort a bit at it, an unseeming sound they they tried to avoid at the best of times.

But this was Eda.

"Yeah.. I don't even know how I'd do that. I don't know if there's any spiders here big enough for a mouse." Their laughter trailed off gently as they let out a content sigh. "Do- do you actually feed the Owl Beast mice? How does that work?"

[edalyn]

Eda chuckled into their shoulder at that little snort, it always used to feel like scoring a point to be able to make them lose their composure in little ways.

All of this was starting to feel surprisingly familiar. Being up at an odd hour of the night with them, just… talking and snuggling and playing with their hair and making each other laugh. It was nice, if she ignored the context. She was starting to realise just how touch-starved she was these days.

After a moment she pulled away enough to answer, but stayed close. "Titan… where do I even start," she muttered half to herself.

"I've learned a lot about the curse. I used to think when I changed that maybe it was just–me but out of control or… something." Eda glanced away, trying not to dwell on how that had made her feel. Even if that was what she wanted to help Raine avoid.

"I mean I used to have nightmares about it but… I didn't know it was genuinely its own thing. A real animal that used to exist. Someone hunted it down and turned it into a curse scroll."

[rainewhispers]

Raine wasn't quite as technically touch-starved. They don't have many people they feel close enough with to allow that vulnerability, that much is true but.. There's also the feeling of contact they're no stranger to when it comes to people they'd rather avoid.

Firm hands on their shoulders, nails not quite digging in, a stern voice.
Come, sprout.

But Eda? Eda was so.. easy. It wasn't like everyone else, am I being too pushy? Am I being too distant? Too close? Too far? Eda was natural and intuitive, limbs intertwined and arms holding bodies close under the stars.

Was it wrong to want that again, after all they've done to her?

Best not to dwell on it.

Raine moved a hand to brush down the feathers on her Back, between the inside of her wing and her shoulder. "Really..? How did you even realize that's the case? Can you- I mean.. can you talk to it?"

[edalyn]

Eda started to say something else, then paused, leaning just a little into their hand and stretching her wing up and to the side a bit, feathers spreading out before settling back down. While Eda--fortunately--didn't have anyone especially overbearing in her life, she wasn't comfortable with this kind of closeness from most people. Raine didn't count as most people.

Right. Focus. Where was she?

"It's... a long story. Involving Hooty," she added, because honestly that should be enough to tell them they probably didn't want to sit through that entire story.

"But, well, I saw its memories in a dream. And they weren't very nice. I used to hate the thing," and by extension herself, but again best not dwell on that. "But... then I saw it needing help." She shrugged a shoulder almost sheepishly. But it wasn't like Raine didn't know she was a sap at heart. Still, it was hard to open up about all this even now, and she curled in on herself a bit, absently scratching her claws down one of her arms.

"Turns out it was just... lost, and angry, and scared. Neither of us wants to be here but we can't change it, either. So... yeah. I talk to it these days. Trying to learn to live with each other, you know?" She really hoped all this wasn't just making the curse sound more confusing than it already used to.