void dream ; open

[crypdick]

WHO: The Outsider & you?
WHERE: A Shared Dream
WHEN: June, whenever
WHAT: The Outsider dreams of the Void, and sometimes people wander in
WARNINGS: Outsider often talks about or alludes to death, murder, violence etc, though he rarely goes into detail



[ You were asleep, and it almost feels like you've woken up again, but something is... strange. You get up, turn around and wherever you were sleeping is open wide to the Void.

Nothingness as far as you can see, except the strange black rock and some sort of species of whale floating in the Void, and the objects and things on the rocks.

The Void draws from the minds of who is there. Some of what is here may be random objects from this world, a hovercar or televison. But some are definitely from somewhere else - there's machines and objects and bits and pieces of architecture from the Outsider's world. Other things you may recognize from home, as the Void draws from your mind. There may even be people you know, from here or home, frozen and unmoving as if in a tableau.

While you look at something, the Outsider appears beside you in a cloud of his telltale black smoke. ]

You've found your way into the Void.

(( OOC: check here for more on how this power works. His vision power is still an option too! If you're cr, he may have pulled you in. If not, people can randomly wander in if they're sleeping the same time he is. If you have dream powers of some kind, feel free to have your character have more control over aspects of the dream, or jam with me about what that might do.))

Comments

[crypdick]

[ The gilt was peeling from her facade.

Now, at least, he had something to go on. His goal was not to break her, not fully anyway, or to (re) (re)traumatize her, though the latter may have already happened. All he wanted was for her to be a little more interesting. ]

They are not in this world. Not the waking one nor the Void. How can they know? How can they prevent you? There is no one here to snitch.

Your choices are your own. What you do and what you say is entirely up to you.

[nightfallallegro]

[ She shakes her head. It's clear he doesn't understand how important it is that this has no chance of getting back to her world. How could he when she hasn't explained?

She tries so hard to force down the fear, and to ignore the memories enough to at least draw upon what she can say. ]

The. The chance it will, get back is not non-zero. [ She swallows hard. ] Even if you never told, an. Another psychic could find out. That psychic might tell someone who. Might tell a person who can retain memories when ported back. Someone might come in without the porter. [ She resists the urge to bite her lower lip, a nervous habit her teacher hadn't been able to break her of, but the government had. ] I don't want to risk hurting people. Lots of people will be hurt if it gets out in my world. People will die. Maybe everyone.

[ And that had been the whole point of killing that woman, hadn't it? To stop the murder of nearly every sapient being on the planet. That was why they were so desperate they used Nightfall and Wishmaster instead of more skilled, more trusted psychics from other states. There just wasn't any time, let alone any reassurance that the more skilled psychics would have made it. ]

[crypdick]

Why would they die?

[ He's not going to question whether or not word would get back somehow. That's an unknown. He doesn't think it's probable, but perhaps it may be possible. ]

[nightfallallegro]

[ She licks her lips a little and haltingly starts to speak again. ]

It. This type of thing. It would gunk up the works. There would be investigations, and the hero program could be put under greater restraints, and not ones that would help people. The junior hero program could be completely eliminated... And... We're needed. I can't tell you why, because it's classified information. But... But they aren't just putting kids on the field because we're cute and are good publicity... We're needed.

If we aren't there to back up and... And sometimes just take on the jobs that the older heroes should be doing, then a lot of people will die, and the senior heroes won't be able to dedicate their time to finding out what's causing a really big problem that I'm not allowed to talk about.

[crypdick]

Is that what they told you?

[ He crosses his arms, the question lying directly in the middle of innocuous and implying something. ]

They tell you you're special and not just that, they tell you you're necessary. They need you to pick up the slack, putting more and more weight on your shoulders until they give you one too heavy to bear.

Is there always another emergency? Is the situation never quite stable? I wonder -

[ That look of longing she gave earlier. He might not know much about superheroes but he does know a lot about people. ]

If you're so vital, how can they allow you the choice to leave?

[nightfallallegro]

[ She shrinks just a little more with each thing he says, until something catches. She props herself up a little emotionally, and looks him in the eyes again. She's not doing very well, that much is obvious, but this is something that means something to her. ]

It's what I've observed. I.. They've told me this, yes. But I choose to stay because I see evidence of it all the time.

[ She fights to continue to hold eye contact. ]

The adult heroes apologise to us. They apologise for not being able to come up against every threat. And they're so very tired. More tired than we are. And we're very tired. [ So tired it's sometimes painful. ] They can't do all the work, even though they want to. And... [ She flinches and looks away, back to the floor. ] Now they really can't hope to... That woman killed most of them. But my team is mostly unhurt.

And... They allow us to leave, because if there was even the slightest chance of it being assumed we were forced, it could take the whole program down... And forcing people to work for you is how you get villains. We've seen it happen in other countries.

[crypdick]

[ The answer at its core didn't change but everything else did. He's getting something closer to sincerity, answers that were less prim and perfect. That's far more interesting. ]

Now I may even believe you.

The one who killed them are dead and you and others like you are healthy and intact. The enemy was killed and you're all picking up the pieces from the damage.

Or you were. Now you are here. Will you continue your work even though circumstances have changed?

[nightfallallegro]

I will. We're still heroes even if we aren't at home.

[ She chews on her lip a little. ]

Even if we were never to make it back home, we're instructed to always do what we can to help the local population. It's what's right. It's what we would like to happen when people come to our world, too. And it wouldn't be alright for us to expect that but not do it ourselves.

[ There was a certain logic there.

Though, in truth, and one she had not yet come to on her own, it was far more likely that this command was to keep them from getting used to a life other than the one they had been conditioned into accepting. Making it a case of 'do unto others' merely gave it a moral backbone to hold it up. ]

[crypdick]

You're still relying on what you have been told.

You take your responsibilities seriously, for whatever that's worth. I wonder what will happen when the choice of what to do isn't so clear-cut, and you have no one to instruct you on a course of action. Will you break, without your structure? Or will you find your own path?

[nightfallallegro]

[ For some reason this question, more than any other question so far makes her patience bend a little, enough for her to say something she would otherwise have been too controlled to say. ]

Do you enjoy making people feel small and bad?

[ Her tone is accusatory, and laced with the frustration that caused her to look away from easy task of answering questions and trying to ignore what felt like jabs at her. ]

[crypdick]

[ Far from being insulted, he seems amused. ]

I enjoy people who make their own decisions, who are capable of standing on their own and making their own way. Those who can do so enough to even change the world.

You are young. You have the potential to grow into something great, just as your growth may be stunted by those who would wish you were a puppet. Or, perhaps, you avoid either fate and eventually lead a normal life.

The future is uncertain, but it is yours to make.

[nightfallallegro]

[ She was frustrated. Frustrated and emotionally tired. She knew she should back down, to try and leave, but everything piled on top of everything else was weighing on her too much for her to be willing to do so just yet.

And though he likely didn't mean it to specifically, one part of his words stuck, hitting her in a way that just made her mad. ]

There is no normal life for people like me! People with my powers don't get to settle down and be librarians or farmers or anything normal. People with my powers... [ She gritted her teeth. ] People with my powers only ever have sad stories if we try. One of the reasons I work so hard to be good is because if I'm good enough maybe the people who come after me won't be seen as scary!

[ She started to feel tears welling up in her eyes and went to wipe them away before they could fall, before she went against the rules about crying. ]

[crypdick]

[ That was it. That was the reason for that initial crack in the facade. Not that she wasn't allowed normalcy, but that she believed it unachievable. ]

All power has a price. But you never chose it, did you? You only chose to take the route that would lead you to what you felt was the best option.

[ He folds his arms behind his back. ]

All stories end in tragedy. Everyone dies. It's not the ending that matters, but the grand narrative of your life. Isn't it worth making it a good story?

[nightfallallegro]

[ She frowns and looks to the ground. ]

I'm not some character in a storybook, someone who exists just so that others can be amused. I... I know that sounds silly, because super heroes are all about performances as well as saving people... But I don't need my life to be narratively satisfying... I just need it to be meaningful on some level... Even if all it does is make it so that people after me might get to have normal lives.

With everything I know now, I would still choose the path I'm on. I would still choose to protect people. Maybe if things were different and less dire I would choose something else. I do not know. My powers don't involve seeing alternate timelines... But with everything...[ Her expression becomes pained for a moment. ] I would choose this, because I want there to still be a world to live in. Even if I don't get the type of life I would like to have.

[ Besides. She's had so little control over her life, even before becoming a hero, she has no idea what she'd like to do. Before, she was on the path of following in one parent or the other's footsteps, they had been putting so much effort into making both paths available to her, but she had been too young to even conceptualise what she wanted to do outside of making her parents proud, and maybe getting to spend more time with them... ]