#balast

They went and burned the plant. Then returned to the massive hotel where every person of interest was staying and tried to get the baby away from the family. The older members got the call their factory was burning and left Merida in the charge of the younger (but still like not also kids) Broad members.

There was a diverse, giant meeting of minds conference happening at the hotel. They had to dodge all of that while having their almost tug of war "save the kid!" With the others. They got her eventually.

But Jim still needed Strickler's help. They actually got caught on a mission to this dystopian type factory on accident. Like they werent supposed to be on mission yet, but the owners of the factory caught them while they were scoping the place out discreetly in Strickler's fancy car. Got implicated in both a kidnapping (that they witnessed with their own eyes as more kids kidnapping the workers and leaving behind boxes of something on a single wheelchair, which had blocked their exit) and worsening productivity (a higher crime to the despicable higher ups).

Also every time a character died they regenerated in a few hours. That's a pretty key thing to note here.

So they were captured. Brought to questioning.

Also important: I was shifting between a watchful third person pov and Jim's pov, so sometimes I was Jim and sometimes I was just watching. (Only once did I shift to Barbara, and that was when Jim was the one who died for the plan that night, while Strickler and Barbara carried it out. Barbara was helping Strickler stretch before the mission that had so far been a failure for 10 nights in a row, and he was sore from regenerating so often. They were talking and laughing against one of the giant train -ish metal storage units. Like theyd have down by the docks. She was mostly focused on the help, but 'helped herself ' to a good look at Strickler's backside while she did so, realized what she was thinking about a little guilty when they were here for a bigger reason, and snapped out of it. Strickler didn't quite see it but he hoped she would and they were both pretty happy about it overall)

In questioning they were at first together, then broken apart, then put together again. Jim and Strickler were trying to stick together so a rescue op later wouldn’t be as necessary. The whole moment of being forced to stop holding arms or something. It was good. Jim was silent in interrogation. Strickler made vague, unsettling jokes and threats and the questioners quickly threw them back into the one interrogation room, for the main boss to talk to them.

Strickler peeked out the blinds and grinned, slowly, and the main boss pushed him aside as he went to check the window. Strickler came to stand behind Jim, silently urged him to stand, and they backed toward the door. The boss was standing by the window in shock.

Hundreds of people on bicycles were overtaking the compound. In various shades of blues, yellows, greens, and one red man, Vector, who didn’t even like Strickler, yet came to his aid as the rest of them did, pedaling away, then scaling the building, rattling the doors, causing general mayhem. They were shown the door and released.

Strickler and Jim grinned and whooped once they were out. Strickler changed into khaki shorts and a purple Hawaiian shirt and green glasses with pineapples on them (see: Gravity Falls for the look) and celebrated with his friends that had come to wreck the place. 

Their original purpose was achieved. But they realized there was something worse happening inside. Later the security was tighter and the beings they’d brought in to guard it were powerful. Most of his friends tailgated outside the gates and that’s where Jim found Strickler again.

He told him he needed his help to finish the job. The mission. Strickler changed back and agreed. 

Each time they tried to sneak in over the toxic river or between the storage stacks, but once they got to the inner playground, they were stopped by the fearsome beings, killing them, forcing a regeneration.

Grims.

Dogs, of various shapes and sizes (the smallest was barely 8 inches tall, the largest was bigger than a mastiff or st. bernard, idk which is bigger) that bit you in the butt and dragged you backward, flinging you from this realm and into the regeneration state, where you always would awake just outside the compound’s gates. 

They tried many different types of bait to get around it, but they couldn’t. They died each time. They eventually brought Barbara in (cue the scene described above, on a night she killed Jim before the mission as to try and be an in too the compound, but it didn’t work).

The dream was unresolved in terms of “did they ever get what they were after” and Idk if they ever got in. But in between all the serious stuff was some seriously funny and good moments. Absolutely none of it is really from the show (except for Strickler and Barbara flirting, I guess, lol) but like. It was so flipping fun to wake up from this one.

Strickler and Jim were allies. He accidentally called him dad and then threatened to stab him with a plastic fork if it was ever brought up again. Everybody called Strickler “barrel” as a nick-name and in-dream-universe it made sense so he sighed but rolled with it. Jim did some morally questionable things. Everybody rode bikes everywhere except Strickler had a maserati or something. Strickler had green eyes and a green changeling form so everybody also nicknamed him Jade. Barbara and Strickler had a cute flirting moment before dying again for the mission.