The Science of Dreams
Saness
Another night has come and gone. All the peanut butter jars have been returned to their shelves. Tolight, Saness has told Ringleader of her dreams, and of her fears. He has offered to use his voodoos to inspect her mind once she's fallen asleep. After a pumpfelt conversation and a shared bath, the time for such may finally be approaching. It was tricky to coax her into unconsciousness, not for fear of what may come, but because she can't quite will herself to take her loving eyes off of him.
Eventually though. Eventually she manages to drift off, seemingly falling into an easy slumber, face soft and clear of paint and troubles.
Ringleader
He doesn't have to take his loving eyes off her and he assures her he ain't goin nowhere. He is paintless as well, and hopelessly in love, and he threatens to knock her out just to see if she takes him seriously. (She probably doesn't.)
Once she's fully sleeped, his eyes will light up, and he'll sink into her head.
Saness
(She doesn't.)
From behind closed eyelids lime does glow purple with his power as Ringleader attempts to join the intangible whisper of Saness's sleeping mind, only for him to succumb without warning to a sensation unfamiliar, a great mental slide moving his awareness physically away from his own body, and hers.
Except... not from hers? His awareness schlocks to a halt inside of Saness's, and the dreaming girl pauses her action, gaze taking on that same purple glow. He can feel her mind process the looming nature of his presence within her.
"You're here..."
To his externalized senses, Saness is OBVIOUSLY in a physical body, in a physical place. Though Ringleader retains his psychic attachment to his own body, his ability to return to himself intact, the physical distance is incomprehensible. Within his awareness of her mind, however, he can feel the translucent haze of slumber, faintly dulling Saness's senses. She's Somewhere Else... but she's not awake.
Ringleader
... Yikes.
Uh? Yikes?
He fumbles vaguely for his dex where he thinks his horn wands might be--
Hmm. Apparently he can't control his own body from this distance. Deeply disconcerting! Alright, fine, this is fine, everything is fine and alright and what the fuck where is he-she-they?
He pushes love at her mind, encouraging her dreamself to consider the surroundings. They may as well get some information, cuz this is gonna Suck in a bit.
Saness
Saness falls as readily as ever to the press of his familiar will, though she is notably far easier to command in this state, even given the threat of distance-related strain. The feeling of Love makes her smile, a bubble of easy fuzziness that fits so naturally with Ringleader's urging.
She rises in a swish of comfortable fabric, the sensation of it on her legs having very little to do with weight as she abandons the lounge and closes the uncomfortably short distance between her bed and the wall of her enclosure.
It's hard, incredibly solid beneath her lavender-washed skin, but it doesn't feel like much of anything. It bears no resemblance to glass nor steel. The color fluxes through opaque and transparent purple, giving only brief snatches of their shared surroundings.
Ringleader
Hm... He'll have her trace the edge of her surroundings, with her foot and with her hand to see if it's straight or curved. This is... Not what he expected to find, in the realm of her dreams. Aren't there supposed to be castles or something?
Saness
Ringleader-as-Saness scuffs her lime-slippered foot along the base of the ground, hand trailing over the slowly surging color, no temperature and no texture to speak of.
It's curved, a nearly perfect dome all around, with a darker seam where it connects with the floor. It's impossible to tell if that's just the color of the floor interacting with it, and whether or not the barrier passes all the way through in a sphere.
Ringleader
... This is... Deeply disconcerting. He thinks he is tired of bits of her being trapped where they don't need to be.
He tries to coax her into using her psi to pokey at the wall.
Saness
He'll find rather swiftly that Saness has no psychic ability, for some reason or another. She operates on muscle memory in her attempt to use her psi, but nothing comes of it. Her own mind flexes uncertainly as she fails to perform the task set out before her, nerves fluttering in her chest. It doesn’t feel the same as wearing a suppressor, it’s like she’s... psych-null, or something.
"That doesn't seem right... So is this a dream, or...?"
His control over her falters for a moment as a ruffled Saness moves to lean her forehead on the barrier, squinting fuzzily into the beyond. It's the same view as before, dizzying slopes and tiles bent all out of shape; though she notes to herself that she feels clearer than she did the night before.
Ringleader
He soothes at her without trying to overtake her, before his voice manifests in her mind.
"Definitely a dream. But also definitely real."
Saness
There he is. She was getting nervous, and the 'voice' to match his presence is immediately reassuring. Also, being a little freaked out helped with the clarity thing for sure, Saness is still growing more wakeful in this dream.
She takes a slow breath and eases mentally toward his presence of her own accord, sleepily treating what little of him she can engage as a tether.
"It's harder to feel you than usual... Than when I'm awake, maybe..."
Ringleader
"It's harder for me to feel myself like this. Don't worry, though, I'm here to help you remember."
Saness
"Not that there's much to see..."
She rubs the edge of her fist along the energy-wall in a circle, as though cleaning glass. It does not disperse the color.
Ringleader
"No, there's not. Still. Once we've gotten all the info we can, I'll try to change your dream over."
Saness
She perks up and nods a "hm!" to nothing, ready to gather... whatever else he thinks he might want.
Ringleader
... Hm. He doesn't really know. Look at the lounge? Squint up at the sky, see if there's any weirdo buildings up there? ... Try to find some weirdo game sense?
Saness
Saness really can't sense much of anything! It's a far cry from her usual ability.
The lounge is sturdy, and heavy. It doesn't match the floor underneath, seemingly brought here from somewhere else. In fact, it better matches Saness's bright golden dress. Up above, a ceiling curls away and around the room to somewhere else, viewable whenever the fog clears briefly enough to see out of the dome.
Ringleader
... He might have the patience to sit and stare and observe if it were his own husk that were trapped and he weren't inside a little dream body, but...
He asks her to check her body last. Make sure it is hers.
Saness
It FEELS like hers, mechanically, but she can't really check for familiar scarring on her waist more than to press through the fabric of her dress, and that... doesn't reveal much. She feels along her neck, however, and THAT... is perfectly smooth, no sign of the damage she took from that collar when she was imprisoned.
How thoroughly should she check? Is this enough?
Ringleader
... Final check to make sure she bleeds?
Saness
Saness obediently puts her claws to the back of her hand and starts to press, but...
... :(
...Can he do it?
She seems softer, in her dreams.
Ringleader
Precious Lumina... He will have her close her eyes and then prick the back of her hand as quick as possible.
... Or at least. Try.
Saness
Her dreamself jerks the smallest amount when her claws flex against her delicate skin, but no blood has welled forth when he opens her eyes to check.
The pain was real though.
Ringleader
... A moment of yearning, before he makes her take her pulse.
Saness
Ladies and gentlemen, she has a pulse. I repeat, she has a pulse.
Ringleader
... C...check for finger prints...
This is way more steps than if she had just bled. But maybe this is a robot, he doesn't know.
Saness
The pads of her fingers are equipped with fanciful fleshy swirls - as is the standard - and what's more, when she presses on her skin it leaves an ordinary and very temporary mark.
Ringleader
"You are so smart~"
Saness
She shuffles her slippered feet bashfully, soft soft soft.
"Will that do?"
Is it time to see if he can change the dream? She's eager to be rid of this cage.
Ringleader
"I think that'll do, sweetest beloathed."
And he will try to shift her dream.
Saness
He can, as any other time he has Saness under the power of his voodoo, control her perception of her environment.
Unfortunately, as Ringleader is riding solely on Saness's awareness of the area, it's not immediately evident that nothing has ACTUALLY changed. To all appearances, whatever he makes becomes her reality. It only becomes clear that Ringleader has no effect on the environment when Saness steps forward blindly into the illusion, only to conk into the barrier that remains physically intact. Ouch!
Ringleader
!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!
He stops directing the dream.
Saness
The illusion vanishes, and all that remains is the lounge, the dome, and a limeblood rubbing her unpainted face.
Ringleader
... :o(
"I could try to... Stop you from dreamin?"
Saness
"...Yeah, okay."
Saness ambles over to her lounge and stretches out flat on it, looking up to the top of her tiny cage, hands folded daintily over her stomach.
"But, just try it."
Ringleader
He tries to pull her away from dreaming at all. Not simply dreaming of nothing, but Not Dreaming.
Saness
It is akin to forcing someone into unconsciousness, a thing he has to hold down and pin in place. The Saness in the dream passes out, dragging her consciousness into some sloppy rodeo limbo, like it doesn't know where to go. If his reflexes aren't quick or if his psychic strength fails him, Ringleader may be ejected from Saness's mind as though flung from the curve of whiplash, slammed an unknown concept of distance back into his own body.
Ringleader
He's never had to have reflexes with a willing person, and his psychic strength was running low by the time they got to this point.
For at least 30 seconds straight, he's out himself.
Saness
The Saness in the dream flutters back to awareness, slowly, and sits up, confused and alone.
"Ringleader?"
Curled up peacefully with the now-unconscious Ringleader of the waking world, Saness's original body dozes on, oblivious.
Ringleader
When he returns to consciousness, his first priority is swearing like a motherfucker.
His second is slipping tentatively into her head to see if she's unconscious.
Saness
Touching her mind, just skimming the surface as he does when passively scanning for life, will inform Ringleader that the Saness that lays with him has brain activity that is uniquely distant from the surface, like an echo of a dream.
Actually slipping in to any depth brings him immediately back down that slip-n-slide, all the way to Saness's dreamself with nothing to hold onto along the way. Her eyes turn purple again, and Saness pauses to sigh. He can feel that she was frightened.
Ringleader
She can feel that he's worried.
"Ow."
Saness
She puts her hand on her cheek to reflexively attempt to touch at Ringleader, who is nothing more than a voice inside her head and the feeling of a shadow hovering over her shoulder. Her brow furrows in concern, a pout on her lips.
"Are you okay...?"
Ringleader
He loves her for a moment.
“You threw me out like a fuckin trebuchet."
Saness
"What? I didn't mean to, I mean, I wouldn't..."
She curls her toes and gives them a tippy-tap on the floor, thinking, anxious. Her mood is more mutable while sleeping.
"...Don't do that again, then..."
Ringleader
.... :o(
"I'm okay. It just was sudden, and my pan is spinnin from the distance... I think I might have to wake you to break you out. Maybe I could keep you out out after, but I think I'd have to keep at it the whole light."
Saness
"That won't do."
Her thoughts are poking at his presence with things like 'is he hurt,' 'spinning, spinning-' 'I woke up and you were gone :<' and other similar bubbles of pitiable sadness and loving concern, broken into unspoken chunks of thought.
"Nothing happens in here. I'll be okay."
Ringleader
"But can you be alone?"
Saness
"...I wish there was something to do," she says so sadly.
Ringleader
... Check for dex?
Saness
Nada.
Ringleader
:o(
"... I could try to stick with you long enough for a half decent rest...?"
Saness
"You're not tired?"
She can't help but be obvious when he's inside her mind; dream Saness so blatantly perks up at the thought of being anything but alone.
Ringleader
"Not so much. Might need to take a break to tend to a bitta a headache, but."
Saness
"A headache," she whines, sitting down and swinging her weightless legs loosely off the side of the lounge, swish swish swish.
Ringleader
"Ain't the end of the world. I'd rather deal with that than you alone."
Saness
She tips her head sideways to squish her cheek into her shoulder, with the intent of expressing 'snuggle my spade' in a movement to no one. She’s trusting, and easy to convince.
"Okay Ringleader. Thank you."
Ringleader
Her hand rises to press to her lips in a soft little kiss.
"I'll be right back, okay?”
Saness
She nods, and kisses her own fingers like a dweeb.
"'Kay."
Ringleader
He departs from her as gently as he can manage, for his own sake, and then comes back as soon as possible, medicined and holding his wands. Time will be spent entertaining her in whatever way he can without actually being there. And then when the evening comes and she wakes up, he will go the hell to sleep for himself. Not for long, but for long enough to recover.
Saness
While awake in his stead, Saness will keep watch over her tired spade and contemplate what they learned together in the dream. It feels real, and it feels fake, both at once.
She checks to make sure her empathy works by keeping Ringleader comfortable and at peace, warding away the fitful demons of his sleep as they come for him.
And so the beginning of her night passes in quiet note taking, gentle frowning, and tender motions.
