towerofanimus | DREAM A LITTLE DREAM WITH ME

DREAM A LITTLE DREAM WITH ME

Characters: all the characters involved in the Dream Event
Setting: various dreams, various locations
Format: any
Summary: Xehanort draws a large amount of the tower into worlds constructed from their dreams in an attempt to learn about everyone en masse
Warnings: ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING

[Tendrils of magic wound their way around, lines of energy flickered into existence, forming a large shape on the ground around where Xehanort sat with his back straight and legs tucked neatly beneath him. Perfect. It was a bigger scale than the one he'd done but a month before, already he could feel the flickers of connection, the shape getting brighter and more defined.

More participants. More mental drag. There was little to worry about. With Xigbar on guard duty, his sleeping body would be quite safe. No, it was time to dream... and see just who would follow.

Darkness shrouded his hand, keyblade flaring into life, and he gripped the handle in both hands, aiming it at the ground, at the keyhole defined by criss-crossing darkness responding, resonating...

drowsiness laced through him, the blade in his hands sagging downward until the tip touched the ground, his posture slacking, head and shoulders slumping slightly

in slumber, the dreams of others awaited

the Master was asleep.]

OOC NOTE BECAUSE I CAN'T EDIT THE POST IT'S ON ANYMORE AND NOT REDOING ALL OF THAT: Dreamers should post to their REAL WORLD thread explaining where their character is, if they made it to a bed or if they're on the floor somewhere or wherever.

If you have questions for me, put them in your base character thread!

If I missed you somehow, let me know and I'll add you to the appropriate section!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Ryoji steps in front of Minato and Minanko, much to the surprise on both of their faces. He can see that they didn't expect him here, but he just smiles.

Somehow, though, he is not afraid. He sees the flash of some sort of monster, straining to get to the goddess, and in an instant he understands completely what has to be done.

Blue and red, Minato and Minako stand out against the darkness.

"You two... it's changed, right?"

They look at each other, and then nod.

"Ryoji, how - " Minako's eyes widen.

"There's no time, Minako. Someone has to seal her away."

"We'll do it." Minato says it softly, but with conviction.

"... No. Use me."

"What?!" They both start to talk at the same time.

"You can't -"

"I won't let you -"

"It's our -"

He cuts them both off with raised hands.

"I was supposed to die a long time ago. Please. You both have long lives ahead of you. Don't waste them by throwing away second chances."

Minako hugs him, starting to cry. Ryoji kisses her forehead, and looks at Minato, who hugs Ryoji once Minako finally let go. Ryoji smiles a little at both of them, and then turns back to the approaching goddess, spreading his hands in a gesture of welcome - or defiance.

He turns to stone, and he can feel himself becoming something more. An eternity seems to pass, but then he can feel his body cracking, sending him tumbling down to the ground or what passes for it in this void that knows no limits.

He turns, and he looks back up to the great door where he was hanging moments ago - and he sees two figures hanging there, bodies made of stone.

"M… Minato? Minako? Why…"

He puts his head against his knees and starts to weep - weeping for himself, weeping for them, weeping for everyone. This isn't how it's supposed to go…

Even if Sora hadn't found any answers within these dreams - at least, he was pretty sure that was what they were - there was no sense in giving up yet. So it's only natural that when he sees one of his roommates asleep (Ryoji, he remembered, though they didn't know each other well) he decides to try again.

This time, the world he's stumbled upon is very, very strange. Some kind of...void, maybe. Sora may not have known much about what was going on, but he had a feeling that it wasn't anything good.

But everything was still. Dark, too. He didn't really like it one bit, but...well, there was nowhere else to go.

It's a few minutes before the boy finally reaches the door - which is the first thing he notices - and sees Ryoji, who holds his attention for longer. He approaches, concern growing as it becomes more and more clear that he's crying for some reason.

"Ryoji?" he says, finally coming to a stop. "Did something happen?"

Ryoji looks up, blinking, trying to place the face through the tears. The voice is familiar, though. Now who is - and then it hits him.

"... Yeah. Something happened. It... it went all wrong..."

"What went wrong?" Sora is wondering what happened here, but he doesn't push. He kneels down next to Ryoji, and waits patiently for an answer.

"I was supposed to be the Seal. They were supposed to live and have long and happy lives. But I must have screwed it up somehow... that's the only reason I can think of them being there."

He wipes his face, eyes rimmed with red from crying.

As it dawns on Sora that the statues in front of the door aren't just statues, his eyes widen in shock. That had to be the "they" Ryoji was talking about - now that he was taking a good look, Sora even recognized one of them as a boy he had met in the tower. If they're some kind of seal, then...did that mean they were stuck that way?

"So...they're holding that door shut?" What for? What was this place, anyway, he wondered.

"Yes. There's... a goddess, Nyx. If she reaches the Earth, all life on the planet will be wiped out." He's not even going to try to explain the flash of the other creature he saw.

"I... I was the one who was supposed to hold her back..."

...and they did it instead, Sora finished silently. He may not have known that they three were siblings, but for them to be willing to hold back that goddess instead of Ryoji...

"They must really care about you a lot, if they're willing to do it for you." He almost hesitated before asking this next question, but his curiosity - maybe a part of him that didn't want to completely believe all the implications of what he was being told - won out. "This Nyx thing...was there no other way to stop her?"

"But... I was supposed to die a long time ago. To have their lives cut short..." He tries to distract himself from that particular point by focusing on his other question. "No. She's a goddess. It's impressive enough that we could stand up against her in the first place."

The whole idea of it - of people having to give themselves up, of that being the only way to save everyone - just seemed awful to Sora. If only they could have just defeated that goddess, and saved everyone that way, but...well, his experiences in the tower so far were teaching him quickly enough that most things in the outside world weren't that simple.

"It sounds like you guys are really close." he observed, still unsure of what else to say in a situation like this. Something about it all made Sora uncomfortable, but he couldn't tell exactly what it was.

"We are. Our parents died ten years ago in an accident... we're all we have left. So we stuck closer together than most siblings, so none of us had to be alone." But this past year... they'd found people to open up to. And Ryoji too, a little...

He can feel it. He can feel it pulling inside of him, growing, getting stronger. He had lost control, and Death had taken over, defeating Aigis easily. He had watched as Death had explained to SEES about Nyx's approach, and the end of the world. Death had allowed him to plead with his brother and sister to kill him, to let him spare them the pain of remembering until everything was over.

They had returned on New Year's Eve, and been refused again. Ryoji stares at his body in the shattered remains of a mirror that someone has tossed out. Through the splinters he can see that his skin is pale except for his hands. His face is completely white already, and black feathers surround him in the snow. He knows that his wings are growing bigger every day, but they're already half as tall as he is. They make it hard to sleep, but he's exhausted. He moves closer to the heater behind the store, trying to get some warmth.

It's not helping. It never does. His skin is as cold as a corpse's. He wonders if he's ever going to be able to sleep or eat or feel warmth again.

The area behind the store was now turned to half a flower garden; though all of the flowers were either burning or turned to ash. Stepping out of it came Jun, his uniform half blue, half white, his face lacking the typical clownish headpiece that was associate with his outfit, but half of his face covered in the Joker's mask. Light blood spots were spattered on both sides of his clothing, and it was hard to tell if he was smiling or not.

For awhile he simply stared, that creepy look on his face, before he finally spoke.

"That's unfortunate."

Ryoji looked up at the smell of burning flowers, panic in his eyes. He gripped what remained of his coat tightly, as he struggles to rise.

"D... don't look at me. No one should be around me... it's too dangerous... everyone is going to die..." He doesn't want to be here, doesn't want to be like this, but more than that he doesn't want anyone else hurt, even if this person looked nearly as strange as he did.

He laughed, though there was no warmth or humor to it at all. He didn't react to Ryoji's recoil beyond that.

"That is the end that mankind will come to. Don't worry; even in the face of Death himself, mankind will persist beyond expectations!"

Even the half of his face that wasn't covered by a mask was smiling, though those words didn't sound very comforting.

"But..." He looked down at his hands, trying to make any kind of sense from his words.

"I want them to live. I really do. But I don't know how to help them... I have Death inside of me, not life." He was out of time. They all were, but he was out of time long, long ago.

Jun reached out one of his own hands, sheathed in a white glove, and grabbed one of Ryoji's, blocking most of it from sight. The smile persisted, but something about it was distinctly off.

"Is that your dream? For humanity to live? To be alive?"

He tried not to flinch away, to keep his voice calm and even.

"For them to live and be happy, yes. I don't want them to be so dissatisfied with the world that they try to call the end... like they're doing now."

"That's impossible though, isn't it?"

His voice remained downright upbeat and cheerful, but there was an air of something a bit more sinister underneath.

"When their dreams are so far out of reach, they have absolutely no chance of realizing their full potential, of reaching their dreams the way they are now. Everyone dreams of the impossible so how can they be happy?"

"I think they do. I just think they can't see it. I believe in people. Even through everything, through the darkness and the sorrow, there's a spark there. I... I think they'll be able to come through. They have to."

If they don't... then he'll end up killing everything. He doesn't want to hurt anyone... so he has to believe in them. Even if he doesn't quite believe it himself, if he's terrified that they won't be able to make it, he can try to make it a reality by at least saying it.

"You can believe in the spark-- and I'm sure that there are a good handful of people that believe in it too. But at this rate, humanity doesn't have the means to ignite it into a fire."

He released Ryoji's hand, bringing his own up to hover above his mouth as he let out a chuckle, and his voice took on a more sinister undertone. "Anything you do to stop that spark from going on will probably amount to nothing. What a wretched life."

"I don't have a choice but to believe in them. I can't... I can't accept the idea of me killing everything. I didn't ask for this - I didn't want this. I don't want to hurt anyone..."

It was getting harder and harder to believe that this would end out well at all, though...

"Fate's a cruel mistress, as they say. We trust with all our hearts in the people that are closest to us, and all they do is end up disappointing or betraying us." His voice remains as poisonously sugarcoated as ever, but there's a bit of an extra sting to that bit.

"No one would blame you, really."

Ryoji seems to shrink back a little, putting a hand to his face.

"I... I can't... please... don't make me..."

Why shouldn't he give into it? He didn't have any time left, none of them did, and to just lose himself in rage and bitterness would be so much easier...

DREAMS

The Universe

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The Death

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