hypnagothic | [The City] IC Contact

[ his arms surround her as well, returning the embrace she gives him though it's more holding her up as she reaches for him. any despair he may have felt for himself at the time seems to have seeped away, but neither is the rage there either, not while his lover embraces him with tears of her own.

from one moment to the next, Vanessa is on her toes while holding him, but when she next notices her surroundings, she is still holding him but now they're lying on the bed together, the comfort of it holding them both up now. ]

[ It's startling at first, only quickly comforted by his arms still encircling her, and there she can curl against him while blinking through her tears. There would be more yet, were she not still recovering from dehydration. ]

I would do anything to keep you from experiencing such suffering again.

[ And yet she only admitted earlier how hopeless their situation is. What can she or any of them do against their new captor? ]

If I could only know what I need to do.

Peace, beloved, and hold to hope.

[ his hand runs its fingers through her unkempt hair, cradling the back of her head as she lies against him. ]

We shall protect each other as best we may, thee and me.

[ 'Hope' is such a hurtful word, now, but there is so little to be good anymore. Already it had been a strain to find.

Giving her poor eyes a rest, she'll keep them closed while murmuring against his coat. ]

What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be;

In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering,
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

[ he completes the poem quietly, smoothly picking up from her break in reciting, gently tightening his fingers in her hair while his other hand caresses against her back. ]

So, too, can something be gained from what was lost. We are not the lesser for it.

[ With such tired eyes, it's difficult for her to see past what came before, but she nods in as much agreement as she can muster. They can at least agree on doing what they may to protect one another—what little they are permitted. ]

How did you manage for so very long without going mad?

[ he takes a deep breath at the question, slowly in and out while his fingers continue to stroke against her hair. it's a long while before he speaks again, long enough for Vanessa to start feeling drowsy, speaking barely above a whisper. ]

... While I was captured, I was ... alone. Truly alone for the first time in clear memory. The guards were always there, of course, outside of my glass encasement. Always. They moved and breathed and sighed. They adjusted in their chairs, rose from them to stretch their legs. They talked to each other, though never to me, shared amusements over their reading. Even in my prison, there was still life. There were still dreamers. But they were just ... not a Part of me.

It was agony. To be cut off from the Dreaming, cut off from the infinite skein of existence which is both deep enough to fall through as well as a part of me. I was alone in a body, trapped in a cage twice over. For even while I have stood in the silence between stars, always there has been the noise of eternity and my own function before. But there was nothing in that prison but my own thoughts. Not the thoughts of the minds that make me as Dream, every dreamer who dreams, be they the smallest insect with sufficient consciousness to sleep and dream of food they lack now but want tomorrow or the dreams of my siblings when they scheme and muse and hope and long, and, rarely, sleep. There was nothing.

It was a ... quiet that I had never known. A quiet that screamed at me. A howl that tore through me like a roaring torrent.

[ Trapped in a cage twice over, yes, she can understand that. She has heard that sort of quiet. Vanessa can understand much of it, but the scale of his loss is so much greater. It simply isn't the same as trapping a person or even a god.

The cage here isn't entirely the same, but he can't really access the Dreaming. There are no animals or insects here, and his powers are arbitrarily limited even with people. These aren't their physical bodies, but that only seems to limit them further.

Swallowing thickly, she opens her eyes to strain and look up toward him, reaching to brush at his cheek. Drowsy or not, she's never too tired to be with him. ]

Have you been suffering the same while here? The silence?

There is similarity here, but ... this place does not compare.

[ he takes another breath to ensure his voice remains somewhat steady, turning into her hand a bit, but his emotions surge in the telling, words wobbling with the control he tries to exert over them. ]

There was nothing but myself, thoughts that belong only to myself, entire and my own. I did not have the depth of dreamer's neverending emotion to draw from. I only had myself. And I was, even there, Endless. As all old things know, nothing that lasts a long time can be one way forever. I did not have the capacity to always, always be as angry as I was, to always be in pain.

There were ... moments. They were short. Fleeting things. Butterfly feet brushing across the surface of water. But they existed.

Those moments were wholly new to me. And I am so old, ten billion years of memory yet likely older than that. But there were moments. Like dust blown across air as if it flew on its own power moments. When I was curled across the bottom of the glass or sprawled across the back or pressed against the front, when there was nothing but cool smooth sensation against my skin and human biological noises and perhaps rustling paper but in every way that matters, and the whole of existence was quiet.

And in that quiet ... was peace.

And in myself, there was only who I am, Dream, not the dreamers, and there were thoughts that rose in the quiet. I thought of my family. I thought of love. My lovers. My wife. I thought of Orpheus. And I had regret. And it hurt. But with it came memories of each of them. And thoughts of them, that was not wrapped up in the dreamers. They were just mine. And so alone, I also had space to turn over moments of beauty. To imagine future dreams. To recall the birth and death of stars and worlds and flowers and rivers and cities and languages and the creation of songs and told myself stories I had not heard in eons since the planets that told them died out. And there were possibilities to imagine. Of places in between. Moments I could take. Things I could have, and they are so beautiful in the quiet. Beautiful hopes. Beautiful ideas. Beautiful places. Beautiful wants. Beautiful loves. What if things were different? There were other universes before, there will be other universes after, and there could be ones where things go differently in so many ways. And I saw them, held them all. That is what I am.

But there, in that quiet, I built out fantasies and dreams of them for myself only for the first time. Alone. And with the cool of the glass pressing against me, in the quiet, I could hold them. Look at them. Feel them. And for the first time, each of them, was just mine. Just ... Dream's.

In that quiet ... was peace. And it felt good. A devastating bliss.

And I have never felt anything more frightening than that.

[ he pauses for a moment, swallowing thickly. ]

It was only my power and my function that I was separated from. And for most of the century, and most of my captivity, that separation was a screaming torment, but there were moments where that detachment was a gift.

It was something new. It showed me that I was in fact a person, whole and entire unto myself, separate from even my other aspects. That was a kind of dizzy euphoria each time I experienced it with every naked inch of my flesh and every infinite space within my conscious. In those moments, when I was both alive and independent and able to enjoy my thoughts and my body as a body, a person whole and entire and self-contained, however brief or extended, I was painfully, tortuously pleased to be caught, content to be in my cage. In those endless instances, be they seconds or years and I knew of both, of sublime selfhood, I was ... a happily tamed thing.

[ here his voice hardens, still wobbling but now with a quiet rage. ]

More than the indignity of the nudity, more than Roderick Burgess's threats and vile insults and wheedling bargains, more than stealing of my tools, more than Jessamy's death, more than Alex Burgess's pleading, and the slow destruction of the Dreaming, it is for this fact, that I had reveled in aspects of my imprisonment, that I will never forgive Roderick Burgess. I can bear debasement and imprisonment and loss. I cannot and will not bear out the shame of such a bliss.

[ There is so much revealed in this confession, and yet it isn't all the surprise it could be. She had already known he had the capacity for wishes and wants, despite his aversion to the topic. To hear him refer to himself in such a solitary way is still striking, especially in counting himself as a person. That means something, doesn't it?

It all means something, and it shouldn't have been experienced at the hands of perverse cruelty.

The more he goes on, the further she nuzzles against him, and her hand slips further up to brush back his hair. It feels easier to ignore her own injury or sorrows when she is in his embrace, both in arms and spirit. She only wishes she was of a better mind to know what to say, to better embrace him in return. Some parts of her are still too fractured to remember certain situations clearly enough to relay to him, but there is an understanding in finding bizarre moments of solace within a cage and nowhere else; it can be sickening in hindsight. A happily tamed thing. 'The shame of such bliss,' it all rings through to her core.

She knows shame; she is its favored companion.

It could have been beautiful. It still could be. Nobody seems to know how. ]

You came to know yourself. He didn't create those moments—they were yours and not his. He is not deserving of such a claim to your heart. Such thoughts, dreams of your own, should not need to be confined to the memory of a cage. Did you not yourself say that something can be gained from what was lost?

I did, an I did not say such words idly.

[ he takes one last deep breath, exhaling slowly and releasing the tension that had been gathering with his words. he pulls her closer, leans into the hand in his hair. ]

That is why I speak to you of hope, my love.

[ The softness of his hair and coolness of his skin are their own comfort for her. She brushes her thumb across his temple while considering everything he's said. Vanessa can see where those initial moments of defiance would seem so nonsensical to anyone else, which is what had spurned this story in the first place. Perhaps he would have done the same as her. ...Perhaps not.

Her defiance hadn't lasted for the entire stay in the chair. She had eventually stopped struggling, and found bizarre revelation the few times that the noises permitted her to. When she could hear only the ocean.

How she wishes they could go to the beach and disappear into the sea. ]

...Does that include hope for yourself?

[ he tips his head down, only enough to look at her, not enough to dislodge her fingers, but his expression seems a little ... sad. or is it resigned? ]

As I said, there is something gained with such experiences.

[ Well, that isn't the most inspirational note to end on, with the implications.

Yet like he said, something can be gained. There are notions he has openly revealed. In these moments, they have both been fragile, and so too evermore gentle with one another. What he carries for a soul, for a heart, she's certain to see so much more clearly, now. She can hold him even closer, now, for whatever time they are allowed together.

But these terrible things keep happening, one way or another. There is no end in sight. Only reiteration.

She leans so that she can sigh into the crook of his neck, repeating his earlier promise. ]

And we shall protect each other as best we may...thee and me...

[ he turns his head, pressing a soft kiss to her temple as he pulls the bedsheets over them both. ]

As best we may, my love. Though you should rest and regain your strength.

Yes. I suppose I should.

[ She wishes he could do the same. ]

Morpheus...?

[ he hums lightly in question, tipping his head a little more to gently nuzzle against her hair. ]

[ The comforting touch has her eyes slipping back shut with her sigh. ]

You are the most beautiful person I have ever known.

[ he doesn't respond for a moment, going still for half a second before resuming the tender motions against her hair. then he tips down a little more to press a kiss just to the side of her eye, the hand wrapped around her back spreading its fingers a little wider, pressing in just a little more. ]

[The City] IC Contact

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