[open] a little bit freaked out

[altusimperius]

WHO: Benedict and you
WHAT: bad dreams + demons + homeschooled mage problems
WHEN: During Nightmare Time
WHERE: The Gallows (mostly)
NOTES: hmu if you want a specific starter

I. Nightmares

Though normally a quiet and inoffensive sleeper, lately Benedict has been talking in his sleep. Anyone listening carefully would notice that it usually begins calmly, perhaps incredulously, and escalates from this to whining protest and the inevitable gasping awake in a cold sweat.

The first few times, he tried to go back to sleep afterward; now, he'll get out of bed and pace the room or leave it entirely, rubbing his hands up and down his upper arms and shivering, compulsively pushing his hair back out of his face.

As time wears on, it becomes less and less likely to see Benedict in his bed at all.

II. No Rest for the Wicked

If everyone weren't having such awful dreams, it might be less clear why Benedict seems to have gone on a sleep strike. He can be found in odd places at night, folded around a book in the library or staring into the middle distance while submerged up to the ears in the baths, usually with a cup of coffee nearby and terrible dark bags under his eyes in defiance of his obsessive skincare routine.
After months of improvement he has also become unusually terrible in his combat training, and the reason for this is clearly the exhaustion he's imposing on himself.

On more than one occasion, he's simply walked facefirst into a wall, a door, or even another person, then stood looking a bit lost, like he isn't sure how he got there.

III. On the Job

Those coming to the Diplomacy office looking for Byerly generally have to get through his secretary first, but lately there's a 50% chance said attaché will be asleep with his head on his desk and a half-drunk cup of coffee next to his face. Perhaps a word on a page becomes a scribble, a long inkstain leading from the last intentional stroke across the desk to where the quill now rests on the floor.
The chances of this being the case grow higher with each passing day.

IV. Wildcard

Comments

II

[notathreat]

Benedict isn't an unfamiliar sight, but the young lordly guy definitely looks like he's having a rough time of it. Especially when he's up and about, not paying hardly any attention.

Ellie comes around a corner and they collide so hard she can hear her jaw snap shut, and she gives a muffled curse, reaching out to steady his shoulders. It's a mark of how long she's been away from her world that she doesn't immediately go for her knife.

"Shit, buddy, you okay?"

[altusimperius]

The collision is rough enough to startle him completely awake, and for a moment Benedict looks as though he has no idea what's going on-- there's that girl, and she ran into him, or--

He rubs his eyes. "Sorry," he's quick to say, "just... a little tired."

Yes, just a little.

[notathreat]

"Tired?" Ellie says doubtfully, her brow furrowing. She doesn't let go of his shoulders, like she's afraid that if she doesn't hold him up, he's going to go down.

"You look half-dead."

Ellie's used to going on very little sleep, but this isn't even that.

"You're heading to bed, right?"

[altusimperius]

He doesn't seem to mind being held aloft, and even appears to struggle a bit with the question. Was he heading to bed? No--

"..no, I'm going to the office," he says instead, looking dejectedly past Ellie at the stairs. The many, many stairs.

[notathreat]

"... in the middle of the night?" Ellie asks, starting to catch on. Dude's completely zonked, but unwilling to sleep. She hesitates, then lets go of one shoulder, getting out of his way.

"I better go with you," she sighs. "Otherwise you'll take a header on the stairs for sure."

[altusimperius]

"The middle--" Bene begins to repeat, then looks around in search of a window. There's one high up, and when it becomes clear that there's no light coming through it, he seems genuinely confused.

"Shit."

Rather than insist on scaling the stairs, his eyes just go vacant for a moment, his brain taking an overlong time to process the situation.

[notathreat]

Understanding dawns in waves, and Ellie just barely rubs his shoulder, a small twitch of something like sympathy, even if she doesn't truly know him well enough for that. Her face has softened, her voice gentling. It gains something almost parental.

"When's the last time you slept, bud?"

II

[muckspout]

Edgard has definitely noticed that Benedict isn't sleeping. When he sees him in a hallway, he starts to say something to him, intending to confront him about this, but Benedict doesn't hear him at all and walks right past him.

Edgard frowns and watches Benedict hit a wall next to a door, blinking. Edgard sighs. That's it.

This time Edgard comes behind him booming loudly.

"This is for your own good!" He hollers and picks Benedict up in his arms like he's a baby.

[altusimperius]

A deep gasp inward, and Benedict is suddenly aloft, his long limbs flailing with the unexpected intrusion of Edgard's forcible grip. For a moment he simply struggles in a blind panic, and then it occurs to him that he has options, and a hazardously-timed Mind Blast sends them shooting apart: Edgard into the nearest wall, and Benedict onto the floor with a crack of impact as his bony elbow hits the flagstone.

Maybe not his brightest idea.

[muckspout]

Edgard hits the wall and slides down it falling into a heap. He curses and then tries to catch his breath.

After a moment of shocked silence, he attempts to speak.

"Benedict?" is all he manages.

[altusimperius]

It takes Benedict just as long to get his wits about him, and then he pushes himself up off the floor, looking over his shoulder at Edgard.

"Sorry," he says quickly, though after a moment he isn't sure why-- didn't Edgard just grab him?

[muckspout]

Edgard slowly sits up, uncharacteristically quiet. He's seen Benedict do this before, but didn't really think about it and the idea that Benedict could do this to him definitely has never occurred to him.

He has a few questions, but he sighs and says grumpily,

"Why did you do that?"

His feelings are hurt and that is clear by his tone.

[altusimperius]

Standing is an effort, especially now that there's some pain in the mix. Benedict rubs his elbow with a wince, casting another glance back toward Edgard.

"You surprised me," he replies, a touch less apologetically. It's fair to say that being manhandled by Edgard tends to be an unpleasant experience.

[muckspout]

Edgard frowns and folds his arms over his chest.

"Didn't hear me call! and then you walked into the wall. and then you--"

Edgard makes an expansive gesture with his hands to indicate the mindblast.

"When I was trying to help!"

[bouchonne]

"Artemaeus."

Byerly scowls at his thoroughly unconscious secretary. When saying his name aloud does nothing, By lets out an annoyed noise and claps loudly next to his ear.

"Artemaeus!"

[altusimperius]

Sitting up with a loud gasp, Benedict is just in time to catch his coffee before he can upend it. It still sloshes all over his hand, and he hisses with dismay-- it's not that hot anymore, but it'll stain.

"Shit," he gasps, "hello. What,"

[bouchonne]

"If you're going to fall asleep," Byerly says, lips pursed with displeasure as he watches that sloshing coffee, "do so in your own room. Do you want someone to walk in here past you? And then be able to walk in and talk to me?"

[altusimperius]

"Sorry," Benedict grumbles, still trying to get his wits about him, opting for a drawn-on piece of scratch paper to try and sop up the remaining coffee on the desk. "--no, I don't. want that. Sorry."

Though he's become an expert at groveling in these past few years, his manner at the moment seems rather more frazzled than prostrate. When he's finally through with flailing around at his desk, he turns to look up at Byerly, offering him a glance that appears at least mostly sincere in its contrition. It's hard to tell, with his eyes so bloodshot.
"Won't happen again."

1+2

[armd]

At first Abby thinks that somebody is taking notes out loud. The murmured conversation coming from around the corner of the shelf she's sitting by in the library seems to be largely one-sided. She listens for a moment out of sheer curiousity, eyes skimming her open book without comprehension.

It's nonsense, mostly. She tunes it out, and returns to the page.

Only to tune back in abruptly once she realises the tone has shifted, the murmuring changing quickly to surprise, first muted and then caught, almost frantic. She's shut her book and got up to step around the shelf, just in time to see Benedict gasp awake, sweat on his forehead.

Abby hasn't seen him be vulnerable before. Usually he's an aloof asshole in whatever direction he pleases.

"You too, huh." Fucking nightmares. She's holding the book shut with her index finger stuck in it, marking her spot.

[altusimperius]

For a moment, Benedict just stares past her, eyes wide and frightened as the last vestiges of his nightmare drift away. Then, slowly, he begins to realize where he is, and he meets Abby's gaze.

His mouth works once or twice, then he just nods, unsure of how else to answer. He sits up, stretching his back-- he's been sitting oddly, and only now realizes how he's sore because of it.
"Is it morning?" he grunts, mid-stretch.

[armd]

"No." Not gentle, but not short with him either. She's woken up suddenly from too many nightmares to want to treat him like she usually would. "Late afternoon." Sun is coming down the other side of the building. Tops of the shelves are bathed in warm light.

She glances down at her finger, caught in the book. Shrugs, "You were talking."

[altusimperius]

"Shit." Letting his head drop forward, Benedict rubs his eyes wearily. "...um... what was I talking about?"

There's a quiet tension in the question, like he doesn't want to hear the answer, but he can't un-talk-in-his-sleep, so he might as well face the truth of it.

[armd]

"I wasn't really listening." He isn't looking at her, but past her. Honestly, Abby knows the feeling. It's confronting to see somebody else trying to wake themselves up, she's realising this is probably what she's looked like to the people who have caught her trying to fall asleep standing up.

"And it was nonsense," she adds, "What I did hear, I mean."

But... "You sounded scared."

[altusimperius]

Even if Benedict has no idea what he himself was saying, it's reassuring to hear that nobody else does either. He certainly remembers the dream well enough.

"Sorry," he murmurs, realizing that if Abby was here in the library doing work, he almost certainly wasn't contributing to her productivity. He's about to excuse himself when he remembers something she said a moment ago:
"you said 'you too'."

[armd]

She ignores his apology, because nightmares aren't anybody's fault, and she knows that well enough– but pauses in the middle of turning away, to return to where she was sitting.

"Yeah. I've... been having a similar problem." Falling asleep during the day, because she hasn't been sleeping well at night; having short, intensely bad nightmares that jolt her awake in cold sweat.