open | brain heat meme

[cozen]

WHO: Anyone
WHAT: Nightmares, slumber parties, etc.
WHEN: Throughout Justinian
WHERE: Kirkwall and surrounding areas
NOTES: Ignore the first prompt if you're bothered by bugs. Also, while this is primarily to help people RP about their nightmares, feel free to use it for any kind of RP you want. (I.e., you have permission to set up a truth or dare game at the slumber party.) Talk about dreams OOC over here

This month, our heroes' sleep is getting more and more troubled. Here are some excuses to write about it.

I. SLUMBER PARTY: Mid-month, an infestation of hardy, prolific Antivan fleas requires everyone to avoid spending prolonged periods of time in their bedrooms while local alchemist Lloyd Meyers eradicates the bugs with his proprietary smoke bombs (and an equally proprietary flea bath for the Gallows' many pets). While the rooms air out for two or three nights post-treatment, bed rolls are available on the floor of the unstaffed dining hall. Sleeping outside in the courtyards is also an option, but a sudden squall of a thunderstorm will drive people inside on the second night.

Footnote: Characters who live in the city are welcome to join this slumber party anyway. Maybe they miss the ferry ashore, maybe they're afraid of tracking fleas into their own homes, maybe they already did track fleas into their homes and Lloyd is treating them too, etc.

II. ROOM SHARE: Does the thought of sleeping in the dining hall with all of your coworkers make you break out in hives? Have you missed the ferry on any other evening of the month? Lowtown has inns, and Riftwatch has a docks-side warehouse with a few side rooms outfitted as bedrooms. But there are only so many rooms available, so you might wind up sharing a room (or a bed) with a friend or whoever is nearby and desperate.

III. CAT NAP: A lack of sleep—whether it be from the nightmares, the workload, routine insomnia, or staying up too late playing Truth or Dare during the Antivan Flea Incident—might make a cat nap on a desk, in a reading nook, or over breakfast particularly appealing. And bad dreams don't need more than a few minutes to get rolling.

IV. CAMP OUT: Investigating reports of enemy scouts in the mountains, traveling along the roads to a neighboring city-state on a diplomatic errand, looking into reports of weird magic on the Wounded Coast, or heading north to provide some assistance to the war effort? All might require pitching a tent and bunking down for the night with your colleague, whether you like them or loathe them.

V. NORMAL NIGHT: If you’re already sharing a room or bed with someone, you don't need this post. But you can still use it for your nightmare threads.

VI. BETTER IDEA: Do whatever you want. Live your dreams.

Comments

I, III

[notathreat]

I. SLUMBER PARTY:

Ellie's been fighting it. The first night she managed to stay awake. Managed to get through it. She's taken cat naps at her desk, because her normal haunts (the stable hayloft, the Aerie) are being flea-bombed, and are all being overrun by well-meaning alchemists.

But nothing would be more embarrassing that having a good fucking scream on the floor in front of all of her coworkers. She's already on-edge enough.

So she tries to find a corner, tries to read a book. But eventually the candles gutter out, and the book ends up resting against her cheek.

And then the nightmares begin again.

It's subtle at first. Twitches, tight breathing. Small gasps and twisted expressions. A cold sweat breaking out over her skin. She shivers, first, curling around the old wound in her stomach, and then the sounds of the thunderstorm start to seep in.

The hiss of rain, the scent of fires. The salt of sea air.

And then a thundercrack hits hard enough to bring her from the nightmares, exploding like a gunshot across her skull.

Ellie wakes up with a scream. Loud, harsh, desperate, breaking and punching holes in her voice with the violence of it. It leaves her breathless and in a cold sweat, eyes wide open, still seeing something that isn't there, fingers clawed like a cornered animal.

Later, she'll be mortified. For now, she's just trying to survive the next ten seconds.


III. CAT NAP:

Maybe it's in the library, maybe it's up in a stairwell where she hopes she won't disturb anybody. Maybe it's one of the storage rooms, where she's tucked herself into a corner where she won't accidentally break anything. Maybe it's at her desk in Scouting, where she's settled her forehead down for just one moment to rest her eyes.

It's not a scream this time. Instead she's crying in her sleep, exhaustion catching up with her, the panic finding no more tinder to catch.

Ellie fights herself awake to stare at nothing, her eyes open, tears tracking down her cheeks. Every catching breath is as quiet as she can make it, like she's hoping no one notices. Like she's hoping she can disappear.

She takes rabbit-fast breaths, unable to hold them long enough to let Blue take her out of sight, to safety.


Wildcard: Ouch

It's probably not intentional. Everyone is on edge. Everyone is hurting. No one is sleeping well, and that's all it takes for one misstep. Tempers are short and desperation makes monsters.

Wherever it happens, it happens. Maybe it's a bumped shoulder in the hallway, maybe it's a startling corner taken too fast. Maybe someone approached just a little too quietly from behind.

But when Ellie lashes out this time, it's not so harmless.

Though she's small, she knows how to make it hurt, and she's so used to being hunted. So used to hesitation meaning death.

Ellie responds to being startled with a closed fist, a sharp punch that she pulls back on at the last moment, but only enough to prevent serious injury.

It's still enough to hurt.

Best to take it, though- self-defense may trigger worse before she fully pulls herself together.

ouch??

[armd]

Abby, having taken the corner too fast for some (apparently), goes oof in response to being punched in the solar plexus. Ellie is so lucky she doesn't respond the way she normally would. She's been dragging herself about the Gallows today, dull-edged and listing impressively; in her exhausted state she grasps for her attacker's wrist too late-

misses, her fingers closing uselessly around nothing, jesus- "What the fuck," she says, her voice catching.

Oh. It's Ellie staring back at her, wild eyed. Abby stares right back. She... thinks it was a mistake but she still says, "Watch it," gruffly. "Thought we had a truce."

ouch!!!

[notathreat]

For a second the two of them stare at each other, nightmares and reality warring before Ellie remembers that they aren't trying to kill each other anymore.

It's hard, when the subject of so many of her bad dreams is right there in front of her. She shudders, physically shaking off the adrenaline, and draws a deep breath. Fear tastes so fucking awful.

"You're the one who fucking snuck up on me," she mutters, but it's without fangs. It's kind of hard to pretend the high ground when she's the one who panicked and tried to punch Abby's dinner out of her.

Come to think of it. Ellie gives a hiss and shakes her hand, irrationally pissed off about how bad that stung.

"What are your abs made out of?" she mutters. "Rocks?"

[armd]

"I'm literally just walking."

She's so tired, it makes her pricklier than she'd typically be with Ellie, or anybody, really. Shockingly, the nightmares don't help. Ellie herself is seldom the subject of them but her grisly work takes center stage far too often. Abby closes her eyes for a moment, pinches the bridge of her nose.

"Only when you punch them," she grunts, and adds, "You okay?" Even though it's a stupid question, because none of them are okay. She's looking out for a colleague okay, she's... trying. That's the theme of their relationship right now.

[notathreat]

She's trying. They're trying. Ellie bites back the shitty retort that's on the tip of her tongue, more because she's tired than because she's actually mad, and because this newfound almost friendly air between them is too fragile to not tend to.

They could easily backslide into bullshit if they're not careful.

"You're the only person I've punched so far," she grumbles. "Maybe that's worth something. You?"

[armd]

Abby literally bites her cheek to keep from saying that she's flattered, that she really knows how to make a girl feel special. Not the time, not the place. The two of them feel a little like dry tinder right now, and Abby sure as hell isn't going to be the fucking spark.

"Shouted at Ellis in the dining hall the other day for taking the last bread roll," she says dully, "So." That's how she's doing.

library's open for snoozing apparently

[favoriteanalyst]

It's not uncommon these days to catch people dozing in the library, and so long as they don't get too violent on waking or scream too loudly, Mobius is content to allow it. It isn't that the sleep is any more restful this way. But it's spacious and quiet. He's been keeping a spare blanket tucked under the desk in case of his own naps in the times he can feel them coming while here.

This time, he brings it over to Ellie. She's finally gotten herself awake. And she looks like she's trying to suck in every last drop of air in the building.

Wordlessly, he drapes it over her shoulders, leaves his hands there as a solid and very real and not at all dreamt up weight.

[notathreat]

Sometimes, it's kindness that can seep into a fault line, widen the cracks until everything breaks apart.

She doesn't see him coming. But she feels the warmth of the blanket as it sweeps over her, down around her shoulders. It's safe, comforting, not quite a hold, and she manages to catch a full breath. It lodges in the back of her throat, then, Mobius lays his hands on her shoulders.

The weight is real. And in the twilight of a nightmare, coming back to reality, the ghosts are all so close.

And it feels like Joel.

Ellie turns to put her forehead on her folded arms on the library table, and cracks right down the middle.

She sobs aloud, like her heart is breaking.

[favoriteanalyst]

It...maybe should have been something he expected. Maybe he should've thought this one through. Come from the front or the side, in view. Said something. He's not thinking straight. He's made a mistake, made it worse.

It's a few long moments before the thoughts finally turn into further action, and he lifts his hands. Feeling awkward. She might not be receptive to an apology at this very moment, though. So he scoots out a chair next to her and sits. There. Existing. And will still be there when she's done.

[notathreat]

Maybe someday, he'll realize that it was exactly the right thing to do.

The storm is intense, but it does pass, leaving Ellie taking deep, slow breaths, shivering now and again as she gets the last of it out. She's been building to this for a while, and he just happened to be there, to touch the right place.

Ellie wipes her face on her sleeve a few times, cleaning herself up, then lays her cheekbone against her dry sleeve, turning her head to look at him. The blanket is still settled across her shoulders.

The warmth, now, is from her. Maybe there's something in that.

"Thanks," she whispers, faintly embarrassed.

[favoriteanalyst]

Someday, when he's not running on the same lack of good sleep as everyone else. Maybe even later, when it all catches up to him. Right now, it seems like a mistake. (But it also seemed like the right thing to do. He's too tired for this shit.)

That she thanks him, at least, eases some of the tension. And he reaches to her again, rubs her back through the blanket.

"Looked like you needed it. You don't have to keep it all in."

He wants to ask something like are you doing okay, but given circumstances, it's inane chatter and nothing more. So he doesn't. No one is doing okay.

slumber party.

[propulsion]

Tony tries. In that, he is here, in this whole adorable dining hall slumber party situation, thanks to some measure of poor planning compounded by some levels of insomnia finally catching up to him. Or so he figured.

No chance. People breathe weird. The squalls outside lash against stone and timber. He is itchily aware of his whole physical self, every minor discomfort, every twinge. Eventually, he curls into a sitting position, feeling the weight of a body that desperately wants to sleep while a brain has other ideas. Like avoiding the depths of what waits for him if flesh wins out.

He is pivoting a little when Ellie begins to dream, and he stops. Listens to the familiar sounds of panic.

Thunder. A scream.

Adrenaline, disorientation, darkness. People stirring. But she has company, Tony having materialised just next to her with a knee to the ground and the other bent, a little out of clawing range and a hand up like his instinct is to lay a hand but stopping just short. "Hey," he says. "You're good, we're good. Thedas, dining hall. Antivan fleas."

[notathreat]

Smart man, staying out of arm's reach of the young woman who never sleeps without a knife.

Ellie focuses on Tony's voice first, his hand second. Mercifully, it was just one scream. And if she's screamed, it means she's breathing. The rest of her body just has to catch up to the rabbit-quick panic of her heart jumping and crashing against the inside of her ribcage.

Fuck, but her body's convinced it's dying.

Thedas. Thedas. Black wings flutter at the edges of her vision, but Ellie forces herself to breathe, drawing herself slowly back like she's following the lifeline of his voice.

She unclaws her fingers, puts her hand to her chest, patting slowly, trembling and she comes back. She gulps air a few more times before she manages to focus, following Tony's hand up to his face.

"Ah, shit," she whispers, quietly mortified, but not confused. Instead it looks like this is a little too familiar.

[propulsion]

"There you go."

It's a sentence probably lost in Ellie's reorienting herself, and isn't really directed her way anyway. He can't hear or know about her heart beat, but he can guess from the elevated breathing, the flush and the sweat, the blanch-white of her knuckles, that it's probably still going pretty fast, that it never slows down as fast as you want it to.

His hand flops, kind of waves at the end of his wrist. You're good. "Sounded like a doozy," he says. Relaxes out of his half-crouch, half-kneel, sitting instead in a tangle of legs. Persistently here, observing, all too sharp for the hour. "Not your first rodeo, huh."

[notathreat]

How many times has she said that to someone? Not my first rodeo?

A wholly inappropriate laugh bubbles up in the back of her throat, possibly a side effect of embarrassment as she reaches up to wipe the tears off her face. He's positioned himself in a way that'll ensure nobody's able to see her but him, and in the moment, she's grateful for it.

Nobody likes to be out of their damn mind in a full-blown panic attack, but it's worse when it happens in public.

"Yeah, that one got me good," she mutters, wiping at her eyes again as she shifts up onto her elbow. He's staying, then. Giving her time to get her shit together.

She clings to the space he's offering, because she knows better than to turn down help. Ellie's still breathing fast. Trying to take measured breaths that don't hurt, or twinge at the old breaks in her ribs, or the deep scar in her side.

Heavily, she flops back onto her back, opens her eyes to look at him.

Either Tony's a lot nicer than she first clocked him, or he knows a thing or two about this shit. She searches his face, feels uncomfortably like she knows the answer.

[propulsion]

Newsflash, he's super nice actually. Pals with everyone. Nobody has ever found him annoying, abrasive, rude, incapable of sincerity, or otherwise emotionally unavailable.

Or maybe it takes one to know one. Tony's focus doesn't clip away from Ellie's when she studies him right back, when maybe normally it might. But he's had a minute and some years to get over himself (a little), and so staves off the usual impulse to deflect and redirect, corner of his mouth lifting into something nearing a half-smile.

"Worse is when it gets you on the field," he says. "At least nothing's actually trying to kill you right now. Besides, you know." Your own brain.

i.

[tender]

"Ellie," is so, so gentle, Derrica's voice coming to her in a murmur as she kneels. Just inside arm's reach, whenever Ellie's eyes focus.

What she wants is to fold Ellie in against her, alleviate this in some tangible way.

But the last thing Ellie needs is more guilt. Derrica knows how someone waking this way lashes out. She knows Ellie capable of defending herself. And she knows Ellie isn't quite yet rooted in this moment, in this place. It would be too easy for this to end badly, and—

And Derrica remembers that very first time they'd met, and stood together on the ramparts. Ellie asking Derrica to be mindful of how she reached out. Even as Ellie had thawed, Derrica has kept it in mind, and it's more important now than ever, perhaps.

[notathreat]

Derrica's been there enough times, now. Enough times for her voice to break through like only something that means familiar safety can after a nightmare. Ellie's heart is still hammering like it's trying to escape her chest, but she manages to breathe. And after a few breaths, she sorts out her vision, enough to focus on Derrica's face.

She's laying on her side, on the floor. He body aches from how she's been holding it, from how hard she's fought the dream.

Instinctively, she reaches out, puts a hand on her arm, pressing down like she's afraid she's going to stand up, to leave her side and reveal something horrible splayed out on the floor behind her.

They aren't trapped with the ghosts, not like that manor on the road, but it's not far off.

"Shit," she whispers, the word thick on her tongue, like she can't make it work properly. She tastes blood. Probably bit herself. The inside of her cheek, or tongue. Another deep breath, and then another. She shuts her eyes, wraps her fingers around Derrica's.

"Did I wake everybody up?" she finally asks.

[tender]

"Not everyone," Derrica answers. "No one who wasn't already awake, or nearly awake."

At the touch of Ellie's hand, Derrica lays back down. Her body curves in towards Ellie's, making them a closed parentheses of an arrangement. The only shift of her hand is to lace their fingers together more comfortably.

The scream was likely hard to miss. But no one is sleeping well now. Derrica's willing to bet there were plenty who were drowsing so lightly a dropped bottle might have woken them. They're having the same difficulty, and Ellie isn't the only one who's jolted awake this way. No one could blame her.

"Don't worry about that now," is said so firmly. "Just breathe. You're here with me, and it's safe here."

[notathreat]

"Shit," Ellie mutters anyway. Her teeth are chattering with lingering nerves, her fingers shaking as Derrica covers them with her own. Her ears feel hot and her brain's still a mangled wreck of memories and dreams, while she sorts it out.

"Fucking embarrassing," she mutters, her voice tight. Ellie hates to lose her shit in public, and Derrica's probably the person who knows it best these days. She hates to be work, hates not being okay. Hates when her episodes are so obvious. But she listens to Derrica's softer, comforting words, and remembers to breathe.

Slowly, she regulates her breaths, in and out, and the shivering smooths itself away. Disappears, until she can hear the grumbling of the thunder outside. The hiss of rain.

Belatedly, she does the math, realizes it may have been the thunder that startled her awake.

[tender]

The only rebuttal is a soft hum. It isn't embarrassing, but Derrica's certain saying as much isn't going to fully dispel that sense.

And Derrica knows that it's hard, feeling like all your nightmares have been put on display for anyone listening. Yes, everyone has their own troubles lately. But that is hardly enough.

"You're okay," is what she says instead, soft repetition as she lifts her free hand to Ellie's cheek. "It was just a nightmare."

A terrible one, clearly. Ellie's skin is clammy, warm under the press of Derrica's fingers.

"Do you want to talk?"

About anything. Dreams. The rain. The fleas and the chaos of their sleeping arrangements. Holden's horse. Whatever is easiest, until Ellie unwinds enough to fall back to sleep.

If that happens.

III

[rowancrowned]

With long legs, he takes the stairs two at a time, thrumming down them with the tap-tap of leather soles on stone. He glances, when he passes, because the sight isn’t unusual, not with current events, but the tears are–

Let her sleep, or wake her?

He doesn’t have to choose. She wakes herself, in the half-light of the stairwell, and he is staring, inhumanly still and tall and with the shard in his palm shining.

“I did not mean to disturb you,” he says.

[notathreat]

It's a terrible place to fall asleep. Really, she thought she'd just be resting her eyes, taking a break before she finds somewhere else to be. The landing is open, vulnerable, and it's the kind of place she'd never normally fall asleep.

She's not sure if it's the dream or the sound of approaching footsteps that wake her. It could be either. But she's not immediately aware that someone's there. She's not aware of much of anything.

She's in a cold sweat, breathing fast, and it's Thranduil's half-familiar voice that brings her back. They've never talked, not properly, but she knows his face. Tallest fucking elf she's ever seen. Moves like he spends some time as a piece of art on display somewhere and only occasionally remembers how to flesh and blood.

Ellie lifts her hands, the both of them shaking -- an old soldier's tremor, out of place on a young woman barely out of her teens, as she tucks her hair behind her ears. She gives him a soft, humorless laugh.

"Don't worry," she says, her voice low and husky, a little thick with the remnants of the nightmare. "Guarantee you're not what's disturbing me."

She wraps one arm around her middle, takes a deep breath, and finally gestures at him, trying for casual.

Hey, my guy. My dude.

"How're you doing?"

[rowancrowned]

He shrugs, fully capable of disregarding dishevelment- his, hers, Riftwatch's in general- and waits patiently for her to settle and speak.

"The past does not relegate itself to time gently, and neither do the dead," he says, casually, like that's normal or cheerful or anything other than the advice of someone old and not human. He meant it to be comforting, probably, or at least reassuring; the elven version of this too shall pass. Thranduil leans against the rail, still watching.

"I have been better."

It has certainly been a year. A little mirth, tossed in. She looks young. He generally has more sympathy for the young.

"An accident?" he asks, and gestures briefly to their surroundings. "Or a quiet place?"

[notathreat]

Even if it's obvious, it's hard to get read so thoroughly when they barely know each other. She spreads her fingers, presses her palm against the old scar in her side, which is itching like it's still on the mend, despite it being several years since she was so badly hurt.

She gives him a wry, tired smile, her eyes a little more raw than she wants them to be, and shifts over to offer him a seat.

She's obviously not the only person needing a distraction.

"A little bit of both," she admits, reaching up to rub her eyes. She does it with the back of her hand, and it comes away damp.

"I was just resting my eyes for a second. I guess it was a long second."

A pause, and then she gives him a thoughtful sidelong long. "Was that a proverb or something? The thing you said about the dead?"