Characters involved are: Ashton (RED), Bastion (ORANGE), Brin (GREEN), Marcus (BLUE), Khiea (INDIGO),
Logged by Brin

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Khiea's Nightmare: Tears of Blood
Violence. A grim, eternal truth of humanity. No matter how hard the pacifist finds, it finds itself lost, back and again, in a world that knows only Violence as its goal and only motive and will. This area is terribly dark, as if held in a fog, through which you can barely see where you are or which way you're traveling in. The sky is dark, dark red in color, the ground is cracked and dry, with trails of blood cast between the cracks. Screams, fears, death, pain.. It all echoes upon the wind, crying through this area like a gale. It all seems so inescapable... Every breath, turn, glance and movement takes you deeper into its cries.
Exits: <W>est, <S>outh, <E>ast, <N>orth... Or Wake UP! In <Sol>aris, <Sh>evat, <A>quavy, the <Ez>ekiel, <K>islev, <Av>eh, or <Ni>san.
Other Nightmares: <Citan>'s Realm
Contents:
Bastion
Khiea
Marcus
Ashton
We can not forever dream /only/ happy dreams.. Can we? Even the little bright-eyed Khiea Dalant is not free of the simple facts of life- That for every happy, beautiful moment, one can not run from the darker notes of existance forever. Smile and smile as you may- It'll catch up to you sometime. Inevitably. It's just a matter of waiting for when.
This is one of those nights. When good intentions do not mean quite enough, when trying to fall asleep on a brighter note really does not mean that much. This is one of those nights where one remembers something that they tried to forget.. And while the mind doged it, the subconcious did not. And here, in the darkness, sits a girl, sitting in the middle of nowhere, her tarnished blue eyes focused quite on nothing. A teenager. No pretty child or princess-spoiled young lady. A young woman sits here, those eyes misfocused and distracted. Looking.. Mildly surprised to find herself back in these darker realms. But oddly undisturbed of the lonliness, the choking fears besides. It's as natural as background noise. It's simply.. Far too cold.
Bastion ponders. He ponders this place and what he sees. "This is....not right." Sitting cross legged on the ground he looks around. He should be afraid but he is not. "There has to be a rational explanation for all this...." Looking around some more running his hand through the cracks in the earth. "how....unusual." Having never know fear in his life Bastion is very calm. "Life is mystery that never ceases to amaze me." Pulling his flute from his backpack he plays a gentle melody to ease his troubled thoughts.
You are carrying:
An Octagonal Tarpaulin(#1739)
You have 179 gold pieces.
Reoite created with number 6906.
A groan comes from the Etone. His eyes are closed, and he is lying on the ground. Unusual, he thought. He assumed that he was sleeping in his quarters in the Ethos HQ. His head stinged, which added to his confusion. He finally decided to stand up. He only gets halfway, though. His stomach seems to turn topsy-turvy as he realizes that there is blood on the ground. He sits, frozen for a minute. He lifts his hands off of the ground, only to see that they are covered with blood. He stands up, jolted. He looks all around the unpleasant scenery, and finally rests his eyes on his clothing. He freezes in fear as he slowly realizes that he is in his old Kislevi uniform...
Description set.
...What on -earth-? Marcus was certain that he was.. Well, he was in Aveh, right? He could have outright, entirely -sworn- that he was in Aveh. And this.. Well, this really, really isn't that. For one, it's -cold-. Other than that, it is dark.. And it is.. There is just something -odd- about this place. Some feeling that the ground is not quite solid, the air is not quite true. Some notion that the world is just rather... Surreal all of a sudden. The teenager blinks a few times in confusion, seeing little but mist and darkness to greet his dazed glance as he scrambles up to his feet. Hrm. Wasn't he wearing his Etone robes before? Because for the moment he's clad in rather plainly Aquevian clothes, just like the sort he used to wear before he left home for the fateful salvage that turned his life full around. "What.." He begins to ask a question, but cuts it off quickly, the noise of speaking seeming oddly too loud for this deathly silent world. With a frown, he simply turns his gaze up, baf
baffled, around the area.. Realizing, slowly.. That he doesn't seem to be alone here, either.
Not being alone...isn't being alone the source of so many nightmares, of curling into a ball in the farthest recesses of the mind, and numbing over with fear at not having other people. Yes, there were other people, some familiar, some not, some....ah, but it is time to show yourself, is it not. And what better place...
Brin appears, as if swirling in a vortex of particles that are neither here, nor there, nor trapped between realities in limbo, as they all might be now. The vortex exudes a small, furry, object, which zips to the shadows, and slowly materialises as a quicksilver sculpture of man, gaining colour as it shimmers and reflacts, and comes to being, with the young, differently-clad Etone at his feet, turned away for now, as if in some horror-story moment the cloak and dager would end it all. Brin smiles, and stares down at the young boy, relaxed. The confusion on the other's faces is not so apparent here.
But aren't there nightmares, too, where the greatest fear is /not/ being alone? Where one is certain that someone they don't want ot meet, someone they don't want to see, is hiding just around the other corner. We lie in wait to pounce. Or.. do we? Khiea does not seem anything but distracted, anything but distant. And those silver-gray eyes are simply /empty/. Apathetic. Calm. As she turns her gaze down from the sky and the fog and... almost lazily focuses on the others wandering about. She sighs, a pale and shallow sound, as she slowly rises to her feet. And fixes that steady gaze upon them all. Ah. Visitors? In any other place in any other state, Khiea would glee at such a thought. The Khiea of the moment, however, simply watches. Silent.
Bastion plays a beutiful Aria he once heard Gabriel play. Siting stll he looks into the darkness pondering his delima. Is this what hes heard about. Nighmares that attack people in their sleep? He had never had a nightmare. What was he supposed to feal? Fear? What exactly is fear. It was something Bastion did not know, Could not know. The melody sounds haunting in this place, enchanting and yet...not so. He closes his eyes and thinks. Why is here? Why now? Still gently playing his opens his eyes and looks into the darkness. Images of fire and death...people he never knew but somehow felt connected to flashed before his eyes. He dropps his flute as a tear runs from his eyes and rasps "M...Mother...."
What the hell was going on here? Where the hell am I, and what am I doing in this...... this... piece of filth? Ashtons' thoughts raced as he looked at his bloodstained hands. To put it in a nutshell, he was confused. He felt like screaming. He even tried once or twice, but it only came out as a small squeak. He couldn't scream, no matter how he tried. He couldn't show human emotions. Fear, sadness, even happiness were things that he could not seem to grasp. He too looks up, but he finds something that makes him even more confused. That girl... That girl who he had ruined the life of... Why was she haunting him?!
That was -definately- not normal... Animals popping out of nowhere and turning into people? Pardon if Marcus stumbles back a number of steps at that, eyes gone wide in confusion that is simply free of comprehension. That's not normal. So what is.. Going on? And he's getting -smiled- at, to boot? By someone who looks oddly so much like that strange guy that Franco was forced to shoot--The Minister, right?--After the incident in Bledavik. But the brave little Rogue doesn't seem so brave at all here, as he vainly tries to stutter through and find something to say... And instead just manages a tone that is so faint and weak that it sounds more like a whimpering child, "Where is this? What's going on..?" He had hoped to sound at least demanding enough to get an answer. This tone is more just.. Rather pathetic, really.
"There is no time for tired justification of your wicked actions, when your soul is laid bare, boy.", the figure booms, seeming even taller then the living Brin's remarkable stature, the face so grim in its complete lack of emotion, the voice so refined from that which was like a boy's only so few years before. But, even the familiarity with what his surroundings were gave him the advantage here. And even at that, the moral advantage was his. "The cloth does not become you, boy. It is the mark of courage. You do not have the right to wear it.". And there is fire. Fire in the eyes of the tall Etone, in his heart, everywhere. "Would you have burned for your faith, as those inside did? Tell me.".
"You are one of the ones who hurt Mister Brin." Khiea's voice is not raised a high octave nor played and trilled until it was cute. It is the voice of a young woman's, how she should sound, how she was designed to sound. And it is strangely eerie to hear such a childishly worded sentence fall from such a tone. And Khiea knows better than to interrupt Brin- He is making quite a good impression all by himself. But the dark clad teenager allows some note of amusement to touch her eyes- Sadistic, almost? Not quite, but it will do- That plays upon her teenage features. Yes. You are one of the ones who hurt Brin. Would you like to.. squirm for a while? The softest of a smiles plays across her features before she adds, voice just as harsh, just as distant, "You think you're quite a big boy, don't you? You can hurt those who don't believe in your pretty little words, in your silly little ways. You must be so very proud." Khiea's words, but oddly /mocking/.
Bastion suddenly snaps from his vissions, brought back by the voices of others. He reaches down for his flute and finds nothing. "OH NO!!" He sobs, "My Mothers Flute!" Stumbling through the murk arms outstretched following the precieved vision of his mother he somes nearer and nearer to the voices. "No Mother...Come back...Stay away from the voices please!" Tears streaming from his eyes Bastion pleads the spectre to stay. He can't stand the thought of having her taken away again. He drops to his knees and screams.
..The jerks are teaming up on him, aren't they? And yet.. Why does it seem so futile to do anything in self defence? He wants to stand straight and threaten them, to stand up and prove he's not afraid.. But something about this dream.. This nightmare.. Although he doesn't know that this is quite that at all.. Makes him rather want to choke and back away. It is likely the tones of voice, the sheer -harshness- of Brin's booming voice, the dull mockery of Khiea's... It sends shivers up his spine. Instinctively, Marcus's hand drops to his side, where his gun should be rightfully holstered.. Only to find nothing. And that draws him a shade paler as it is. It's all he can do to try--Try being the key word here--To snarl and narrow his eyes a little in response. "I am not afraid of you.. Either of you. It is the cloth that does not deserve me to follow it. And those who believe in the lies that go along with it are simply fools." The young lady is a mocking one, isn't she? Strange that a girl with
...such a pretty face could be so utterly.. Well, bitchy. "I'd do anything for what I believed." Vague. Would he die for it? Er. No. But he doesn't have to say so. "Oh, but I -am- proud, miss. I'm righting the world." Brave words, them all! And yet.. It would really help if half of them weren't quiet and stuttered, wouldn't it?
Brin laughs, a drawn-out shuddering of the room that adds to the mockery. "You...you reach for a weapon before defending yourself with the conviction of your beliefs? I pity you.". He draws back his robes, revealing his empty holster. "Our only weapons here are our beliefs, and the truths that stand behind them. Fear is only what you feel, since you think I would hurt you. If that is so, then I am afraid you have lost your way, indeed. Bringing the world to true right by the eradication of a percieved enemy is a fallacy. Every war ever fought has proved that, boy.". A smirk appears at the side of his mouth, and his face is shadowed. "Tell me. Do you speak for your entire organisation? Do you see destruction as the resolution of a wrong?". The smirk grows wider, searing. "Hah. So simple questions, and yet, you have not answered even one. Would you -burn-? Would you suffer the same fate you deal out? Consider your answer, boy".
And to that? Khiea /laughs/. It's a quiet note, as delicate as bird trills, soft and careful and rather humorless. Even as her eyes glint with amusement and she claps her hands behind her back. A childish gesture for a woman's body. Even while she is -amused-. "Silly. -Anyone- can kill people. Anyone can harm people. Why do you think that makes you spe-cial?" Mockingly breaking the word up. It sounds so.. Cute as child-Khiea, but for some reason, as a teenager, it makes it sound like she's going to momentarily destroy something. "Just what are you righting the world -of-? All those silly little people who don't think exactly like you do?"
Bastion stumbles through the darkness and trips. Looking up he sees an image. Amdist the twisting, swirling void he sees a vision of beauty. A girl unlike any he has ever seen before. Face shrowded in darkness, calling out mockingly into the void. Bastion stares. So pretty yet so....demented. If he could feel fear he was certain he would feel it now. He tries to speak but his words catch in his throat. Something inside him wishes he could reach out to this poor soul...but something else tells him to stay away from this one. For the first time in his young life Bastion is torn...
Bastion says, "of course you are"