70. [DREAM/DREAM/DREAM/DREAM]

[foolishwren]

<sub>[So while the rest of Johto alternately panics, cries, or rushes around trying to capture as many of the soulstealing insects as possible, there are dozens of souls floating around in that dream limbo, drifting in and out of each other's slumbering thoughts and visions. Whether it's nightmarish flashbacks or just those dreams where you're at school taking a really hard test, and then Dracula shows up, and then everybody's naked ... anything is possible when it comes to what people see in their sleep.]

[But what appears in the darkness in this particular spot in the spaceless, shifting mass of dreaming souls... is a door.]

[It's old, and covered with boards and bolts, rusted near-through in some places. The lock is broken-- mangled and half-melted and wrenched out of the keyhole. The only thing on it that doesn't look ancient is a scrap of torn notebook-paper that's taped up on it at roughly eye-level. It reads only a single phrase:]</sub>

Fear of blood tends to create fear for the flesh.

<sub>[More importantly, though... the door is ajar. Through the gap come the scents of rust and metal-- and something organic, fleshy-- and a low, deep hum of industrial machinery. It's not a door that anyone in their right mind would want to go through. ... But for anyone who may have stumbled this far into the dreams of their fellow lost souls, either in flight from some other nightmare or just pure, wandering curiosity... there's just no other place to go but through the door.]




[Go on. Open it. After all.... it's only a dream.]</sub>

[ooc: SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG, GUYS. Thanks for being patient! If you commented on that planning post, there's something spooky planned for your character to do here so please feel free to tag or not tag as it pleases you!]

~*~

[ooc: This is the IC post for what was announced over here! Even if you didn't comment there, feel free to participate! I'm still happy to whip up Silent Hill scenarios for folks!]

Comments

[show_my_cannons]

... Megatron's air commander. A sniveling coward. A traitor.

[foolishwren]

Guess I know to avoid anybody named that if they show up here, then...

[show_my_cannons]

[Look, Heather. Look at this face. This is maybe the most serious Ironhide has ever looked.]

If anyone shows up calling themselves Megatron, or Starscream, you will not speak to them. Tell me. Tell Cliffjumper.

Stay away from them.

[foolishwren]

_{[... Whoa, okay. She feels the seriousness. As such, her answer doesn't have the usual PSH YEAH YEAH W/E tone she so often speaks with.]}

... Okay.

... What should I do if it's unavoidable? _{[Not that she expects such a meeting WOULD be... but she's already had a few chance encounters pop up at exactly the wrong times. Best not take chances.]}

[show_my_cannons]

[He nods, accepting that answer. He can tell she understands that much.]

[Then he tilts his head, considering her question.]

... Run.

[Yes, the Autobot who just stomped around Silent Hill and doesn't afraid of anything there... is telling her to run.]

[foolishwren]

<sub>[... Yeah. That's not lost on her at all.]

[All the same, her brows furrow.]</sub>

Even if they're human?

[show_my_cannons]

[He nods, and hunkers down a little further, so he can better look her in the eye.]

Even then. They are dangerous, sadistic. Megatron has seen just as much war as I have. And he has no problems slaughtering those he deems to be insects.

Annoy him, even as a human, and he would make your death slow, painful. He would find a way.

[Ironhide doesn't raise his voice -- he keeps the same, deathly serious tone, his good optic staring her straight in the face.]

[foolishwren]

... Eh... slow and painful, huh... <sub>[She sounds dubious... not in the sense that she's doubting Ironhide's words, because she doesn't doubt them at all, but ... something else.]

[Hard to stretch a death longer than seven years...]</sub>

[show_my_cannons]

Yeah. Pretty much.

[He drops his gaze, then, making a sound dangerously close to a sigh.]

Or... quick. And terrible. [His voice lowers, some of the steel leaving his tone. Two years wasn't nearly enough time to accept a loss, when you lived for millennia.] He was known to devour the sparks of his enemies.

[foolishwren]

Sparks... means 'souls', basically, right?

_{[Heather sighs, herself. Then she lifts her hands, palms up.]}

Look, I-- ... for the record. I believe you. And I will try to avoid 'em if they ever decide to rear their ugly heads in Johto, but--

... I should probably tell you that this place has things in it that are way worse than any of the creeps that've popped out at us here tonight. Not just 'bigger' worse, or 'stronger' worse. I just mean.... worse. Worse than I think most people can imagine-- maybe not worse than what you're talking about, but I'm willing to bet it's a different brand of bad.

_{[Now folding her arms, she looks looks him straight in that blue optic with her own hazel-brown eyes. For once her plucky-teen attitude is absent-- there's just determination there now. Determination and honesty.]}

...N'I'm still alive.

So I'm just saying... if anything comes down to a fight... a human's a human.

And I can fight humans.

[show_my_cannons]

Heart. Soul. Both.

[He shrugs slightly, and his hand sort of hovers over the crack -- no, the hole -- in his chest armor. His own spark was perfectly fine, since it would take more than a missile strike to breach his armor completely. But the thought...]

What sort of bad?

[He falls silent, listening to her -- honestly listening. If she can be perfectly frank, he owes it to her to pay attention. His good optic flicks over her once or twice before he nods, once, sharply.]

Your spark is strong. Be proud of that.

[foolishwren]

_{[She does break into a small grin at that.]}

Don't worry, if I had any more pride, my head would be a hot-air balloon. <sub>[She was tough stuff and she knew it!]

[But the grin fades as she rubs the back of her neck, turning to look off across the shadowy back-lot with a thoughtful frown.]</sub>

It's... hard to explain, exactly. I'm not ... totally sure I could put it into words.

I'm not eloquent like my Dad's writing always was.

But this place... there was something wrong with it generations before I was even born. Stuff under the surface... it's not war, so I can't... compare it to what you talk about. But it's... something.

Guh.

It's just complicated.

[show_my_cannons]

[When she moves, so does he, rocking back on his 'heels' to crouch more comfortably.]

Yeah. Sounds like someone else I know.

[He just sits there, in silence, letting her talk. When she finishes, he blinks, slowly. The bad optic just sort of twitches.]

Complicated, huh?

... Bad neighborhoods are like that.

[foolishwren]

Yeah... I guess that's really the best way to look at it.

'Cept it's basically the worst neighborhood anywhere on Earth.

_{[Yeah, yeah, talk all you want about sleazy cities and gang wars, but until a neighborhood ritualistically abuses children, nurtures unholy gods and for some people occasionally turns into a rusty, rubble-filled industrial jungle that crawls with eldritch abominations, Heather's pretty sure Silent Hill wins. Plus, it's got its own drug ring.]}

... Too much suffering's gone on here for it to ever be totally clean. Sort of like a rotting wound.

_{[Turning back to Ironhide, she eyes his armor.]}

... I guess you guys rust, which is sort of the same...

[show_my_cannons]

I would believe that.

[He lifts his head, scanning the area. Ironhide is about as sensitive as his name implies, but even he can sense the weight, the lurking violence of this place. It's nowhere he'd want one of his charges to be in -- it reminds him, on some level of the last days... the cities of Cybertron worst hit by the war.]

[That, though, he doesn't say. It's not a time for comparisons.]

No. I understand. Even without mentioning... eugh... rust.

[Don't talk about rust, Heather -- that's like robot cancer.]

[foolishwren]

Yeah... If I thought I could show you the things I'm talking about without... sticking my hands back into murky waters I really never wanted to explore again, I would.

... That and... even if this IS just some whacked-out dream, it's...

It's not safe.

_{[The same words she'd said earlier... and didn't seem to say all too seriously about the monsters they've faced tonight already, even if they are quite obviously unsafe to her.]}

[show_my_cannons]

[Ironhide just listens. He's not very good with words. He's blunt, direct, and lacks anything resembling tact. Anything he could say here would... just end badly.]

[Instead he just extends a hand -- it's an offer of support. A gesture intending to say he understands. Trusts her word. That he won't push this.]

[It's supposed to be a lot of things. Most of which he can't quite articulate well enough.]

All right.

[foolishwren]

_{[She smiles in response. It's a tired, world-weary smile, but it's a smile.]}

... With all that said, how do you like Sucksville so far? Pretty dreary, huh?

[show_my_cannons]

[He knows that kind of smile all too well. So he shrugs, leaving it at that.]

It could use a couple more craters.

[foolishwren]

_{[The smile curls into a MUCH more familiar Cheshire-grin.]}

... Wanna give it some?

[show_my_cannons]

[Ironhide answers with a snort, and lowers his hand.]

[Let's go paint the town in napalm, kiddo.]

[foolishwren]

<sub>[She grins and steps up.]

[If she had to be stuck in a nightmare of her own design, she couldn't imagine a better way to spend the time than getting to blow it all to hell.]</sub>