foolishwren | 71. [Action/Video] Backdated to Sunday afternoon.

Current Location: Olivine hotel room

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71. [Action/Video] Backdated to Sunday afternoon.

_{[You know when you wake up and you feel like there's a leaden weight sitting on your chest, stopping you from moving? Most of the time when that happens, it's because of sleep paralysis. Somewhat less of the time, it's a close encounter of the third kind. ... This time, however, it's a very large Furret curled up neatly in the middle of Heather's chest, taking advantage of the fact that her trainer both produces heat and is stationary and comfortable, AND of the fact that there is currently a brief moment in which nobody is looking over in this direction to shoo her away.]

[... Except that Heather's not going to be stationary much longer.]

[The first thing that happens that disrupts the vacant, sleeping stupor of Heather's face is a wince and a scrunched nose, because fluffy Furret tails are not the best things to have brushing up against your nostrils when you're coming out of a deep sleep.]}

Nhngngnh...

_{[Ffffh what was-- what. Oh, ow. Opening eyes that haven't seen light in a good seven days kind of hurts. And trying to talk through a throat that hasn't made a single noise kind of hurts too, which is why all that Heather manages at first is a sort of croak.]

[But that croak is enough to get SOMEBODY'S attention.]

[From the foot of the bed, Cujo snorts into wakefulness from where he's been faithfully sleeping on his trainer's ankles. With a deep wuff, he surges to his feet and joyfully clambers over the blanketed body, stepping on Arty and causing her to vacate her perch atop Heather's chest with an indignant hiss, until he's standing over her with a great big doggy smile and a paw on either side of her.]

[Heather squints up at him, scrunching up her face. On one hand, the sight of those floppy orange ears and big black nose is one for sore eyes, but on the other... oh god does she not want to see a dog right now after the kinds of dreams she'd been having...]

[Coughing and lifting her arms weakly, she tries to shove him away long enough for her to get her bearings.]}

Cooj, gimme some spac-- acklPHTHG OFF.

_{[No force in this world or any other could stop Cujo from greeting his favorite human being's return to wakefulness with lots of licking. Startled into a slightly more awake state, Heather makes a still-sleepy noise of disgust and shoves feebly at the Growlithe, scooting away.]}

Dammit, mutt, I mean i--

_{[Turns out, trying to slip out of bed after not moving for a week? Hurts, too. WHOMP. Face, meet hotel room floor. And possibly part of Henry's sleeping bag.]}

[VIDEO]

_{[A few minutes later, presumably after proving sufficiently to her father that she's not DEAD, the feed clicks on, revealing a very, very bedraggled Heather who looks like she went a week WITHOUT sleeping instead of spending the whole time unconscious.]}

Mornin'.... what'd I miss?

_{[ooc: Because the nightmare threads will likely affect CR pretty strongly, I'll tag them as long as anybody wants/it takes them to be finished! I'm also fine with discussing their outcomes, though, if anyone needs a conclusion right away.]}

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_{[The smile melts away from Heather's face.]

[She doesn't look... surprised, exactly. ... Just sort of resigned. She lets out a puff of breath and looks down at the edge of the blanket she's got pulled over her knees.]}

... I thought I saw you down there...

. . .

[ah... now he almost feels bad for bringing it up] Sorry. Though I might've seen you, too.

_{[It's not exactly like you can ignore that sort of thing... she'd rather talk about it with him than most other people, though. After all... he WAS one of the first people she'd ever opened up to about Silent Hill in the first place.]

[She rubs her temples.]}

... To answer your question, yeah.

... A little.

[there is only a small pause before he leans forward and wraps his arms around her shoulders in a tight hug, without asking her anything else. they can talk about it in a moment, right now, she probably needs this]

_{[Yeah... yeah, after everything, a hug is pretty nice. Even if she only walked in on the very tail end of Kaito's unfortunate adventure in her memories. She goes right ahead and leans into the hug, letting her head flop somewhat listlessly against his shoulder and scooting to the side a little so that he can sit without being in danger of slipping off the edge of the bed.]}

M'sorry you had to see that.

... But I'm glad it was just the sewer.

_{[... Yeah. 'Just' the sewer.]}

[He holds her tightly, mumbling as he responds]

... the sewer was bad enough. [Yeah... gonna have nightmares of it]

_{[She won't begrudge him those nightmares... at least she's used to them.]

[Working an arm free, she worms it around him so that she can rub a hand on his back. If there was one thing she'd never wanted... it was for her friends here to be exposed to Silent Hill. Even if they were just being exposed to it through the ghosts that still lurked around in the dark spots of her mind.]}

... Did he hurt you?

[He... actually pauses when she asks that, though he doesn't pull away from the hug. He doesn't want to worry her, though he doesn't want to lie to her either]

... had worse.

_{[... Oooh yeah. The pause pretty much tells her everything, and she moves her hand up from his back to squeeze his shoulder tightly.]}

I'm sorry... I'm so sorry...

... I thought I made sure that guy would never hurt anyone else again, but I guess everything lives on in memories...

[shaking his head into her shoulder]

Like I said. Had worse. I think the smell was worse than the pain.

[a beat]

... I think I should be apologizing to you. It was a dream for me.

It was real for you.

... Heh. I guess that's true.

_{[Scooting a little closer so that she could wrap her arm around his shoulders more firmly, she went ahead and rested her chin on top of his head. She doesn't really care if whatever he experienced in there wasn't 'real'-- she'd gotten caught up in enough nightmares that whole week to know that they were still scary as hell... painful, too.]}

But still.

Last thing I ever wanted was for anyone here to ever have to see... that place.

... Leonard's quite the charmer, in'e?

[he snorts at that statement, rolling his eyes as he does so]

Very charming.

You have an interesting group of 'friends.'

Only if you use the definition of 'friend' very, very loosely.

Or sarcastically.

That too.

So, uh... did he say much of anything to you down there?

I only heard the...

... The tail-end.

He rambled on about some 'Order.' Guess it's the crazy cult you told me about.

Yeee-eeeep, that's them all right.

Funny story, actually... he sort of just automatically assumed I was one of them when we met.

He was preeeetty pissed when I was like "what the hell shit are you talking about".

... he's gotta make that mistake often. He thought they had sent me, too.

_{[She shakes her head, inadvertently messing up his hair in the process.]}

He's delusional, basically.

Sort of just assumes that anyone who'd help him out MUST be on the same side... and if they're not, wellp, obviously trying to trick him.

... WAS delusional, I guess I should say.

[a frustrated sigh]

... and he's not the only creep you had to deal with there either, is he?

_{[She heaves a deep sigh at that.]}

No... no, he wasn't.

.... N'as awful as he was, I guess overall I'm glad he's the only thing you met.

_{[... A pause.]}

... He was, right?

I met a bunch of creepy squeaky things, too. I dunno what the heck they were, but...

[... if Leonard and the Numb Bodies paled in comparison to what Silent Hill really held, then...]

You're really strong, Heather.

... Creepy squeaky th-- ... OH. Oh, god. Those. _{[He can probably feel the shudder of revulsion that runs through her. She wasn't sure they'd creep anyone out quite as much as they'd creeped HER out... but that didn't much matter. Things that weren't supposed to exist were scary no matter who they were appearing to.]

[She's quiet a moment before speaking up again.]}

... I know... thanks.

You're welcome.

... and 'm sorry you had to go through that.

_{[She shrugs her shoulders, with a weak chuckle.]}

Heh... there wasn't any avoiding it, really.

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