[ A wintry return pulse, fluttering like a bird's wing or a shorn flower, a too-natural capitulation to the bond the Murmur brings. But familiarity gives the sensation new dimension as compared to the dream; Subaru has already felt this man's hands, so what cords his mind and heart are also easy to bear. ]
[ Oh. Huh. That was a friendlier reception than he was anticipating. Not that he thought Subaru hated him or anything.
Something to consider, later. For now, he has a different topic to go over. ]
There's aβ[ Arthur pauses, searching for the best word to describe this. ]βmethod I wanted to tell you about, to help discern a dream from reality. I don't doubt your natural ability to keep both feet on the ground, so to speak, but when we're dealing with dreams like the one we met in ...
[ He trails off, letting Subaru fill in the rest. Sleep's dream (or rather, One's, because Kalmiya had corrected that notion) had been ultra-real, even with the fantastical elements. It catered to the senses and had a solidity that was abnormal by usual human standards. ]
...I understand. [ Robust as his senses are, whittled down to a gleaming edge over the years, they can only account for so much here. ] You've probably walked countless more dreams than I have, so I'd like to hear what you have to say.
[ A brief hesitation only now manifests. ]
There have been points since I woke up here where I've wondered.
[ Something in him relaxes as Subaru acknowledges the informationβwhile the other man hadn't given him reason to think he was prideful or one to scoff at a helping hand, there was always a possibility. Arthur thumbs the weighted die in his pocket, feeling out the indentations of the pips as a blind man would with braille. ] Dunno about countless, I could probably get you a number, if you want data for a comparison.
[ Okay, not the point, but hey. It's there. In case Subaru had any doubt of what kind of person he was. ]
You wouldn't be the first. Don't think you'll be the last, either. This place has a way of blurring the lines. [ His hand closes around the cherry red die, the edge digging into his palm like an odd comfort. ] A friend of mine came up with the theory of a totem; a small, unique object you could carry in your pocket. Preferably weightedβnot a coin or currency, since too many people would know what that feels like.
[ Mirroring Subaru's earlier hesitation, there's a moment of conversational suspension, a breath before the plunge. ] Hers was a little metal top that would spin forever in a dream, instead of toppling.
[ No, there was no doubt. But there is something to be said, he thinks, of data in relation purely to dreams. Many could be driven to insanity by that. Instead...
..."Hers" lands with such softness that Subaru understands on instinct alone that the "was" following it must ache in recesses that he rarely allows anyone to see, let alone touch. Silence follows in acknowledgement, though he measures the weight of its knowing against the light of his consideration. He's trying to help, so he puts his focus in the corresponding place. For now. ]
Assuming its total uniqueness to its owner, that simple object would be difficult to translate into the language of the dream without suspect variations. It's a genius idea, really.
[ He wishes he could say that each time he brings up Mal to someone that it gets easier. Maybe if he'd been able to talk about her in the immediate aftermath of her death, it wouldn't feel like speaking of a long-buried secret. But, he hadn't. None of them had, really. Mal's death had left a gaping hole in all their lives, something he and Cobb had carefully stepped around if they ever ventured too close to the topic.
Even now, with Subaru's gentle acknowledgment, he feels like he's right at the lip of that abyss; the vertigo of looking down from a high ledge. Arthur swallows around the symbolic discomfort and pushes onβshe would have wanted her ideas known. And there really isn't a better way, so far as they know, to tell the difference between reality and a dream. ]
Should someone visually recreate it in a dream, the weight would be an unknown factorβyou'd know instantly if it were incorrect. Haptic memory is nearly our best, in terms of senses, and tends to follow us into a dream more readily.
[ Death has a signature that's both impossible to mistake and impossible to succinctly describe. It waits in the corners of the house you thought you knew, it catches you mid-step on a busy metropolitan sidewalk. It stalks with static strides, in blooms of instinct millennia old, in years that feel like yesterday. It walks with you into a dream, and it waits for you to awaken, or to not awaken. To acknowledge, or to not.
He knows. He knows, he knows. This is his language. This connection blurs faintly at the edges with it. ]
[ They're both walking along this line, a tightrope, and trying not to spill over on either side. Arthur feels like he's been balancing for years now, one foot in front of the other, and a deep-set well of anger bubbles up. Why should he be expected to keep his propriety? Can't he just scream the grief out of his lungs? Will he stop thinking about her then? Will he stop catching himself reaching for a phone that isn't here, to call a number that doesn't exist anymore?
Swallowing, he carefully ignores the flood, lets it wash over him without being swept out to the ocean, and keeps treading along the invisible line between sand and sea. ]
I did. A loaded die I picked up in Vegas several years ago.
[ It's his thousandth time feeling it, but his first time feeling it this way: raging through the Murmur. How instinctual it feels for his soul to dash itself against the confines of another's self-control to find the haunting attached to what's beneath. Like running his hands through glass to reach him.
That instinct burns in him like a branding: even here, he will never be normal.
And it's a cruelty, he's sure — to be protected by a ghost. To confront the loss in every corporeal moment that intersects knowledge and responsibility. That's why Arthur is here, the dogged waves licking at his heels, his steady gait. How exhausting that must be for you, Subaru thinks, the inward press of such a presence flushing that instinct out of him. An instinct that is natural to him, but also cultivated, whittled to a gleaming point.
He can't promise walking towards him will harden the sand or stall the sea. But he thinks it would be better to reach him than to not, even if not today. ]
That's a generous advantage, for one whose language is dreaming. It works like it should?
[ Within the quiet seconds between words, he feels something like a chill. It's not unwelcome, exactly. He's reminded of an array of frost along a windowpane, the cool touch of glass a strangely soothing balm in a too-warm room. At the edges of his senses, there's the hush of a first snowfall, powdered branches muting the rest of the world.
The crystalline structures recede, leaving only pinpricks of moisture behind. ]
In reality, it does. When I'm in a dream, though, it behaves more like a regular dieβthe numbers come up at random. That's part of the trick: to know the totem does different things, depending on whether you're awake or asleep.
There is aβcaveat. [ Because it isn't foolproof. Something he found out fairly early and had to rely on other methods. A familiar paranoia slithers up his spine, draping itself over him with the heaviness of velvet: what if he isn't in reality? What if this is limbo and he's just convinced himself that he's in the real world? What if waking up from this nightmare is as easy as putting a gun to his temple and pulling the trigger, like he's done in dreams hundreds of times?
Would he wake up or would he be following Mal ten stories down, thinking he needed to get back to his life?
The precise click and whir of his thoughts stumble, gears grinding against a screw in the spokes. Releasing a noisy breath, the well-oiled rotations begin again, the stopper disappearing between steel teeth. ] Sleep can influence small pockets of dreaming to appear, so the totem isn't always accurate. Typically, they're not too large, though, and they pass with some time.
[ At least, that's been his experience. ]
It's not as dependable if you don't train for it, but in those moments, the best way to tell the difference is to trace your steps back to how you got there.
[ It's as if eyes turn inward, piercing. Such is the dreamer's purview when something goes awry, clarity whittling to seek the imperfections, just so. Not Sleep's attention here, but Arthur's. His cognizance betrays him, attempting to draw his knowledge out of safe narrow alleys and out into the open where anything could be possible. Any escape, any violence, from any direction. He can't offer reprieve, he can't dredge this dream or dispel this illusion.
Subaru's intuition coats the rift of his thoughts like a wintersoft sheen and dissipates just as quickly when he recovers. Acknowledgement, perhaps. Of the way out not always being what it seems, and the same deceit could be waiting at the end of either fork in the road.
And within that smoke is a mirror, a world in which Subaru would choose the dream that reflects his wish over a desolated reality. ]
That passage between worlds is something I'm more familiar with navigating. Spiritual entities perform similar feats when trying to avoid detection. If I find one, it might be better to engage with it first to understand it better.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
[ A wintry return pulse, fluttering like a bird's wing or a shorn flower, a too-natural capitulation to the bond the Murmur brings. But familiarity gives the sensation new dimension as compared to the dream; Subaru has already felt this man's hands, so what cords his mind and heart are also easy to bear. ]
What is it?
no subject
Something to consider, later. For now, he has a different topic to go over. ]
There's aβ[ Arthur pauses, searching for the best word to describe this. ]βmethod I wanted to tell you about, to help discern a dream from reality. I don't doubt your natural ability to keep both feet on the ground, so to speak, but when we're dealing with dreams like the one we met in ...
[ He trails off, letting Subaru fill in the rest. Sleep's dream (or rather, One's, because Kalmiya had corrected that notion) had been ultra-real, even with the fantastical elements. It catered to the senses and had a solidity that was abnormal by usual human standards. ]
no subject
[ A brief hesitation only now manifests. ]
There have been points since I woke up here where I've wondered.
[ Concession. Weakness. ]
ARRIVES 3000 YEARS LATE WITH STARBUCKS
[ Okay, not the point, but hey. It's there. In case Subaru had any doubt of what kind of person he was. ]
You wouldn't be the first. Don't think you'll be the last, either. This place has a way of blurring the lines. [ His hand closes around the cherry red die, the edge digging into his palm like an odd comfort. ] A friend of mine came up with the theory of a totem; a small, unique object you could carry in your pocket. Preferably weightedβnot a coin or currency, since too many people would know what that feels like.
[ Mirroring Subaru's earlier hesitation, there's a moment of conversational suspension, a breath before the plunge. ] Hers was a little metal top that would spin forever in a dream, instead of toppling.
no subject
..."Hers" lands with such softness that Subaru understands on instinct alone that the "was" following it must ache in recesses that he rarely allows anyone to see, let alone touch. Silence follows in acknowledgement, though he measures the weight of its knowing against the light of his consideration. He's trying to help, so he puts his focus in the corresponding place. For now. ]
Assuming its total uniqueness to its owner, that simple object would be difficult to translate into the language of the dream without suspect variations. It's a genius idea, really.
no subject
Even now, with Subaru's gentle acknowledgment, he feels like he's right at the lip of that abyss; the vertigo of looking down from a high ledge. Arthur swallows around the symbolic discomfort and pushes onβshe would have wanted her ideas known. And there really isn't a better way, so far as they know, to tell the difference between reality and a dream. ]
Should someone visually recreate it in a dream, the weight would be an unknown factorβyou'd know instantly if it were incorrect. Haptic memory is nearly our best, in terms of senses, and tends to follow us into a dream more readily.
no subject
He knows. He knows, he knows. This is his language. This connection blurs faintly at the edges with it. ]
Did you arrive with yours?
no subject
Swallowing, he carefully ignores the flood, lets it wash over him without being swept out to the ocean, and keeps treading along the invisible line between sand and sea. ]
I did. A loaded die I picked up in Vegas several years ago.
no subject
That instinct burns in him like a branding: even here, he will never be normal.
And it's a cruelty, he's sure — to be protected by a ghost. To confront the loss in every corporeal moment that intersects knowledge and responsibility. That's why Arthur is here, the dogged waves licking at his heels, his steady gait. How exhausting that must be for you, Subaru thinks, the inward press of such a presence flushing that instinct out of him. An instinct that is natural to him, but also cultivated, whittled to a gleaming point.
He can't promise walking towards him will harden the sand or stall the sea. But he thinks it would be better to reach him than to not, even if not today. ]
That's a generous advantage, for one whose language is dreaming. It works like it should?
no subject
The crystalline structures recede, leaving only pinpricks of moisture behind. ]
In reality, it does. When I'm in a dream, though, it behaves more like a regular dieβthe numbers come up at random. That's part of the trick: to know the totem does different things, depending on whether you're awake or asleep.
no subject
Do you suppose a totem crafted in reality as we're experiencing it right now... [ Sleep's Manhattan ] would have the same effect?
[ Subaru thinks that would stand to reason, but it bears asking.
It wouldn't be the only thing from home refashioned. ]
cw: suicidal imagery
Would he wake up or would he be following Mal ten stories down, thinking he needed to get back to his life?
The precise click and whir of his thoughts stumble, gears grinding against a screw in the spokes. Releasing a noisy breath, the well-oiled rotations begin again, the stopper disappearing between steel teeth. ] Sleep can influence small pockets of dreaming to appear, so the totem isn't always accurate. Typically, they're not too large, though, and they pass with some time.
[ At least, that's been his experience. ]
It's not as dependable if you don't train for it, but in those moments, the best way to tell the difference is to trace your steps back to how you got there.
no subject
Subaru's intuition coats the rift of his thoughts like a wintersoft sheen and dissipates just as quickly when he recovers. Acknowledgement, perhaps. Of the way out not always being what it seems, and the same deceit could be waiting at the end of either fork in the road.
And within that smoke is a mirror, a world in which Subaru would choose the dream that reflects his wish over a desolated reality. ]
That passage between worlds is something I'm more familiar with navigating. Spiritual entities perform similar feats when trying to avoid detection. If I find one, it might be better to engage with it first to understand it better.