梦见: [ location: serenity | accidental visual ]

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

River hasn't been sleeping, not well, not since Dawn, and when the tablet clicks on from its place amidst a haphazard pile of flowers to show Serenity's cargo bay.

Every few seconds she walks across the frame (step step heel turn step heel turn step turn step step step). She's holding her necklaces (one a cross, the other a locket of vervain) taut enough to dig in at the back of her neck but not hard enough to break, and if she'd hold still one might notice some impressive bags under her eyes.

It's been days. Multiples. She can see them stretching out in front of her nose, a snake of exponential progression winding into a giant coiled ball, growing and growing until mass present exceeds the limits of volume and everything breaks. Maybe that's how they'll get out, eventually. The city will be too full of snake-days and their husky skins to let the barriers stay in place...

River snorts an unamused little laugh as she turns back around. "That's not likely. Adjustments... It's thoroughly biodegradable husk."

A beat passes and she stops, heel on the ground and toes in the air ready to make another step. Any second now.

"Smells like a graveyard," is her only irritated observation before she's off again.

(Step step heel t urn step heel turn step turn step step step.)

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[ location ] i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Luck had nothing to do with how Stefan came upon the corner of Serenity that River managed to hide herself in. He'd successfully ducked past the other resident on board several times, that man who was part of this ship's crew and from River's own world, using tricks he'd learned for hunting that had later been adapted for evasion to continue to allude the stranger he didn't quite know how to address yet. Stefan's a sociable person when he wants to be, and right now he's not sure if he does. Things are complicated and confusing and such a mess, and he's here because River's one of the few people (outside of Katherine, of course) who seems to enjoy his company anymore.

River, who he found by following the sounds of a heartbeat beating far too fast - like some cornered and afraid; like someone who was being hunted and knew they were prey - and was currently flinching in her sleep in a way Stefan wasn't comfortable with continuing to watch.

He shakes her - gently at first, one hand on one shoulder accompanied by her name, his, and an urging for her to awaken. When nothing happens, he tries again, a little rougher, but not so much as to hurt her in the hopes of jostling her awake from what appears to be a bad dream.

"River. River, wake up. It's Stefan. River."

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

Yǐn​cáng: to hide. River can recognize the futility in hiding from herself, how curling up in a metal cocoon like so much smuggled goods won't change the outcome, but that doesn't mean she wasn't going to try.

Stefan may be shaking her but he doesn't wake up.

Her frown deepens, face pinched and distressed. Her throat twitches like she's trying to swallow but forgot how. Her eyes are darting beneath her eyelids like pinballs and her hands are eerily still against all this movement.

A sharp intake of breath. A swallow not-swallow. A slow exhale while her head cranes back against the metal floor then lolls to the side.

She still doesn't wake up.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Stefan shakes her again, rougher this time, but again, River doesn't stir. And he hesitates, for he isn't one to normally do such a thing. Even during the days when he'd had the switch flipped, when he ran rampant and lived his life based on the instincts and wants of what he was instead of his emotions guiding him, he didn't do this often. It had taken a while to learn, for contrary to popular belief, having the ability to do something did not mean one could do it well, and if not for the fact that he was back on the human blood diet, he would not be attempting this at all.

He releases his hold on her once he's removed her necklace, moving away to sit against the opposite wall; he doesn't need to be close, after all. Concentrating, Stefan focuses in on River. It's like compulsion, only instead of forcing your way through the walls of a person's consciousness, you simply find a backdoor and slip inside, unnoticed.

Door found, Stefan enters her subconsciousness. He intends to step in and pull her back into the world of the awake, but what he finds once he steps inside is not what he expected.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

It's flat.

A thin layer of sand over hardwood. Smells antiseptic and white on top, trickles down beneath the cracks in some spots but the volume never changes. Walls are there-not-there, great flat hallways of sand and the whine of drills behind each door.

Her feet thunk-skisssh as she walks.

(Somewhere something is dead, crawled inside the floorboards all mummified and dusty old with neglect. There were no oils or brains or burials just that corner, that spot no one sees as the sand seeps in but goes nowhere.)

Her feet thunk-skissssh as she walks.

There are hands at the ends of her arms, hands she forgot she had, purple evil things that do evil deeds. The blue and the blood that stains the gray she's wearing wherever she touches it and leeches up her arms in slow spindly reaching.

(thunk-skisssh)

Her mouth is open but all that comes out is a rush of sea-foam that trickles down but goes nowhere.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Stefan stumbles, falling to his knees and rolling across what looks like sand, but doesn't quite feel like it. And although the setting seems to be perfectly still, it feels like he's in motion and it makes his stomach churn unpleasantly. (Back in the realm of reality, Stefan twitches, shifting in his spot in response to the unexpected discomfort.) He had anticipated a traumatic or terrifying scene, as was common with nightmares that gripped with iron claws at a person's consciousness and kept them anchored deep in their dreams, but what he imagined hadn't been this.

"River!" He shouts, gripping at the walls that come and go as they please, eventually finding his footing again.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

Things go solid like they'd been that way the whole time. Walls stay up, anchored to linoleum covered cement that squishes slightly from rot.

When River turns to look at Stefan the sea-foam is gone. There's something on (in) her forehead like a giant insect with the purple from her hands creeping up her shoulder, winding up her neck like a blooming bruise. There are splatters of blood on her and a metal serving platter in her hand but she doesn't know where they came from.

"Shhh."

Behind her there are clunks like falling dominoes as the doors lock and the endless hallway bends out of sight. There are clunks like falling dominoes of feet moving closer.

Eyes wide and panicked she whispers, "Run," right into his ear from twenty paces away and takes off.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

...okay, Stefan's had enough of this. He'd been curious to see just what was going on in River's head that was keeping her so rooted in her dreams, but this is starting to freak even him out a little. It's like being trapped within the oil paint and canvas of something envisioned by M.C.Escher or Salvador Dali, and it's making his vision swim.

What he does takes longer than it should, but it's been years - decades, even - since Stefan's done this, and there's something about River's mind that feels almost elastic. He pulls, but instead of there being slack and give, there's resistance like tugging on rubber. He has to focus and pull, putting all of his effort into it in order to drag the scenes spun by River's mind to him and weave them into something else entirely. While Stefan was originally going to recreate something familiar to River from Taxon, it's taking too much out of him and falls back on default, taking something from his own mind and applying it to River's, something he can easily throw together without much thought or effort: Veritas.

River will now find herself standing outside of great plantation house, the air hot and thick as it was in the days before the land was covered in more buildings than the Earth was meant to hold. Stefan sits on the steps to his childhood home, calm and as if being here is the most natural thing in the world.

"You don't need to run."

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

Her mind is elastic, nylon knit stretching gaping thing that holds just as much as it snaps against and passes through.

River fits herself into the parameters as well as she can, standing barefoot in the grass wearing what, in her perception of history (the one that was taught in school so far away), is an entirely accurate empire waist dress that stops at her knees. Okay, certain liberties were taken, whether they were conscious or not. Distantly, Veritas now has a pulse wave security perimeter courtesy of the Tam Estate on Osiris.

That she's looking around with great suspicion should be expected.

"It's bigger," bigger than she'd imagined it, and River toes the grass, rocks back and forth, pulls up blades between her toes. She may not need to run but the urge to is persistent.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

"I was modest in my estimates," Stefan replies, deliberately allowing himself to settle back into the familiar, comfortable patterns of a way of speaking that lost it's flare a long time ago. When he rises from his place on the steps, the modern clothing seems to melt into the trousers, suspenders, and white shirt of the era, his hair a bit longer and his expression less hardened and worn around the edges.

The clothing that she created for herself, whether intentionally or not, gets a slight raise of his eyebrow as he circles around her, coming to stand before her as he remarks, "Not what I would call conventional, but it suits you, Miss River." He leans in close, almost conspiratorially. "However, if I were you, I would mind my ankles. Some consider showing off one's feet to be more taboo than bearing it all for the world to see."

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

She doesn't seem too phased by it. Things are until they aren't, blending seamlessly into different tenses like they always were what was.

When he calls her attention to her dress, though, she frowns at him. Calm, distracted from what she was pulled out of by the change of the pulling itself and the need to focus on the task at hand. River examines her feet first, wiggles her toes and puts the blades of grass back where she found them, safe and unharmed. Totally inoffensive, really.

But she pushes her skirt down anyway and it shifts into something a little more appropriate. Well, it's floor length now, but she's still not wearing shoes when she turns her attention back to Stefan.

"Prude," she informs him. Be glad she didn't choose the 'bearing it all for the world to see' option.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

"Gentleman," he corrects, nodding in appreciation of the garment change, even if she still ignored the need for shoes. It wasn't like this was actually Veritas and Cordelia would come rushing out of the house, demanding to know why he was spending time in the company of such a trollop. He could make that happen, but there was no need.

Stefan was in complete control of this dream - or so he thinks. Being as unaware of the extent of River's own psychic abilities as he is, Stefan has no idea just what River's capable of.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

Cordelia may not be rushing out to chastise him but she stirs, somewhere inside and full of past, somewhere behind the doors and the steps guarded by a docile tiger with Katerine's eyes. This window opens both ways.

And Stefan may notice he's now wearing one of the Core's finest vests while a fully loaded medical bag rests at his feet.

River squints and circles him in careful measured steps, grass bouncing beneath her feet.

"Gentle brother," she re-corrects, skirts dragging a gentle rustle behind her. "Drank in the wrong stream and turned into a tiger. Not mine. But you look like him sometimes."

With the end of her circle she winds up toward the steps, stopping long enough to pat the tiger affectionately on its head.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Stefan looks down at himself, running the palms of his hands over the unfamiliar fabric of the vest, eying the medical bag sitting at his feat. Brother. He... looked like River's brother, sometimes? He'd suspected she had family, but he'd never bothered to inquire. There was something about asking that seemed out of place, that he always felt he should wait on whenever the desire to ask struck him. A brother made sense, and Stefan's intrigued (as well as touched, and had River not had her back to him for the moment he directed a softer, fonder look in her direction, she would've seen it, too) by the notion of a brother, as well as what the medical bag means. Was her brother a doctor? River had read his journals, knew all about the early years; she would've known he had wanted to be a doctor, once upon a time. Was his dream profession her brother's actual one, or was this just River paying mind to that wish of his?

The tiger catches his attention, the eyes, the voice-- And Stefan's eyes widen when he realize it's speaking to him in Katherine's voice, uttering words he hears not only in his memories, but during his couplings with his sire, as well. "Sweet, steadfast Stefan," the tiger croons, the phrase something often spoken to him in heated whispers these days. He flinches at the sound and tries to weave the tiger away, to change the dream into something else.

The animal doesn't budge, doesn't change. He doesn't understand why he can't do it, but his subconscious - or perhaps hers - does.

Again, the tiger speaks, providing him with an answer in Katherine's voice. "Don't you know that rules are meant to be broken?"

Stepping into the mind of a psychic meant bending the rules of traditional dream walking.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

"He's a trauma surgeon," her voice carries over her shoulder and down the porch, sounding distinctly of pride. This is the familiar; not Veritas or dreams or Stefan, but Simon. Behind all these doors are things not-hers, memories and histories she never lived, but Simon is where she claims sole ownership. That's where she makes her home.

"Was."

And in that moment she remembers why the tenses all had to change. The pressure drops as the tiger growls a Katherine growl and when River turns around to look at Stefan (not Simon never Simon) she's back in the sea foam green 'uniform' of the Academy, complete with conductive plating. Veritas, all of Stefan's workings, remain unmoved.

It's River that's in flux, a frightened ball of girl getting pulled back to her own nightmares even as she stands solid on the wooden slats.

"He was but you aren't--" A step backwards. Two. "Why is this here?"

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

"I did it," Stefan answers, tearing his attention away from her declaration of her brother's profession to her demands. "I can... Weave the dreams of others, take control and spin it in whatever direction I'd like." Knowing how much of an invasion that sounds like (and is), Stefan presses on with his explanation. "You wouldn't wake up. I was worried. I intended to see what was keeping you unconscious, but found..." He gestures, vaguely, not wanting to recreate the horrifying scenario he'd stumbled upon when he first stepped into her head.

He takes a step towards her, making up for one of the steps she took back from him. "This, I did, to distract you. Whatever that was... You shouldn't have to experience it." Relive it? Now's not the time to ask.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

She looks at him, hard and calculating. Fear is ebbing back in the face of how dare you and not again.

The nightmares aren't things she talks about. Barely even to Simon, and rarely elaborated on. How could she explain it anyway? And now Stefan has come in and seen it all and change it without telling her. Seen it and changed it like he's the brother allowed to fix her.

(Gratitude will come later, slowly.)

"It wasn't yours," said darkly as she storms pass him and into the house with the crack of thunder in her heels. The Katherine Tiger laughs to itself on the steps.

One by one, the doors are opened. Flung wide like open autopsy chests, hinges creaking as the knobs crack against the walls.

Rosalyn stands behind some of them, wide-eyed and waiting for her suitor. Others have the rumble of a father in their floorboards. There's one with a pair of giggling, half-dressed women sporting open bite marks on their necks, and the next room down is empty save blood soaked furniture.

This is what happens when you don't as a psychic for permission.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Stefan can't breathe. Try as he might, he finds that his throat has closed and his lungs are refusing to take in air. His eyes linger on Rosalyn for a moment, before settling his gaze upon the bleeding, half-naked women. How did River even know about that? He hadn't written that down, not about those girls in that whorehouse in New Orleans that he'd indulged in without a care - in more ways than one - after they'd gotten off that train.

There's a few moments of wide-eyed staring and breathes that start and stop, going nowhere as his body refuses to cooperate. A large gasp of air floods his lungs when he finally manages to breathe in, and--

"Enough!" Bloodshot eyes and fangs, Stefan pushes through the haze, this strange grip he feels on the dream, and makes Rosalyn and those girls disappear.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

She stands very, very still, wearing the clothes she did in December. The stain is there, dried but still growing in its own memory.

Behind her is a man, young enough but older than Stefan, a little taller than River with the same dark hair but blue, blue eyes. His mouth is drawn in a thin line of concentration, head tilted back and chin out, looking every inch the doctor he was always supposed to be. Clean and polished and good. Secure and solid and constant. Every molecule the idolized brother.

She stands very, very straight, good posture stretching vertebra into a taut harp string. The notes are in her fingertips, the ready ready ready heartbeat of panicked foxes running in her veins. They twitch in anticipation without moving.

"You aren't--" and her eyes dart between the fixation points of his face (chin ears eyes mouth eyes nose ears nose eyes mouth forehead eyes mouth eyes mouth eyes mouth) as if they can pin it in place. Then her demeanor changes, fingers twitch freely, she half-smiles and half-frowns and back again. It's almost like she's completely forgotten she just ran through his available mind and pulled out his own nightmares. "He came for me," she says, enunciates each syllable with reverence and care as they drop like weights off her back.

River frowns again, eyes dart (eyes mouth eyes mouth eyes mouth) as she maps out differences. Schisms. Contrast. Draws the lines of the parallels that will never ever meet.

"You can't be him." Clear, firm, decided.

What's unclear is whether she says it for Stefan's benefit or her own, but the phantom-Simon shifts his weight and crosses his arms to illustrate his projected agreement on the matter.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

"Fratellino."

Stefan turns away from the sight of River and her brother - name, there's a name there, and Stefan tries to pull at it, but it's as if there's a wall up in her head he can't quite tear down - to look in the direction of his own. For a split second, it's the Damon in Taxon; expensive, dark blue shirt and slacks, unscuffed shoes that should carry the evidence of things he's done, but don't. And then, it's not. It's the brother he used to know, the one who wasn't a murderer or had moments where he was barely holding on to his sanity and ability to disern right from wrong. He's in clothes like his, greasy, messy hair shoved carelessly under a hat.

"The bridge," Damon says to him. "Come on. I'll race you!" And then he takes off.

He makes a move to run, but a warm hand on his wrist stops him. Stefan turns his head to see Callie Gallagar.

And then images whirl together too quickly, far too quickly.

Damon killing Callie, hanging out with socialities in New York, a Bon Jovi concert in the 1980s with Lexi dancing at his side, the Tomb Vampires tying him up and torturing him, the sense of relief that washes over him when Damon walks into that basement, the taste of Elena's blood--

With a gasp, Stefan ends the dream, barely having enough sense about him to grab hold of River and drag her into the realm of the waking. Stefan's sweating and panting. What the hell was that?

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

River wakes up with a shout and a scramble, backwards against the bulkhead, feet kicking like they can propel her through it and out the other side.

They don't. They stop. She breathes, ragged panting breaths, hair in her face and hands over her eyes.

It hasn't registered yet that Stefan is there, that the dream wasn't just a dream. For now she's focused on making sure she's awake, feeling metal that's metal and skin that's skin.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Stefan shakes off his own disorientation in order to take control of River. He pulls her back from the bulkhead, pinning her legs with one hand flat against both her knees - he normally doesn't use that superhuman strength against others, but he doesn't want her to hurt herself with that kicking she's doing - and holding her steady with one hand at her shoulder.

"River," he says. "River, calm down. It's me. It's Stefan. It's okay. You're okay."

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

There's a long moment where River still tries to kick, to squirm and pant and fight.

But there's words and voice and face and someone else, so she settles, still panicked panting shaking. Even with the superhuman strength, she can't help but think of Simon, a second of thinking this might be home.

"They come inside," and her voice is keening between gasps, "with blood-- With it and falling..."

When she looks up it's not Simon's face. It's Stefan's and it's Taxon and it's all wrong.

Her hands go up as her face crumples, covering Stefan's and pushing weakly.

"Aren't him. You aren't."

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

Stefan sucks in a sharp breath, the weight and intensity of her emotions squeezing at his heart and for a moment, he can't breathe at all. She wants him to be her brother and he's not. He empathizes with this - in more way than one - more than she'll know, or perhaps she already does. If Damon were to be absent from Taxon, Stefan would miss him terribly; he'd function and be realitively fine, but there'd be a missing piece of him that couldn't be replaced.

He's not Simon, and he can't replace him, but he can do his best to be there for her and make life in Taxon less lonely.

"Oh, River," he says gently, emotion thick in his voice and tears in his eyes. What he's feeling is only half his own, the rest is hers. "I know, I know," he says again and again like some sort of mantra, pulling her into a hug.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[biverbam.livejournal.com]

Her hands fall but they keep pushing, a token of resistance even as her head falls forward on his shoulder. She's too exhausted and shakey shaken for anything else. There's no one else to cry to today, no Simon, no Dawn, no Sol, (no Godric, no Kaylee), no one left. Just this brother-shaped thing in front of her she can't fully understand.

"You aren't," and she matches him repetition for repetition, like it'll make it clearer.

i try to sleep, they're wide awake, they won't let me alone;

[virtued.livejournal.com]

It's not enough to make Stefan back away, his own emotions twisting with River's, entangled in such a way that he can't tell which ones are his and which are hers. Maybe it's because he was just inside her head and that connection hasn't completely diminished. There were instances when if one toyed with the mind of another enough, a residual bond could be formed and accessed for a while, like when Damon had compelled Caroline from afar when he'd locked his brother in the cellar.

"Shhh," he soothes, stroking her hair with one hand. "I'm not, but I'm here."