δ first dream δ
δ It's all green, so very green and bathed in sunlight with the grinding whir of cicadas rising and falling in the warm, steamy summer air. She takes a deep breath and smiles, leaning out from under the leaves in her hands to gaze up at the sky. They're a good size to use for an umbrella, and the smell of bay and shiso is marvelous, pleasantly stinging her nose.
She's just about to start climbing down to the ground, when she hears a huge, strange rumbling sound, and crunching gravel, and...voices. Curious, she -
- suddenly finds herself looking up at a looming face, far, far overhead, and ducks down against the stem of the plant, holding up the leaves like a shield and waiting, trembling. Finally, it moves away, loudly crushing the grass with its feet. She breathes a sigh of relief and hops down the plant from stem to stem, hitting the ground running. Somewhere, she hears a yowl and runs faster, already well aware of what that noise means, and leaps through a metal grill to safety just before a huge, furry cat slams into it. It hisses and keens, reaching its claws through the slots in the grill. She smiles and gives it a cheeky wave, before hurrying off through the cool, dark space under the house.
Home. This is home, and she lets herself in, setting the leaf in the -
- woman is scolding her, gray hair pulled up into a ponytail, wondering aloud what would happen if she were Seen. She catches a snatch of words ("The bay tree is so far away!") before the dream shifts and pushes them into another room, a cluttered kitchen. A taciturn man stands over her, and she laughs and calls him Papa.
"It's all right," she hears herself saying. "He didn't see me. I hid under the leaves!"
The man - her father - gives her a gentle look, and then takes a hook from his backpack and sets it into the - oh. Oh, my. The kitchen is larger, now, a hundred thousand times larger it seems, and dark and silent except for the massive echoing clack - clack - clack of a human clock, far away somewhere. She has just enough time to register this, when her father pays out a length of line from the hook, leans back, and hops off the counter into space.
Shocked and delighted, she runs to the edge and watches him rappeling down -
- climbing up -
- no, it's her that's climbing up -
- gathering up a lump of sugar in her pack -
- unsheathing a long, vicious pin from its place at her side, with a ringing sound of steel -
- and as she looks up at her father among the whirl of images, laughing, saying, "Borrowing is fun, isn't it?", she turns to look over her shoulder and freezes, her cheerful smile slipping away as she sees that same vast face with its enormous dark eyes, looking calmly down at her.
"Don't be afraid," the voice booms, like quiet summer thunder -
- and she wakes up. δ
She's just about to start climbing down to the ground, when she hears a huge, strange rumbling sound, and crunching gravel, and...voices. Curious, she -
- suddenly finds herself looking up at a looming face, far, far overhead, and ducks down against the stem of the plant, holding up the leaves like a shield and waiting, trembling. Finally, it moves away, loudly crushing the grass with its feet. She breathes a sigh of relief and hops down the plant from stem to stem, hitting the ground running. Somewhere, she hears a yowl and runs faster, already well aware of what that noise means, and leaps through a metal grill to safety just before a huge, furry cat slams into it. It hisses and keens, reaching its claws through the slots in the grill. She smiles and gives it a cheeky wave, before hurrying off through the cool, dark space under the house.
Home. This is home, and she lets herself in, setting the leaf in the -
- woman is scolding her, gray hair pulled up into a ponytail, wondering aloud what would happen if she were Seen. She catches a snatch of words ("The bay tree is so far away!") before the dream shifts and pushes them into another room, a cluttered kitchen. A taciturn man stands over her, and she laughs and calls him Papa.
"It's all right," she hears herself saying. "He didn't see me. I hid under the leaves!"
The man - her father - gives her a gentle look, and then takes a hook from his backpack and sets it into the - oh. Oh, my. The kitchen is larger, now, a hundred thousand times larger it seems, and dark and silent except for the massive echoing clack - clack - clack of a human clock, far away somewhere. She has just enough time to register this, when her father pays out a length of line from the hook, leans back, and hops off the counter into space.
Shocked and delighted, she runs to the edge and watches him rappeling down -
- climbing up -
- no, it's her that's climbing up -
- gathering up a lump of sugar in her pack -
- unsheathing a long, vicious pin from its place at her side, with a ringing sound of steel -
- and as she looks up at her father among the whirl of images, laughing, saying, "Borrowing is fun, isn't it?", she turns to look over her shoulder and freezes, her cheerful smile slipping away as she sees that same vast face with its enormous dark eyes, looking calmly down at her.
"Don't be afraid," the voice booms, like quiet summer thunder -
- and she wakes up. δ