Sweet dreams are made of ...

[infernal_rival]

Nisei is unconscious. He took four steps into a room he's never seen before, and sank to the ground, for no apparent reason. He's sleeping, but in his mind, he's re-living something in great detail.

Comments

LATE!!!!!!!!!!!

[beloved_by_all]

She was crying again

Nonsense. Seimei is never late. //Teasing you.

[infernal_rival]

[Nisei becomes aware of your presence the moment you start waking up. It ... appears that you just materialized on the floor. You're face-up, at least, and in a single, fluid movement he's pulled you upright and set you down again you with your back to a wall. There are blankets and pillows of various shapes piled up against the sides of the room, so you aren't directly on the ground. He was feeling very queasy, a few moments ago, but ... seeing to it that you're safe and well is non-negotiable. You may notice that he's still quite pale.]

Seimei?

[It's focused, quiet. He doesn't want to pry, but he *doesn't trust this room* so - there's a strong vibe of Are you alright? Do you need anything? Tell me what to do underlying the name.]

Oh totally true :P

[beloved_by_all]

[Seimei snuggles into the blankets without even meaning to, his ears had been pressed back now come forward. His eyes flutter opened]

Nisei?

n_n

[infernal_rival]

[Nisei swallows, still trying to get over a lingering sense of violence and unease. You look fine, untouched by the nightmares that he woke from so recently ... and impossibly perfect. There's a space, between when you open your eyes and consciousness comes into sharp focus behind them that Nisei is very partial to. The effect, the way your face changes as you settle into it is sublime, like mist coiling up towards the moon. And it's something that almost no one is allowed to look at.]

Yes.

[Since you aren't in any immediate danger, the rest of what he might say can wait.]

[beloved_by_all]

[He takes a deep breath and stretches, examining his wrists as if he expects something to be wrong with them. He's trying to disguise this in the stretch but it takes a bit to long and he looks a bit too surprised.]

This infernal place...

[infernal_rival]

[Nisei tenses.]

Has it done something? I was thrown headlong into a memory the moment I came in.

[He's volunteering this, because it will let you compare your experience to his, without pushing you to admit what happened.]

[beloved_by_all]

And what memory was that?

[Not that easy, Nisei]

[infernal_rival]

[He's surprised at the sudden sharpness, but Nisei's expression warms.]

That fighter you asked me to kill for you, when you decided to trick your pursuers - in my dream, I killed him all over again.

[He'll tell you about the differences, if you want to know more. That said, he doesn't want to over-share. Your questions for him tend to be limited, and you look annoyed.]

[beloved_by_all]

[He knew Nisei wouldn't offer anything else, but he's considering how to phrase his second question.]

Is that all?

[infernal_rival]

[A pause. When you're in this sort of mood, Nisei much prefers to be able to present you with certainties. His thoughts aren't clear-cut, but he's trying to make them that way.]

Not quite. There were a couple of things about it that I'd never remembered before. The fighter you singled out was nothing like you. They were weak and easily controlled. But ... as a corpse, making people believe that person was you wouldn't have been hard.

[He's being careful. The fact that you're incomparable, completely one of a kind goes without saying. And yet, the person he killed had everything but your darkness. As far as Nisei's concerned, that means there was a passing physical resemblance, hardly worth mentioning. Except that it might have been better to kill them in a way that the carcass would be immediately mis-identified. And what's more, it brings up the possibility that someone has tampered with his memory. Nisei has more to say, and if you don't speak he'll go on, but I'd imagine you have questions.]

[beloved_by_all]

[A sigh and he motions for Nisei to continue]

[infernal_rival]

The other thing is, I was testing him; trying to see if I could get him to reveal his identity. He claimed not to remember it, but he wrote ell oh vee ee and then a half-finished stick on the ground before I killed him. If I'd noticed what he'd been up to, I might have let him finish.

[Nisei is sure if that actually happened, he would have obliterated the evidence of it, though he has no memory of doing so. He's trying to make his voice as even and matter-of-fact as he can. Seimei is completely normal. Everything he does is completely normal. Whatever Nisei has uncovered, it will be dealt with. But he can't help but watch for his sacrifice's reaction, with a mixture of curiosity and tenseness.]

[beloved_by_all]

Why didn't you tell me that then?

[Seimei seems a little perplexed. He's trying to figure out why that memory didn't seem quite right. What was wrong? Hadn't that happened? But there...when Niesei begins to spell Seimei realizes what was wrong. Why the memory felt so...odd. Ritsuka hadn't been there. He'd told Ritsuka about reading the diary he hadn't been awake. Right?]

[infernal_rival]

Because I had no memory, before, that it happened. I just ... knew it when I woke up. I can't think of anything that would contradict what I remember, but short of a spell or an order, it's hardly something I would have breezed past.

["It" being the name of his victim. The obvious question, just who did you send me to kill? goes unspoken. At the time, it wasn't relevant. If it was Ritsuka's fighter, as he suspects it is now, he still doesn't have the wherewithal to ask. That would be brilliant and terrible and beyond anything he'd imagined Seimei was capable of, and it has implications that Nisei doesn't begin to know how to deal with. Betrayal of that magnitude is something he's only contemplated on an intellectual level. It's never been relevant to him.]

[beloved_by_all]

Strange.

[And he won't get an answer. If Seimei wanted you to know, Nisei, he would have told you a long time ago. He's still thinking about his memory...]

Very strange.

[infernal_rival]

Yes ...

[God, you appeal to his sense of cruelty. There's a dark, silent ripple of well-being in his chest that Nisei wouldn't trust, if he wasn't also experiencing it in every leap and twist of his consciousness. You - regardless of what you've done, or ordered him to do, you're holding the only chain that he never *really* felt like tearing out and destroying. Which won't stop his curiosity. But it does temper it with other considerations.]

There's a Soubi here, from about when you cut ties. I'd imagine you've met by now? He was also in this room, and whatever he saw left him off-balance.