(Untitled)

[crazedingly]

[Walk into Delirium's 'house'. A hundred sleepless nights breeze past your face. The smell of hospital disinfectant and despairing dementia swirls in shades of blue and green in the maelstrom of colours. You might see a sundial that doesn't work, or a pool of live butterflies, or a stack of a thousand fevered hallucinations. You might even, if you'

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[toweredingly]

[Roland is really wishing he hadn't gone to investigate that smoke now]

[He actually did pass the siguls, but he didn't pay them much attention. They were just part of the scenery]

[He's mostly just having horrible flashbacks to what Walter showed him right after Jake died. You know, the whole universe-and-your-place-in-it thing?]

[...Del's realm is basically just close enough and just far enough away from the inside of Roland's head to make it the worst it could possibly be]

Gods...

[His eyes are watering]

[crazedingly]

[Have a teenage girl sitting on thin air several metres above your head swinging her leg as she plays with a butterfly. That'll make life less confusing and brain-breaking.]

It's not just Russia in my realm. You're another people in my realm. You're the one who won't let himself be mine.

[toweredingly]

Are you doing this?

[His hand goes to his head, which is sending sharp stabs of migraine-pain through him. His hip's hurting, like it hasn't since the Stephen King thing. It's kind of hard to breathe]

[His good hand goes to his gun, caressing the sandalwood grip as he looks up at her with streaming eyes]

Your realm? This is... Gan...

[crazedingly]

No, it's not gan. It's just where I live. I thought you weren't one of mine?

[toweredingly]

I'm not!

[Might be slightly snappish because ow]

This is like... this is... gods, I've walked the borders of this place. Madness. This is madness.

[crazedingly]

[No offence, Roland, but DUH]

[Dropping down to approximately ground level now, or where ground level would be if there was in fact ground.]

Did you get lost in the swirly colours?

[toweredingly]

I walked in through the smoke.

How do I leave? Do you know?

[crazedingly]

You go out. That's how you leave. Most people get stuck.

[toweredingly]

I can't get stuck here.

...It hurts...

[crazedingly]

[Calmly]

It always hurts. And lots of people get stuck. Even I get stuck here sometimes if the bad places move around and I get scared.

[Kicks absently at a curling tendril of mist]

[toweredingly]

...No. There is a way out. So I will find it.

...I came here once before and escaped, did I not? After the third door. After Jake. Slipping in and out over the border, like mist, like dust, in and out of madness and I didn't know what to do...

[crazedingly]

[Not really bothered either way]

I don't remember everyone who comes in here. I don't remember myself sometimes. I forget who I am and why I'm where I am.

[toweredingly]

[Going to ignore her now, forcing himself to straighten up, forcing himself not to feel the pain in his head and his hip and his arm and everywhere, forcing himself to be sane]

[He takes a deep breath, closing his eyes to better see the face of his father]

[crazedingly]

Why are you shutting your eyes? Don't you want to see me any more?

[If youopen your eyes, be prepared for a FACEFUL'O'DEL (tm)]

[toweredingly]

[Ignores her for the best part of a minute. When he speaks again, he sound a lot more like himself]

I close my eyes so I can better see the face of my father.

[crazedingly]

Oh. Is your father behind your eyelids? How does a father fit behind your eyelid? All there's room for is jelly and tears and...and...and eye stuff.