dreaming;;;

[makes_you_tick]

It's dark. It's possible to tell this because it's not pitch black. No, there is the occasional flourescent light on- security lights, of course. Nothing seems secure about this place, though. That light keeps blinking off occasionally, for instance, and it looks like one of the glass doors down the hall is shattered onto the floor

Comments

we are surrounded by all of the quiet sleepers inside the quiet earth

[makes_you_tick]

There's the sound of shattered glass in the distance, towards the hall of concrete. The ticking speeds up.

"Alone again, are we." Sylar's voice doesn't seem to have a source, other than right next to the ear. But there's obviously no one there.

we are surrounded by all of the quiet sleepers inside the quiet earth

[makes_you_tick]

A few seconds pass and as she gets closer to the shattered glass, the jagged outline of what's left of the window remains. It's hard to see the two figures inside, but one is holding the other by the throat. A look of fear crosses the face of the first, and he yells.

There's a bang and red splatters against everything.

The ticking stops for a few moments, then restarts, slower once more.

you are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream

[adamantined]

She's been here before: the endless and winding halls of Primatech feeding and pouring into each other, the belly of some monstrous beast. In those memories Claire carries a shot gun in her hands, and her father is at her back. In this reality she is alone and unarmed, her footfalls subdued and dull to her ears. Claire wonders if this is a dream, all her senses blurred and balled up in cotton, and wonders why it's a dream she's having if it is.

Her fingers move across the walls as she walks and walks, and she remembers that a woman died down here, and that Claire herself became a killer, too, in this place. The Company is nothing but a massacre, a real monster, living and breathing, and even though Claire has been here before she walks on pins and needles. "Where are you?" she breathes, though she says it to no one.

In her dreams, he's usually here, too, just out of sight, a shadow on her peripheral the way he had been at Homecoming.

you are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream

[makes_you_tick]

One of the halls she moves down gives way to brushed molding, the wood frames and doors of a house. It leads into the familiar, still dark. But the rattling shutters don't make any noise this time, they just hide the promise of palm trees behind them. The lights flicker on and off just the same as before, but the only sound is the ticking.

"Aren't I always here?" Sylar asks. His voice is right next to the ear, and he's nowhere in sight.

you are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream

[adamantined]

It's not the dark or the ticking that keeps her on edge, looking back and down across the floor, in the corners, as she moves cautiously. At once it's like being back in Costa Verde, alone in a house with an unearthly presence, something too big and strong for her to wrap her fingers around but still tangible, still breakable. At one point, at least, no longer breakable.

The voice in her ear is tangible, too, a paradox: soft and salient and weighted and jagged. It doesn't scare her, doesn't startle her into running. You can't be afraid of the monsters that you've already face, can't be scared when you know that you're never going to die. But the bottom of her stomach does drop out in sick anticipation, and Claire whirls on the heel of her foot to find the space behind her empty. She moves across the floorboards, her heels slapping hard and confidently in the stillness.

Come out, she thinks, in the darkest parts of her own conscious. Come out and, quieter, where are we? She wishes she would have thought to pick up the glass on the

you are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream

[makes_you_tick]

I'm not hiding, he says, still out of sight. The blinds stop moving- everything stops moving, except for the clock on the wall.

Te blinds are gone, and the kitchen is different. A framed picture of Claire, smiling obliviously in her cheerleading outfit, sits on the kitchen counter. There's a jug of iced tea still beading condensation, a cell phone broken into three pieces on the floor.

There's the sound of glass shattering towards the front door.

Action

[dreamsofnoah]

Her shoes tap against the floor as she walks down one of the halls, fingers trailing against the wall. She's singing softly as she makes her way along the corridor.

London Bridge is falling down, falling down, falling down.

Road seems at ease in spite of the ominous environment - dreams have always been her playground, her element, and she always favours the darker, creepier kinds of dreams. It could almost be something she thought up herself, if it wasn't for the more modern aspects, computers and fluorescent lights.

Break it down with sticks and stones, sticks and stones, sticks and stones.

She's half consciously tapping her fingers in time with the ticking, wondering whose mind it is who came up with this dream.

[makes_you_tick]

It's quiet, other than the ticking. Well, for a minute or two.

"Nice song." The voice is right at Road's ear, but Sylar isn't visible. His presence is soaked into the environment, but he doesn't seem lucky enough to have a form here, yet.

The lights flicker.

[dreamsofnoah]

She turns her head at the sound of the voice, but doesn't seem surprised when no one is there. Instead, she smiles far too wide, the grey skin of her Noah form looking unnatural in the flickering light.

"Hmm~. It seems appropriate ♥"

The disembodied presence seems vaguely familiar, but she doesn't appear too interested as of yet, preferring instead to just enjoy the sensation of walking through a dream.

[makes_you_tick]

"This place will fall soon, too. Want to help?"

More panels of glass crack and shatter, pieces scattering across the ground. A large crack crawls up one wall and down another.

[stokerwasahack]

Henry's accustomed to the quiet of buildings after the day's work is done. While there's always life to be found in the night, his paths take him to empty places often enough, a brief respite from the modern chaos that can be overwhelming to a vampire's senses. Henry straightens his robes--the Garter robes this time, and honestly, the wardrobe changes he's subjected to by these dreams are becoming ridiculous--and sets out down the hall. Where is that damn clock?

[makes_you_tick]

The clock is nowhere to be seen. Everything here is still, even the air. Dust hangs in place in the few shafts of weak light provided by the fluorescent glow. The ticking of the clock increases very slightly in its pace.

"What are you looking for?" The voice is quiet and close, but there's no one nearby.

[stokerwasahack]

Time frozen while the clock continues to tick? Henry bares his teeth in an instinctual response to the unnatural experience and the implicit danger of a presence he's unable to locate. "Can you hear it?"

[makes_you_tick]

"Always," is the response. "Don't be upset. It helps." The ticking speeds just a bit, as if to support this.

Quiet for a minute, and then a repeat. The words are soft and gentle, the tone low and deep. "What are you looking for?"

[cold_dry_pieces]

Brian doesn't usually dream. Or, if he does-- if it's true that you can't not dream-- he doesn't remember. It doesn't interest him, really; he puts little stock in trying to analyze one's subconscious based on them. He's always felt he has a good handle on his own subconscious, anyway.

But this is unusual-- he feels somewhat out of place, half-aware that this isn't his dream. It's not an entirely pleasant realization-- it means he isn't in control, which is never good. Still, standing here won't accomplish much, so he heads down the hall, more or less in search of the source of the ticking.

[makes_you_tick]

As he wanders, the normal plaster gives way to concrete. The large five is spray painted on the wall at intervals. The other side of the hall is glass- holding cells.

About three cells down, the glass is broken- shattered really. There's a loud yell, and then red splatters against the glass and into the hallway. It's more than it probably should be, sliding down the walls in thick globs.

The only sound now is the ticking. It fills the space.

[cold_dry_pieces]

He stops short at the yell, the first evidence that there's anyone else here, flinching in reflexive disgust at the spatter. Unarmed and in unfamiliar territory-- he stands against the wall for a long moment, waiting for something more to happen-- for someone to walk out of the cell, or someone else to come running in to see what's happened.

Once it becomes clear that there's nothing, no one, he takes a few slow steps forward, cautious but curious, to look through the shattered window. Unsurprisingly he does his best to avoid stepping in any of the pools or puddles. Not out of compassion, or even concern about evidence-- but out of compulsive fastidiousness.

[makes_you_tick]

There's a very small woman in the cell with her brains blown out. Her right hand holds a pistol.

The ticking had faded a little, but now it's back in full force. It seems to be coming from all angles.