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Description
When Jax dreams, he realizes he’s back in the city that he and Gil had discovered in his REA. It’s slightly different – less cohesive, likely without the concentration he’d needed to share the space with another person. This is just a facsimile his mind has created; it’s a strange disconnect, being lucid enough to know he’s dreaming but not aware enough to break free of it. Some of the buildings aren’t quite building shaped, and it almost appears as though some of them are dissolving into the atmosphere. Things aren’t stable here.

The city is still quiet save for the distant sounds of life milling around the edges. He thinks he can see movement beyond the alleys and side streets, but it’s only when he doesn’t look directly at it. As soon as he seeks it out, it vanishes, and things feel a little emptier and a little colder. He begins to shiver as he walks, but he’s not sure why. When he rubs his arms, he’s suddenly aware of the fact that he’s fully human. He’s definitely not in the REA, as if there had been any doubt.

Without Gil there he feels very alone. Perhaps it’s for the best – after what happened the other day, he hadn’t been able to contact the other man. Frankly, he’s still not sure what happened while he was still trapped in Jax’s REA. He wanted to find out, to reach out and make sure he was still okay, but the lack of response made him wary to push harder. If something bad happened, he doesn’t want to make it worse.

Jax is broken from his thoughts when the muffled sounds of life in the distance begin to fade, stuttering as they’re undercut by another sound.

Crying.

He feels a chill run up his spine – it’s inhuman sounding, too much like the creature that Gil had brought into his dreamscape. He’s uncertain, though; could Gil’s demon still manifest in a closed dream? He keeps a cautious eye out regardless, walking through the warped buildings and trying to make sense of his surroundings.

The crying warps, fades, and echoes. Sometimes it disappears for a bare moment, replaced again by the sounds of people walking and cars running. But then it comes back in full force, and it sounds so close that the source might as well be breathing down the back of his neck. He turns, looking around frantically each time, but there’s nothing. No signs of life.

He slows when he sees the flash of white down the alley to his left. The walls aren’t quite parallel – they seem to lean towards one another and curve in a way that isn’t industrial. The light fades further in but he can clearly see the flicker of white deeper into the shadows, just like the fur coat of the woman Gil said was his long lost trainer.

He pauses at the mouth of the alley, flexing his fingers when he realizes his palms are becoming sweaty. Is it her – it? The creature? Maybe his mind has conjured it up on its own, or…

He swallows hard, before taking a step into the alley. It takes him a moment to return to a surer pace, eyes casting up and down as he watches the shifting and dissolving walls overhead that bleed together like tree branches that have begun to thread into each other over time.

He realizes as he walks that there are bits of white fur like a trail leading up through the alleyway, glowing softly in the deepening shadows. The creature’s coat might be shedding, he thinks, but when he comes upon the first one and stoops to retrieve it, he sees that it isn’t fur. It’s a feather.

As soon as his fingers close around it the walls seem to shudder in tandem with the unseen figure’s crying, the noise deepening inhumanely as though he’d harmed it. He feels his heart clench in his chest, but he keeps moving, following the trail of small feathers deeper and deeper into the darkness. Each one dissolves when he reaches it, lessening his light, but they seem to grow larger and brighter the further in he walks.

By the time he reaches the final feather, he sees it suspended in darkness, white against the black. He looks over his shoulder and realizes the city no longer exists. Everything is gone. It’s just him, and this feather, giving off the faintest of ambient light for him to see by. The crying has stopped.

He leans down and reaches for it, but fear rips through him immediately when he hears a blood-curdling scream cut through the silence. He barely manages to throw himself backwards as a figure seems to tear itself out of the darkness in front of him, lunging at him with an unholy screech.

It’s a poorly remembered copy of the creature Gil had brought into his dreamscape – that’s the best he can tell as it swings at him, misshapen claws narrowly missing his torso as he jerks out of reach. It’s riddled with tears and made up of parts that don’t seem to fit together properly, and when it screams, it sounds like three different voices struggling for control of a single body. The only things giving it visibility in the blackness are the wisps of white cloth and fur – no, feathers – sticking to its body in strips.

The creature advances on him again, claws flexing, shoulders heaving – it’s barely realistic enough to cross the uncanny valley, which makes it all the more disturbing as it stares at Jax with hollow black eyes. He side steps slowly, trying to work his way around it; there’s no escape route that he can tell, and he’s not in the best possible form to take it on in a one-on-one fight. It lunges again, catching him off guard, and he manages to pivot out of the way fast enough to avoid being skewered. It rips a gash through his shirt, though, and he hisses in pain when the razor claws glance over flesh.

His eyes are drawn down towards the white feather on the ground, still glowing softly, and he does the first thing he can think of – he throws an arm around the bulk of the monster’s body mass and puts all of his weight forward, tackling it to the ground. He uses the momentum from the hit to roll forward and snatch the feather up in his outstretched hand before it can stop him.

As soon as his fingers close around it, however, it dissolves, flickering particles of white disappearing into the air.

He wakes up a moment later, staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom.

Description
When Jax dreams, he realizes he’s back in the city that he and Gil had discovered in his REA. It’s slightly different – less cohesive, likely without the concentration he’d needed to share the space with another person. This is just a facsimile his mind has created; it’s a strange disconnect, being lucid enough to know he’s dreaming but not aware enough to break free of it. Some of the buildings aren’t quite building shaped, and it almost appears as though some of them are dissolving into the atmosphere. Things aren’t stable here.

The city is still quiet save for the distant sounds of life milling around the edges. He thinks he can see movement beyond the alleys and side streets, but it’s only when he doesn’t look directly at it. As soon as he seeks it out, it vanishes, and things feel a little emptier and a little colder. He begins to shiver as he walks, but he’s not sure why. When he rubs his arms, he’s suddenly aware of the fact that he’s fully human. He’s definitely not in the REA, as if there had been any doubt.

Without Gil there he feels very alone. Perhaps it’s for the best – after what happened the other day, he hadn’t been able to contact the other man. Frankly, he’s still not sure what happened while he was still trapped in Jax’s REA. He wanted to find out, to reach out and make sure he was still okay, but the lack of response made him wary to push harder. If something bad happened, he doesn’t want to make it worse.

Jax is broken from his thoughts when the muffled sounds of life in the distance begin to fade, stuttering as they’re undercut by another sound.

Crying.

He feels a chill run up his spine – it’s inhuman sounding, too much like the creature that Gil had brought into his dreamscape. He’s uncertain, though; could Gil’s demon still manifest in a closed dream? He keeps a cautious eye out regardless, walking through the warped buildings and trying to make sense of his surroundings.

The crying warps, fades, and echoes. Sometimes it disappears for a bare moment, replaced again by the sounds of people walking and cars running. But then it comes back in full force, and it sounds so close that the source might as well be breathing down the back of his neck. He turns, looking around frantically each time, but there’s nothing. No signs of life.

He slows when he sees the flash of white down the alley to his left. The walls aren’t quite parallel – they seem to lean towards one another and curve in a way that isn’t industrial. The light fades further in but he can clearly see the flicker of white deeper into the shadows, just like the fur coat of the woman Gil said was his long lost trainer.

He pauses at the mouth of the alley, flexing his fingers when he realizes his palms are becoming sweaty. Is it her – it? The creature? Maybe his mind has conjured it up on its own, or…

He swallows hard, before taking a step into the alley. It takes him a moment to return to a surer pace, eyes casting up and down as he watches the shifting and dissolving walls overhead that bleed together like tree branches that have begun to thread into each other over time.

He realizes as he walks that there are bits of white fur like a trail leading up through the alleyway, glowing softly in the deepening shadows. The creature’s coat might be shedding, he thinks, but when he comes upon the first one and stoops to retrieve it, he sees that it isn’t fur. It’s a feather.

As soon as his fingers close around it the walls seem to shudder in tandem with the unseen figure’s crying, the noise deepening inhumanely as though he’d harmed it. He feels his heart clench in his chest, but he keeps moving, following the trail of small feathers deeper and deeper into the darkness. Each one dissolves when he reaches it, lessening his light, but they seem to grow larger and brighter the further in he walks.

By the time he reaches the final feather, he sees it suspended in darkness, white against the black. He looks over his shoulder and realizes the city no longer exists. Everything is gone. It’s just him, and this feather, giving off the faintest of ambient light for him to see by. The crying has stopped.

He leans down and reaches for it, but fear rips through him immediately when he hears a blood-curdling scream cut through the silence. He barely manages to throw himself backwards as a figure seems to tear itself out of the darkness in front of him, lunging at him with an unholy screech.

It’s a poorly remembered copy of the creature Gil had brought into his dreamscape – that’s the best he can tell as it swings at him, misshapen claws narrowly missing his torso as he jerks out of reach. It’s riddled with tears and made up of parts that don’t seem to fit together properly, and when it screams, it sounds like three different voices struggling for control of a single body. The only things giving it visibility in the blackness are the wisps of white cloth and fur – no, feathers – sticking to its body in strips.

The creature advances on him again, claws flexing, shoulders heaving – it’s barely realistic enough to cross the uncanny valley, which makes it all the more disturbing as it stares at Jax with hollow black eyes. He side steps slowly, trying to work his way around it; there’s no escape route that he can tell, and he’s not in the best possible form to take it on in a one-on-one fight. It lunges again, catching him off guard, and he manages to pivot out of the way fast enough to avoid being skewered. It rips a gash through his shirt, though, and he hisses in pain when the razor claws glance over flesh.

His eyes are drawn down towards the white feather on the ground, still glowing softly, and he does the first thing he can think of – he throws an arm around the bulk of the monster’s body mass and puts all of his weight forward, tackling it to the ground. He uses the momentum from the hit to roll forward and snatch the feather up in his outstretched hand before it can stop him.

As soon as his fingers close around it, however, it dissolves, flickering particles of white disappearing into the air.

He wakes up a moment later, staring up at the ceiling of his bedroom.