ɪʀᴏɴᴡᴏᴏᴅ ᴇᴍᴘᴇʀᴏʀ ᴇsʜᴀɪ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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tushanshu_logs2013-08-09 07:07 pm
ironwood) wrote in tushanshu_logs2013-08-09 07:07 pm
Entry tags:
- post: npc,
- thread: billy costigan,
- thread: midii une,
- thread: tim drake,
- thread: zatanna zatara,
- † amon,
- † annabeth chase,
- † arthur,
- † asbel lhant,
- † bruce banner,
- † bryn zethir,
- † bucky barnes,
- † charles xavier,
- † clara oswald,
- † clark kent,
- † damian wayne,
- † dick grayson,
- † dorian gray,
- † finnick odair,
- † frank zhang,
- † galatea,
- † hayley stark,
- † jack frost,
- † jaime reyes,
- † javert,
- † king richard,
- † korra,
- † kyle rayner,
- † leonardo (2003),
- † leonardo (2012),
- † lex luthor,
- † lord henry wotton,
- † marius pontmercy,
- † olivia dunham (alt),
- † percy jackson,
- † rachel dare,
- † raimei shimizu,
- † scott lang,
- † shayera hol,
- † the archive,
- † tobias matthews,
- † tony stark (mcu),
- † toph bei fong,
- † una persson,
- † vanessa cleveland
Event | Landfall | Dreaming
Characters: Any and every!
Date: August 10th - 31, 2013
Location: The realm of Dreaming as accessed via Sinbrilee
Situation: Dreaming is but one of the three realms and here characters are subject to their fanciful thoughts.
Warnings/Rating: Please place content warnings in subject headers!
Sinbrilee | Dreaming | Death
Life. Dreaming. Death. Three realms overlaid upon one another and yet each distinctly their own. They dwell in Life and do so live upon the back of the great turtle as those of Sinbrilee did upon the shell of his sister. However, there stand numerous arches of marble throughout the ruined city that are inlaid with runes beyond understanding. Those that live and breathe which step through those whose runes glow with faint, iridescent light tread instead into the realm of Dreaming.
Here, there exists no single defining characteristic beyond the visitor's imagination. The landscape sculpts to their individual thoughts, the events to their dreams. From a drab gray nothing to the most brilliant of displays, the senses perceive all that they wish to perceive for all that nothing here truly exists. This far from Tu Vishan, the ability to shape their surroundings is all they have, for Sinbrilee's Dreaming does not have the energy to sustain powers, only the bodies of those that dwell here.
Should two parties near, then the Mesh begins. Dreams, you see, not only can be shared, but they strive to be. These visions sculpted into reality reach out for one another and blend. They begin an exchange akin to a linking of the minds, within which one visitor can learn the other's deepest thoughts. Their limitation is but compatibility, for two minds that cannot flow upon the same current cannot hold the Mesh.
Happiness or loss, the landscape and events play out memories and fancies with a most convincing air. The mood rises and falls with the tide of the visitor's mind, detached as they are from the soothing influence of a great turtle's mind. Nothing here, however, is real; 'constructs' simply fade if taken through the archways and even the greatest scientific minds or tools will reveal nothing of its source. This is an ancient magic of an ancient realm, long practised in concealing itself from any prying.
Note: Due to the fluid and highly individual nature of Dreaming, no official subheaders will be provided in the comments of this post. Feel free to post and thread however you like, so long as the rules of Dreaming are adhered to.
Date: August 10th - 31, 2013
Location: The realm of Dreaming as accessed via Sinbrilee
Situation: Dreaming is but one of the three realms and here characters are subject to their fanciful thoughts.
Warnings/Rating: Please place content warnings in subject headers!
Life. Dreaming. Death. Three realms overlaid upon one another and yet each distinctly their own. They dwell in Life and do so live upon the back of the great turtle as those of Sinbrilee did upon the shell of his sister. However, there stand numerous arches of marble throughout the ruined city that are inlaid with runes beyond understanding. Those that live and breathe which step through those whose runes glow with faint, iridescent light tread instead into the realm of Dreaming.
Here, there exists no single defining characteristic beyond the visitor's imagination. The landscape sculpts to their individual thoughts, the events to their dreams. From a drab gray nothing to the most brilliant of displays, the senses perceive all that they wish to perceive for all that nothing here truly exists. This far from Tu Vishan, the ability to shape their surroundings is all they have, for Sinbrilee's Dreaming does not have the energy to sustain powers, only the bodies of those that dwell here.
Should two parties near, then the Mesh begins. Dreams, you see, not only can be shared, but they strive to be. These visions sculpted into reality reach out for one another and blend. They begin an exchange akin to a linking of the minds, within which one visitor can learn the other's deepest thoughts. Their limitation is but compatibility, for two minds that cannot flow upon the same current cannot hold the Mesh.
Happiness or loss, the landscape and events play out memories and fancies with a most convincing air. The mood rises and falls with the tide of the visitor's mind, detached as they are from the soothing influence of a great turtle's mind. Nothing here, however, is real; 'constructs' simply fade if taken through the archways and even the greatest scientific minds or tools will reveal nothing of its source. This is an ancient magic of an ancient realm, long practised in concealing itself from any prying.
Note: Due to the fluid and highly individual nature of Dreaming, no official subheaders will be provided in the comments of this post. Feel free to post and thread however you like, so long as the rules of Dreaming are adhered to.
no subject
Everything about this dream has the familiarity of someone whose company he's grown used to, and so he isn't dressed as his true self here. He's simply Bruce Wanye, profligate. He's met himself before, living a life unchanged by the trajectory of his parent's murders. He was a poor dumb fool, untrained, untested. Forged by liquor and wealth and women more than by fire and blood. Bruce envied him as much as he hated him, but he's very nearly that man here.
Dorian, his mind tells him quietly, the way Alfred might whisper in his ear at a party when something's come up that requires the master's immediate attention. This is Dorian.
Each time Bruce recognizes the fabric of a dream, it takes him a moment to orient. He's trained for this, of course, but the influence here is... stronger than he's used to. He imagines himself with a martini glass and it's so, takes a drink of it. It burns like the alcohol he never drinks on its way down. Bruce catches Dorian's wrist as he lifts up that picture. He's smiling, all pomp and ceremony.
"Oh, come now, Dorian. Were the nineties really so terrible?"
no subject
Dorian has never lied to Bruce, but perhaps he has never been entirely honest. Charming in his good moods, wretched in his bad ones, he has exposed Bruce Wayne to the childish and mercurial edges of his emotions. This, though, is different. Here, he is his age.
Singapore is taking over, the Raffles eating up all of Delphine's hotel, the air filling with fragrances from another coast. RAF soldiers join the crowd. When Dorian looks at Loretta's picture again, it's Isadora instead.
He hears his sister's trembling voice carried through the crowd as the dragons rise like snakes from the water. "And before I die, can I just ask, did you—did you m—" A crack of something (neck) as something of the walkway crumbles and the dragons circle them. And Dorian?
He feels nothing.
Dorian rises to his feet and tucks the picture into his breast pocket. He glances over the dragons that have his sister's eyes. "Mm, perhaps it would be better if I took a different approach." He steps close enough to Bruce to get between him and the rest of the world at a moment's notice, but he puts all his focus on this young man in front of him. "Have you ever been to New York, Bruce? New York or a city like it, but the temporal difference will make it difficult enough. I suspect if we both know the place, we can make it more stable. And New York has always been relatively safe for me."
no subject
(He and Dorian are friends, after a fashion, but Bruce is a Detective first, and his instinct is always to look for weakness. Don't touch it or look in its eyes, Dorian says, and part of Bruce goes gotcha.)
"I've spent some time in New York," he says, injecting a worry he doesn't feel into the way he speaks. None of the horrors of Dorian's mind are things he's afraid of facing, but it wouldn't do for that to be revealed. "But I have no idea how to make that work."
no subject
Dorian rests his head on his chin and looks at Bruce. "You ought to leave Dreaming. It's really only suited for the innocent and the painfully nostalgic. I hope you are neither."
no subject
(He knows his own, after all.)
"I think I'd prefer not to leave you alone, if it's all the same to you." Bruce exerts a little of his will, and the decay grinds to a halt around them, and the city streets smell of Gotham. It isn't a pleasant scent, oil and exhaust and decay both urban and otherwise. A street sign that's been painted over to say Crime Alley is in the distance, but the landscape fades back to Manhattan after a moment, and twists before it settles back to the time and era of Dorian's choosing.
no subject
"You never behaved as if you'd read the book," Dorian notes. A boy who might have been a younger Steve Rogers goes coughing by, and Dorian watches his progress away.
no subject
Seeing Rogers, the small, sickly child he used to be, is like a knife. The last time Bruce saw him-- well, it hardly matters. He's gone. Whether returned to his own world or otherwise, he's been AWOL for weeks now. "I'm sorry," he says abruptly. "About Steve. I know you were friends."
no subject
He taps his fingers once along his jaw in a line. Endless vanity, but he isn't really that curious about what Bruce thinks of him. He's just so very aware here of the thoughts he has had about Bruce for some time now.
no subject
"That you're a great deal more complicated than you like other people to recognize," he says neutrally. "And paradoxically, a great deal simpler. I suppose, to that effect, you're something of a puzzle, Dorian Gray."
no subject
The Gravediggers. There's something in that song that makes people angry, that reaches into people's souls and amplifies the belligerence and lust within them.
Not Dorian, of course. There is nothing for it to reach.
"I can't remember what I was thinking, letting Oscar write that book." With a smile, he stirs lemon into his tea. "I keep the element of surprise only against the incredulous and poorly read."
no subject
What interests him, what's always interested him about Dorian, is how completely he hides the scars until he decides to show them. It's not acting, not the way Bruce does it. Hn.
His cup contains black coffee, and Bruce lifts it to his lips to feign a drink. "Gray is a rather common last name. And the boy was a blonde, on paper."
no subject
The song continues on, that rugged, rocker's voice carrying out over the piers. Outside, scuffles start breaking out. But in here? Here, in this room decorated in fading Victorian glamour, it is peaceful.
"Have you ever heard of the Gravediggers?" Dorian's fingers tap his teacup along to the beat by a conscious choice. "I assume not. I'm not sure if they even exist in your universe, and even if they did, they fell back into obscurity after Otto died. Otto's voice aside, I never really liked their music."
Tannhäuser starts, and the violence stops.
"You really should go back, Bruce."
no subject
"Or we can sit here over tea and discuss why you seem to think anything here can frighten me. I've done business in Gotham for nearly three decades, Dorian." There's a wry, sardonic edge to his tone. A slip of that businessman's facade. Even without being Batman, Bruce is still a son of Gotham. The prince thereof, if you believe the tabloids. And Dorian is hardly unfamiliar with masks.
no subject
Instead of the Gravediggers, the radio changes to a piano piece. Chopin. Nocturne in Bbm. The smell of decaying flowers seeps in.
"Certain kinds of shared experiences, if you will, tend to bring people closer together." He indicates the room with a wave of a hand. "It's hard not to notice that my mind our main composer." It doesn't matter if it is a conscious decision on Bruce's part or not. This isn't really about the horrors or what they truly are under their facades. Dorian and Bruce have made choices about how they want to know each other. It is not Dorian's choice to show Bruce what else there is to him.
no subject
'Friends'.
Clark counts, after a fashion. But Dorian knows nothing of who he really is, and uses the term too lightly. What fashions them thusly, what draws them together? It was Favrielle, once, and Bruce's hand tightens briefly on the arm of his elegant chair. "You assume my staying will transmute the quality of our 'friendship'."
There's no hesitation in the way he says that word. If Dorian wants to label whatever form he believes their acquaintance to ultimately have, Bruce won't contradict him. It may have even been true, to another man in another time. He does like Dorian, as much as he ever likes immortals, creatures of shadow and magic. And there is so little humanity here, and almost too much by the stroke of the same brush. Decadents. They've both been born in the wrong time, lives intersecting by chance. Gotham would have eaten Dorian alive, perhaps at any age. And Bruce would surely not have survived Victorian England.
(Or he would have thrived there, and the thought fills him with honest revulsion. He hates that side of himself. He wouldn't claim that suffering built honest character of anyone else, but it's true of him in many respects)
no subject
('Why is your friendship so fatal?'
Well, Basil. It's best we don't get into that.)
It's best, Dorian believes, to be particular about friends. But language is often better used imprecisely.
"It will." His gaze is set and level. "Whether or not it will change from your side, it will certainly change from mine." He smiles at Bruce, and it's as light a smile as he used to wear when he was truly young. "Why would you want to stay in another man's dreams?"
no subject
Though it's not his ego at work here. Bruce is always looking for weapons to use against other people. He has an idea of what Dorian can and cannot do, but hypotheses and assumed imaginings are nothing compared to the real thing. Bruce functions well the more information he has, and he has less than he would like about this man. Still. After so many months. It's almost a slight against his abilities.
no subject
Dorian stands, that light amusement playing over his lips, and walks over to Bruce's side of the table. "But I can try." He leans back against the table, and with a peculiar quality of innocence, he manages to make the confession seem true and his own. "From the moment I met you, your personality had the most extraordinary influence over me. I quite admit that I adored you madly, extravagantly, absurdly. I was jealous of every one to whom you spoke. I wanted to have you all to myself. I was only happy when I was with you. When you were away from me, you were still present in my soul . . ."
Dorian meets Bruce's eyes, and he descends into a genuflect, the pose of proposition and of piety. He takes Bruce's hand in his, and with a reverence that is almost pained, he says, "You were made to be worshipped."
He holds the moment.
And then smiles with all of youth's self-satisfied pleasure, like a schoolboy who just auditioned particularly well for a recital. "What do you think? Has your ego been appealed to?"
no subject
"'No man comes across two ideal things. Few come across one'. I suppose you're in too masochistic a mood to quote the Hymn of Apollo."
no subject
He taps his fingers on the table. "I confess, my personal favourite artistic movement is not overabundant in joyful poetry. Yeats did not look back on that cohort as the 'Tragic Generation' without cause. Calm, sad, secure; with faces worn and mild: / Surely their choice of vigil is the best? / Yea! for our roses fade, the world is wild; / But there, beside the altar, there, is rest."
no subject
'Tragedy', in in artistic sense, is an isolated thing. A swirl of snow in a closed globe. Something for an audience to pick apart and render down to what it believes to be human components. He's never been a fan of it in any context.
"Did I ever tell you about the Quake?" he says, mildly. Somewhere outside their secure little den, the lights flicker in response to his thoughts. Yes, the cataclysm that destroyed his city once is like a scar upon his soul. Deeper in some ways than others.
no subject
no subject
There's a sense of ownership to the way he says my city. And in a way, it's far more serious than anything he's said to Dorian before.
"They spent a year on a government-mandated lock-down. No supplies brought in, no people allowed out. But Gothamites always have been a rather tough breed."
no subject
"So you endured and survived it."
You collectively, you specifically. Perhaps not you individually. How many of that 'tough breed' of Gothamites did not endure, he wonders? Dorian remembers the late nineteenth century Darwinists well. A breed is tough only because the weak don't make it.
no subject
"As I'm sure you can imagine, I endeavored to ensure all buildings built after the Quake were observing regulation. Apparently I'm quite the political lobbyist when I put my mind to it." His tone suggests he's half-daring Dorian to contradict him.
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