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i'll be right there

[And he is there, in record time, knocking quietly against the doorframe of the observatory.]

Hey.

[He sounds tired, exhausted even; even the days without nightmares hadn't really been enough to wipe the memory of what he'd experienced under sedation from his mind. Even planning the sleepover and trying to use that as a distraction hadn't been enough. Even with all his talents, every psychological coping mechanism known to his concept of modern science, none of it could really do anything.

Logically, he knew it would take time. But logic isn't enough to keep him from wishing it weren't happening.

He'll move slowly to sit near her, footsteps nearly silent as he makes a special point to avoid any sudden movements. He has a covered plate in one hand; some of the apple cookies he'd baked the day before for the sleepover.]

[ Any other time, Roxy might have pounced him as soon as he appeared in the doorway, or she might have at least met him in the doorway and greeted him. She's just as tired as he is, if not moreso; taking the entirety of the nightmarescape into you can do that. It can do a whole lot of other things, too.

She knows how should feel to see him, but every fiber of her being is screaming at her to run away. She doesn't want to be here. Not with him. Not with someone who cares, when she doesn't even have a feel for herself anymore.

She says nothing when he enters, and she only glances at him out of the corner of her eye when he takes a seat. She pulls her blanket around her tighter and shivers, vacant stare zoning out on nothing in particular on the other side of the glass. ]

[He sets the plate down, the quiet clack of plastic against floor almost oppressively loud in the silence. He doesn't need any SHSL talents to know that something's wrong; his eyes search her face, all silent concern, looking for the smallest hint that she needs something like her usual physical affection.

Instead, as a kind of test, as he sets the plate down he shifts closer to her, letting his shoulder gently bump against her blanket-wrapped one, but going no further. Just that gentle pressure of his shoulder against hers as he follows her gaze out the window.

If she wants to talk, she'll talk. Maybe not to him, and that's fine. More than anything, he just hopes that his presence is enough to remind her that she isn't alone.]

[ It does the opposite, unfortunately. She's desperately trying to feel anything for him, anything at all, and all she's getting is a headache for the effort. She's never felt this empty in her entire life; she'd take anything at this point. To go from feeling so strongly about everything, to caring about absolutely nothing, not even herself... ]

...

[ She pulls her blanket tighter around herself, beginning to shiver, her teeth lightly chattering in the eerie quiet of the observatory. When she can latch onto an emotion, it's always a deep, unfettered sadness, the same kind that has taken root in the Sea Dragon and driven him insane. ]

[He lets the silence hang in the air between them for a few long minutes, watching the little eddies in the water, the way minute particles swirl around with the current, the way fish swim. There's a lot to look at, in the ocean; there's something about watching it move that's kind of soothing in its difficulty to predict.

After three minutes of silence, he ventures to speak, voice low as he glances sideways to her.]

It's fine if you don't want to talk... do you mind if I do?

[ She shakes her head and hangs it, resting her forehead against her knees. She doesn't mind if he wants to talk. She would talk, but... Only if she knew she could go a second without being uncharacteristically morbid and/or depressing... or worse. ]

Edited 2016-10-12 13:06 (UTC)

Okay.

[But he still doesn't say anything immediately, taking a few seconds to organize his thoughts, return his gaze to the ocean. Even after speaking about it with Komaeda at the sleepover the night before, there's so much that he's fully aware his mind has repressed in an effort at self-protection. A futile effort to preserve something that's already been manipulated and played with long before his time in the dreamscape.]

I tested something. While you were gone. I tried to use heavy sedation to avoid entering the dreamscape. The logic being that if I remained in the lowest level of the sleep cycle, it would be impossible to dream.

But what I experienced instead... I lost myself. Overwhelmed with pain and fear, being torn apart piece by piece.

[He shivers, suddenly chilled himself as he keeps staring at the ocean, intentionally reaching deeper, forcing himself to remember what he'd felt.]

You... were trying to help everyone, weren't you? Your text. You tried to use your powers, right...?

Did something like... what happened to me happen to you, too?

[ Up until now, Roxy has been expressionless and silent, a prisoner to her own mind, body, and soul. When he relates his experience with the dreamscape and the Void with her, though, her head tilts to look at him, her jaw agape when he says he... lost himself.

Her eyes begin looking a bit too wet. ]

What the fuck were you thinking?

Edited 2016-10-12 13:35 (UTC)

[He hears the subtle shift of clothing and blanket when she glances to look at him, and he looks away from the observatory glass to meet her eyes. It takes an instant to see that her eyes are wet, and he feels... bad. And yet relieved beyond measure. If she can cry, that's better than just... emptiness.

So as he explains, he keeps his voice low and quiet, just trying to project himself as someone calm and comforting. Even though it hurts. It's obvious in his eyes, the slight way his flesh prickles with goosebumps.]

Current medical theory suggests that dreaming is the brain's way of learning and remembering new experiences by shaping them into a form for your brain to practice. This is accomplished through what's called REM sleep, rapid eye movement, and occurs in the lightest stage of the human sleep cycle. If I could bypass REM sleep by forcing my sleep cycle to remain in the lowest level, then perhaps the connection to the dreamscape could be blocked. It wouldn't have been a long term solution, but... it was my attempt to help everyone here.

[ She's angry.

She's angry because she's helpless. There isn't a damn thing she can do against the Sea Dragon, nor his powers, nor his minions in the Void, who attack them at any given moment, unprovoked.

She's angry because her loved ones keep disappearing without warning, never to be seen again.

And now she's angry that another dear friend is fucking with the Void, the absolute source of her misery. ]

No fucking shit. It was still stupid.

Edited 2016-10-12 13:54 (UTC)

You're right.

[He agrees easily enough. It was stupid. He knows it was stupid. But it had to be tested.]

That's why I had to do it. If I didn't... Komaeda would have. And especially knowing what the consequences were... I'm glad it was me.

[He glances to her again, eyes flicking over her face, reading her anger.]

You're the same way, aren't you...? That's why you did what you did.

[ Roxy is a mess of things right now, none of them good. When he explains what he did, despite how stupid she thinks it is, she also thinks it's super heroic. Selfless beyond measure, and just the sort of thing she expected from a good guy like Hianta.

It also makes him super hot in her book. Goddamn. ]

Something like that.

Edited 2016-10-12 14:17 (UTC)

[He nods, just once, and sighs quietly through his nose. For once, he'd hoped his incredible perception was wrong. That he'd made a mistake. But if she's reacting this way, and responding to his explanation like this, then...]

It hurts, right...? Not knowing... not being able to trust your own feelings, your own thoughts. Going through all of that.

It's... like despair, isn't it?

[ Welcome to her nightmare, Hinata. That's life for the Rogue of Void. The nightmares are just giving everyone a taste of what it's like to be her every goddamn day. ]

Yeah.

Edited 2016-10-12 17:02 (UTC)

Yeah.

[He exhales quietly through his nose again and returns his gaze back out to the ocean beyond, just sitting there. There's no real way for him to help her, he's quickly realizing. For all his talents, the thing that will help her most is time. Time to process this, time to-- regain herself.

He knows all about that.]

I know it doesn't sound very impressive right now, but... I know you'll be able to get through this. You're one of the strongest people I know. The future holds more possibilities than... what we felt.

[ Time doesn't actually fix things. It just makes them easier to deal with. ]

You don't know anything.

[ She breaks down and holds her head between her hands, her head pounding and her nausea flaring as she struggles with the dissonance of her soul. When the Void left her, it damn near sucked her entire soul out of her body. But that's not even the worst part of all of this.

The reality is, that even if she reclaims those lost pieces, she still won't feel whole. She may never feel whole. ]

You're wasting your time.

Edited 2016-10-12 18:22 (UTC)

I don't know everything, [he corrects, quietly. He can't pretend to fully understand her godmode powers, or exactly what she did. She was gone far longer than he was, and with the timing of the cessation of nightmares as it was... there's no way she hadn't had at least an influence in it.]

But I don't think I'm wasting my time. Do you know...? How many pieces of my brain they carved out? How much of me they erased and overwrote, and erased and overwrote? Over and over again until it seemed impossible there was anything left.

You're a programmer. [He tilts his head, looks at her again, and gently lets one hand rest between her shoulder blades. He knows she doesn't know anything about what he'd gone through back home, nor would she have any reason to. His point still stands. He'll bare every piece of his past to her if it could make her feel even a tiny bit closer to whole.] You know how difficult it can be to completely remove something and leave no trace.

[ You know how difficult it can be to completely remove something and leave no trace.

The words hit Roxy like a punch to the gut for some reason, and she visibly flinches. Wrapping his arms around his knees and pulling them to her chest, her face is obscured by her bangs. ]

They took pieces of your brain...?

[ When she told him he was scared someone was watching him, she didn't... ]

Oh god...

Edited 2016-10-12 21:55 (UTC)

Yeah. To turn an ordinary person into someone extraordinary. Someone who could be the world's hope.

[There's no edge of bitterness to his voice, though, and he keeps his hand between her shoulder blades, gently rubbing her back and fighting the urge to try to pull her into a hug.]

But even though they tried to erase me completely... replace me with someone else entirely... it wasn't possible. Like data on a hard drive. Even once overwritten, with enough work, with enough time and energy and help from people who cared about me... I can be myself again.

I'm not telling you this to make you feel sorry for me. I'm telling you because... I think you're stronger than the Void will let you think you are, right now. I know you can come back. Maybe... not exactly the same as the person you were, but stronger for it.

[He pauses, leans in, and gently presses his forehead to her shoulder.]

I'm really grateful for what you did, Roxy.

Edited 2016-10-12 22:06 (UTC)

[ Roxy's heart sinks. He might as well have not said any of that other stuff, because she's fixating on one thing, here: his disappearance.

This happened to him after she disabled URSULA's monitors in his room. This happened to him after she even used her own powers to give Hinata an extra layer of obfuscation, to make him further undetectable by monitoring, technological, magic, or otherwise. And yet he still vanished. ]

Grateful? I didn't do anything.

[ She really wishes she could feel something besides sad and hopeless. ]

And now you're-- and everyone else-- I didn't change a goddamn thing!

You made the nightmares stop. For two days... we got to think it was over. Two days we were able to sleep peacefully, try to recover from this constant mental onslaught we're ungoing.

[He keeps his forehead pressed against her shoulder, closing his eyes and sighing quietly.]

Roxy... what happened to me happened long before I ever even met you. There's nothing you could have done to stop that. I wouldn't have wanted anyone to stop it, back then. I signed up for it willingly.

That week I was gone... I regained three years of memories, of things that had already happened.

...

[ Roxy shakes her head. Not even sacrificing her soul was enough to stop the nightmares, apparently. They returned, and the Dragon still needed to be taken care of, and she's just so tired. ]

Still... Hinata... I wasn't able to do anything! I'm not like John. I'm not a hero, or even a good leader, and I'm not strong. If the culmination of my power can't help anyone here, then what is the fucking point?

The Void should've taken me with it.

No.

[He stands up then, though he doesn't go far. He just moves, crouches down in front of her, and takes both of her shoulders, pulling her in close if she'll let him.]

Roxy... the messages you sent, the things you did... you had no way of knowing if you'd come back from that, or even if it would work. But you did all of that for us. You're suffering because of what you did for us, you can't underestimate how powerful that is.

That's what a leader does. No one on this base blames you for not single-handedly stopping the nightmares. Even with all the talents Hope's Peak Academy forced into my brain, I can't stop them. But I've been able to use these talents for other good things. And I know your godmode powers have helped before. You helped me that time, didn't you?

[Obfuscating the monitors. While it seems like a minor, laughable thing, he still appreciates how quick she was to take care of it, how easily she accomplished it. Just for him.]

[ Runny mascara is becoming her new look apparently. ]

I didn't help you though! I didn't help anyone. Everyone's still suffering and the Dragon's still out there, wanting to hurt us or worse. I can't even bring the Troll egg back for Kanaya and Karkat...

[ Her head lowers. She can't look him in the eye anymore, too ashamed of herself and her failures. ]

I've never wanted a fuckin' drink so bad in my life, and I can't even have that, because I can't be trusted to do a goddamn thing without overdoing it. Fuck my life.

Edited 2016-10-12 23:07 (UTC)

You did help.

[He still doesn't sound angry, or helpless. He's doing his best to keep his voice calm and level, as if somehow that might help her. He honestly isn't sure if he can manage to emote the same way he used to.

So he just leans in and presses his lips to her forehead. If she doesn't want to look at him, that's fine. But maybe a small, affectionate gesture like that will be enough to shock her long enough for him to pull her into a tight embrace, so she can just cry on him if she wants instead of into her own hands.]

The only person who expects you to do all of this all by yourself is you.

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