Fiction (Dreams in Digital)

[CassieMcCullin]

[OOC Note: I actually had this dream about a month ago. It was hard to get down on paper, but I hope you enjoy it.]

She's lost in coma where it's beautiful
Intoxicated from the deep sleep, deep sleep
Do you wonder what it's like living in a permanent imagination?
Sleeping to escape reality, but you like it like that

Cassie awoke slowly, the optic lenses that pass for her eyes adjusting to the dark. Her head hurt, her limbs felt battered. Her coat - wait. She didn't remember putting on her coat. She rarely went out at all since the twins were born. Her coat was dirty, as if she'd been dragged into wherever she was.

She looked around. She was in a cell of some kind. Conrete walls, bars in front of her. Through the bars, she could see more walls of the same type. There were other cells, but they were spaced far apart and she couldn't see into them. Her captors didn't want anyone talking.

Well, she could handle a simple cell without help. Just a lock; it should yield to a localized fusion reaction, melt clean off. She brought her finger up to the lock... and nothing happened.

She growled in frustration. Why weren't her powers working? Maybe her energy had been drained. Very well; she was an Avatar. She would rest
a little while and try again.

She tried over and over. Every power she had, every tool built into her body. Nothing worked. She grasped the bars and shook them, calling out to whomever might hear. No one came. Eventually she gave up and curled into a ball on the floor of her cell, and slept.

She didn't know how long she was there. She lost track of time - there was nothing to mark its passage. No captor ever showed a face. She racked her brain, trying to think of who had the power - and the desire - to do something like this. No answer made itself evident. She resigned herself to her fate, and meekly waited for rescue.

She woke one day - night? - and jumped to her feet. On the other side of the bars was a man clad in black leather, a pink and black feather boa draped around his neck. "I knew someone would come! I'm so glad you're here..." The corners of her mouth turned upwards in a rare smile.

He smiled back, that disarming smile that had won her over so many years ago. She waited for him to produce a key and set her free. Then his smile became sad, and he shook his head.

She watched in amazement as he stepped through the bars. "But I... Those were solid! How did you...?" Her face fell. "You're not really here, are you." It wasn't even a question. "You're a ghost. I remember now... You died years ago."

He spoke slowly, softly, and made a gesture with his hand out in front of him. "Something like that. As always, my dear, things are more than what they seem." He brought his hand up to her cheek and cupped her face.

"You feel real enough..."

"Haven't I always, to you?"

She closed her eyes, and covered his hand with hers. "You're not going to rescue me."

"I broke free of this prison long ago."

"I can't!" she cried out. "I've tried everything, I..." She bit her lip.

"Do you know why you are here?"

His question caught her off-guard. "What? I... no. I suspect they know about my plans, they're trying to stop me."

"Wouldn't you, in their position?"

"I..." She could form no words. She'd known, of course, that there would be opposition. But not on this scale.

"Orion... Why are you doing this?"

The question seemed so natural, but the reasons in her head somehow no longer held water. "To... To make them afraid. To change things. To make them see."

His hand traveled down her arm and reached around her back, pulling her close. She stood paralyzed, as she always did when he had stood so near. He tilted his head down to her neck. "Many years ago, you stood between a Delphi and my sword. You told me fear was not the answer."

"I was wrong." She was certain, once; now her voice wavered.

"You don't sound so sure of yourself anymore."

"I haven't been, not since you left."

"My dear, I am not your savior."

She turned her face away from his. "...I know. But maybe... Can you give me a little hint?" She hated herself for how she was; standing there, trembling like a little girl, relying on someone else to help her.

He turned her face back to his with his other hand. "If you make them fear, they run with no direction. If you make them run towards something..." He waved his hand in the air, that same gesture she always saw him doing, the one that looked like "and so on...". He smiled that twisted smile, and she was his again. As if she ever wasn't.

"How do I do that?"

He pressed his lips to her ear. "Do not make them fear," he whispered. "Make them dream."

And then he was no longer solid, passing through her, behind her. She spun around to call after him...

...and saw no back wall to the cell.

"Thank you," she whispered to the air where he stood not a moment ago. "For setting me free."

Something on the ground caught her eye. She bent down to pick it up. A feather from his boa. She smiled to herself, tucking it away in her coat, and stepped out of the cell.

She awoke slowly, the optic lenses that passed for her eyes adjusting to the dark. She heard the sound of a baby crying in the room next to hers. She looked over at her sleeping husband, and got up from the bed. She thought over her dream as she walked to her daughter's crib. As she bent over to pick her up, something clutched in Maebh's tiny hand caught her eye.

A pink and black feather, one of his that she'd kept. She smiled curiously. "Now, how did you get ahold of that..." She tucked it away in her robe and rocked her daughter, singing her softly back to sleep.

Guilty by design she's nothing more then fiction.
She dreams in digital, cause it's better then nothing.
Now that control is gone, it seems unreal,
She's dreaming in digital.