[open] a friend in need's a friend indeed

[nedofpies]

Who: Ned and OPEN
What: Random encounters & fallout from dream-walking tomfoolery
Where: House 20, the garden, anywhere around town
When: Day 89

It's been a long week. A long, mostly-sleepless, weird week during which Ned has seen far more of his friends' and neighbors' subconsciouses than he would have liked to. Plus, a creepy city made of crystals that everyone seems to have seen, but no one will claim as their own. Shady stuff. Today, he is determined to wear himself out. Perhaps if he's tired enough, whatever mojo the men behind the curtain have put on him won't be strong enough to stir him out of a deep and dreamless sleep.

It's probably a futile tactic, but he can't just do nothing.

So he is a bustle of activity - cleaning the house, walking around town, checking on the crops to see if they are holding up well (carefully, with an eye for any enterprising tigers roaming too close to the edge of the forest), keeping an eye out for new faces and an ear out for rumors of missing ones.

Comments

[nedofpies]

Ned doesn't pick up on the fact that Buffy is bluffing, continuing to look perplexed as he wonders why she, alone, it would seem, was unaffected by the experiment. Even Daneel had fallen asleep, and by all rights that was physically impossible for him. Perhaps she had merely not noticed. Perhaps whoever had trespassed on her dreams had managed to be discreet.

Crap, how better to describe it than that? "Sort of... participating in one anothers' dreams. Well, sometimes participating, sometimes just watching. Like a vision, except with information from two brains instead of just one." Wow he is really not doing a good job of making this any less complicated.

[rulebreaks]

Suddenly, she gets a little serious. She's trying to stay nonchalant but this is decidedly NOT O.K. with her but she's helpless here and she hates that more than words can say.

"...How long has this been happening?"

[nedofpies]

Ned runs a hand through his hair, counting back, "About five nights. For me, anyway. I don't think anyone I've talked to was going through it before that."

And who knows how long it will keep going on. It's so hard to tell in this place, what changes will be permanent and which are temporary.

[rulebreaks]

Buffy nods, taking that in to absorb as best she can.

"Has anyone ever told you you have an... interesting cadence when you speak? It's not bad. It's just."

Hmm. "Candency. Almost soothing." She shrugs. She was totally listening. Maybe.