Unreality [DawnsLight]

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Flinne saw the fear, the pain in the Dreamer's eyes, and he felt as lost as he had when he first stumbled into her wood. He took the ruck in hand, and dipped his head in a nod of thanks. It was good to have something to eat. That way, he didn't have to fish about in dreams for food. The results were never a sure thing, and were often accompanied by a surge of unreality. This way, at least he'd be able to avoid stepping into dreams until he absolutely needed to.

I should comfort her. The thought came as a surprise to the Survivor. She's vulnerable, and afraid. Say something, idiot!

He was saved from deciding on his words immediately when the girl wrapped her arms about him. He returned the hug with one arm, earnestly. The other was still toting the ruck, and -thus- occupied. "Everything's going to be okay, Aria. I'll see if I can find out more about the Unreality on my end. And I'll try to stay out of the dreams for as long as I can, but I'm not sure how long the roads will still be there."

He was terrified of precisely what would happen to him if the last vestiges of his crumbling existence disappeared. What if it goes while I'm in a dream? When I step out, where will I exist? That thought shook him, and he felt queasy all over again. "Get some proper sleep. And be careful." He admonished, before disentangling himself from the woman he had begun to think of as his thread. His lifeline. He could have disappeared in her arms, but that felt... Cruel. In stead, he turned his back to her, and stepped out of the bunker. And then he was gone, back in his world.

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Most houses were gone, reduced to a foundation set in the barren, lifeless soil. Some buildings remained, where people had gathered en-masse. A church here. A bus-stop there. A strip mall, or a school. The desolate half-dissolved skeletons of humanity's old stomping grounds made the vast spaces between seem all the more vacant.

But where are the shadows? Wondered the survivor, with a chill. He could see his own of course, stretching out before him, but not so much as a single untoward patch of shade dotted the land. There was no shadow but his own. Not indoors. Not beneath tables. He didn't see any of the twisted wrecks that had once dotted the street, but he found that he missed them. They gave the now-barren roadways some credulity, in a post-apocalyptic sort of way.

Unsettled, Flinne sat himself down in the middle of the road to open up the rations, and maintain his weapon.
 
After he had gone, she let the world she built dissolve around her into white. Vaguely, the Dreamer wondered if something similar would be both of their fates when all as said and done. She spent the rest of the night in dreamless sleep, and woke the next morning feeling rested but numb.

No work today; Aria went about her daily routine, beginning with an early run. She turned on her shuffle and began to stretch outside her apartment. With no more ceremony than a deeply drawn breath, she was off and running.

Against the music and the rhythm of her stride, the rest of the world seemed to fall away and she was able to slip into reverie. Yet, this wasn't lulling enough to stop her from warily glancing around at the shadows around her.

The morning light gave her skin a honeyed glow as a light sheen of sweat began to build from her exertion, taught muscle rippling as she moved. Her hair bounced and swung with each footfall, her breathing keeping measured time. He said there was time. I have time. She thought hopefully. A beautiful clear morning had a way of making her thinking brighter. She nodded once, a plan made. If it took every day of the next ten years he predicted, she would call every observatory she could. Persistence had to pay off eventually, she reasoned.

Aria's muscles began to burn with exertion but she pushed on, her thoughts turning to Flinne. She found with some surprise that they often turned to Flinne. He is the man of your dreams. Literally. She snorted at the sarcastic thought, skipping a song as she rounded a bend in the trail. But he said that he would be in touch with more information if he had it. So there's hope... Her thoughts trailed off. Hope of what? She wasn't so sure that she meant only hope for her world, but a hope that was smaller. It almost seemed petty to compare the two. Idiot; stop that line of thinking. He's surviving. A smattering of images rose into Aria's mind: Flinne's hands as he cleaned and oiled his rifle, the way his hair fell and almost curled; bare shoulders and intense green eyes. He looked rough, there was no doubt about that fact. But he didn't look bad.

Sighing at her own immaturity, Aria ran on.
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Some time later, when she had showered and changed, Aria perused the internet for telephone numbers. No time like the present to get started. Pulling up the contact information for the observatory nearest to her, she set about calling; readying herself to be laughed off the line.
 
Flinne stayed out of the dreams that night, and he saw not a hint of shadow all through the next day. He came to the conclusion that Aria's dream-signature bound him to a relatively narrow region of Dreamers. Most times, he could tell the appearance or disappearance of the day by the flashes of reality that popped up in his world. A troubling new trend began to emerge however.

As The Survivor strode by one particularly vivid signpost, it let out a shriek of metal, and began to melt into a white-hot heap of slag, before that too lost it's color and faded to ash. The entirety of the process took perhaps a minute, and Flinne could only stare dumbstruck. Slowly, he began to unlimber his rifle, as the very ground itself where the signpost had stood began to cave. More surprising still perhaps, was a hand that gripped the crumbling edge of his ground.

For a moment, Flinne thought one of the dreamers had stepped -impossibly- into his world. Then a second, and a third, and a fourth hand gripped the edge, in varying states of decay.

Not a survivor then. A nightmare. Zombies. Who the hell has nightmares about zombies?! Flinne grimaced, and rather than sticking around to shoot it out with the shambling dead, he took off in an easy jog. Any faster, and he'd tire himself out in no time flat with all the munitions he was carrying. It was going to be a long day.

Dreams were now something to be watched as closely as his surroundings, capable of bursting into sporadic and dangerous nightmares, some of which Flinne was ill equipped to deal with. Sometimes, he'd come upon the leavings of a dream gone sour, and it would leave a crater in his world. Wide enough and deep enough to swallow a truck in it's entirety, and peppered with whichever drooling beasty claimed the Dreamer within.

Panic shrieked in the back of his mind, as his world fell apart. In the quiet stretches of nothingness between the tragic sinkholes, The Survivor found his mind returning to one in Dreamer in particular.

Aria, find the answer before it's too late.
 
Aria really began to hate the inventor of the cellular phone. It was nowhere near as satisfying to hit "end" viciously as it was to actually slam the receiver onto the cradle. With a sigh, she cradled her head in her hands. It had been hours since she began, and after checking which observatories were still operating and finding their contacts in addition to calling and getting either no answer or getting very tersely told off, she was starting to lose some of her earlier enthusiasm. Just one more, and then call it quits for a bit. Go get some dinner or something.

Dialing the number, she waited, resigned to one of the two outcomes she had dealt with all day. There was a click and a man picked up, sounding irritated already. Scenario two it is. "Hello sir, I'm calling with a strange question. Please don't hang up- it's just a second of your time!" Aria added quickly after hearing the man beginning a tirade already. "The stars and planets, far out on the edges of where we can see... have you seen them? Are they winking out? Disappearing?" Bracing herself for shouts, she was not at all prepared for the silence on the line. She had to pull the phone from her ear and check to see that there was still a connection. At last, an incredulous voice filled the silence.

"How did you know? Who are you?"
 
Flinne grimaced, as he put his eye to his irons, and squeezed the trigger once again. What should have been a thundering crack sounded more like a muffled <i>whump</i> as his Mosin's bullet put another hole in the knee of the snarling beast bounding after him. Werewolves. Werewolves, and zombies, and swamp things. He'd even been set upon by <i>clowns!!</i> Though admittedly that particular nightmare had been satisfying to dispatch, to say the very least. Unfortunately, these nightmare beasties were just as resilient as their mythical counterparts. Fortunately however, The Survivor only had to dissuade them from snacking on his chewy bits until the -usually- dead dreamer's fear ran out of steam.

The werewolf stumbled, and a spatter of too-red blood splashed the stretch of road in the middle of nowhere, before dissolving into nothingness. The beast itself took a half-step more, before it's grew fuzzy around the edges. And then it fell into a pile of sifting dust that would doubtlessly be disintegrated by the unreality in little enough time. It might have blown away, but there was no wind. Not any more. There hadn't been for hours, and something in the pit of the Survivor's stomach told him that it would never blow again.

Cradling his rifle in his arms, he set off at a quick jog, his stomach twisting. The sinkholes were becoming more common. More than once, Flinne had needed to backtrack to find another rout towards the last of the buildings he needed to reach. He was running out of options. And he ached to see his dreamer again.

<i>When did she become <b>my</b>Dreamer?</i> He wondered, and he allowed himself a rare, wry smile as he approached the shell of the CDC.
 
Tossing the empty ramen container in the garbage, Aria clicked off the kitchen light and made her way to bed. She hadn't been able to tell the man on the phone much, but surprisingly enough he had agreed to exchange emails. The genuine interest he had shown was reassuring, but the implications had left her feeling physically and emotionally drained. She didn't even have the energy for a proper meal and knew that she would regret her shortcut.

Aria slipped out of her pajama pants and tossed them over the back of a chair before slipping between the cool sheets. She pulled a blindfold from the bedpost and put it on before laying down; she had been sleeping with the lights on lately. Not so exhausted that she was asleep as soon of her head hit the pillow, she let her thoughts run where they would before drifting off. She refused to wander into the nightmare territory that was quickly consuming her waking life and instead focused on what she usually focused on: Flinne.

The thought of a faded and desolate existence was so alien that she had trouble even visualizing it and the sets of post-apocalyptic movies washed of color had to be a stand-in. She had so many questions. What does he do there, besides run from whatever it is that's consuming his world? Who was he before all this happened? Why did this unraveling of reality take place to begin with? What will happen to him if he's caught, killed; or when his world dissolves to nothing? She rolled onto her back and heaved a sigh, her jaw clenching is frustration.

He can pull things out of my dreams... If only I could pull him out. Would he agree to trying? Would it hurt him to relive what his world went though? Aria balled the sheets in her fists, her teeth gritted against this pointless train of thought. Making a conscious effort to calm herself, she began breathing deeply in and out, and her muscles slowly released their tension.

The morning's run came back to her, pleasant and bright and cleansing. With it, the images of Flinne burned into her memory. She chided herself again; she was 23, a grown woman. Grown women don't act like this. Get a grip and get to sleep.

With that, she settled back against the pillows and had soon slipped off to slumber. She dreamed of the safest thing she could think of; she dreamed of being home.
 
Flinne grimaced as he picked up his pace. His feet drummed on the once-smooth, now grainy stairs that felt almost if they were moments from losing their constitution entirely. Having cinder blocks, desks, cabinets, and the very floor itself slowly pull skyward around -and sometimes beneath- you was terribly unsettling. He cursed the building for it's uncannily inconvenient timing. It had begun to dissipate as soon as he had set foot inside, and he'd been unable to gather much more information than he'd already had. Letters had lost their meaning, along with numbers it seemed. All but the serial number on his rifle, and the markings on his casings. Those -he assumed- retained their reality through regular contact with Dreams and the dreamers that made them by proxy.

His boot crossed the threshold of the CDC just as the building gave an immense groan. It was an eerie noise, like the last rattle of a dying man. Flinne's boots sped further still, and he half-turned to watch the unmaking of one of mankind's last bastions against unreality.

Something cold and wet dripped on his head, and he stiffened. The CDC was no more. As a matter of fact, he wasn't even outside any longer. Bewildered, the Survivor stared at his surroundings, confused and bewildered. "Did you just... <i>rain</i> on me?" He demanded, as if whichever poor dreamer had fallen asleep just then had been at fault.

<i>It's not a Dreamer's fault if you stumble into his dream by accident. It's not as if they mean to draw you in.</i> He chided himself.
 
The small apartment was sparse but cheerfully decorated and comfortable. Daylight streamed through the tall windows, diffused by the sheer curtains that billowed lazily in the warm breeze that blew in from outside. Photographs in bright frames lined the walls. The furniture was mismatched but looked comfortable and well cared for; a combination of hand-me-downs and thrift store discoveries. The little kitchenette seemed often-used and clean and beyond that, down a short hallway, the foot of a bed was just visible.

As far as dreams went, this one was boring. But then again, that was just what she was going for: something safe and familiar. Which was why when the air began to shimmer like heat off of asphalt Aria became worried. This was not her doing, and she watched with wide eyes from where she sat at the counter of the kitchenette. Her heart began to race as the distinct feeling of other filtered into her dreaming. Other, but not wrong. It was gone as suddenly as it had started, a young man filling the space a breath later. Disbelief coloring her features, Aria slid from the stool on which she sat and moved closer slowly, hazel eyes searching his face.

"Is that really you? The real Flinne?" She had never questioned before, but she had thought about him so much before she went to sleep that it was possible this was some invention of her worried mind. Aria had never seen him appear before either; it was always as if he wandered her dreams waiting to be found. This thought seemed to solidify his realness for her and she smiled a little. "I don't know that I meant to rain on you if that's how you got here, but I'm happy to see you. Welcome to my home."

She became suddenly self-conscious when she realized she was wearing her sleep attire. A heathered grey camisole left little to the imagination as her breasts strained against the soft cotton fabric, the smooth plane of her stomach just visible between its hem and her panties. She hadn't been expecting a guest so suddenly like this. She crossed her arms in front of her in an attempt to cover up a bit and stammered a little when she spoke jokingly, "This is like one of those dreams when you show up at school in your underwear."

She turned to hide her furiously blushing face from him, beginning to walk down the hall. "I'm going to put on clothes; want to take advantage of this situation and get a hot shower? Bathroom is just here. If you have time, of course." she finished lamely.
 
Flinne's indignation lasted precisely as long as it took for his eyes to fall on Aria. His mouth went dry, and his eyes went wide for a moment, and a sort of primal desire that he hadn't felt for years sparked up in the pit of his stomach. He was staring, he realized, and in the woman's very own home. "Ah... Yes. It's me." He broke his eyes away politely. "I'm sorry to intrude. I..." He cleared his throat. The Survivor was embarrassed! He took a breath, and chanced a glance at his host once again. She was just as pretty, and just as scantly clad as before.

"It could be one of those dreams where you show up in school naked." He wished he'd had the words back almost as soon as they left his lips. Again, he pulled his eyes away, as she began to walk down the hall. "I'd like that. The shower, I mean." Flinne was really quite out of his element. "I... I don't suppose you could dream up a razor? I haven't had a shave for nearly a week." He called, as he meandered towards the bathroom.

He leaned his rifle between the sink and the toilet, out of immediate sight but within easy reach. His greatcoat he dropped on the sink as well. The button-down blouse got similar treatment, and he lifted a boot onto the toilet to begin unlacing it. He'd had dreams of a shower himself. For a strange moment, he wondered if Dreamers could step into his mind like he could theirs.
 
"Razor and foam are in the medicine cabinet," she called through the door before stepping into her bedroom and half-closing the door. Her pulse was racing like she had just run a mile at full-tilt; he had looked at her! Her hands shook just a bit as she rifled through her closet and began to dress. Fixing her hair in the mirror, her began to relax once more, reminding herself that it was probably the first time he had seen a woman in that state of undress in ages. Of course he was going to look. And his dig at her was just a little hurtful, she had to admit to herself. It was difficult enough trying to decipher what was real interaction and what wasn't without him adding to the confusion. Deciding that she looked presentable enough, Aria exited the bedroom and made her way back into the kitchenette.

She was waiting on him with a cup of coffee and a sandwich when he came out of the bathroom. "So, were you able to find anything out? I was able to get in touch with an observatory. It's not much and they might still think I'm a loon, but it's a start..."
 
The Survivor hadn't <i>meant</i> to insult his host of course. He was just really quite bad with people. A year spent running from your unmaking with no human contact will do that. She did have nice legs. His other boot came away as had the first, before the Survivor fished about for the razor.

<i>Great legs...</i> Flinne mused, as he took to shaving. So distracted with the thought was he, that he managed to nick his jaw. The dot of red was a surprise, and he -quickly- tore a corner of toilet paper to stick to the wound. His social skills weren't the only things that required re-learning, it seemed. Blushing at his own foolishness, he quickly finished the job of cleaning his face, before doffing the last of his clothing to shower.

As the hot water ran over him, he let out a long-suffering groan of pleasure. How long had it been since he'd had warm water, rather than cold? Or any, for that matter? And then a thought struck him. He was in a woman's home. In the shower. Naked. His cheeks colored, and he slapped at his cheeks briskly.

<i>Stop that. You're her only source of information. And you're <b>technically</b> not even real. Besides, a girl like that's bound to have a man about.</i> Firmly, he closed the door on that line of thinking, and turned the hot water to cold. <i>Water heaters are overrated anyhow.</i>

When Flinne had finished his shower, he was shivering. He dried himself off with a towel found about the bathroom, before slinging it around his hips and tying it off. His clothing he consolidated into a neatly folded pile, atop which rested his boots. He held the pile against his chest with one arm, and cradled the rifle easily with the other as he stepped out again. He was a bit thicker than when Aria had first seen him, although he still had the leanness of an athlete about him. Skin shimmered, still damp from the shower.

He set his attire down on the nearest flat surface, and his rifle joined it. "There's not much left." He said, lifting a hand to brush back his slightly too-long hair. "I tried the CDC, but the building began to come apart when I entered, and..." <i>God, how do you say that the words on the files didn't <b>mean</b> anything any more?</i> "There wasn't much to find." The pause was brief, but it was there. "My world's becoming unstable. I don't know how much longer I'll exist."

He took a moment to actually <i>look</i> at Aria, rather than addressing her. She looked good. Very good. "Do you live alone?" He blurted. Flinne, master of poise and tact.
 
When Flinne joined her at the kitchen counter she had to wonder briefly as to whether this wasn't actually some sort of hormone-fueled dream. Hazel eyes traveled over his body, taking in the way the water still glistened on his bare chest and stomach, the way the towel clung to his hips, the muscle of his arm as he brushed back his hair. Now that he had shaved, Aria noted just how handsome the Survivor was. He was good-looking before but now, like this, he took her breath away. Remembering to breathe, she just caught the last of what he said and cursed herself for her distraction. Her heart almost broke.

How much longer he'll exist... No. Here I was ogling him like some bitch in heat and he's struggling against losing his very existence. How could I- Her thought was cut short by his question. Lips suddenly dry, she ran her tongue over them to moisten them once more. Her voice had a husky edge to it when she answered quietly, "No. I live alone."

Blood thundered in Aria's ears, but she swallowed hard and tried to focus, to move on. That little question seemed so weighted despite how it was delivered, blurted as if it took some sort of suddenness to ask. "Flinne... You can take things from my dream to your world; do you think that could work the other way around? Would you be willing to try?" She moved closer to him, only about a foot away now. So close that it felt like electricity jumped between them and she tried to control her breathing. Focus. "You said that you can take things on your person, things you held... What if I held on to you when I woke up? What then?" She looked up at him through her lashes, scared by what she might do if she were to actually tilt her head up.
 
The Survivor felt the eyes of the Dreamer on him, and his pulse quickened. His bright, green gaze was steady on Aria's face. He was afraid that if he broke it away the desire in his eyes would be naked. And that was -perhaps- not the best choice of words at the time. Despite himself, his heart gave a little skip of joy. She lived alone. He could have gathered as much from the apartment's furnishing's of course, but the way she'd answered had suggested she'd caught the meaning behind his words. The one he'd been trying to hide.

"Oh." He said. <i>Oh? That's all I've got? Rapier wit, and master of repartee. That's me.</i>

His brows rose as the Dreamer drew closer, and his heart threatened to batter it's way out of his ribcage. It was a wonder the woman couldn't hear it. Her suggestion sparked his curiosity, and his brows rose. He was silent for a stretch, the gears of his mind turning through the possibilities of returning to a world of life. A world of reality. Hope blossomed in his chest.

And then he quashed it mercilessly. His shoulders tightened, and his eyes broke away. "I couldn't let you do that, Aria. I may be able to take things from your dreams into my reality, but my reality is unraveling. There are no laws, not any longer. Nobody to say that dreams can't be real."

He swallowed, trying to work some moisture into his suddenly dry mouth. "You might take me back to your world if you held me close when you woke. But then again, I might drag you into what's left of mine. You're far too important to risk." The words sounded bitter in his mouth. More important than what he'd said however, he <i>cared</i> for her. He wanted to keep her as far away from Unreality as possible.
 
When he spoke his rejection of the idea, her fists clenched at her sides and she looked away, but Aria did not move away. Not yet. After a moment of contemplation where the silence seemed to stretch forever, she finally raised her face to him. "Important? Flinne, I'm nothing. I'm an assistant case worker, I go get the coffee and run the errands and file the papers. You're the last man alive where you're from... I- It hurts to think of you going back to that. To think that you might not come back to me. I can leave a message about what's happening in my world, and after that I'm not important any more." She closed the gap between them, her hand resting lightly on his chest. His heart was beating so fast. "Even if you ended up taking me with you, at least then you're not alone out there."

She wanted to look away, to hide the tears that had begun to well, but she refused to look away from those unsettlingly green eyes. "You're the important one. Please..."

Aria ached to press her lips to his, but she couldn't intrude on him like that. Instead, she held her breath and waited.
 
Flinne only just worked up the courage to meet the woman's gaze as she turned it away. Her hand on his chest was like a bolt of lightning. There was nothing between her palm, and his chest. It would be all too easy to give in to his carnal desires, and idle away the hours 'till Unreality caught him. His mind was racing, and he suddenly wished he had his rifle in hand. It had been his only companion for so long that he felt naked without it. Aria's eyes were tearing up, and he felt his resolve crumbling slowly.

<i>Way to go <b>survivor,</b></i> He thought bitterly to himself. <i>You've managed to make the only woman in the world who cares whether or not you go on breathing cry. Big man.</i> His jaw tensed, and he considered the complications. What if he already existed in Aria's world? Would his presence on the same plane of existence as himself tear the fabric of reality even further? Worse yet, what if Aria were pulled into his world? He knew that it wouldn't last but a few days longer. A week, at the outside.

"Three days." He said. "If you have somebody to pursue the search in your absence, somebody that knows the dangers of Unreality, and of the shadows and nightmares within three days, we can try to retrieve me."
 
Relief flooded her features like the sun appearing behind a cloud. Muscles relaxed that she didn't know she was tensing; she almost sagged against him but caught herself and instead took her hand from his chest to wipe her eyes. Aria took a shuddering breath and smiled.

"Right. I'll work my hardest, Flinne. Thank you." The Dreamer stayed close for a moment more, lips parted as if to say something else. Instead she bit her bottom lip and turned away. "I made you something to eat, but I think the coffee has probably cooled. I thought instead of talking about the shadows and...and things, we could get to know each other better?" This last was said with a hopeful note at the end as if she wasn't entirely sure he would agree.

Aria leaned back against the counter, long legs crossed in front of her and still plenty visible in shorts. She took one more long look at him before grinning, a light in her warm hazel eyes. "You should probably get dressed too, I'm finding it distracting in the best way."
 
Flinne resisted the urge to sigh as her hand left his chest, although he was finding it easier to breathe with it gone. The Survivor had thought he'd left all this hopeful romantic silliness behind himself when he saw the last of humanity disappear on his planet. He was rather glad he hadn't, as it turned out. Even as complicated as it made things. He nodded briskly at her thanks and made to move towards his clothing, although he paused curiously when Aria looked as if she were about to speak on.

His stomach gave a gurgle at the prospect of food, and he let his arms cross rather casually over his chest. He made it look relaxed, rather than defensive. Getting dressed was another one of many good ideas the dreamer had come up with of course, and Flinne tried hard to ignore the blush that leaped to his cheeks. <i>Distracting?</i> He glanced down at his bare torso. "Oh." He said, and straightened. "Yes, food sounds... I'll be right back."

Flinne stopped by the table to take up his clothing again, although he left the rifle where it was. He hurried into the bathroom while -at the same time- trying not to look rushed. Off the towel came, and on went his clothing. He looked good in a uniform. When he came out of the bathroom again, he looked like nothing so much as a young Russian officer, with the double-breasted grey greatcoat buttoned firm down the front, and his boots laced up tight. It was as if he was trying to make up for his previous state of undress by putting as many layers between himself and the Dreamer as he had on hand.

He considered for a moment taking up his rifle, although he couldn't justify taking it for something so mundane as a meal and a conversation with a pretty woman. With a sigh, he returned to Aria's kitchenette. "Right," He said. "Getting to know each other." He looked about as prepared for the conversation as anybody else might be for his post-apocalyptic world. "Where do we start?" He asked, bluntly.
 
She shook her head and blew out a silent puff of air as Flinne went to go change. Lame. You are so so lame. Was that flirting, because it looked more like being lame. She cast her eyes skyward, hoping that once the Survivor was clothed she could stop acting like a fool. Let the poor man enjoy a little rest and calm before the night is over.

Aria absently went about refreshing Flinne's beverage and making sure the sandwich was still fresh, lost in thought as to how on earth she was going to accomplish what seemed a Sisyphean feat in three days. At least she was a little ahead of the game, she reasoned. Having already made a contact gave Aria the feeling that she had at least made some progress. She hoped that her luck held, not just for her sake and Flinne's, but her entire world would unravel just like his if the problem wasn't figured out. This prospect caused her chest to ache. So many questions with so few answers. Flinne didn't have any new information, either. A little sigh escaped her as she pushed the thoughts aside. Not now; just enjoy what you've been given at this moment.

Hot coffee restored and a cold glass of water nearby just in case, the Dreamer hopped up on the counter and swung her legs back and forth slowly, smiling when the Survivor emerged at last. He looked nice in the uniform and she was able to keep her wits now. This didn't stop her from feeling a little silly when he asked where to start. Her fingertips drummed a little rhythm on her knees unconsciously, nervous.

"What did you do, or like to do, before everything happened? Where did you live? Who were you before you were the Survivor?" Aria looked at him inquisitively, shoving her hand between her knees to stop their movement.
 
Flinne took up the sandwich as the nervous Dreamer began to fidget, and he took an ungraceful bite out of it. Survival hadn't allowed for many table-manners. Of course, that didn't mean he let any of the sandwich's leavings drop to his uniform. Sloppy he might have been, but wasting food in a world where there wasn't so much as a crumb to be found was as good as signing your own death warrant. He set the sandwich aside for a sip of the hot coffee, and then that too went in favor of the water. He didn't deprive himself of any of the sensations at hand.

<i>You deprived yourself of one,</i> Said a cruel little voice in the back of his head, and again his eyes flicked to Aria's oh-so-lovely legs. His cheeks mantled, and he covered the glance by half-inhaling a sip of water, and spluttering. He hoped the woman took it as a response to the sudden flurry of questions, rather than the cover for oogling that it was.

Clearing his throat, he leaned his own hip against the counter, and faced the Dreamer. "Before... Before it all went sideways I was pretty average. I lived in North America. I had a day-job at one of those superstores that had everything under the sun. I moonlighted as a vocalist in a punk band. I liked to shoot," He nodded towards his rifle. "But I never got around to getting a hunting license. I've been in the martial arts thing for a while." He cleared his throat. "Back when I still had instructors, I mean. I haven't had time to practice in... Well, in nearly a year." He took another bite of the sandwich.

When he was finished chewing, he added, "Tell me about you." <i>You could have asked her before you knew she was your ticket back to reality.</i> Sniped the voice. He muted it viciously.
 
Aria winced as he choked; she didn't mean for everything to come out in such a rush like that. She looked at him apologetically, leaning back and bit and crossing her legs to stop her fidgeting. She watched him intently as he spoke.

He seemed so normal from what he was telling her. She wondered what would have been if she had known him through another means and quickly abandoned that line of thought. There was a sort of rough-edged refinement to him though, despite his self-classification as average; she liked that even if his social graces were in need of polishing.

When he turned the conversation in her direction, she was a little unprepared. The normalcy of the topic was surreal to her suddenly, and she had to look away to collect her thoughts before speaking. "I'm.. uhm. I grew up in the country before moving here, and I think I already told you about my job. I actually shoot too, but with a bow. I learned how at camp one summer and it just stuck." She smiled, "I took a few self-dense classes when I moved into the city, but I don't know that it's really martial arts. I like to run, and try to do it on the mornings I don't have work..." Aria trailed off. "I'm kind of boring I guess. I don't go out much, and I don't date or anything." She slid off the counter and arched her back in a long stretch, not meeting his eyes.

"I'm sorry if this is boring, Flinne. Honestly I didn't even know you would be showing up tonight and I just wanted to dream of something peaceful. I was thinking of you before I went to sleep and I suppose that it... I don't know, really. Geeze, I feel like I'm embarrassing myself here." Aria spoke softly, almost to herself as her arms came up to wrap around herself.
 
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