Dream 03 → Fire Down Below

[irregular]

Warnings: Situations of peril. Spoilers for Ken's backstory, but nothing you don't know by Episode Four.
Dream Effects: INTERACTIVE.
Notes: Aside from Ken himself, the figures in this dream all resemble the same young Japanese man. Ken knows who this is, but he isn't saying. The men will not reply if spoken to and are quietly menacing, but not overtly aggressive. They just like stalking people.

This is how Ken dreams of fire.

He never knows how he came to be there - not in the dream, at least. Lying on concrete with the reek of petrol clinging to his clothes and his hair, he opens his eyes on flame.

The building is burning. Catwalks, gantries, machinery: all burns. Flame licks at the windows of the warehouse, at the very walls: he can feel the heat on his face, hot and oppressive as the air of a kiln, hear the roar of the fire in his ears. It deafens him, it leaves his head ringing. He can feel the heavy, heated air burning in his lungs - get out, damn it, got to get out of here before he chokes--! The smoke, thick and black, burns his sinuses; It gags him, blinds him with tears and sends sweat pearling up acrosss his brow, his back...

Ken springs to his feet, the breath catching in his chest; he can think of nothing but the need to flee, but he never runs for the doors. The doors are blocked, or blazing. There's only one place he can go and that's up.

Up.

He sprints for the nearest stairway just before a burning beam scythes down from somewhere above him and crashes to the ground where he had been lying. Ken looks back, then runs again, the treads of the stairs shuddering against his feet. Everything burns - flames lick at the gantry he runs across, and it yaws violently beneath his feet, chunks of debris rain from above, and that is burning too. The breath burns in his lungs.

After a time, he becomes aware that he is searching. Searching for something, or someone - the catwalk gives way beneath his feet, and the scream is choked off in his throat as he throws himself desperately forward, snatching at stairway or girder or anything that will arrest his fall-- Panting, he hangs from the broken walkway for a while, before pulling himself up and struggling on...

And, after a time, he becomes aware of the figures, looming through the choking smoke. Circling, and growing ever closer.

All he can do is keep moving. Keep moving forward because maybe, just maybe he will be faster.

Comments

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

Smoke in his eyes; that would be what Youji registers first. Not the familiar scent of tobacco smoke. Actual, honest-to-goodness, are-there-batteries-in-the-fire-alarm? smoke. Something tickles the back of his mind, something about staying low to avoid the smoke, but he's too tall to be doing so comfortably.

He's not alone; that would be what Youji registers second. He squints, trying to make out what he sees, but isn't certain. Vaguely man-shaped, but nothing else.

And footsteps overhead. Within the circle he senses the other figures to be forming, senses from the way the hair stands up on the back of his neck.

The enemy of my enemy...

"Hello?" he calls. "Who's up there?"

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

The sound of someone's voice registers, at first, only as a break in the pattern.

It's that which brings Ken up short: the awareness that something is different. It cuts through the panic that fogs his mind sudden and sharp as water dashed in the face, snapping him back to something that's almost like clarity. He knows, though the voice is familiar, it's not one of them who is calling. They have never called to him before - not even his name, for of course they know who he is. They have no need to; there is nothing they need to say.

Though the cry is only barely audible over the spit and roar of the flames, the sound of his own labored breathing, and the creaking of the catwalk Ken stops short all the same, snatching at the catwalk's handrail and suppressing a cry as his hands close around the metal. The railing is hot, and just to touch it burns his palms. He leans over all the same, eyes streaming as he peers down into the thick, choking columns of smoke, desperately searching for the source of the voice: he finds it in the form of a man, tall and - like the voice - only painfully familiar. Wiping at his eyes, Ken struggles to focus, to work out where he's seen that form before--

"Hello?" His voice sounds strange to him, high and thin and panicked. "Can you hear me, who's there?"

What he means is help.

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

And the strangeness and utter impossibility of the situation hits him next. Youji last remembers lounging on his couch, trying to refine his sketches of Alice's garden into a final design. And failing. He'd finally caught sight of his watch at 11:47, leaned his head back, and mean to doze off for just a moment before dragging himself to bed.

He'd jolted awake at who knows when, exhausted, and meant to check on Ken before finally going to bed. It was a habit he'd gotten into in Germany, just to see if he shouldn't be watching the local news for unusual murders the next morning, and he'd gotten into it again since Ken had decided to be an idiot and start picking fights he couldn't win.

So he'd gone to check on Ken and ended up... here. In a burning building.

There's a connection, but his memory isn't providing him with an answer.

"It's Youji," he calls up. He reaches for his watch, and pulls out a line of wire. Just in case he needs it.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Youji.

Youji. Christ, of all the people who could have fetched up here, it's Youji-- Why is it even a surprise?

"Youji--"

Ken can't quite help himself: he starts to laugh, and his laughter is breathless and hysterical and almost as choking as the smoke. He clings to the railing for dear life and laughs until he's gasping, until shortness of breath forces him to stop. Shoulders shaking, choking on the heated air, he straightens, wiping at his eyes, and peers into the clouds of choking smoke again.

Yes: there he is. Stood with a thin skein of wire glistening between his fingertips, the light of the flames dancing on the thin metal, sending it to sparkling and the guy really could do with being better-dressed for it. His feet are bare, his shirt is rumpled and, if Ken is any judge, he looks as if he's abruptly woken to find himself trapped here...

Inexplicably, Ken wonders if he should apologize to him.

"It's me," he calls, through a fit of coughing. "Ken. I can't get down."

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

Well, good, Youji thought. He hadn't thought it would be Schuldig.

The laughter and coughing does worry him, but not enough for true concern. It's Ken; he'll pull through. Always does.

He glances at the wire in his hands. It was strong enough to hold a grown man up by the neck; it might hurt some, holding on, but Ken could probably climb down it.

"I'll send a wire up to you," Youji yelled back. "Is there anything you can tie it to? You could climb down from there."

[dimmed-shiner.livejournal.com]

Well now, this place continued to be entertaining. For all the places Mogget had walked, he couldn't say he'd ever walked through another person's dreams. The others he'd encountered had been plebeian at best, boring. What indeed did it say for the people of this odd world that their dreams were so commonplace?

This one was the first he'd stepped paw in that was somewhat diverting, aside from the whole novelty of walking through other's dreams, which had worn off rather quickly.

Perhaps he could...

Mogget smiled, an unnatural expression for a cat, his mouth split open wide and gaping dark as his muscles stretched unnaturally under skin suddenly fitting like a loose overcoat. Yes...

And his skin split down the back, the brilliant white fur revealing even more brilliant (almost blinding) white fire. His luminance faded enough to match that of the fire raging around, though his color--or lack of it--was unmistakable, as he approached the dreamer.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Anything, anything... Ken casts about himself desperately for a few moments for something that looks like he could tie a wire to (something that isn't unsteady, or on fire--) before his gaze alights, again, on the handrail before him, and at that he almost laughs again. Talk about being unable to see for looking. He leans back over it, looking back down at Youji and he looks very small from up here, almost smaller than he had done when Ken looked away from him but that's not possible, it's the fear and it's the flame, it's doing things to his mind that just don't make any--

"Yeah," he shouts - it's as good a way as any to distract himself from his fear. "There's a handrail, I can--"

And he's coughing again, convulsively, doubling over: he hopes Youji will just go with it, won't ask him to elaborate. The smoke burns his eyes, it burns his lungs and couldn't that kill you as sure as the flames could, just breathing in smoke? He thinks, there was something like that.

On a blazing walkway girdling the walls of the room, a figure swims through the smoke. Walking through fire without a burn, it glides slowly toward the mouthway of the catwalk - and stops there, waiting quiet and patient as a man with nowhere particular to go would wait for a bus or a train, and as it waits it turns its blank, blameless face toward Ken. Ken raises his head, gasping: though he can make out none of the details of the stranger's face the man, he is sure, is looking right at him. No, not looking but watching, watching and waiting to see what he'll do next--

"I'll figure something out!" He shouts to Youji. "Just throw it!"

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

As soon as Ken begins to cough again, Youji pulls his shirt up to cover his nose and mouth; it isn't a perfect filter, but it will have to do. The heat is beginning to smother, even as the smoke rises, and he can feel sweat beginning to drip down his face--but he'll be fine as long as it isn't in his eyes.

He twists the wire about his fingers, and thinks. He doesn't think Ken would be able to find the wire on the ground, and would lose too much timing attempting to do so. Can he send it to hit Ken--he aims, and has to stop himself from ringing him right around the neck. He smiles ruefully as he widens the loop and tries to aim for Ken's shoulders; it won't be tight enough to restrict, he'll be able to pull it off as long he doesn't panic.

"Ready?" Youji calls, and doesn't wait for an answer; he just lets it fly.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Ken cries out as the wire catches him about the shoulders, and nearly, nearly succumbs to panic.

He cries out at the feeling of the wire encircling his body, he tries to pull away and yelps again when it only causes it to bite the deeper. Cursing and struggling, wincing at the sudden bite of pain, Ken claws desperately at it as it digs into his shoulders-- he closes his eyes, forces himself to calm. Forces himself to take deep gasps of the scalding, choking air, for what little good it will do, and think. He knows Youji, he knows that, half-blinded by cholking skeins of smoke, there was noother way he'd even have found the wire in the first place-- Okay. You know why he just did that. You know why, Hidaka, calm down.

Calm down.

Forcing himself to work slow, to work careful, Ken unwinds the wire from about his shoulders. He gently tugs it from about him then, the fine skeins of it held loosely between his hands, he walks back to the railing and carefully wraps the wire about it, ignoring the feeling of it cutting into the tips of his fingers, making his fingers and his palms bleed. He doesn't look up, just concentrates on the job at hand. Wrap it about the support strut, tie it off, tug at it to make sure it's secure--

He straightens. Leaning back over the parapet, he yells down at Youji. "Got it!"

And all the while the stranger just watches, as if there's nowhere he would rather be. He can wait.

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

Youji is a bit torn as to whether he should cut the wire or not, whether he should reinforce it or not; he doesn't want to send Ken another firing, after he'd panicked just then; Youji is relying too much on Ken being Ken-the-experienced-assassin, he realizes.

Dream logic. Because this is a dream world, right? Perhaps this is a different Ken, a Ken more prone to panic and--the fire means something. He knows that. Something Ken may have mentioned--or not mentioned--once and never again.

Granted, panicking in the midst of a fire was a normal and understandable thing, but Ken was not afraid of fire. Could interact with it perfectly well, but--best to find a door, and get out. He still perceived others around them, and it made him uneasy; he'd yet to see one.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Ken didn't see the cat stepping calmly into the warehouse. Blinded by smoke, wiping the tears from his eyes with the back of his hand, he didn't see the look on the creature's face, didn't see the smile, didn't see it tear itself in two as it transformed.

He saw the thing it became, though - the light, burning and brilliant even through the flames that leapt and crackled about him, then slowly fading. Even harried and terrified as he was, he couldn't have missed that. Gasping, he stooped short, nearly stumbling and falling onto the catwalk. He snatched at the rail to catch himself, ignoring the burning heat of the metal, the scalding pain that seared through his palms: he turned, desperately casting about himself to try and find the source of that sudden, terrible light--

Found it in a figure stalking the factory floor, a figure which burned but was not itself consumed, with a brilliant pure white flame.

It was the figure of a man, but a man of fire - or it was man-shaped, at least, or nearly so. The figure was clearly too tall, curiously elongated, its limbs stretched out and too long, its fingers long and spindly: there was something unsettling about it, something that had the breath catching in Ken's throat, had him stumbling back a pace. It was as if whatever the creature was - for it wasn't human, it couldn't be that! - it had heard of men, but never seen one, and so had been forced to improvise...

He stood, and he stared, and he crossed himself. Then ran again, though to where he didn't know.

Just as long as it was away, that was all--

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Ken isn't watching Youji any more. He's too busy tugging at the wire, testing the strength of the knot.

Then, that done, he looks down at it and swallows. It looks awfully thin...

Awfully thin and awfully frail, frail as cobweb and damn the fact that cobweb is supposed to be so strong, it always broke easy enough when he touched it. Never mind that just handling it has left Ken's palms and fingers sticky with his own blood, blood that looks almost black in the light of the flames (but where's the pain? shouldn't that have left him hurting?) and he can't help but wonder, will this take my weight? Never mind that he knows what it is, that he's seen it before, seen Youji hefting heavyset men nearly twice his size off their feet with his wire... now it comes down to it, he's just plain frightened.

But the flames are licking the struts of the catwalk and, on the walkway before him, stands the quiet figure of a man he would recognize anyway, a man who he killed. The wire looks thin and sharp and uninviting but to walk forward, now, would be suicide.

Here goes nothing, he thinks - and, gripping the wire so tightly he can feel it biting into his palms, feel blood crawling hot and sticky down blistering skin, he swings himself over the side of the catwalk.

For a moment he simply hangs there, waiting for whatever happens next to happen: for the knot to slip, for the wire to snap and send him plummeting to the ground, to lie bleeding and broken with nothing to do but wait for the flames to claim him-- nothing, of course, happens. He simply dangles there, clinging desperately to the wire and fighting the urge to look down: then, closing his eyes, he slolwy inches his way down the length of the wire, trying to ignore how thin it feels beneath his grip, the agonizing scrape of metal on metal as the wire grates against the handrail. Slowly, slowly he makes his way downward, only daring to open his eyes when he feels the first brush of the concrete floor against the soles of his shoes...

Ken lets go of the wire, collapses to his knees. He's out of breath, he's trembling, his eyes slip closed again as he curls up on the floor, shaking uncontrollably. Oh, God, he's thinking. Then: Oh, God, how am I going to get out?

Even the air seems cleaner down here.

He raises his head. He says, "Youji."

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

"Ken," Youji answers with a tired sigh. "Let me see your hands. There's a reason I usually wear gloves on missions."

Even as he says it, he's scanning the room peripherally, but for all the firelight, the smoke keeps the building dark. And the circle is tightening. There are definitely others surrounding them; how he knows it, he's not sure, but he wonders if maybe he's still missing something. There is a meaning to the fire; there should be a meaning to who is chasing (?) him.

Where is the doorway? Youji didn't walk through one, he knows that. He remembers entering Ken's room (well, the spare room Ken was sleeping in) and maybe seeing him asleep, but it blanks out after that.

It takes a bit of effort to rip the bottom his shirt to make something he can wrap Ken's hands in. He thinks about asking if Ken had a sharp weapon with him, but dismisses it quickly. Definitely not an experienced assassin sitting there at his feet.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

"Sorry."

Is that his voice? How awkward he sounds. Ken raises his head, gives Youji a guilty grin. It's almost shy, the way he holds out his hands, as if he's embarrassed to admit to what a mess he's made of them in simply trying to get away. He sits there, hands outstretched, as Youji bandages his palms with shreds of his shirt, and wishes he didn't feel like such a burden.

Should never have tried to climb up, and yet--

And yet something in Ken knows, it just knows that going up is the only way out of here. He can't explain it, he can't even define that feeling, but everything he has is screaming at him, demanding to know why he came back. He wasn't close to the exit: nothing like it, but voluntarily resetting the damn level just to say he's not doing it solo... what the Hell was he thinking? The flames are crackling and hissing; somewhere he can't see, metal groans in sickening protest, and something tumbles from the ceiling to land heavily on the ground behind them. He can't help but wince.

If they stay here they're going to die. It's that simple.

"We've got to get out of here," he says, when Youji gives him his hands back and draws away: Ken hardly knows why he bothers wasting the breath, when it's so obvious. "There's no door down here."

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

"There's no door up there, either," Youji says dryly. "Unless you really think you can walk on air."

He did take a quick step forward when a large mass of debris fell behind him--close one--but otherwise, gives no indication of distress. Unease, yes; his eyes are everywhere, scanning constantly, and he's listening, too.

It occurs to him that listening to Ken--dream logic--might be a good idea, however, and he starts to walk.

"Are we in a basement?" he wonders. "Is the door on the next floor?"

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

"But that's how it works."

Tearing his gaze from Youji's face, Ken glances about himself - at the flames, at the figures looming up through it - and he swallows. They will come no nearer, he knows, but still... Anxiously, he looks back up at his friend. Though even Ken knows that what he is saying makes no sense, he looks almost as grave as he does just plain fearful.

"Youji," he says, "this isn't... I've been here before. It's just how it works. You have to climb and I know it doesn't make sense. But there's no other way out. There just isn't."

He scrambles to his feet and, without waiting for permission, leans heavily against Youji as much to keep his balance as for the reassurance his friend's presence offers. He's still, much to his embarrassment, shaking, and he closes his eyes briefly as he forces himself to calm, concentrating on evening out his breathing. For a moment he does nothing, simply stands and counts his breaths - one, three, six--

He pulls away as Youji makes to move forward, stumbling after the man as he picks his way cautiously through the flames. Youji doesn't know where he's going, that much is obvious but with the stairs - those stairs, anyway - out of the question, there's nothing for it but to look for another way up.

(The figures follow, quiet and patient. They have all the time they need.)

"A warehouse," Ken corrects him. "But you've got to go up. It's... just how this works. I'm sorry."

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

"The fact that you look frightened is enough for me," Youji admits. "It's really not something I'm used to."

So climbing it is. Is it possible to latch a wire on to the rafters, bypass the floors (and individuals lurking therein?) and just climb up? But no; the smoke impairs his vision and it's getting harder to breathe; harder still the higher they go.

"I wish it wasn't that way," Youji mutters, more quietly, as he begins walking the perimeter of the room, looking for the staircase. "You know smoke rises, right? Not that it will matter once the room is full, but I'd like to not deliberately go looking for death, if it's all the same to you."

Something snaps in his mind after that tirade, and he looks back at Ken. Eyes narrowing.

"How much do you know about this setting?" he asks neutrally. If he knows the only way out...? But if he's wrong...

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

How much does he know. There's a loaded question, if Youji only but understood it. Ken shivers in spite of the heat, resting his hands on his upper arms for a moment and, momentarily, hanging back.

"We're not," he says, "supposed to be able to get out--"

He breaks off, coughing.

There are no doors in the warehouse - Ken knows this in his blood. He's checked, checked dozens of times, he's been here often enough to know it for a fact. No doors, and the only windows are small, set high in the walls. The only way out is to climb - to break a window, or try and find a way to the roof. Smoke rises, and it's getting hard enough to breathe down here: Ken coughs again, wiping at his eyes with his bandaged hands. It's no choice at all, but it's the only one there is - unless, of course, Youji really wants to burn.

Ken doesn't. He'd rather choke. Rather climb until he was sure he was high enough that the fall would kill him, and jump. It had been horrible enough the first time, and he barely remembered it...

He swallows. Says, "I know it's supposed to kill me. I'm meant to die here, Youji. That... that's why there's no door."

[slantedcross.livejournal.com]

"Block your mouth," he says briskly. "Taking in this much smoke should not be attempted except by a seasoned professional. And not without enough nicotine to make you think it's worth it."

He nudges Ken towards the perimeter of the room. Overexertion probably isn't a good idea, but staying still was even less so.

He didn't really want to acknowledge Ken's final statement, but his curiosity is piqued. And he has a feeling he needs Ken lucid and thinking straight in order to make his way out.

He stopped at a staircase, and just sighed. "Well, if you do die here, somehow you recover long enough to really annoy the hell out of me sometime in the next three years," he says. "Any ideas what we'll find at the top?"

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

It isn't a very good joke, in fact Ken isn't even totally sure it's a joke at all, but he laughs weakly all the same. It's a weird kind of relief to have something to laugh about here of all places, even if the giggles catch in his throat and leave his chest aching, even if the laughter tails off into another fit of coughing, and even as he doubles over and struggles to suck in the filthy, too-hot air, it leaves him feeling weirdly better.

Youji's right, though, and he covers his nose and mouth with one cupped hand for a lack of anything better to do it with.

He says, "Okay." And follows.

The flames roar all about them as they pick their way across the baking, cracking floor: behind them something vast and heavy falls with a loud whumph, sending sparks flying through the air and Ken winces, hurrying to catch up with his friend. Youji doesn't know where he's going, but then Ken can't say he's any surer on that himself - all he knows is that they've got to climb, that whatever's waiting for them at the other end of the maze of shuddering catwalks and stairways strung above their heads like a great steel cobweb, it has to be better than this. Anything would be better than to burn...

Though Youji hesitates at the foot of the stairs, Ken doesn't wait. He pushes past him, clambering quickly up the first few steps, only stopping short and turning back when he realizes that Youji isn't following.

"No," Ken admits, letting his hand fall from his face. "I don't know. We've just got to go up. And..." He hesitates. Wonders, for a moment, if he wants to admit to this at all. "I said supposed to. Something happens and I don't. I'm supposed to die but I don't and I think they--" He gestures vaguely about him at nothing in particular, "--don't like that."