[ OPEN ] pre-event (until...)

[nightwash]

WHO: Ronan Lynch & OPEN
WHAT: Before (& eventually after) Event #1
WHERE: Room 2 & The Library
WHEN: June 12 - 14 (& eventually June 19)
NOTES: Prompts in the comments! Action or prose is fine.

Comments

room 2 | june 12 | closed to kylo ren

[nightwash]

( Continued from here. )

Kylo continues to be a source of intense relief. Ronan is practically dead on his feet, though he can't tell if there's something about this place that's sapping him of energy or whether it's a consequence of his last dream — the last dream.

"I can't possibly be the only one who wants to sleep next to you," he teases, with a quirk of his mouth and a quick sweep of his eyes over Kylo's substantial body. The Tower, indeed. "But I got here first, so I guess I call shotgun."

He kicks off his shoes like he's just been waiting for the excuse, then collapses into the bed beside Kylo's. Everything hurts in the best way as he sinks into the mattress, splayed like a tossed ragdoll. He'd probably be halfway to sleep already if Kylo wasn't holding so much of his attention by simply looming nearby. Ronan doesn't want to close his eyes yet.

[photophobic]

Shotgun?

Kylo frowns to himself, filing that one away for later. He's got quite the substantial list of terms and phrases whose meanings he can only guess at already, just from this conversation— Tarot, Occult, Shotgun— and without his usual rescue method of simply slipping into the speaker's mind to peek at the back of the flashcard, he's feeling intolerably ignorant.

Or he would be, if Ronan weren't distracting him with that very unusual way of looking at him. Even without his extra senses he's sure he can feel it lingering on him even after Ronan's thrown himself on the bed like he's been longing to all this time. Kylo sits back down on the edge of his own with a soft hiss, reminded by the motion of the bruises almost certainly blooming under his skin right now.

"Most people find an excuse to leave a room the moment I enter it," he informs Ronan lightly. "You're the first to fight for the honour of my company."

[nightwash]

Ronan smiles at that little hiss of pain, obviously proud that he did some damage, even if he ultimately lost the battle. It was a good fight. A nasty one. He's looking forward to more of them.

"I can't tell if you're being modest or trying to sound cool," he says, shifting around a bit to accommodate his own aching spine. "You're not scary enough to counteract that hair. You're like a romance cover crossed with an emo rocker. That's got to be someone's type."

That someone may be in the room presently.

[photophobic]

"The High Mage forgot to summon my helmet," Kylo says.

His mouth tugs towards a smile again, amusement pulling at his features despite something of an effort to keep them flat. The result is almost certainly at least a little bit unpleasant. Possibly very. Whatever Kylo Ren is, it appears he's not at all used to using facial expressions to communicate.

"There aren't many who've seen enough of my face to form an opinion on it."

[nightwash]

It doesn't look unpleasant to Ronan. It looks like a stubborn flower sprouting from the cracks between concrete. He can believe what Kylo's telling him because he can see it written in those features, the unfamiliarity of compliments, even if it's still hard to believe he's the first.

"Lucky me," Ronan purrs with more gravel than usual, on account of Kylo crushing his throat earlier.

[photophobic]

This is all very uncharted territory for Kylo, who until very recently hadn't spared much thought at all for his own attractiveness (or otherwise). It doesn't make him uncomfortable, exactly. He quite likes it. But the slight heat rising under his skin at the rumbling purr of Ronan's voice has his fingers curling into a loose grip, digging idle pressure into the mattress he's perched on. He couldn't explain why if asked.

"You," he leans in a fraction to tell Ronan over-firmly, "Are supposed to be sleeping."

[nightwash]

Ronan bites back a reflexive yes, daddy. This isn't Gansey or Bryde he's talking to. He just met this guy a few minutes ago. While he's not exactly scared of a punch to the face, he doesn't want to push so far that Kylo rescinds his generous offer.

Instead, he says, "I'll close my eyes if you promise to keep talking."

[photophobic]

This time, he laughs. It's short, sharp, and more like the sudden rumbling release of tectonic plates finally dragging past the point of tension than anything else.

"What shall I talk about?" he asks, deciding to indulge Ronan— if only for his persisting audacity. "It might surprise you to learn I don't know any bedtime stories."

room 2 | june 13 | open to roommates

[nightwash]

So the problem of roommates didn't turn out to be such a problem at all. Now that Ronan's found a babysitter who's prepared to strike down any nightmares that might escape whenever his powers are restored, he can catch a reasonable amount of sleep every day.

No, the new problem is this: Ronan can sleep, but Ronan can't dream. Can't dream. He wants a new pair of boots. He wants an electric razor. He wants some fucking deodorant, because the stench of nineteen-year-old boy is getting a little too strong even for the nineteen-year-old boy in question.

And he's hungry.

He's so hungry.

He used to try to chase off this feeling by devouring every dish in sight, but there's nothing in the dining hall that can sate him and he knows it. It's a hunger that's both terrifying and extraordinarily irritating, and the only way he's figured out how to deal with it here is by not dealing with anything else. Even Ronan knows that no one deserves to get on the wrong side of his hangriness.

Confining himself to Room 2, he sits on the edge of his bed and waits. What for? Who knows. He probably won't feel it when he gets his powers back, because he never does. If he had the energy for it, he'd distract himself with pushups or go find something to hit, but if he had that kind of energy, he wouldn't need the distraction at all. The only thing he can do is sit here and feel the slow collapse of his essence, the yawning void of his unmaking, the creep of death working its way outward.

He checks his nose for a bleed. He checks his ears for a bleed. He checks his nose for a bleed.

He's so fucking hungry.

He looks like shit.

the library | june 13 | open to all

[nightwash]

He should probably have tried this sooner. In the back of his head, he can hear Bryde's voice scolding him wearily: "You wanted a world where you could dream anywhere, and now that you have it, what have you done with it?"

"I know," Ronan mutters to himself as he leafs through a book in the library. "There are not two of me."

A nearby scholar, formerly engrossed in reading, turns a glare at him. Ronan returns it until he wins the staring contest, then drifts to another book.

Books. Fucking books. Learning magic, of all things, from fucking books. These were trees once. If they were still trees, they'd probably be a lot more useful in teaching him than they are in this corpse form, scrawled knowledge imparted in a way that makes Ronan feel like a corpse, too. This feels about as natural as Wikipedia. Does this really work for everyone else?

A quick glance around tells him yes. To his left, one mage conjures rainbow bubbles out of thin air. To his right, another lights a candle with a snap of his fingers. The scholar who ocularly scolded him now appears to be rearranging inked words.

"Fuck," sighs Ronan, shoulders sagging.

room 2 | june 19 | open to roommates

[nightwash]

The room is a forest of swords. Hundreds of them, stuck into every surface like pins in a cushion. The mattresses and pillows are stabbed through as if a rain of swords fell from above, though of course they did not fall. They've embedded themselves there without human hands or gravity to guide them. The bedframes and canopy poles are splintered where broadswords and rapiers have become wedged in the wood. The stone walls and the decor are lost behind a frost of hilts climbing all the way to the ceiling. The floor is overgrown with sharp blades, some of them stabbed into it and some growing out of it.

The dreamer is spared, though he can't lift his head to see if any other sleepers are present or whether his roommates are in the same ruined state as the furniture. Like some kind of carnival trick, Ronan is sprawled out on the bed while sword blades stick out from everything that isn't a part of his body.

He's paralyzed. He always is, when he brings something back with him. In this case, he's brought almost a thousand somethings back with him, and all he can do is contemplate the disaster while he waits to return to his body. No one is screaming and he can't tell whether that's because they're still asleep or they're already dead or they had the good fortune of partying too late to end up at ground zero.

[nadine_he_loves]

Nadine's taken to visiting the baths late in the night, finding it the easiest way to have her choice of the private rooms. Long baths have always been a particular relaxing pleasure for her, and while she has no Jewel albums or Danielle Steele novels on hand, it's still helpful.

And it was. She's returning to her room, hair wet, looking forward to crawling into bed and passing out for the night.

Fate, it seems, has other plans. The sight that greets her when she opens the door, barefoot and still dripping, stops her in her tracks. What the hell happened?

"What....?" Cautiously, hesitantly, she takes a step inside to get a closer look at the extent of the damage.

[nightwash]

Ronan lingers outside of his body for another moment or two, a soul disconnected from the boy frozen on the bed. Then his perspective shifts and he's seeing through his eyes instead of his astral self, staring miserably at the shredded canopy overhead and the blades hanging inches from his face. He sucks in a sharp breath, like he's coming up for air.

"Nadine?" he asks, his voice rough and wary. He could swear he heard her just now. "Are you dying?"

He won't be much help, if she is. His own bed is a death trap. It's impossible to avoid every blade as he sits up. Several of them slice shallow cuts into his forearms. One blade, hanging from above, catches him in the shoulder before he twists free of it.

[nadine_he_loves]

"No, but I'm not exactly having a great time. Why does our room like sword swinging mobsters were taking their revenge against it?"

She doesn't need a detailed explanation, something general will do fine, but enough to let her know whether or not this is going to be a regular occurrence. These are things roommates need to know about - allergies, frequent visitors, rains of swords...

Then Nadine notices that Ronan, at least, is not unscathed. Sighing, she carefully picks her way to the nearest bed and yanks a section of already-torn sheet off. Between teaching and her cross country trek with Joe and Larry, she's relatively experienced with patching up cuts and lacerations.

[nightwash]

"It's a long story."

It's not, really, but it usually gets him a lot of questions, which he won't be in the space to answer until he's at least clear of the present hazard. Foolishly, he hadn't thought, Go to sleep in a suit of armor in case you summon five thousand swords, and went to bed without so much as a shirt. He's got nicks and slices up and down his torso by the time he's pushed away enough swords to reach the edge of his bed, adding to an impressive collection of scars given to him by nightmares in the past.

[nadine_he_loves]

"Does it happen often?"

Nadine has never tried to imagine how to move through a room full of swords, and is beginning to wish she'd indulged in some less likely thought exercises before now. It's very slow going, and she really wishes she weren't barefoot at the moment.

"Okay, either way, we need to get you cleaned up and then this cleaned up."

Without thinking, she's using her teacher's voice, subconsciously treating this like the worst classroom accident in history.

[nightwash]

Ronan doesn't know how to answer that. Does it happen often? No. Yes. No, but it used to. Yes, but only when he feels shitty. No, it's usually worse. Yes, but he'll get it under control if people can just give him a chance instead of trying to cut his head off with his own partner's sword.

Which, thankfully, is not among these swords — even if some of them are engraved with the words FROM CHAOS.

He hisses, "We don't have to do anything. I'll take care of it myself."

Big words for a kid who's bleeding everywhere.

[nadine_he_loves]

"It'll get done quicker with two sets of hands."

Nadine's tone is firm. She can't get any rest until this is taken care of, she may as well help. And she can't ignore someone just bleeding in front in her, it's not in her nature.

Ronan's words don't deter her and she continues to weave through the mass of sharp metal to approach him.

"And there's no point in wasting time arguing when we can be dealing with this. So are you going to let me get the worst of those wrapped?" She holds up the shredded pieces of sheet.

Return from the Wurm

[photophobic]

Kylo can tell something's off before he even sets foot in the room. Tired as he may be and distracted with thoughts of the tunnels, the moment he steps back through the fast travel portal to the Castle it hits him. There's a wrongness. An imbalance. He feels ripples of it in the way some of the castle servants look at him as he makes his way through the halls. Amusement, he thinks— though he can't think why.

The mystery reveals itself when he finally reaches the dormitory, ready to sink into the comfort of his gloriously oversized bed... and finds that in his absence, someone has turned the entire room into some kind of nightmarish pincushion.

Someone who appears to be in the process of trying to pull one of the hundreds of swords speared through every surface out from the post of his bed.

Kylo stands in the doorway for a moment.

"Yours?" he asks, redundantly.

[nightwash]

Ronan has been at this for hours now, but the pile of dislodged swords is just a fraction of the number remaining to be pried from the rest of the room. It looks like he started with Kylo's bed, for whatever reason, though even with half the swords removed from it, it's unfit for occupancy now or ever again.

With his back to the door, he doesn't notice Kylo's arrival until he speaks. Then Ronan freezes, his shoulders tensing while he tries to work out Kylo's mood without having to face him. His hands remain wrapped around the hilt of the sword he'd been working to free from the wood, white-knuckled.

"I wasn't kidding," Ronan says, "about the nightmares."

[photophobic]

Apparently not. Kylo's eyes sweep from the obvious tension of Ronan's frozen posture to the pile of recovered weapons... and back to the ruins of his bed. The significance of the gesture doesn't escape him— of everyone in the shared catastrophe of this room, it's Kylo's wrath Ronan wants most to appease.

"And they weren't exaggerating about our abilities," he offers, picking his way through the maze of blades, pausing to examine the sharpness of a sword-tip erupting from the floor with a curious finger. "Returning to us. Here. Allow me."

A centering breath, a slow, easing curl of his fingers, and the sword Ronan's been fighting with is far more compliant.

"Take it."

[nightwash]

Ronan hadn't known whether or not Kylo would be furious upon his return. He'd braced himself for a harsh confrontation, at least. Bryde would have torn into him for a nightmare like this, so sloppy in its handling, so obviously rooted in emotional turmoil, so lacking in discipline and restraint. Ronan was supposed to be better than this, and even though Kylo didn't know him very well, it was a reasonable fucking expectation to believe his bed would be intact upon his return.

The sword pulls free like it's suddenly decided Ronan's worthy of it. Ronan tosses it aside with the rest.

"You don't have to help me," he says, his face still turned away as he moves on to the next hilt. "They have extra beds down the hall. This shit's going to take forever."

[photophobic]

Kylo considers, watching Ronan pointedly avoid turning to face him and moving instead to tug on another of the swords speared through his bed.

"Were they coming for you?" he asks instead of acknowledging Ronan's suggestion. He grasps the hilt of a sword pierced through the bedpost by his pillow instead of aiding Ronan with his, this time. "In your dream. All these swords."

And out from the wood comes the blade in one smooth pull. Kylo throws it aside and moves to the next.

[nightwash]

Ronan glances at Kylo, a frown tugging at his mouth. This is all embarrassing enough as it is. He doesn't need Kylo pitching in, looking close enough to notice that most of these swords look like the one he'd won in a fight last week. Not perfect replicas. Variations on a theme. Ronan had been watching, but his attention had been fixed on Kylo rather than the prize, so the dream version was approximated.

"If they had been coming for me, I would've woken up looking like swiss cheese."

No. He'd probably look worse. This many blades? There would probably be nothing left on his bones. He yanks and yanks to no avail, the sword in his hand hardly budging. Kylo makes it look easy. Of course he does. He's not a stupid fuckup, not like Ronan.

[photophobic]

If Kylo notices the similarities between the swords skewered through every available surface in the room and the one safely in its scabbard at his hip, he doesn't mention it.

"Swiss cheese," he prompts. The next sword he reaches for without grasping it in his hand, brow furrowing as he curls his fingers and pulls, directing the freed blade to the pile with a flick and a thought.

"Served on skewers?"