yumemigaoka | June catch-all (and also some of May lmao)

[Well. That was a disaster. Bruno has caused - contributed to - been involved with plenty of disasters in his day, but that whole thing really took the cake.

Back in the Waking World, the rats are overjoyed to see him up and about again. He knew, when he last went to sleep, that he might be out for awhile, so he'd stocked them up with plenty of food and water, and explained once again that they needed to be very very careful if they went out into the DU to forage. It's impossible to say that they understood. Bruno thinks rats are a lot smarter than people say, but he also knows that he just got used to talking to them during his lonely years.

For himself, he just tucked himself away in his basement hidey-hole and hoped against hope that no one would find his sleeping form there. Fortunately, it doesn't seem like anyone did.

It's been much too long. He feels faint from hunger and thirst, and weirdly sore besides. Must've been sleeping weird. The kids had people to look after them, so hopefully they're doing a little better...stiffly, he limps his way back upstairs to the common areas. He's just looking for something to eat and drink, but if anyone else comes into the cafeteria, he forces himself to slow down and act nonchalant. He's just a regular guy! Not a Dreamer, no reason to fuss!]

So...all that stuff's over now? With everyone being asleep for ages? They're all - they're all okay now, right?

[He's more or less fine, but he's still sort of worried about the kids.]

[He doesn't feel so comfortable in the Dream Sphere anymore, though.

It was nice for a while. Getting to talk to other Dreamers, and not be recognized or even really questioned that much. But he's mucked it up now. People must know that he has some kind of prophetic abilities, after what he did at the party, and then later on in the fight against that big...thing. He's ashamed, too, of how badly he was affected by it there. He's the adult in the room, most of the time. He should've been helpful, not just cowering on the ground while the kids took care of everything!

Granted, it's not exactly his first time being useless in a fight.

At least now it's broken down into Torments. A lot of Torments, yeah, but he can handle some of those. Omen doesn't go searching for help anymore. He just searches the future for groups that he's pretty sure he can defeat solo, and takes care of things himself. If he gets knocked back awake, he gets knocked back awake. Whatever, who cares.

In the Reverie Necropolis, one of his typical haunts, he finishes off the last of a trio of Torments with a well-timed attack, and immediately lets his rats crumble back into dust when it's gone. It's tiring, fighting alone. He's gotten too used to being able to recruit help in this Dreamer-packed zone. Yumemigaoka's getting him too used to...well, a lot of things, probably.

He's too lost in his thoughts to notice there's someone else around. But when he sees another Dreamer, he starts, and then quickly begins to glide off down the tunnel in that spooky shadowy way of his.]

[Of course, the Slumbering City is a mess. They basically just had a whole Godzilla experience. Bruno picks disconsolately around in the rubble. It still feels a bit like his fault.]

Maybe if we just...

[He gestures, and a few of his rats shove a piece of wall back on top of its own crumbled remains. It's. Sort of standing up?]

You know I bet if I could get some Dream Plaster, I could patch this up.

Looks like. You look awful. [sigh] Then again, it's not like anyone else in here looks like they're doing okay after that disaster.

[ apparently, there's some new kid to worry about- a dreamer who arrived in the du during the chaos of the 51st anniversary. while she didn't get trapped in the slumbering city, she's still given the staff plenty of cause for concern. the scars, the spaciness, the amnesia... people are starting to wonder where she's even sleeping at night after an offhand comment about her not knowing where her apartment is.

when bruno shuffles back into his basement "bedroom," he'll find the answer to that particular question in a tangle of limbs twisted at awkward angles crashed out where he sleeps; the kind of nigh-gordian sleeping position that only a lanky teenager with awkward proportions can find comfortable.

considering how the rats don't seem to mind her presence, she's been sleeping here for a while, and feeding bruno's friends to boot. ]

Oh, I'm - I'm fine. Just...haven't been sleeping that well lately, heh. That's ironic, right? But, uh, I guess everyone here's been really worried. Obviously something was going bad in the Dream Sphere.

[He shrugs a little. Like, it must have been pretty scary to get stuck on the outside too, right? They would've all been totally unaware of what was going on, and maybe not even sure if the Dreamers would wake up at all.]

Good to have everyone back though.

Um.

[Well. How...how did she even get here? Like, he doesn't really lock the door behind him or anything, since it's an abandoned storage room down in the basement, but that still doesn't really explain why there's a kid asleep in this closet. Where Bruno lives.]

Hey, are you...okay?

[Maki sighs again.] You guess? We've all been pulling way too many hours. I'll be surprised if even ten percent of us show up to work tomorrow with how little sleep people have been getting, aside from the Dreamers who got stuck.

[ Guess there's a double startle.

Because Omen isn't the only one startled at the sight of someone else in this place. Prisma seems about the same, letting out a yelp the moment their gazes meet. She kind of feels like she's being caught with her hand in the cookie jar, after all - or in her case, as a sole young Dreamer in a place she probably shouldn't be on her own. But she can't always find a group to go hunt Torments with, and despite the way the Dream Sphere feels so much more Torment-filled than the usual, she still wants to train, a-and maybe it'll be fine--

Except then she just had to run into someone she has deemed an official Responsible Adult. Even if he's getting startled by looking at her. Apparently that's not enough to tarnish Omen's reputation in her mind - especially when Prisma knows so little of how anything went down with the people stuck in the Dream Sphere a while ago, having been stuck outside of it herself. ]

I-I'm sorry..! [ She blurts out, especially when she realises that Omen is-- leaving? Is he leaving? O-Oh gosh-- ] D-Did I make you mad?! I'm so sorry..!

[Sonic's doing his usual thing; running around, taking out Torments as they show up... He'd miss the major fight in the Slumbering City, only showing up at the end of it to help corral the mass of Torments whatever-it-was dissolved into. He'd complained about missing the action, but that was mostly for appearances. The important bit was that the city and all the Dreamers were... Mostly all right.

But since he got away nearly scot-free, Sonic feels like it was the least he could do to help take out the leftover Torments still menacing this part of the Dream Sphere. Which means-]

Oh no you don't!

[and there's a bright blue streak that runs past Omen to cut of his escape for a moment before he realizes that this guy's just colourful enough in this dreary zone to not be a Torment]

... Oh wha- Whoops. [he stands up, a little sheepishly in English;] Sorry. [then back to Japanese;] Thought you were a Torment there for a moment. No offense, but you kinda blend in with the crowd.

[he might be speaking a little too quickly, since he's not aware that the person he's talking with isn't a native Japanese speaker themselves]

[Tycoon is helping where he can... And that's mostly by clearing out any stray Torments still lurking about the City. The sight of part of a wall going back up is startling though and Tycoon quickly jumps over to investigate. It couldn't be a Torment (that would be really convenient if they could fix the mess they made!), but it never hurts right?]

Ah... Hello, Omen-san. [Dreamer names were so weird. But now that there wasn't any impending kaiju looming over them, Tycoon decides to make the most of this opportunity with a rather elusive Dreamer] Um... Thank you, for your help before.

Heh, right...

[Have they? That's...that's nice.]

I wasn't, um, looking after any of the Dreamers or anything, at least. Wouldn't mind a day off, though.

[Wait. Wait, did he actually take enough time off to cover all that time he spent asleep? Bruno looks like he is suddenly, silently starting to freak out.]

Geez - !

[Omen nearly jumps out of his skin - which, in the Omen disguise, looks a bit like he just suddenly became a foot taller. The cloak always touches the ground! Though he was talking, he was very much just doing it to himself.]

Oh. Uh. Hey, no, that - I didn't really do anything. Back there.

What - ?

[fuck

Bruno glides back, waving his shadowy arms. Maybe in a minute he'll process that she's awfully young to be in a zone like this by herself; for the moment, he's just meeting her anxiety with his own!]

Hey, no, it's fine! I just, uh, didn't know anyone else was here!

Uh...

[Well, he didn't get all of that, but he understood the apology. And he can sort of guess the rest. This wouldn't be the first time he's been mistaken for some sort of Torment. Back in the day, his clothes - his whole thing - used to be a lot brighter, but...well, anyway.

He waves a shadowy hand. His accent probably does make it clear that Japanese isn't his first language. He's a little self-conscious about it these days, but...at least he's getting good enough at the language to worry about accent?]

It's okay! It's fine. I'm, uh... [Just kinda gesturing at all of himself.]

[blue ears perk up when he hears the accent]

Oh! Not Japanese? What are you more comfortable with? Anything works for me!

[He gives the other, spookier Dreamer a thumbs up. The upside of travelling and living around the globe as much as he has means he can easily put multilingual on his resume! So long as it remains on a casual conversation level and no one decides to bust out the thesaurus to sound smart... Okay, so maybe it's not resume quality, but it's certainly something that comes in handy now and again!]

But hey, it looks like most of the water that was here drained out at least. Is uh... This place usually flooded like that?

Oh, uh...you speak Spanish?

[It'd be nice to talk to someone in his native language again! He hasn't managed it consistently for a while. Yumemigaoka's pretty multicultural and all, but people here usually have English as a second language instead. Bruno understands a bit of that too, but he's never worked at it like he's been doing with Japanese.

He'll go on in Spanish once it's confirmed, though. The Omen voice is...almost immediately not a thing, he really does better with that when he's prepared to meet people.]

Uh - no, no, not really. It hasn't rained this much since I started coming here. I've been a little worried about it, with the tunnels and all.

[But, he's here anyway. Not like he'll drown for real.]

Aah-!!

[the way Omen suddenly stretches out is startling enough that there's a sudden soft 'pop!' noise followed by a 'thump' as a familiar green tanuki hits the floor. Don't mind Tycoon just laying there on his side for a few seconds... ~~Wait, did he die-~~ No, he's fine, just recovering from the shock.

Tycoon flops back onto his stomach once he's sufficiently recovered, though he doesn't change back immediately]

That's not true! The rats I saw in the middle of that were yours right? I would have been in trouble without them.

[Sonic holds out a hand to indicate 'sort of' before switching to pretty straightforward Spanish. Unlike his English and Japanese, Sonic actually sounds like someone who's only sort of familiar with the language]

I'm all right with Spanish. [a pause, then he points to his ears with both hands, a gesture that suits a cute girl more than a teenage boy but maybe he's trying to break the tension] Better at listening!

[and for his own sake, he switches back to- Hold on, which one would this Spanish guy prefer? Sonic uses English in the interim] Which is easier for you, English or Japanese?

But huh. It was flooded when all of that was going down, but it looked like it was going away towards the end there. I figured I'd swing by and see how things looked.

[his eyes light up at the prospect of adventure] Wouldn't hurt to check those tunnels out, yeah?

I do not envy HR figuring all that out right now. Personally, I'm just glad we didn't have a tech meltdown on top of all this.

Uh, yeah, that was me. But, you know, with the actual fighting. Guess I'm not really in my prime anymore, heh.

[Not that he was ever a Striker or anything. But his shield...he hasn't been able to properly summon that in a long time. Without it, what's he able to do, really?]

Uh - Japanese, probably.

[He'll go on in Japanese, then!]

I know a little English, it's kinda everywhere, but Japanese is the one I've been studying. And uh - yeah, I guess it probably wouldn't hurt.

[...

.....

............wait]

Oh, wait, you want me to come?

Eeeesh, yeah. That'd be a nightmare!

[he is going to go forge his pto records tonight after hr goes home]

Yeah, no kidding. Hopefully that doesn't end up happening. I don't think Crimson was a hacker on top of everything else.

Mmm, well. Wouldn't help us either way, would it?

June catch-all (and also some of May lmao)

immediately post-event, Dreamer's Union

post-event, the Dream Sphere, Reverie Necropolis

throughout july, the dream sphere

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