Stars and Feathers (Monroe)

[Travis Morgan]

Tired. So tired. His feelings were so intense these days. He'd just gone out for a little sun, but the people.. he felt so drained. So exhausted.

He had intended to go back to his room, but walking through the common area, the sofa caught his eye. Just for a second. He just needed to sit down for a moment.

Travis sank into the couch cushion and closed his eyes. He desperately needed to rest. Soon, the softness of the cushions eased him to sleep. His mind drifted, and he could tell he was falling asleep, but he was past the point of caring. It felt good to rest...

Mountains. Clouds. wind.
There was everything.
An expanse of nothing.
An all consuming wing.
Wrapped him up. Filled him with feathers.
Black as night.
Glistening with moon.

A voice. Music.
The thunderbird fled.
He fell. The music caught him.
Gently down.
Down.

Down.

Down.

To a room made of stars.
Watch them turn.
Twist.
Spiral.
Envelope him.
They were warm. So warm.
He was close.
Too close.
They burned.
Made of fire.

Stop!
The stars let him go.
Travis breathed...

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

It was the middle of the day, which meant it was the perfect time to try and catch a little sleep while he could. There was an arm chair in the common room that he'd turned to face the wall. He was curled up in it, beanie pulled over his messy hair and over his eyes as he slept, lounged in the chair.

Monroe was exhausted. It felt as if he was truly never really rested. Sure, he could pull out of dreams. He knew how to now but it took energy and he only did it when he really had to. He'd fallen into nightmares, wet dreams, weird dreams, you name it. He didn't remember the last time he'd had one of his own.

He'd only been asleep for just over an hour and it was peaceful, the most peaceful sleep he'd gotten in a long time. It was actually replenishing his energy, which meant that nobody had decided to take a nap nearby at this point in the day. That was a victory. Well, it had been.

He knew something was going to change when images began to morph in his head, a ton of random images flooding his vision, although he couldn't see a person who these images belonged to. It was strange.

[Travis Morgan]

Travis laid on the ground. Staring up at the stars, which were staying at a respectable distance now. There was long grass beneath him. Everything was still now. A wide expanse of nature. The sky went on forever.

Travis turned his head. "Michael?" He was there. Standing over him. In shadow.

"You need to let go." He said.

"What?"

Michael smiled, and disappeared. Travis sat up. "...what's that supposed to mean?" He rubbed his head and looked around. Michael was gone. But there was someone else. Travis looked at him and tilted his head.

"Who are you?" He heard himself ask.

The wind blew, and the grass rustled.

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

Monroe felt the scene morph around him and he looked around. Was he in a forest? A blonde boy was laying on the ground and talking to someone talking in front of Monroe, another guy, a fleeting vision of someone who was telling the blonde that he needed to let go.

He wouldn't answer why and disappeared instead. "Sorry you didn't get your question answered. People in dreams tend to be bastards like that. There one minute, gone the next. You're one with very...fleeting images for dreams. Interesting." It was like he was taking inventory of who had what kind of dreams. It was true though, dream versions of people that were conjured up in people's heads hardly ever liked to comply with one's demands.

"Damn, do I have to go through this every time? Sorry...it's just...nobody apparently knows who I am, yet everybody dreams about me. Funny how that works, but you seem relatively harmless and not like you'll beat me up after intruding on your dreams, so I'm Monroe."

[Travis Morgan]

Travis blinked. He hadn't actually noticed that he was dreaming. Of course, it made perfect sense now that he thought about it.. he just hadn't been thinking about it.

"Yeah," he pondered, "fleeting images.. awkward angles.. bad lighting.. I usually can't see what I'm doing. This one's pretty cooperative, actually.

"So.. wait.. are you like an actual person? Like.. you're not just part of my weird subconscious? You exist out there somewhere?" Travis made a sweeping motion with his arm to indicate out there, like the world outside of this dream had a particular direction.

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

"Sorry...didn't mean to weird you out. Most people don't know that they're dreaming. They think it's reality, but...yeah, I'm an actual person. I'm not a figment of your imagination if that's what you mean, but if I am, you definitely have good taste," Monroe joked, watching the boy make a hand gesture. "Yeah, actually I go to Hammel--which I'm guessing is where you are, because I wouldn't enter someone's dream who was miles away."

The blonde must be new. Monroe didn't know everybody, but he knew enough people being a senior.

[Travis Morgan]

"So... You're power is getting sucked into other people's dreams? That seems.. like it could get pretty uncomfortable. I'm sorry." Travis scratched the back of his head. The landscape was starting to go a little wobbly.

The sky was spiraling. It looked a bit like Van Gogh's Starry Night.. but somewhat darker. Somewhat more imposing. Then the stars began streaking out of the sky. Like fireworks.. but more dangerous. A star landed on the grass next to Travis, and he jumped up.

"Wow," he muttered, standing next to Monroe, "the sky is falling. Really?" Travis looked up at his dreamscape. "Putting a little too fine a point on it aren't you?" Another star shot out of the sky and landed at their feet. "I might be a little stressed out. Just got to Hammel like.. a week ago--" He stepped back as another star fell. "It's possible that I find it completely overwhelming. Maybe we should be somewhere else now."

Travis turned around and looked out over an expanse of glistening white snow. Mountains. They were in the mountains. He glanced over his shoulder to see that they were standing in the mouth of a cave, and they weren't alone. There was a dragon. Sleeping. With blue, iridescent scales.

"Wow," Travis breathed, "really stressed out, apparently. Maybe it's a nice dragon?"

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

"Yep," Monroe confirmed. "And uncomfortable is an understatement. A very big understatement. It's awkward and weird and let's just say I'm glad that your dream isn't about you getting it on with someone else. I've been in far too many of those."

He looked up at the sky, following Travis' gaze. It was swirling and then things actually began falling from the sky. "You know, I'm not sure Freud could even analyze this dream." It was so entirely random. He moved out of the way as another star plummeted from the sky. "And stressed is understandable. Powers suck and are a bitch to get used to." He would know. "Your stress is probably just amplifying the insanity of your dream. You haven't gotten much sleep lately have you? As an exhausted person, I can recognize other exhausted people. A great talent, I know."

He watched as the scenery changed, letting out a sigh. Snow covered mountains. Now this seemed more peaceful. That is, until he turned around to see a sleeping dragon. "A dragon? Really?"

[Travis Morgan]

"Apparently," Travis sighed, pressing a hand to his forehead. "I am really tired. There are so many people here!" A frigid wind tore past them to punctuate Travis' frustration. "And what, I ask you, is the point of being asleep if this is going to happen. This is like.. the opposite of restful!"

At least in this dream Travis didn't seem to have a problem communicating. He was talking now better than he did in real life. That weird dream sensation made the conversation seem less real. Less like he was having a conversation, and more like he was watching himself have a conversation.

Travis took a deep breath to calm himself and looked at the dragon again. "Hey," he said after a moment, "d'you wanna try to ride the dragon?"

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

Monroe understood how the guy felt to a certain point. So many people was frustrating and really zapped his energy but he didn't understand fully because he didn't know that the blonde was an empath. "I understand, believe me. I fall into dreams all the time that aren't mine...and I'm never rested even when I'm sleeping."

He turned slowly, fully facing the dragon that was sleeping. Couldn't he just change the scene again? You could technically control your own dreams right? It was your dream and...lucid dreaming. He'd heard of it. It was all about awareness and control, but he wasn't about to give Travis a lesson on lucid dreaming.

"Ride the dragon?" Monroe stared at him for a long moment as that wasn't what he expected him to say next. "It's not going to kill us?"

[Travis Morgan]

"But we're dreaming," Travis said and looked over at Monroe. His brow knitted briefly. "But.. I mean if you really don't want to thats fine." He studied Monroe's face for a second. Feeling.

Maybe someplace less dangerous. There seemed to be some discomfort with the idea of being killed by a dream-dragon, and Travis wasn't one for making people uncomfortable.

It made him uncomfortable too.

Travis smiled, then sat down on the ground and closed his eyes. This was his dream, right? Right. So he could make it be whatever he wanted. Calm.. Calm..

Slowly the landscape changed again. The mountains melted around them, and the dragon was swallowed up in them. Travis breathed slow. Visualizing someplace serene. Someplace quiet. After some time, they were in a small clearing. Young trees made a circle around a patch of short grass. There was still snow falling, dusting the scene with white. Pink and blue flowers poked through the cottony snowflakes, and an old oak tree grew tall at one end of the clearing.

Travis opened his eyes slowly and looked around. "Thats better," he said, "and no dragons, I think." He looked up at Monroe, still smiling. "This should be a bit more restful."

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

"I know it's a dream, but it's hard to explain. Being a dreamwalker, everything feels ten times more real and I'm not so sure death would be very pleasant here, whether it's actually happening or not," Monroe explained to the young blonde. He'd never actually died in a dream, but he didn't want to experience it. Something about it made him really uncomfortable.

Before he'd really thought about it, or decided to ask the kid to change the dream, it did and he assumed it was the guy's influence. "I know you're stressed, but if you're aware you're dreaming, your dream doesn't have to be shitty. You can change it." Although most of the time people weren't aware they were dreaming. Monroe guessed that's what he was there for.

"Winter, huh? My favorite season," he said, looking around at the falling snow. He hated the heat and was waiting for summer to pass. "Let's hope there isn't any snow dragons lurking about," he said as he looked at the boy.

He got a strange vibe from him. "You said you're stressed. I don't mean to judge, but you seem rather carefree here in your dreamscape. Although I guess that's how most people are, given it's not a nightmare."

[Travis Morgan]

"Yeah.." Travis mused, "I'm sort of awkward in real life. People are scary. I mean, I know you're a real person.. But everything has that hazy dream feeling and... Also I don't seem to have the ability to censor what comes out of my mouth here."

Travis laid back on the snowy grass with his hands behind his head. He looked up into the sky, watching the snow fall towards him. "So, do you ever get to have your own dreams? Because.. I'm pretty sure not dreaming unhealthy."

[Thomas "Monroe" Montgomery]

"People are scary but I can assure you that I am not. Seriously. I'm harmless," Monroe told the guy. He was pretty good at reading people and this guy definitely seemed like a shy, introverted kind of person. It wasn't a bad thing, but the good thing about dreams was that you could be anybody you wanted to be, because it wasn't as if you were really being judged or known for it.

He laughed, almost sort of bitterly as he joined Travis in the snow. "I don't remember the last time I had my own dream. It doesn't happen too often anymore. It's always somebody else's and it's not healthy. Not when I'm so sleep deprived all the time. My caffeine intake is ten times that of a normal person."

[Travis Morgan]

"That's really not good for your heart," Travis commented, turning his head to look over at Monroe. "If you want.. I could try to wake up or something. Let you get back to your own brain?"

Without waiting for an answer, Travis closed his eyes and screwed up his face like he was concentrating really hard on something. "Aaaaaannnnd... Awake!" He opened his eyes again. Monroe was still there, as was the snow, and the grass. Travis sighed. "Or not.. Hey what happens if you go to sleep in a dream?"

He'd never been so curious about dreams before. He wan't usually aware when he was having one, and if he was aware, it never occurred to him to do anything. But now he was interested. Lucid dreaming was fun.