[OPEN] gotta get worse before you get better

[eidxiety]

Who: Ain & Whoever wants to put up with this
What: Add disappeared, so it's time for mental breakdown #3
When: End of month, after the dream event ends
Where: Various places in the Grove, see prompts
Warnings: death and grieving, hallucinations, mentions of suri, probably yandere shit, more TBA


i. Open - Across the River

[And so a glorious dream ends, the flower bud spits Ain onto the ground, and he goes about moping for several days, like everyone else does. The dream's burrs are still hooked underneath his skin, pulling at the corners of his mind. On occasion, something dances behind his vision, a blur at the corner of his eye, a voice he's heard before but cruel and twisted and wrong. Ain's eyes stay unfocused whenever this happens. Such things aren't White Lily's fault — sure, none of that helped Ain's already-fragile mental state, and his awakening had been particularly rude — but it's not like she had ever intended to force these twisted versions of dreams on him. That had been Suri, of course, taking advantage of the fact that Ain's psyche is starting to fragment day by day. Yet he shows no signs of Corruption, dragon-blessed as he is, so it seems this is merely an attack of advantage.

They aren't real. He should know this. It doesn't seem like he does, though, so the cruel hallucinations of his friends continue to torment him. Yes, of course his ideal was that everyone could be together in peaceful times (and maybe he could stay with all his partners forever), why are they being so needlessly brutal toward him about it? Ain doesn't get it, does not everyone want to live peacefully with their friends? Is that, like, weird? Is it the marriage thing? Yeah, it's probably the marriage thing. He always knew he was a freak, that's what people told him anyway, people outside the dream.

In all of this, though, what's gutting Ain the most is that while he was asleep, Add went missing. The bracelet's signal is nonexistent, the metal loop cumbersome and cold. The hallucination version of his friend-turned-partner has nothing helpful to say about this, and although half of Ain's brain logically understands that this isn't real — Add is dead and gone, disappeared while Ain was completely disabled — the part that's too tangled up in itself to escape can't fathom that this could be anyone else talking to him. It's a careful push and pull, tug-o-war with him at the centre of it all.

From where he's seated on the opposite side of the river, the side where Wolfwood and Livio's house is at, nestled away in an alcove that he and Elsword like to camp at. He sits forward, knees pulled to his chest, the amethyst-inlaid bracelet that was once connected to Add's sitting on his right wrist instead of with the others on the left.

He's talking to someone. Well, to you he's talking to himself, but to Ain, he and Add are currently arguing. Bad news all around here.]

You always leave. Why are you getting mad at me? Did you forget all the times you've run off without us? [... ... ...] You're being more of a dick than usual today!

[Nevermind, he's not talking. He's yelling.]

ii. Closed to the BFs/Elsword - Bakery

[The dream-hooks are still wedged into the folds of Ain's brain, but today, it seems that he's somewhat broken out of it and can focus... at least enough to know that things are very wrong, that he's wearing a bracelet-link belonging to a dead man, and that something is wrong with his brain right now. This is not exactly a cry for help, though, because lately Ain hasn't really been doing that. Surely the turbulent emotions, the back-and-forth, has been just as bad for the still-living partners that are bracelet-bound to him? For Ezell in particular, it's not like he needed that aid to see how Ain's doing, but the other two... yeah. Oh yeah. Sorry, boys. At least Elsword is so far spared the wrath of Ain's violent mood swings, right?

Ain has dragged you upstairs to his room. His room, exclusively. No longer his and Add's, where the plushies of the man in particular are dragged to the forefront of the room, no longer hidden because Add was weird about them at the time; they're sitting on the top bunk of the bed now where he normally keeps the ones of Elsword (sorry Elsword, hi Elsword), staring down at you as Ain grabs you by the wrist and pulls you into the room.]

You have to stay here tonight. I don't want anything to happen to you, or for us to enter another dream and one of us to go missing overnight.

[It sounds so rational when he phrases it like that, but the way his eyes dart around say he hasn't at all woken fully up yet himself. That, and the fact that the bracelet basically pings with the emotional equivalent of if you leave me alone right now I will chase you down and knock you unconscious and drag you back here to be supervised by me personally might be a dead giveaway that this request is not based in anything rational at all.]

iii. Open - Outside the Dimensional Library

[And then Ain disappears for a bit, both to pray to Ourania and ask her to fix the nasty scars Suri gave him ages ago — they're cute, swirling whorls of silver now, still there but far less damaging to look at — and to head off to the strange portal-library. Despite his best judgement, of course. The last time he was there, he walked out and Vash was dead on the ground.

That was nice.

He's gone for a few hours. Part of it is spent crying into the Bibcoons. Part of it is spent talking to something within it. He emerges just fine after, though, no worse for wear and having presumably gotten his fill of books. The dream still has him, but it's lighter now. Less harmful, less of Suri's claws, more peaceful. His eyes still dart around, and he still answers things that aren't there to your eyes, but he seems... better. Happier? As though he's mysteriously bounced back from everything that's been happening over the last while.

He's laughing at something over his left shoulder, having a full conversation seconds later. Behind his heels is Dachie, trotting along after his master as usual. The owldog's eyes lock with yours, and he tilts his head, ears flicking back in that way disturbed animals often do.

Something isn't right.]

Comments

[foreversembrace]

[Till lives in a very, very fucked up world. He's been around people who are deeply hurt and traumatized, and have developed coping methods out of necessity for survival. He doesn't always understand them, but he's seen it in other kids, in other young adults just like him. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to look at Ain, hear him say that, and realize that something's very wrong.

They've just come out of the dream, right? The dreams turned nightmare that seemed so real and perfect, but were just another beautiful lie.

...they're not in them anymore. Right...?]

...your. Friends. Are they still...here?

[eidxiety]

Mm, yeah.

[Great answer! Mmmyeah they're still there, mmmmmyeah Rena is trying to introduce herself to a man who won't respond to her, mmmyeah mysteriously no one is bothered when they don't get a response to what they're saying, because this dream that Ain is in is meant to help him and not necessarily be entirely realistic. They're all acting based on Ain's memories of them, after all.

Dachie's ears droop, and he rrrrffs. He doesn't get it either.]

[foreversembrace]

[Till is...absolutely not equipped to know how to help Ain in this situation. He really is not. Like yes, he knows what this looks like, but if he knew how to help he would have by now...and long before now, even.

For a long moment he isn't sure what to say, lifting a hand to nervously tug at the scarf around his neck. Given the fragile state Ain's clearly in, one wrong word could make things a thousand times worse. He shares a glance with Dachie, feeling Jiblang make stressed noises against his ear.]

...I was thinking I was kindof hungry, actually.

[Till suddenly blurts, veering away from the topic of hallucinated friends entirely.]

Is the bakery open?

[eidxiety]

Haha, it should be. Ezell usually doesn't close it down unless something major happens.

[Ain will start walking Till that way, Dachie in tow. It's not a long walk and Till could go there himself, but they're hanging out! They're chillin! Dream-Ciel is asking if he should make lunch and Ain actually responds to it out loud:]

Yeah, haha, we probably should.

[Knowing that he's not actually going to get lunch from Ciel sucks, but he'll live... he sort of has to.]

[foreversembrace]

[Till, who had been doing so good to try to not point too direct of a light on Ain's current situation, finds himself blurting before he can think better of it:]

Should what?

[eidxiety]

Oh, sorry— make lunch.

[The light is on Ain now sorry bud.]

I can't cook, though. I've been learning, haha, but it's a slow process. I think it's better if you grab something premade so I don't give you food poisoning.

[foreversembrace]

[It's enough to basically confirm his suspicions, but the thing is...he doesn't know the el search party, or anything about them, so he can't really picture who- or what- Ain thinks he's talking to.

He just knows that it's...worrying. And it's probably something he should tell somebody about, but he wouldn't even know where to begin. Then again, he thinks if he were in Ain's position, he'd be pissed off if someone did that to him...ugh, he doesn't know.]

Whatever you could cook probably isn't any worse than some of the shit I've eaten in my life, trust me.