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KittyClaws33 widens her eyes as she is suddenly in a room.

Before, she was in front of that caterpillar with the hookah and then in a blink of an eye she was in an empty room.

She looked around, and saw that the room was bare but then at the end, an exit appeared.

"Oh," she exclaimed as she moved forward towards the exit sign.

But as she stepped forward the room seemed to shift and when she ran towards the exit it disappeared completely.

"N O O O O O O O O O OOOOOO!" A tiny girl screamed, and she turned around sharply, knowing the cry of that voice.

What stood before her was a memory that she had forgotten...and hoped that it would stay that way.

Her brother was yelling at a women his age and he held the childhood version of herself in his arms.

"Lizzie...," he said, his voice cracked as tears run down his face.

"I'm so sorry, Cain, but I just can't!" The women had her arms up, clutching the middle of her chest.

KittyClaws33 looked down, knowing what the scene was suppose to play out.

That women was the love of Cain's life, Elizabeth. But because of her selfishness, Lizzie had left Cain and Cain, torn between the love of a family member and the love of his future life, he choose to stay with her.

When she was young she loved her brother dearly enough to be selfish enough so that he would never leave her.

Their family was big and it was already hard enough as it already was but to have the only family member that loved and care her leave because of someone else...?!

But in turn....Cain had changed. He still loved her to death but even so, the light that was in his eyes before had dimmed.

And it was her fault.

She turned and rush through the exit, tears running down her eyes. She wasn't looking where she was going and a palm appeared before her and smacked her on the chest.

She stumbled backwards and landed on her butt and looked up.

She stared in surprise that a single arm...was coming out of a single mirror.

Her eyes widen as a full figure...of herself step forward, but it wasn't what she expected her true self to be.

She had long purple hair, a dizzy princess looking eyes that held a hint of selfishness and cruelty. The outfit she was wearing, was that of a goth lolita, an outfit she had worn when she was little.

She was the complete opposite of the self she was before, punk rock, short hair and piercings.

"Surprise? You shouldn't be." It said with so much malice in it's voice.

"Who-" But she didn't get a chance to finish her sentence. "I'm you," it said, "I'm the one who loves Cain and no one else will get near him. Not. Even. You," it finished with a sugary sweetness in it's voice as a dagger appeared in it's hands.

She scrambled up from the floor and her own dagger appeared in her own hands, tears streaming down her face. "N-no!"

"Oh but I am!" It jump forward, slicing her cheek and it kept on cutting her, dealing blow after shallow blow, never giving her a chance to attack.

"CAIN BELONGS TO ME AND ONLY TO ME! I DON'T CARE WHO OPPOSES ME! NOT EVEN CAIN!" It's face no longer looked pleasant and sweet but it was angry and it laughed. "I DON'T CARE HOW CAIN FEELS! HE ONLY BELONGS TO ME!"

Her eyes widen in determination as the thought of her beloved brother crying. "NEVER!"

With so much conviction in her voice, she summoned up all her energy and attacked the mirror image in one fell swoop.

In that moment, she had made a promise to herself. That Cain's happiness was her happiness as well.

It didn't matter if it hurt her, even if Cain would, in the end, be far away from her. It was her turn to make him happy.

In that instant, the mirror image was no longer her. The person that defeated the image was the true her.

Or as the caterpillar would say, "You are you."

She stared at the ground, heavy breathing. Her surroundings had changed back to the forest.

She stared in surprise and lifted her boot.

There.....was a card, her reward.

A cake had been a most unexpected find. Unexpected, but not unwelcome. The gryphon had stared down the sugary treat for long moments, debating having a taste, weighing all possible consequences. It Looked delicious, even benign. Certainly a little taste wouldn't hurt.

And that, perhaps, was the perfect reason to throw caution to the wind and dive in, figuratively speaking, that is. As everything around her grew, cheek still filled with lemony delight, Pckt had to admit she more or less expected this to happen. This was wonderland, she'd eaten strange cake, shrinking was inevitable.

"Who are YOU?"

The voice, rude, turned her around, and she gave the caterpillar on it's mushroom wide as as it regarded her in stony silence. What did it mean who was she? She was herself. She was Peyton, she was a Sun Hunter, she knew exactly who she was.

But apparently she took too long to answer. Glowing eyes narrowed, and next she knew it was blowing smoke at her, billows of it. More smoke than was phsyically possible.

"Find out!" The voice floated back at her, still rude, through the haze.


The room was pink. The had both loved pink, so their mother had talked their father into letting them paint the walls a bright, vibrant pink. It was loud, almost obnoxious, but they had loved it. It was the room she had shared with her younger sister for 9 years. The room she had grown up in, because anything after it had not been childhood as it was meant to be lived. It was the room in their first home, before everything had gone wrong.

It held a pair of twin sized beds up against opposite walls. There was a wide desk between them under a window, bookshelves to either side filled with either girl's preference. Figurines and stuffed animals were scattered everywhere, but despite the color, the room had never been overly girly. Just bright. PcktHottie stood in the middle of the once shared room, and she blinked at the familiar walls before a sound drew her attention to Astrid's bed. She was there, a miniature version of herself, laying on her stomach with feet kicked up and attention on the coloring book she was working on. There was a half colored picture of a Disney princess on the page. Belle, she thought, but the dress had been colored purple, the hair blonde. It was pretty, but it was inaccurate, and Hots had remembered pointing it out with a quiet chuckle and being told her sister had liked it better that way.

A smile tugged at her lips, and she took a step towards the bed, before stopping herself, arms wrapping around her stomach as the smile faded and her head shook. This wasn't real, not anymore. This was in the past, and you couldn't live in the past. No matter how happy you might have been in it.

Backing up, she reached back blindly for the doorknob and pulled, stepping through, into a different room.

It was grey. Not the wall color, but the entire memory room and everything in it, including herself. She was sitting at a desk, Elbow braced, chin resting in her upturned palm. Her attention was directed down into the open pages of a well worn book. It was quiet. Silent even. Nothing was happening. Nothing moved.

Nothing changed.

Head shaking, Hots backed up again, back the way she'd come, through the door. Away from what it might have been if she'd stayed.

A dead end.

The room she found herself in next was large, well furnished. She'd never seen it before, but somehow she knew she was on the second floor in the dorms. A glance towards the door showed a pair of coats hanging beside it. One small, hints of minty green spreading up against the familiar crest of a sun. The other was a tree, Life. Noah? Maybe.

Curiously she crossed the living room and headed for the bedroom, but when she passed through the doorway and into the next room the only thing that lay within was a full sized mirror. The door closed behind her, and Peyton Jumped, startled, before a laugh drew her gaze forward once again in time to see a smiling figure step through the reflective glass. Short, deceptively delicate in appearance, but radiating in confidence. She stared into familiar lavender eyes, and felt her lips pull back in a cold sneer. Blades in either set of small hands, the pair charged at one another.

Metal clanged, as they collided, slashing, stabbing, moving past each other. There was a second that stretched on infinitely, then one of the figures staggered, fell, and melted into smoke.

The scenery melted away. Grass towered over her again, a mushroom sat before her, and on it, a sugary confection.

Victory tasted sweet.

[I suck and forgot to roll for Nergui, so here is her roll. 8|
It goes with that post right up there.^]]

S.cargo no longer seemed to be surprised to find bits and pieces of edible food lying about and, much like others before her, had learned that they often led to helping her solve her problems. This place seemed to have some sense of.. well, sense.

When she'd shrunk this time she didn't seem to suffer the slightly nauseating sensation as the first couple of tries and for that alone she was glad. By the time the smoke began to clear she wasn't sure if she was glad to be free of the caterpillar or afraid of what this new place might be..

Even after standing there a moment, she wasn't quite sure what it was.

Examining her hands, she appeared to be.. very young. Yet she was still her, she thought. Her eyes swept up to the over-large dining table to her left and the large, plush couch to her right. Everything was done in faded yellows, like an old photograph.

She hesitated as she walked forward, staring straight across the room to a plain door.

"Don't leave me, sugar pie." Her heart stopped so hard in her chest that she was sure she was going to die. Was she already dead? Panic filled her as she stared across the room at her father.

"Daddy?" It was her voice, but young. He was perfect. Dark hair, green eyes, and the most dashing soldier she had ever seen. His dimples made her heart melt.

But..

She swallowed and looked away from his open arms, toward the door. There was only one way that could be her father, and she didn't think it included an exit. With her heart in her throat she crossed the room, reached for the door and pushed. Her dad's confused cry followed her until the door shut behind her.

Here she was more comfortable. Around her sat toys long forgotten, over-sized and over-stuffed. An immediate joy filled her as she raced across the room, exit and caterpillar forgotten. She flopped down next to a unicorn with a sparkly horn, plush and purple and perfect.

She picked up a hoof and turned it over in her little hands, tracing the crooked heart stitched lovingly on the bottom with impossibly petite fingers. Voices filled the room.

"What should we name him?"

"I don't know, Daddy."

"A heart and a name, that's the deal cutie pie."

A sigh fluttered through the room, small and exaggerated and ruined by a small giggle at the end.

"Yoo-sa!"

"..what is yoo-sa, honey?" The man's voice sounded confused.

"Yoo...sss...aaa!" The child spoke slowly, as if she were reading something clumsily.

"Oh, no, that's u, s" he stopped "yoo-sa is a beautiful name."

"I know!" Her giggle was joined by a heart laugh, and the voices faded..

Tiny S.cargo stared at her own hands, holding the unicorn. It had been so long. She could just stay here forever, with yoo-sa, and maybe daddy would come home..

Panic filled her and she reluctantly let go of the unicorn's foot. She pushed herself backwards across the floor, scooting until she got her feet under her to run to the next door. She flung it open and ran in without looking.

It was dark. Way too dark. As the door to the last room shut behind her, she could barely see her own little hand when she reached out. She turned to her left and lightening struck in the distance - bright and sudden and so terrifying she couldn't stand it.

A yelp escaped her and she quickly clamped both hands down over her mouth. Too late. A light flickered on in the room and her mother stared at her from a large bed. Mascara streaks stained her face and her beautiful hair was ruffled. Empty bottles lined the edge of the bed on the floor below and an envelope was dropped among them.

"Come here, hunny," she begged softly, inhaling with a sniffle.

She, as an adult-child, knew what this was. She hadn't made the connection until that moment but now it was just so obvious. So painfully obvious. She was halfway across the room when she remembered it wasn't real. Her mother's face made her weak, the envelope was a sickening taunt.

She turned and looked at a misplaced door, the sight of it solidifying her mind and helping her ignore the begging, drunk sobs of the woman in the bed. Doing her best to ignore sounds around her, she crossed the room and turned the doorknob.

It wasn't a spectacular room, but it was bright and vivid. Her hand was a stark contrast, small and dull and yellow like a faded photograph. Ahead of her a mirror shimmered. A tall, beautiful woman crawled out and for a moment she thought to cry out for her mother.

But those eyes were green, not her mother's perfect blue.

Realization hit her and tiny S.cargo swallowed down her gasp. The real S.cargo was colorful and vibrant, but confused. She was hesitant as she stepped forward and kneeled down, matching bright eyes to bright eyes.

"You're not real," whispered tiny S.cargo.

"And you are? I'm not a baby." But something in her voice hinted that she wasn't as brave as she thought.

For a moment, tiny S.cargo thought about crying. She could just plop down and wail until her mother came to get her and..

No.

Tiny S.cargo wasn't just tiny S.cargo. She was all of her! She had faced her mother, her memories, and her losses alone. The woman staring at her looked brave, but she was more hesitant than tiny S.cargo felt.

"Hey, wait," the real S.cargo hesitated, staring down at her hands. "Are you getting brighter?"

She glanced at her own hands and, indeed, she seemed to be growing increasingly more vivid. As she glanced over at the real S.cargo she saw why - the woman was rapidly losing color and age.

"You forgot," she said suddenly, and the real S.cargo stared up at her suddenly. "We forgot. We were so sad that we just wanted to forget, so we forgot it all." Each word and she grew older, brighter. The real S.cargo withered in front of her, but she kept going. "Don't forget who you are," she whispered, "and who loves you."

A heart and a name, that's the deal cutie pie

Loss struck her hard in the chest as she let all the things she had forgotten overwhelm her, and at last the real S.cargo (or was she fake?) disappeared. Still, loss was a feeling and she welcomed the pain with a grim smile.

Find OUT.

OUT. The sign flashes, the intermittent rough pink light on a haze of smoke that is a textbook illustration for gritty down-and-out.

He exhales a final tendril of smoke himself, contributing to the general squalor, and the cheap carpet under his bare feet is matted with a dozen things not worth examining or thinking about too closely.

Thinking about anything too closely is not what one does here, in this room in this house. That is, after all, the entire point. Alex in the corner rocks back and forth distractedly with his fingers suspended over the keyboard unmoving. The perpetually-written Great American Novel has been sitting three-chapters-finished on Alex's hard drive for over a year now. The laptop is part of the ritual, for him. Taym forever vomits ten minutes later, every damn time, like clockwork ("Taym's our canary. That's how we know it's good," Mike jokes to a nervous-eyed new kid watching him retch into the kitchen sink), and Alex has his work-in-(imaginary)progress.

The expected implements are arrayed in a neat row on the floor. Ritual: a well-chosen word. A series of carefully-observed and somewhat superstitious steps, an illusion of control and orderliness that invests the self-destruction with a sense of care and responsibility. He always knows, every time, that despite the meticulously-followed, sacrosanct process, the ritual is a farce.

"Sharon called," Alex says, and he jumps because he'd somehow thought of Alex there as he'd have thought of a corpse, or a toy, or a discarded shoe. The realization makes him want to go and heave up into the kitchen sink. "She's coming over and bringing--"

"Shut up," says Taym, very quietly.

Alex shuts up, bewildered, and Taym kneels down and he examines the apparatus of enjoyable self-destruction, turning each item over and over in his hands until he comes to the last.

"I just--"

"Shut up."

"Yeah, but are you gonna--"

"Shut up."

Of course he is. Of course he is. Just once, back into a space where thinking doesn't hurt because thinking is impossible.

But of course he isn't.

He tries to pocket the lighter at least but it won't, for reasons he cannot understand, stay in his hands when he stands.

"You're never gonna finish that book," Taym tells Alex. "You're gonna hock the laptop and forget to save a copy and you're going to say you're trying poetry instead, but you aren't going to finish any of those, either. You'll never be the next Steinbeck, but you could probably have managed something decent, but you won't. Because I love you, man, but you're a ******** up. Both of us are ******** ups."

Alex stares at him, and Taym, closing his eyes, fumbles his way to the exit sign. The door opens and on the other side is the smell of bleach and smoke and of someone else's skin, distinct and immediate because it does not belong here and never will.

He could have guessed this one, really. And it could have been almost anyone, but it's always the latest. Always the flavor of the week: he has never been one for a harem, even in the days when he probably could have managed one, and the biological term is, he thinks, serial monogamy. Because he's an addict--right? One thing at a time, and that thing to the exclusion of all others. The only words for affection that he knows are the language of brief, possessive obsession.

Her slim bare leg lies above the tangle of the sheets, her toe flexing back and forth restlessly; she is reading some trashy magazine again with a pen in hand although why she bothers, since it's B's all the way, he isn't sure. There is a freckle high on her inner thigh, almost in the hollow where it curves into her hip, a freckle that he knows in this room, in this world, he has very recently kissed, and he wants to tell her about discovering that freckle and every hidden thing about her; he wants to tell her about finding, on the lower back of his first girlfriend as she got up to find a change of clothes, a tiny scar he had not known she'd had, and the thrill of that small secret she hadn't even realized she was divulging, and he wants to tell her: this is why your notes are a mistake.

He leaves tomorrow for the Sahara, and he's promised her that he'll come back because his whole life has been a series of promises he had neither the ability nor the intention to keep, but that's tomorrow, and there's a half a day and a whole night spread out in front of them and her hair, backlit by the dim bedside lamp, is a flame that makes his knees weak: phoenix. The dorm beds are narrow and laughably unsuited but she is slim and he is barely more than a breath and there is space beside her if he keeps her close, space enough to curl around her naked shoulder and to put his forehead to the curve of her neck.

"Oh," she says, playfully reading off the page with a salacious flip in her voice: "Is your man as open as a 24 hour diner, or is he so closed-off you'd need a SWAT team to break through? Find out with this romantic quiz."

He has no claim to exclusivity; he can't hold her or own her in any meaningful way. So he's given himself a half a day and a whole night to quietly and secretly, behind the closed doors of his own desires, pretend. Because it wouldn't mean anything anyway. Because there is no stability here, even if she'd wanted it. Because the best he could ever hope for, now--the only thing he could possibly be permitted and that thing so laughably far-fetched it wasn't worth considering, especially with her as wild as an animal and as impossible to hold as a palmful of fire--was the sort of delusional sham Candace was setting up with Dakota. A meaningless word for a meaningless promise about a meaningless committment. A couple of sterile, tiny rooms, a couple of carefully-finagled hours between full work rosters, and then one of you dead at 25, 26, 27, and the other soon after.

"Jesus wept, the first question is so--," she begins, and then: "Where are you going?"

"Out," he says. And because his life is a series of promises he has neither the ability nor the intention to keep, he adds: "I'll be right back."

The human brain begins to anticipate patterns at two steps. Through the third door, his stomach clenched with dread, and he already on some level knows what is beyond it.

He thinks at first the room--the bland, impersonal, IKEA-furnitured room in a brand new mass-produced featureless split level in a brand new mass-produced featureless suburb visible through the broad windows--is empty. And he relaxes, but when he does the tiny hand slips into his and he closes his eyes.

"No," he whispers, "please."

She is confused, and she tentatively says the single word that will never stop breaking his heart, the name, the title which he has never properly earned unless enduring the sick terror of the vastness of his love for her counts as earning it, and perhaps it should. She says it like a question, and this, too, breaks his heart, as does everything she does and is.

A tiny piece of him, separate and distinct and fascinatingly unformed, waiting to be shaped by life, and there for him to shelter and protect.

"It's OK, sweetheart," he says, and she's too young to understand the break in his voice. She leads him to the little plastic table in the corner, a bright spot among all his fastidious white-and-wood furniture, to show him some thing that she has made, and her voice reaches him dimly through the pounding haze in his head and he sinks to his knees when she puts the blocks into his hands, still chattering in an explanatory fashion. She is so smart. Talked early; full sentences months ahead of the milestones, and solemn-eyed. She rarely laughs but she smiles constantly, always. She always smiles for him. He'd left her behind. He'd died for her, literally and figuratively, because he'd never wanted to see the day when the smiles stopped coming. He'd managed four birthday parties and knew he'd be dead by the fifth, or worse, that he simply wouldn't be there.

The neon exit sign flashes behind her, over the front door. There is no one else here, not even Grim: it is him and his daughter, and he can't leave her here alone.

It's not real

She is distracted by the task of carefully describing the scene she has set up: a couple of blue bricks for a boat, a white one she has informed him indicates a duck, a little round-headed plastic person. She does not see him shaking. She does not see the tears beading on his eyelashes where he can feel them heavy, waiting to fall.

Please. It's not real, sir. Please.

He cannot look away from her face, her tiny face with his cheekbones and his eyelashes and his dark solemn eyes, and distractedly he hides his tears by kissing her temple when she turns to make sure he is paying attention. Of course I am, sweetheart.

I was never supposed to see her again it isn't real, sir, please.

He has given up hiding from her now and he sobs openly and weakly, touching her long hair with his shaking hands and it is the fact that she does not react with worried care, with that ludicrously adult look of wide-eyed concern that she would sometimes give him when she caught him in a moment of weakness despite all his efforts to hide them from her, that makes him realize that Fiona is right and that this is not his daughter but a simulacrum, a shadow, an echo, a dream. He does not care. He clings to her, to this doll that looks and sounds and forms her clumsy sentences like his daughter, until Fiona's pleading rises into real distress and he realizes that she, too, is doing what he had not thought her capable of, and is weeping, her voice in his head broken around her intangible tears.

"Hang on a second, honey," he manages brokenly. "I'm going to go outside. I'll be right back," he promises her, he promises her, he promises her. "I'll be right back."

She clings to his hand and begs him to stay and he smoothes her hair back from her grave pale forehead and disentangles himself to leave. She does not cry. Not even the dream world, apparently, is that cruel.

The door closes behind him, and he leans against it to choke back his tears on his sleeves. His sleeves are white and gold and ornate; the sleeves are embroidered with crescent moons above the cufflinks. He steadies himself, because the only thing in this room is a mirror and he knows who he is now--he feels in the contortions of his face the twist and pull of the scar across his jaw and his cheek; he feels the easy power in his body as lean and self-assured as a tomcat's--and in this body, in this self, the mirror is not full of fear.

Every scar is the mark of a man who's proved himself worthy. A runic hunter seven years on the front line. There are plenty who owe him their lives, and he's somehow managed to keep his own.

But the face in the mirror is not that person's, and there is no easy smirk or long hair: there is a tired expression and lines too deep around the eyes.

"I'm sorry about this," Taym tells him, and he steps out of the mirror, and he sits down in a chair and he gestures for him to take a seat. He does, without thinking.

"Listen," says Taym, his voice exhausted. "I know there's supposed to be some epic fight to the death or something here, but we already did that once and I hate to be a d**k about it, but I won. I'm not sure if you remember."

He remembers.

"Right. So let's just skip that and we'll skip the Hobbit riddle games and the fiddle matches or whatever else you're thinking about right now and we'll make this easy. Convince me," he said, "why I ought to go back in there and why you ought to be the one that walks out of this room."

Convince me, he says to the him-that-isn't, the dream-him, why I ought to go back in there.

An expression of confusion flits across the scarred, sun-brown face.

Convince me, he says again.

"Because I'm better," the dream says, and Taym laughs a little hollow laugh.
"No ******** argument here, I just don't think that's a particularly great leap of reasoning. Nor entirely--sorry about this, I know it's a low blow; I would--in keeping with your divisional ethics."
Another flicker of bewilderment and Taym wants to punch the dream on the jaw or to break his nose or put his teeth on the curb. "What do you mean?"

"Aren't you all about self-sacrifice over there in Moon? Aren't you supposed to be the ones who get into the line of fire so that others can continue? Or is that how you managed to last seven years, by valuing yourself so highly? If you say yes I'm going to be so ******** disappointed but not even a little surprised."

"No." The answer was indignant, a flash of youthful rage. "******** never. I know my job. I'm just really ******** good at it."
"So do it now. Let me walk out of the room. You stay here. You were never real anyway."
"This is ******** nonsense. You're me. This is--it's not even suicide."
"Pseuicide," suggests Taym, and they both pause a minute to be pleased by this before the dream continues.

"So no. ******** you. I'm better than you. I did everything you couldn't."
"Like what?"
"I shut them up." He didn't have to say who. Both of them knew. "I shut them up without ever having to do what you did."
"You had an unfair advantage, though. You had a direction. What the ******** did I have? I did what ********... look at you, man. You look like a forty year old cancer victim."
"And you look exactly as much like an obnoxious, arrogant little s**t as you are. Fair?"
Silence.
"You ******** everything up. You left her. You left every one of them but you left her and she's what, a ******** orphan now, or as good as, because it's not like April's ever going to come back for her and thank god for that. You let her think you offed yourself. She's going to grow up thinking that she wasn't enough to make you stick around."
"She's going to grow up, though."
"What, like she wasn't if you stayed?"
"Maybe not. But that isn't what I meant."
"What is?"
"What's life expectancy for a runic hunter--" and he dropped the nickname drily, unimpressed "--pirate boy?"
Silence.
"You're twenty-five years old, ******** you."
"So she is going to grow up, because she existed. I managed it. I got exactly what you wanted. Idid everything you couldn't. And you know what? I am you, OK, I am you--you are me--and we are the same, and I did that for you, and I <******** it up. We ******** it up, man."
A long pause, and then: "It was worth it," the dream said, not a question.
"Not really," said Taym tiredly, and if he'd been talking to anyone else the words would have been blasphemy. "That much grief isn't worth a goddamned thing."
"So that's your argument."
"What is?"
"That you've suffered more than me, so I ought to be noble and self-sacrificing and let you go on to do some good."
"I don't know. I don't think I had an argument, but sure, that sounds good. Excellent reasoning, or something."
Another long pause. "If I do that for you now, you'll do it for someone else later." This time it was a question.
"I'll try my ******** hardest," he says.

It's a promise he will, for once, keep.

It hadn't been a debate, not really; it had ended on a technicality but the terms had been set and abided by and there is no need for them to establish aloud the victor, because they are each other and know full well who's won.

Self-sacrifice has always been the best high. And one of them is better at it. One of them knows the difference between sacrifice and self-immolation. That one stands.

Without looking back at the empty chair it walks to the mirror, and it climbs inside and is gone in a twist of smoke. Taym watches it go and he averts his eyes from the gaunt, weathered face of his own real reflection and absently he passes his fingers back and forth over the crossed scythes embroidered on his coat before he stands, painfully, achingly, to reach into the mirror frame and retrieve the little morsel now waiting there.

He sinks his teeth into it and he exhales, and when he does his breath is blue smoke, and he looks down at the spiked armor of his boots and the fur of his cloak.

Back to work, he thinks.

[Entering]

Coming upon a cake, Ash could not resist eating it. It was very pretty and tasted good as well. But then the world started to change around the Cheshire Cat. Growing large and larger. Until even the grass was unbelievably tall above her.

There is smoke, but no sound of anything burning, and she still had all her bits attached and in good condition so Ash decided to go to the great smoking mushroom looming ahead. Or rather, the great smoking caterpillar thing looming ahead.

The Cat starts to bristle under the stare and even more when the ... thing, asks her who she is.

Who is she?
As if it was any of its concern. Plus she's not so sure herself at the moment. She know she's dreaming, so maybe the dreaming and the dreamed her are different. That makes two of herself at last...

Coughing from the smoke Ash hear the imperious command to "Find out " before she finds herself in a room.
The room it tall, filled with morning light... And when she looks at herself she realises it's all wrong, this is definitely not herself!
She spots a door on the other side of the unfamiliar room made of clear wood, with a neon sign above it. The exit, perfect.

Starting in the direction of the door she passes dark forms made of dark wood, probably furniture but she doesn't pay much attention to it. Arrived at the center of the room she finds an etching in the ground that stops her in her tracks. She knows this shape.... A sword.. an asian looking sabre in fact. With long ribbons attached to the guard of it. she knows this object, she's sure of it. If she could only remember ! but just looking at it makes Ash happy. Hers, this is hers. But witch one of her selves? Tearing herself from the etching with difficulty, she makes her way to the door, never looking back, or she wouldn't be able to leave.

And once again the ghoul finds herself in a new room. This one's walls and ceiling are all black with tiny clear spots like stars. The ground looks like earth and grass... and spread from wall to wall is a pumpkin patch. There are people in a corner, a couple, looking at the ground. Not seeing what they are observing the Cheshire come closer.
The winged ones -valkyries her mind supplies- are looking at a baby. A tiny infant with white hair and very small wings without feather but only black fuzz.

The child is sleeping in the pumpkin leaves. The adults discussing their opinion of the baby. Ash feels like she's looking at herself, but were are the purple ears and stripped tail? In a daze she continues to stare, until the child wakes up and starts fussing about. Golden eyes...

Dumbfounded the ghoul realizes that this is her dreamer self's birth and adoption by her parents. She watches the couple pick the child up and start cooing at it to calm the baby.

She could have stood there watching the scene unfold for all eternity. Because none of her selves should remember this. She was much too young. Was this an illusion, or the real thing? So many questions.
But nagging at her mind is the fact that the caterpillar sent her here, and she was quite miffed at it. She could see the exit sign, it both hurt her eyes to look at it and beaconed her.

Stay or go?
Stay or go...?

Go, she had to go, she couldn't keep watching a reflection of things long past, she had other things to discover!

But making the decision and following through are quite different things. it took a lot of efforts to cross the kilometres to the door.... even it it was only 10 paces away. But exit this room she did.

Everything was suddenly small. The cake was delicious though. OCTOPU55Y guessed it was worth it? She wasn't sure. She suddenly felt as insignificant as a plankton-- which was funny, because her height was as small as one now, should she measure herself compared to one. As she listened to the flowers gossip around her, OCTO suddenly realized— wait, wait wait, was she really this small...? She couldn't have been. The flowers looked like trees with how tall they were. And flowers were extremely small when she last looked that them— they barely reached to half her leg... If she was that small... Oh no. She needed to be careful in case anyone was to step on her.

Suddenly, OCTO realized there was smoke sliding around her lazily, but it didn't smell like anything was on fire. Looking around warily, her eyes stumbled upon a very big mushroom. With a very very big caterpillar. OCTO really should've been attentive. Now she was going to get gobbled up and die. But it turned out, she didn't. Watching as the caterpillar sucked a long drag, she quirked an eyebrow at what it said before. Who are YOU?

She pursed her lips.

In what way did he mean? As in, her reputation? Or... Ghouls, she didn't know. OCTO wrinkled her nose slightly, tempted to reach for her pocket card and read off of it before going against it— but the caterpillar had let go of it's long breath of smoky air, it raveling all around her in a flourish. She couldn't see anything— didn't even feel the smoke enter her lungs. It was so real... But it wasn't. Her senses were all dimmed. "Find OUT," she heard, the voice echoing through her head as the wind picked up and the smoke vanished.


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Now she was in a white room. Well— not she, but another person. She wasn't... She wasn't herself.

A solid white room, reaching from one lane to the next. OCTO squinted at the other end. Over the door over there, there was a neon sign that said— what did that say?? She walked closer.

She literally walked to the middle and flat out stopped. Hundreds— millions of books littered the floor of the hallway. She was stepping over them, one by one, trying to ignore them, their marvelous covers, their knowledgeable spirits. If she stopped— IF SHE STOPPED, she wouldn't ever leave. EVER. Books, computers, libraries— anything that had to do with knowledge... All were things she would risk herself to read. But that was just what the room wanted, for her to stay, stay and fail. She had to keep going. She didn't even look back.


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The second door was a little harder.

"Imbereee~" OCTOPU55Y heard. She stopped. "Where are you going?" She turned around to look at the voice, surprised to see her two sisters there— the oldest, the youngest, and baby. "Come pway wit us!" She heard, seeing her youngest sister, Laymere, grabbing onto her younger sisters pinky. She was so tempted to run over and hold them. Oh, how she missed them... "Maybe later," She said to them, but they didn't seem to hear her. Their voices echoed in her ear again, and her desire grew more and more, but Imbere held strong— OCTO held strong. Reaching the door, she was finally able to read the text. 'Exit,' it said. OCTO pushed the door open, her sisters voices finally leaving her ears, making her relax— even if just a little.


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The last one was the worst.

As she approached the next door, OCTO stopped in the middle. The thing... It was a portal. To the human world. She gasped. How could they...?!? Her deepest desire was to visit it one day, to see what all the fuss about scaring other humans was about. Everything sucked down underwater. And she hadn't spent enough time in Halloween to want to stay... She heard such fun things about there.

But she had to wait her turn.

She couldn't jump in so recklessly. So she turned around and walked away, the burning desire still making her heart break from want.


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The plain room was small, and but the mirror was extravagant. When she stepped out of the mirror, OCTO couldn't help but wince. She... Was... Oh. She had to defeat herself before she could continue. Alright— alright, she could definitely do this. Her other self raised an eyebrow, a silent question— To which OCTO responded with a smirk— a yes. Both began asking each other random questions, filled with curiosity, each wanting to know more about the other. But her strength— her Real Self was too strong, too great, she couldn't, couldn't win, and she knew it. With a smirk, she disappeared into a cake. OCTO blinked. Did she...? She looked down, taking a piece of the cake and plopping it into her mouth, munching a little before feeling herself get smaller, even more smaller than before. But even though she felt so small, she felt great— stronger now, actually. Wait, did she step on...? No, oh, it was just a card. She took it with a smile, and quickly walked away, putting it away.

She was perfect the way she was.