Welcome to Gaia! ::

It never had been that Kyran was getting to be more adventurous, more daring, or more curious to how the outside world was really like. No, if he had a choice in the matter, he would remain sealed away from the rest of it and watch as everything passed by, from the sidelines, if only it would perpetuate the one thing he wanted to see occur. Why did his sister's happiness have to be so difficult to keep a hold of? Why did he have to keep screwing it up, time after time?

Kyran had taken the day to scout the area, informing Kiara of what he was planning on doing during the early part of the afternoon. He never expected to really run into anything out here, his true motives being a mite less obvious. Kyran just wanted to build up his capabilities of being more than just a nuisance to his more knowledgeable sister, to actually lend aid where necessary, become something more than a constant burden.

With the transformation initiated by the arrival of a magically-infused star-shaped artifact, the differences between the twins' abilities to coexist in their environment was made sharply, more blatantly, obvious. Merely taking into consideration skill, the quality of being able to adapt to a more human physique, the two couldn't have been more different -- much like the vast difference each of them displayed in temperament. Perhaps it was the fact that the two of them had shared a star, or maybe it was the separation of who gained the physical to who gained the mental aspects of being human, but Kyran was far from passing as a normal child.

He violently stumbled, foot snagged on a barely-upraised patch of grass before him. Crouching to the ground, his walking stick tumbling to lie beside him, Kyran took the opportunity to catch an aggravated breath. His hands were throbbing from leaning so heavily on the gnarled staff for balance over such a distance of time, so he rested them across the metal braces along his boots to cool them off. The fall of night had quickly descended over the past half an hour, but while Kyran felt more comfortable in this particular setting, he was a bit worried he may have strayed too far out from his and his sister's home before coming to realize the time. His sense of direction was not impaired, not in the slightest, but Kiara's insistence that he was prone to messing up even the simplest directions poisoned his confidence in his own abilities. I'm never going to get used to walking... he hissed to himself, allowing the shiny darkrai's words to puncture through his thoughts in the silence of the night.

After a few more moments of quiet solitude, Kyran gradually began noting a worrisome facet of where he was located. His head slowly rose from its resting place on a knee, blue eye flashing in the dark as the realization hit -- he smelled smoke. It wasn't a strong scent and he wasn't picking up the radiating heat, so it was likely a controlled fire, but... "A campsite? Out here?" he rasped, shakily rising back to his feet and pressing most of his upper weight on the staff in hand. In all the time he and his sister had taken up residence in the area, Kyran had not once run across anyone that ventured into camping this far out. There had been plenty of wild pokémon in the area, sure, but...

He shook his head, stealthily attempting to maneuver himself nearer. The light grew in intensity through the shrouding of underbrush, and the soft glow reinforced the fact that it was not an out-of-control flame. This... this could be bad; very bad. His pace slowed as he leaned on the back of a tree near the small clearing, where it appeared a teenaged pokémon-turned-teenager was busy making sure everything in the campsite was in order. The brunette... really looked out of his element, but that only elevated the skepticism within the darkrai's mind. Did the frail-looking teddiursa belong with the humans, or was he another feral pokémon out on his own? It appeared it was the former observation, and for all intents and purposes, it was probably safer to assume the worst. While Kyran was not particularly afraid of others, he feared for the sanctity of his and his sister's obscurity. They were suppose to remain unknown, hidden, lest the humans decide to drive them off again -- or, worse yet, capture the two of them. They were not entirely welcome to linger around the Gaians, and over time, the feeling became mutual. He did not want to be hunted. So it was all Kyran could do to drive anyone away from gaining any ground on the cave the twins stayed in, to hit them with a nightmare that was capable of rending the knowledge free from their minds that the darkrai were anything but the product of fearful imagination.

...But Kyran was exhausted over his trek so far out. He slumped against the tree, shoulder scraping against the rough bark as he sat back down. The teen was still tending to the campsite, from the looks of it, but there was a good chance he was going to fall asleep soon. It was likely Kyran wouldn't even have to put him to sleep on his own despite the lack of hesitation he would have enacted to make it happen sooner, should there be a need. So, in the duration of the next few moments, he opted to take the time to catch his breath and observe curiously through the veil of foliage outcropping the clearing. Individuals were always much too unpredictable while awake, and he had no intention of engaging interaction while on this plane of existence. Or, really, at all... Time would be what had final say on whether he could pursue preference or need in this encounter.

The lack of mobile activity that Kyran was observing as he took the next few moments resting created less strain to hurry things along. Jayme was doing busy work, sure, but nothing that took a lot of energy to accomplish. This created more of a relaxed atmosphere, allowing the darkrai child ample space to regain his energy in a shorter period of time. Strange how watching the hyped up activity from another could cause an introvert exhaustion merely by being a spectator...

He didn't watch too closely, considering nothing Kyran was seeing lent him any further knowledge into the workings of the teenager's mind. All he saw were preparations being enacted for rest, and the boredom from viewing it caused Kyran to become slightly fidgety to do something he enjoyed to do more. In fact, he was just about to hit Jayme with a Hypnosis attack, tilting his upper body to peek around the tree still obscured by brush, when he jolted at the sound that emerged from the teddiursa's throat.

What was that?

It was rare that Kyran was in the vicinity of anyone that was happy, or even bordering on the emotion, and this instance didn't seem to be any different. Most people would sing when they were feeling more jovial, so his experience with that aspect of society was almost null. The birds never even seemed happy enough to do so near the twins' cave. He... honestly didn't know what to think of it, other than it was kind of strange. He didn't understand 'music,' and rarely understood the superficial, but he decided not to interrupt it regardless. He wasn't sure why he hesitated... because it sounded nice? That didn't make sense, though...

The confusion drove the darkrai into a more contemplative state, giving more time for Jayme to finish the tasks he set out to do before trying to sleep. Kyran didn't mind if he didn't have to send the teen into the dream realm himself, just as long as he got to have some entertainment when he metaphorically hacked into it. Once he realized the musical score had ceased, he peered back through the thick branches of the bush before him, only to discover that Jayme had already drifted off to sleep.

Kyran staggered to his feet, stepping past the outcropping foliage to get a better link-up with the camper, careful to make sure that Jayme actually was asleep and not just attempting it. Especially considering his feet kept getting stuck in the overcrowded branches, still without the proper control he wanted. It took some doing, but he managed to stumble into the clearing, straying toward the outer edge so that he could more easily escape should something go awry. As much as he wanted to believe otherwise, he was still no expert on the infiltration of dreams, especially when the target was more conscious of the dream-state than the average pokémon. Those stars that transformed the few chosen seemed to rewire cognitive abilities at times, even in their sleep...

As he situated himself to a more comfortable seat on the floor and set his walking stick down, his ears tuned in to the vocal whimpering, the shards of Jayme's pleading pointing to a nightmare already initiated. Kyran frowned, attempting to make out the slurred words, but in the end it really didn't matter if he could hear them clearly or not. An impish grin split across his face, realizing there was a lot less work he was going to have to do in order to make this an entertaining observation through the workings of this poké-teen's mind; he wasn't even going to have to twist an otherwise pleasant dream around to see what sort of fears hid within. "Now what are you so afraid of..?" he asked in almost a whisper.

Infiltration into an unguarded mind was a piece of cake, a welcome change to the effort it took to even get this far into the forest. He was quick to conceal his entrance, manipulating the space around him to cast a sort of blind spot to his hiding spot, as though stepping behind a one-way window. While there was no way he could have such ability in the real world, he knew where it was he currently resided and was able to bend real-world rules to support his own whims with little difficulty -- all he needed was the imagination in order to do so. Once an individual realized they were actually in a dream and were not currently, actually experiencing what happened therein, oftentimes even the dreamer could do the same. The only problem was that they usually woke up soon after... and Kyran would be booted back to that accursed physical plane along with them.

It was interesting to see the teddiursa so afraid of things that seemed to parallel his own personal fears. Instead of unnerving the darkrai child, however, it intrigued him, but this may have merely been because Kyran had seen abandonment nightmares before. What caused them was much more interesting, and other pokémon that dreamed of such a situation were merely exhibiting a phobia of the prospect. It seemed Jayme had legitimate experience...

There was an edge of a rare emotion clawing to breach surface, something similar to guilt, but Kyran didn't seem outwardly fazed by it, more interested in pressing deeper. Noting the shifting of the ethereal plane, he could tell this was along the outer areas of Jayme's fears. This was something he displayed more openly, but not something that was more piercing to the psyche. Fears with the sharpest claws were never easily verbalized, as though speaking them allowed assured that they would occur. He pulled at the scene, but stopped himself before he altered it to dig deeper; this was merely the beginning, so there was no need to rush. Kyran would discover what Jayme feared the most in due time, but he might not have to pull the puppet strings in order to unearth it.

It hadn't occurred to the nightmare-born child that Jayme's constant busy work before sleep had been out of a need to distract himself from an otherwise anxiety-ridden mind, but once he had stepped within such confines, Kyran quickly discovered why it had been so simple of an infiltration in the first place. Seemed the teenager was quite the thinker, and such solitude amongst the scenery of trees and white noise only intensified what could be pushed to the back of the mind while in the presence of company. Kyran was all to familiar with such cause-and-reaction, which is why he tended towards distracting himself with the fears of others.

Jayme's own experiences, those that he was trying not to allow to rub him the wrong way, seemed to bubble to the surface so much easier now. Perhaps the teddiursa was not so used to being alone, as he was now. While the darkrai child could not exactly pull the more conscious memories to the surface without disrupting the nightmares as they unfolded and possibly alerting the dreamer to the observer in the shadows, he could gather a touch of the emotions that propagated the natural nightmare infestation. It was a tangled mess... this frail-looking teen really seemed to have a lot of problems that twisted his nerves. The singing the snooping child had heard earlier was much more plainly felt as a reaction to releasing some of Jayme's distressing anxiety than a feeling of content. Kyran grimaced at that, turning attention back to the scene transitions.

Such outer feelings, those that drove the nightmares on, spurred their realism, were felt by Kyran as though he were feeling it as well, but much more far off. It happened when his mind was linked to such an extent with another -- vague 'sympathy pains,' in a sense, but nothing that gave severe distinction. Much of what Kyran was able to decipher was caused by years of using his abilities, guessing what he was feeling and finding ways to determine whether he was correct in his assumptions or not, usually out of further observation in the physical realm. However, each pokémon was different, they all perceived the world in different ways, so it was an ongoing game to try to figure it out. Nothing he was too stringently focused on getting right, for he had never had cause to break into someone's dreams more than once, but a skill he tried to develop further nonetheless. Despite all that, hunger was a mutual feeling across all species. The pinching, burning feeling one would get when they went too long without food, made sharper with the passage of time... and judging from how well Kyran was able to catch onto the feeling, it had been quite some time since the teenager had last had a meal. Did he somehow not know how to forage for food, like any normal, wild pokémon? Was he one of those that the child had heard about, bred for in captivity? Or did he just forget how? Maybe he just hadn't been out here, in the woods, long enough to be able to gather food. Kyran's mind was swimming with curiosity, but none so strong as what he had originally came in here for from the beginning. Maybe they were even linked, but the stress of starvation was most likely a pressure point for how easily the nightmares were seeping in, twisting Jayme's dreams.

As the nightmares progressed fluidly from one to the next, Kyran started catching on to what linked them all together. He had been hazarding a guess that Jayme had experienced abandonment before, but as the mental trauma turned more to physical pain, transitioning with the age of the teddiursa, Kyran realized the nightmares were headed chronologically from when he had first came into contact with one of the jirachi's stars. Funny how that was, weren't those stars suppose to grant wishes, make things better for a pokémon in a sense? For Jayme, they seemed to have only made situations increasingly difficult, more scarring, as he inched closer to what the humans considered 'adulthood.' Did that mean the deepest of the brunette's fears was something that had surfaced much more recently, or was that all coincidence? The wicked smile that played across the shadowy apparition of a poké-child seemed to intensify; he seemed to be so mentally distanced from others that he couldn't see them as anything other than a means to scavenger hunting, to see if theories would play out as predicted.

The stage scene confused Kyran at first. He didn't understand performance, let alone what Jayme was suppose to be doing up there. There was the hint that it was something he was suppose to do, but didn't quite grasp at the fact that it wasn't stage fright, either; he was just baffled. He leaned in to try to get a closer look, as though in doing so he would be able to pinpoint what about it was so terrifying to the teen, but the scene quickly shifted to another fear among the same scenery. Kyran was not aware that the singing he had heard earlier was used for the entertainment of the staring eyes in the crowd, unable to place two-and-two together, and didn't quite understand that silence in such an occupied space was out of the ordinary. He could, however, understand the fear of evolution despite being unable to experience what it was like personally. Well well, that would certainly be a change... he smirked to himself, rocking back, seated on an invisible ethereal cloud, Though I'm fairly certain that it wouldn't be so drastic, with such a small body type. Humans didn't seem to undergo such extreme changes when they grew, and as much as he was loathe to admit it... they now appeared more human than pokémon in physical structuring.

The shifting atmosphere around the dream state indicated that Jayme was getting more and more scared of the dreams that were barraging his mind, giving Kyran reason to assume they were getting closer to the heart of the teddiursa's more inner fears. He was unaware of the physical reactions the petite-framed Jayme was displaying against that which he did not want to see. Shifting around as the scene transitioned further, deeper, the mischievous child tried to get a better view of what was to come next. If he had to dig in himself, he wasn't about to hesitate.

There were numerous flaws in the way Kyran perceived that which he came into contact with in the outside world. Truth be told, he had almost zero social contact on the physical plane, the only other individual he'd ever met while awake being his own sister. As soon as he ever came into contact with another, Kyran always hit them with a Hypnosis attack, hiding amongst the broken and scattered shards of an unconscious mind. Rarely did individuals recognize or act in the same manner they did while awake. So while the darkrai child was capable of adapting his understanding in such a state of mind, he was less-than-accurate when it came to conscious thought. He barely understood Kiara, despite trying everything in his power to please her... and failing.

He just didn't understand.

The frustration quickly compiled, adding layers upon layers over time. The stress of this lack of communication, despite not craving it from another source, held the irritants more steadfast, and the more recent body mutation only proved to be icing on the cake. The more he had the solitude to think about it all, the more discontent he became. Such reaction was associated with many a stupid stunt, and even Kyran was not immune to the side effects.

As much as he was enjoying the show that was played out before him, he still could not shake the restlessness, the impatience, spurred on by curiosity. There was so much information hidden in this one teenager's frightened mind, so many things Jayme was afraid of that was born from very realistic consequences instead of the imagined... All the input kept raising more and more questions in the socially inept child's own mind. He couldn't comprehend the various aspects of life in the city, but there were always vague notions he was quick to see parallels in.

A more blissful thought seemed to spark across Jayme's mind, catching Kyran off-guard. Seemed the teddiursa was more of a fighter than he thought, even when caught in so many snags of a darker sort. It was almost unnerving, considering the darkrai wasn't used to being present in the face of happiness, even bleak hope, and wasn't too sure he liked it. Maybe it was just his own anticipation to get to the 'next scene' or not, but he was almost tempted to intervene when Endymion's image appeared. Annoying disruption...

He twitched a claw, but hadn't the need to move any further before Zevian burst onto the scene. Kyran literally breathed a sigh of relief. Regardless, he frowned at the scene, but found it to be bordering on the bizarre; seemed the teen knew quite the drastic range of demeanors.

Relief quickly turned more sour when he could feel the confusion intermingled with Jayme's fear over the encounter. He doesn't know why there's so much rage all the time... Kyran was able to gather that well enough, but the realization gave him a prickly sensation down his spine. It was too similar to how things were with Kiara, despite the adverse reaction Jayme offered to the anger-stricken one, not trying to satisfy but trying to escape instead. Kyran withdrew his observation for the moment before the disconnected name-calling arose, unwilling to be reminded of something so close to home at the present.

It didn't take long for the child to feel the presence of a cold, sharp, sick feeling in Jayme's mind. If he wasn't at the heart of all that the teddiursa feared now, he was skimming the core. Once more, Kyran's own worries and fears were superseded by those of the teenager, and the darkrai's more irrational behavior returned. Maybe it was a response to that which Kyran was running away from, but he honestly didn't care to think too hard on the matter. It wasn't about the child, and it never was.

His intrigue was stoked, despite his lack of a grasp on what exactly was going on. The first thought that cropped up in the darkrai's mind was that maybe the fear that was emanating off of Jayme in reaction to seeing Reese was a fear of humans in general. Kyran shook his head lightly, knowing that the darkrai had merely been pulling from what he knew of the humans himself -- next to nothing. No, with everything that was swirling in Jayme's mind in his dreams, his nightmares, the teddiursa was a member of the humans' society. The teenager understood what they did, how they worked...

... and what they were capable of. That was it!

Jayme was still pretty good at fighting it, all things considered. Despite the helplessness that was obviously being felt in this imagined scenario, Jayme still had the upper hand. He was pushing away, his mind keeping tabs and making sure nothing actually happened that Jayme couldn't face. It often happened when Kyran dug himself in deep, through the layers of terror in another's mind, when they had so many hidden things to fear, that they didn't want to face.

Due to this, Kyran could see that he was not likely to get very many answers if he left things to their own devices. At the heart of a nightmare, there was a limited amount of time before the dreamer awoke, whether it was willed that way or it was because of something too shocking. Or death, but that wasn't so obvious the case here. Unless Reese was holding out a hidden knife or something. He couldn't fathom it, why didn't the teen just fight back? Why plead like that?

It was then that the darkrai released his hold on his own actions. With a light smirk, he attempted to lock Jayme's ability to move, to paralyze the teen, if only for a moment or two. It was possible that this may only shorten the nightmare, and Kyran had very limited experience in extending a nightmare successfully: he was in their mind, which could ultimately veto his own capabilities of control, but only if they realized they could. In some cases, fright could work its way into becoming a fail-safe power switch and jolt the dreamer awake. In other cases, it could lead to more answers.

What are you so afraid of? he repeated, peering around. Kyran was quite oblivious to the implications of the encounter Jayme thought he was experiencing. He just didn't get it. He never thought of humans as anything similar to pokémon, and refused to make the correlation. Jayme's cries for help were falling on deaf ears in the face of inquisitive perplexity.

While Kyran's motives were made to mar the nightmare in a way that could show him -- or even merely hint at -- what Jayme was so terrified of from this lowly human, he really hadn't expected his block on the teddiursa's recognition of movement to go so... was 'well' the correct term here? It didn't seem as though the teenager was aware that the sudden inability to scurry out of this man, Reese's, grasp was anything out of the ordinary. Was he usually this terrified of a single person? Just this particular one, maybe? For a moment, it almost seemed silly for Jayme to be so horror-struck over the actions of a single man when, compared to pokémon, usually could hardly defend themselves very deftly at all.

He had been pulling these skimming thoughts from his own mind only by observation, however, as he could tell that Reese's grip on the small frame of the poké-teenager was violent enough to leave bruising. He admitted that it would have been amusing if Jayme actually kicked the man... but Kyran's momentary paralysis still seemed to be taking effect, Jayme not yet having shaken it off. Or maybe he was still just that scared... and judging from how near the central hub of fear they were, the young intruder wouldn't have been surprised.

Maybe it was because Kyran didn't tend to trespass on the mind of a misplaced human within the forest his home neighbored that he was not privy to the kinds of acts that Jayme feared would happen to himself. He could understand the concept of not wanting to be touched by someone you didn't like, or even that you did, but he could tell that that was only grazing the problem at hand here -- that didn't tend to petrify a person, after all.

Funneling the voices spoken so that he could hear them without having to be so close, he took note of the malice Reese's words held, verbalizing Jayme's fears more pointedly. Ah... it was beginning to click for the nosy child, the pieces falling into place as to why Jayme couldn't fight back, even if he had the fighting capabilities to do so, You're just a slave to this human. Despite Kyran's innate need to keep his emotional distance from those he infiltrated, the information he was unearthing just... didn't sit right with him.

"You are living a lie."

The darkrai slowly drifted backward; his vocalized words seemed harsh, but he understood well enough. A single, deeply-ingrained fear had cultivated the spiderwebbing of many offshooting roots, mostly paranoid trepidation through the twistings of Reese's statements but all very realistic nonetheless. He was able to comprehend the logical apprehension, the connections made out of dismay and years of abuse, even though the actions enacted still eluded him.

The thing was that, as a legendary pokémon, Kyran had initially been completely genderless. It wasn't until his exposure to the star gifted by an unseen jirachi did Kyran have the option of identifying more with one gender than the other, and it didn't seem to have been a choice that he had consciously made, but more the role that seemed to suit him, according to the discovered star. Due to this, any sort of open affection, good or bad, was made alien two-fold: he hadn't experienced any of it growing up, as a stowaway of existence, so the knowledge was absent in the files of his own mind. In this sense, he really was much like a young child, only privy to the vaguest in a platonic sense. Anything further than that was quite foreign to the darkrai.

And, to be honest, quite frightening. The dark apparition of a child had absolutely no clue what was going on, as the nightmare took on another turn, added another layer. He could gather that whatever scarred Jayme's psyche so deeply in this respect, amongst all his many outlying fears, was something that was bad. Regardless of the redundant 'why's' that kept cropping up, he was fairly certain he most likely didn't really want to know. It was only at this point in time that Kyran began suspecting that his own curiosity really had clouded his judgment...

He hadn't much time to dwell on that realization before Jayme abruptly shifted his mental state to the conscious realm. Kyran jolted from his seat on the ground, in the clearing but towards the outer edge, as his own consciousness was flung back from its meditative state. Disoriented, he stared at Jayme's huddled form, attention perking to the words the teen was trying to tell himself between the terrified, choked sobs.

Before he gave his mind any chance to feel sympathy, his self-preservation instincts shot through him, causing him to flinch. He was out in the open. Without thinking, he hastily shifted his weight to the walking staff tightly clutched between his hands and tried to pry himself upright. His faulty reaction time and disoriented state of mind caused him to slip, falling backward into the outcropping of bushes along the clearing's outer edge. Hissing, he quickly scooted back to hide his form more completely. Maybe he didn't notice... the child hoped, now awake with adrenaline kick to the chest. His hands slipped to the braces on his boots, attempting to tighten them further in a panic, I don't think he saw me in his dream... I'm pretty sure he didn't...

...But Kyran couldn't be absolutely sure. The darkrai wasn't suppose to exist in this world, to the inhabitants that dwelled within it. Had he just blown his cover? Did he just endanger not only himself, but his sister as well?

The shadow-skinned child, as he watched Jayme's reactions escalate to a peak level, quickly began realizing that his own harbored nervousness was unfounded. It was out of instinct that Kyran insisted he keep himself from view, that everyone was out to lock him up, pokémon or not... but considering the circumstances of the current predicament, of Jayme's mindset after such an emotionally jarring rest, it should have been obvious that the teddiursa was blind to all but the nightmare most freshly cut into his psyche.

The hands around the straps on his boots loosened their grip as the child watched, cautiously, the actions that the teen retaliated to the unknown noises with. The more panicked Jayme seemed to get, the less tense Kyran felt -- it meant that the brunette was too shaken to investigate what had caused it. However, it also seemed that he assumed that it was who had harmed him, which... in a way, was true, but not entirely how he was picturing it to have been. Kyran was not Reese, after all, and he had not been controlling what the image of Reese had done.

The boy flinched as the teen jumped to his feet, momentarily considering that he may have read what Jayme was capable of accomplishing on fear-driven adrenaline. That is, until Jayme tore off in the opposite direction... Kyran sat, slightly bewildered for a brief interim. When it was obvious that Jayme wasn't coming back anytime soon, the darkrai hissed an irritated sigh. I could just walk away right now, without any repercussions... he grumbled to himself, It would be the easiest course of action. This isn't my problem. This isn't. My. Problem.

Damn the guilt. He had always had that much humanity, at the very least, even as a pokémon.

He eased himself upright, slowly as he made sure that the encampment was deserted. His nerves were on full alert, twitching to the slightest sound that caught hold of his tapered ears. There wasn't a soul around, and he had a difficult time keeping such a notion in the front of his mind; he wrote it off as an effect of being yanked so forcibly from the confines of a deeply-scarring night terror. It wasn't often that the child found opportunity to do that, in years previous.

Kyran's steps were slow, much slower than he would have preferred. Jayme was easy enough to track, as the teenaged poké-human didn't seem to have the knowledge to conceal a trail, but the speed at which he had taken off was far above what Kyran was currently capable of. With a glower, the child grabbed at a piece of fabric that had torn with the grabbing hands of the stiff, low branches. The snags the terrified runaway had gotten himself in to helped to bridge the gap that much quicker, but it still couldn't have been faster than fifteen minutes before the darkrai-child caught wind that Jayme was nearby.

The forest, especially this far into the belly of it, was much darker than the point at which Jayme had escaped from. Here, the foliage was much thicker, and the trees congregated enough to help blot out the sky more completely. It was exactly why Kyran was not worried that he may run into someone else the further he crept along the broken trail, eye giving off a dim blue glow in the encompassing darkness. He peered down the slope that Jayme had fallen victim to, giving a light sigh; what exactly had he gotten himself in to, and how was he going to get himself out?

The child was highly adverse to attempting the sharp drop himself, remaining perched at the top. "That was not the most... intelligent thing you could have done," he nearly scoffed in the darkness, hoping it would merely alert the teen to the fact he was there instead of frightening him further. That's all he would have needed, to go chasing after the teen again... Then again, he wasn't privy to the fact that Jayme had been injured further than the short tumble that caused the stance on the ground floor, either. He knew that such impact to the lungs could leave one paralyzed, though, and frowned at the thought, "...You alright down there?"

While Kyran may have been oblivious to the particular apex of fear that Jayme had been, was currently, experiencing, he wasn't ignorant of the fact that the teen was terrified enough to act on impulse. That much was apparent, by this point, even if it was hazy as to how far lost in that terror he was. At least, from an outsider's perspective, it was. Before Jayme even opened his mouth to respond, the fear laced in the air was almost tangible despite the tremors running through the teddiursa's body having ceased in the time it took the child to locate him.

He tilted his head slightly as a response emerged from the deafening silence. The child still had to strain to hear Jayme's words in the still night air, likely due to the angle and positioning, unless Jayme really had been mumbling. His eye seemed to flicker in the dark, his gaze easing away as Kyran was able to pick out the fragmented sentence, Ah, right. Not okay. That... should have been obvious. The pale-haired child had just been witness to the mental breakdown, or more specifically. the cause...

Kyran may have been able to figure out Jayme's mental state easy enough, but the teen's physical state was a different story. The child questioned whether Jayme would be of sound mind enough to formulate a proper reply as he watched the battered boy check himself over. He was responsive to what Kyran was saying, that much was positive. He also didn't seem to be afraid of the child, as disembodied of a voice as he may have been in the pitch darkness of the night. Then again, Kyran was unsure how perceptive Jayme was capable of being at the present. The living were such fascinating subjects to observe, the thought couldn't help but burrow its way into his mind.

As Jayme tested his limbs for injury, Kyran disregarded his doubt that the teenager could, in fact, answer the posed question. He caught the flinches, and when the injured arm was pulled into view, caught the briefest hint of blood on the air. He wasn't sure if it was because Jayme was unaware of the injuries or if he was just trying to sound tough, with the brief reply that was offered. He frowned, eye only narrowing the slightest bit in skepticism, but he didn't want to pry. Honestly, if Jayme was physically well off enough, Kyran would prefer to high-tail it as soon as was possible. "Can you walk?" he asked, words carefully pointed. He didn't want to get any closer in proximity than he already was; he was uncomfortable enough.

"It doesn't matter who I am," he replied curtly. He didn't like that question. While he wasn't sure how to answer it aside from what little he had offered, he also didn't want to reveal too much. As it was, Kyran was still unsure if Jayme recognized him from his darkened dreams. The child couldn't remember off-hand whether he had been seen, whether he had been heard, or whether Jayme had been able to touch base with either; he had been too caught up in the task of digging further into the receptacles of Jayme's mind to confirm or deny. Instead, he brushed the question off, twisting the answer into another that had potential to become the stand-in. "There's nobody else here," the darkrai-child stated with a dismissive wave. There was no Reese.

If there was one thing Kyran could say that he was decent at, it was his observational skills. He hardly shifted position as he watched Jayme's movements, and the silence of this particular area of the forest assured a lack of environmental distraction. He saw the teen flinch in pain, mentally cursing that he would probably need to help out if he were to make sure the teddiursa made it back to camp. It was one thing to terrify a person, but it was another to leave them stranded in unknown territory while hardly able to move.

Jayme's response was a little less than convincing, but at least the teenager had managed to move in the correct direction to the foot of the slope he had so precariously tumbled down. "That was a nasty fall you took," Kyran commended dryly.

However, the teddiursa's recoiling behavior at Kyran's response to who he was only managed to stir confusion in the child in return. "Mad?" he parroted, his voice growing softer at the unexpected expression of fear, "I'm not upset. What gave you that idea?" He hadn't realized his tone of voice, unwavering and cold from his lack of social interaction, could inspire an adverse impression to those he made contact with. His words were too lacking in emotion that when even the most subtle traces were heard, they were likely heard with more intensity. Of course, it helped that Jayme was already receptive to even the smallest hints of negative temperament, especially at present...

While the thought briefly crossed the darkrai's mind to help the teen climb up the sharp decline, the fact that Jayme hadn't requested the aid despite alluding to the pain he was in caught Kyran's curiosity once more. Wasn't he only causing himself more unnecessary injury by doing that? Was willpower really that strong in the teen? The latter was unlikely, considering what Kyran had been witness to while present in the other's nightmares. Did he just not like asking for help? That was fine by the dark-type child point of view, but the darkrai was beginning to question whether he should really be so obsessed with his own level of secrecy, at least anymore. Jayme was in contact with humans on a regular basis, but... would he really rat Kyran out, if he knew? Frowning, he decided not to take the chance. Even if he did end up helping Jayme back, he could stick to the shadows while doing so, and make it back before Jayme's eyes adjusted to the darkness. The forest was under a thick cloak of shade tonight, though, so it was possible they hadn't even the need to move quickly to accomplish the feat.

He couldn't help but be amused by Jayme's stubbornness. It was enough for the child to switch the hand that held his staff to grab the teen's arm with his own unclawed hand, offering to help pull the teddiursa back to his feet without forcing the issue after Jayme had wrapped the other arm. Sure, he was almost a good foot shorter, but that may not have been immediately evident. "You sure do apologize too much..." he commented. Why did Jayme keep doing that, and to Kyran of all people? A total stranger? It was a rather foreign concept, considering Jayme hadn't actually done anything to warrant the need to do so. Shaking his head, a bit amused, he answered the posed question with a statement, "Your camp is back this way. Come on." Ugh, what had he gotten himself in to?