JAWS • DECEMBER 2025 EVENT/TDM

[uruz]

TDM & EVENT: JAWS

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Show Me Those Pretty White Jaws

The dream has been coming in waves for those new to Sleep's touch, as a shoreline that never stays still. As a sky that never remembers to include its stars. Beneath it all, there is a voice. Her voice: silk-sweet, coaxing from just beyond the approaching wave that towers like a moving mountain. She tells you to come home. She promises it won't hurt, even if she never tells you what waits beneath. You see the shape just before the dream ends: a massive black tidal wave, yawning wide and black until it looks like a pair of jaws breaking upon you. You don't have time to resist.

You and your veteran Vessels will awaken in water.

There is no surface. No bottom. No sky. No sound but your own heartbeat and the echoes of water being slashed though, dull and endless in the still, frigid dark. You are suspended, weightless— Some may have difficulty to breathe without inhaling water the first few times, while those aligned with the waves will feel it come like second nature. Once you acclimate yourself, you'll notice that around you drift glowing filaments; thin, pulsing threads that coil like jellyfish tendrils, softly luminescent. They curl and twist through the water, and when you look closer, you realize: they show you things. Memories, maybe. Dreams, maybe. Each one unique to your gaze: a hand reaching for yours in the dark, a goodbye that never finished, a face you haven't seen in years. They are what you think love looks like. What you once needed it to be. And when you touch them, they wrap around you, gently, warmly . . . Hungrily— and begin to pull you down.

To ascend into the next level, you must let go. But not everything that binds you wants to be released. The filaments drifting through the water show you what you think love looks like— what you've built it into. They are gentle at first, beautiful even, but the longer you cling, the more they pull.

There are ways to escape them: You may bind your filament with another's and together speak aloud a shared truth: what you believe love really is. If your hearts align or at the very least come to an agreement, the threads dissolve into light and lift you upward. If your beliefs clash or contradict, the threads knot tighter, and something . . . May take interest in you.

Beneath you, something moves. Huge, silent and almost regal. It glides through the deep like a phantom, almost too large to be real. You feel its presence before you see its flash of pearl white and glowing red eyes, three on each side of its face: a shark.

The shark is here to choose its next meal. It smells grief, fear and seeks out trauma most of all. It is drawn to the most unspoken parts of you, the very parts you thought were buried, roused from the tightened ropes of what you crave in your heart. And when it chooses you, it does not bite immediately. It invites, with its jaws opening like a sanctuary and slow towards you.

Inside is I, whispers Sleep. Allow Me to have you whole, and you will be at peace. Show Me love.

Fight against her, or even with your current partner about what love is, and Sleep will open her maw, spilling tendrils from her throat and begin to stalk you. Best be prepared to fight the possessed Megalodon— She will laugh, amused as you do, like a great cat playing with its food. And if you were to be caught, well. You'll wake in the dream's next level with an undeniable prey drive, whether Token or Offering.

She will do anything to keep you here.

NOTES:

• There is no surface visible at first. Light only comes from the filaments. As characters resist, act, or ascend, a faint stained-glass shimmer begins to pulse upward, hinting at the dream's next layer.
• Sound is muffled— speech emerges as bubbles, but meaning travels regardless. Words feel heavy here. Some phrases may literally change the water (turn to light, birth dream-objects, or ripple with tension). You will do better using The Murmur as a means of communication. Luckily you have your mask on!
• The Shark always circles once it senses trouble within you. Sometimes close, sometimes far, but always felt. If characters listen closely, they can hear the echo of One's voice coming from inside it: pleading with a haunted, at times screaming melody.

TOKEN EFFECTS

• The dream bends subtly around Tokens, especially at the whims of an Aquamancer. Walls of pressure open before them, and filaments shift course as if expecting them. This can make their path easier, unless they start to doubt their purpose.
• Tokens perceive emotional resonance as currents in the water such as subtle flows of energy. These can guide them (or others) toward escape paths, or signal when the shark is near.
• When a Token speaks or acts with strong intent, the dream sometimes translates it into a symbolic structure: A word might become a floating glyph. A gesture might alter the filament's shape. A moment of clarity might reveal a hidden path. Other characters can interact with these dream-objects, but they're fragile, unstable, and prone to distortion by doubt.
• The deeper Tokens go, the more they feel themselves pulling apart and begin to experience dual awareness: one part dreaming, one part watching— some may even see flashes of within the shark's belly, and One's voice much louder. The deeper they go, the more detached they become, and the more they lack the ability to act at all.

OFFERING EFFECTS

• The shark is more fascinated by Offerings. It circles them often, sensing kinship— or potential. The more monstrous the Offering, the more the shark "pauses' near them, almost curious.
• Offerings feel "the pull" more clearly, particularly Merrows and other aquatic-based Offerings—they can sense where the surface might be, and where the shark intends to strike next. They may even see pulses in the water that others miss, similar to Spider Man's "spidey senses".
• An Offering may experience rapid body changes submerged. Fins may appear, bones may shift, teeth may lengthen without warning and so on. This makes their movement easier or harder, depending on how much of themselves they're holding back or how apt their monstrous forms are at swimming.
• Some Offerings may feel drawn to the shark— not in fear, but in understanding. They may see themselves in it, and vice versa— One's song in particular is hypnotic, and for split moments you may understand his pain through his words. This might make you more prone to being consumed, though, so hopefully your partner can help you out of it—?.

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Watching Me With Eyes Of A Predator

The surface you breach is not water— it's glass.

You strike it with the force of falling sky. It fractures beneath you in a bloom of painted light. For one weightless moment, the dream hesitates, sputters. Then the world shatters, and you fall with the cascade.

Water pours through the crack in the ceiling, carrying you down in ribbons of color and a shattering splash. Stained glass shards drift like petals through the now collapsing roof, and you eventually land not in sand, but upon a cathedral floor, slick with tide. Around you, the water spreads, pooling across the stone and swallowing the walls in a rising hush as it finds escape through the doors.

The cathedral is vast, impossibly so. Its architecture towers, crooked and immaculate, built more from longing than stone. No altar awaits you. No congregation. Only the sensation of having trespassed into something meant to be private. Veteran Vessels may recognize this cathedral as St. Patrick's— before it was drenched in One's blood sacrifice.

High above and surrounding you, the stained-glass mosaics churn with captured light. f you linger beneath one of the window's rays, your appearance may begin to change under the light. You appear as someone else sees you. Be it a hero. A monster. A disappointment. A god. A weakness. A temptation. Even a burden. That version of you clings to your dream-body like a second skin; uncomfortable, intimate, and undeniable. For some, it may be beautiful. For others, unbearable.

If you and another stand beneath the same window, you may each appear as the other secretly imagines. There is no control and no negotiation. Only truth twisted through the lens of want, resentment, fear, or love. And it doesn't go away until you leave the light.

Eventually, the cathedral doors open by dream's will. Beyond them lies a cloister garden: narrow paths, pale trees, and wild flowers that bloom in stillness. At the far end, behind the overgrowth and ruined arches, you see a hollow.

It is a corridor where the dream collapses inward, twisting, warped, half-swallowed in fog and dread. Its stones pulse faintly beneath a shallow film of water. Black tendrils reach from its depths like roots, veins, twitching toward sound, warmth, and movement. You see them dragging matter into the earth, and between them lie bones, contorted and fresh, half-consumed.

And farther still, a body that still breathes. Glimpsed only briefly, A masked man's form is stretched by the hollow's gravity, arms pinned behind the veil. He does not move, or speak. Or perhaps, he cannot. The hollow does not let him go and will not, should you make your attempts. If you step foot in the hollows that have consumed him, you too will be consumed. A three eyed Tod sits at the hollow's edge, a single bushy tail splitting into three, as its body plays with illusion like smoke put to dance over fire. It says, as its head floats up and its maw splits into a grin too cheshire to ignore: Wearing shoes, yet no feet in sight. You'll hear steps pound in the death of night. What is it that you need, to cross this narrow blight?

It disappears and only leaves you the riddle to chew on.

Nothing living can cross the hollow, you'll soon find. Nothing except . . . The Nightmares.

Just outside the garden's boundary, you'll find horses built from wind and shadow, flickering at the edge of your vision. Their bodies are black— not the color, but the absence, swallowing all light. Some of their craniums cound be seen, others have a jutting horn of bone from their foreheads. Where eyes should be, there are six: three stacked on each side of the skull, glowing dimly red like distant embers beneath ice. Their manes flow like torn fabric, like drifting vapor that trails behind them like the smoke from a snuffed candle. Their maws are too damn wide to be herbivorous, yet they seem to enjoy the act of grazing. They wait, unchained and wild in a herd.

This is the only way forward. Only they can pass through the hollow untouched. But how to ride one—? You may chase them. You may plead, command, kneel. You may offer them all your need and all your love, promises that you will provide if they become your steed. But they were not made to answer it. For every Vessel, there is one single Nightmare that will choose them, and thus you will choose each other. They have their own personalities, some more aggressive or shyer than others. The harder you reach, the faster they vanish or harshed they will attack if unready. Try to mount one through force, and you'll regret ever trying. Try to bind one, and it will break you.

But if you are patient, if you figure out its nature and how to please it— your Nightmare may come closer. One may circle you. It may bow its head. Their snort is warm and real against your palm. If successful, it will lower itself to its knees. If you've got the height, they will simply wait, patiently, for you to get on their backs (Or not; there are plenty of sassy mares out there).

If you accept, you might not be taken somewhere safe, but you will be taken somewhere true, away from here. And if you force your want upon them, if you cannot let go— you will be left with something else.

In the distance, across the flooded cathedral floor, you may see One again. Flashes, glimpses. Always chasing a mare he never reaches, or the opposite— the mare chases after him.

NOTES:

• If a character successfully forms a bond with their Nightmare, it will return with them in the form of a waking world steed, officially introduced in the next event. You're free to give it the personality you wish.
• If a character attempts to force a connection with a Nightmare at any point (tries to catch, mount, command, etc.), the mare will bite or kick, which Vessels will suffer as a persistent dream-mark that will carry into the waking world.

TOKEN EFFECTS

• Light clings unnaturally to Tokens in the cathedral, especially near the stained glass. It bends around their bodies like a false halo, casting them in divine or monstrous outlines depending on who watches.
• If a Token casts or channels any magic within the cathedral or near a Nightmare, the spell does not manifest, but instead, a cold mist escapes their mouth, and the Nightmare turns to look. The dream rejects force.
• When a Nightmare looks directly at a Token, their eyes eclipse, pupils vanishing into rings of shadow. In that moment, a fragmented vision floods the Token's mind . . . not from the Nightmare, but from another character nearby. It shows the Token how that character once dreamed of them, what they feared, needed, or hoped they would become.

OFFERING EFFECTS

• The stained glass causes a subtle change in scent and physical appearance turning into a more grotesque version of this— Offerings begin to smell or look like what others most want from them.
• Offerings may always know where the Nightmares are, even when hidden. But the more they try to act on this knowledge, the harder the Nightmares are to reach.
• An Offering's body will react before they realize it, flinching from lies, bristling in moments of emotional pressure, pulling away from contact, and so on. They may startle even at gentle contact, as if something inside them is as reactive as they are.

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Where The Delicate Stops

As your Nightmare takes you through the misty hollow, you may begin to notice the empty city of Manhattan as veterans remember. There is no warning but the eerie silence that surrounds you like impossible weights. The cathedral once behind you folds inward— wrong, deep and full of pressure. It bursts through the hollow's path, through the city's street, and then— The dream ruptures.

Stone peels backward like paper. Glass liquefies mid-air. The sky above the city pulls itself inside out. Time bends sideways. And from the edges of the dream, something, someone, begins to hunt. Sleep's presence moves like the very shark she chose as a vision of her physical manifestation. She does not speak or rage. But you feel Her, rising like fever beneath the skin of Her world as the hairs at the back of your neck do. She does not want you this deep, and neither does One.

Somewhere within the collapse, you may see them— entwined, shifting, trembling. One's face is turned toward you, screaming something that doesn't reach your ears. Sleep's hands are tangled in his body. She pulls him back with a gentleness that breaks the sky, and he screams, reaching for you with his last breath before consumption. The dream convulses.

The Nightmares bolt with you still on them.

The city rises to meet you from the shadows, but it's not the city you know. Skyscrapers twist at unnatural angles. Streets flood, then dry, then flood again. Tendrils burst from subway grates and gutters, slashing upward like tongues. Streetlights spin like compass needles. Cars levitate, crash, freeze midair. You move through it all at breakneck speed, but the exit keeps shifting— a hole in the world that flickers just beyond reach where you see your body, fast asleep.

Somewhere in the chaos, a few Nightmares are caught. Sleep strikes like lightning— she coils like a viper and tightens like a vice. One touch from Her, and your Nightmare collapses mid-gallop, its body unraveling into smoke and light. No sound. No scream. Just absence. And you fall right off it like a ragdoll.

Others fall beneath impact, too— a wrong turn, a shattered wall, a burst of heat from One's grief. A broken leg. A crash. A wound too deep to ride through. If your steed is lost, you fall. And if no one reaches for you, you stay fallen. Others are near, and their Nightmares still run. All of you have a terrible dread in your bones— if you are caught or left behind, the consequences will be dire. You might not even wake up. So, call out. Cling. Climb. Share. Two Vessels on one mount. Anything to survive and flee as the dreamscape tightens its wrathful grip around you.

Sleep calls inside your spine. You can't make out what She says. One answers, the same blur of garbled words in your marrow. And then, just before the dream can take you, just before you reach an exit— you rise.

Your body lifts from the Nightmare as it paddles the air with desperation, it too rising. You're pulled upward, weightless, as if a thread inside your heart has been yanked by a furious god. You float, twist in the air. Your vision glows white.

We've got you.

And then you wake up— mid-air in the waking world.

Your body slams into your bed, floor, street, soil, wherever it was that you had slept. Reality greets you with terrible impact.

NOTES

• If a character does not find a mount in time, they may be caught in the dream collapse. They still wake— but they wake broken. These characters may wake up bruised, disoriented, or emotionally fragmented, and this can be explored in the next waking world event.

TOKEN EFFECTS

• Any Tether they feel becomes unstable—splintered. For brief moments, they feel it breaking and re-forming again and again, with slight differences each time.
• The more emotionally charged they are, the more the dream pulls toward them; tendrils snap faster, debris veers unnaturally close.
• Their body flickers with signs of their own magic—sigils, symbols, runes— burning just beneath the surface of their skin like constellations. These glow brighter as the dream collapses, as if trying to tear free.

OFFERING EFFECTS

• Where Offerings are grazed or injured, they bleed light, not red. It floats up like mist.
• They hear One's heartbeat, not theirs, and it speeds in panic. It affects their own pulse, the mare under them . . .
• The Nightmare no longer follows the Offering's will—it will respond to their fear instead.

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OOC NOTES

➤ Welcome to Somnia's third TDM, which doubles as the month's gamewide event!
➤ This TDM is considered game canon. You are free to have your character remember as many details as possible when they wake up.
➤ Only new characters are free to experiment with the Vessel options, Token or Offering to your liking; this is a dreamscape, so multiple/different situations for you to really test which option you like most is possible. Current characters must remain as their chosen Vessel type unless you requested a switch, which can be done on the Taken page.
➤ All TDMs take place within a dreamscape, meaning characters can interact with the setting without needing to apply. Come have fun with us!
➤ Veteran players, I ask to please refrain from making post-event threads for the time being! We have some important information to take into account in next month's event when characters are slated to "wake up". At the very least, please wait for the information to be offered on the next plotting post. Thank you everyone for your patience!
➤ Please comment on the TDM's INVITE TL if you are a new player interested in joining the game, but don't yet have an invite. Current players or the mod may reach out to extend an invite. Once you've got one, please don't forget to comment on the Invite page so you may properly link it in your reserve and app.
➤ Questions? Please direct them to the designated questions comment linked below!

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Comments

[merged]

Sharon did not mention the mess Jinx had already stumbled into—about Sleep whispering in her ear, twisting things, and making promises. Vander was already reeling from the simple fact that Jinx was here at all, grown and changed in ways he never got to witness. No point in weighing him down with more.

She could imagine how her own adoptive parent might react if they suddenly found her again after years apart. That ache, that shock. "A kid's view of their parent doesn't change all that much, even when they get older. You're still her dad. Just seeing you again will be good for her."

Whatever either of them had been through, whatever they'd become, none of it mattered as much as the bond between them. "People don't get many chances to see someone they loved and thought they'd lost for good." And she did not dare mention it would be the second time Jinx had seen him in these dreams. A part of her wondered if this was another manipulation on Sleep's end, another act of cruelty. Only time would tell.

[cantilevers]

Vander tipped his head slightly as she made an attempt to reassure him, but he was actually not that convinced. After he had died (he thought he died...), she would have been left alone when the Lanes were turned upside down. If she was lucky, it would have been Vi to find her first and protect her, but if that wasn't the case, she would be on the road to Silco's triumphant return to the Lanes.

He had plenty of secrets, plenty of things left unsaid, and for all he considered himself a good parent to them, the fact remained that he had plenty of skeletons in his closet that history and himself glossed over. Who knew the things that would be unveiled after his death, and she was as sly as she was impressionable.

Instead, he caught himself dragging his hand over his face, and he stopped the gesture mid-way down his cheeks and tried to pretend it had all been intentional. "Time will tell if that's true. We didn't exactly exchange a good-bye prior to my leaving; she's... she was sensitive the idea of abandonment."

Still, this was not something that he could control anymore. He was here, and for better or worse, he would face his daughter. "Do you have any family in this place?"

[merged]

It was clear her attempt at reassurance didn't land, and the crease in her brow deepened. Sharon was certain—no, she knew—that Jinx would only benefit from having Vander nearby. She knew Jinx would want to see Vander just as badly as she longed to see Silco and Isha. But convincing him wasn't her job; he'd figure it out on his own. And when he did, she'd get to tell him she'd called it from the start.

"No, no family. I, uh... I don't know if I'd want them there anyway." Her gaze dropped, and she let out a tight breath. "It's not a safe place, and it isn't a kind one. I don't want my parents thrown into that, even if we'd be suffering together." She ached for them, but the thought of them being turned into leverage, especially after how openly she'd defied Sleep, made her stomach twist. Chris and Rose deserved a world untouched by Sleep, far from her many-eyed gaze.

"It's fine, though. I've met plenty of people I care about now. Your daughter included."

[cantilevers]

Ah, well that was insightful actually, knowing she wouldn't bring her own family here to this unknown place. Perhaps it was the most honest assessment of this place that anyone could provide to him, and that meant that, if he stayed, he had a better idea of what to expect. He did not enjoy the idea that his daughter suffered, and he wondered if Powder would prefer to suffer alone than have any of them here as Sharon did.

"Understandable. Most people wouldn't want their loved ones to suffer no matter how much they may wish to see them again," he replied in agreement, though not without a touch of sardonic humor in his tone. Perhaps he was meant to suffer, or perhaps he was meant to support. He liked the idea of the latter. "What kind of danger can I expect in this place?"

He hummed, and he expected that he would be able to make allies and friendships with some effort on his part. He wondered if he could befriend the reason they were here as well. Probably not, but who didn't like a challenge? "Well, you know what they say, misery loves company, but I don't think it was meant so literal."

[merged]

Sharon grimaced sympathetically as she realized exactly how that must sound—how horrible it really was when said out loud. But it was better he heard it now than get blindsided by the reality of the place when it all hit at once. Nobody deserved to wake up there without any idea of what was waiting for them or what they would be put through.

"Danger varies. Most days, the biggest threats are starvation, illness, and the wildlife. It's pretty cold, too. But the real danger comes with the blood moon, and—" She cuts herself off, her brow knitting. "—The city you'll wake up in used to have more than a million people, and all of them are mindless zombies now. They rise with the moon, and then... then they hunt us. Not to kill us, but to force us to succumb, to turn us into what they are."

[cantilevers]

As much as he felt a pit opening up in his stomach about what he might be facing, Vander also shored up his mental and physical reserves to potentially take it all head on. If Powder needed him and would feel comforted by his presence, he would make certain to be close to her and provide support. He was sacrifice everything he was to protect her; he'd done it before, he'd do it again.

"Sounds like my home city," he reflected carefully, considering how he was manage it now that he was older and weathered. He raised his eyebrows at the mention of a blood moon and the effects on the previous residents. "So every month we will be facing millions of undead? Is there currently an effective avoidance strategy?"

[merged]

He thought it sounded like Zaun, and maybe there was a hint of it buried in Manhattan's bones, but every glimpse she'd caught of the Undercity still pulsed with life. People struggled, sure, but they lived. Manhattan was hollow by comparison, the streets too quiet, the emptiness heavy.

At his question, she crossed her arms and gave a slow shake of her head. "As far as I can tell, it hits about every other month, but it's only happened twice, so who knows if that'll stick." She knew how flimsy that sounded and wished she had something more certain to give him. "You can avoid them, though. Stay quiet, pay attention. Some people have made it through by holing up in upper apartments and riding it out. I've done it myself when the streets were too crowded to handle alone."

Last time, the Hosts had been strangely calm, almost passive thanks to One's sacrifice, but she doubted they'd get that miracle twice. If they did, Vander would be more than ready for them.

"But they're still human bodies underneath the fungus. They die the same way."

[cantilevers]

Zaun was a vibrant place with its own culture and peoples, but it was also a harrowing place where there wasn't enough to go around, starvation and neglect was far too common. People worked and loved and lived and died there. He wanted to think that he would be walking into a place that he could navigate around given his own upbringing and culture, but it was hard to say until he woke up and discovered everything there was.

He nodded his head in confirmation that he heard the timeline, filing that away as it would become useful. He would immediately have to hunt for an area to avoid the masses it seemed otherwise it could end poorly. He couldn't do that to Powder, assuming he did arrive wherever this place beyond this happened to be.

"And do some people fight them and kill them off then? That seems dicey given the numbers you're describing." He might choose to buckle down and hide. Well, perhaps his first order of business would be bunkers that were safe for people to hide in underground.

"Are there bunkers anyone has organized?"

[merged]

"The biggest cluster I've ever come across was maybe twenty at once. Usually it's just two or three, but they seem to almost have a... a hivemind. You take out a couple, and more drag themselves out of the shadows." Sharon had stumbled into plenty of trouble whenever the blood moon dragged the hosts out, but it always felt unavoidable. It wasn't like it was a single night of terror—it lasted days.

"But yeah, people fight back. You'd be surprised by what some folks are capable of there." She'd watched Kalmiya tear through an entire group, body twisting as those claws cut them down like paper. The image refused to leave her—nor the drained slump of the woman's body afterward, joints loose as she adjusted to her shapeshifting.

The next question pulled a thoughtful purse of her lips, her brow knitting. "Not really. Aven settled into a hotel and offered space to anyone who needed it, but no one's made a real effort to gather people into one place. We're all scattered across the city." Sharon had thought about suggesting something more organized, but doubted anyone would listen. It wasn't like she had experience to lean on, not beyond what she'd seen from the Order, and how they'd managed to survive decades in a place arguably worse than Manhattan.

[cantilevers]

All of this was good information which he had no reason to disbelieve. He considered as he listened, stroking his fingers through his beard as he nodded along. "And how abundant are weapons in this city? I assume if you know where to look or know how to build them, you can cobble something together?" That might have to be his priority, especially if he was to protect himself and his.

"Perhaps, perhaps not. I've seen some unbelievable things in my time," he reflected softly. Maybe he'd been one of those unbelievable things at one time, but those memories were muddled and murky. He preferred not to dig into them at this point in time. "But I'm always open to learn new things that people can do."

It seemed there might be an opening that he could settle into, build a community for those that wanted to band together. He was someone who knew the value of numbers, but then again, if the city was so big to contain millions, then a bunker might not due the trick. He would see, assuming he woke up beyond this place. "So you don't actually know when someone is in trouble and may need assistance. I see this apocalyptic place brought in a bunch of introverts..." he said with a long-suffering sigh. They just needed a well-meaning extrovert to gather them up.

[merged]

"Really depends on the weapon. Firearms are out there if you know where to look, and there's always baseball bats, golf clubs, knives... You won't be hurting for options." Vander was a big man who grew up in a tough place. He wouldn't need much to hold his own against a Host.

It was no shock that Vander had seen the unbelievable, and given the circumstances, she suspected he would be able to handle whatever insanity she laid out in front of him. Manhattan had more than enough of it to go around. Talking reflections. Dead men walking. Deep, emotional bonds that tied people together, mentally & emotionally. "Some shapeshift. Some can become massive creatures—one guy is literally part centipede now. Others can control water, fire, or wind. And some can make you see whatever they want you to." She fell into that last category.

"More like a rightfully wary group, but we can communicate over long distances. There's a kind of... shared mental space we can reach through our masks, and we can also tether to the people important to us. It..." She frowned and touched her temple. "It's like having a constant mental connection with them. It can get overwhelming if you have a lot of them, but you can pick up when someone is in danger."

[cantilevers]

Well, as much as he had once stepped aside from directly intervening in violence, he knew better than to not have a weapon to defend himself with against a legion of shambling hive-mind undead. There was a time and a place, and he knew from the old ghost stories that there was no reasoning with something that was technically braindead. "It sounds like the options are abundant and varied. My kind of place if I was twenty years younger."

Ah well, those all sound like the kind of things he'd heard about for those that touched the Arcane a long, long time ago. Of course, there was something that twinged in himself at the mention of shapeshifter and becoming creatures. He could take it all in stride he knew, as long as he kept his priorities and focus in the forefront of his mind. "And is that arbitrary or meaningful designations thanks to Sleep? I assume there is no choice and no changing what we can do in that way?"

He frowned, not certain how he felt about the idea of a tether. As social as he was, he had many secrets that he kept quiet and wasn't willing to disclose easily. "Tether, huh? I suppose face-to-face conversation is still out of vogue, is it?" It made sense though for people to keep track of their own, but it was an information sharing system that would definitely take some learning and managing. "How does one form a tether?"

[merged]

"I've never thought to ask her about that. One conversation with that bitch was more than enough for me, but if I had to guess, they're meaningful. Hell, they might even be cruel." Sharon wasn't sure she actually wanted an answer. She had already played that guessing game before, turned it over and over until it went sour in her mouth. It never led anywhere good. It only left her more bitter than she'd like to be.

Out of vogue, he said, and Sharon couldn't stop herself from shaking her head. It sounded exactly like something Chris would have said, that particular brand of fatherly lame that managed to be embarrassing and strangely endearing at the same time. A real talent. "You get close to someone. The fastest way is sex. That's a guaranteed way to form one, but those tend to run deeper, more emotionally invasive. I would not recommend it for your first."

She exhaled, thinking it through as she spoke. "For me, it takes some kind of emotional connection. You can feel the start of it once you've made a couple, and you learn when to... close the gap between the threads, I guess." She made a small, helpless gesture. "Psychic shit is hard to explain because most of it lives up here." She taps her temple again. "You'll know when it happens. And once you do, you can start making them on purpose. You can cut unwanted ones too, but the deeper they go, the more it's going to hurt to sever that connection."

Sleep cut one of hers. In a fucked up way, it was worse than dying.

[cantilevers]

"That's not surprising. Gods or entities calling themselves gods often are far removed from the citizens they assert their wills upon," he reasoned simply. He had prayed and learned enough about Janna to know that benevolence came with one hand and punishment with the other. He thought that it would still be worthwhile to have a conversation with Sleep; he wondered if people didn't ask the right questions or they didn't enjoy the contents of the answers. "What about your conversations with Sleep bothered you the most?"

This was just the beginning of his fatherly awkward endearing nature, and he would use it to his advantage wherever and whenever he chose to do so. It could come with certain advantages, though the information that she provided was interesting. "Sex guarantees one, huh?" He was not as deterred as he probably should be. "What do you mean be 'emotionally invasive'? This all seems like tethers are a function of oversharing."

He nodded his head, finding the offering of information affirming that this young lady was attached to his daughter. Information was valuable, often wielded as a sort of currency where he was from. "I appreciate the fact that you're sharing your experiences with him. It's provided insight that I might have otherwise had to fight to understand, but this does make some sense to me." Tethers were just another bargaining chip perhaps, especially after she mentioned severing them. It might hurt him, but it ultimately could hurt the other as well. His resilience to pain was high; he would be curious if it stood up here as it had back home.

"You must have a deep connection with my daughter, if I'm guessing this tether business."

[merged]

"Beyond all the poetic bullshit she likes to spout, she's the reason my dad is dead. She claims she saved me, but what she really did was strip away my choices and doom the last person in the world I cared about." The words came out sharp, venom threaded through every syllable, bitter. Corrosive. "And that's not even touching the fact that she manipulated Jinx, tried to use her."

And then Sleep erased the conversation from the Murmur. No matter what Jinx tried, she couldn't prove it happened to anyone, but Sharon hadn't believed for a second that the other girl imagined it.

Sharon lifted a brow. That did not sound like a man particularly bothered by the idea of forming deep, emotional bonds through sex. Some people were far too liberal with themselves, though notably, it was the emotional aspect that bothered her, not the physical. "Yeah, basically. You're connected. You can feel sensations, catch memories, emotions." She gestured vaguely, fingers tracing an invisible line. The tethers were useful in ways the masks weren't, but the constant connection had its downsides.

Vander was quick to make connections, and Sharon nodded, lips pressing together as uncertainty crept in. "Mmhm. We're... friends." Who sometimes make out. "We're there for each other when things get too rough, and things get too rough way too often."

[cantilevers]

Vander slowly nodded his head, empathy clear in his expression. He could understand that pain after all, and it would be a cold day on the docks that he didn't sympathize with her feelings on the matter. "I'm sorry that you suffered because of her," he responded softly. "Losing anyone close to you is difficult but especially a parent." He hummed, growing more and more aware that Sharon's closeness to Jinx was being exposed as deeper and deeper with every passing comment. He suspected they had a tether. "Sounds like quite the entity we're dealing with."

Now more than ever, he would like to have a conversation with this Sleep, to suss out what he could in commentary and make his own impressions. Powerful people often had no basis to understand the realities of common man after all. They lived too high and the ground too far away.

Oh, well tethers didn't sound THAT bad, and he had been on a dry spell thanks to... well, events in his own time. It didn't matter much now anymore holding back, did it? He'd died - or thought he died - and he couldn't imagine going through this new life or hell or purgatory alone. He wanted connection. "That could be useful keeping track of your people, I suppose," he replied, expertly downplaying his own interest again. "Though it goes both ways, and I'd hate to worry people if Sleep is as bad as you say."

Vander nodded his head slowly, corner of his lip tugging up. He knew what 'friends' meant in a tone like that. It wasn't entirely his business, but as long as his daughter was happy, that's all that mattered to him. Sharon seemed like a good level head. "I'm happy she has someone who cares for her and watches her back. Everyone needs that someone in their life."

[merged]

The flash of empathy earned a pinched look from her, a brief flicker of hurt that was there and gone as she shoved every emotion back into its box. Vander did not need to deal with what her rage could do, how it could change her, and thoughts of Sleep always dragged it to the surface.

"Useful, and necessary." As invasive as tethering felt to her, it would be a lie to say she did not take some enjoyment in forming them. Still, she's deliberately avoided doing so through more physical means, wary of how deep those tethers can run, of the awful things they might dredge up.

She did not miss the twitch of Vander's lips, that almost knowing look. It made her suddenly self-conscious, like she's shown more of herself than she meant to. "Yeah, they do. She's got a couple of people like that." Not in the hot and heavy sense—at least as far as she knows. "I'm sure she'll introduce you to all her friends when you wake up in the morning."

[cantilevers]

He did no press when it was clear that she was pushing the emotion down. Instead, he focused on the information that she was sharing, nodding his head in agreement to the idea of these tethers. Useful and necessary was probably the best description that he would refer back to once he began to form them. Tethers seemed universal at least.

"Does she? She was always the shier of the bunch, but I'm glad she's come into her own," he replied with fatherly pride. Now if this meant his daughter tended move around as he had once done in his youth or if it was more friendship. He was leaning towards the latter than the former.

"Maybe? Teens don't tend to start their reunions with introducing their parents to their friends from my experience," he remarked playfully. "Maybe she'll think I'm embarrassing or I'll pick things up that she doesn't want me to." Like who Jinx was sweet on and who she wasn't.

[merged]

Jinx was good at projecting confidence, even pushy in some ways, but Sharon had caught the cracks in that act. Little flashes of shyness, moments where the mask slipped, and the softer, more fragile parts showed through. The pieces she worked so hard to keep hidden. Sharon recognized it immediately. She knew that trick well.

"I wouldn't really know what most other teens would do," she admits with a small shrug. Sharon never had friends back home. Not once. As a kid, she was quiet, withdrawn, already haunted by things she couldn't name. As a teenager, it wasn't allowed. It wasn't safe. "But if you were my dad, that'd probably be the first thing I'd do, after giving him the sparknotes version of everything I've been through."

A way of weaving the two halves of her life together—letting the people who mattered here meet the people who mattered there.