Encounterlogs
Lucys Odd Encounter Sr Colton 241211
On a brisk early morning at Delta Delta Delta Sorority, Lucy finds herself contemplating between a party invitation and an intriguing workshop on dreams and psychic potential, the latter led by Professor James Hayden, a large man with a keen interest in the differences between gender psyches. Despite her skepticism, Lucy decides to attend, intrigued by the opportunity to delve into someone's mind through their dream. The workshop, attended by only a handful of students, seems an odd mix of lecture and practical experiment, aimed at exploring dreamworlds and the psychic energy that connects them. As the professor explains the process and the ethical boundaries of such invasions, Lucy's inquiry emerges: the safety and potential misuse of these abilities remain at the forefront of her concerns.
The practical session takes Lucy into the dream of Rene Cross, a volunteer student with a "sound mind" according to Professor Hayden. In his dream, a beach setting, Lucy navigates the unfamiliar territory with a mix of curiosity and caution. Her mission is to find out Rene's surname, a task she accomplishes by engaging him in conversation, marveling at the vividness and lucidity of the dream environment. The challenge, as it turns out, is not in finding the information but in ensuring Rene wakes up, a feat Lucy achieves with an eerie prompt that quickly snaps them both back to reality. Back in the classroom to polite applause and Rene's dazed awakening, Lucy reports her success to Professor Hayden, her experience leaving her with a newfound appreciation and wariness for the power of dreams. The professor commends her discretion and suggests future exploration of her capabilities, hinting at the complexity and potential of psychic talent. Lucy's success in the task is evident, but the moral implications and the ease with which she navigated another's subconscious weigh heavily on her, marking the beginning of a deeper foray into the psychic unknown.
(Lucy's odd encounter(SRColton):SRColton)
[Tue Dec 10 2024]
In Room Six in Delta Delta Delta Sorority
This dorm room is a lively tapestry of college life and sisterhood, shared by two girls. On one wall, a DELTA DELTA DELTA tapestry takes center stage, surrounded by candid snapshots brimming with laughter and shared memories. Twin beds, each with plush, patterned bedding, are strategically positioned to maximize the space, their arrangement creating individual nooks of personality and comfort. A whiteboard calendar, bustling with color-coded events and deadlines, hangs near a makeshift vanity that's a collage of cosmetic treasures and strings of fairy lights surrounding a Wal-Mart mirror. Dressers sit at the foot of each bed, covered in stickers.
It is night, about 27F(-2C) degrees, and there are a few dark grey stormclouds in the sky. There is a waxing gibbous moon.
(Your target and their allies have been tasked with stealing a vital piece of intelligence from a subject by delving into their mind with dream invading to try to tease out the secret.
)
Lucy perches on the edge of her bed, the morning sunlight spilling across her legs as she opens the sleek black box. A pleased smile tugs at her lips, letting out a soft laughed, clearly charmed by the unique presentation.
It's rather brisk today, early as it is, and there's little wonder why Lucy hasn't quite left her bed yet. The auroral chocolate might be a little ironic for one of her kind, but it's at least very pretty. It's not the only invitation she's going to receive this morning, either. There's a soft knock at the door - soft enough to not wake anyone - and after a moment, the door unlatches to reveal a sleepy-looking dormmate.
"Hey, good morning," she murmurs, stifling a yawn. "One of the professors is starting up a workshop on dreams and psychic potential and stuff like that. I was going to go... But I'm going back to bed. It's too cold for this. Just thought I better let you know there's a slot open." She flashes Lucy a little smile, then shuts the door and stumbles off to her own room, leaving the younger student to ruminate over her party invitation and her study invitation, both.
Lucy offers the student a sleepy but sincere smile as they shuffle off, "Thanks for letting me know," She says softly, her voice warm despite the morning chill. As the door clicks shut, she leans back slightly, the chocolate invite still in her hand. Her gaze lingers on it for a moment before she shakes her head with a faint laugh at herself. She sets the box aside, stretching lazily before realizing the need to pull herself together. She fixes up her clothes. Her reflection in the mirror catches her eye, and she offers herself a bolstering nod before heading out to where she suspects the workshop would be.
Once Lucy's outside the sorority house, it's thankfully easy to tell where the four-in-the-morning class might be held, judging by the panel of lit windows visible through the side of the building. Psychic class in the mental health clinic; how fun. There are a few stern glances from orderlies and receptionists as the young woman winds her way through the building - she'd best not be disturbing any of the patients this early - but there's no real impeding of her way.
The class itself is being held in one of the experimentation rooms, with a handful of chairs pulled in and other clutter cleared away to make room for the students... of which there are only two or three others, not counting the student lying down on the table in the middle of the room. There's a funny dish-helmet affixed over his head and a loose blood pressure cuff around his arm, but neither appear to be active at the moment, and the student mostly chatters away with one of the others as the professor sets up.
The Professor himself is quite a large man, both in height and width, and sports a well-groomed but notably dyed black beard. "Oh!" he says, when Lucy slips in. "Good, good. I had been hoping for a female student - it's always worth exploring the different potentialities held between the different genders and the roles those genders thrust us into. Please - take a seat. I'm Professor James Hayden. We'll be beginning shortly."
Lucy's eyes narrow slightly as she studies the professor, her skepticism barely concealed - 'Different potentialities, huh?' she thinks to herself, the words circling in her head like a warning bell. Still, she bites back any retort and forces herself to nod politely as she makes her way to an open seat near the back of the room, where she can observe without feeling too exposed. Settling in, she adjusts her posture, her arms crossed loosely in front of her, giving off the casual air of someone trying not to look too invested.
"Not so much weird bullshit as some of you may be thinking!" announces the professor, who lifts a finger to tap at the side of his head. "Yes - that's quite right, I am capable of hearing your thoughts, Mister Brixton. With time, effort and some hopefully-helpful education, you can nourish a talent like this for yourselves." He gestures to the volunteer student lying on the table below and says, "Rene here is a regular volunteer for my work and has one of the soundest, safest minds I have ever had the privilege of exploring - a perfect situation for first-timers who've never entered someone else's dreams before. He has, of course, consented to this."
The portly older man steps around to activate a projector, which flashes a series of diagrams and artist's renditions of the nightmare and the physical world and how they overlap each other. "God has seen fit to grace his creation with a mind so potent as to transcend the body," he declares, before entering into a basic spiel of the nightmare, of dreams, and of the dreamworlds and the psychic energy used to create them. Mentions of psychic feeding and the less-than-savoury aspects of nightmare invasion and dream snares are mentioned only passingly if at all, and the entire presentation is given a rather Christianised, milquetoast spin on things.
"Now," he says. "We're going to take these basic fundamentals and use them to enter Rene's dreaming mind. If you can return to the waking world of your own volition and inform me of our brave volunteer's surname, you will receive a credit towards your grades... and hopefully, a seed will have been planted to allow you to grow your minds! Before we begin, do any of you have any questions?"
Lucy lets her skeptical gaze soften a little as she settles back in her seat, twirling a strand of her dark hair between her fingers. She muses internally: 'I guess it's a good thing he's teaching this instead of hanging around ATMs, plucking pin numbers out of people's heads. Still, is this safe to be teaching to people? Won't it be abused?' She shakes her head slightly, her lips pressing into a thin line to keep the skeptical remarks she desperately wants to make from slipping out. Instead, she leans back in her seat and folds her arms, her expression carefully neutral as she glances up at the professor, "No questions, professor. I'm ready." Her gaze flicks briefly to Rene on the table, then back to the professor, her jaw tightening just enough to signal that she's prepping herself for what's to come.
Rene himself flashes Lucy a little wink and a thumbs-up, then lays himself out flat on the bed, resting his head back into the helmet. The professor claps his hands together as well, calling, "Perfect! You'll be making our first attempt, then. I will be observing through the machine, here." He nods aside to the screens and keys hooked up to Rene's medical gear, then flicks a finger at the boy, who begins snort only a moment later.
"Now, I'm going to offer you the same rest, Miss Frost, so please, get comfortable..."
Things swirl and drift and Lucy is unconscious - a specter looking upon herself, upon the classroom, upon the professor; who meets her formless eyes and tips his head towards Rene's sleeping body. Diving forward into the man's dream is both simple and difficult, after that. It would appear to be quite difficult to willfully direct one's own dream-spectre in any direction other than the nearest dream to sink into. Focusing her mind is therefor Lucy's most difficult task... but getting in is easy.
She's on a beach, somewhere. Hot, pale sand sifts underfoot, and she's adorned with a plain black swimsuit - one that seems to shift and become whatever Lucy might want of it, with just a little nudging. There are other beach-goers around, of course, but few of them seem to have proper faces, and there are few enough of them milling around that it's not hard to spot Rene in a set of swim trunks sunning himself on a towel, making idle conversation with a few figments of his own imagination. He's not bad-looking, either, though the dream might have slid him a few steps closer along the spectrum towards having a movie star body.
Lucy's initial steps across the beach are awkward, like someone learning how to walk on sand for the first time. Her gaze darts around, taking in the strange, faceless beachgoers. It's unnerving, but also fascinating. She's never been to a beach, this much is clear from the way she squints at the vast ocean as if it might leap up to meet her. Finally, she huffs and brushes her hands over her arms, muttering, "Not real. Just a dream. You're being weird, Lucy." As if talking to one's self is the most normal thing to do. Spying Rene, she exhales a soft 'oh' and makes her way over. His physique, a bit more polished than what she remembers, gives her pause, and her eyes narrow as if weighing whether to comment, "Hi." She eventually begins, voice a little high before she clears her throat, "So, um... what's your surname? Nicely asking." Her lips twitch into a slightly forced smile. Clearly just going for the path of least resistance.
Perhaps some day Lucy shall learn the difference between the most direct path and the path of least resistance. It had been an eerie thing, how the beachgoers simply had no reaction to her moving past them... but once she draws Rene's attention, they begin to acknowledge her existence, and even react to her words. Mainly by drawing away and making funny expressions at her, unfortunately, but it's something. The spectres which had been speaking with Rene have enough of their faces intact to bear looking at, and they mostly employ it to snicker at the young woman in a reflection of the other student's own mood.
"Um," he says, laughing a little nervously. "Hello to you too. Do we know each other? You're kind of familiar." He pushes himself up off the sandy towel, then sticks his hand up for Lucy to shake. "Rene Cross."
Lucy clasps Rene's hand with a firm shake, her grip firm and her expression laced with a self-satisfied smirk, "Lucy." she introduces herself simply, the corner of her lips quirking up. "And yeah, I guess I do know you now. Rene Cross, huh?" She tilts her head slightly, her hair spilling over one shoulder as her eyes flit across their surroundings, then back to him. "Honestly, I wasn't expecting it to be this easy," she admits, her tone carrying a faint hint of amusement. "But hey, I'm not complaining. Having fun?"
A confused expression flits across Rene's features at Lucy's apparent satisfaction. For all that he's got that killer bod going on - and yes, it is a bit more killer of a bod than it had been only a couple of minutes ago - there's not much going on upstairs. That, or he's just wrapped up deeply in his own dream.
"I mean, it's just my name," he laughs, not keeping /all/ of the befuddlement out of his voice. "But yeah - it's a nice place. Nice view." He pauses to glance away from Lucy as he says it, staring into the ocean horizon instead. "Nice and hot, is the main thing. I can't stand the cold. Nice to meet you, Lucy."
There's a voice in the back of Lucy's mind, then - Professor Hayden's voice.
"You'll have to wake him up, now," it suggests. "And the fastest way to wake up a dreamer is to tell him he's asleep! Go on - give it a try."
Lucy flashes Rene an easy smile as she settles herself on the sandy towel beside him, "So, Rene, you come here often? I mean, not a bad spot to kick back. The sun, the waves, the whole vibe." Her voice is light, casual, and conversational as she brushes a strand of hair from her face, "You ever think about how vivid dreams like this are?" she continues, leaning slightly toward him, "Like... how it all feels real. But i's not. None of it's real." Her tone shifts imperceptibly, a faint edge creeping into her words. "You're dreaming, Rene.." She whispers, her voice dipping into a haunting, almost otherworldly timbre. Her expression grows serious, her gaze locking onto his with unsettling intensity, "And you need to wake up. Right. Now."
At first, there's the mind's natural inclination to trust that what it perceives is what is real. Rene leans back a little bit, grimacing a little as his eyebrows rise.
"Hey, I mean - maybe, you know, ease it up a bit, haha," he says, verbalising the 'ha ha' instead of actually laughing. It's a delayed process, though, and as he studiously looks away from Lucy, the shitty details that his dream had failed to accurately reproduce begin to stand out. She can all but see the lightbulb ding to life over his head as he realises what's going on. "Oh, shit, right, I'm doing a demo!" he says. He turns to say smile back at Lucy - maybe apologise for curving her so hard - and then her eyes flick open from where she's sitting in the makeshift classroom to the sound of polite applause.
Rene's sitting up a little, too, though judging by the expression on his face, the details of the dream are quickly escaping him. "You, uh - you get it?" he asks. "Wait, uh, tell the professor, privately. The others still gotta do it."
On cue, the professor flashes a warm smile at Lucy and says, "So you see, dreams are in fact very effective grounds for finding information! But it is important to not manipulate others' mental state too much or cause undue harm in the process. And, of course - a dreamer who realises they're a dreamer will wake up on the spot! Full marks, Miss Frost. If you'll just come whisper the name over to me, I'll mark down your efforts today. If you any younger, we'd be looking at gold stars for today!"
Lucy walks up to the professor with a slight blush creeping onto her cheeks, feeling a mix of pride and discomfort at the success. She leans in, whispering the name "Rene Cross" softly into the professor's ear, before straightening up, "It was... educational," She says with a small, sheepish smile, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear, Her voice is light, though there's a flicker of discomfort in her eyes, as if she's unsure whether the ease with which she pulled off the task was something to be proud of or slightly unsettling. Still, she straightens her posture, giving the professor a polite nod, "Thanks for the... lesson. Never really thought about dreams like that before."
Taking Lucy aside for a moment to speak quietly with her, the Professor says, "I appreciate you not ruining the class, Miss Frost. Of course, you could have worn whatever you wished - when you enter someone else's dream, your conscious mind has all the power of the dreamer's subconscious mind. When we enter dreams, we become - at first - subject to the rules of those dreams. You will be like any other human if you should traipse through a dreamworld, for instance. You likely were in a swimsuit purely because of the beach setting. Perhaps if you attend my next class, you can spend some time focusing on transforming your clothing to better fit your own mind's eye than those who would behold you?" He smiles, then gives Lucy a pat on the shoulder before he returns to the machine.
"Right! Who's next?..."
The practical session takes Lucy into the dream of Rene Cross, a volunteer student with a "sound mind" according to Professor Hayden. In his dream, a beach setting, Lucy navigates the unfamiliar territory with a mix of curiosity and caution. Her mission is to find out Rene's surname, a task she accomplishes by engaging him in conversation, marveling at the vividness and lucidity of the dream environment. The challenge, as it turns out, is not in finding the information but in ensuring Rene wakes up, a feat Lucy achieves with an eerie prompt that quickly snaps them both back to reality. Back in the classroom to polite applause and Rene's dazed awakening, Lucy reports her success to Professor Hayden, her experience leaving her with a newfound appreciation and wariness for the power of dreams. The professor commends her discretion and suggests future exploration of her capabilities, hinting at the complexity and potential of psychic talent. Lucy's success in the task is evident, but the moral implications and the ease with which she navigated another's subconscious weigh heavily on her, marking the beginning of a deeper foray into the psychic unknown.
(Lucy's odd encounter(SRColton):SRColton)
[Tue Dec 10 2024]
In Room Six in Delta Delta Delta Sorority
This dorm room is a lively tapestry of college life and sisterhood, shared by two girls. On one wall, a DELTA DELTA DELTA tapestry takes center stage, surrounded by candid snapshots brimming with laughter and shared memories. Twin beds, each with plush, patterned bedding, are strategically positioned to maximize the space, their arrangement creating individual nooks of personality and comfort. A whiteboard calendar, bustling with color-coded events and deadlines, hangs near a makeshift vanity that's a collage of cosmetic treasures and strings of fairy lights surrounding a Wal-Mart mirror. Dressers sit at the foot of each bed, covered in stickers.
It is night, about 27F(-2C) degrees, and there are a few dark grey stormclouds in the sky. There is a waxing gibbous moon.
(Your target and their allies have been tasked with stealing a vital piece of intelligence from a subject by delving into their mind with dream invading to try to tease out the secret.
)
Lucy perches on the edge of her bed, the morning sunlight spilling across her legs as she opens the sleek black box. A pleased smile tugs at her lips, letting out a soft laughed, clearly charmed by the unique presentation.
It's rather brisk today, early as it is, and there's little wonder why Lucy hasn't quite left her bed yet. The auroral chocolate might be a little ironic for one of her kind, but it's at least very pretty. It's not the only invitation she's going to receive this morning, either. There's a soft knock at the door - soft enough to not wake anyone - and after a moment, the door unlatches to reveal a sleepy-looking dormmate.
"Hey, good morning," she murmurs, stifling a yawn. "One of the professors is starting up a workshop on dreams and psychic potential and stuff like that. I was going to go... But I'm going back to bed. It's too cold for this. Just thought I better let you know there's a slot open." She flashes Lucy a little smile, then shuts the door and stumbles off to her own room, leaving the younger student to ruminate over her party invitation and her study invitation, both.
Lucy offers the student a sleepy but sincere smile as they shuffle off, "Thanks for letting me know," She says softly, her voice warm despite the morning chill. As the door clicks shut, she leans back slightly, the chocolate invite still in her hand. Her gaze lingers on it for a moment before she shakes her head with a faint laugh at herself. She sets the box aside, stretching lazily before realizing the need to pull herself together. She fixes up her clothes. Her reflection in the mirror catches her eye, and she offers herself a bolstering nod before heading out to where she suspects the workshop would be.
Once Lucy's outside the sorority house, it's thankfully easy to tell where the four-in-the-morning class might be held, judging by the panel of lit windows visible through the side of the building. Psychic class in the mental health clinic; how fun. There are a few stern glances from orderlies and receptionists as the young woman winds her way through the building - she'd best not be disturbing any of the patients this early - but there's no real impeding of her way.
The class itself is being held in one of the experimentation rooms, with a handful of chairs pulled in and other clutter cleared away to make room for the students... of which there are only two or three others, not counting the student lying down on the table in the middle of the room. There's a funny dish-helmet affixed over his head and a loose blood pressure cuff around his arm, but neither appear to be active at the moment, and the student mostly chatters away with one of the others as the professor sets up.
The Professor himself is quite a large man, both in height and width, and sports a well-groomed but notably dyed black beard. "Oh!" he says, when Lucy slips in. "Good, good. I had been hoping for a female student - it's always worth exploring the different potentialities held between the different genders and the roles those genders thrust us into. Please - take a seat. I'm Professor James Hayden. We'll be beginning shortly."
Lucy's eyes narrow slightly as she studies the professor, her skepticism barely concealed - 'Different potentialities, huh?' she thinks to herself, the words circling in her head like a warning bell. Still, she bites back any retort and forces herself to nod politely as she makes her way to an open seat near the back of the room, where she can observe without feeling too exposed. Settling in, she adjusts her posture, her arms crossed loosely in front of her, giving off the casual air of someone trying not to look too invested.
"Not so much weird bullshit as some of you may be thinking!" announces the professor, who lifts a finger to tap at the side of his head. "Yes - that's quite right, I am capable of hearing your thoughts, Mister Brixton. With time, effort and some hopefully-helpful education, you can nourish a talent like this for yourselves." He gestures to the volunteer student lying on the table below and says, "Rene here is a regular volunteer for my work and has one of the soundest, safest minds I have ever had the privilege of exploring - a perfect situation for first-timers who've never entered someone else's dreams before. He has, of course, consented to this."
The portly older man steps around to activate a projector, which flashes a series of diagrams and artist's renditions of the nightmare and the physical world and how they overlap each other. "God has seen fit to grace his creation with a mind so potent as to transcend the body," he declares, before entering into a basic spiel of the nightmare, of dreams, and of the dreamworlds and the psychic energy used to create them. Mentions of psychic feeding and the less-than-savoury aspects of nightmare invasion and dream snares are mentioned only passingly if at all, and the entire presentation is given a rather Christianised, milquetoast spin on things.
"Now," he says. "We're going to take these basic fundamentals and use them to enter Rene's dreaming mind. If you can return to the waking world of your own volition and inform me of our brave volunteer's surname, you will receive a credit towards your grades... and hopefully, a seed will have been planted to allow you to grow your minds! Before we begin, do any of you have any questions?"
Lucy lets her skeptical gaze soften a little as she settles back in her seat, twirling a strand of her dark hair between her fingers. She muses internally: 'I guess it's a good thing he's teaching this instead of hanging around ATMs, plucking pin numbers out of people's heads. Still, is this safe to be teaching to people? Won't it be abused?' She shakes her head slightly, her lips pressing into a thin line to keep the skeptical remarks she desperately wants to make from slipping out. Instead, she leans back in her seat and folds her arms, her expression carefully neutral as she glances up at the professor, "No questions, professor. I'm ready." Her gaze flicks briefly to Rene on the table, then back to the professor, her jaw tightening just enough to signal that she's prepping herself for what's to come.
Rene himself flashes Lucy a little wink and a thumbs-up, then lays himself out flat on the bed, resting his head back into the helmet. The professor claps his hands together as well, calling, "Perfect! You'll be making our first attempt, then. I will be observing through the machine, here." He nods aside to the screens and keys hooked up to Rene's medical gear, then flicks a finger at the boy, who begins snort only a moment later.
"Now, I'm going to offer you the same rest, Miss Frost, so please, get comfortable..."
Things swirl and drift and Lucy is unconscious - a specter looking upon herself, upon the classroom, upon the professor; who meets her formless eyes and tips his head towards Rene's sleeping body. Diving forward into the man's dream is both simple and difficult, after that. It would appear to be quite difficult to willfully direct one's own dream-spectre in any direction other than the nearest dream to sink into. Focusing her mind is therefor Lucy's most difficult task... but getting in is easy.
She's on a beach, somewhere. Hot, pale sand sifts underfoot, and she's adorned with a plain black swimsuit - one that seems to shift and become whatever Lucy might want of it, with just a little nudging. There are other beach-goers around, of course, but few of them seem to have proper faces, and there are few enough of them milling around that it's not hard to spot Rene in a set of swim trunks sunning himself on a towel, making idle conversation with a few figments of his own imagination. He's not bad-looking, either, though the dream might have slid him a few steps closer along the spectrum towards having a movie star body.
Lucy's initial steps across the beach are awkward, like someone learning how to walk on sand for the first time. Her gaze darts around, taking in the strange, faceless beachgoers. It's unnerving, but also fascinating. She's never been to a beach, this much is clear from the way she squints at the vast ocean as if it might leap up to meet her. Finally, she huffs and brushes her hands over her arms, muttering, "Not real. Just a dream. You're being weird, Lucy." As if talking to one's self is the most normal thing to do. Spying Rene, she exhales a soft 'oh' and makes her way over. His physique, a bit more polished than what she remembers, gives her pause, and her eyes narrow as if weighing whether to comment, "Hi." She eventually begins, voice a little high before she clears her throat, "So, um... what's your surname? Nicely asking." Her lips twitch into a slightly forced smile. Clearly just going for the path of least resistance.
Perhaps some day Lucy shall learn the difference between the most direct path and the path of least resistance. It had been an eerie thing, how the beachgoers simply had no reaction to her moving past them... but once she draws Rene's attention, they begin to acknowledge her existence, and even react to her words. Mainly by drawing away and making funny expressions at her, unfortunately, but it's something. The spectres which had been speaking with Rene have enough of their faces intact to bear looking at, and they mostly employ it to snicker at the young woman in a reflection of the other student's own mood.
"Um," he says, laughing a little nervously. "Hello to you too. Do we know each other? You're kind of familiar." He pushes himself up off the sandy towel, then sticks his hand up for Lucy to shake. "Rene Cross."
Lucy clasps Rene's hand with a firm shake, her grip firm and her expression laced with a self-satisfied smirk, "Lucy." she introduces herself simply, the corner of her lips quirking up. "And yeah, I guess I do know you now. Rene Cross, huh?" She tilts her head slightly, her hair spilling over one shoulder as her eyes flit across their surroundings, then back to him. "Honestly, I wasn't expecting it to be this easy," she admits, her tone carrying a faint hint of amusement. "But hey, I'm not complaining. Having fun?"
A confused expression flits across Rene's features at Lucy's apparent satisfaction. For all that he's got that killer bod going on - and yes, it is a bit more killer of a bod than it had been only a couple of minutes ago - there's not much going on upstairs. That, or he's just wrapped up deeply in his own dream.
"I mean, it's just my name," he laughs, not keeping /all/ of the befuddlement out of his voice. "But yeah - it's a nice place. Nice view." He pauses to glance away from Lucy as he says it, staring into the ocean horizon instead. "Nice and hot, is the main thing. I can't stand the cold. Nice to meet you, Lucy."
There's a voice in the back of Lucy's mind, then - Professor Hayden's voice.
"You'll have to wake him up, now," it suggests. "And the fastest way to wake up a dreamer is to tell him he's asleep! Go on - give it a try."
Lucy flashes Rene an easy smile as she settles herself on the sandy towel beside him, "So, Rene, you come here often? I mean, not a bad spot to kick back. The sun, the waves, the whole vibe." Her voice is light, casual, and conversational as she brushes a strand of hair from her face, "You ever think about how vivid dreams like this are?" she continues, leaning slightly toward him, "Like... how it all feels real. But i's not. None of it's real." Her tone shifts imperceptibly, a faint edge creeping into her words. "You're dreaming, Rene.." She whispers, her voice dipping into a haunting, almost otherworldly timbre. Her expression grows serious, her gaze locking onto his with unsettling intensity, "And you need to wake up. Right. Now."
At first, there's the mind's natural inclination to trust that what it perceives is what is real. Rene leans back a little bit, grimacing a little as his eyebrows rise.
"Hey, I mean - maybe, you know, ease it up a bit, haha," he says, verbalising the 'ha ha' instead of actually laughing. It's a delayed process, though, and as he studiously looks away from Lucy, the shitty details that his dream had failed to accurately reproduce begin to stand out. She can all but see the lightbulb ding to life over his head as he realises what's going on. "Oh, shit, right, I'm doing a demo!" he says. He turns to say smile back at Lucy - maybe apologise for curving her so hard - and then her eyes flick open from where she's sitting in the makeshift classroom to the sound of polite applause.
Rene's sitting up a little, too, though judging by the expression on his face, the details of the dream are quickly escaping him. "You, uh - you get it?" he asks. "Wait, uh, tell the professor, privately. The others still gotta do it."
On cue, the professor flashes a warm smile at Lucy and says, "So you see, dreams are in fact very effective grounds for finding information! But it is important to not manipulate others' mental state too much or cause undue harm in the process. And, of course - a dreamer who realises they're a dreamer will wake up on the spot! Full marks, Miss Frost. If you'll just come whisper the name over to me, I'll mark down your efforts today. If you any younger, we'd be looking at gold stars for today!"
Lucy walks up to the professor with a slight blush creeping onto her cheeks, feeling a mix of pride and discomfort at the success. She leans in, whispering the name "Rene Cross" softly into the professor's ear, before straightening up, "It was... educational," She says with a small, sheepish smile, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear, Her voice is light, though there's a flicker of discomfort in her eyes, as if she's unsure whether the ease with which she pulled off the task was something to be proud of or slightly unsettling. Still, she straightens her posture, giving the professor a polite nod, "Thanks for the... lesson. Never really thought about dreams like that before."
Taking Lucy aside for a moment to speak quietly with her, the Professor says, "I appreciate you not ruining the class, Miss Frost. Of course, you could have worn whatever you wished - when you enter someone else's dream, your conscious mind has all the power of the dreamer's subconscious mind. When we enter dreams, we become - at first - subject to the rules of those dreams. You will be like any other human if you should traipse through a dreamworld, for instance. You likely were in a swimsuit purely because of the beach setting. Perhaps if you attend my next class, you can spend some time focusing on transforming your clothing to better fit your own mind's eye than those who would behold you?" He smiles, then gives Lucy a pat on the shoulder before he returns to the machine.
"Right! Who's next?..."