I13DT - Sweet Dreams Are Made of This

by **Nailah Weaver** » Sat May 17, 2014 12:41 am

Nailah has gathered those interested in the Astral trip in the Lighthouse lobby. There's a whiteboard in the room as well as an appropriate number of loungers arranged in a circle around what appears to be a portable brazier holding a small flame. She's standing in front of the whiteboard, writing a couple things as she waits for everyone to arrive.

((Assume that the kids had a chance to sign up for it, no need to make that a thread. Usual "No need to post your arrival" rules apply. If you want your char to be there assume they arrived in time.))

by **Steve Jones** » Sat May 17, 2014 11:04 am

Steve walked in, pausing to wonder at what the brazier had to do with anything.

by **Miranda Weaver** » Sat May 17, 2014 11:18 am

Miranda wandered in, dressed in her 'new normal' over-sized red hoodie. She gravitated to a small orbit near Nailah without saying anything.

by **Haley Crusek** » Sat May 17, 2014 1:03 pm

Haley stood near the back of the room, her now-altered amulet tucked into her shirt. She didn't want to especially spend more time with the crazy bitch, but she was curious to see what else she could learn about the Astral.

by **Emily Inque** » Sat May 17, 2014 1:55 pm

Emily enters the room, doing her best to be pleasant and normal. She was under strict command to be on her best behavior during the field trip.

by **Kay Haddock** » Sat May 17, 2014 2:28 pm

Kay quietly steps into the room and is about to head over to Miranda when she sees she's standing near Nailah and suddenly changes her mind, hanging back instead.

by **Miranda Weaver** » Sat May 17, 2014 2:33 pm

Miranda does wave at Kay when she notices her enter.

by **Emily Inque** » Sat May 17, 2014 4:01 pm

"Lions and tigers and bears, oh my," Emily mumbles.

by **Nailah Weaver** » Sun May 18, 2014 9:28 pm

"Alright, that should be everybody, but before we start we need to go over a couple things." Nailah says, walking over to the whiteboard.

"First of all, you should think of the Astral as the subconscious of the world. That means not everything might immediately make sense to you and seem to operate by it's own strange rules at times, but learning about that is part of why you're here. Especially those among you who have psychic abilities, though on some level everyone is connected to the Astral, so I'm glad to see non-telepaths being curios enough about this to sign up."

"Secondly, some people might appear different to you than they look in the real world. This is because sometimes the unconscious mental image we have of ourselves is different. We call these Avatars and they're by no means set in stone. They can change as we grow older and our view of the world and ourselves changes, but with enough focus and discipline it's also possible to project an image of your choosing. That's one of the perks our telepaths will have who will find this much easier to accomplish. If I catch anybody making fun of this you're out and you'll be wishing you'd only gotten stuck with yard duty."

"Finally, the Astral is not an amusement park. I'll be guiding you so we'll be staying in the parts that are safe, but keep in mind that this is a place in which thoughts and feelings determine reality, to some degree, so there's the chance some of us will be bringing our own demons with us. Don't worry, that doesn't mean you'll accidentally spill all your secrets to the rest of the class, but we might encounter some of those in whichever shape they might take. A lot of these things are rather abstract so they tend to take the shape of things we find generally threatening. The important thing to remember is that if your fear of the math exam takes the shape of a giant spider..." she says, drawing a brain on the whiteboard, then a couple squiggly lines coming out from it, followed by a spider. "...then that leaves it vulnerable to being fought by you or your classmates with, say, thoughts about studying." She draws a couple more crude brains and squiggly thought-lines summoning a huge glass around the spider.

"Or you literally punch it into submission." she smirks slightly. "If a fear takes physical shape then the act of dealing with it gains a couple new venues. Any questions so far?"

((As usual, if you want your char to have made it on time you're free to assume they were.))

by **Kayla Turnbull** » Sun May 18, 2014 10:41 pm

Kayla turned, and smirked in Haley's direction.

by **Alex Carpenter** » Sun May 18, 2014 10:54 pm

I don't belong here, Alex thought as he fidgeted, listening to Ms. Weaver go on.

by **Steve Jones** » Mon May 19, 2014 9:35 am

"If a fear takes physical shape can't it hurt you too?"

by **Nailah Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 12:41 pm

"Yes, but not physically. And most fears aren't crippling enough to do lasting damage to your mind. There are places in the Astral where these things can get dangerous, where the darker thoughts of people and even other beings can overwhelm or even hurt you, but we aren't going anywhere near those places."

"Anything else?"

by **Miranda Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 12:43 pm

Miranda shook her head.

by **Brigid Plunder** » Mon May 19, 2014 12:45 pm

"We're... we're not going to look, like... really weird, are we?" Brigid asks sheepishly.

by **Nailah Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 12:51 pm

"That depends on what you consider really weird, but no. I will be surprised if any of you end up looking stranger than me."

by **Emily Inque** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:06 pm

"Where is the Astral?" Emily asks, sounding curious. "Physically, I mean."

by **Steve Jones** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:09 pm

"Pretty much everywhere and nowhere," Steve says.

by **Emily Inque** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:14 pm

"That makes no sense. You are very unhelpful," Emily says.

by **Nailah Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:20 pm

"The simplest answer is that it has no physical location. Metaphorically speaking it's in a lot of places. Our minds, our hearts, our stories and legends."

by **Emily Inque** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:29 pm

"We will be traveling in a metaphor?" Emily asks.

by **Nailah Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:31 pm

"That is exactly right."

by **Emily Inque** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:32 pm

This seemed to cause Emily to get lost in deep thoughts. She didn't appear to have anymore questions though.

by **Nailah Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:44 pm

"If no one has any more questions then we're just about ready. Go ahead and make yourselves comfortable." she says, gesturing at the lounging seats.

by **Brigid Plunder** » Mon May 19, 2014 4:51 pm

Brigid nods nervously and sits down.

by **Miranda Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 5:20 pm

Miranda settled in, adjusted her hood, and folded her hands over her chest.

by **Nailah Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 5:50 pm

Once everyone is settled in Nailah walks up to the bowl in the middle. "Just relax, especially the telepaths among you can help if you just let yourself be aware of the other minds around you." Kneeling down in front of the bowl she adds a bit of fuel to the small flame, including some (harmless) incense as she quietly chants. Then she gets up and quietly walks over to her own seat and lies down, closing her eyes.

Slowly the light seems to dim as the smell of the incense fills the room. Everything seems to grow oddly muffled and distant until the small flame in the bowl suddenly seems to flare up in a bright column of sunlight that rapidly expands, washing over everyone and when it fades their seats suddenly seem to stand in a wide open field of yellow-golden grass, a gentle breeze blowing that makes the landscape slowly sway as it stretches out towards the horizon. Straining the ears there's the faint hint of music being carried on the wind.

As Nailah stands up it becomes obvious that she's quite a bit larger than she normally is and walking on all fours. "Welcome to the Fields of Tranquility. I believe some of you are already familiar." she smiles.

by **Miranda Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 5:57 pm

Miranda stands up, dressed in a black toga-style dress and wearing a red hooded cape with the hood pulled down over her eyes. Her eyes are bound with something that looks like linen. The edges of her hood and dress are embroidered with eyes done in a Greco-Roman style.

by **Brigid Plunder** » Mon May 19, 2014 6:12 pm

Brigid slowly gets up, looking around. She looks quite a bit taller than she normally is, and the usually baggy clothes she tends to hide in are coming up woefully short.

by **Kay Haddock** » Mon May 19, 2014 6:20 pm

Meanwhile Kay is too awed by the landscape to notice that she looks quite a bit more human again from the waist up. Of course from the waist down she's pretty much entirely fish now. When she tries to stand up she ends up falling out of the seat and kind of floating in mid-air, too flabbergasted to even freak out. "What the heck..."

by **Kayla Turnbull** » Mon May 19, 2014 6:59 pm

Kayla stood up, appearing to tread water in midair.

She appeared to be a fisher-girl, bearing a large, fine thread fishing net about her shoulder.

"Impressive.."

by **Steve Jones** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:07 pm

Steve stood, looking every bit the retrofuture space hero in his red shirt, black pants, boots, and holstered raygun.

by **Brigid Plunder** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:18 pm

"...oookay, so pretty much everyone looks cooler than me," Brigid mumbles, looking down at herself and blushing, while trying to get her outfit to cover better.

And failing.

by **Kayla Turnbull** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:42 pm

Kayla swam over, looking approvingly at Brigid.

"You need to uncover more often."

She was dressed in similar fashion, in a tight, sleek tankini.

by **Miranda Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:49 pm

"Nice, isn't it?" Miranda said, moving over to Kay.

by **Brigid Plunder** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:53 pm

"Uhm, look, this isn't... I didn't intend this..."

She says as she fumbles with her glasses that clearly have no lenses in them.

by **Kay Haddock** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:58 pm

"I... I dunno..." she says, carefully flicking her tail and floating through the air. "Hey, wait." she says, noticing her normal-looking hands and touching her face. "Ohmigosh!"

by **Kayla Turnbull** » Mon May 19, 2014 7:58 pm

Kayla laughed.

"Just get rid of the empty frames. You obviously don't need them here in the astral thingy."

by **Miranda Weaver** » Mon May 19, 2014 8:04 pm

Miranda just smiled and let Kay have her moment.

by **Kay Haddock** » Mon May 19, 2014 8:08 pm

"I'm like a mermaid!" she says, then suddenly seems to realize something else and looks down at herself, relieved to find that she still seems to be wearing one of her hoodies.

"Wait, how am I swimming in the air?" she wonders and promptly falls down to the ground.

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