Glimmers of a Dream

[Thalia]

“Spirit World.” She repeated his phrasing curiously; turning it over in her mind like a foreign trinket, as if perhaps it might yield its secrets under enough scrutiny. No conclusions were drawn from her thoughtful expression, but she did take a moment to glance at her surroundings like things had finally been given a context. This place had lots of names, and she had probably known them once. No longer, though.

The stranger’s clothes melted as she watched, resculpting themselves into dreary attire. He added glasses. She stepped back when he moved forward to look at the canvas, though only to give him enough space. Scrutinising his profile, she began to wonder what this meant; the presence of another. There were other places she went - sometimes not wholly of her own volition. Occasionally, on the precipice of waking here, she was instead dragged toward the lights of others; then, once there, was chained to their whim and conceptions. It did not happen often, but she knew enough to recognise that this was not the same; nothing directed her now but the distractions of her own mind. Other times she was voyeuristic, with little shape or form. She saw plenty of people then, but none saw her. So this was not that, either.

“I do?” A faint smile pricked the corners of her lips. Lost suggested panicked, and she wasn’t that. She did not know where she was, granted, but she also didn’t care very much. Familiarity softened her view of this place, if perhaps not actual understanding. Her existence here was instinctual and she didn't question much; it went some way to explain her fuzzy edge of vacancy, the way she flowed from one moment to the next like water. If she was lost, then she was accustom to being lost.

“Jon.” She considered his hand a moment before offering her own. Would she remember? Could she remember? She'd never tested her memory of this place, this Spirit World - had never needed to. When she woke here she was so easily distracted, drawn to whatever remnant of thought sparked and died as oblivion settled on her like a well-loved blanket, then ever onward until her time faded. Consistencies strung some sort of tapestry behind her - cognition demanded at least some context - but she might have slept a thousand years between each one. She had never had a reason to look back.

“I’m…” She faltered, trailing off in a way that was more puzzled than distressed. She’d had lots of names, but they were all murky, distant things too formless to grasp. It had never before been necessary to pluck one out and dust it off, and now that it was, she found she was incapable. She had no name, not here; her reality was too vast to encompass something so mundane. Or perhaps she was too ephemeral; she was never exactly sure which. Still, she didn’t seem overly concerned by this lack of identity; she smiled somewhat ruefully, and shrugged. “You may call me what you like, I suppose. It doesn't really matter.” Her head tilted, content to abandon the absence of her name, and how strange he might find her not knowing it, for something more interesting. “A guide? To here?”