Gone After

Michael shook his head, opening his eyes to the weird blue surroundings.
...wait where is this? He wondered. He'd tried dream walking before, he'd found Sam that time, but he hadn't even ended up in a blue nothingness.
"...ah MJ, that you?" a voice echoed around.
"Yeah... Where are ya? I can't so you." Michael called out to Danny's voice.
"..Oops." Danny's form appeared out of nowhere, sending up swirls and clouds of blue.
This place was weird as hell...
Before Michael could ponder this more, something ..or somebody fell on top of him.
"Ach!"
"...sorry dude." Sam laughed standing up and helping her friend up.
"'s all good. Nothings broken."
Loud and seemingly annoyed voices came into earshot and they quickly got closer.
"Well you're acting like I dragged you here!" Joseph snapped.
"You put something in that tea didn't you!?" Eva snapped back.
"Hey guys. Snap out of it." Sam said to the two bickering teens. Both of whom reluctantly shut their mouths.

In the new silence all five teens looked around, somewhat confused, they had all just gone to sleep after getting back home after a mission. Why were they here?
'Could we all be lucid right now or something? 'Danny asked, not wanting to break the eerie silence of the place.
'...I never remember it being like this.' Michael replied, the other three nodding.
'...and is it just me or are your guys' auras really dim here?' The red head pointed out.
The other four nodding again.
Let Michael repeat, this place was weird.

Danny kicked up some of the blue stuff on the ground sending up more shapes and swirls, 'Well what do we do now?'

Derek shoved his hands into his pockets idly, not sure what to do with himself. Lilith had told him that nobody had turned sixteen within the last few hours or would while he was Lucid. And no Nightmares were to be found. So she told him he had the night off. And then she had disappeared.
...Might as well check on the Dream Realm to make sure Lil was right about the Nightmares...
Derek didn't even bother to close his eyes as he imagined the white mist swirling around his feet turning blue. In mere seconds, it wasn't just his imagination and he had entered the Dream Realm.
The moment he was aware that he was in the blue realm, he knew something was off. Maybe it was the very loud, and very teenager voices that echoed around, or the plumes of blue mist that were floating around haphazardly. Or perhaps it was the brunet kid standing right in front of him, kicking blue mist into his face.
"......Who are you?"

Danny jumped back, "Holy shizz cakes! Sorry dude. Didn't mean to kick ....ah... blue stuff in your face."
'Uh guys, speak up I have no clue what to say to this dude!'
'Ah...Im at a loss right now. I don't really understand this whole dream world yet.' Sam said looking at the new guy. He had blonde hair with some random black streaks running through it and demon wings. Kind of odd.
Michael sighed, "Since nobody else will talk out loud," Danny and Sam looking away from Micheal's green gaze, "We're pretty much lost. I guess. We're not completely sure where this is, could ya explain for us?" he put it bluntly.
"Oh yeah just go out all open and straight up ask, what if this guys not on our side? What then?" Eva muttered. Danny kicked her.
'You are such a bit-- ',Danny started.
'Just stop it so we don't look /too/ insane to this guy. Really now.' Joseph huffed. They had been called crazy multiple times when they had forgotten they were talking through the connection.

Derek glanced from teen to teen, suspicion growing. If this was some sort of Nightmare, then it was definitely one of the trickier ones.
"...What do you need me to explain? You're obviously not NonLucids who broke the binding, you're not in the form of little kids. So that means you're Nightmares, or one very large Nightmare. So...I don't really know how you could prove otherwise to me."
Derek fought back a growing wave of panic. They had to be Nightmares. that was the only explanation. And if this was some illusion a Nightmare was making, and it were really right behind him, or if they were all the Nightmare broken up into different pieces, or-
Derek kicked himself hard in his heavily bruised shin and let out a yelp of pain. He bit his lip and forced himself to calm down.
"Look. I'm going to feel terrible if this is some kind of mix-up, but the odds of that are...pretty much nonexistent. If you guys were Nonlucids and are able to be in your Awake forms, then...then you're all probably more powerful than half the Lucids here added up. Shi-"
Derek kicked himself again. Nightmares could use that information. Was he trying to give the Nightmares more ways to fool the Lucids? This would mean that even more Nightmares would try to disguise themselves as NonLucids and make Derek's job a hell of a lot-Derek kicked himself for a third time, forcing himself to concentrate.

'HA so I was right when I thought we might be lucid right now!', Sam chuckled.
'That explains like /nothing/.' Danny laughed at her.
'...guys shut up.'
Eva looked at Derek like he was the insane one, "Are you stupid? I me--" Danny kicked her again before she had time to speak further.
"I assure you, we are not ...ah nightmares." Joseph spoke, he pushed his glasses up on his nose, "And I apologize for us being here, ...well that is if we're not supposed to. We're not even sure about how we got here ourselves."
Michael rubbed the back of his head, "You said lucid, so we're still asleep in our beds right?"
"I swear, if any one of those stupid priestesses sent us here..." Eva muttered, earning another kick from Danny.
"You do realize that the priestesses are probably somewhere here right? I mean, at least one of them ends up popping up in one way or another in the worlds." Danny told Eva, it was true, in every world the priestesses at least left a clue or a mark or /something/ to show them in the right direction.
Michael shook his head, "Sorry, they can be a bit of a handful," he chuckled, "Anyways, is there anyway we can prove we're not the bad ones here? I really don't want to find out what you or this place is capable of if we're on the receiving side."

Derek rubbed the back of his neck anxiously, still mulling over the endless possibilities. He had barely heard what they had said. He was too caught up in his own paranoia.
The tingling in his hand was what snapped Derek out of his distracted muttering. He nearly jumped as Lilith appeared right behind him, jabbing him in the back.
"I told you to take the night off! Why are yo-"
Lilith broke off and her eyes glazed over slightly as she took in the sight of the teenagers.
"....."
"Yeah."
"....Who the hell are they?!"
"That's what I was trying to figure out," Derek sighed.
"Well you clearly weren't doing a good job of it if you still don't know who they are!"
Lilith shoved Derek behind her and stood solidly as a barrier between him and potential danger.
"...Uhm, Lil? I'm a Lucid now, remember? I can fend for myself!"
"I'm not letting this thing lay one tendril on you," she snapped, glaring at the teenagers with venom.
"...You know, if it's not a Nightmare..." Derek muttered.
"Then it'll be, what, five less kids to plague mankind?"
"..."

Eva snorted, "Five less to protect it mind you! Don't start acting like high bitch, I got plenty of those back home!"
The other 4 of the teens sighed, that could have been very bad...
'Danny can you make a barrier? Or is the aura too dim here?' Michael asked quickly glancing at the brown hair teen.
Said teen shrugged his shoulders, 'barely, I can try but I don't know how well it would hold up..'
Eva looked like she was going to open her mouth again when Sam clamped a hand over her groupmate's mouth.
"Sorry. Ah... yeah We're not nightmares.. or whatever that kid called us. Seriously. I kinda want to wake up in the morning." Sam glared right back at Lilith, she could tell the chick was pissed off, but really threatening to kill them off? Really?
'This isn't going to end well.' Michael groaned inwardly.
Psssst, dudes, if ya need to protect yourself, use the blue stuff.
...Okay well the priestesses were here....kinda...hopefully.
The group, not including a brooding Eva, glanced at each other, once knowing they had all heard the voice, they felt just a /little/ better. Now to see what this angel chick had in store..

Derek bit the inside of his cheek as Lilith paused.
"...Alright. Probably the only way we can prove you guys aren't Nightmares is by not being able to be destroyed by the usual stuff that sends Nightmares away. But that won't mean I'm going to stop, because it could also mean that you're just an unusually powerful Nightmare. Also-"
"Lil, don't you always tell me that you shouldn't reveal your tricks to the Nightmares?"
"...Good child, you actually listen to me."
"You sure you don't wanna call in a few other people before taking them on? We might need backup, or someone who can tell us that this really is a huge-ass mistake!"
"Derek, it's a Nightmare, okay? Seriously. I've seen a few in my day that are just this tricky."
Derek glanced form face to face, taking in their different expressions.
"Lil, seriously. Could a Nightmare rea-"
" Yes now shut the hell up Derek! I don't need backup, I can take care of this myself!
"Fine, if you can do it on your own, then I guess you don't need me getting in the way," Derek snapped before disappearing with a loud pop!
Lilith sighed heavily then faced the teenagers again, studying them intently.

Well shit.
Sam looked at her friends... and one bitch.
Michale swallowed almost silently, 'Danny be ready, and the rest of us... I guess do whoever told us too and see if you can make the shield stronger with the blue stuff.'
The rest nodded, Danny closing his eyes seeing if he could draw any power from the dimmed aura.
"Ah, do we really have to do this?" Eva looked at the angel chick, "I mean really, you're being such a controlling bitch right now."
"...If i had a gag right now, that would be lovely." Sam growled.
"I got the next best thing." Danny said, kicking some of the blue stuff into Eva's face.
"H-hey!"
Dudes. Pay attention. I don't want to have to save your asses.

Lilith smirked at Eva before kicking up into the air and sending a massive wave of blue sparks into the air that flared and rang out as they transformed into searing white hot flames that could eat through skin in seconds. Lilith spun as she landed on the ground gracefully, like a cat. She muttered to herself for a moment before the ground that the teenagers stood on gave way to a quicksand-like substance.
Lilith cracked her knuckles, calling out, "This is just my warmup."

"Shi-- Da--" Michael started, but more of the blue stuffed his mouth.
Don't say your names!
The dust cleared, and Michael jumped up out of the quicksand that had been materialized a few seconds before. Blue shimmers of light sprung to life under his groups feet, shooting them into the air above the sinking ground. Luckily, Danny had enough power to start up a shield to hold off the flames.
Michael threw up some of the blue stuff, seeing he wouldn't be able to hold everyone up, and tried to shape it into soemthing that would float.
...
he ended up with a balloon.
The other catching on, tried to scoop some of the blue up and mold it into other things, Eva had a giant floating ball and was trying to stay on it.
Once everyone was floating well enough, Sam kicked up some more stuff to help Danny's shield.
"Is it working?" Sam called out.
'Yeah.' 4 replies came.
She's not done yet, hold up.

Lilith raised an eyebrow at the teens. Interesting tactic. Funny how they hadn't fought back yet...
She grinned as she imagined the balloon popping and the ball turning into lead. Within seconds, she had all of the teenagers tumbling from the air. She swept her hand and the floor turned into a sea of spikes.
Have fun landing on one of those!
If they didn't try to fight back after that, then she'd consider hearing them out.

'Sam, Danny, help me with he boards!' Michael told them through the connection. Between the three of them, they managed to stop from being impaled on the sharp spikes.
The boards were wobbly and weak, but they were good enough to let the teens settle on safe ground. They stood up and faced the woman, they weren't shaken, they'd gone through demons worse. Now to wait to see what happened next...

It could still be a Nightmare...Problem is I've never fought one that takes so long to start fighting...
Lilith sighed and stuck a hand on her hip.
"Look. I don't know what you kids are. For all I know, you actually are NonLucids who somehow managed to both break the Binding and appear in your Awake forms. I don't know. And I don't really care, as long as you aren't a Nightmare. You should probably leave here if you can, because you really don't want to deal with real Nightmares. Also-"
Lilith was cut off as there was a loud crackle of light. Lilith muttered profanities as the silhouette of a girl wearing a fedora and a foofy neon green dress appeared. A large boom and flash of blue marked the entrance of her partner, a boy wearing equally flamboyant clothes.
" For God's sake didn't anyone tell you people that tonight is a night off?! " Lilith roared.
The girl stared at Lilith for a second, then brushed herself off, coming into better focus.
"Look, Lilith. I know you probably don't understand, but me and Camden wanted to spend our free night here, getting more fighting practice. We really-"
"When I say it's a night off, I really, really mean it," Lilith replied stonily.
The blue kid walked up to Lilith.
"Chill out Lil. We're not going to do anything stupid. We just wanted to go mess with a few Nightma-"
" That's exactly what I'm talking about! The higher ups themselves told me to make it very clear to everyone that-"
Rowan cut in quickly, "Whoa, the higher ups?! They never-"
"Exactly," Lilith snapped.
Rowan and Camden exchanged worried glances, then nodded back at Lilith.
"Alright, we'll go," Camden said dejectedly.
Rowan closed her eyes and began fading, when she happened to open them again and take in the other people in the Realm.
"Whoaaaaaa Lilith you can't deal with that Nightmare on your own! Holy shiii-Lil are you trying to get rid of us for some kind of suicide mission?!"
Lilith visibly gritted her teeth as Camden and Rowan rushed up to her.

"Can we stop being refereed to as an 'it'? Both verbally and mentally please. I can hear you." Sam stuck her tongue out, "We're five different people here."
"No way in hell I'd wanna be Ev-- her." Danny said pointing at the girl with the long black braid. But also remembering not to say any names out loud.
Joseph thought for a moment, "Hey... wait... higher ups? Like the people that run this place or whatever?"
Michael caught onto what Joseph was thinking, "...yeah. I think we may or may not know them... depending on the situation we're in right now..."
Finally somebody gets it! the voice laughed in their heads.

Camden and Rowan looked taken aback.
"Uh...sure? We're not used to treating Nightmares with respect so erm..."
"...Look, you wanna see the higher ups? The only way you can see them is if we summon the whole crew, and that could be potentially fatal, since Nightmares could take advantage of us all being in the same place. They don't even know how many of us there are, and we like keeping it that way," Lilith explained, still suspicious of the teenagers.

"For the last time we are /not/ nightmar--!"
Sam got cut off my the blue stuff swirling up and blocking her line of sight. The swirls started to settle down, but now a talk girl with... a ton of brown bushy hair was standing inbewteen the two sets of groups. She wore a long golden trench coat and had blue-green paws prints climbing up her arm. Her other arm had a net running up it. And her hair... it was insane. A lot of it was pulled back into a floofy ponytail, a bit of blues and reds mixed with the brown. And weird curls with crystals snagged in them sprung from a few places. And there was still hair to spare rolling down her shoulders.

"Well hello there peeps." She grinned, giving them a fake bow/
"...priestess co--"
"shhhhhhh. I told you already, no names here. 'm Chase dummy." The girl rolled her eyes at the teens like that had told her her head was a turtle.
Michael blinked, he had also forgotten that they constantly changed names wherever they were anyways.
"...Your pretty forgetful MJ." Chase said with a giggle.
"...fffff."

Lilith's eyes widened and she nearly fell over at the sight of Chase.

"G-God don't scare me like that Chase! You people are always popping up all over the place and it's freaky as hell!"
Camden and Rowan nodded in dumb agreement, stunned just by the sight of a higher up.

Chase stuck out her tongue at Lilith, "That's half the fun girly."
"Yeah umm... PC... ah Chase, Could you like, tell them we aren't nightmares?" Danny asked looking at Chase.
"Oh yeah. Right duh. They aren't nightmares dudes. ....and what the hell, why are any of you even here? Nope wait, wait, you really don't need to answer that."
"...you people look more stupid every time we see you." Eva mumbled.
Chase smirked deviously, "Oh really?" Everything was still for a moment until Eva's hair started trying to stuff itself down her throat.
Chase clapped her hands, "Now that that's done and done." she looked back over at the other lucids, "Mind giving them a few lessons? Im actually kiiiinda busy. Kay thanks. Luv ya bye~" She said before completely disappearing in another poof of blue swirls and smoke.

"Wait Ch-....."
The three Lucids stared dubiously at the group of teenagers in front of them, now finally convinced of their innocence.
"...Sorry about, you know, trying to kill you. If you knew what we deal with on a daily-...nightly basis, then you'd understand," Lilith finally managed.
Rowan stared at Lilith for a moment before mouthing, " Where's lover boy? "
Lilith shrugged.
"Probably making another mess for me to clean up."

Michael sighed and waved it off, "Don't worry about it, we get it."
'...soooo what now?' Sam asked.
Danny and Joseph shrugged at the same time, Danny saying 'No clue.'
'How much are we supposed to get from being in a dream world?' Michael questioned.
'Well its gotta be worth something, seeing as murder was just on the angel's mind. 'Joseph snorted.
'I guess we just wait then.' Michael sighed.

"Oh. Right. The kiddos. Uh...well...can you kids please tell us who you are so we at least know how much we need to teach you?"
Rowan cut in, "As in, how the heck are you this powerful during your first try at Lucidity?!"

"ah... where to start."
"The million dollar question..." Eva got kicked again.
Michael cleared his throat," Well, I'm not completely sure. We're more aura users. I know a few of us have done lucid dreaming before... but this is completely different."
Joseph spoke up again, "I think what would put this into better prospective, we're pretty much conditioned to learn whatever. We just need to know the basics for around here? Ah... like major baddies, why you guys are here and things..."
...we don't even know what we're supposed to be doing here. Sam thought.
Psh you normally have no problems with this kind of stuff~
"...you know if you were just standing here,this would be so much easier." Sam retorted.
don't talk out loud to me, it makes you look stupid.

"...Aura...I've heard of that somewhere... Yeah Chase has mentioned it a few times. Let's see... God how I hate explaining. kay Lucid Dreaming means you can control every aspect of your Dreams. Thing is, Dreams are real. If you get injured while you're Lucid and don't get it healed, you'll have those injuries when you're Awake. The Awake realm isn't as real or vivid as the Lucid realm. Uh...everyone here is naturally Lucid, but we put a Binding on everyone because most people are too weak to fight the Nightmares here. We test out sixteen year olds to see if they're strong enough to become one of us. We pretty much protect the Binding and everyone from the Nightmares. Is that too complicated?"

See they were nice and didn't day anything about you talking to nobody. Chase's voice snickered.
...you know for an over old ruler of aura, you're such a kid.
....you know, that sums crap up really well.
....
Have fuuuun~
Sam groaned, "No its no too complicated it makes a lot more sense then some things at least."
"...now why the hell did they send us here?" Joseph muttered looking around.
"...so we leave here once we wake up right?" Michael questioned.