New Beginning

(stupid title is stupid >>)

A sixteen year old James sighed and shut his laptop down for the night. He had lost track of time after midnight had come and gone. And he had school tomorrow. Might as well catch a few hours of sleep while he still had time. The blond set his glasses aside, rubbing between his eyes right where the glasses tended to dig in and leave little marks on his nose. He really needed to look into switching to contacts.
He stood with a small groan and flicked off the light. Now the last barrier was getting to his bed without falling over a stray piece of furniture or pile of junk. He walked slowly, waving his arm around in front of him in the hopes that he would feel anything in his way before falli-James fell over what felt suspiciously like the desk chair that he could have sworn was a few inches to his right. He crawled the rest of the way to his bed, not trusting his legs. Finally, the bed was before him. James flopped onto the thick mattress with a tired sigh. He was asleep in seconds.

Justin gasped, back arching in pain, as he awoke in the Lucid realm. Well, that's where he was, he just didn't know it. He wasn't even supposed to be asleep! he hadn't fallen asleep in 17 years, really. The pills had made sure of it.

Coughing, and struggling to sit up, Justin rolled onto his stomach and fought the urge to barf. His head pounded in his head and the world was impossible to focus on, because all it was was a mass of swirling smoke. The darkness pulled back from his vision but it didn't help in making the world any clearer.

He shuddered and clawed at his arm, desperate to wake up from this nightmare.

"Hello? Anyone there?!"

His voice cracked painfully and he bit back a broken sob.

"Please..."

James shook his head groggily, blinking. He was surrounded by thick swirls of blue smoke. He lifted a small hand to clear some of it away-...wait. Small hand?
A small, wavering voice broke through his muzzy, confused thoughts.

"I-I'm here!"

Shouldn't his voice have sounded...older?

"Where are you?"

"I don't know!" Justin almost wailed back, shaking. Freaking doctors, he needed his medicine!

"I'm by... the... swirls!"

He swallowed.

There were lots of swirls.

"K-keep shouting! I'll follow your voice," James called back, getting to his feet-Seriously what was with this?! He was only like, 3, maybe 4 feet off the ground? Madness!

He slowly followed the frightened voice through the thick blue, eyes wide open for any sign of another person.

Justin started as a small child stepped into view, blond hair, blue eyes, thin, and pale. He looked scared, terrified even, and Justin quickly clamoured to his feet because children always came first with him. But only until he was on his feet did Justin realize that he had shrunk. Big time. And his arms had gotten thinner, if that was even possible. Smaller hands, too, bony and looking all too easy to snap.

"W-w-where are we?" He asked in a pitifully small voice, noticing the higher pitch accompanied with a tremour. He sniffled and hugged himself weakly, suddenly achingly cold.

"I don't know," James replied, shivering at a sudden gust of icy cold.

A dark figure emerged from the swirls a few feet in front of the two boys.

An object appeared in front of the other boy. It was black, and shun dully in the strange light emanating from the swirls.

The figure slowly came into focus. A girl with long hair and a quirky smile.

Strange.

Justin straighted, shocked, scared, and pained.

"E-Emily?" he asked brokenly, almost terrified that it would be her.

But please, please, please! Don't let it be her!

The girl sharpened into focus for a brief moment, then was gone. There was no sign that she had been there.

"D-do you know her-"

"Shit! Derek, I told you to hurry it up with finding them! Do tyou know how close they were to being- God Derek!"

"I'm sorry Lil! I coudln;t find them anywhere!"

Two loud voices drifted into hearing, slowly growing in volume until two new people were standing before them.

One was a teenaged boy with blond hair streaked with black. He had demonic wings and a red t-shirt with white pants. He looked embarrassed.

"Are you kids okay?"

A woman with bluish-blond-white curly hair and white angel wings crouched down to their level, staring at them with deep concern in her eyes. You never would have known she had just been yelling at the other person just a minute ago.

Justin bit his lip, blood immediately beginning to flow as his oddly sharp canines pierced the skin.

Strangers, strangers, strangers, don't talk to strangers, they didn't understand, they couldn't understand, they wouldn't want to understand. Don't talk to strangers. They'd beat you, hurt you, lie to you, steal from you, they'd you use for their gain. Don't talk to strangers.

Years of lessons from the psychologists ran through his head.

Don't talk to strangers!

Lilith glanced from the extremely thin, pale boy to the other, less thin and pale boy. Jeez. The first one looked like he had been through a death camp or something.

"Y-yeah, I'm okay," the one with blond hair replied in a small voice.

The other one didn't make a sound, didn't even make eye contact. He looked like he was ready to flee at the first sign of danger.

"Are you alright?"

Lilith spoke in a very quiet, gentle voice now, like one would use to approach an injured wild animal.

Derek, glanced from boy to the other.

"Lil, do you want me to take blondie here and test him so you can deal with the other kid and get him ready?"

Lilith nodded slowly, not taking her eyes away from the small boy for one instant.

Justin hugged himself tightly, completely ignoring the other people. He'd been told that if he pretended they weren't there long enough, they'd go away because they didn't want to waste their time with something like him. And it had always worked, so far. No reason why it shouldn't now.

He didn't even blink as the teenage boy- Derek- took the blond boy by the hand and pulled him away a bit, before turning back to say something to the girl, Lil or whatever.

"Be careful, he doesn't look good."

No shit he didn't look good, he had somehow gotten out of the institute! His collar was gone, too, which could only mean that the doctors had decided to dispose of him. They'd always talked about it about the other patients, never him, but there's a first time for everything, right? They had tossed him out somewhere and now he was going to die because he didn't have the medication that kept the Attacks fro killing him. He was basically a walking corpse with them, but better than being tossed in the burner.

James stared at the blond boy curiously, fear slowly melting away.
"Where are we?"
"We're uh...well this place is called the Dream Realm."
The boy proceeded to give a very long, drawn out, and extrememly confusing explanation of what Dreaming was, about turning Lucid, and about Nightmares. Lilith would ahve smacked him very hard for going into so much detail and for jumping form topic to topic, but since she wasn't there to stop him, the explanation simply stretched on and on until James felt like his head was going to burst.
(no I am totally not being lazy >> -shot-)


Lilith sighed.
"Can you hear what I'm saying? Please, just show me some sign that you know I'm speaking. Then I can make everything so much less confusing for you. I can explain where you are and why you're here. You don't have to speak, just look at me. Please."

Justin didn't move or make a sound, choosing to ignore the girl. Doctors said not to trust people who didn't understand. And she obviously didn't understand.

"Alright, well I'll try explaining some stuff for you anyway. Right now, we are in a place called the Dream Realm. You are asleep right now. Up until now, your subconscious has been locked behind The Barrier, which is the realm where everyone else is while sleeping. You would have no memory of the barrier because it wipes clean memories and leaves the subconscious a blank slate while asleep, so that nobody knows about Dreaming. Right now, you're in the form of a little child because when someone first becomes Lucid, or taken from the Binding and allowed to be made aware of the Realms, their subconsciouses are vulnerable and weak, like a child. If you want, I'll show you how to return to your true physical state again."

She paused just to see if it looked like the boy was listening. It was hard to tell.

(blargh I think i'm going to say the Emily nightmare was enough to be considered his test thing. i kinda screwed up the order of events by having them explain stuff first >>; i guess i'll force james to fight his nightmare next time i reply)

Justin continued to ignore her, though turned this information around and around in his head.

She probably belonged in the same institute as him!

"Alright kid. Now that I have successfully boggled your ignorant little brain, you're going to fight a Nightmare. Have fun."
Derek took a few steps back and smirked.
"W-wait what?!"
And suddenly, he was balancing on a line of thread that ran on without end. It was stretched taut and was suspended in an ashy sky.
James gave a sharp little gasp. He didn't have to look down to know that he was farther away from the ground than he could have imagined possible. A building pressure in his head and mounting panic swelling in his chest was all he knew in that moment. He couldn't move. He was a statue. And then a faint breeze melted his rigid limbs.
Oh God oh God oh God oh God ohgodohgodohgod
Slowly, the thread shifted under his feet-no, he was the one shifting. The grey sky was spinning before his eyes and then he was falling, mouth wide in a silent scream of terror. And suddenly a black pit opened beneath him, promising no hope of escape.
Nononononoooo
Desperation guided James's feet as he bent them as if he were about to land on solid gr-He fell hard on his knees on the flooring of the Dream Realm, breathing ragged. Little flecks of white floated in the peripherals of his vision.
"Huh, impressive. You'll do. You okay?"
The boy shook his head, partly to clear his vision, partly in answer to the question.
"...Right. Well take a few minutes to recover I guess..."


"..."
The kid still wasn't even acknowledging her existence. This was going to make everything so much more difficult.
She debated putting a hand on his shoulder and possibly trying to soothe him. But he'd probably freak out on her if she tried anything like that.
"Look I don't know how to get you to talk to me or anything, but I'll tell you a bit about myself if it'll help at all. My Lucid name is Lilith, and the one with demon wings is Derek, my partner. You're going to need to come up with a different name for yourself when you're Lucid. Otherwise the Nightmares can eat you, which is bad in too many ways to even begin explaining. Anyway. I'm one of the oldest Lucids here. I've been around a few years longer than most of the others, so I'm the one the higher ups trust with the most information. Me and Derek have the assignment of testing potential new Lucids, like you and that other boy. Uh...I don't know, I'm not a very interesting person. I feel like I'm just rambling to you and you're not even listening sooo I'm not sure if it's even worth saying anything else until you show me that you're at least understanding my words. I'm not going to hurt you, me and Derek are going to protect the two of you until you're strong enough to do this on your own. It's pretty ridiculous of me to ask you to trust me, and I can see that you probably have a hard time doing that, but at least acknowledge me. Please."
It was like talking to a wall. This was bad. At this rate he wouldn't pick a Lucid name, learn how to change his appearance, or plan to meet up with the other kid to get their bond.

Wait a second.

A dream.

That's what she'd been telling him, it was all a dream.

Dreams could be erased the next day, all he had to do was ask the doctors to give him the shot.

What he did here wouldn't ever matter...

"C..." he swallowed, still not sure if she was gonna bite his head off or something. "Can my n-name be Saint?"

He liked the Saints. His favorite place in the hospital was the small church near the emergency room. It was always deserted so he was ab;e to just enjoy himself and read from the library they had along the walls. And he had really come to like the Saints he read of.

James finally got some control over his body again.
"Better?"
He nodded, not trusting his voice yet.
"You have a fear of heights, don't you?"
No shit Sherlock.
"It's more of a phobia," he muttered.
Derek nodded.
"Alright, well I'm glad you were able to overcome it like that. You'll be a good Lucid with some training. We're gonna join back up with Lilith and that other kid when they're ready, so sit tight."


Lilith gave a shaky sigh of relief. She smiled gently and nodded.
"Yeah, that's a great choice. Want me to show you how to transform into what you actually look like? I think you'll feel better."
Alrigth Derek, you guys can come over here now. My kid's finally talking. Your kid passed the test, right?"

There was a brief pause as she waited for his thoughts to connect to hers.

Yeah he did great. Okay we'll be there in a few.

Justin nodded slowly, still trying to convince himself that nothing could go wrong. He wasn't positive this was a good idea, he probably wouldn't ever be.

Still...

He hated being a kid. It was kinda awkward and tight in the small body, stifling. His already weak lungs weren't getting any better in this tiny diaphragm. A larger body would be within his best benefit at the moment.

A soft glow emitted as two figures appeared a few feet away from Lilith and Saint.
"Just in time! We can show both of you two how to transform at the same time! How convenient. Observe Derek, this is called time management. It is a very useful skill to have not just while Dreaming, but also in the Awake Realm! Who would have known."

Derek rolled his eyes good naturedly and pushed the blond kid to Lilith, not really noticing that he still looked slightly terrified for his life.

Lilith grabbed the kid before he toppled over and glared at Derek. She turned back to the blond and gave him a kind smile.
"Did you pick out a Lucid name yet?"

He shook his head. Lilith noticed he was shaking a little.

"Well I think you should do that before I show you how to transform. Think for a few moments and the-"

"Camden. I want to be Camden."

She raised an eyebrow and nodded. "Got it. Camden. A very nice choice."

"Alright you two. I want you to close your eyes and imagine yourself standing in front of a mirror. Not as you are right now, but how you'd look on a normal day. Concentrate on the details, and imagine yourselves transforming into that. Take it nice and slow."

Saint frowned, showing the first emotion he had besides fear in the place.

"Excuse me?" He called out in a timid voice. "I've never looked in a... a mirror..."

They weren't exactly abundant in the institute. Besides the blurry reflection in the metal bars and steal tools, he'd never seen anything distinguishable.

Camden shut his eyes hard, blocking everything out so he could try this.

Lilith deadpanned.

"...You...You've never seen your reflection? Uh...Well that could be a bit of a problem...What about photos or pictures of yourself? If not then...I guess try imagining how it physically and mentally feels to be in your normal body. That'll probably work as well as a reflection would."

How had someone never seen themselves in a mirror? Where did this kid live?!

Justin nodded and squeezed his eyes shut tightly. He;d never seen a picture either. Well, he had, but he'd been five. So that probably wasn't the most accurate thing in the world. He just decided on focusing on what he believed he looked like, the logical growth from the picture, and concentrated. And was a bit surprised at how quickly it began to work.

He could feel his organs expanding, slowly, pressing against his bones, the familiar ache growing into something even more familiar. He limbs grew thing and bony- feeding the subjects wasn't the number one priority- and his height growing. His hair grew a bit long but stayed the same colour for the most, he thought, adding a red tint that he had always liked in people.

A sudden pain made itself known in the back of his skull and he winced, reaching back to clutch at the skin. Closing his eyes even tighter, Justin willed the pain away and focused on the task at hand. His clothes, thankfully, had grown with his body and fit comfortable and lose, so the protrusion of his ribs wasn't very obvious. Same with his hipbones.

Careful not to yelp too loudly at the appearance of the brand on the top of his left hand, Saint opened his eyes slowly and took in the now dulled colours.

Both Lilith and Derek gaped.

"Th-That's-Saint you're-...Wow," Lilith finally managed, eyes wide in unconcealed awe. Then she remembered his fear, and his dull, unresponsive face. The angel quickly contained her shock.
"You're very talented. That's amazing. Very, very good. I'll show you some extra stuff to try before you wake up."

She flicked her gaze back to the other boy, who was slowly changing.

Camden muttered softly to himself as he imagined his body elongating and changing shape to match the picture he had of himself in his mind. He felt a prickling all over as his limbs stretched and his face aged. He stretched his arms over his head as he opened his eyes, trying to get some feeling into his slightly numb muscles.