paixaorpg | Between Sleep and Awake [ Completed]

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Between Sleep and Awake [ Completed]

Character(s): Tinkerbell, NiGHTS
Content: Tinkerbell arrives in Paixao.
Setting: Joutenheim Gate and surrounding areas.
Time: Evening, Week 33
Warnings: None.

Far in the fields of grass surrounding the domed city of Paixao, a golden little light twinkled faintly. Closer inspection would have revealed a tiny fairy on the ground, apparently sleeping. Tinkerbell rolled to her side and yawned, stretching her limbs as far as they would go. When she sat up, rubbing her head sleepily, her diaphanous wings flitted briefly. As she gazed with bleary confusion around herself, a few things became obvious.

The first was that she was not in her cozy little hollow inside the tree she shared with Peter Pan and the Lost Boys. This grassy, empty field was completely unfamiliar! The second was that Peter and the boys were nowhere around. Growing alarmed, she flew up from the grass and rose high into the sky, desperately searching for any recognizable landmark or figure...but there was nothing! "Peter!" she called out as loud as she could. "Peter Paaaaan!" She turned in the air, finally taking note of the rather large statues holding guard over an entrance into the biggest building she'd ever seen.

Tinkerbell curled her hands into fists, scowling. This was obviously some kind of prank of Peter's! Oh, she was gonna get him good as soon as she found him. Mustering up all her indignation, she sped through the air towards the two giants, bypassing the groups of people without a glance, leaving a golden trail of pixie dust over their heads.

"Peterrrrr!" she called angrily as she zig-zagged through the crowd, looking for any sign of his impish face or green clothing. When searching still yielded no results, she slowly drifted down to a lamp post, shoulders slumped.

This really wasn't funny.

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NiGHTS had been lounging outside of the city, experimenting with music - a few notes here, a pause there. He'd had fun in Halloween Town, but now that he was back he was just as restless as ever. Being here beat dying (which had been just what NiGHTS had been about to do when he'd been pulled out of his world and into this one), but that didn't mean he liked the boredom. Every place around here was the same; even the so-called "new worlds" were ultimately just another world inside the castle.

The Nightmaren's thoughts were interrupted by a voice calling for - Peter Pan? Where had he heard that name before? NiGHTS swooped down in search for the source of that voice. "Hello?" he called. "Is anybody looking for Peter Pan?" Oh, he knew he had heard that name, but where?

Tinkerbell's head shot up as she searched the domed sky for wherever the voice came from. "Yes! Yes, I am! Hello?" She hesitantly rose up from the lamp, turning slowly in the air to find...oh! Whoever this...person? was, he knew Peter Pan! She zoomed into his view with palpable excitement.

"You know Peter Pan?"

NiGHTS tilted his head to one side, thinking. Where had he - oh! "No, but I heard of him from someone called Captain Hook," he replied, crossing his arms. "I haven't met anyone of that name yet, though. Have you checked the message boards? Those are usually a good place to check." Whoever Peter was, he sure seemed to know a lot of interesting people. Maybe NiGHTS would be able to meet him, if he ever came to the city.

Hovering in the air in front of NiGHTS, she openly gaped at him in confusion. "Hook...! So he's behind this? That no good stinky codfish! I -- wait, what's a...'message board'?" Tinkerbell flew closer to those large, strange eyes, peering suspiciously. "And what are you? Where am I?"

The more she stopped to think about her situation, the less and less she liked.

NiGHTS leaned back, shrugging. "I don't know if Hook's actually behind all of this. he didn't seem very intelligent." Even so, there had been something subtle and sinister about Hook; maybe the pirate captain was smarter than he appeared to be. The nightmaren crossed his arms, smiling. "A message board is something you leave messages on, using your journal. And as for me? I'm a dream, of course! What are you?"

Another shrug, though this one was less casual than the first. "You're in Paixao," he replied, "and none of us really know where it is or how we came to be here. As far as I can tell, we were pulled here by someone else. Or something."

She giggled at the intelligence comment -- she couldn't help it, even with her worry. Anyone who knew what a stupid old man Hook was had to be somewhat decent. Still, her laughter faded and she sighed, slowly drifting back down to the lamp post. "That doesn't make any sense..." she said quietly, sitting with her legs tucked under her. "None of that made sense! I don't have any kind of journal with me. How could anything pull me into a different world without me knowing?" Of everything NiGHTS said, apparently the comment about being a dream was the only thing Tink was capable of accepting.

Edited 2011-07-31 22:57 (UTC)

Tinkerbell didn't have a journal? That was odd. "You know," NiGHTS told her, floating closer to her, "you should have gotten one at the city gate." Then again, she was very small; maybe the guards at the city gates didn't think she could carry one all by herself. "Tell you what; you can use mine, if you'd like to make a post. Maybe your friend's in the city." He couldn't help but feel a little sorry for Tinkerbell; she looked so very lost.

"I don't know, either," NiGHTS admitted quietly. "I've been trying to find out, but I haven't really discovered anything."

"I just zoomed right in looking for Peter, I didn't...see any guards..." she trailed off, pouting slightly as she felt a wave of defensiveness. She didn't do anything wrong! But then, this dream didn't seem like he was accusing her of anything. In fact, he'd been pretty nice and helpful.

She looked up at him with a small, sheepish smile. "Thank you...I'd like that. Maybe I can use this journal the way you said. What's your name?"

NiGHTS giggled a bit. "Maybe you were going by so quickly that you didn't even notice them," he teased. "That's okay. I tend to ignore them anyway." The guards, with their blank stares and empty questions, reminded him rather of the Shleep that occasionally invaded Nightopia and the Dream Gate - nothing really worth paying attention to, but terribly annoying if one allowed them to be.

He smiled at Tinkerbell, brushing the memories aside. "My name is NiGHTS! What's yours?"

"I'm Tinkerbell." She took NiGHTS finger in her tiny hands and shook it the way one would shake an entire hand in greeting. "I'm from Neverland, where Peter Pan and Captain Hook and the Lost Boys are--" She broke off with a gasp, hands going to the side of her face. "The Lost Boys! I don't suppose you've seen them anywhere either? They wear animal hoods and they can play the best games..." She stood up, her wings fluttering now and again. "Oh, I have to find out where everyone is...I gotta get a journal! If I use yours, it might confuse 'em!"

And without a word, she flew back to the gate, ignoring the line to land right in front of the gatekeeper. With much imperious demanding and short-tempered bursts of conversation on Tink's end, she was blessed with a smaller-than-average, though still too large for her frame, journal. Wobbling in the air unsteadily, she carried it back through the gates with some effort. "Oof...! How is this a j-journal? It's not even paper!"

"Tinkerbell, huh? Nice to meet you." But Neverland? NiGHTS had heard of that place, whispered in the occasional dream world - and Owl had mentioned... what had it been? A book? Well, NiGHTS had never really paid much attention to the old bird's lectures, anyway. Oh, well. "I haven't seen anyone of that description here," he replied. "But..." Oh, dear. He trailed off as Tinkerbell zoomed away, amused at her impatience; NiGHTS himself was prone to wandering off in the middle of conversations if he got bored.

A few minutes, and the strange girl was back. NiGHTS held out a hand in a silent offer to help her. "I don't know. That's just what they're called."

She was more than happy to plunk the journal in NiGHTS' outstretched hand, exhaling a loud breath as she perched on his shoulder, draped dramatically. "That's so heavy! That man at the gate said it was a journal, but it's like a rock! And shiny!" Tinkerbell frowned, rubbing her chin as she examined the device, leaning forward on NiGHTS' shoulder.

"How does it work?"

"They're not like any journal I've seen before, either," came the reply as NiGHTS relaxed in mid-air. The only journals he'd ever seen before coming here had belonged to Owl, and they had been large, dusty-looking tomes. He'd never really bothered to have a look inside of them. "They're pretty useful, though," he added as an afterthought. "I've even played a few pranks through these."

He opened his own journal and demonstrated to Tinkerbell, though he refrained from posting. "After you've typed or said everything you wanted, just go to 'post' and it'll be up." NiGHTS found himself rather liking the pixie; she was frank and funny and didn't seem to care to question what he was (bug-eyed stares and startled gasps were pretty funny, but even they grew tiresome after awhile).

She grinned, her wings rapidly fluttering in excitement behind her. "You play pranks too? I love pranks! Especially on that codfish, Hook!" Her attention was brought back to the journal, however, intrigued as she was by the way things worked. Part of her really wanted to just take it all apart to see how it all fit together, but she did have higher priorities.

"I...think I've got it." She took her journal from his hand and carefully flew down to the ground, settling heavier than she would have liked. After a few seconds in struggling to get it open, she frowned in concentration and pushed down on the button that would allow her to speak to other people.

After she was done, she looked up at NiGHTS. "I hope this works..."

NiGHTS laughed, the sound bell-like and warm. "I love pranking Hook!" he exclaimed. "Once, I pretended to be a crocodile and made ticking noises, just to scare him." Another laugh at the memory. "You should have seen the way he sped off! I don't think he ever found out it was me." Okay, so the shape-shifting and the darkness had helped, especially as NiGHTS couldn't change his colors, but it had still been funny.

The nightmaren joined his new friend, though he didn't touch the ground as he waited. "Well?" he asked after a few minutes of not really listening to the chatting that resulted. "Any luck so far?"

"...nothing," Tink said quietly, frowning at the screen. "More people who don't understand anything...a lion talking about darkness and something called Heartless!" She lifted her head, her almond-shaped eyes bluer for all her worry and sadness. "Is it true? Can they really steal your heart?" It seemed like one of most terrible things she'd ever heard, as bad as growing up.

NiGHTS nodded. "Yeah, they can. They're pretty easy to take care of, or avoid if you're not strong enough or don't feel like fighting." The nightmaren tried to take care of those creatures whenever he could; he didn't like the thought of someone turning into one of those things because he'd been lazy. The Heartless were bad enough; having heard a bit of what made them that way had only made it worse.

"Hey," he continued, offering the fairy his hand, "you know, it's not all bad. I'm sure your friend will show up eventually. And in the meantime, I can help you!"

She glanced again at the journal before flying up to close it, determined. "I'll fight as many as I need to. It's not right for them to take hearts! If they're made from the darkness, I just need to glow even brighter." When NiGHTS offered his hand, she flew over to perch lightly on his palm, hands on her hip as she smiled up at him.

"I'm so glad I met you, NiGHTS. Thank you for all your help!"

"I'm going to fight, too," said NiGHTS, still thinking. "I've been getting pretty bored around here, anyway. There's not a lot to do, once you've explored." Granted, he still hadn't checked out some of the other floors - mostly Halloween Town and Destiny Islands - but they all seemed to end with still being trapped in the castle. Besides, the Heartless were a force that needed to be stopped, and so were the people who were unleashing them.

"I'm glad I met you, too, Tinkerbell. I have a feeling we're going to become good friends."

"Yes!" Tinkerbell exclaimed, flying up in a loop before hugging the side of NiGHTS' face. "I would love for us to be friends! You seem really fun and you've helped me out so much." She flew backwards a bit to take in all of the nightmaren's wide, strange eyes. "I still have to try to find Peter Pan, even if he's probably not here...but we'll definitely have fun together, NiGHTS!"

She flew down and sprinkled the journal liberally with her pixie dust, coating it in a light golden glow. It rose up much easier when she lifted it this time, though it was certainly unwieldy. "I'm gonna go find a safe place to put this. Now that I know how to use it, we'll be able to stay in contact."

NiGHTS laughed, a gloved hand coming up to curl around Tinkerbell gently in the imitation of a hug. "Good! In that case, let me know if you want to hang out or something." It would be nice to not be the only flying being around Paixao; keeping low to the ground was getting annoying. One would think someone would figure out how to fly somehow; oh, well.

He nodded at the fairy, pushing his amused annoyance at the shortage of flyers around away. "Alright. And take care, okay?"

"I will! I'll see you soon!" She flew up and nuzzled NiGHTS' nose with her own before turning and lugging her journal away, her flight leaving a golden trail of pixie dust behind her. Now that she knew there was someone here as nice and fun as NiGHTS, she was much less panicked and even a little excited. This would be a grand adventure!

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Between Sleep and Awake [ Completed]

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