[ChicletPrime]

Thorns Under The Moon: 8

• nice. actual background of dead city now.
  
• i agree, this dream is excessively detailed. Zayne must have dreamt it over and over and over again.
  
• a cluster of black crystals like a flower, tall as a three story building.
  
• "a protocore cluster"
  
• okay, hold up. hang on. all this time we've been dealing with protocores and aether cores that are, like, the size of a small peach pit, MAYBE.  although in battles, they can be the size of people i guess. in this future that Zayne keeps seeing (whether he knows its a future or not), the crystals are growing to the size of BUILDINGS? what the hell are they feeding on?
  
• is this what cracks the world?
  
• and he's tried (shield)breaking these but they reform within seconds. oh my god.  right, he's been trapped in here for two days while i was knocked out.
  
• me, with brilliant thought: ".. another protocore cluster in this field, providing energy to each other".  well, that does happen in our actual battle fields sometimes, this is just.. magnitudes bigger.
  
• protocurve detection, ahoy! its that way, boss.
  
• oh no. we have to split up. i hate this idea suddenly.
  
• oh. odd emotion in Zayne's eyes? we'll be okay. just lock in and stay focused.
  
• yeah, this is my Zayne. he's just channeling his other self a little bit.
  
• oooh, what?  he calls his ice forward but "dark impurities" emerge but stop spreading just underneath the surface of white.
  
• "its as if a looming black hole threatens to consume everything pure and white. yet a thin, unwavering layer of pristine ice remains resolute in being the last line of defense."
  
• well, THAT'S something.
  
• and now the ground is changing, to cling and... slow him down? hold him back?
  
• this is a stupid dream. wake up! both of us!
  
• oh no, we're not going to conjure William forth again, are we? nooo that would suck so bad.
  
• this is terrible
  
• "bloody tears stream down from William's empty eye sockets." ewwww "An array of faces emerges from the cluster's projection."
  
• EVER just has SO MUCH to answer for. if they were trying to save the humanity from time, they've destroyed it instead.
  
• oh great, now the dead people are berating Zayne / Dawnbreaker for not being able to anything but spare them pain.
  
• after making such a point of his steady, surgeon hands, now his fingers are trembling.
  
• fight it off, its just a dream!
  
• nooo, now he thinks i'm there too. and he went to kill me like the others but ... oh no, please don't tell me he's hallucinating inside a hallucination and a big bad wanderer is going to eat him while he hesitates.
  
• even worse, i'm begging him to kill me.
  
• "black ice flowers from her chest, their petals unfurling."  oh. oh Zayne.
  
• the black cluster pulsates with blood red light, the air trembling.
  
• oh wow. again. (i say that a lot). Zayne just... called pure black ice crystals through the ground, freezing everything in the shadows.
  
• and he conjures more as a dark figure approaches, only he's the one frozen.
  
• oh no oh no.  mirror mirror on the wall, show me my true face?
  
• or worse. that sounds like fucking Carter's voice. 'don't throw yourself in danger just for her'
  
• 'his entire body becomes encased in ice. black crystals pierce his chest and spread to his fingers'.   this is the worst retelling of Snow White ever.
  
• 'seek your destiny - only then can you be redeemed'.   well, that's nicely cryptic.
  

Thorns Under The Moon: 9

• okay, i'm out at least. Zayne must be collapsed somewhere nearby.
  
• oh wow. we are in the wrong damned city!
  
• maybe we're not as out as i think we are. am i hallucinating still or what.
  
• fuck, still trapped. this is so Silent Hill.
  
• hello, white mist of terribleness! i missed you there for a moment.
  
• back at the apartment in the ruins? and Zayne collapsed on the ground.
  
• ... uh flashback?  'its too dangerous' -- "can't control it... leave".
  
• the sound design is wonderful. i can * hear * ice moving and crackling.
  
• back in the apartment, which is at least one step still inside the dream, blackened ice is on his wrists and neck.
  
• YOU ARE SO NOT FINE
  
• whatever the black stuff is, its wisp'ing like smoke.
  
• is this a fight he's going to lose at some point?
  
• eeeeee
  
• so, first things first.. suppress his evol so he can recover faster. his left arm apparently is the fulcrum?
  
• oh no, we are NOT leaving you behind as the better option. i don't care if you might actually be the most dangerous thing in here - i've met Sylus and he didn't frighten me (all that much) either.
  
• see?  there! all fixed. all the black stuff is now.. hiding somewhere inside you, probably. but its not on the surface anymore infecting the air with little black particulate spores, so we're counting  that as a win.
  
•  * hold his hand
  
• definitely, please don't lose this fight at some terrible moment
  
• what DO you do when you know the corruption is inside you and you can't get it out? that only your strength can hold against it and all strength fails eventually?
  
• aaaand slingshot back into our real body, white mist everywhere and my heart thumping crazy time.
  
• my heart-crystal-disease is having a field day today.
  
• OH HE PICKED ME UP IN HIS BIG STRONG ARMS
  
• god, you're gorgeous.
  
• aaaand i'm out cold.
  
• "But at least, I have one last choice."
  
• DO NOT LIKE THAT ZAYNE.
  
• what.. what are you doing?
  
• are you covering me in ice? no, you're ... what the hell are you doing?
  
• you took something out of me and put it into you?!
  
• that looks very painful. what is WITH my boyfriends? is every single thing a tragedy in the making?!
  
• Sylus, you might be my only hope for loving and well-adjusted.
  
• oh shit. his hands are going black.