ic Asleep on the job

[Supercape]

GM

 

Saturday 21st September, Early Afternoon

 

The art of the Byron Gallery was, as one might imagine, Byronesque. Vivid, 18th and 19th century classical, with, the owner (a Mr Winston Pudgeball) would say "a modern twist". The art itself hovered around the "just above average mark", with some excellent pieces, some mediocre ones, and everything in between. Rich landscapes, clouds, romantic heroes and heroines on Parisian streets suffering nobly for their art, tortured by a sensitive nature, or perhaps by alcohol and consumption. 

 

A half dozen people sauntered around the displays, accompanied by Mr Pudgeball, a sweaty, rotund and tall man, with thick glasses and a physique that seemed to have a kind of muscular fat to it. He was enthusiastic, nervous, and very keen for people to buy the over priced art on display. He tried to ply every browser with a glass of cheap rose, and chocolate muffins (that did not match). Despite his vaguely irritating manner, he genuinely did like the art, and genuinely knew his art. 

 

He sauntered around Adrianna Lindell like a fly around manure. Pudgeball was a young man - maybe thirty - and without the glasses and without the excess of five, maybe six, stone, he would have been moderately attractive. A bit old for Adrianna, mayhap, but still, she had the looks and he was but a man. And not that old. 

 

"Quite the... ah beautiful melancholy about this piece, don't you think?" he said, fawning over Absinthe in Paris, by Rene DeSaens. "Makes one appreciate the delights of modern sensibilities?"

 

There was nothing odious or pest like about Pudgewell. He was making polite conversation with an attractive set of... eyes. For art. 

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer 

 

The Dreamer wheeled between paintings with a small smile. She wore her hair in a long braid, and a dress in warm autumnal reds and golds, embroidered leaves tumbling down the seams. She had managed quite the feat this day- She had managed to corral her dreams into staying as hidden as they could while she toured the gallery. The occasional one disobeyed, like the pixie currently flying away with a chocolate muffin, but for the most part they were not interrupting her day at the Byron Gallery.

 

So she tried not to be peevish at the owner doing that exact thing, it was only polite that he engaged with his guests. She smiled politely up at the man as he offers his thoughts on the painting before them, "It most certainly does, DeSaens is clearly an artist of great skill. I've seen few artists portray misery so beautifully." She takes a small sip from her glass of wine, the cheap rose having been replaced with a dream of a much superior vintage.

[Supercape]

GM

 

"Ho ho ho!" said Pudgeball, pressing his stomach with both hands so to expel a half genuine laugh. "Yes indeed, beautiful misery. I can see you are quite the wit. May I offer you a drink?" he said, grabbing a glass of cheap champagne from the counter. And drinking it. 

 

"Oh ho ho! I meant that for you! ho ho! must be my nerves? Can I drink you an offer?" he repeated in a mangled garble. He swiped another glass, shoving it almost under the Dreamers nose.

 

He raised his head to the other five browsers. 

 

"Ladies and gentlemen... If I may be so bold as to ask for your valuable attention for one minute?"

 

The slight drowse in his voice told the Dreamer that the champagne bubbles had hit his brain. 

 

"In the back room I have a new selection! Debut! For your esteemed eyes only. If you would be so good to follow me..."

 

The lone security guard rolled his eyes but kept otherwise professional. He looked bored already. 

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer

 

The Dreamer gave a confused, disbelieving smile at the man's strange response to her statement. She opened her mouth to turn down his offer of champagne when he downed it, and then babbled some gibberish and forced the glass into her face. She pulled back from the assault upon her senses. Was this man real? Most of her dreams weren't so... confronting. She took the glass and pretended to take a sip to be polite, before passing it to a small gremlin as soon as his eyes were no longer upon her.

 

She considered carefully the statement about going to see this new item in his collection. She wasn't sure how comfortable she was following this man to a private location, but thinking about it at least she would not be alone and she was curious to see the new painting. Even if he purveyed swill and called it wine, his collection did include well made art. She wheeled after him, smiling wryly at the guard who rolled his eyes.

[Supercape]

GM

 

The back room was dark, with sullen, soporific air. Dust hang suspended. There was the grind of a malfunctioning air condition unit, a fan stuck. The air was hot. 

 

"Splendid!" said Mr Pudgeball, sweating profusely. 

 

One more guard stood here, but if the one in the main room was dozy, this guy was practically asleep on his feet, his head nodding downwards, occasionally jerking up, only to repeat the pattern.

 

The art here was strange, vivid. Clouds, castles in clouds, strange skies, strange birds. Steampunk zepplins and ornithopters. All very alien, like a figment of imagination. 

 

And one picture in particular stood out. A man with long red hair, handsome, perhaps melancholy, elegantly dressed in 19th century drapes in the style of a gentleman. In his hand, a glass ball full of lurid green smoke. 

 

"Moyd!" said Pudgeball, pointing at the picture. "No. Seriously. Its called Moyd. Perhaps the name of the gentleman? Very mysterious painting. Odd name...."

 

But what particularly resonated with the Dreamer was the skies and people of these paintings, particularly Moyd. It felt, surely, as if this was some dreamscape. Perhaps the dreamscape that she had come from!

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer 

 

The Dreamer looked over the paintings, recognizing a distinct nostalgia in many of the pictures, while Mr Pudgeball seemed to fall even further down his personal rabbit hole. The hot air and strange behaviour of the host combined with the familiarity of everything led her to a conclusion:

 

She was dreaming. This was not real, and likely neither was Mr Pudgeball. She looked around the other people, trying to spot inconsistencies, strange behaviors. Were the people dreams? Or had she caught innocent bystanders in her own failure of control? She held her hand up to draw Mr Pudgeball's attention, she needed more detail to ascertain who was true and who was false.

 

"I grow curiouser and curiouser, is the the one who painted these known, or the opposite?"

[Supercape]

GM

 

Perhaps the Dreamer was dreaming, perhaps everything was a dream. 

 

The handsome gentleman of the "MOYD" painting seemed to look at her. Eyes following her. Maybe his long red hair seemed to flow. Or was it a trick of the light?

 

Of the half dozen other visitors the gallery, the Dreamer noted one was particularly... anxious, restless, hands with a hint of tremor. A middle aged man, average stock, unruly black hair just starting to recede. A lined brow, but alert eyes, brown, deep. He reached inside the pocket of a cheap jacket. 

 

It was a subtle and swift movement. 

 

He brought out a glass ball. Filled with green gas. 

 

Exactly the same as the gentleman in the Moyd painting was holding!

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer

 

The Dreamer's eyes narrowed as the painting seemed to move and no one responded to her query. One man was moving suspiciously. Was he a Dream acting upon the others and placing them under thrall? Or was he a ø real person and beginning to sense something was wrong? She could only hope that there were heroes working to release these people from her uncontrolled magics from the outside.

 

She couldn't be certain whether the man was real, but the orb was clearly important to whatever this dream was. She had to ascertain what might be happening. And the first step of that would have to be figuring out if the man was real.

 

So decided, The Dreamer wheeled herself next to the man, speaking in a slightly sing-song tune, "Ah, the green gas glitters gaily in its glass gaol in the gallery. I chanced a glance and saw you bore an orb yourself!" She smiled as if nothing in the world was wrong as she looked up at the man, offering her hand. "I am called Glinda Gladly, would you happen to know the provenance of that wonderful painting?"

[Supercape]

GM

 

"What-whu-who?" said the man, vocal cords so garrotted by anxiety that his voice sounded like a mouse high on helium. 

 

"I mean.. gas... what? What are you...err.... singing... err...."

 

The man was so discombobulated he could barely two string two words together in any sort of grammatically correct structure. Beads of sweat almost jumped out of the pores on his skin, the veins on his neck pulsed violently against a collar that was suddenly too tight, too starched. 

 

And his hands, cold, slick with sweat, numb - they started to wobble, tremble. 

 

And the glass ball? It fell out of the paralysed fingers, ready to smash on the ground...

 

 

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer

 

The Dreamer's smile stayed beautific as the man fumbled to respond, nervousness and confusion clashing in a way that told her this man was real. And then he dropped the orb.

 

She was certain that the orb was a centerpiece to the Dream, some figment of her mind that was influencing the course of events. If it broke it might end the dream, or it might continue and she would need to start over in identifying the source.

 

With a quick lean, and a focusing of her Dreaming that caused it's fall to curve slightly, The Dreamer caught the offending object. She looked down at it suspiciously as she straightened in her chair before looking up at the man. "Careful there, broken glass can be such a bother. Would you happen to know how this came into your possession?"

[Supercape]

GM

 

The man gasped, took a step back. "Oh sorry I..."

 

He swallowed, not easily. Closed his eyes, a quick breath. 

 

Then rallied. His eyes opened again and his faced crunched up. "That's mine. That's mine, please..."

 

He went to take the ball. 

 

"I know perfectly well where it came from,"

 

The Dreamer was perceptive. His eyes flicked, just an instant, the painting "Moyd", where the handsome red haired man was floating in the clouds, an identical glass ball full of green vapours in his hand. 

 

"And.. could you give it back. Please!"

 

 

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer

 

The Dreamer quirked an eyebrow as the man rallied, calming himself to at least some degree. Was this her dream's influence, or his own determination coming to the fore? This would require further investigation. "Of course, far be it from me to deprive someone of their property. I must admit I must admit to some curiosity, it bears such a striking resemblance to the one in the painting!" She lifts it to eye level, holding it next to the painted one in her eyeline and peering at it, even trying to peer through it.

 

"You would not happen to know what it is would you? Or pergaps who the Moyd fellow in the painting is?"

[Supercape]

GM
 

The man glanced at Moyd once again, longer this time, but dragged his eyes back to the dreamer. His face was sweating, his eyes wide. 

 

"Him?"

 

He gulped. 

 

"You wouldn't believe me if told you. Bad dreams..." he shook his head and stiffened his spine. "Little lady, I'm a crook. A villain. A thief. And if you don't give me back that ball I'm going to shove my fist so far down your mouth I'll be able to pull your wheelchair through your intestines. Don't think being crippled is going to stop me...."

 

"Is there a problem here?" asked Mr Pudgeball, coming up, lacing his thumbs through his suspenders. He still had a vapid wide grin on his mouth, but he was raising a distinctly dissaproving eyebrow at the crook, villain, thief looming over the Dreamer. 

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer 

 

The Dreamer was quite surprised at the man's shift in demeanor, even more so at his threat. But his comment about bad dreams stuck out. This was her doing. A timid man forced to enact the role of a villain by her dreams. So, paradoxically as the man threatened her, her expression turned to one of pity.

 

She had to get the orb away from this poor man, before any more harm befall his person.

 

And Pudgeball provided the perfect distraction. She quickly shifted the orb out of both their views as he approached, before focusing her dreams- what left of them apparently obeyed her still- to float it off to a surreptitious corner as she turned to face the man, a reassuring smile on her features. "My apologies sir, we were having a discussion about what the orb in the Moyd portrait might represent, and got a tad... lost in our passion for art. What do you think it might be?"

[Supercape]

GM

 

"Moyd? Well, your guess is as good as mine, young lady!" said Pudgeball, rather proud of his ignorance, or perhaps proud of his humility in acknowledging his ignorance. "One would imagine it is a portrait of some sort. But of someone in the clouds, in that attire? Perhaps a superhero of the nineteenth century, ha ha! well, its an idea. Not backed up by any history, mind you. Scholars have tried searching for any such superhero and not a jot nor a tittle. And yet, well he does look rather handsome and superhero like, do you not agree?"

 

The Crook was increasingly disorientated, looking from the Dreamer to Pudgeball to the painting. 

 

And then he noticed the ball had gone. 

 

"Where is it? Where is it? Damn you!" he spluttered. "This is meant to be an art theft!"

 

"A what!" said Pudgeball, eyes widening, taking a step back. "Not in my gallery, sir! Security, arrest him!"

 

The security guard did not respond. He was snoozing on his feet, lost in slumber. 

 

He was asleep on the job!

 

And the audience of half dozen art enthusiasts were looking similarly drowsy!

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer

 

The Dreamer half-listened to Mr. Pudgeball give his opinions of the painting, about to give her own monologue about the orb in the Moyd painting when the 'Crook' interrupted as he noticed her little disappearing act with the Orb. She was pretty sure the dream was close to breaking as the man's role in it was starting to break. 'Meant to be an art theft' was fairly clear.

 

She smiled sadly up at him even as Pudgeball called for the sleeping guard, putting the rest of the scene out of her head as she reached out a hand to him. "No it is not, this was never meant to happen. I know this must be terribly confusing, but you are not a criminal. Please sir, take a breath and have a seat. I will help you through this."

[Supercape]

GM

 

"It was meant to happen!" screamed the crook. 

 

But for all the screaming that echoed around the gallery, the other residents and the security guard barely raised an eyebrow. Asleep on their feet. 

 

"I was... I was called!"

 

"By who? Not I, sir!" said Pudgeball, cheeks ballooning in indignation. 

 

"By him!"

 

The Crook pointed at the Moyd painting. 

 

As if in a dream - well, it had to be said - the man in the painting turned to face them, and...

 

...stepped out of the painting. 

 

"And who called me?" he said, voice low, and somehow both gravelly and melodic. The man's aura seemed to bend all attention towards him, magnificent, intelligent, kind and cruel. His eyes swept the group. 

 

And then he hurled the glass ball from his fingers. 

 

The tinkling of shattered glass. 

 

The smell of cut grass. 

 

Green smoke filled the room. 

 

The Dreamer could hear the sound of bodies collapsing, hitting the floor. But who? It was hard to see - just vague shadows in the green mist!

[Kaede Kimura]

The Dreamer

 

The Dreamer sighed as the man insisted upon the role her Dream had pushed him into, trying to work out what thread she might pull to unravel it. She had never quite appreciated the work the Soporifics had performed in her home world, but given how quickly one might be able to solve this situation she found herself dearly missing them. The situation continued to escalate before her when Moyd stepped free of the painting. "Oh bother." She said, before he hurled the orb, shattering it and releasing what was apparently a sleep gas of some kind.

 

The Dreamer felt it's influence tugging at her, trying to lull her into sleep, but focused. She Dreamed of clean air in her lungs and wakefulness. She couldn't see through the cloud. Would she still be in the gallery when it cleared, or had her dream changed scenes? She wheeled forward slightly, looking for Moyd. She called out softly into the fog, "Would you be opposed to having a civil conversation, Mr. Moyd?"