The Dreamtime

[Mattbot]

"If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."

[Varthonai]

The Clown grins, rears back, and slashes cleanly through Matt's body--which vaporizes instantly, leaving behind nothing but a heap of brown hooded cloak.

Which is odd, considering that Matt hadn't been wearing a cloak.

"NOOOOOOOOO!!!" screams a voice the Clown has heard before.

The Clown turns to see a dragon-like creature moving at a steady pace by the opening of the cavern on the opposite end of the pool, followed by...

Alex...

"YOU!" the Clown roars, lunging back into the water and swimming toward the cavern entrance with all his strength--but Alex grabs a potion at random from around KD's neck and hurls it, and it explodes in midair and brings an avalanche of rock tumbling down to barricade the entrance.

[Mattbot]

"Run Alex, run." Matt's voice calmly whispers into Alex's mind from beyond the dream world.

[kronosdragon]

KD wheeled around, feeling the tug around her neck and believing it to be another monster of some sort. She jolted back after discovering that the entrance of the cavern had caved in. She turned to Alex and nosed his arm, silently asking what had happened.

[Big Boom]

(I will probably get an infraction...)

It was once again silent, except for the slight drops of water hitting the floor. Alex let out a sigh, it seemed that their only option would be to backtrack and find another route. Kronosdragon nudged his arm, this time demanding an answer.

"The clown was one step ahead of us again." Alex frowned and looked towards the wall of unstable rocks now blocking the opening to the cave. "It looks like we are the only ones left here, unless of course the initial dreamer is still alive. Or any other survivors from the dream state. But we have to keep moving...going to the clown will have to wait, if we stay here...death is only certain."

They both turned towards the opening opposite from where they were.

"RRRRrrrruuuunnnn Allleeexxx Ruuuunnnn," a faint moan from beyond the nightmare called. Alex stopped, at first it had seemed like wind, a distant sound being masked by the noise of their own footsteps. But it was more distinct then that, a voice of some sort. Kronosdragon has stopped just as abruptly as Alex, now nosing his arm again.

"Run..." Alex muttered to himself. The patter of the droplets halted, only leaving Kronosdragon and Alex listen to the soft buzzing sound starting to grow from the caved in part of the hallway. Instinctively both of them started to make a dash for the light of the other side of the hallway. Maybe they would make it.

[Varthonai]

(Posting for LOF since he's inactive and under my character's control in-game)

leapoffaith navigated easily enough around the Lego monstrocities that were forming themselves from the ground up and pouring out of Warren's closet.

THUMP

An earth-shattering thud rocked the entire room, throwing LOF off-balance, but he kept running blindly ahead until he suddenly ran up against a brown corduroy obstruction the thickness of a tree trunk. He looked up, and up, and up at the titanic creature that reared its head hundreds of feet above his own. The massive brown toy bear, "Cordy", had leapt from his perch on the rocking chair, which now creaked back and forth with ear-splitting scratches of wood on wood.

LOF tried to dodge to the side, but Cordy lifted a massive foot and plunged it into the floor where LOF was headed, splintering the floorboards and nearly dragging LOF down too as it caved in. Cordy let out a powerful roar that resonated through the walls and the floor, and LOF felt compelled to turn his head skyward and look at the bear's snarling face--its eyes and mouth had begun secreting milk, which ran down its features like tears of rage and rabid frothy drool.

"Help!" leapoffaith screamed to Angua as Cordy moved in. "Help me! They're attacking me, too!"

***

The Clown claws furiously at the cave wall. Brothers! it calls out across the web of dreaming strands, contacting the Clowns in the Heart of Nightmare. Our prey are headed for our home! I have failed to stop them--prepare to intercept the intruders!

[sgt_Angua]

Angua stared at the Giant Cordy as it roared and attacked, but ducked quickly out of sight when the man called for help, not wanting the bear to see her. She wasn't going to help him. He couldn't be trusted. This could easily be a trick to put her in the path of Cordy, or cause her to send Belkar or Dr. McNinja and leave herself unprotected. Even if it wasn't a trick he had tried to hurt her, and was almost certainly involved in whatever happened to Warren.

Warren... Angua needed to get out of here and find him.

[Varthonai]

Cordy took another step forward, creating another pocked crater in the floor and trapping LOF between his two lower paws. The impact shook LOF onto his back and Cordy thrust forward with one of his forepaws, smashing LOF into the ground. LOF felt his ribs splinter like matchwood, and coughed blood.

"F-fuck you, Clown," LOF gasped as Cordy reared back and roared triumphantly. "I didn't sign up for this..."

As treasonous thoughts flashed through his mind, the syringe before LOF's eye reappeared. LOF grimaced.

One way or another, I'm going to die in a few minutes, he realized.

As Cordy reared down again, intending to crush LOF to death this time, the dreamer raised his hand to intercept Cordy's descending paw. With the last of the dream energies the Clowns had left him, he created a portal that tore open the dream-stuff of Warren's room. Cordy roared in pain as the portal shredded through the seams of his paw, ripping it to shreds and sucking out the stuffing; the giant bear pulled back in time to save itself from being completely destroyed, but its entire right arm had been torn off at the shoulder and matted wet white stuffing drooped limply out of it, dripping milk like blood.

Now there's a way to escape, LOF thought gravely. And a way for allies to get in. That's some hope... for Angua, at least.

The syringe quavered violently and then snapped forward, quick as a snake. LOF screamed as the needle buried itself viciously in his face, plunging through the soft tissue of his eye and lodging itself in his brain. The handle pushed itself down and then released, and LOF felt neurons bunching and squishing together and being slowly sucked up through the needle. The pain of having one's brain drawn out while one is still alive is a very unique experience rarely felt in everyday life; there was very little physically painful about it, but the psychological horror and existential dread was more than enough to make it terrible.

At least I DID something, was LOF's final thought. At least I wasn't just the Clown's puppet.

[LOF has been killed off due to inactivity]

***

(KD, Big Boom, the light at the end of the tunnel will take you through LOF's portal and into the room with Angua in the Heart of Nightmare. You'll have to fight LOF's Clownified corpse when you get through, though.)

[leapoffaith]

(dang it I was just about to come back and kill myself off nice heroic ending though Varth. I appreciate it.)