Somewhere Between Ochopee and Everglade City (open)

Not locked, privacy not required. He opened the door and let it swing open.

Cass was bent over the tub, scrubbing a bit of blood of blood out with a wash cloth, her back to him. She was wearing the motorcycle jacket. The razor blades she'd palmed were on the edge of the tub.

He looked at the razor blades then to her cleaning blood. His brow just arched. "Do I even want to know why your cutting yourself?" he didn't sound happy about that..but hey he wasn't flipping out that was good right?

"Probably not," she said as she continued to scrub, as she sniffled. "Makes me sure I'm still here."

Again more mumbeling in cajun..."Ill get the bleach..." and he walked out of the cabin speaking his cajun rambelings..a couple minutes later he came back with a bottle of bleach still rambeling in cajun.

"Can you at least mumble in French if you're going to mumble all upset like?" She sighed quietly. "I can at least understand French."

Cass took the bleach from Alexander, spilling a bit of it into the tub as she started to scrub again.

Oh that just got a glare for a few seconds...followed by one word in Novajo that distinclty sounded like the word women would be used in this situation. followed by a slight growl. He turned back to the living room to find his pack of ciggeretts again.

Oh... oh fuck no...

Cass stormed out of the bathroom, arms crossed.

"Maybe I forgot to say... Please?" Glare.

He glared at her, his eyes narrowed. This time he spoke in French...."you damn women are going to drive me crazy. If it isn't pleasing everybody, or fixing everybody, or trying to find something rather then fix your problems in a sane way." He pointed to the bathroom. "that is not cool. I don't know why you do it, hell I don't particularly care, but that is not sane, and this is coming from someone that considers a batshit crazy sob a father to him, and he doesnt drive me as frackin crazy as the women from your family does." really yea it came off as angry but it was that brother just caught his sister being stupid anger..

"Funny thing about that, I never claimed to be sane!" He came off angry, she threw it right back at him in French. "If you don't like it, you don't have to see it! God dammit!"

He shook his head. "yea too late for that now isn't it. Kinda blew that right down the drain, no pun intended." his voice softened.."does it work, really does it work?"

(unless otherwise noted he's speaking French from this point)

"At least I know when I wake up, I haven't been anywhere I wasn't supposed to be. So put that in your pipe and smoke it," she hissed before turning around and heading back into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her.

Was he supposed to understand that? No, more than likely not. No one ever did.

"And just what in the hell is that suppose to mean." He walked up to the door just as it was being slammd in his face.

Cass kicked the door for good measure.

"It means... it means I hope to hell if you don't dream, you don't start. Unless you want to be sucked into a time warp."

She kicked it again.

He went quiet...He thought about what she said...there were reasons behind everything. He checked the door knob again, seeing it was unlocked. he stepped forward...."allright...I over reacted...I'm sorry. I've been through enough that I shouldnt have over reacted like that.." he spoke softly..."I do dream. But ive never experienced a time warp..." did he believe her...why? "but I have experienced other things. Being stuck in the reflection realm.." yea he just said that, a lasombra stuck in the reflection realm weird..."ive dealt with fairies, and other things. so why don't you tell me what happen." he spoke low so that only she could hear him though.

Cass looked skeptical that he'd believe her, and not particularly comfortable talking about it. So she continued to clean the tub while she spoke softly to him in French.

"It was only a couple of nights after Christmas that I had started dreaming. I wasn't sure what to make of it because that hasn't happened since I was mortal. There was a lot of color, a lot of words that didn't make sense, and a few images, too. But nothing made any real sense to me. The dog is what stood out the most. A mangy, rabid, nasty looking thing that seemed to chase me, haunt me. The first night I woke up, I wasn't sure what to think. So I... probably foolishly... poked my head into the astral realm right there in the bedroom. Something was there. I could see this blackness sort of oozing out of the mirror and I could hear lots of things speaking horrible things. I wasn't sure if it was related to the nightmare or not, but it was overwhelming. The prince's ghoul, who I talked to, wasn't convinced I was actually awake for it, but I felt like I was. And the room was so cold, so very, very cold."

She actually shivered to think about it.

"The next night, the nightmare had intensified, but it was the same... The dog, the words. And when I awoke, I left the room with my bag. I had intended to step outside just for a minute to get my head on straight and then come back to find... someone. But the bag was so heavy. My camera had seem to freeze over, like a frost. That wasn't a dream-- I felt like something was... I don't know, following me? Attached? It scared me out of my wits and I just ran. I ran to get away from it. I don't remember how long or how far I ran, but I wound up up a tree in the swamp. There was a bird on the branch, sleeping, and I felt the need to touch it. When I did, a wind came and forced me to lose my balance, just enough so that my body had turned. And the dog was there up above me in the tree. It's head exploded, thousands of biting and stinging insects-- something I've never seen before-- just poured from this dog's head and swirled around me and began, I thought, devouring me. And I fell. I thought I had been staked by the roots below, but I remember the roots going through my leg and my arms, too. And then everything went black. When I came to, I knew something was wrong because I was whole and I was in different clothing and... there was a sun. Everything seems to go hazy after that. But I remember trying to get home, begging for help. So much so, I think I pissed someone off."

She shook her head.

"Rai says I've only been gone just over 15 days, but... I swear I was gone for over a year."

He listened. And listened intently. "It sounds familliar to me. But It could be something different. Cass, they havn't figured out what happened yet?" the anger was gone and he was sitting on the edge of the clean part of the tub, concerned for her clearly.

The Rose shook her head in the negative. "No."

"Is this why you want to leave?"

"Yes..." Then she shook her head. "No... I just... I don't know. I just want to go, okay?"

"If that's has anything to do with it it's pointless. Atleast i think it is. It will probably follow you wherever you go."

"Yeah... I know," she nodded, turning on the shower to rinse the bleach away.

"And you leaving probably won't keep others here safe. Especially if whatever it is has figured out anyone you care for, my experience running just makes things worse with this kind of thing."

"I know that. It's just one of many reasons, though. I'm not so naive that I think leaving will solve that problem."

"Then why not stay, atleast until we figure it out?"