Field Trip [for Schon]

[smartass_captain]

It's not often that Jim shows up in the Nexus in uniform anymore. Since it's become his getaway form work, it always seemed more prudent to just wear his everyday clothes. He's in Starfleet golds today though, kicked back in an overstuffed chair in a quiet corner of the forum, doing 'paperwork' on his PADD.

There's a nearly empty cup of coffee next to him. Maybe he's waiting for someone. Or maybe he just got tired of being bothered in his quarters. It's hard to tell, with Jim.

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[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

The wonder has begun to pall. The simple, singlemindedness of the choir strikes a chilling chord in Schön's heart. Bedlam. Lost ones. This choir has been locked away in their own dream, for how long? His cane is still to hand, and that hand tightens on it. No, not a cane, a staff of ebony, shod in silver and capped with the Eye of Night.

"No. You will not take my dreams, and you will not take me. I offered you fair trade, and you answer me with theft. Is your choir a shackled one, to hold together for so long? If not, then do not dare to shackle me."

[smartass_captain]

Okay, okay this looks bad. Jim scrambles with the tree roots while trying to keep Schon in sight above him. Scientific testing has proven that phaser fire does not work on trees. It has also proven to make them angrier.

The phaser does make a decent blunt instrument to beat away grabby roots, but you know, one of the trees limbs would work better.

"I'm coming man, hold on! Wake up okay?!" When he's able to wriggle free he's going to start climbing as fast as his arms will take him to try to get Schon back.

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"Hear me, dream choir. I am the Traveler, the Finder, I am the Way Between, the Seeker and the Son of the Eye of Night. Bind me at your peril, for I will bring you no wonders unwilling. Force me and I shall bring you only nightmares."

[smartass_captain]

Bind you? But you can Hear. Surely you want to Dream, don't you? Why waste your gifts with the dream-shells who are blind, deaf, and alltogether useless?

There is an uncertainty in their answer, as though they cannot understand Schon's anger at this turn of events. He should be grateful, being accepted into their choir. Certainly a better fate than the one he entered their domain with, clearly.



----------

Jim has never been so thrilled to hear someone spouting crazy things he doesn't begin to understand. If Schon is talking, that means he's awake. If he's awake, that means he's still alive. And if he's alive, then Jim climbing up after him has a purpose other than assuaging his own grief.

"Stop threatening the trees and let's get out of here! Thank fuck you're alright." A block boot is hooked around a branch as Jim begins hauling himself up closer to where Schon is.

"You hurt?!"

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"They Dream, as well," Schön points out, "and I teach them to Hear. They interest me, and I would see what they will become." He considers for a moment whether to add anything, before pointing out, "they could join you in song one day." He's still gripping tightly to his staff, however. If they don't seem persuaded, it will be time to insist upon his freedom.

He can't hear Jim, or he would answer him.

[smartass_captain]

You would waste your gifts teaching the dream-shells? Tragic. Unfortunate. A Dreamer who cannot be saved from his own delusions. The choir seems to grow quieter, and the forest begins to become perceivable, little by little.

They are fuel for the Dreamers, not worthy of the gifts. Go back to the shells if you wish, but do not bring them back unless they are an offering. That's not ominous at all. If that's how they feel about telepathically challenged, what does that mean they did to Jim?

Dropped him about twenty feet as soon as they began to relinquish their hold on Schon is what. Grabby roots still kind of want to drag him back with them, but they're almost waiting to see if Schon will notice.

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

Tragic? Unfortunate? He thinks much the same of them. "Find your feet, Captain," Schön advises tersely as awareness of the physical world returns. "We need to be going."

To the Choir, he offers one last warning: "your fire will consume itself, your Dream will stagnate and wither. I pronounce no curse, merely a prediction. You have wrought your own withering end, and I will weep for you. Good-bye."

Turning, with a vise-like grip on his cane, the thin man stalks out of the wood.

[smartass_captain]

"Oh yeah. Ssssure." Everything sucks. Jim is pretty sure he hates just about everything right now. He kicks at the roots still tentatively trying to grab at him and scrambles to his feet so he can follow Schön out of the woods.

At least that pounding headache from all the super loud telepathy he can't parse will fade as they exit the forest. The bumps and bruises he'll just have to get creative when he goes back to the ship.

"...That...was not part of th'plan, by the way."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"No," Schön agrees, setting a brisk pace, "I rather imagined it was not. You need to remove your people from this world, Captain, and ban any others from visiting it. The inhabitants consider you a nuisance at best, and food at worst. They will also seek to ensnare anyone capable of perceiving them, to join their choir. Has anyone slept while on the surface?"

[smartass_captain]

"I'm fine, by the way, thanks for asking." Jim wasn't the one going all ga-ga over the stupid talking head screaming treeple. Actually he's still not quite back on balance after having to have his head vibrated by...whatever that was. Telepathy or whatnot.

Schön doesn't even seem a bit out of place for being hypnotized or whatever it was. This trip sucks. He doesn't even reply to Schön's question until he's stumbled for the third time and just stays seated at the top of the hill a fair distance outside of the forest.

To hell with it. Trees can't walk, and Jim doesn't feel like his head's going to pop anymore.

"I know--about the whole, eating people thing. They were trying while you were having a tea party in the branches or whatever. No one's slept planet side, no worries there. And, considering this place fucking sucks, there's no worry on me filing this planet under 'Fuck That Noise'."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

Schön stops when Jim does, turning to stare back at the forest and leaning more heavily on his cane than he had during the walk; now that the desperation of the situation is over, he's feeling the toll of it.

"Their world died," he explains, "long ago. They hid themselves, and slept, and this--all of this that you see--is the barest echo of the dream they share. They have been too long in isolation, too long in dreams; they have lost touch with the waking world, and see you who cannot hear them as empty shells."

[smartass_captain]

"Wait..." Jim makes a face. Clenches his fist in the grass he's sitting in. "So...all of this? Sky, grass, flowers....everything? Is...not? Real?" Jim can't deal with this right now. Imaginary grass and psychic trees.

"...That explains why nothing lives here anymore I guess." Jim scrubs a hand over his face and sighs. Flops back onto the grass and stares up at the sky. "....They didn't fuck you up in the head too bad? You weren't answering for a long ass time. I was worried they'd done something to you."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"Reality is not always quite so solid as you believe it to be, Captain. Sometimes, someone else's belief is the stronger."

"They were extending an invitation, but I have seen the product of such lives before. I am..." He pauses, examining himself in a moment of self-reflection and smoothing down some of the snags and small tears in his suit. At last, he concludes, "unbroken."

[smartass_captain]

"That's good." Jim sighs again and man he is tired after fighting off a forest of NO. "Let's blow this joint and take our picnic to the Parklands. Hardly a getaway vacation, for you, but considerably less mind rapey and nommy."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"Mm. Yes." He sighs, donning his hat (where was it this whole time?) before nodding agreement. "Let us be off, then. I don't wish to seem an ungrateful guest, but I fear this planet has lost its charm."

[smartass_captain]

"You weren't the one getting groped by trees, buddy." Jim shudders and gets up, more sure of his footing and ready to be rid of this place.

"Still, sorry for dragging you all the way out here for this. My epic space adventures are usually..." Beat.

Jim, seriously?

"...Actually I don't know what else I was expecting, this is exactly how my missions go." Jim sighs and shakes his head.

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"Was I not?" he counters dryly, but his heart isn't in the debate. "Think of it this way: how swiftly would you lose your patience with a placid world?"

[smartass_captain]

Jim could debate the difference between having a nap with some treeple and getting choked out by tree roots while also getting blasted by tree mind rays, but whatever. It's not worth making Schon mad and Jim is happy to project that he totally had everything under control down there.

"That depends. Are there people to mess around with? because if not? Fucking yesterday."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"Mm. If there is no trouble to find, you'll make some?"

[smartass_captain]

"Not the kind of 'messing around' i meant, but sure, we'll go with that." The hike back would be much faster than the hike there if it were not all uphill for the most part.

Jim isn't exactly wiped by the time they're back to the ship, but he does look a bit winded. Hard to tell if that's from the hike or the drop before it. Or the choking.

Sad day for Jim. He'll gather up the assorted picnic he'd set aside and take one last look out at the planet's surface.

"Well, it was worth checking out, at least. Let's head back to the Nexus."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

"'Trouble' couldn't be a euphemism?" he counters genially, having the advantage on the walk back of a cane. "Out of curiosity, how much did you see, and hear, in the forest?"

The proposal to return to the Nexus is met with a nod, though he doesn't engage in much wordplay aboard the Enterprise--being around such cold rationality is tiring, even if the actual iron content is low.

[smartass_captain]

"Fair point, my friend. Fair point." Jim will get them beamed back to the ship and head off toward the Nexus, and he is a good enough host to withhold his chatter until they're back somewhere more pleasing for Schon.

The Parklands is no alien oasis, but at least nothing is going to try to eat them, there. Jim pulls out a bottle of deep blue liquid and offers it to Schon.

"A thank you present for holding such an outstanding party. It's Theta III starfruit wine."

Jim waits until they're settled while he considers the other's question.

"I saw the trees moving, and I felt...something. It was similar to when I mind melded with a Vulcan the one time. I suppose that's what telepathy feels like. It was like standing next to a huge speaker and having it just blast you with sound waves, but they weren't at a frequency I could hear. Didn't mean they couldn't do damage. I was knocked off my feet feeling like my head was gonna pop for a while there. Then the trees started moving--you fainted into some branches and disappeared, and I started getting choked out by the roots. I tried calling out to you, but it felt like there was cotton stuffed into my mouth. And my ears. Like my voice was nothing. After that, not getting eaten/choked took precedence over everything else."

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

Schön considers Jim's account of events carefully, then accepts it with a nod. "They underestimated you, it seems."

[smartass_captain]

"Seems like the liked you pretty well. I'm glad they didn't hurt you too bad. Unless you got fucked in the head, that's never good." Jim winces in sympathy.

"Sometimes the worst scars are the ones that don't show."

(Sorry, this got away from me somehow.)

[u_can_have_it_4_a_song]

The bottle Jim offered is opened, sniffed at thoughtfully, before a measure is poured out (into cups; he's not making an offering to the land).

"They saw a measure of kinship in me, and wished for an adoption. The state they had reached was... disquieting, to say the least."