fandomhigh | Good Omens...And Bad: Prophecy in Theory and Practice, Lab Five

Friday, October 6, Second Period

The room is arranged in a combined of big, extremely comfortable looking armchairs and piles of large, also comfortable looking cushions and pillows. The lights are dimmer than usual, there is the faintest hint of a scent, as if of fresh spring air, and very soft music is playing.

"First off, I want to remind everyone to hand in your take-home test from last week. And in honor of Homecoming, there will be no homework today.

We're veering from the printed syllabus a bit for today's class, because I want to match our labs a little better to the class lectures. On Monday, we discussed dream interpretation. Today, we're going to experiment a bit with our dreams.

Before we begin, I want to stress two things to you. First: this lab exercise is entirely voluntary. Anyone who feels uncomfortable participating need only speak up, and I will assign a different exercise. Second: you are completely safe. This room is protected from any outside interference, and the only...energies, so to speak, that will be able to access it are those that are connected to you personally. The source of your own sight, your own prophetic abilities. Nothing can hurt you, and I will be keeping a close watch on everyone.

Now, the exercise. I want you to get comfortable. Curl up in one of the chairs, find a place on the cushions, whatever you prefer. Count to one hundred, or recite Latin verbs, or whatever it is you usual do to calm your mind so that you can sleep. I'll help you along, so that once you're in a relaxed state, you'll be sure to fall asleep. You may not reach a dream state, but if you do, once you awaken I'd like you to write down anything you recall about the dreams you had in your journal. You won't be sharing these with the class, although you are more than welcome to come and see me next week if you have anything you'd like to talk about with me."

Anyone who decides to participate in the lab will find that the atmosphere of the room is incredibly relaxing, and very conducive to sleep. The naps will actually only last about twenty minutes, leaving plenty of class time afterwards for writing down notes or chatting with the other students.

[ooc: As the professor says, this is an entirely voluntary lab exercise. If your character is absolutely dead set against trying it, just let him know. Anyone not participating might be asked to help monitor the others. If you do dream, and you want something to happen, please ping me in the OOC thread so I know to keep watch on your character specifically. ~~Please wait for~~ OCD threads are up. Have at!]

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Noticing that Blair was showing signs of being somewhat disturbed, Aziraphale knelt next to him and lightly laid the tips of his fingers on the young man's hand. Slowly and carefully, he brought Blair back out of the dream state, and into the stage of sleep just before awakening.

Blair twitched and his good hand came up to rub against his cast frantically. "...off...guide...g'off...blood!"

Aziraphale laid his hand more firmly on Blair's shoulder.

"It's all right, you're in a safe place."

Blair woke with a gasp and stared up at Aziraphale for a moment before raising his casted arm. "Is it still there?"

For a moment, Aziraphale was concerned the Blair wanted to know if his arm was still there. Then he realized it must have been something else.

With a reassuring smile, he answered, "Your arm is exactly as it was before you went to sleep. Can you try writing down what you saw? And then we can talk about it if you like."

Blair stared at the cast for a long moment and then nodded. "Uh...sure." He reached for a notebook and scribbled for several minutes, trying to relate everything that he had dreamt. When he was finished he sought out Aziraphale.

"I've finished." Blair said, still giving his casted arm absentminded rubs.

Suppressing an overwhelming urge to hug Blair -- because hugging wasn't exactly in line with the sort of professoris persona he was trying to communicate in class -- Aziraphale smiled again, and waved Blair to sit down.

"Do you want to talk about it? We don't have to do that here, of course, if you'd rather not. You can take some time to relax, have a spot of tea and read a bit until class is over if you like."

Blair nodded at the mention of tea and tilted his head at Phale. "Did you do something to make me have a weird dream. It was...different. I-I think I was on the spirit plane."

"I didn't do anything at all, except provide you with comfortable and safe surroundings. Your dreams are your own."

He handed Blair a cup of tea. "I take it you've never dreamt a visit to the...er, 'spirit plane' before?"

Blair gave one last rub to his cast before taking the tea. "No, man. I usually have to meditate and even then it doesn't always work."

Aziraphale nodded. "You might want to think about doing a more in-depth study on the idea of lucid dreaming. If it's easier for you to dream your way to this spirit plane than to do it through meditation, then perhaps you'll find the skill helpful. Are you feeling all right?"

"Yeah, maybe." Besides anything else, the idea of an in-depth not catching his attention is cause for concern.

"I don't kn..." Blair trailed off and the hand holding the teacup twitched as if he wanted to rub his arm again. "How much does it hurt to take a cast off?"

And Aziraphale was very concerned.

"I'll take it off for you if you like. I can even heal your arm the rest of the way, if you want me to, or just put the cast back on."

Moving to sit next to Blair, Aziraphale took hold of the cast and carefully slid it off his arm. It felt as though the cast simply became large enough to come right off in one piece, although it didn't seem to change in any noticable way.

Blair stared at his arm, but didn't touch it. The pale skin was free of any handprints, bloody or otherwise.

"You can put it back on, man." Blair said quietly. "Sorry I got all crazy."

"It's understandable, my dear," Aziraphale replied softly. "Dreams...even the ones the average person has, affect you in a powerful way. You've no reason to feel embarrassed that it seemed real. Prophetic dreams particularly can be difficult to just put aside once they're finished."

He carefully slipped the cast back on, and it settled comfortably into place on Blair's arm.

"Have your tea, and rest a bit. I've plenty of books to choose from if you'd like to read, or of course you can just sit quietly for a while."

Blair ghosted his fingers over the cast, outlining a handprint and he shook his head and picked up his teacup. "I'll just hang out here for a bit, man. Thanks."

At some point a wee origami duckie waddled over to investigate Blair's tea cup. Wasn't as if the duck could drink or for that matter even smell the tea...it was just a curious little duckie.

Or...maybe it was a crafty little duckie and this was it's attempt to get closer to all that wonderfully neat looking hair!

It took a moment for Blair to focus on the duck, but once he did, he picked up the wee duckie and placed it on his shoulder. Because teacups and napkin duckies made for bad friendships.

"You can see from better up there, anyway."

Good Omens...And Bad: Prophecy in Theory and Practice, Lab Five

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