"Go to hell! Mudbathing pig-bitch!"

A tall dirty blonde girl stumbles out of an orphanage, St Aloysius of the Damned as it's sign reads, dark eyeliner around her eyes, plain black pants and shirt, a wide brimmed black hat perched atop her head, half focusing on shoving half falling out clothes in to a duffle bag. She slams the front door of the orphanage shut with a kick of her foot, and digs in to her bag to find her sunnies, leaning just outside the grounds to also pull out a cigarette and lighter, proceeding to focus on lighting it in her mouth. Once done, she takes a deep drag and exhales with a frustrated sigh.

She's passing by when that happens, and slows down.

"Everything okay?" she asks.

She looks up, peering over the tops of her shades, an eyebrow raised in contempt.

"Sure lady, just fine."

She both literally and figuratively blows her off, blowing smoke out the side of her mouth towards the stranger. 

"Do you have somewhere to go tonight, or money for a hotel room if you won't trust a shelter?"

Her head snaps back towards this woman, an immediate frown marring her features.

"Look, whoever you are, I don't need some random strangers help. And trust me, I'm not someone you'd want to help."

"I find I've yet to regret helping someone. I'm not demanding you trust me. But I can give you information on nearby shelters, or at least some spare cash."

"I don't... uh... I don't go to shelters anymore."

"There's one you're unlikely to have heard of." Even if the tiny shelter for those few in the know might get mad at her for it. "But I'm fine just giving you money for a motel."

"It's not them, it's... They'd throw me out. They always do."

She mumbles around a mouthful of smoke.

"I have influence with this one. But I understand the concern."

Ariadne stops to breathe, deep, connect back with her aura, and checks the kind of vibes she's getting from this woman. It seems positive and fine, and even though there's a part of her that is trepid, she decides to dip her toe.

"It's just... Stuff happens around me, it's not an orphanage for the damned for no reason." She nods back to the building behind her.

...Interesting. Earth's usually too normal, and Lianne can't quite see the weave here...

But there's been damage, lately, to just about everything.

"I'm not particularly normal myself. The shelter knows how to care for those with unusual concerns." A bit lightly, "Last time they grouched at me it was about some kid trying to summon Cthulhu."

Her eyes widen as her head snaps up to make immediate eye contact. 

"I'm not a moron. Stuff just kind of falls over around me." Ariadne lets silence awkwardly hang for a second as she takes another drag from her cigarette. "I'm sorry for being rude, I'm... My name is Ariadne."

"I'm Lianne."

"Lianne. I... I'd actually be down to check out that shelter, it'd be good to go somewhere safe, where people aren't automatically assuming I'm the antichrist, so if..."

Ari's sentence trails off, she gets distracted by the feeling of someone watching her, goosebumps rising on her arm opposite Lianne.

"Can you feel that?"

There is, indeed, a tingle, something curling around the primal part of her mind -

She doesn't have enough time to look more than alarmed before - 

The world lurches, and Ariadne is yanked - backwards, upwards, downwards, spinning inwards - it's unclear - 

And the world changes, colors slamming in. It's her dreamscape, a cavern lit only dimly by glowing patches of moss and little white flowers decorating the vines that reach in tendrils far above her. Many paths branch off from here, large and small alike, and all interesting and beautiful. Crystals bloom from most surfaces, their colors muted but all a mixture of blues and purples. But it's vivid and real as it's never been - 

And she's alone.

"Woah..." She blinks rapidly, stumbling back trying to regain her balance. Once she does, she realises the familiarity and yet strangeness of where she is.

"Well hey there sweetness." She caresses a few plants. "Any chance you can point the right path to go down? I'm looking for a way home."

The plants curl a bit under her touch.

There's a faint shuddering in the vines going down one of the paths she's explored the least - it'd be mistakable for a light wind, except for how utterly still the air is.

"Thank you sweetheart."

She slowly slinks down the way the plants indicated, continuing for quite a while, stopping every so often to talk to plants, make sure they think the way ahead is safe.

It's a long route, and she quickly gets to where she's never been before - 

But then there's a place where the plants arc away from each other, and at first it looks like it'll be another cavern.

It's not.

The path opens onto a mountainside, a rocky cliff-face covered in vines falling away below her feet, the sky above riotous and alive, twirling sheets of night with stars trapped in their nets, clouds billowing and flowing among and above and between them. Thin strands of aurora trail along the edges of the distant horizon, dipping down to brush the mountaintops then soaring back up. There's what might be trees far below her, their spindly fingers reaching up the cliff, and little groups of flowers here and there, some glowing, most not.

"Woah... Where the heck am I?" She looks down towards where the trees are. She calls down to them politely. "Anybody wanna give me a lift down?"

None of the trees responds, however, a pure blackness comes slithering up the cliffside, and once she notices it, she stares in a mixture of fear and awe. This has certainly never happened before. She backs away as it get closer, and once it reaches the top, it hovers on the edge like a pool of inky darkness.

"Hi?" She steps forward slowly, not quite sure what's happening.

The shadow curls a bit at the edges in response to her voice.

The shadows, if she tests her weight on them, are solid, and can easily support her, though they feel soft in a way.

With her weight firmly on the surface, she bends her knees to stabilize against any movement.

"Nice to meet you... I guess. If you could take down the cliffside, that would be very kind of you." She keeps her tone soft and inviting, but firmly not condescending.

The shadow ripples - 

And then flows down the mountainside like a misty river, billowing when it hits rocks or trees and slipping through openings. Yet the part she's on remains steady... Mostly.

The trees look a lot bigger, a lot stranger, up close. Dark, with little gashes of odd colors, the silhouette of the branches against the roiling sky odd. But they rustle when she approaches, acknowledging her.