A Lonely Dream Show

You are in the dreamscape theater again, the lights already going down and the screen being lit up as you hear the faint sound of the film projector starting up behind you. Looks like Tara does have something to share after all.

However, instead of your room or any familiar sight around the campus, the image that shows up on the big screen is of an alien landscape. It is barren and desolate with black sand, the sky a gloomy swirl of dark gray clouds that look like they will start raining at any second. Somehow, you know they never do.

Flying along this landscape, you see through Tara's eyes as she passes miles of nothing. She occasionally passes another creature but they are shadowy and indistinct. Some have outlines that remind you of other animals and mystical creatures but somehow off, while others are completely unfamiliar shapes with equally unfamiliar physical movements. However, despite their utterly alien nature you do not get the sense they are some kind of unknowable eldritch horrors so much as just... different. And very lonely.

Suddenly, a crack appears in the air in front of Tara. A beam of warm, bright light trickles in and softly cuts through the gloom drawing Tara closer to it like a moth being attracted to a glowing light bulb. As she draws nearer, you can see that on the other side of the crack is another, entirely different alien landscape. However, this one is far more colorful and resembles a deep forest with plants of all sorts of bright colors that almost seem to shimmer in the sunlight that glows down on them. Drawing closer still, small figures around the same size she is become visible.

Other fairies! More traditional looking ones with butterfly wings in a multitude of colors and patterns flap about, playing mid-air games and laughing cheerfully. Tara picks up speed, flying towards the crack and you can feel her excitement at the thought of joining in, making friends with beings like her, maybe going off into the trees with some of the better looking ones and getting to fool around for the first ti--

She bounces off an invisible barrier, like a pane of glass blocking off access from her side of the crack to the other. Her collision must have made a sound on the side the other fairies are on, as they all whip their heads in Tara's direction. For her part, Tara presses up against the barrier, pounding her tiny hands against it helplessly. She cannot escape on her own. She needs one of them to reach in and pull her through.

Instead, the other fairies look at her in horror, their faces going pale with fear before they scatter and fly off into the brush. Once they all vanish from sight, Tara stops pounding at the barrier and flutters backwards to watch it slowly close up again. An intense feeling of sorrow and loneliness grips your heart that you can sense is coming from your familiar as she resumes her aimless journey and just as it feels like those emotions are going to become maddeningly overbearing there is a sudden, intense flash of light... and you are suddenly seeing yourself in Summoning Class from Tara's point of view.

A montage of events follows; a rush of colorful sights, new sounds, smells and sensations that are just on the edge of overwhelming. You see things from her perspective like her comfortable, glittering coin bed, gigantic and delicious food, and curious creatures to interact with and tease (especially that loud, snooty blonde lady). Through it all are flashes of your face showing a whole range of emotions, but mostly of you smiling, and culminates in the surreal image of you looking up at yourself looking down at you through Tara's eyes as you claim her virginity. Warm pleasure fills you and the happiness that follows it is almost dizzying until the image suddenly cuts again to your room, Liam just barely visible out of the corner of her eye as Tara sits on your bed and looks at the door expectantly for you to return like an eager puppy.

Instead of the door opening to admit you, a thick, black shadow suddenly seeps through the door's cracks. Tara takes to the air in shock while Liam shows no reaction, completely unaware as the shadow takes a humanoid shape. The warm happiness is replaced by ice cold fear, the shock of the change almost painful even in your disconnected dream state. The shadow reforms into a humanoid shape and approaches the bed, initially ignoring Tara and placing a very familiar note and tape recorder on the mattress. It then does look up at your familiar and, even though its eyes are invisible you can feel the intense glare the shadow is giving Tara.

In mid-air, a small portal of swirling grey clouds like those in Tara's original realm opens. You do not know if this is what actually happened or if it is merely a fairy's dream dramatization, since you are pretty sure Liam would have noticed and reacted to a magic portal inexplicably forming right in front of him even if he could not see the shadow, but the main idea of what happens next remains. The sensation of fear more than doubles in intensity as the shadow suddenly lunges forward and grabs Tara out of mid-air with one of its dark hands before thrusting her towards the portal. The figure does not push her through but holds her close enough that she can see a series of purple runes that form around the edges of the portal. You do not know exactly what they say in their entirety, but you do see the symbol for "permanent seal" among them. Turning the Dragon Fairy around to face it, the shadow brings its other hand up to where a mouth would be and extends its forefinger in a shushing motion.

The message is clear: "Let nobody know who I am or else you will be returned to that terrible, lonely realm forever."

The shadow then throws Tara towards the bed and you snap awake with a gasp just as she is about to hit the mattress.

Bolting upright, you look over at Tara's coin bed to see it empty and panic for a moment before you remember to look down at your pillow where your familiar is looking up at you, her eyes shimmering as she shivers and hugs her knees to her chin. You gently scoop her up in your hand and very slowly bring her close to your face, carefully brushing the top of her head with your lips. "I'm so sorry," you say, "You don't have to tell me any more than that. You'll never have to go back to that sad place ever again, I promise."

Tara silently sniffles, gazing up at you as if trying to ascertain the truth of your words before she nods and wipes at her wet eyes. "Anything I can do to help you feel better?" you ask, "An extra large breakfast? Take you out somewhere really nice to fly around and play before classes? Just stay here and let me pet your head a while?"

She ponders your questions for several seconds before a metaphorical light bulb goes off over her head, she flaps her wings and takes off from your hand. A smile forms on her lips that slowly starts to reach her eyes as she places her arms behind her back and curls her tail around towards you, flicking her tail tip at you as an indication for you to follow her.