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Bean stood in the silent basement of her aunt and uncles castle. She sighed when she realized where she was. She could tell this was going to be another nightmare, the last 2 dreams were, and those were from this same night after awaking in frantic panting and trying to go back to sleep.
She wasn’t sure why this one was starting here. All of her other Maru set dreams had started and ended in the room where she was about be crowned by metal rusty nails that had seen the same thing countless times. It was always more painful than her other dreams, she always woke up swearing she could feel the screws still trying to twist their way in. She hoped there was some reasonable explanation, that it was just her imagination, and hopefully not in the going insane way. She didn’t want to be apart of that curse.
She walked around the empty room, it was in the messy state it once used to be before it exploded. Assorted liquids covered the floor and the only dry surfaces were the backs of fallen bookshelves that managed to pile over the liquid level. When she walked further in however her dream seemed to have had some bookshelves stay in place, creating a clam little area in the back.
Bean realized she recognized that area. It was the same where she had found Luci trapped in a jar to be pickled for eternity. She ran over, in hopes that when she got there that there would be some dream Luci to keep her company in this nightmare.
When she turned the corner her heart dropped, although at the same moment she was already thinking she should’ve known better and expected that instead Dagmar would be standing right there. Waiting for her.
“Oh Bean you came back!” Dagmar said with her usual fake motherly sweetness. She too was in the exact same condition before the explosion, a few bruises, messy hair and that dark creepy outfit.
“Stop messing with my head!” Bean demanded. Her angry stomp wasn’t as threatening when the water weakened the sound.
“Why? Don’t want to be screwy like the rest of the family?” Dagmar chuckled as she held up the crown a little higher with her emphasis on the screws. “It’s your destiny darling, you’ll eventually end up like the rest of us, even if you don’t want to wear this thing now you’ll want to help us eventually. Just like me.”
“I will NEVER be like you! I’m nothing like you!” Bean insisted as she stepped away each time her mother stepped closer.
“Oh really? Look at yourself now. You’re already half way to being another me.” Dagmar said, nodding her head down to the water on the floor in front of Bean. Bean looked down at it curiously and saw her reflection.
Yet it wasn’t hers. All that stared back at her was a Dagmar version of herself. She yelped as she saw it, immediately looking away. She did see herself again when she did, but differently. It wasn’t in a reflection, it was in another perspective. The Bean in front of her was still freaking out about her reflection. When she stopped that Bean pointed at her angrily and yelled how she doesn’t look like her, act like her, or was anything like her.
The Bean that was seeing this just stood frozen in terror at this perspective. She could already tell what body she was in now. She didn’t need the feeling of new clothes on her to tell her that, or her new reflection that was in the water and glass bottles around them to tell her that. Not even the crown within her hands was the main source proof. It was knowing her dreams. Of course they would force her to literally be Dagmar. Her dreams always sucked like that.
What she didn’t expect was to lose control of this new body. Against her will it walked forward and held up the crowd once more. As the ‘Bean’ in front of her nervously backed away it turned into someone else, no one she knew, and probably someone no one else know. It did still look like her though. Like a future relative, perhaps a daughter. That’s why it hurt when her ‘own’ body ignored her and ran after the girl, tackling her and trying to force the crown on her.
She cried at her Dagmar self to stop and mixed with the other girl’s cries to stop. The matching screams cries haunted Bean within her uncontrollable new confinement. It felt too real, she had forgotten this was just a nightmare when the crown got closer as the girl began to struggle more and more to push it away.
“No… no! Please, stop! Don’t do this! Stop!” She yelled out more. She could finally feel herself pull away from the bodies hard. She panted as she sat up in her own bed that had once again had to deal with her night terror sweat. She started to remember that it was all a dream. The fact calmed her enough to steady her breathing to a somewhat more normal, or at least quieter.
“Beanie?” The soft, concerned voice pierced through her racing thoughts. She looked over to where she heard it and saw Luci sitting on the window sill smoking, by the looks of it, his 6th cigarette. When Beanie just looked at him without answering he continued for her. “Another nightmare?”
“Yeah…” She sighed. “What are you doing up?”
“Couldn’t sleep.” Luci shrugged, he could’ve added the fact it was her fault for constantly making noises in her sleep, but he’d save that for later. Just for now. “What was this one about?”
“It was about my mom again…” Bean admitted as she put her knees up and her hugged her legs, hiding her face in them. “About me being her… I don’t want to be like her. I’m not like her!”
She paused for a moment and there was a sad silence filling the room. Bean hid her face in the blankets that covered knees even more as tears filled her eyes. “Everyone already thinks I look like her… people just think I’m my mom or a screw up… and that’s basically the same thing!”
Another small silent pause, before Bea looked up at Luci.
“Luci… do you think I’m like her?…”
Bean knew Luci wasn’t the best guy to go to when it came to asking this stuff, yet she still hoped he would at least have some sassy, passive aggressive comment about how she wasn’t ’cool’ or ‘hot’ enough to be anything like her. What she didn’t know is that Luci really didn’t see her as Dagmar. In fact, he barely saw who was actually sitting on the bed.
Instead he saw someone much smaller, barely even taller than the pillow behind her. Her messy hair was smaller and her innocent teary eyes were bigger. The huge bed looked like an entire pool of softness around her. Luci didn’t see Dagmar, only sweet, innocent little girl.
“I don’t really see it.” Luci said, shrugging it off.
Beans face softened a bit at his response, even if a simple one.
“Thank you Luci.”