Dream Theory - Commentary - Ch. 9-10 (Patreon)

Welcome to our nearly-halfway point of Dream Theory!  ‘Nearly-halfway’ because Chapter 11 is officially the halfway point, but who knows if I’ll remember to mention that next time.  Plus, as they say, no time like the present!

Which is probably what Blake thought when she finally makes it back to Vale in Chapter 9.  There’s another saying for that...better late than never?  Well, in this case, being late means Yang isn’t there for that sweet welcome home kiss and love-fest she was hoping for.

But she’s back in Vale!  That’s a step in the right direction, right?  Of course, now we have no idea where Yang is.  Maybe Yang isn’t even in Vale anymore (that would suck, wouldn’t it?).  

Blake goes to her and Yang’s apartment to search for clues the old-fashioned way, but she makes a couple of references (in this chapter and the next) that there’s another way for her to find Yang - through the Dreamscape.  This goes back to what they’ve mentioned about how fragments of thoughts, feelings, and subconscious can slip into dreams.  What she’s talking about is going into the Dreamscape, finding Yang, then hoping Yang drops enough clues for her to figure out a location.  If not a location, then an identity, or multiple identities.

That’s some sci-fi investigation skill!  But she also expresses a great deal of hesitation in following that course of action, which she doesn’t explain to us now but...we’ll learn why later on.  In Chapter 10 though, she mentions that she doesn’t know if that’s a dream she’ll wake up from - which takes us back to the hints she’s given about how the Dreamscape can be dangerous.

At the beginning of Chapter 9, she’s caught in this place where she knows a way to find Yang, but is scared to use it - but is also scared of what might happen to Yang the longer she’s missing.  From Yang’s reaction in the previous dream, it’s probably fairly obvious what’s happening, but Blake makes it a little clearer in these chapters - Yang’s living in dreams, basically.  Dream manipulation while someone tries to figure out what she knows.  With how fragile our minds can be, this is obviously a very precarious and dangerous situation.

Which is why Blake’s in a hurry.  But she’s also cautious and tries not to rush straight into something when she could get hurt (even though that’s what she wants to do).  I think this hesitancy has grown over the time she’s been away, and a bit of paranoia has developed.  Which is why, at the beginning of the chapter, she’s sitting in the park across the street versus rushing right into the apartment to begin her search.

Her hesitancy presented the opportunity to bring the police back into the story - the ones that show up at Yang’s apartment and convince Blake to wait outside for longer.  Their appearance served a couple of weird, probably unimportant purposes.  

One, I delayed Blake entering the apartment to extend the chapter and give her more time to reflect on what was happening.  Two, I realized that there could easily be bad guys just chilling in Yang’s apartment, and Blake would rush in there all on her lonesome with nothing but a taser.  Bad news!  Three, I wanted to show that other people care about Yang and are looking for her.  Also, that the department already knows she’s missing, which means someone already reported her missing.

We learn later on that that person was probably Ruby.  Probably?  Most likely.  Most definitely Ruby.

One thing I thought about after the fact - that Blake mentions here - is that she wants to believe it’s just a prank.  That Yang’s not really missing but decided to go to extreme measures to draw Blake home.  Blake would be pissed.  That’s like playing a joke with life or death consequences.  More like, life or kidnap consequences.  But that would definitely be the preferred answer (unless it resulted in their deaths, in which case...maybe not).

I’d like to point out something seemingly inconsequential that also has a weird importance to the story.  I’m referring to, of course, Yang versus Ruby’s preference in living locations.  As Yang mentioned before, she likes to live on a floor where leaving through the window is a survivable option.  But there’s another method to her madness, which Blake brings up in Chapter 9:

For some reason, Yang always insisted upon using the stairs instead of the elevator.

Later in the chapter, we learn why Ruby chooses the top-most floor even though Yang considers it ill-advised:

“That’s why you live on the top floor - people won’t take the stairs.  Instead, they get into the electronic deathbox.”

I have to admit that they both make good points, and I’m not sure who I would side with.  In Yang’s case, you have a way to escape if, say, a group of intruders sets your apartment on fire - out the window.  In Ruby’s case, you just stop anyone from coming up to your floor, but have more difficulty getting out if the stairs and elevator are blocked.

I guess the solution for Ruby is to move to a building with more than one staircase, but also install a zipline from one of the windows to a nearby rooftop.  Then from that building, install easily placeable bridges to the next rooftops (in case someone’s chasing, of course).  And then from those buildings, a myriad of locations where you could rappel down to the street and make a speedy getaway.  Maybe store a car right at the bottom of those rappel lines - an old, broken-down looking car that actually transforms into something like the batmobile.

Back on track...and back to Yang’s apartment, where Blake points out their less-than super high tech security features.  Obviously, one would wonder why they don’t have the latest and greatest gear when Ruby is Yang’s sister, and that’s a good question!  I don’t think I explicitly answered it in the story, but I think it’s due to complacency.  

That’s right - complacency.  Because their security is already more advanced than all of their neighbors, they must live in what’s considered a ‘safe’ part of town.  If all of your neighbors had guard dogs, but you had guard dogs and a moat filled with alligators, wouldn’t you feel pretty secure?  You probably would!  Even if laser-shooting robots were a security feature you could add.

Well, I think the same would apply here.  They already have way more than their neighbors, plus...Yang’s a cop.  She can take care of herself (or so she thought).

What makes the apartment less secure, however, is that Yang hadn’t changed the passcode in over a year.  But Yang keeping the passcode the same served an important purpose - mainly, pulling at our heartstrings.

Actually, not.  That was a nice side effect, but the real reason was because I needed to get Blake into the apartment somehow.  Can you imagine what would’ve happened if she showed up and Yang had changed the passcode?  Then what would she do...stand in the hall and wait?  (I’m imagining her sighing and resting her forehead on the door, in disbelief that she can’t even get into her own apartment.)

If Blake couldn’t get into the apartment, she couldn’t get the hidden camera, and she couldn’t see Yang kept everything as it was, and she couldn’t grab Yang’s mechanical arm from the nightstand.

When I think about Yang living there alone, in an apartment she still essentially ‘shares’ with another person, I get pretty sad.  She’s stuck in the past.  She can’t move on.  How can she move on when all of Blake’s stuff takes up half of the room?  She’s basically cursed herself to living in the past while the rest of the world moves forward without her.

That’s how she finds herself in such disheartening situations at work, where everyone expects her to be better now.  But how can she get better when she goes home and steeps herself in the person she lost?

Tangent on sadness, sorry! 

So Blake goes through the apartment, grabs the hidden camera, grabs Yang’s arm, and sets out to find someone she knows can help her find Yang.

Oh, I wanted to point out a small section of the apartment scene that I removed because, ultimately, it didn’t fit into the whole ‘future’ theme.  I think you might immediately see why:

She was on her way out when something on the floor caught her eye.  As soon as she knelt down for a closer view, she knew what they were - blood drops.

There weren’t many, thankfully, but a trail of red droplets started at the floor near the foot of the bed and headed towards the door of the apartment.  Blake wasn’t experienced in determining how much blood was too much, but it didn’t look like it came from a serious wound - more like a small cut or bloody nose, maybe. 

It wasn’t until my last read-through that I realized...what the heck...the police are looking for Yang, and there are freaking blood drops on the floor?  Did the police not see those?  Did they not take a sample to compare against suspects?  Even if the people wore masks, they probably can’t mask their blood, right?

That should make it way too easy for the police to find or at least confirm a suspect, so I took it out.  No blood drops, which were really only added as a way to drum up worry for Yang.  We’re already worried though, right??

Sometimes, stuff like this slips through.  I mentioned it last time with the library filled with physical books, and now leaving a trail of blood drops behind.  I guess that’s why proofreading and editing are so important - you need to get into your AU’s mindset and make sure everything fits in that world.  If it doesn’t fit, you need to explain why it does.  (Of course, people will still find ways to pull it apart, but that’s true of any story.)

Moving on, and more sadness coming through - this time for Blake.

She hadn’t spoken to Ruby since the day before the explosion, at a dinner the three of them had shared.  Through Yang, she knew that Ruby was doing well, but...she wished different circumstances were bringing them together again. 

I guess this isn’t super descriptive of what Ruby and Blake’s relationship was before everything happened.  Knowing how close Yang and Ruby are, however, we can probably extrapolate that Blake spent time with the two of them often.  Very often.  In fact, I’d say Blake probably considered Ruby to be one of her close friends.

So not only did Blake lose her life with Yang after the explosion, but she lost her friendship with Ruby.  Because her only ability to communicate is through the Dreamscape, and she spends all of that time with Yang, she hasn’t even spoken to Ruby this entire time.  She only hears about Ruby through Yang, and Ruby only hears about Blake through Yang and watching Yang’s dream sequences.

Blake has some major patching things up to do.  Both relationship-wise and life-wise, it seems.

Oh!  I wanted to point out Blake’s reference to the neighborhood Ruby lives in, where she feels free to wear the holomask due to the number of ‘tech junkies’ around.  My thought here was that there would be people who embrace technology to such a high degree, they’re decked out in the newest gear 24/7.  This wouldn’t necessarily be Ruby, however.  Ruby’s very skilled with technology, obviously, but she’s not sporting all these crazy tech bracelets and wearing hover shoes or stuff like that.

Tech junkies are probably pro-forever dreaming, too.  They’d willingly live the rest of their lives in the dream, because nothing gets more techy than that.  Plus, in the dream, they could have technology that doesn’t even exist yet!  Think The Jetsons on crack.  That’d be pretty cool, yeah?

But that doesn’t diminish how cool Ruby is.  I really enjoy her character in this story, as I think she’s appropriately badass while also mature and personable.  I especially loved, however, her short interaction with the young girl whose apartment they essentially broke into.  That girl was going to scream, and that would’ve been a bad thing.  Ruby, however, keeps a cool head and comes up with a way to put the girl at ease.  

Also, I think if Weiss had seen that interaction - and how great Ruby is with kids - she would’ve been swooning while thinking about their future.

The person who didn’t keep such a cool head was Blake.  She’s actually lucky Ruby was around, as seen here:

The instant she heard the door handle turn, her adrenaline started pumping and she nearly bolted - she would have bolted if Ruby hadn’t grabbed her arm and held on tight.  

I thought this small moment was really appropo and reinforced Blake’s character through this story - she has a strong flight reflex.  Her instinct is to run - which is why she left Vale and why she pretended to have died in the bombing.

She wants to run, and she’s learned not to trust anyone.  That’s where her paranoia comes in, as she’s certain anyone can be turned against them.  This is also why she’s not keen on trusting someone she just met (aka, Weiss).

One thing I found interesting about this story is that Weiss and Blake haven’t met prior to Chapter 10.  Instead, they’ve only heard stories about one another through their partners.

Blake heard Yang tell ‘horror stories’ about Weiss as an attorney, but only recently heard about Weiss and Ruby’s relationship.  Her thoughts on that are this: 

It seemed a little too coincidental that someone so confrontational would suddenly pursue someone so close to Yang.

Basically, she thinks Weiss is working with the bad guys and only started dating Ruby to get closer to Yang.  (Can we even say, at this point, that that’s not true?)

On Weiss’ side, she only knows Blake as Yang’s girlfriend who ‘died’ but is actually alive and refuses to come home.  She sees how that affects Yang, and she’s clearly upset about everything Blake’s done or hasn’t done.

I drew some similarities here between Weiss and Yang from WDU, although their circumstances are quite different.  Yang in WDU knew Weiss before she ran.  They were already best friends, so Weiss leaving hurt Yang in a way it didn’t hurt Ruby.  Also, since Yang is protective of Ruby, she’s pretty harsh to Weiss while trying to keep Ruby safe.

In Dream Theory, however, Weiss has no connection to Blake.  Her allegiance is only to Yang, and only to making sure Ruby and Yang are ok.  Because she lacks that prior to connection to Blake, she can be harsh and biting in a way Yang couldn’t quite manage in WDU.  Weiss is actually free to dislike or hate Blake here, which Yang couldn’t do.

And Weiss sure shows that dislike, doesn’t she?  She must’ve saved up all her sarcastic comments from the day only to lay them out on Blake in a few minutes.  

I actually really love this protective version of Weiss - she’s biting and a little snide but you can just tell how much Yang means to her.  Like with this comment:

“She wasn’t herself,” Blake answered in lieu of going into detail.  “She acted like...like she was being manipulated in some way - through her dreams.”

“Isn’t that what you’ve been doing this entire time?” 

Ouch.  Here, Weiss is basically saying that Blake seeing Yang every night but not coming home was a form of manipulation.  That brings us back to Yang not being able to move on, so Weiss is a little right (although Yang also wanted to see Blake too).

She also throws down this burn: 

“We want to find her just as much, if not more, than you do.”

And Blake obviously loves when people downplay her love for Yang.

What’s funny is that Blake and Weiss have an unexpected similarity in that they both read ‘old-fashioned’ books, so we might assume they’re both kind of ‘old-fashioned’ people.

She thought she was one of the few left who indulged in a physical novel, but did Weiss do the same?  Or were those only decoration?

Then there’s Ruby and Weiss, who are cute even when Weiss is being prickly.  Did you notice how Ruby got into Weiss’ house at the end of Chapter 9?

Ruby set her palm on the scanner beside the door and heard it unlock.

Ruby can come and go as she wants, which I would liken to giving someone a key to your house.  That’s pretty far into a relationship when that happens, right?

There’s also Ruby’s influence on Weiss’ home, which Blake describes as ‘exuding warmth and liveliness - from the plush carpets rolled out over wood floors to the coat rack with several colorful jackets hanging on it.’

Blake doesn’t make the connection, but those jackets were definitely Ruby’s.  And it was probably her idea to roll out carpets (Weiss’ feet get cold, you see…).  Weiss’ house probably used to be as cold and pretentious as Blake expected, but not anymore.  All due to Ruby’s influence, of course.

Also, how adorable is Weiss for recreating Ruby’s office in hopes that Ruby would stay over more often?  Weiss doesn’t come right out and say that she wants Ruby to stay over more - which she could have.  Instead, she buys all this fancy computer gear and sets it up so Ruby has a workstation away from home.  (Clearly, she’s still not completely forthcoming with her emotions.)  She even buys Ruby a new tech glove which might *cough cough* look exactly like Thorn from WDU.  What a coincidence!

Ok, on to the bigger story at hand and what we learned over the last two chapters.  Obviously, a group of people came for Ruby after taking Yang, but decide to just set Ruby’s apartment on fire when they can’t get to her.  When she wonders why they did that, Blake has this to say:

“They’ll tell Yang you’re dead anyway.”

“Why?”

“To break her.”

Obviously, Yang seeing her sister’s apartment in flames while being told that she died would be...crushing.  

I loved, however, how much Ruby cared for the rest of the people in her building, and worked so hard to get them all out before anything bad happened.  I think that’s where her ‘protector of the people’ side really kicked in.  And, when they get to Weiss’ house, one of the first things she wants to know is if everyone got out ok.  (They are, don’t worry!)

Weiss then puts Blake’s feet to the fire, so to speak, and tries to get an explanation for what’s going on.  While Blake does provide some information, we should be immediately wary of what she says when she thinks this: 

But she would only give them the tip of the iceberg - nothing more than necessary.  

She follows that up later with this: 

That wasn’t precisely what Blake said, but she nodded anyway.

So basically...we should take what she says with a grain of salt, because she’s still hiding something.  The information she gives us, however, is something like this - 

Either way, they had her close at hand to witness the unwanted beginning of her creation.

Unwanted beginning of her creation...again, implicating her in whatever’s going on, while also pointing out that it’s not at all what she wants to happen.  She also brings up Detective Saffold - the detective Yang told about the lead on the bombing - which leads to some illumination from Weiss:

“Detective Saffold is a snake - she tries to sell out the department every chance she gets.”

Well that’s not a great person to give such sensitive information to, is it?  Obviously, if Saffold tries to sell out the department, that suggests she gives confidential information to others in exchange for money or favors.  So...who knows what she did with the info Yang gave her.

Then we get Blake’s quasi-explanation for what’s wrong with Daydreamer, and what happened at her work.  There’s an exploit - a flaw in the new system - but I think we already assumed as much.  Blake doesn’t go into the details of that flaw, however, so we’re none the wiser there.  Then, she says she brought it up, was told it would be fixed, then the head of the company - Taven Bishop - sends her on a trip (to swim with the fishes…).

From Weiss’ explanation of Taven in this chapter, we can assume he’s not the type to be messed with.  He’s wealthy, powerful, and influential - and Weiss is currently representing his son on a case.  Talk about a conflict of interest...Weiss now believes Taven had something to do with Yang’s disappearance while also tasked with getting some charges against his son dropped (more on that later).

Somehow, Weiss got dragged into this whole mess with the rest of them!  And I can’t wait for you to see how they get themselves out of it.

If next week’s our halfway point, we’ll be done with this story before you know it!  Oh, and before we wrap up, I wanted to mention that if I ever don’t talk about something you had a question on, feel free to send me a message and I’ll either answer there or add it to the next commentary.  I try to catch as much as possible, but I obviously have biases as the one who wrote it.  I understand my words perfectly, but that doesn’t mean everyone else does!

Anyway, more gay things to come.  Thank you, as always, for your support!

Until next time,

Miko