>>5587506For a moment you consider getting some work done, but this headache keeps bothering you.
It's not severe or anything, but it just grabs your attention somehow. Like someone poking at you, explicitly trying to be annoying.
So you decide to rest.
You want to take care of yourself, at least a little better. So that you can be around for your crew when they need you.
After taking some supposed headache medicine, you lie down in bed and cover up tightly.
There's a fan mounted to the ceiling over your bed, blowing cold air down onto you. It also provides plenty of white noise, since it's pretty loud.
You reach for the dimmer switch mounted above your headboard and turn down the lights... but... well, you don't feel like sleeping in complete darkness tonight
So the room dims down to something like twilight, and you roll over to get some sleep.
It's a little difficult.
Even with the white noise from the fan, you can't help but keep focusing on the ringing in your ears for some reason.
It's like a worm digging into your brain, or one of those damned jingles that gets stuck in your head for days at a time.
You feel a slight hum in the bed as the ship engages it's FTL drive. SHODAN must be headed back to Thekia already.
There's no-one to follow you this time, so you don't have to worry about getting ambushed.
...
.....
Something like forty minutes passes, and you can't get to sleep.
You're tired, honestly. Mentally more than physically, but you are tired. You should be able to sleep.
...You reach into your night stand and grab a bottle out of the back. Your own bootleg version of whisky, made in a fabricator.
It's already cold from sitting in your room, so you just unscrew the cap and throw it back. A few shots always helps you sleep.
After downing about a third of the bottle, you toss it back into the drawer, slam it shut and wrap yourself back up under the blankets.
As expected, the booze does help you sleep. After it starts kicking in, you feel yourself drifting off to dreamland. Slowly, steadily...
...
And then you find yourself back on your farm. Sitting on your porch, in your rocking chair... with good ol' Mutt laying beside you.
There are no corridors of metal or concrete, no lasers or asteroids or freaky aliens trying to kill you.
There's no demons or monsters or the infinite void of space trying to turn your lungs and mind inside out.
It's just your little farmhouse, a patch of nice, green grass, a tree in the front yard... and a sea of golden wheat as far as the eye can see.
You can smell the fresh, clean air of your home. The smell of plants and dirt, and a little bit of manure. It feels good.
Standing up, you walk out into the yard, stretching your arms and feeling the warmth of the sunlight on your face.
Of course, Mutt is eager to follow, wherever you go.
