“Vinyl! Vinyl, are you awake?” Nudge, tap, nudge. The voice came like cotton floating down the river. “Oh, dear. Please tell me you are not dead, or else this is going to be uncomfortable.”

Vinyl tried to speak. She tried with all she had. “Hrrrg.” Close enough.

“Ah! Vinyl!” More tapping, more nudging.

“Hrrrg.”

“Vinyl, wake up! Hush, hush! Please?”

Vinyl opened her eyes. She immediately regretted it.

The room was mostly dark, but whatever light lingered was enough to hurt Vinyl’s eyes. Everything was musky and smelled like dust. Vinyl was laying on cold hard rock, surrounded by rubble, and feeling thunder inside her head. The ceiling was of stone, and way too low to be comfortable. There was a single window with no glass and iron bars blocking it, but the sunshine came dimmed through it. A muffled sound in the distance — screams, and fire, and the sounds of war.

“Vinyl?”

And the voice.

The voice came from Vinyl’s right, the place of soft and warm. So she turned, expecting something, and something she saw: Octavia. Face like an angel, bowtie ruffled, mane full of dust. Worry in her eyes, but a smile in her lips. The room smelled of dust, but she smelled of old wood, and strawberry tea. She was holding Vinyl.

She asked: “Vinyl? Are you okay?”

And she looked beautiful, in that moment between sleep and wake, in that dimly lit place of cold stone and low ceilings.

So Vinyl grimaced and looked to the side, then said: “Blegh.”