Chapter Text
A hail of bullets tore through the air above Firefly’s head, missing her only by a hair’s breadth. She ducked behind some metal crates, clicked the hammer of the revolver in her grip, then leaned out and fired twice. Two assailants dropped, their weapons clattering to the floor.
Her expression stayed calm as she swung her legs over the cover with an exaggerated flourish, sauntering towards the last masked shooter. He only whimpered, gun trembling in both hands, and Firefly put a bullet through his head, the corpse vanishing into mist.
She blew the smoke from the barrel, twirling the gun in her hand before sliding it back into her belt. With the Nightmare defeated, whatever remained as the “backdrops” of this bad dream were no match for the invincible agent that she was now.
She approached the hostage, freed her from her bindings with one swift movement, and caught the damsel in distress in her arms before she could fall.
“I’ve got you, my lady.”
The girl squealed and burst into tearful gratitude. Firefly nodded along, already feeling the edges of the world dissipate around her—
—and then she woke up.
Another mission complete.
Firefly could never dream.
Well, that wasn’t entirely true—she could dream. It was just the dreams she saw were never her own. Whenever she fell asleep, her consciousness would slip away from her, dragged away by an invisible tide until she found herself in the dream world of another person.
She couldn’t remember exactly when it had started, but it was this particular ability of hers—or “talent”, on days when she felt generuos—that had eventually brought her to CODE’s attention, an organization she’d stumbled across during one of her early dream wanderings.
Confidential Organized Defensive Establishment—CODE, for short.
A defense organization assembled by multiple intelligence agencies with the purpose to combat unordinary threats. Monsters, ghosts, memetic entities, extraterrestrial lifeforms and everything in-betweeen… Their work happened in the background, quietly and secretly holding up the veil of normalcy across the globe.
And just like any top-secret organization of their particular scribe, they referred to their human resources using merely numbers—in Firefly’s case, she was the special agent, CODE Number 26.
It was her job to handle Nightmares. Despite what the name would suggest, they are far more than just bad dreams. Mysterious entities that manifest inside people’s dream worlds, taking shape and drawing power from the deepest fears of their host. Left unchecked, they don’t just stay contained in their sleep. They could seize control of the host and even manifest their unnatural powers in reality, causing real, widespread damage.
It is Firefly’s responsibility to prevent such a scenario and defeat the Nightmare dwelling inside someone’s dream before that can happen—ideally, at least. If a Nightmare does escape into reality, then she would have to go out in real life and handle that too…
(It’s only happened once, and she’s never letting it happen again.)
But anyway—
After another productive sleep, Firefly stretched herself out of bed, stifling a yawn. She grabbed her phone from the desk, the screen flashing too bright for her eyes. Reading the word “BILLS” three times caused her to sigh as she placed it back and grabbed her other phone—smaller, and angular, a phone issued by CODE.
One simple notification from the message app, and she could already guess what it read.
“Mission complete. Good work, 26.”
Right. Her Commander was a woman of few words, after all.
With that, Firefly left the warm covers of her bed and got to her feet. Daytime meant she had ample time to do her errands and maybe even relax before she had to leave and infiltrate another dream in her sleep.
One of the downsides of this job is that she had to have a strict bedtime.
And… It was definitely abnormal work, that’s for sure, but the pay was extremely good, and Firefly couldn’t complain on that front.
That night, as expected, another directive came through her CODE Phone. A simple message—just a header saying “Your next mission:”, followed by a vague imperative.
Business as usual, then.
She closed her eyes.
Sleep, for Firefly, didn't come the way it did for other people—that gradual softening of the edges, the slow surrender of the body. It was more like flicking a switch, transitioning from one state to another. One moment she was in her room, and the next she was somewhere else entirely.
Tonight, that somewhere else was someone’s dream once again.
When Firefly opened her eyes, she found herself sitting inside a moving train.
The seat beneath her was plush and seemingly well-worn, like it had been sat in a thousand times. She was in a passenger car, for sure—wood-paneled walls and rows of seats running down either side, with warm overhead lighting hanging above her. The window beside her didn’t depict sceneries typical of a train ride, but instead showed stars, streaking through the darkness of space.
A space-faring train, hm? Quite the active imagination.
As usual, even here, she could see the red concave moon of the dream world watching over her.
The girl got up, heading for the connecting door. What waited behind her was a car that was exactly identical to where she had been earlier. The same walls, the same light, the same red carpet under her feet. Again, again, and again—door after door, car after car, repeating until Firefly’s hand finally gripped a handle that felt different from the others, and pushed through.
It was bigger than the rest, with a higher ceiling and a sweet smell in the air. The first thing she noticed was a curved counter running through the middle of the room, backed by a shelf packed with bottles and glasses she couldn’t recognize. Behind the counter itself stood a tall, red-haired woman polishing a glass in her hands, and she simply looked up with a smile when Firefly took a seat in front of her.
“A customer,” she greeted. “What will it be?”
No surprise in her voice, Firefly noticed. If she’d dreamed of running a bar, then a stranger coming up to the counter would feel natural, Firefly supposed. She must be the Dreamer, then—most likely.
Firefly thought about it for a bit—since she was in a dream, might as well try something she’s been wanting to for a while.
“Vodka with martini,” she answered. “Shaken, not stirred.”
“Been watching spy movies, hm?” the woman looked her over for a moment, then turned to prepare the order. She slid the delicate, finished product across the counter, and Firefly caught it without looking, her eyes still taking in her surroundings. The bartender raised an eyebrow, faintly impressed, and went back to polishing a glass.
Firefly noted her observations in her head. The dream felt... warm, definitely didn't come from the mindscape of someone anxious, that's for sure. She would even go as far as to say lived in. This was the kind of bar that had regulars who had their own favorite drinks on the menu, and the seats around her all had dents worn into them already. The woman in front of her must have been dreaming it for a long time.
She was still working through the logic of it when someone slid onto the stool right next to her.
“Hey, Himeko," the newcomer said, before pausing. "Oh, she's new.”
“...Yes, I noticed that,” the older woman, Himeko, acknowledged.
Firefly turned. The girl beside her had long, grey locks and amber eyes that seemed to capture the bar’s lighting in them. She rested her chin on one hand, elbow on the counter, watching Firefly with an infuriatingly attractive smile.
“Hey,” she greeted.
"...Hi."
"You're not from around here, are you?"
“Mhm, depends on where here is, but I’d say no.”
Stelle fixed her eyes on Firefly, studying the girl. Whether she was curious or suspicious, Firefly couldn’t really tell. But she then relaxed her posture and offered a hand. “Stelle. Nice to meet you.”
“You can call me… 26,” Firefly t introduced herself, taking the offered handshake. Their grip lingered in each other’s hands for a second longer than necessary, before they both pulled back.
“Ooohh, mysterious,” Stelle joked. “So, what brings you to… our train?”
Firefly considered her words carefully. Stelle didn’t seem like someone hostile, but there was certainly something different about her. She acted with too much agency and her presence was far too solid to be a construct that Himeko simply dreamed up.
“I simply wandered in,” she eventually answered, a half-truth.
“People don’t just wander into here unless invited.”
“Ah, then maybe someone left the door open?” She flicked her eyes between Himeko and Stelle, trying to gauge their reactions. The latter simply opened her mouth, closed it, and turned to Himeko with a face like someone that was about to be accused for something.
Himeko finally set down the glass in her hand, sighing like this had happened before. “Stelle. You should stop bringing people here without telling me first.
"It wasn’t me, I swear," Stelle defended herself. "She just... showed up?"
"That was your excuse last time, too, with that writer girl. What happened to her, anway?"
"It just didn’t work out! And I’m being serious here!”
Himeko gave her a long look, noticing that Stelle was being genuine after all. “...Well, I suppose weirder things can happen,” she said, turning to Firefly. “I’m sorry about that. You don’t seem like bad company. Please enjoy your stay on the express.”
“It’s okay, I don’t mind,” Firefly returned the smile. “But thank you for the welcome.”
Firefly picked up her glass and took a sip. Whatever the dream had decided a vodka martini tasted like, she was willing to bet this wasn’t it—warm and sweet in a way that wasn’t possible outside a dream. She turned her attention back to Stelle, who was still watching--staring?--at her, and decided this would be the best time to gather intel.
“I’m sorry, did you say ‘our train’ earlier?”
“Oh, did I?” Stelle chuckled, glancing out at the window where stars flew past. "Well, technically it's hers, but it's also mine... and a few others we’ve brought over. It's... I guess you could say, ‘shared’?"
A shared dream? Multiple people dreaming the same thing, and conscious of it even? That was unusual—Firefly had never seen such a case.
“It’s strange, though. All the people brought here have always been someone at least I or Himeko know beforehand,” Stelle continued. “Have I met you before, Firefly? I feel like I’d remember if we have.”
“No,” Firefly shook her head. “We’ve never met.”
“Well, I guess that makes sense,” Stelle leaned her face against one hand again, batting her eyelashes and snickering. “You do look like the girl of my dreams, after all.”
“Could you please not flirt in front of me, Stelle? Bringing them here is already one thing,” Himeko sighed, to which Stelle only pouted. While the pick-up line was certainly charming, Firefly could only hone in on the discrepancies she noticed. Whose dream exactly was this?
“Come on, it wasn’t that bad, was it?” Stelle’s pout changed to another smile as she turned her attention back to Firefly. “Right? Tell me you’re at least a little charmed.”
“Well, I suppose it’s the kind of line that only works if the other person also wants it to.”
“...And?”
She took a slow sip and let the quiet stretch, returning the smile just slightly. “I wonder~”
That warm, relaxed atmosphere held on for a little while longer. Stelle and Himeko had gotten caught up in some conversation, and Firefly was content, for the moment, to let it continue. The stars kept moving outside the window—much larger in the bar car here compared to the passenger cars she went through—accompanied by the humming of the engine beneath them.
She hadn’t forgotten why she was here. She was here on a mission, of course. The dreamer was almost certainly one of these two—but there had been no immediate dangers so far, and pushing too quickly would complicate things. It would be better to get a read on the situation first.
"Sever the dream". That was the mission given to her by CODE this time. Vague and ambiguous as always, but seeing these two, Firefly had a sense of what was going on. She just hadn’t worked out the how yet.
"So, 26, mind if I ask you something?"
Firefly perked up, hearing Stelle call her name. She nodded, but before Stelle could open her mouth and voice her question...
The train suddenly lurched.
The shockwave passed through the floor, up through the stools into Firefly's feet, and then most of the lights went out, what was left leaving the room they were in only dimly lit. The stars outside the window stopped moving, their light seeping in.
Firefly was already off her feet before the other two, an arm held up as if to tell the others not to move.
"What's going on? Himeko, you aren't having a bad dream, are you?" Stelle asked, eyes darting all around.
"I... don't think so," the older woman hesitantly answered.
Something heavy hit the connecting door.
A loud bang echoed, dents forming through the connecting door where Firefly came from. Once, twice, each impact leaving a visible dent in the metal until the whole thing just folded inward and crumpled like paper, and whatever was on the other side stepped through.
Humanoid, but definitely not human. A long grey mane flowed from the back of its head like smoke. Its body was the color of deep space, a shade deeper than black. Cracks of gold branched, spread, and rejoined across its body like roots, culminating in its chest, where a glowing, golden orb was present. A star for a heart. Its face was permanently contorted in an expression of agony, eyes pulsing with the same beat as the light in chest.
Stelle took a half step back, something primal in her body telling her to flee. “W… What is that?”
“A Nightmare,” Firefly answered, stepping forward. “And what I’m here to stop. Stay back.”
Firefly flicked her wrist, and the Knight Invoker materialized in her hand—CODE equipment, built for this kind of situation. A belt-like device, its buckle white with a golden trim, and a wide, empty, round socket at the center that was clearly meant for something.
She slung the belt across her chest, its straps flying over her shoulder and hooking around her back automatically, securing it onto her like a sash.
This wasn’t all, of course. She reached into her pocket, pulling out a small, orb-shaped, capsule-like item. This one was grey in color, with a clear portion across the middle that held something akin to an armored creature rendered in pixel. Capsems—these were items with the power to “make dreams come true”. It was hard to manipulate dreams that weren’t your own, but using devices with preimbued concepts, such a feat is not difficult to achieve. This one in her hand was endowed with the power “to break”.
She inserted the Capsem into the dedicated socket on the device across her torso, before her thumb found the activation trigger mounted on the buckle itself.
[BREAK]
Firefly raised her hand, hovering above the Capsem on her chest.
[ON YOUR MARK… ON YOUR MARK… ON YOUR MARK…]
The belt’s looping announcement echoed across the car, catching the Nightmare’s curiosity. It stopped dead in its tracks, choosing to observe Firefly first.
Sometimes Firefly wondered why agents or spies like her needed such noisy, attention-catching equipment—but she supposed times like these were where it came in handy.
“Disguise.”
Her hand swept across her chest, fingers flicking the clear part of her Capsem and causing it to spin in its port as she did so.
[INVOKE KNIGHT SYSTEM:]
Condensed dream essence flowed forth from her belt, covering her body like liquid. Within less than a second they hardened, forming and solidifying into armor that replaced her silhouette. A pointed crest rose above her head, fixing into place as the “eyes” beneath glowed teal against the dark.
[BREAK]
“H-Huuuuh?” Stelle vocalized behind her, flabbergasted by the sudden turn of events. Well, Firefly wasn’t surprised that she was shocked—but she had bigger matters to worry about now.
The agent calmly took a step forward, followed suit by the Nightmare charging at her. It crossed the distance in an instant, one arm swinging wide. Firefly dropped her shoulder and let it pass over her head, then came up inside its reach and drove her elbow into its torso. The Nightmare staggered backwards, gold fracture-lines flaring at the point of impact.
It recovered fast, coming back low this time, adjusting. Firefly caught its arm at the wrist, redirected the momentum, and swung the monster hard into the bar counter. Wood cracked, bottles toppled and hit the floor. The Nightmare struggled and grabbed the counter's edge, wrenching its arm back in a wide sweep that forced Firefly to make some distance back.
Behind her, Firefly heard Stelle and Himeko moving towards the far end of the car. Good. She didn’t have to pay attention to collateral, then.
Firefly went down to one knee, pressing her palm against the floor. This was one of the stranger things about fighting inside a dream: the world could bend to your whims if you knew how. And with her Break Capsem, breaking those rules was easier than normal.
She worked her fingers under what was supposed to be a solid surface, the way she might get a grip on the corner of a rug, and pulled.
The section of floor between her and the Nightmare peeled back.
The Nightmare had already committed to a lunge and found nothing to land on. It pitched forward—and Firefly was already there, bringing her knee hard into the side of its head on the way down. The golden eye flickered. It rolled into the wall.
Unfortunately for her, it got back up. It raised one hand, and the far wall of the bar behind her suddenly came apart. It collapsed—no, dissolved, the wood and glass and metal separating into nothing until the cold darkness of space poured in. The stars outside looked closer now—
…Wait, no, they were closer! What looked like one dot in the sky suddenly surged towards Firefly, aiming for her like a stray bullet, followed by even more stars breaking loose from where they were perched.
Firefly threw herself sideways, rolling along the floor as she narrowly dodged the projectiles that formed constellations of bullet holes on the wall behind her.
Crouching on the ground, she hurriedly took the Break Capsem off its port and slotted in its replacement—an orange one this time, pressing the activation trigger afterwards.
[BLAZE]
[ON YOUR MARK…]
One more flick.
[INVOKE KNIGHT SYSTEM: BLAZE]
The armor encasing her body shifted, tthe Knight form's turning orange and red in the place of grey, the temperature around her climbing fast enough that the air around her shimmered.
If Break was her jack-of-all-trades toolbox, then Blaze was her raw firepower—and Firefly felt she needed to end the fight quick.
She got up and went straight at the Nightmare, hitting it low and driving her molten fist into its body, letting the heat do the work. The Nightmare writhed, gold lines pulsing in quick agitated bursts. She got both her hands on it and pushed, punches burning, and for a moment she almost had it—
She realized, a second too late, that she was standing directly in front of its chest. The Nightmare’s star of a beating heart glowed, and from it, a massive golden beam erupted that struck Firefly directly. There was no heat emanating from it—instead, only an inevitable and unavoidable force that sent Firefly flying all the way back to the other side of the car.
She hit the far wall hard enough to crack it and came down in a heap, her transformation’s heat fading, struggling to restabilize. She pressed her palm to the floor and started to rise.
Across the ruined bar car, the Nightmare’s attention turned toward something else.
Stelle was already moving, putting herself between the Nightmare and Himeko with her arms out. The Nightmare raised one hand, and the section of floor between Stelle and Himeko came apart in a precise surgical line, separating them cleanly across a gap that hadn't been there a second ago.
Stelle stumbled back, and Himeko stumbled forward, now on the wrong side of the gap and all alone.
"Himeko—!"
Stelle cried out, and Firefly got on her feet. She spun her Capsem one more time, hoping for even a slight increase in her suit’s physical performance, but even as she measured the distance she knew she wasn’t going to make it.
The Nightmare reached Himeko and placed a hand on her shoulder. A strange door appeared behind her—one that looked unnatural, as if it was forced here from another dream. The fracture-like lines spread from the Nightmare's body across Himeko's skin in branching gold, and Himeko made one small quiet sound before the light in her eyes went out.
Then the door opened.
Firefly didn’t even have time to ponder what she had failed to prevent. The next thing she knew, everything crashed around her, some otherworldly force expelling her out of the dreamscape...
....and back into the cold, hard floor of reality.
In a room somewhere far away—one even Firefly had no knowledge of—a woman dressed in a sharp black suit stood at her desk, a holographic screen projecting footage from Firefly’s latest infiltration. Beside her, a younger woman with silver hair in twin braids adjusted her glasses as the recording ran.
“I see now,” the older one amongst them only nodded, pausing on a single frame where both Stelle and Himeko were visible, and zoomed in on one of them. “It appears we have found the key we need to complete Code:Terminus. As long as CODE has that ability under our control…”
She turned to the agent next to her.
“21, issue 26 her next orders in my place.”
“Yes, Lady Titania. What would you have me tell her?”
Your next mission:
Take the Dreamer alive.