Chapter Text
Red strings wrap around his fingers tightly, once used to make people dance and now they cut circulation. They make his fingers numb. The strings tangle themselves around his arms, digging in and making him bleed. They wrap around his throat tightly, cutting off his air. He struggles to breathe with the strings wrapped so tightly around him. They were connected to so many people, but now it's all to a new puppeteer. Sometimes it changes, especially depending on who walks into the cell.
Today he feels the strings lift and loosen. He looks at the man standing before him. There's strings intricately tied to his fingertips, all connecting to one string and leading right to Dream, wrapped right around his throat. All others fall away at this time, the only string around him loose and a deep red. It's wrapped around his ribs. He reaches up to put a hand over his heart and grips the orange jumpsuit tightly in his palm.
"Dream...?" George's voice waivers at the sight of him.
Dream can't even imagine what he must look like, his face morphs into something different whenever he looks at himself. He can't recognize his own body if he sees a full reflection of himself. He can't stand to look in the water when he washed his face in the sink, his face isn't his own. He stares at George through his mask.
"You shouldn't be here." He mumbles, using the wall to help himself stand up. He stumbles a bit, vision unfocused. His stomach clenches painfully, and his legs threaten to give out beneath him. He leans against the wall for a moment and shuts his eyes, trying to get the floor to stop moving on its own.
"Dream... what's happened to you?" George takes a step towards him. That string tightens around his ribs, digging into barely-there flesh and bone.
"Prison's happened, George. You should leave. You shouldn't be here." Dream lifts his head, standing up straight. His spine aches with the effort, and he's already fatigued. Dream looks at George now, and those strings tighten around his ribs even more at the sight of his face, it's been too long since he's seen him. Maybe it hasn't been long enough. He hates how George manages to wrestle his way beneath his skin with just that sad little look on his face, dig into his skin and make him bleed.
George has always had that sort of effect, he supposes. Too endearing for his own fucking good. Dream wants to punch him, turn that sad expression into fear and make George hate him. He wants to cut the string that digs into his ribcage and set it on fire. He wants to feel it burn in his hand as he watches George leave just like everyone else.
"Are they even feeding you? You look... you look awful, Dream." George frowns, his eyebrows knitting together in worry and Dream wants to wipe that look off of his face for good. He feels the urge, just one good fucking punch.
"Of course I look awful, George. It's a prison. If I looked good, Sam wouldn't be doing his job properly." Dream huffs coldly. He tries to rip the string from within his skin, but the closer George gets to him the deeper it digs in, the tighter it gets around his ribs. It digs into the little bit of muscle that's still there, cutting right through it slowly. "Stay away from me."
"Dream, come here," George reaches for him, but Dream smacks his hands away. George recoils, and the strings loosen, until-
"Dream?"
No. No don't you dare fucking look at me like that. He wants to scream. Stop looking at me like that. I'm trying to protect you, stop fucking giving me that look. Be grateful!
The words sit heavy on his tongue as he stares at the hurt look on George's face. The waiver in his voice had been enough for the strings to rip through the muscle, and start to get tangled in his ribcage. George is pulling the string tight around the bones, bending them so much it hurts . The string around his neck stays firm but not suffocating. It's the only thing not actively trying to kill him from the inside.
"Dream, you're bleeding," George's voice has never sounded so small. "You've never bled before."
"What are you talking about, George? I've bled many times." Dream raises an eyebrow, looking down at the blooming red spot on his jumpsuit. He's torn something open on his arm, he can feel it. The way the wound sends shocks of pain up and down his arm, all the way to his fingertips. Luckily he knows it's just a flesh wound. Something he did a few days ago, dug into his skin with his nails and clawed until he felt something.
"No, no you haven't. Not here. Not like this. You... you aren't acting the same. You're not letting me help you this time, what's changed? Why am I here again?" George runs his fingers through his hair a bit. He takes a deep breath, and Dream stands in place, dumbfounded.
Wet warmth drips down his arm, soaking into more bandages that were begrudgingly put on a few days ago because Sam doesn't want his wounds getting infected. If he gets sick and dies, then... well, it's just not good for Sam, now is it?
"What are you talking about, George?" Dream asks. The string pulls him closer, just a step. He stumbles a bit. He should step back, he should make George leave, yell, scream, hurt him-
"Am I dreaming again?" It's quiet, barely above a whisper.
"Dreaming? George, you're being dumb. Of course this isn't a fucking dream." Dream snorts meanly. How idiotic. A dream? Why would this be a dream?
"Because that's all I ever do these days. I just dream of you. You're... you look a little different than you look right now."
"And what do I look like right now, George?"
George is silent for a moment, Dream knows the way his eyebrows raise ever so slightly while he thinks of how to properly phrase something. That string bends his ribs more, it hurts to breathe.
"You look more real. Too real to be... to be real, I guess." George frowns, and the string pulls at Dream's ribs. It beckons him closer, only a few steps between he and George now.
"What does the other me look like?" Dream humors him, feeding into this little fantasy George has of him not even being real. He could show George just how real he is at any moment. He could wrap his hands around George's throat and squeeze the life out of him just to show him how real he is. Wait. Would he... would he really kill George like that?
Why did I think of that? Dream clenches his fists tightly, nails digging into his palms as he tries to focus on George.
"The other you... he has this mask... it's stupid," he laughs a little, Dream hates how almost fond it sound, "it's an X over a sideways D. He sometimes has these really big black wings, three pairs of them. He has freckles like you. He sounds a lot like you, more echo-y. He's dressed in white robes, with a golden sort of halo over his head, two actually. They form like, another X over the X of the mask..."
Dream raises an eyebrow, trying not to laugh. George sounds absolutely fucking absurd.
"... he has a green cloak, and that's... that's it."
"How could you possibly think that's me?" Dream laughs.
"Because his voice is the closest thing to yours I've heard since my first dream here."
Oh.
The strings pull Dream's ribs until they feel like they're about to snap. "George-"
"Do you have any idea what it's like? Wandering around to the stupid entrance of the prison to try and see you? To... to finally ending up coming here?"
Stop. No- Dream's ribs start to crack, the string around his throat gets a bit tighter.
"I don't even know if this is real. You're probably not even real-" George reaches up to pull at his hair, a nervous habit of his.
"You let me be here! You didn't help me during the final disc war!" Dream didn't want him to help.
"I wasn't even there!!! I don't remember being there!" George snaps, and yells and Dream feels his bones start to break.
"You left me!"
"You're not even real!" George yells, and shoves Dream. Their meeting goes downhill from there, George throws himself at Dream, and the two tumble to the floor of the cell.
When had George gotten so strong? Or... had Dream just gotten weak?
George is frantic, reaching for Dream's mask while Dream tries to push him off. He rolls them over, putting a hand on George's face and shoving so the back of his head hits the floor roughly.
Dream's ribs crack when he hears the sound of George's head hitting the floor, the way he cries out in pain. He feels the wound on his arm burn, and he just stares down at George.
The string is tight around his neck, cutting off circulation. He's already lightheaded from it all, disoriented.
His ribs hurt. George knees him in the back, and then Dream's back is against the floor, the mask is ripped from his face before he can react. His brain is slow, it's getting harder to breathe, harder to stay awake as exhaustion tugs at the corners of his body and mind.
The string breaks past Dream's ribs, wrapping tightly around his heart and squeezing as tears land on his face.
"Oh my god..."
"You're an idiot, George." Dream starts to sit up, George backing away and helping him up. He's too dizzy to stand, so he chooses to remain on the floor. That string tightens around his heart, his throat. It's almost suffocating to him.
"You... you're... you're real. Oh my god," George reaches out again, touching Dream's face. Dream doesn't have the energy to stop him, the contact smearing George'stears across his cheeks. Dream just lies on his back again, trying to stop his head from spinning.
"I missed you," George starts, "oh, God, Dream I-"
"Stop, George." Dream sighs, his heart hurting from how tightly that string wraps around it. It sews itself in through the ventricles, even attaches itself to his aorta.
"Just... just stop."
"But, but Dream this is amazing, this is the first time I've actually seen you since-"
Get out. Why are you even staying here? Leave. Dream doesn't want him to, not fully. He wants to hug George and tell him he's sorry for yelling at him, he can see that he's hurting.
But at the end of the day, it sounds like Dream is the root cause of that hurt.
"George. Talking to me is just going to hurt us both and you know that. You didn't even know I was real until a few moments ago."
"Well that- I- Oh my god, Dream your arm!"
Dream looks down, the red spot has made it's way all the way across his forearm, and red drips from his fingertips slowly, steadily.
"Sam!!!" George yells, this was going to cut their visit a little short.
"George," Dream grasps George's arm, black tugging at the edges of mind, "don't come back for me. Do not come back here."
"I'm always going to come back for you, idiot. It's like I'm tied to you or something." George smiles.
Dream hates him. He hates that smile, that string attaching them. He wants it to burn, he shouldn't have attachments, he doesn't have attachments. Because he doesn't care about George. He should've killed him when he had the chance, the energy.
He doesn't need anyone. Especially not George, who carries him out of the cell because he's too weak to move. Not George, who stays by his side as Sam drapes him in chains and attaches him to an infirmary bed. Not George, who visits him every day, removes his mask and touches his face and hair to make sure he's real. Not George, who always stays no matter how much Dream yells at him, tells him to leave.
He doesn't need George, who's so annoyingly sewn himself into Dream's own heart and no matter how much Dream tries to rip the string, to burn it, to destroy it, and can't.George's red string is wrapped taut around Dream's throat, and is sewn into his heart. George is like an infestation Dream can't get rid of. He doesn't need George, who's always there and rarely complains.
George should hate him. Dream has tried making George hate him. The back of his neck burns sometimes, it feels like rage and jealousy being burned into his skin. It's painful, but nothing is back there. Perhaps a torn muscle. George has checked, Sam has checked, everything seems fine but it burns.
Dream doesn't need George, who loosens the string when feels like a collar to be led around by, or perhaps to hang himself with in pursuit of something he can't have anymore. George is overwhelming in his presence, but can tell when Dream needs a break. He can see the pleading words in Dream's eyes as he has to leave the prison infirmary for the night.
Please don't go.
George smiles, reassuring and gentle, "I'll be back, Dream."
But he isn't.
George never comes back. No matter how much Dream hopes for him to, for how much his own string pulls for George, the connection remains loose.
Dream screams for him, when Sam is trying to put him back in the cell. George's archery skills are some of the best Dream's ever seen and gods what he wouldn't do to watch an arrow go through Sam's skull.
Dream cries for him, curled up on the floor of his cell. His too-quiet cell. His too-empty cell. His cell that's lacking the suffocating feeling of someone giving a damn, of someone who's too persistent to just leave.
But that's what Dream wanted, right? He wanted George to leave. He wanted that string loose and cut. He wanted it burned, even.
So why does it hurt so much?