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Surprisingly, this was not the first time Dream found himself running in a dark forest, running from crazed murderers. George and Sapnap, he had been running from nearly his whole life, and while Antfrost and Bad were new additions to the hunting group, he had been running circles around them for long enough to know their footsteps as well. The new guy though - Warden, is it? - is proving to be a challenge.
The guy seems to teleport across the woods, heavy footsteps falling silent before resuming the stomping, slow gait again.
Dream hated it when they added another hunter- especially the ones that are only for one-off hunts, "special occasions" as Sapnap once called them. A new hunter means new tricks, ones he doesn't know how to watch out for, and that's more terrifying than whatever his hunters will do to him.
Dream's escaped from the hunters' clutches before, more times than he's been captured, but that doesn't erase the fact that he has been captured before. His guys, George and Sapnap don't do too much to him, and always let him go after a few days, Ant and Bad don't seem too concerned with keeping him captured, they just hold him down until the other two find them, but new people? There's no guarantee they won 't kill Dream. It's happened before, or at least it's almost happened, a hunter got a little too knife crazy and next thing Dream knew, his intestines were on his chest, pulsing in time with his heart.
There shouldn't have been a way to survive that, but here he was, running like the incident never happened, hardly even a scar from the experience. He really doesn't want a repeat of the experience, though, so he turns so fast he almost stumbles - he catches himself though, he hasn't actually tripped in ages, he's too agile for that now- when he hears the warden stomping in his direction.
He can't believe that he misses his hunters.
But he knows what he heard - if he wasn't listening to the sounds around him he'd have been dead long ago - he knows that a dog barking and a familiar scream - the one Dream used to cause when tricking the hunters into traps - can only mean one thing.
He couldn't count on George to pull his "Dream is my prey" bit. George was probably dead.
It's sickening how much Dream hates that thought. George was his first hunter, before it turned into an only slightly deadly game, when it was genuinely a fight to survive, so he should be terrified of whatever took him down, and grateful for one less hunter to run from.
But all he feels is anger, and despair.
The barking picks up, and fear strikes through the previous statement. He stills, for only a second, to try and pinpoint the dog's location. His fear is confirmed when he hears Ant's guttural howl and a squishy tearing sound.
Holy shit the dog was closer than he thought. He bounced on his feet twice, building up momentum before darting off again.
Luck was on Dreams side, tonight, it seemed, cause just as Ant's screams die down and a howl picks up, dream find finds himself on the forest's edge, on a road with a convenient store, lights still on, even several cars in the parking lot.
Fuck yeah!
Even if he can't think of a good excuse to call someone - fair games never needed him to, he could always find a win factor, could always beat the game , he could use the store to his advantage, stealing food to help him going all night, even as a shelter for a few hours, Dream's set up quite a few traps using public locations to his advantage, and even with his allies (how could he call them his allies they want him dead ) dropping like flies, Dream has survived way too much for this to be where his story ends, his script is not over, he will wring out every last second of screen time he can, and enjoy every second of it.
He enters the store like a normal person would, not shaky hands or breath to tip anyone off that something's out there. A man with green hair behind the counter looks up from his phone, smiles, and welcomes him with a mumbled "good morning".
So at least he survived past midnight, it seemed. There's an albino girl searching through the isles, gnawing at some beef jerky. The man behind the counter doesn't seem to mind, so he makes his way to the back corner, looking for an energy drink he could stomach. It's easy to pocket it, no cameras to see him, and he grabs a granola bar to pay for up front.
After the transaction, Dream pauses.
"Do you have a bathroom here?"
The man- his name tag says Sam on it- nods and waves to the albino girl.
"Fran," he shouts, "go unlock the bathroom door for this guy!"
The girl perks up, and bounds towards the back, and Dream scrambles to follow her.
The bathroom is bigger than he expected, a set of stalls rather than just the one toilet. So the bathroom window was a good sight to see, an easy getaway.
The door shuts behind him, but before he even takes a step, Sam's voice from outside the door stops him in his tracks.
"You ever wonder why they call me the Warden?"
Whipping around, he saw a dog sitting in front of him, where the girl was just standing.
No, not a dog. A wolf.
"You don't actually have to answer that one, because not really anyone who finds out lives to tell the tale."
A pause, a silent cue for Fran to start growling at Dream, standing up, teeth bared.
"Because, Dream, once you enter my prison, my Pandora's box, you can never get out so long as I'm here to keep the prisoners in check."
Dream backed up until he hit the wall, directly under the window. A million different escape plans flashed through his mind, but each one had a fatal flaw, there wasn't enough time or space or- fuck!
"Fran?" The growling stopped at the Warden's command.
" Attack. " Fran barks in affirmation, lunging at Dream, who flinches back, falling on his ass, arms over his head, like that would delay the inevitable-
And Fran flops over him, doing her happy wiggles and licking his face. Dream can't help but laugh at her antics
" Cut! " The director's voice screeches, clearly irritated at yet another display of affection Fran showed everyone. Dream couldn't quite blame her, they've had to reshoot almost every scene with Fran in it to get the right amount of footage to edit as one shot.
Fran was a wonderful actor, but she was a service dog, first and foremost, and the dream team were wonderful actors as well. He couldn't hold it against the dog when all she wanted was to make sure he was okay and not having a panic attack like his wheezing suggested.
Sam opened the bathroom set door, calling Fran to his side. She reluctantly got off Dream after a few sniffs, nuzzling his hand before bounding to Sam's side, getting quite a few treats for her troubles.
A few moments later, with Sam and Fran leaving the set to reset her mood, the filming process was ready to begin.
"And…. action! "
" Attack ." Fran barks in affirmation, lunging at Dream, who flinches back, falling on his ass, arms over his head, like that would delay the inevitable-
But instead of the neck, Fran had gone for the stomach, which was now open and exposed and-
Fuck, that hurts !
A mangled scream escapes his throat- but the beast continues ripping through him, blood and organs everywhere on the floor, The Werewolf was barely even eating what she threw out, making a mess of everything that once kept Dream alive. This was it. The end.
Or, it was the end, until his eyes opened again. He sat up, in the middle of a forest. Instinctively, he knew he was being hunted- by both his hunters and the Warden- by Sam .
Now, he truly understands what Sam meant. This hellscape was Sam's creation- a prison to trap Dream in. He doesn't know how he hadn't figured this out before, with the deaths he's had.
In the distance, Fran howl's, already on the move.
And Dream just lies there, and lets the Warden do his job.