Work Text:
George doesn't go to sleep. He merely wakes up.
Despite the ever-present exhaustion that hangs over him like a cloud, there’s never a moment in which he finds himself drifting off. There is only the murky ascension from unconsciousness, or sometimes the breath-catching abruptness of being startled back into the world of the living. He's long since lost track of where he is in the cycle of wakefulness and dreams - though these days, he wonders if there's even a distinction to be made. It's all blurred into a miasma of hazy uncertainty, and he finds it difficult to care either way.
Dreaming, waking. What's the difference anymore? Threads of commonality weave through either state, making it pointless - if not outright impossible - to tell which is which. And it's not as though knowing would change anything. Waking, dreaming. They're one and the same as George meanders aimlessly across the server.
He just wishes he wasn't so tired. He can't remember the last time he felt truly awake.
Maybe it's the god who's responsible. Seems like something only a god could do - trapping you in some sort of hellish purgatory in which you never sleep but you're never truly awake either. And it wouldn't be the first time DreamXD had sent someone to hell for Their own amusement.
George knows he could ask XD. He's just not sure if the several heated minutes of indignant rage from the god would be worth the eventual mollification (usually achieved through reminders of a promised lifelong friendship) and subsequent answer - if XD was feeling obsequious. And even if XD admitted to being guilty, what then? Tell Them to stop? They're a god. George doesn't think he has that much sway over XD, mild sense of favouritism aside.
So he doesn't ask. It doesn't matter anyway. He supposes it's convenient, in a way, not having to sleep. He could get more done… if there was anything to do.
It's been quiet around Kinoko. Figures flit through now and then, but it's hard to say whether they're real or merely players in the dreamscape, so George rarely bothers to engage. Sometimes they pull him into their errands, their conversations, their petty drama, and George plays his part with a sense of disaffected duty. He's not terribly invested either way. There are no stakes, nothing to compel him to care.
Only one thing nags at him - not quite an obligation, but something that would be polite of him to do. But is polite the right word? What does one call the indistinct sense of duty that compels a person to check in on former friends, regardless of how bitterly things might have shaken out in the past?
Sometimes George stares at the distant obsidian monolith that is Pandora's Vault and wonders why he hasn't yet gone to visit. Neither while dreaming nor awake has he set foot inside its doors, and if asked for an explanation, he doesn't think he would be able to give one. At his core, tucked away deep behind the overgrowth of apathy, there might be something resembling fear of what awaits inside.
But George isn’t afraid of Dream. He’s merely afraid of what he might feel upon seeing him.
But surely it can't be anything worse than this interminable boredom.
Maybe it's finally time.
George knows he might lose his conviction if he puts it off any longer, so he sucks in a breath and utters the words as a brusque statement of fact: "I think I want to visit the prison."
Focused on the ground and carefully picking out his footing as he manoeuvers past a shattered portion of the Prime Path, he doesn't have to look around to know that XD is bristling at the words. He can practically feel the displeasure emanating from the god like static electricity - though there's nothing to worry about. XD's rage is unpleasant, and it's never fun to bring up subjects that are guaranteed to set Them off, but George knows he's not in actual danger.
"Why?" The voice hasn't dropped to the guttural bellow XD favours when They're furious, but there's a rumble that promises imminent anger.
"Dunno," George replies. When he finally glances back, he isn't surprised to see that XD is looming directly over his shoulder now. He meets Their eye - where eyes might be on a normal person, anyway - and ignores the simmering aura of hostility. "I haven't yet. Maybe I should."
"I don't see why that would be necessary, " XD growls. " There's nothing to see there."
"There's nothing to see out here either." Still taking care to watch his step, George moves closer to the enormous pit. The crater. Whatever it is. There's an outcropping of dirt near the precipice, and he takes a seat, mindful that one wrong move could send him tumbling into the void.
XD would probably save him regardless, no matter how annoyed They are. They're too possessive to lose George to something as benign as a hole in the ground. Few things, living or terrain, threaten George these days.
So he stares into the pit, at the new landscaping - though is it even new any more? George can't remember when it changed. All he knows is that it went from being a shredded gouge in the land to a lush ravine, almost as if the land has always been cleaved in two. Newcomers wouldn't know that a country once stood where the ground is now blown open to bedrock. The only signifier of the remnant history is the flag that hangs limply from a post embedded at the very bottom. The wind doesn't reach the depths of the ravine, and the bold colours of the material lie folded and hidden in shadow.
George swears he's seen the flag flying before. Maybe they tried to pin it up to simulate the appearance of wind rippling through the material. Or maybe he dreamt that, and the current sorry state of the flag is reality. Or maybe this is the dream.
It doesn't matter. As with almost everything, he doesn't care.
XD is still lurking behind him, silent and fuming. George knows Them well enough to be able to tell when the silence is loaded, but he presses on regardless.
"So can you help me?" he asks.
"What?" Incredulous and haughty in a manner not unlike Dream himself. George tries not to think about it.
"There's no way Sam would let me in to see him," he goes on. "So can you help me?"
George hasn't spoken to the warden directly, but he doesn't have to in order to be certain that Sam would refuse his visitation point blank. Especially after what happened with Technoblade. Anyone who isn't vocally in opposition to Dream would be a liability in Sam's eyes. George doesn't know it for sure, but he knows. And he's not terribly interested in the bureaucratic rigmarole of arguing with the warden over nothing.
"They're saying your friend escaped with the anarchist ," XD retorts. The word friend is laced with unhidden asperity. " The prison is empty."
"He didn't, though." Another thing George shouldn't know but does. He's dreamt of Dream's escape before, though he knew even then it couldn't be real. A rare moment of lucidity, simply because Dream had appeared radiant and whole as he scooped George up into a crushing hug. That wasn't the man who had been locked up, and it wouldn't be the man leaving the prison.
The recent escape was no more real than the one from his dreamscape. And XD knows it as well. Why They'd lie, George isn't certain - though he has suspicions, all of which pertain to the god’s unsubtle possessiveness.
The god flits about moodily, never straying far from George but unable to keep still - more traits that are uncomfortably reminiscent of Dream. George is forced to wonder again what connects the two, given XD has only provided the barest of hints and seems generally dismissive of Their human facsimile. I’m part of him - which doesn't explain anything at all. They've refused to give more detail, and George isn't certain if he really wants to know anyway, if only for what it might imply about Dream himself.
Some questions are better left unanswered.
"Why should I help?" XD says, sounding petulant now.
"You're a god," George replies. He nudges a small rock with his foot, pushing it over the edge and watching it tumble down the cliffside until he can no longer make it out. "I assume you can get into the prison."
XD falls into another brooding silence as George continues to find stones to toss into the ravine. Restless behaviours for a bored existence. At least visiting Dream would be interesting.
George still doesn't know what to expect, after all. It's been almost a year since they've spoken. And it wasn't as though the last conversation ended on a particularly friendly note.
He draws his cloak over his shoulders, wrapping it tight around his chest as though it will shield him from the sudden trickle of unwanted memories. The dethronement hadn't been a dream. That much was a stark, unpleasant fact. His final accusatory words were real - if not in sentiment, then certainly in utterance, which was all that really mattered.
Not that he even believed them at the time. It was just something hurtful to say, something to cut his friend down with a single blow. Selfishly, George doesn't think Dream is capable of hating him. At the very least, he wasn't back then.
Solitary confinement with no visitation for months could have changed things. And George knows he can't very well blame Dream for that, no matter what blood is on his hands.
On the surface, Dream did it for the server, sure.
But George knows Dream did it for him.
Closing his eyes, George allows the recollections to permeate his mind rather than shut them out, as he normally might. Where others have permitted bitterness and distrust to foster, there is still only an ill-defined gap in George's chest where Dream once resided. Disillusionment has clouded his ability to rage and storm against Dream's actions; unlike the others, he just can't find it within himself to care. Not in the right way, anyway.
Maybe it's wrong of him, but there's no metric by which he can gauge that for himself. He doesn't really know where to draw the line for morality anymore. It's difficult when there's nothing concrete about his existence to give any of it any weight.
Not for the first time, he wonders if there's any merit to keeping Dream in prison.
George asks the question before he can stop himself. "Could you let him out?"
"Who?"
"Dream. Could you break him out of the prison?"
If the god's earlier silence was tense, it's now razor sharp and barbed. George keeps his eyes shut even as he feels the hairs on his arms stand up and hears the loose pebbles on the ground rattling from some form of unseen energy. The air is thick and smells of ozone, as though lightning is about to strike at any minute.
George realises that it’s not unlikely.
The god's next words are ragged and venomous and hissed directly into George's ear. "Why would you ask me to do that?"
"Dunno," George says, more blithe than he feels. "Why not?"
Sure enough, he hears a rumble of thunder next. This might be the angriest DreamXD has ever been. For the first time in a while, George feels an inkling of mortal concern.
"Why not? Why not? " XD's voice is almost incoherent in its distorted rage. " He's in there for a reason. You would really wish his freedom upon the server? His tyranny? You would risk the lives of your friends to let one man out of prison?"
George finally opens his eyes to see XD floating in front of him, robes whipping about and billowing in an unfelt gust of wind. The god's face - or the irreconcilable void of shadow beneath the hood of Their cloak - is inches from George's, so close that George might have been able to feel Their breaths if They needed to breathe.
XD's fury is palpable, but Their reasoning falls flat. The god doesn't care about cruelty on the server - not when George has seen Them sow it firsthand. He can't bring himself to believe that XD would have any moral basis to refuse the request... which leaves him with his earlier suspicions about XD's motives for keeping George away from the prison.
That is to say, jealousy.
It's a trait that both the god and the man with Their namesake share, though while Dream was always simply preferential and protective, XD is violently defensive. George is merely surprised when the hostile behaviour extends to Dream as well, especially to the point where XD wouldn't enable a prison break in spite of the chaos it would inevitably cause. He thought it might be fun for the god, but he hadn't factored in this potential consideration.
"You don't care about that," George says. No point in hiding the truth.
"Maybe you should," XD retorts, which is as much confirmation as George needs.
He knows he won't be able to sway the god, not when They're this enraged. But this does provide an easy venue for compromise.
Sighing as though he's about to make a generous concession, George gestures vaguely in the direction of the prison. "Fine, you're right. But visiting him isn't really a problem, is it? Nobody even has to know."
The god hums a low note, but it's not immediately hostile. They're considering it.
"It'll just be a quick chat," George continues. "I want to see if he hates me now." He delivers the statement lightly, trying to appeal to XD's hope of a rift between them, though the undercurrent worry that it might be true still nags at his heart.
XD scoffs a laugh, which George takes as a good sign. "I still don't know why you'd bother," They mutter, but the fire in Their tone has burned down to embers.
"It's something to do," George replies. It's not the entire truth, but it's a large part of it.
Another moment of quiet, this one far less strained.
"All right, " the god concedes. " I can give you fifteen minutes."
George can't stop himself. "That's it?"
XD bristles again. "I do this favour for you and you're still ungrateful? I should just ki -"
"Fine, fine, fifteen minutes, okay," George interrupts hastily. He's not sure if the imminent threat would have been directed toward him or Dream, but he doesn't want to push his luck either way. An idea occurs to him, and he tacks on a quick addendum. "Thank you, DreamXD."
As hoped, the god settles again, placated by the gratitude. "Fifteen minutes, " They repeat. " And don't ask me to set him free, or I'll kill him in front of you."
That answers his previous question. George nods in agreement, uncertain of whether or not XD would make good on the threat and eager to keep Them appeased for now. The risk is too great to treat the possibility lightly. XD's fond of nightmares, but that doesn't mean that They would reserve the vengeful execution for the dreamscape. It could end up very real.
With a pause, George realises the visit itself might end up being a dream. How would he even be able to tell?
He wants to ask XD to ensure he's awake, but he's afraid another demand might restart the whole argument. Surely it would be real. Surely he would know, based upon Dream's reactions alone.
Despite everything, he thinks he still knows Dream well enough for that.
"Ready?"
The question gives George a start. "Right now?"
"Right now. Let's get this over with."
"I... okay." George is about to get to his feet when he feels a sudden wash of dizziness. Bracing himself with one hand to the ground, he tries to shake his head to clear it, but -
George wakes up.
Somehow on his feet despite an unsteady grogginess, he's a moment in reconciling his surroundings into anything but a dull gloom. Blinking the sleep from his eyes, he soon makes out the weeping walls of obsidian and the radiant heat of lava pulsing at his back. Though he's never been in it, he knows this is the prison. Not least of all because Dream is standing before him, frozen in shock at the sudden arrival.
XD is off in the corner. Probably supervising, possibly sulking. George doesn't pay Them any mind. He's here for the man in front of him, who still looks so tense that his body seems spring loaded.
Glancing over his own shoulder, George notes the thick layer of glass separating them from the rest of the prison beyond the lava wall. Maybe he should've asked to be behind the cell barricade. As with everything, though, it doesn't really matter - this is no different from the thousand other dangers that the god has probably shielded him from, with or without his knowledge. Dream can't hurt him any more than tumbling into a ravine would.
Dream wouldn't want to hurt him anyway. George is sure of that much, no matter what XD thought.
The room is like a furnace, stale air made almost unbreathable as the heat bakes through the wall of glass and netherite. George wicks the sweat from his nose with one finger but doesn't break eye contact with Dream, who is still staring at him with mingled fear and cautious awe.
Gaunt and somehow hollow looking, the man standing before George is nearly unrecognisable. Even with the tattered prison rags draped over his form, George can tell Dream is teetering dangerously close to emaciated. The lurid bruises and aging cuts littered across his flesh only do more to make him look as though he's at death's door - which he might very well be. He's a shadow of the fit and confident warrior George once knew; the only hint that this might be the same person is the cracked and dirty mask still strapped around his ragged, uncut hair.
One eye is visible where the mask has broken apart. There's a hard, inquisitive glint there, a keen sort of scrutiny that serves as the one spark of life that hearkens back to the former warrior.
In seeing that familiar shrewd appraisal, George allows himself to believe that this might be real after all.
"Been a while," George ventures awkwardly, because he can't stand the silence.
Dream doesn't react, though his gaze keeps flitting over to where the god is hovering.
"How have you been?" George presses on. A stupid question, but routine politesse is an old habit. Tough to break.
The reaction is faint, but it's there. A short chuckle - more of a scoff.
"I came all the way here, so we should talk, idiot." More silence. "This is boring." George glances at XD. "Let's just go."
"Wait," Dream says, because he's predictable. Eyes dart toward XD and back again. "George." George hears the rust around the name, formerly delivered with such honeyed fondness that it was almost sickening. Not that George ever minded the cloying attention, even if he was never sure what to do with it.
He doesn't realise how much he's missed it until his name sounds unfamiliar on Dream's tongue.
"Dream," George replies in kind, testing out the name for himself. It's not as difficult for him. He never really stopped talking about Dream. Not like some of the others did.
"George." The repetition comes out almost as a sigh of relief. "I didn't really think you were... ever gonna visit." The earnest admission comes out even more stilted than George's name, as though he's wrenching the vulnerability from some walled off portion of his soul.
"Yeah, well, I've been busy." Lies and yet not. Kinoko still feels like a work in progress.
"Too busy for me," Dream says, and there's some of the venom George was expecting - not that he has much experience with it being directed toward him.
George doesn't know how to respond, so he uses the ensuing silence to peer around the tiny room. Despite never having visited before, he gets the sense that it’s been changed recently - the glass barricade looks too fresh, too new, and it’s made Dream’s available space even more limited. Though George never expected the prison cell to be luxurious, he now finds himself realising just how uninhabitable the living conditions actually are. They couldn't have been good to begin with, but this is worse than he assumed.
Dream's gaze continues to flick in XD's direction every now and then even as he tracks George's every movement, posture hunched and cautious like a trapped animal. Which he is, really. The ineffable splendour of the god hovering moodily in the corner makes Dream look even more bedraggled and wild by comparison.
After another wordless minute, XD flits over to George's side and puts Their face directly next to George's ear. "I want to leave," XD declares loudly, though Dream doesn't flinch. The god must be speaking to George alone.
"Deal with it," George mutters. He catches the way Dream's brow knits with annoyance - he thinks the comment was directed toward him. Thumbing in XD's direction (the god leaps back to avoid George's hand), George tilts his head to doubly emphasise who he was talking to.
And - miracle of miracles - there's something that might be a smile on Dream' face. It's nowhere close to a grin, but there's a pale imitation of humour cracking through the stony glare.
"So this - this god," Dream says, and his voice is less guarded now, bordering on amicable. "He got you in here, right? And Sam doesn't know about it?" The words start to jumble together slightly as he rushes to get them out. He's excited.
George knows the question is coming. XD prepared him for that eventuality.
And made him swear against entertaining it.
"I guess," George replies slowly. He can't feign ignorance; Dream isn't an idiot, and he knows that George isn't one either.
"Then he can get me out." The breathless wonder in Dream's voice feels like a knife twisting somewhere in George's midsection. It's making it difficult to look Dream in the eye, to see the burgeoning hope that's a spark away from turning into a blaze.
The god laughs. George isn't sure if Dream can hear it.
"He can get me out," Dream repeats. "You were out there and got in without setting off the alarms, right? You have to get back out too. So why not take me? You can take me with you!"
The hint of a smile has stretched into a manic rictus, Dream's visible eye wide and pupil blown as he takes a few unsteady steps toward George. XD tenses up, but George doesn't back away as Dream locks both of his shoulders in a grip that’s surprisingly vice-like despite the tremor in his hands.
"George, you can get me out." There's an insistence that borders on desperation, as though he's making the plea while simultaneously trying to convince himself that it might be a real possibility. "You can get me out of this place. This, this hell. Away from -" For a moment it seems as though he wants to say a name, but he changes tack. "...away from everyone."
"Dream," George cautions. He doesn't know if the warning is more about the impending bad news or the fact that the fingers digging into his shoulders are about to leave bruises.
"I won't tell anyone it was you," Dream continues, still rushing and stumbling over the words. "I won't even bother you after we get out. You can go back to your - to whatever you were doing. I just want out. Please, George, don't leave me in here -"
"I can't," George interjects. He experimentally tries to flex his shoulders out of Dream's clutches, but he isn't budging. "Let go of me."
Dream doesn't let go. "What do you mean you can't? Yes you can! That's - he's a god, isn't he?"
"I'll explain if you let go of me." George hears XD growling somewhere behind him, and he thinks Dream might wind up being fed into the lava wall piece by piece if he doesn't release his hands. George drops his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, even though he’s sure XD is listening carefully. "Do it before someone else does it for you."
Fortunately Dream seems to get the hint. With a fearful glance at a point somewhere over George's shoulder, he lets go and stumbles back a couple paces. "Sorry," he says, sounding far from apologetic. "I just... you can't? What's that supposed to mean?"
George doesn't know if telling the truth would be any more effective than spinning a believable lie, but he's never been particularly adept at hiding things from Dream. Not through means that aren't silence, anyway, and he can't very well remain tight lipped when Dream is staring at him with bemused agitation.
"I can't, because... it's not up to me," George begins slowly, tipping his head toward the god again to indicate who's responsible.
"Five minutes," XD intones. If They're bothered by being thrown under the bus, They don't show it.
George ignores the warning. "I'm sorry." Here's the rust that hadn't formed around Dream's name; the apology sounds clumsy and inadequate, even if it's authentic. At least, he doesn't think it's dishonest. His own uncertain feelings about his former ally aside, no one deserves to be locked up in this hell.
And yet, despite having deific power on his side, there's nothing George can do about it.
Dream's expression, briefly alight with hope, has settled back into a neutral slate, the moment of open vulnerability now shuttered away as he digests George's words without responding.
"Look, if I could do anything..." The sentence trails as George realises he has no concept of how to end it. What would he do? Set Dream free and leave him to his own decisions? Try to keep him safe? Could they stand a chance against a server that has a vested interest in keeping Dream locked up?
George can't even trust what's real and what's the product of his sleeping mind. He couldn't help Dream even if he was fully committed to protecting him.
His heart rate staggers along in his chest as he desperately scrambles for anything he can say. XD barely gave him time to prepare for the visit, least of all its unexpected intensity. George's mind is a storm of conflict with only one clear thought in the midst of it all: that he can't stand to see Dream like this, in here, and he would bend the cosmos to see him out, consequences be damned.
But even the secondhand power to shape reality itself is no use to him. And now Dream knows it too.
"Sure. Okay." Dream's tone is inscrutable, blank as his mask. "It's out of your hands. You could've come to visit at any time, but you were busy. You have a god on your side, but you're still helpless. I get it."
The accusations land like dagger points, and yet George can't bring himself to be defensive. Not when his eyes pass over the intricate webwork of scars visible on every inch of Dream's exposed flesh, not when George has been pointedly absent until today for reasons that seem hollow and foolish now.
"I'm sorry," George repeats. Useless, helpless. A man with a god on a leash and no more power for it, like a figurehead wearing the crown of a land.
Maybe he never deserved it after all.
"I am too," Dream says, though there's no softness to it. No solidarity or understanding. Only the phantom echo of George's petty jab from months ago.
George takes the hit silently, internalises it, accepting the returned volley of disappointment. He deserves it.
"One minute."
George feels his heart lurch in his chest. Whatever he expected from the visit, this wasn't it. This wasn't enough. There's only a moment of breathless hesitation before he reaches forward in order to take Dream's hand in his own, trying not to wince at how bony it feels in his grasp.
"You'll get out," George insists, unsure of who he's trying to convince. "We'll get you out."
"We?" Dream asks with a sneer, though he hasn't thrown George off. "That's worked well so far."
"Shut up, idiot. Just... let me figure something out."
Dream's single visible eye meets George's gaze and - though George thinks he might be imagining it - seems to soften, if only by a fraction.
There's a weighted moment, a second that stretches into an eternity. With a sharp breath, Dream places his free hand over top of George's. "Don't put yourself in danger," Dream says, quick and low and desperate, and there's a waver to his voice that George has never heard before. "I'm not - it's not worth it."
George opens his mouth to respond - to protest, to deny it, to tell Dream that this is the first thing that he’s been able to care about in literal months and that alone means it's worth more than he could ever express - but he only has time to register the crack in Dream's facade as his face crumbles with despair before the scene cuts off.
George wakes up.
This time he's horizontal rather than standing, though instead of grass or obsidian beneath him, he's laid upon an actual bed. The soaring wooden ceiling and collections of fungus along the walls indicate that he's back at Kinoko. He strains for a moment to hear any voices or footsteps, but the building is dead silent.
XD is also nowhere to be seen. George is grateful for the solitude.
He throws back the covers and sits up, pulling a face at the stiffness in his muscles. It certainly feels as though he's just woken up for real, but that would mean the prison visit was merely a dream. And he would've known if that was the case.
Probably, anyway. He didn't have much time to think about it either way.
But Dream's scarred and stoic face, the feel of his hands biting into George's shoulders, the way his too-thin fingers threaded through George's as he urged him to be safe... George doesn't think that was imagined.
Nor did he imagine his determination to free Dream. The trouble is that his resolve is fading as the seconds pass and he remembers just how impossible a feat it would be, particularly without XD's help. Someone with more allies might be able to make a difference, but George has a hunch that no one he knows would be terribly invested in seeing Dream walk free.
But caring about something - even if it's just a fruitless aspiration to free Dream from the most well-guarded facility on the server because his incarceration pains George more than a personal grudge - is a welcome change. It feels like a reason to keep going.
As the gravity of Dream's predicament sets in, George accepts that there's nothing he can do to help him. Not without XD contributing to the cause, and the god seems too possessive of George to invite a threat to his monopoly back onto the playing field. He isn't sure if he can discourage XD's obsession, nor would he want to be on the god's bad side anyway; it's just a shame he can't use Their powers to his benefit in this situation.
It doesn’t take long for George to conclude why XD wouldn’t want to help even if it would make him happy - freeing Dream would mean George’s attention would be diverted. Why XD chose him, he's never known - though the unspoken proximity to Dream seems too coincidental to be random. In more detached moments, George has entertained the idea that any version of Dream must be drawn to him.
It's only amusing until George recognises the road goes both ways. He can't pretend that XD doesn't occupy the spot left vacant by Dream's absence. It's not even close to a perfect fit, but it's something, more than the nothing of his shallow interactions with the other server members. It's companionship across both the sleeping and waking worlds as everything else in his life smears into an indistinct mess of faces and events… and the one blisteringly focal fact that Dream isn't there.
Dream is gone. DreamXD isn't. And George is inclined to believe that the god would like to keep it that way.
He has no plans to express his displeasure to XD - not when he saw how uniquely furious it made Them last time, lest XD have Dream visit George in a nightmare. Reality was a cruel enough sight; George doesn't want to see how XD's subconscious machinations could make it even worse in revenge.
All at once he feels the crushing weight of helplessness descend upon his shoulders. Where apathy once protected him from the futility of Dream's imprisonment and the unspoken pressure of the god's affinity, there is only a raw wound, salted and chafed by fresh reminders of his inability to act. It's as though everything exists outside of his control, at the hands of more powerful server members - or a literal deity. He merely hadn't paid his lack of agency much mind, because until now it hadn't mattered.
Now, he feels acutely powerless.
He can't even choose when to sleep.
The building is still quiet. Rarely is Kinoko bustling, but the silence feels sharper today. The only sounds are the groaning of wood planks and the faint howl of a breeze through one of the upper windows. The kingdom could accommodate countless citizens, and instead it stands barren, each empty room serving as a memorial to everyone who was once a key player in George's life, a space where they might be if he hadn't lost the ability to care about people.
For the first time in as long as he can remember, there's something - someone - to care about. And there's nothing he can do about it.
And he's exhausted. So unbelievably exhausted.
Aware that it's a fool's errand, he lies back down and pulls the bedcovers up to his chin. Closing his eyes, he knows he won't be able to sleep - it's never by his own volition, no matter how tired he is - but he can pretend he's resting.
And while it might not be the same as dreaming, he can play back the visit in his mind's eye, from the moment he saw Dream, thin and shaking and yet so undeniably present and alive , to their intertwined hands and a solemn promise that they both know will go unfulfilled.
Dreamt or real, the conviction persists.