Work Text:
The waking world left Mizuno as peacefully as it came. Which was to say, without warning.
Mizuno would work for hours on end until he passed out from exhaustion. Eric hated it (even though he would do the exact same thing), and Jinam especially hated it, but Mizuno thought it was inconvenient at worst.
It wasn’t that bad, really. Mizuno had lived through more sleepless nights than he could count, so one more wouldn’t change much.
Despite it all, deep sleep covered his mind like a weighted blanket. No one would be able to wake him up tonight. The shallow waters of his consciousness rose, sloshing around his skull as the sinking feeling intensified.
Thick black water flooded his senses. The only thing he could hear was the whooshing of waves rushing around himself.
Mizuno couldn’t recall opening his eyes, but there was the faintest flicker of light, blinking far, far away. The only thing filtering through the ontological sea.
He writhed against the sea, sluggishly propelling himself up with numerous strokes upward. The efforts exhausted him, but a gut instinct told him to keep trudging on.
The glimpse gradually became a glimmer, then a luminous refraction. It grew nearer and nearer, and before Mizuno knew it, he broke surface tension.
His eyes were met with circular motes of pale yellow light, aimlessly floating in the dark air. He could breathe again.
The rest of his body floated out of the oppressive water with little resistance. He hovered briefly before the soles of his feet came back into contact with the surface.
Mizuno’s hair floated in the air, as if he was still submerged.
“What… where am I?” He asked no one.
Mizuno looked down at himself and saw a dark ombré covering most of his body. It faded into a pale, translucent yellow at the ends of his limbs.
He turned around, and a cape of shade and glimmering lights followed him. It was black and pale yellow as far as he could see.
“I guess there’s only one way to find out.”
He trekked across the sea’s surface with airy steps, sending ripples of reflected yellow outward into the expanse.
Despite how stunning his environment was, he still needed to find out where he was, and more importantly; how to leave.
The boy floated away from where he emerged and neared one of the aimless balls of light. Despite seemingly being made of shine alone, it didn’t hurt his eyes.
Mizuno carefully raised an arm and grazed his palm against the orb. A warmth siphoned into his palm, balancing on the edge of being too hot to handle and a comfortable temperature.
With a slight push, his hand sunk into the orb, warmth surrounding his digits as it glowed brighter.
He took a step closer, staring closely at the glowing mote. He leaned his forehead against the mote, then found himself fully phasing through.
The vague warmth enveloped Mizuno. The sudden disproportionate brightness seared his vision for the briefest of moments, then morphed into a familiar scene before him.
Gusts of humid orange smog swirled through the air. The currents had the consistency of powdered chalk and looked like they’d been drawn with a clumsy crayon. They emanated heat like concrete in the summer sun.
Windows of stained glass stretched upward, nearly touching the ceiling. The polygonal designs they housed were warped into burnt, circular patterns.
Wooden church pews lined the insides of the one-roomed building, though it was difficult to distinguish any details due to the orange wisps of heat.
The carpeted row that parted the sea of seats was swarmed by the wisps, and no one stood at the engulfed altar. No bride, nor groom.
Maybe Mizuno was the bride? He was standing at the other end of the aisle.
He looked down at his clothes. Nope, no wedding gown. Just the same spacey garb as before.
This had to be a dream. A very realistic dream.
He stepped away from the whirling spirits, or whatever they were, concerned on what direct contact would do to himself.
As he did, Mizuno found his back against stromatic, lukewarm steel. He turned and laid his eyes upon a familiar steampowered mech.
Inside of its cockpit was Eric Pockets, leaning back in its seat. His heaving chest was slow, as if he were sleeping in the middle of this madness.
Mizuno scurried to the wrecked mech and knelt beside its pilot.
“Eric? Are you okay?”
His eyelids cracked open just enough to see the shine in his eyes, “Are you… a ghost?”
“What? No, I’m not dead.”
Eric tried to reposition himself as his fogged-over eyes drifted further open, “Is everything still on fire?”
“Um…” Mizuno glanced up at the formless orange smog roiling above their heads, “… Nnnno?”
With an audible creak, Eric managed to sit up in the scraps of the machine. Mizuno’s gaze flicked to the inside of it, next to his friend’s head. He could still see the little message that Jinam and him had carved there in secret.
It wrote; you got this!!!
It was meant to be a surprise for Eric, but neither of them were sure if he ever saw it.
“What happened, anyway?” Eric mumbled.
“I think you’re dreaming?” Mizuno regained eye contact with him, “At least, this doesn’t feel real. It’s hard to explain.”
“Oh…”
Eric seemed to accept the news with no fanfare, nor much of a reaction at all.
Suddenly, as if a switch had been flipped, his eyes cleared up.
“Wait, why are you in my dream?” Eric pointed a finger at him. His face was a bit rosy, whether from the humidity in the room or something else, Mizuno wasn’t sure.
“Well…”
Now that he really thought about it, he had no idea. Did he somehow form a psychic link with Eric without knowing? Was this some bizarre, layered dream that would keep going deeper and deeper? How in the world would Mizuno even begin to explain what he had seen?
The questions were a lot to unpack. Too much. So he chose not to think too hard about it for now.
“I’m just passing through, that’s all.”
That wasn’t technically a lie. It’s not like those motes of light came with labels.
“How’d you get in?”
“Through a ball of light,” Mizuno shrugged.
“Oh. Weird.”
A beat passed before the starrier of the two rose from his kneel, “I guess I should go now. It probably won’t do us any good to mess with your dreams.”
“I-I mean…” Eric blurted out the words before Mizuno could even turn away, “I like having you around, you know? You don’t have to leave. Not alone, at least.”
Mizuno’s brows furrowed, “I don’t know if that’s a good idea. I don’t know what could happen.”
“Then we could find out together, maybe?” Eric outstretched his hand, “I mean, I trust you, so…”
Mizuno stared at his palm. He wondered, just for a moment, if Eric knew that this wasn’t just a dream. It’s not like he could just ask that to someone, so a mystery it would stay. At least for now.
“You… you don’t…”
He trailed off as he stared back at Eric. He didn’t dare continue his doubtful words.
Mizuno gingerly reached out to Eric, gingerly holding his wrist. He pulled him to his feet, the two of them carefully avoiding the remnants of their steampowered mech.
“Careful.”
“I am.”
Once the two of them were on stable ground, their gazes lingered at the wisps gathered around the altar.
“Do… you think that’s a problem?” Eric raised his unibrow.
Mizuno pondered on it, then shrugged, “Well, it’s a dream, isn’t it?”
“Touché. Let’s get outta here.”
Eric took Mizuno’s hand, holding it in his palm instead of being led by the wrist as he turned around.
His hand was warm. Not like the lights in their radiant, ethereal presence, but warm like a faint sunbeam still able to be felt through closed blinds.
As the two of them pushed open the doors out of the infested church, the world fell away.
The ontological sea and motes of light returned with a flash, and this time Eric was by his side in similarly starry garb. No cape, though.
“Uh, okay! Now I have more questions!”
“If the question is ‘are we safe,’ I’m pretty sure the answer’s yes.”
“Cool, cool… not what I was gonna ask, but cool…” Eric’s voice petered out before he asked; “Are you unlocking secret fish powers or something?”
“What???”
“I-I dunno!” He waved his hands in front of himself, “I don’t know if this is like a normal thing for you at all or not! This seems way weirder than usual!”
Mizuno thought to mention that he hadn’t ever met someone of the same species as him, so he had zero clue whether this was ‘normal,’ but decided against it. He would hate for Eric to pity him, of all the things he could do.
“I have no idea either.”
The boys’ conversation was cut short when a mote lazily floated in front of their faces, humming lowly.
“So, this is what a dream looks like?” Eric poked at the light. It lazily bumped away from his hand like a balloon.
“Maybe?” Mizuno shrugged his shoulders, “I think it’s more like… a consciousness.”
“Seriously?”
Eric asked before trying to phase through the mote headfirst. His scalp whammed against the ball of light, which suddenly decided to react like a solid object.
“Ow!”
“Maybe only I can go through these.”
Mizuno suggested, promptly taking the mote in both hands and resting it against his forehead, focusing on what little warmth this one held…
… And nothing happened.
He pulled himself away from it, tilting his head, “Or… maybe this one just doesn’t like us.”
A low rumbling reverberated from all around.
“Do you hear that?”
But before Mizuno could reply, the two of them sank beneath the surface. He reached for Eric as the still waters became tumultuous and swept them away from each other, deep into the ontological sea.
Mizuno woke up abruptly.
When he came to, he realized that he was standing upright in a doorway. The doorway to Jinam’s room, specifically.
Speaking of Jinam, she was standing in front of Mizuno, shaking him by his shoulders.
“Mizuno!”
“Agh!” He shoved himself away from her, blinking rapidly like something got caught in his eyes, “Wh-What??”
“Sorry, you were just sleepwalking again. Are you doing alright?”
“Uhm… I think so. I just had a weird dream. I’ll be fine.”
Jinam’s mouth pressed into a thin line as she crossed her arms, “Your eyes don’t usually stay open when that happens, though. It’s kind of making me worried.”
“… Wait, again?”
The sound of footsteps pattered toward Mizuno and Jinam. They glanced back and saw Eric in his pajamas, staring at Mizuno, and he whispered, “What was that!?”
Whatever it was, it definitely wasn’t just a dream.