Chapter Text
Hob Gadling doesn’t go back to sleep that night.
He stays awake on his side, staring at the ancient bottle of wine that had miraculously appeared on his bedside table. While his stranger often appears in his dreams, this time feels different. It’s not just his subconscious fondly conjuring a wayward friend; this time, the apparition feels real. The bottle — conjured into actual existence — confirms his suspicion and raises more questions about what kind of being his visitor truly is.
Several nights pass and Hob finds his sleep broken, when it manages to come at all. He wishes there was some way to contact his elusive friend and perhaps extract a few answers from him; centuries late better than never.
On one night it occurs to him to attempt to lucid dream. He had done it before; with a bit of practice he is confident he can do it again, enough to gain at least a modicum of control over the dreaming world and perhaps summon his stranger to him. Of course there is always the possibility that a summoning does not go over well with an entity who enjoys the rigidity of 100-year schedules, but Hob decides he’s earned an indulgence or two after centuries of putting up with the other man’s eccentricities.
It takes a decent amount of practice, but he’s rewarded one night as he snaps to awareness in what appears to be the hall of a castle.
The walls are high and imposing; the air hangs heavy, saturated with a nightmarish quality that would make it difficult to draw a breath, if breathing was a necessity in dreams.
“And you are?” asks a voice just in front of him; a woman with pointy ears seemingly apparates into his line of vision. Though her tone is not exactly warm, it has a grounding effect on him amidst the oddness of the reality he finds himself in.
“Hob; Hob Gadling,” he introduces himself with what he hopes is a bit of his usual charm. Difficult to remember to be charming, in a place like this. “Err… I’m looking for my friend,” he adds, suddenly conscious that he still doesn’t know the man’s name. “Dark hair? Wears black?”
The woman looks at him with a slight air of resigned disappointment; like a parent who knows their child is about to do something stupid but also knows they must let them learn through experience. “He won’t take kindly to an unannounced guest,” is all she supplies.
“I’ll take my chances,” Hob replies, with a little less conviction that he would have liked. Fake it ‘til you make it, right?
“Fine.” She gives him one more discerning look, then walks off, adding over her shoulder, “Up the stairs, turn left. Big room.”
And with that she is gone. Her absence allows the surroundings to resume their oppressive qualities, and Hob focuses on remaining calm despite the slightly rising panic from within. Up the stairs, turn left, big room. Up the stairs, turn left, big room , he chants to himself like a mantra as he ascends the ridiculously massive staircase.
Heart pounding, he reaches the top of the staircase and turns, almost immediately spotting a large set of ajar doors opening to a colossal chamber; ‘big room’ as a descriptor was certainly a choice.
His heart utterly stalls in his chest as he spots the figure at the very end of it; it is unmistakably his stranger, barely standing and fragile. Something is very, very wrong.
Something alerts the other to his presence at the door, because the stranger whips round to face him, eyes black and demonic. The already dark room turns darker yet, ominous shadows rising behind his friend like living storms or dragon wings. The figure before him crosses the length of the room in less strides than should be possible, palpably evil, like a devil about to consume hell’s newest denizen. He stumbles back despite himself, back slamming against a wall. If the intent of the presentation is to frighten him back to mortality, then it’s bloody working.
“How dare you,” his voice is utterly soaked with venom, face now just inches from his own.
This is the end, Hob thinks vaguely. His mouth opens, but no words form.
“Leave this place,” the figure seethes, tendrils of black smoke—or are they snakes?—rising from his body and curling inward, surrounding Hob on all sides. He searches the stranger’s face for something familiar, anything at all, but the being before him is all darkness and terror.
A strangled breath escapes Hob's lungs, forming the barest hint of a sound. He stands frozen, utterly rooted by fear, incapable of movement. The dreamscape begins to shift and blur around him, edges warping, reality unraveling. Whether he's being expelled by the entity or his own subconscious is wrenching him free, it's impossible to say—but in an instant, he is flung back into consciousness.
He bolts upright in bed, sheets soaked, chest heaving. His heart hammers violently against his ribs, threatening to break through. Mercifully, the bed is empty—no one is there to witness the shuddering breaths, the way his hands tremble where they clutch the blankets.
What in God's name just happened?