Chapter Text
*
Listen. You can hear the screaming.
Morpheus felt as if he were floating, even though the cold floor made him shiver and his ribs ache from the pressure. He could feel tiny grains of sand and dirt digging into his cheek.
Three children are trapped in an elevator with Bobby-Joe McCann.
He couldn't see anything. He guessed that the reason for that was his closed eyes. Had he lost consciousness again? Perhaps. How long had he been here? A hundred years? Was he still in his prison of glass, naked and vulnerable with the eyes of his captors watching his every move? Does this mean he had only imagined his escape, dreamed it up? He doubted that was even possible for him.
Harold Smith prowls the dogs' home, a tire iron clutched in his bloodied fist.
But this didn't feel like the glass box. The ground was cool but unpolished and dirty, not rounded. And his prison had always been quiet, insulated against any outside noise, with the only sound coming from his two guards, talking about boring, vulgar things or from his own useless breathing. But now... Now filling his hearing, there were the endless, terrible screams.
Maudie Carillon screams with laughter as the flame devours a geriatric ward.
"-hope that's the right place, damn I don't know what I'll- G. Rover Cripes, it's you!"
There was a cloud around him. Thick, like liquid fog, but at the same time as solid as stone. He tried to move his arms, tried to lift his head, but his efforts were in vain. He couldn't tell whether it was truly the air around him that had grown heavy and dense or if it was just the incomprehensible weakness in his body that made moving an impossible task. He doubted he was even breathing since his chest felt as useless as the rest of him.
Listen.
Through the impenetrable fog surrounding him cut, sharp and piercing the screams. The sobs. The howls of joy and terror.
Listen.
"Hey! Can you hear me mate? Dream?"
You can hear sobbing.
He was cold. He wished he could shiver. Except his body felt too exhausted even for that.
"Dream? You're not- you're not breathing."
On the freeway helpless weeping comes from the crash-sculpture of twisted, blistered metal, burning rubber and shattered glass.
"Please, Dream. Don't be dead. Please. You're not supposed to die, you hear me?! You're not supposed to die!"
He searched with his mind inside himself to find something tangible. Something burning.
"Shit. Shit, shit, bloody fucking shite, what did that trench coat jackass say already?"
A small candle would be enough. A flicker of a flame would be enough. Burnt out ambers still emanating a faint glow would be enough. The light of the smallest farthest star lost and hiding in the vastness of Night would be enough. Anything would be enough.
Listen to the anguish of a world in which the bad things are coming out of the dark places.
Anything.
"I got it! You wait here, you hear me!"
In the radio room Nan Fowler knows she has no more ambulances to send, and the calls just won't stop coming in...
Anything.
Listen.
Listen to a world in pain.
There was nothing.
Listen...
There was a hand on his cheek.
"-gonna take these pills and fall asleep, alright? And I hope I'm gonna dream, so you can get back to your place."
The hand was warm. Soft. No, not really, it was rough and had thick callouses, but still. Soft. It felt so incredibly real through the liquid air. Not piercing and painful as the screams. But gentle. He hoped it never left.
"-talked to that cuckoo wizard, he said you're stronger there- Shit, I really bloody hope this helps. Here let me-"
The hand was gone for a moment. Then the sensation of warmth returned, but not only to his cheek. He could feel his head lifted up and down as it lay on a breathing chest. An arm was wrapped around his waist and another hand stroked his hair. His body was pressed close to the side of another's.
"You're gonna be okay, you know that right? I'm not gonna let you die, I swear."
The chest rose and fell in a quick uneven rhythm. Breaths of air stirred the fog around his hair.
"I know I'm just a human with a really long lifespan and I'm not good at magic, so if this doesn't work... Well then I'll just find another way to fix you. You know I will."
The rhythm began to settle into something slower.
"'Cause you're my friend."
And slower.
"I hope."
The chest rose and fell with an even sluggish pace. He felt with his mind the presence of another, clear and close and comforting. He knew it with all its shining peaks, glistening with pride and happiness and all its darkest pits crawling with shame and regret. He found there things that were far more terrible than the liquid fog and knew it to be a normal human mind. A mind he recognized.
There were battles fought for kings and queens long dead, and men cutting down one another, so accustomed to blood and gore that it couldn't possibly shock anymore. There were late nights of drinking at stinking bars with fellows, loud and cheerful with and horrible headaches in the morning. There was lust for women first, then after years for men as well. There was a sweet child called Robin who would die in a bar fight before his time. There were moments of wonder sprinkled around like stars as old hands held one new invention after another. But even these stopped being surprising after a while.
And then there were meetings with a strange pale man with eyes shining like stars. There was the anticipation of seeing him every hundred years and the certainty that he would be there undying and eternal. A slow build of companionship that in the end - for a long time unbeknownst to the owner of this mind - grew into love.
Then Morpheus saw finally through the clouds surrounding him, a door, a brightly shining passage into his own realm. The Dreaming was at the reach of his hand.
He was submerged in dark water, pushing his way upwards, needing with every fibre of his being to break the surface. He struggled and forced his useless body to cooperate, to make one final attempt. He found strength enough to move in the warmth of arms around him, of a strong body sleeping beneath his exhausted one. With a herculean effort, he pushed himself up and broke the surface. He gripped the edges of the doorway with desperate hands and pulled and finally, finally fell inside.
*
Had anyone walked inside the Justice League storage room that night, they would have seen the strangest collection of random oddities piled around the walls. And among them, on the floor nothing but a single middle aged man with brick red hair, snoring peacefully.
But thankfully nobody came that night.
*
"That's it, here we go, harruck! Ah- Hah- There- There we are, got your blasted arse outta the waters. Thunderation mate, what were you thinking taking a swim in the Atlantic bloody ocean! You've a far greater chance of meeting a kraken here than a herring!"
Morpheus listened to the ridiculous monologue while he shook on the wooden planks of a caravel. It swayed on the uneven sea, making his stomach twist unpleasantly. But even as he lay there soaked, gasping and sick, he relished in the feeling of his chest moving with every expansion of his lungs as he drew in frantic breaths. He raised his hand to run his fingers through salt-crusted hair and felt incredible relief at not being restrained by that terrible weakness that had left him unable to lift a finger mere moments before.
"Hey! Are you even listening to me? C'mon, this is important stuff-"
He let his head rest on the wood and feel its texture, its essence that was the fabric of the Dreaming. He felt and smelled the salty breeze on his face, whipping his hair across his eyes. He let himself feel the tremors that shook his body at the icy combination of wind and wet clothing. The relief was as intense as it had been mere days ago when he'd touched the land of the Dreaming for the first time in a hundred years.
"-really hope you're thankful, I got you out of there, before- Wait a minute, what's the Sun doing there?"
Morpheus opened his eyes to look at what exactly was the problem with the Sun. And found it. It seemed to be submerged in the ocean, illuminating the dream universe from below the waves. He thought it was quite an aesthetically pleasing idea.
"I'm dreaming, aren't I?"
He kept staring at the underwater sun. He wondered when he would hear the screaming again.
"Bloody Hell, Dream you're alive! And shit, you're freezing, here- let me-"
Arms wrapped around him again, squeezing tight. He was lifted into a sitting position with his upper body leaning onto the breathing chest. He felt safe again.
"Dream? Do you think you're gonna manage to stand up? You can't stay here on the deck."
He thought he should answer, perhaps with only a nod, but that seemed like too much of a waste of energy. So he put his strength into trying to lift himself. Arms helped him up, but all strength left him halfway through the ascent and he would have toppled over, had he not been caught in an embrace, so his entire weight was held up by the other.
"Okay. We got you up, you're doing great Dream. Now, think you can walk a bit?"
He tried to move his feet and in the process found that trying to support his own weight, no matter how slight, was impossible. He nearly fell over again.
"Alright. Alright, that's not gonna work. Dream? I'm gonna have to carry you. You fine with that?"
He nodded. Probably. Or perhaps it was just the rocking of the ship.
"Okay then. Here we go-"
He was hefted up by an arm around his knees and another around his shoulders. He managed to lift his own arms to hold onto the neck of the man carrying him. His body was rocked both by the gait and the moving of the ship. The rhythm eased his heart, while he stared over the shoulder at the deck of the ship. He noticed now that the wooden planks were not in fact wooden, but were made of plastic. A recent invention, he guessed.
"How's it even possible for you to weigh this little Dream? Feels like I'm carrying a kitten."
Morpheus gave a quiet snort at the apt comparison. He traced the stitch pattern of the 20th century shirt with an index finger, while they descended wooden stairs. He was carried down corridors lit by ancient torches to a cabin.
There was a blazing hearth, burning at the far side of the room, illuminating and warming the sea chilled timbers of what appeared to be a captain's cabin. He was gently deposited on the rug in front of the fire. It was pleasantly warm and he felt old strength returning to his bones as the chill subsided. He missed the arms that had held him before and wondered where Hob had gone.
Where Hob had gone.
Hob!
Hob had brought him here. Had helped him. Had found him half dead on the floor of the Justice League storage room. Morpheus wondered how he hadn't connected the name with the arms that had held him.
Hob returned and wrapped a coarse blanket around him. Then lifted him up again to rest on his chest, kept safe from the screaming of the wind and a world in pain by a tight embrace.
"Dream, I- I don't really have a clue what's happened to you or what I'm supposed to do. I'm just hoping this helps a bit."
A beat of silence.
"Dream? Do you think you could talk to me? Just a word perhaps? Please, it scares me, seeing you like this. You're supposed to be one of the strongest things in the entire damn universe and to think what must have happened to do this to you-"
Hob briefly tightened his hold around thin shoulders. His chest rose and fell with a slow rhythm that Morpheus had taken a shine to. He pressed his nose into the fabric of Hob's shirt and breathed in the scent of leather bound books and cheap wine. There was shame tugging at the edge of his consciousness, shame at being seen in such a state, at seeking comfort. He feared that Hob might think less of him after this, but the safety of the embrace dispelled these thoughts.
He thought he should answer the question.
"Hob-" the voice was so small, that Morpheus doubted he would be heard over the crackling of the hearth. He tried to keep talking, but found his lips to be uncooperative. Thankfully Hob was looking down at him and noticed his efforts. He caressed his arm in calming strokes and let out a long relieved sigh.
"Yeah, it's me Dream, it's me. Thank you for saying something, it- it means the world. You scared me to death back there, when you weren't breathing, you know that? Or- hah- at least to a not-so-fatal heart attack."
Another exhausted sigh.
"But don't push yourself okay? Just rest. I'll stay here. I swear."
"Hob- how-" he needed to know how this was even possible. How could Hob have possibly found him in that storage room. How could he have known that taking him to the Dreaming was the right thing to do. Why did he know to call him Dream, when he'd never actually given Hob his name?
Hob waited patiently while Morpheus tried again to form words. It felt as if with every moment spent in the Dreaming a tiny fraction of his strength returned.
"How are you here?"
Hob stroked his back and held him close. Then he spoke with a soft voice.
"I've been looking for you Dream. For thirty years now."
Morpheus raised his head to look Hob in the eyes. He found them to be gray and old, too old for the face that looked as if it had seen no more than forty years of life. And in their depths he found the soft words to be true.
A tender feeling came to life in his chest at the knowledge that Hob cared enough to look for him for so long, even after Morpheus had stormed away from their last meeting. He relaxed completely into the arms around him and, even exhausted as he was, felt safer than he had for perhaps centuries. Or millennia.
And rested.
*
"Can you hear it?"
His voice was clearly audible now, stronger. He didn't know how long they'd been here, but he felt alive again. Stars shone in his eyes and were reflected in Hob's grey ones.
"Can I hear what?"
"The world. The people. They are screaming. And crying and shouting. And hurting each other."
"Yeah. I can hear something I think. Thought it was just the wind."
"The wind is in pain too. And the trees and the cats and the cities. Everything that can dream is in pain."
"... the cities? Yeah, fine- Why? What happened?"
"My dream-stone. My ruby, it was... Taken from me. I found it there, in the storage room, I- I touched it, but it-"
"Tell me."
"It did not belong to me any longer. It was changed. Tampered with. Turned against me. It stole so much of my power..."
"Is that why the world's hurting?"
"Somebody is using it to bring dreams to life. Nightmares. Somebody is pulling horrible things out of the collective subconscious and letting them out into the waking world. Primal things. Immoral things. Violent things."
"Jesus-"
"They are meant to stay in my realm. In the Dreaming, where they can play out as mere fantasies that cannot hurt the world, cannot plunge it into madness and chaos."
"Yeah, I heard it on the radio reports. There's planes and cars and trains crashed across the whole damn States. And firetrucks and ambulances racing everywhere, I saw them on my drive here, it was a miracle I even made it. And there was a dead woman in her car. Shot. Just here in front of the storage. I thought I'd gone mad."
"The world will go mad soon. I must stop it, I must rebuild the borders. If I fail then... Then there will be nothing left but Destruction and Death. They may both be kind in their own ways but... It is my duty to keep the borders. To separate the real from the unreal. It is my purpose. If I fail in that task then there is no use for my existence."
"Shit. Shit, okay, what do you have to do? Dream, tell me how I can help. Please."
"I need to reclaim my ruby. I do not know how. Still, I will find a way. I must. You Hob though, you cannot help me with this. Even though you choose not to die, you are still a mortal and this matter is beyond you. I would not risk your sanity for a task where you can offer me little assistance."
"Alright, I'm not gonna argue with that. But... I can still get you to your ruby. Do you know where it is?"
"Yes. I believe so. I can feel it, not far from where your body rests."
"Good. I'll get you there then."
A pause.
"Thank you."
"Dream, do you think you're strong enough now? To face whoever's got the stone? What if it takes even more of you than before?"
"I- I do not know Hob. I am still very weak. Yet I cannot linger here anymore. The world is in pain, Hob. Listen."
"I understand. Okay then... Wake me up."
Morpheus reached with a slender hand to touch his forehead. And whispered.
"Wake."
*
Morpheus felt the chill of the cold metal floor first, then the absence of a blazing fireplace as he crossed from Dreaming into Waking. Same as in Hob's dream though there was still the presence of a warm body, a moving chest beneath his head. He pressed himself closer to Hob, feeling alone without the familiar fabric of his realm around him. The rhythm of Hob's breaths stuttered as he woke, disoriented at first, then letting out a sigh when he remembered the conversation in dreams and what happened before.
"Ah. Dream, you here with me?"
"Yes."
"Good. Think you can get up?"
"Yes."
They pulled themselves up, Morpheus swaying a little on his feet, so Hob steadied him with an arm around his shoulders.
"Okay?"
He felt a brief flash of anger at the arm supporting him. He hated how weak he was, how Hob would pity him for it. Then he remembered his wounded pride a hundred and thirty years ago and his own foolish behaviour and felt ashamed of himself. Hob was here helping him, risking so much for him, he'd been searching the world for him for thirty years and Morpheus would resent him for that? He lowered his eyes, not wishing to catch Hob's grey ones.
He nodded.
"Let us go."
They made their way outside and into Hob's car. There was indeed another car there, a dead woman behind the wheel, shot in the head. Blood oozed down her face grotesquely. They tried not to look at her.
Past the wailing of the car horn and the sirens in the distance, Morpheus could hear the screams and the sobs as clear and piercing as if all those people were dying inside his mind. He guessed they were in a way.
Hob guided him towards the passenger's seat and sat him down carefully. Morpheus lowered his head and covered his ears with his hands. It did nothing to stop the noise that had grown deafening in the last minute. Hob climbed into the driver's seat.
"You can hear it all, can't you? Even here, outside dreams."
He nodded.
Hob started the engine and they drove off.
"So, where do we find it?" Hob asked.
"This is the right way."
"Okay."
They sat in silence for a while. Or at least it could probably pass for silence when Morpheus managed to lock the wailing world outside of his mind for a second. It never lasted more and always returned with another horrible scream.
Hob spoke again.
"Dream, isn't there anyone who could help you deal with this mess? I know there's gods, fairies, witches, demons, angels and whatnot out there for Christ's sake! One of them's gotta be able to help. Right?"
"They are mostly concerned with their own realms and are not prone to interfere in the business of the Endless. Besides, bargaining with them would take so much time, that the world would burn before we were finished."
"Oh..."
Another stretch of silence.
"And your family? The other Endless? Aren't there seven of you?"
Morpheus chose not to answer that question. Partly because he did not feel like talking about his siblings. And partly because he himself did not know the answer. Would they have come to his aid? Or would they have left him to deal with his mess on his own, like they always did? And he couldn't possibly ask Desire, not with the grudges between them still unresolved.
Hob asked no further questions.
"Here."
Hob stopped the car a distance away from the diner, to avoid perhaps being spotted by whoever was inside. Morpheus felt that it did not truly matter whether they were seen or not. He felt as if he were expected here. He moved to open the car door, then paused.
"Hob?"
Hob turned towards him and waited for the question.
"Hob I-"
He collected his scattered senses and tried again.
"I would like for us to meet again. If I- When I fix this. To talk."
He paused.
"And for me to apologise."
The words tasted bitter on his tongue as he said them, but in his heart he felt relieved. Hob gave him a gentle smile.
"Yeah, I'd like to see you again too. I've missed you."
Morpheus looked him in the eyes and felt a familiar sensation in his bones. A deep ache of a wish, a need making itself home within his soul. A deep burning need for Hob to reach across the distance that separated them and touch him. To cup his cheek perhaps as he had before, to run a hand through his hair, to pull him into a tight embrace. To kiss him. And the same longing to close the distance himself.
But none of these things happened. Morpheus knew that Hob refrained from touching, because he wasn't sure whether he was allowed, now that his friend had regained his strength. There was love there, he'd seen it, clear as any day, but the uncertainty was simply far stronger. A fear that he would lose his friend again were he to overstep the line like he had that night in the 19th century.
And Morpheus... Morpheus did not touch either, although he longed to feel again that sense of warmth he had found in Hob's arms. He did not touch, because he was afraid as well.
So he turned around and, opening the door with a quick movement, left without another word. As he walked towards the diner, he felt terrible fear gnawing at his heart.
He feared that this was the last time he would see his friend.
*
Hob watched him go in silence. His gait was certain enough, but he still stumbled on a couple of steps. He walked towards the diner and opened the simple glass door with a CLOSED sign hanging on it and disappeared inside. The stain across the sign looked disturbingly like a bloodied handprint. Hob tried not to imagine what had happened there, although he suspected he would hear about it on the news in the morning.
He pulled out a cigarette to calm his nerves. It took five attempts to light it, because his hands were shaking so much. He thought what a miracle it must have been that he'd been able to sleep back in the storage with the amount of stress his mind was under. He guessed that finding the pills had been another miracle. Or maybe he'd been just lucky that the dead woman had a bag full of medicine. Probably a nurse.
Damn lucky.
He let out another shaky breath of smoke and tried to relax. There was a flash of strange red light from the windows. Through them he could see illuminated, a severed hand stuck with nails to a marble counter. The stone wasn't so white anymore. There was a severed head on one of the tables and scattered on the floor, he could see glimpses of butchered bodies. Then the light was gone and the diner was hidden again in darkness.
He took another pull of his cigarette.
Why does this disturb me, he wondered. I've seen far worse stuff in my life. In battles as a mercenary. And later... on the slaving ships.
A breath.
I've woken up before, covered in someone else's guts. A few dead bodies is nothing new to me.
And another pull.
Maybe it's because... I know that something really damn powerful did this. Something that could hurt Dream.
He rolled down the window and let the ash fall on the road.
I get now there's stuff out there that could turn entire cities into graveyards. Yeah, I know that now. The things I'd met while searching for Dream...
Another drag of smoke. He could hear screams. He was quite certain they were coming from the inside of his head.
But all those insanely powerful beings, all the gods and aliens and shape-shifting cats- for Christ's sake- they all... Respected the Endless. Those seven entities that seemed to be running the show from behind the scenes, that no one's ever actually met, but everyone knew in some way that they existed.
He breathed out. The screams intensified. He chuckled.
To think that I was once enough of an idiot to consider myself and Dream the only two immortal beings. What a bloody fool you were Hob, what a bloody fool.
The cigarette had burnt out. He tossed it through the window.
He's gonna be alright. He is. He's the bloody- whassit called- anthropomorphic personification of dreams. And dreams don't die.
The diner remained dark and unmoving. He thought that he'd probably feel more at ease if that severed hand got up and waved at him through the window. And perhaps drew a smiley face in blood on the glass. At least then there'd be something to distract him.
He also thought quite calmly that he was going crazy.
He leaned out to look at the night sky. The stars shone bright and alive. He wondered whether they were indeed alive, if one could talk to them. Get to know them. Fall in love with them. Then he wondered, because they reminded him so much of Dream's starry eyes, whether his friend had ever met them. He was quite certain that the answer was yes.
He watched them for a while and remembered.
He remembered the first time he'd met Dream, some six hundred years ago. Looking back, he was amazed with himself at how normal he had considered the presence of a man with bone white skin and black eyes, dressed in the most luxurious gown, that would have put his royal highness Richard the Second to shame, in a stinking tavern.
He remembered a conversation a hundred years later:
"Yeah, the bastard's watered it down again, even admitted it this year! Says the frost killed half the vineyards and he wouldnt've had enough drink for everyone if he didn't do it. It's not like he actually needs an excuse, he's been at it for the last five years, even in 87 when the vintage was the best we've had in half a century."
"Indeed. Quite a shame, really. Greed so often spoils our enjoyment for the finer things."
"I take it you've got your cellars full of the best wine one can find- wherever you live then?"
"I do in fact. The last time Lucienne counted there were 75 barrels of The World's Finest Wine Straight from the Bosom of Virgin Mary. And another 97 barrels of The World's Most Watered Down Sludge. It always did puzzle me why humans would dream more often of drinking horrible wine..."
Hob attempted to stop cackling madly at his companion's perfectly straight-faced delivery of such ridiculous names. He failed.
"Well then, cheers to your cellars, mate! May they never hold The World's Most Ordinary Wine!"
When he lowered his glass, he noticed a tiny smile playing on the thin face. It made him look quite beautiful, he thought.
"I cannot compete with my youngest sister though. I believe she still has a few gallons of Green Mice and Hedgehog Urine Flavoured Wine. If she has not misplaced it since last I saw her."
Hob was quite proud of himself, that he'd managed to spit out his mouthful onto the floor instead of at Dream, when another bout of laughter shook him.
He remembered the fire casting deep shadows on the pale face as they spoke. He remembered finding himself drawn to the sight for reasons he couldn't properly understand back then.
And he remembered the feel of Dream's body in his arms, a gentle weight on his chest. He knew with certainty that even if he never got to hold him again, he would remember that forever.
There were no more screams.
Just peace.
Hob's head drooped onto his chest. He felt more tired than he had in ages.
The only noise is the gentle, even cadence of people asleep.
In, out, in, out.
Hob closed his eyes.
Listen.
And fell asleep.
You can hear it.
*