#Support: Flora | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

bleue-flora · 3 months ago

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just realized i’ve been following your work for over 2 and a half years

Wait… really?! Have I even been here that long? Wow. You must have been here from the beginning then. Well, for real, thank you for sticking around and supporting me. :) It’s been a crazy ride, anon, and I’m glad I have been able to entertain you along the way. <3 <3 <3

Yeah, I just checked and looks like I posted the first chapter of my first ever fanfiction on November 5, 2022 after being encouraged by @monsoonrays to post the scene I wrote of Dream’s Twitter space scrapped lore because I just wanted to know what it could have been like and since I didn’t find many people writing it, I decided to do it myself lol. I didn’t necessarily plan on sharing it though, it was more so just for me and I never intended to write more, the other three chapters just kinda happened after the Las Nevadas stream gave me staged duo brain rot (I’ve never recovered)…

But ya know I figured maybe what’d be really fun to look at, now that we’re getting all nostalgic, is my very first draft just to see how far I’ve come and just to say, don’t let your grammar or verbiage or whatever keep you from writing, because you can edit, and improve, and get help, and ya know it’s also okay to have scuffed grammar or not be the best writer. For years I didn’t write because I thought I couldn’t, that I was bad at it, that I wasn’t creative enough, that my grammar and spelling were too bad to be a writer. And now, despite adhd, dyslexia, and a reading comprehension disorder, I have posted 182,135 words to ao3. In large part thanks to y’all’s support and encouragement and appreciation. <3 <3 So, to anyone who needs to hear this, don’t let your weaknesses hold you back. I thought I couldn’t write, I thought I couldn’t draw people, I thought I couldn’t make a cool YouTube video. And yet, here I am, over 2 years later, with 4 figure art pieces, 9 ao3 posted works and a couple cool YouTube videos (not to mention a crap ton of Tumblr essays lol…)

And without further or do let’s go back to the beginning, back to my brain in October 2022, during the height of senior engineering midterms and still recovering from a concussion…

Scrapped Lore - Ch 1 of Hell in a Box

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Thoughts racing in his head as he follows the coords his ally has provided. The gentle wind brushing surprisingly cold sand against his armor. A feeling of confidence and protection engulfing him with his netherite. His smug grin hidden under the mask. He didn’t have this before. Let’s see how Quackity does in a fair fight. Before he knows it, he’s arrived at his destination. A stair case before him leading to what appears to be an underground base. Quackity’s name tag is below, so Dream enters. Despite the growing unease in his chest. Despite the fear creeping its way up his body. He ignores the warnings of the inside voice telling him to run, as he pursues, revenge consuming his mind.

He makes his way down the stairs into the darkness and before he can even think or take in his surroundings, it’s raining potions, the all too nostalgic sound of glass shattering, running a shiver down his back. Weakness. Blindness. Nausea. Harming. His knees buckle, his body collapses. The world appears to be spinning as if tilted on its axis. His vision begins to go dark, and he just hopes that what he sees is a drug caused hallucination. That the rough dark obsidian and the old familiar room is just his mind running with panic, playing tricks on him, joining the chemicals swimming through his veins. It wasn’t.

Slowly Dream’s mind begins to make its way back to consciousness and into his body. Before he opens his eyes, he can feel the thick coarse texture of rope wound tight against his skin. From head to toe he’s tied in a cruel-fully painful manner. In what seems to be a rather excessive amount of rope. Almost as if the person or persons were deeply afraid of his escape. They are right of course to be afraid. He’s not the bloody, weak, frail thing he was in prison. Well not completely, anyways. Around his neck, lies rope tightly attached to his hands, constraining a good amount of his already limited air flow. Adding to the anxiety and panic making its way through his lungs. He’s completely restricted in his attempts to escape, all movement tugging at the rope around his neck. He can’t breathe. His hands pulled through the wooden bars of the back of a chair, tied behind him and the oh so nostalgic feeling of the wooden chair beneath him. Well, ain’t this familiar. It’s not made for torture though, no armrests to bind his hands for removing nails, no smell of blood stains on the wood. Yet. But it’s not The chair, and as pathetic as it sounds he can’t help but be a little comforted by that fact. That observation keeping him sane. It’s not the same. It’s not the same. It’s not the same. He’s not back. He made it out. He’ll make it out again. Maybe.

Thrown out of his thoughts, he realizes that he can hear voices. Through his head is pounding headache, a likely result from the shear about of drugs in his system, he can make out the distinct voice of Quackity and Sam speaking on what to do with him. What he wouldn’t give to never hear their voices again. Never hear his name from their lips. Yet here he is, again, tied to a godforsaken chair ready for another session with his tormentors. Armor-less. Alone. Helpless. It’s like nothing has changed, his weeks of healing vanished at the scene. He can’t make out the whole conversation but focusing he make out, “Should we just kill him?…Can’t put him back now….We should kill him the same way he did you…Don’t you want revenge, Sam?...I say it’s time for someone else to lose an eye to a fucking pickaxe!... Let’s do it with the same one, his, oh the irony!...” His ears specifically pick up the all too familiar, sadistic gleeful tone of Quackity, sending an involuntary shutter through him. As he feared, they’re going to kill him. What a waste, months of torture, isolation, starvation and for what? For them to put him out of his misery now. What’s the point? It can’t have all been for nothing! He can’t have made it through this year, just to die here, bound to this chair at the scene of his endless nightmares, like he never left.

He hears footsteps leading away from him, an angry yet cheerful rhythm that he immediately recognizes as Quackity. Despite the circumstances, he can’t help but feel relief at the distance gained between him and his torturer. The nostalgic sound of redstone activating, signaling his exit, and probably bringing down the lava wall.

Reluctantly Dream’s eyes open and he peaks with a sense of dread washing over him. Please don’t let it be real. Please be a dream. Unfortunately, to his dismay, a lava wall falls before him, blocking his exit, the far too reminiscent sound of its loud flow buzzing in his ears. Oh, how he wishes it would stop! Oddly, he’s not sure how to feel. If he should be horrified to be trapped yet again by the warm liquid or glad that it’s blocking out Quackity. But he can’t help but feel relieved. The familiar lava, his twisted form of protection, yet again. Not that it’ll last.

He’s positioned in the middle of the cell room and his initial observations prove his suspicions correct. Oh, how he wishes he was wrong. The chest, the cauldron, the purple tears falling from the ceiling, even the crying obsidian seems to be placed in the exact same spots. He would know. It’s all a bit too real, too reminiscent. He can feel the rough obsidian pressed against the soles of his scarred bare feet. It can’t be the vault though. He has the key, it’s his. His hell turned home. His vulnerability turned protection. He’s not afraid. It doesn’t matter. It’s not the room he fears it’s his situation. And yet, he can’t help but feel the dread and fear crawl its way through him at the sight of the replica before him.

Taking in his surroundings, he hears the other pair of boots grumpily trot closer until what he knows to be Sam is standing rather close to him. Sam hasn’t noticed he’s awake yet, or he is ignoring him. He has mastered that skill after all. He never listened before. He never gave into mercy while hearing his screams. But he’s not the same Sam. He’s not the Warden anymore. This is different! There’s a chance.

So, as a last straw to save his neck once again, he thinks up what to say. Manipulation is his strength after all, even if he’s minutes away from a full blow panic attack, Even if it’s life or death. Oh, how this feels like de ja vou. He made Sam his bitch after all, he can do this.

Breaking the comfortable silence, Dream mumbles still kinda out of it, “S-Sam…”

Sam’s head immediately whips around, to him, locking his gaze. Meeting the crazed smily mask sending an involuntary shutter down his spine at the sight of his murderer. That’s quickly accompanied by a satisfied grin making its way up his face at the man’s predicament.

“Look—look who’s awake!… Dream, the most 'powerful' man on the server, bound helplessly to a chair, again. Who’s the idiot now?” Sam smirks back.

Despite his words, Dream can see the uneasiness in his form, his facial expressions not fully matching his words. Ignoring Sam’s bait, Dream instead causally asks, tone smooth and surprisingly calm, “How—how have you been Sam?”

Sam rightfully taken aback by the friendly coolness in Dream’s tone, looks at the man again, vision a bit blurry at the sight of the haunting smile. Without realizing he mindlessly utters, “Good I guess… I mean—What do you—?… You—you killed me Dream! What do you mean how have I been?” His confused tone turning loud and angry with great momentum.

Unfazed by the revelation, Dream reasons back, voice steady, despite the slight tremor in his hands and the suppressed flinch at the raised voice, “To—to be fair… I only killed you once and you know, you can be hurt about it, but that—that was justified. You abused your power over me in prison, so I took a life. Quackity took time out of his day to visit me, for months, just to inflict pain and misery” Joyfully fulfilling his cruelest fantasies. Doing unspeakable things that not even the darkest nightmares could come up with. Things not even Dream would have ever considered. The Unfathomable, Indescribable, creativity in making hell on earth. “So you know, I came here to kill him…” Dream pauses, Quackity’s name on his tongue sending involuntary shivers down his back and a hitch in his shallow breath. He doesn’t say how he’s just hoping this will help him sleep through the night for once. Or how he’s desperately grasping at something to mend his broken mind and body. How he’s trying to feel safe instead of afraid.

Finding his voice again, “All of us—all of us have our reasons. You know, we are all right from our point of view… But I would say that—that the books are balanced between us. You know, I’ve left you alone. I released you from Tubbo’s imprisonment. I fed you steak, cake and even—even golden apples when they left you to starve. You know, I haven’t destroyed anything on the server. I haven’t imprisoned or tortured or waged war. All I’ve done is try and live, hunted down like—like an animal by the entire server.”

“Oh come on, Dream, don’t act all innocent. We both know you’re not.”

Annoyed, Dream responds coolly, “Innocent? No one’s innocent, Sam. Not—not you. Not me. Not Quackity. N-not anyone! You know, we all have enemies. We’ve all wronged each other for our own reasons. But I’m not your enemy. I’m not the—not the bad guy. I’m not—I’m not pure evil.”

“So you say... I should— I should just what?… Let you go because you 'let me off easy' because you’re not—not evil?…” Sam’s voice rising again, ebbing with mock pity. A stroke of anger burning in him, “You haven’t—you haven’t yet? As if that’s a comfort! As if that washes your slate clean! As if I can leave here and not fear you coming after me, the rest of the server… and T-Tommy! As if—as if you didn’t murder me while I was defenseless, after I gave you access to the prison!”

Dream suppresses a wince from the tone and for the briefest moment fear, panic and anger pass across his face. No one notices.

In a much more hushed defeated tone Dream somewhat desperately voices, “You know. he’s—he’s going to kill me, Sam.”

Silence falls between the two for a brief moment, before Dream continues, “He’s going to—he’s going to take my last life… and you know unlike your death, he’s going to drag it out to a painfully slow degree. Butchering me like I’m—I’m nothing but a cow for his dinner… I’m a person, Sam, a member of this smp. I may—I may not be the 'good guy' b—but you know I’m not the big bad they make me out to be and neither are you.”

“I’m not like you! Of course, I’m—I’m not the bad guy!” Sam states firm, voice shaking from that last insinuation.

Dream lowers his head, the yelling is really not helping his ponding headache nor his panic. It’s all a bit too familiar to everyday in his cell. Him trying to reason with the Warden Sam for any spec of mercy. Being denied because ‘he deserves it.’ He made the rules of the prison after all.

Another moment of silence passes between them. Dream barely keeping at bay the sense of dread rising through him, the feeling of defeat and hopelessness washing over him. His hindered breath becoming more and more labored as his body holds still, waiting for what’s to come. He’s running out of time and Sam wasn’t budging, not that Dream’s surprised. Just as stubborn as always in his righteousness and fury. Still intent on allowing the walls to be painted with Dream’s blood for his wrongdoings.

His panic just continues to get worse the longer he’s here. Trapped in a perfect replica of the cell that backdrops the scenes of his never ending nightmares. He wonders if maybe insanity has really taken him over. Maybe Punz was right that one can only endure so much before they crack. That people have limits before they break. Because right now he can’t help but smile. Maybe it’s the lack of oxygen making it to his brain. Maybe it’s because he’s finally greeting death like a friend. Maybe because he too can see the sadistic irony of his situation. Maybe because what else can he do after all, that’s what his mask made him, a smile. Nothing more. Nothing further than the smooth white surface. A seemingly sadistic pleasure painted on. No man behind the mask. Just a simple smile for all to see. A monster to haunt nightmares. An emotionless, unfeeling predator without motivations. But don’t predators also have motivations and reasons? Aren’t predators also prey? Don’t snakes bite to protect themselves and their nest? Not to be cruel but out of necessity and instinct.

Insanity or not, Dream can feel himself slipping into the darkness but he is nothing if not stubborn. He’s nothing if not desperate to live. Even when it would be easier to let go. Even when death would be a mercy. Even at the times when life was endlessly unbearable. He’ll be damned if he lets Sam feel like the good guy in his last moments. If he lets Sam and Quackity keep their hypocritical, self righteous, satisfied smiles at the sight of his misery.

So Dream, face stretching into a grin, mutters under his breath, “P—Prove it.” A challenge, born of desperation and anger.

“W—What?” Sam voices, caught off guard by the end in silence.

“You know, prove that you—that you are not the bad guy!” Dream lifts his head to meet Sam’s gaze and smugly smiles under the mask. Because if he doesn’t he might just let the sobs of fear and despair escape him. An anxiety attack of anguish held back only by his pride. Because if he doesn’t smile, maybe Sam won’t see him as the strong and dangerous monster but as a human being.

“Prove that you aren’t me or Quackity. That you wouldn’t kill an unarmed man to satisfy revenge. That you know—you are good and do things for the good of others... If I —I die today the revive book dies with me. Can you really say that’s for the best? That you know… that—that price is worth paying for revenge?

An deathly silence falls again. Sam pauses in his pacing to look at Dream. Meeting his gaze, Dream can see that Sam’s face shows he’s thinking about and considering something. At the sight, Dream can’t help but feel a fragile hope build in his aching chest. That perhaps today won’t be his last. That perhaps people do change. Perhaps there is such thing as mercy. But he can’t fully embrace it, because he knows he could lose that hope in an instant. The one attachment he could never seem to sever and loses far too often anyways. He clings to it desperately watching Sam’s every movement. Holding in what little oxygen he can get in his lungs, ready to release with either relief or despair.

Sam begins to move again, seemingly making up his decision and pulls out his sword with one smooth movement. Sending uncontrollable panic through Dream. Breathing becoming impossible, mind and sight losing focus as Sam approaches, sword in hand. This is it. Sam’s going to kill him. Perhaps this is the mercy he deserves. Sam will be quicker than Quackity at least. The sword comes up under his chin pushing his head up to face Sam’s glare. He can’t look though he doesn’t want the last thing for him to see to be his former friend’s righteous fury. Disappointment. Disgust. Or whatever emotions clear on his face depicting his intent to kill him off for the last time. A red drop of blood falls slowly down his neck at the sword’s pressure, but then there’s the sound of rope being cut, releasing the painful pressure from around his throat. He finally breathes, looks up, and meets Sam’s eyes. Oh? Is that regret?…pity?… Doesn’t matter. It’s not anger, it’s not self righteous fury, it’s not the look intent on taking one’s final life. If he squints hard enough he can even see his former friend’s gaze. At the sight, Dream can’t help but feel the ghostly warmth of Sam’s hug and smile at the past memories. Of fishing together on the docks of the house he once built. Sam’s laughter and ambitions filling his ears, tearing through his already mangled heart. A brief moment of actually good memories filling his head, a welcomed change. And then it’s gone, a mere second over, Sam’s face replaced with one of determination as he continues to saw through the rest of the ropes, seemingly intent on not nicking Dream with his sword in the process but failing in some places. He’d be lying if despite the ropes being cut, the sword’s proximity was still causing slight panic that only worsened when Sam moves behind him. But then it was over, his hands free, already beginning to regain some feeling in them. Sam turns, flicks a lever the all too nostalgic sound of the lava lowering, opening his way out. Or his torturer’s way in. He turns to Sam who’s not making eye contact with him, and whispers a hushed hesitant, “thank you” before bolting out of the room.

Not wanting to test his luck any further. He makes his way to the light, just in time too, as he sees Quackity making his way through the desert back to the entrance. He sneaks around, narrowly missing Quackity’s line of sight and speedily goes from corner to corner hiding from sight best he could. He may be out, but he’s still screwed. He has no armor. No weapons. He has nothing. It’s at this point when the panic that subsided comes back full force. The sound of an alarm begins to go off as a message appears in the chat calling for everyone to search Las Nevadas for him. Fuck. Looking around he spots a cave and runs like there’s no tomorrow, because there may not be one toward the nearby cave.

Slumping down the wall as he attempts to pull air into his lungs as fast as possible. Adrenaline and anxiety adding to his already out of shape body making it really hard to breathe. His mind going through a million plans of how to escape the city, when he hears a voice that sends an involuntary shiver down his back. The former president’s propaganda about him ringing in his ears, he spins round to meet Wilbur’s gaze, who whispers confused, “Why are we hiding?”

Here’s the link to read what happens next and the current version which has like another 1000 or so more words cuz ya know, I can’t help but add angst :)

#what happened to the punctuation? why are some things bold and not? I got no idea….. lol #and looks like I my first dsmp Tumblr post was back in April 11th 2023 where Dreamcatcher was put in a poll against NEFTW and I was estacti #like you can’t even compare me to that but it was so cool #dreblr #dsmp #c!dream and c!sam #scrapped lore #c!dream #flora writes things #hello there #but seriously thanks for the support I’m glad I can have entertained you over these years and you’ve enjoyed my madness :) <3 #… wow I feel old now I really can’t believe it’s been so long…

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