#dreamlessblurb

[sing-me-under]

Thinking about a fic idea from Dick’s POV about Jason taking his place at Bruce’s side except this is completely based on my own amalgamation of canon.

1.

It starts when Dick returns to Gotham post-Deathstroke hoping for some comfort and safety away from heroism for a bit and childhood familiarity with Bruce only to find out that not only did Batman have absolutely no clue Robin was kidnapped and assumed dead, Bruce had even taken in another kid with black hair and blue eyes. He’s only had Jason for like two months apparently, and they’re already making plans for adoption.

Probably the worst part about this whole thing is that Bruce didn’t even think about Dick, the kid he’d had for almost nine years at this point, at all. (Dick doesn’t acknowledge Bruce’s all-consuming fear for Dick’s safety in the entire almost nine years they known each other. He doesn’t think about how Bruce’s overbearing, over controlling tendencies was Bruce caring too much. It must have eaten at him, not knowing how Dick was. Jason will remember Bruce’s ever present concern for the Golden Child.)

Dick can’t bring himself to resent either of them. He was the one who destroyed all of Batman’s surveillance, yelled at Bruce for trying to keep an eye on him, then didn’t even check in to let Bruce know he was anything other than dead or alive. Of course Bruce wouldn’t know anything that wasn’t always public knowledge. The kid also idolizes Robin, and Dick wouldn’t begrudge a kid out of a safe and loving home just because it was his first.

Dick doesn’t even try. He just goes straight to Alfred then leaves later that evening with a tin of cookies for the Teen Titans.

2.

Some months later, Dick sees a Gotham Gazette article about “Robin spotted in Gotham!” with a super blurry smear of yellow, red, and green chasing after another blurry smear that kind of looks like Batman. Dick storms back to Wayne Manor, intending to bury the fuck out of Batman for letting his shiny new son use his name, only to find out that no, actually, the truth is a little more complicated than just that. Apparently, Batman got injured or whatever, and while he was on bed rest, some knock-off Batman was running around Gotham. Jason more or less grabbed a shitty Robin Halloween costume from some costume store (because of course there would be shitty Halloween costumes of irl heroes) and chased down the fake Batman. (I am so obsessed with pre-crisis Nocturna but I’ll hold myself back here)

Afterwards, Bruce begrudgingly agreed to accept Jason as a vigilante since this was like the third time Jason had stopped a crime all on his own (the first time being Ma Gunn’s crime school) and Bruce would really prefer Jason do crime fighting from the safety of Batman’s cape. By the time Dick saw the article and made his way to Gotham, Jason was still trying to design his own vigilante uniform and come up with names (his ideas are terrible). Dick is honestly so tired of being angry that he just sighs and goes “you know what, I want to cut all ties with Batman. It’s not like he wants anything to do with me either. Jason, do you want to be Robin?”

Dick becomes Nightwing, a kryptonian legend. Aside from the OG Titans and some of the founding JL members, Nightwing has no connections to Gotham and especially not to Robin.

Sometimes, Dick Grayson visits Alfred and goes back to Titans Tower with a bag of homemade food. Sometimes, he brings some soulless souvenir as a late/early birthday/holiday present for Jason. He avoids Bruce each time.

3.

When Jason died, Dick was on a mission in space. He missed the funeral by a whole month. When he found out, he and Bruce scream at each other about shit knows what. Something about how he deserves to know when a kid dies in his suit with his name. Something about how Dick didn’t even care about Jason. Something about how it all was Bruce’s fault. Neither of them remember the words exchanged, but it ended with Bruce slapping Dick and the menacing silence that followed.

4.

Things don’t get better. Tim appears, pulling Dick back to Gotham and saying “Batman needs Robin. He’s going to get himself killed.” Apathy buries the feeling of grieving a still living not-dad. He’s already crossed the stage of acceptance. Batman can die for all he cares. It’s not his job (not his place) to help Bruce.

Nightwing still gets roped into saving Batman from Two-Face. Tim still steals the Robin uniform and saves them both.

Batman looks at Tim. He’s done this song and dance before. He doesn’t even try to stop Tim and just goes “fine.” Nightwing thinks “I won’t let this one down. I’ll be a good brother, mentor, predecessor to this one. I’ll deserve to go to this one’s funeral.”

Bruce attempts to reach out one more time. Dick finds himself living closer to Gotham than he has in a long time. Undercover work makes his skin crawl — the blood on his hands never seems to wash off — but weeding out the Bludhaven Police Department feels almost like a vacation where he can pretend to be Dick Grayson, normal member of society, instead of Nightwing/Robin. (It’s the closest Bruce gets to being reassured of Dick’s safety.)

5.

Life goes by. Dick and Bruce fight again and again. Batman and Nightwing fight side by side and back to back. Bruce and Dick stitch each other up in the Batcave and let bygones be bygones.

The Red Hood appears. Dick never really knew Jason all that well. He wonders if Bruce ever thought his dearly departed son was capable of committing such atrocities. Barbara says Jason had a darkness in him even before. She refused to elaborate further.

Bludhaven gets nuked. Jason disappears.

Dick returns to Gotham, to Wayne Manor. While he heals, Bruce sits at his bedside and Tim and Cass cuddle up against him. They’re just a pile of bats and birds basking in each other’s presence and the steady heartbeats that prove they’re alive.

Dick realizes that he hasn’t heard Bruce laugh in a long, long time.

6.

Their life is hard. Things happen. Death happens. Life happens.

They’re all still alive. Somehow. Despite all attempts otherwise. Life has settled, kindly. Things aren’t getting worse. Sometimes, Dick thinks it might be getting better.

Dick sits with Jason at the kitchen table. They’re technically not supposed to bring mask stuff into the manor, but Dick is too immersed in this case to set it down while he makes a sandwich at 2AM. Jason is eating straight from the pickle jar. Dick know for a fact that Jason is only doing that because Dick can see him and he’s just being an asshole. Jokes on him. Dick is just happy Jason is alive and comfortable enough to be an asshole in stately Wayne Manor’s kitchen.

Dick doesn’t know what compels him, but completely unprompted, he says it anyway.

“I used to hate you.”

Jason doesn’t even falter. He just glances up, bites through his pickle, and deadpans,

“No shit.”

Dick can’t help but grin. “Yeah? I thought I was hiding it pretty well.”

Jason raises an eyebrow. “For my 13th birthday, you gave me a keychain from some NYC gift shop that spelled ‘J-a-c-e-n’.”

[sing-me-under]

I have unintentionally developed this whole post-Vol 2/pre-flashpoint timeline for Booster Gold and his little time travel family. There are three major components:

Rip Hunter is not around anymore. He’s not dead, obviously, but it’s reached a point in their personal timelines where they’re meant to separate. Rip can’t mentor the younger version of his dad forever nor should he. Booster has learned everything he needs to know from Rip, and now it’s time to part ways and make their own choices without the future influencing them. While Booster does occasionally come across younger and less experienced versions of Rip Hunter, all future Rips have effectively disappeared. Now separated, Booster sets up his own base elsewhere.

Booster and Michelle raise Rani in Neo-Gotham. Specifically the early 22nd century. This is Neo-Gotham at the end of Terry’s Batman career. It is more or less implied that sometime in the 22nd century, a nuclear war breaks out and gives way to the next dark ages. You can’t leave traces/ripples if they’re wiped from existence. Booster is still active in the 21st century by virtue of being an established hero there, but once keeping up appearances is over, he returns to the 22nd. Michelle stays in the 22nd century and just lives her life there.

Booster’s mystery future wife is Trixie Collins. After reuniting at some nebulous future date and going through a whole crisis together, Trixie can’t go back to her (unfulfilling) life, so Booster moves her to the 22nd century. At some point, she and Booster decide to act on the chemistry from their early years, and Rip is unintentionally conceived. Booster decides to retire from the 21st century hero scene, and they get married. But pretty early on, they realize that they’re not really romantically interested in each other. It’s partly acknowledgement of comphet society and that they’re both decidedly on the far side of the Kinsey Scale and also Booster is more or less too traumatized to truly emotionally connect to another person anymore. Booster and Trixie are still on good terms, so they stay married (and eventually come to consider each other best friends). And by virtue of being married, Trixie ends up getting more involved in Booster’s time cop thing and starts handling his logistics. They make a great team.

So from here, my brain came up with the following scenario:

Rani wants to become a superhero.

Rani-centric story idea under the cut. This one really got away from me.

The 22nd century is absolutely not a good time to get into heroics, and Rani knows that. That’s exactly why Booster chose it.

Rani has her own super power set, but it's not combat oriented. But there is this desire baked into her soul, so she takes a page (a whole chapter, really) from Booster Gold’s book. She steals a power suit and a time sphere and… doesn’t quite succeed as planned.

Instead of 1990s Metropolis, Rani finds herself in mid-21st century Gotham, the height of the legacy generation of heroes. Much to Rani's annoyance, Booster asked Nightwing and a not-quite-yet-retired Batman to keep an eye on her. It's mostly to prevent anyone else from solidly putting together that "Gold Star" is the infamous Booster Gold's daughter. Having the Bats' backing also means Rani isn't just plopped into the world with no legal records or emergency contacts.

Rani's story is mostly hijinks and heroics.

She's a D-list hero who frequently finds herself teaming up with other heroes, but she struggles to connect with any teams.

She keeps running into Legionnaires investigating some sort of intricate time travel plot and finds herself fighting alongside them to save the world. Unlike the 21st century heroes, Rani does connect with the 31st century heroes.

Sometimes, Rani also gets caught up in the Carter family business and gets swept away on a few time traveling adventurers with characters like Gold Beetle, a younger Rip Hunter (and Jack Soo), and even her baby brother, Junior.

In her downtime, Rani works part-time and does a few odd jobs here and there. Her saving grace is that she doesn't have to pay rent since she "inherited" Booster's townhouse.

Specific plot points include:

Booster's old JLI teammates immediately recognizing that Rani is Booster's daughter. They are equal parts glad that he's out there somewhere just living well instead of dead in a ditch, forgotten, and also hurt that Booster never introduced his family to them and that they had to find out from his teenage daughter.

In Time Masters: Vanishing Point #5, Booster warps their home to the end of time in order to lose the time assassins that had been chasing them. Time pirates also got to Rani in order to get the location of Vanishing Point from her, but she doesn't know it since Booster (with Trixie and Junior) abandoned the 22nd century shortly after Rani left. While the Carters frequently visit Rani, Rani doesn't have the means to visit them.

Rani overcomes her avoidance of the 31st century in order to save the world. While there, she becomes an official reserve member of the Legion. She returns to the 21st century anyway, not yet ready to give up on it.

Give me the Booster Gold: Convergence plot line, and Rani has to deal with the aftermath.. or maybe just ignore the whole Convergence thing and straight up rip off the time cancer subplot. Booster is bouncing through time uncontrollably, and Rani , Michelle, and an older Rip are chasing him down until they end up in the 90s (Rani finally gets a glimpse of the 90s and is disappointed) and find Booster in Ted's lab. Rani takes the place of N52 Booster in this. Everyone goes to Vanishing Point, and Booster transforms into Waverider. That has some wildly angsty potential.

The time cancer plot ends with Waverider returning everyone to their intended times. There's no universe-shattering crisis this time, so it's more like Waverider just isn't fully in-tune with his powers yet and fixed the anomalies by instinct rather than intent. It does mean that Rani finds herself in the 31st century and needs to be rescued from a dead planet and her own panic attack by the Legion.

Rani, fully attached to the Legion of Superheroes, officially-officially joins their group and decides to permanently stay in the 31st century as a hero.

Other notes:

There are also some implications that Booster may be nudging events in certain directions to keep the flow of time steady. Unbeknowst to Rani, Booster pre-programmed a different year and location for her to land in and disguised it as a glitch. He may or may have also arranged for some run-ins between her and some Legionnaires.

There’s a little hint at an abandoned Rani-centric plot thread towards the end of Vol 2. My guess is that there was supposed to be a 31st century arc for Booster Gold where he'd earn the trust and friendship of Braniac 5. I'm also guessing that Rani, who is shown to be a literal super genius, is more important than initially believed. She was probably supposed to be returned to the 31st century to fullfil some sort of essential role and subsequently not be adopted by the Carters because DC is allergic to happy parent-child relationships. I will be ignoring this guess.

Rani still has PTSD from Daxam's destruction and suffers from anxiety in her day-to-day. While she should have been returned to her intended place in the 31st century, she was too distressed by 1) being unadopted by Booster and 2) being in the time Daxam was destroyed and Emerald Empress is lose. Altogether, it was decided that Rani would stay with Booster and Michelle (and Rip as well, at the time). Either way, Rani refused to step foot in the 31st century, so Booster only ever brought his son of the two to visit Brainiac. Rani's knowledge of the Legion is restricted to what Booster and Junior have told her.

[sing-me-under]

Change

Here we go! It’s done! Much earlier than expected because I got my Apple Pencil replacement literally with a day instead of the week I was told it would take. So that’s cool.

Anyway, blurb under the cut because I’m posting this on the desktop site instead of mobile.

The name of this blurb in my notes is “Hot Iced Tea.”

It all started on a sunny autumn day.

A star fell from the sky and crash landed in the middle of a forest. No one saw it happen, and no one heard. No one knew that a star fell from the sky then stood up and wiped the dust and dirt off his shimmering ethereal form.

It all started when a lost star was discovered by a warrior of fire and ash.

On a beautiful autumn day, they fell in love.

That was the start.

Winter was the end of many things. A lot changed when winter came, and it didn’t stop changing as when winter continued. There was death and there was tragedy, and there was a lot to lose and suddenly nothing left to lose.

But through it all, at least they had each other. As factions splintered and relationships broke, Sapnap still had his fiancés. One day, they’d get married. Maybe it wouldn’t be the grand festival they planned before Doomsday, but no matter what, they still had each other. Even as the world crashed down around them, they still had each other.

It was the beginnings of spring when Sapnap noticed that Quackity’s work trip was going on for much longer than normal. Karl had even gone on two of his trips in that time, and he was getting ready to leave for a third. Sapnap asked Karl to look for their lost fiancé on his last journey, but when Karl returned, he pointedly avoided the topic. In all honesty, Karl avoided every topic  

The only thing preventing Sapnap from looking for Quackity on his own was that he had absolutely no idea where Q was. All he knew was that Quackity was far enough away that their comms weren’t connecting. By the time all spring flowers were in full bloom, Sapnap was too occupied in Kinoko to leave. All he had hope for was that Karl would come across Quackity somewhere or that George’s (increasingly infrequent) trips to the mainland would hear news from El Rapids.

Then summer came.

George was always asleep. Karl was gone more often than not. Quackity was still nowhere to be found.

Sapnap was given total control over an entire kingdom that was never meant to be his to run. He was its guardian, the head of militia, but he was never supposed to be in a position of power. He never wanted to.

So he sat alone as boiling heat waves ripped through Kinoko Kingdom. His naturally high body temperature meant he was used to his friends and family standing away from him during summer time, but this was a whole new form of isolation. It was far far too quiet.

And so summer went.

And autumn starts again.

This time, a love dies.

[sing-me-under]

The End?

Sketch Compilation of the world’s last moments. Please click on image for full resolution.

Above the infinite void, the glowing eyes of the legendary Ender Dragon stared down at a platform of obsidian.

She carried within her the Final Will of The End, the benevolent truth of The Universe. Did she know she would meet her demise to a god’s martyr?

George betrayed them. Just as they were about to catch Dream, George turned on them. The End was opened, and the hunters were nowhere near prepared to continue through.

So there they were, just outside the remains of the town where it all began. Staring up at a star-filled sky..

Sapnap was no stranger to war crimes, but he felt unnecessarily responsible for the destruction Karl caused. So in the ruins of a town that no longer was, Sapnap sat with the youngest survivor, and he wondered what would become of her after.

Despite the deafening silence of the ever growing Void, war continued to rage. It was a battle to delay the inevitable, whatever that ended up being.

Elsewhere in the world, people watched the sky shift and shake.

At ground zero

In an ordinary city

Across the world

For one night, magic was quiet.

In one silent night, a god killed magic.  

And as magic died in a blaze of light, the universe shattered.

[sing-me-under]

The Clock On The Library Wall

Time was a strange thing. It certainly functioned, but it wasn’t the most reliable.

Sometimes, it moved slowly. Sometimes, it moved way too fast. Sometimes, days would pass in a blink, and sometimes, a year felt like centuries.

The sun rose and set. Plants grew and animals grew and people died.

That was time. Infinite, yet never enough.

There was a clock on the wall. There were actually a lot of clocks all over Karl’s library, but this clock was special. This one single clock on this specific section of this one wall was different from all the other clocks in the library.

This clock told the truth.

While all the other clocks lied, telling whoever looked at them whatever time they wanted it to be, this clock always told the truth. When even the very fabric of the universe lost track of time, this clock always kept pace. Through every dilation and deletion and reversion and continuation, this clock ticked on.

No one knew, of course. They always assumed it was a faulty clock, if they even saw it at all. The only person who would recognize the clock for what it was never even noticed it, too absorbed in the endless fog of shifting time to find the only ray of clarity that remained.

And so the clock ticked on.

And on.

And on.

[sing-me-under]

Been thinking about FundyWasTaken and the Dreamon Hunters bit again recently. When I was really deep into my AU, the only way I could rationalize that bit was to just split Fundy into two characters: c!Fundy Soot, son of c!Wilbur Soot, and Dage (short for Fundage) Wastaken, ex-fiance of c!Dream. Dage is like 70% an OC at this point but it’s still basically Fundy.

I’m going to rant about my AU’s timeline for Dage because I put way too much effort into this crack idea.

I had this idea that Sally and Dage were siblings (both salmon hybrids) and also dreamon hunters because I really loved the fics where Sally was a pirate on c!Puffy’s ship prior to crashing in the SMP. (Does anyone else think it’d be so fucking interesting if c!Puffy was a dreamon hunter despite having adopted Dream? Like, the narrative irony would be ridiculous. From my understanding, dreamons are thought to possess players, but I’ve always held the hc that Dream himself is a dreamon.) Anyway, Sally settled down in the port town that would become L’Manberg and would meet Wilbur. Meanwhile, Dage would continue his dreamon hunting.

Dage would meet up with his sister every so often in Dream’s SMP. (That’s also how he’d met c!Dream in the first place. They’d keep in contact and get engaged but it’s a long-distance engagement because of Dave’s wanderlust. DNF isn’t canon the SMP, but the age old mutual longing that just never worked out that is very much there. c!George gets married to Ninja later anyway.)

Dage would also be there when c!Wilbur showed up with c!Tubbo and c!Tommy. Tommy avoided Wilbur and Sally’s courtship like the plague to do his own thing in The Community (better known as the original Greater SMP but for world building, I call it The Community), and Tubbo more or less became Dage’s apprentice and left the SMP for a bit. When Tubbo came back, that’ll be when he’s officially joined the SMP.

Tubbo returns to the SMP because Sally just divorced Wilbur and left c!Fundy in Wilbur’s care. At this point, Fundy is a little older, around 10-12-ish. Fundy grew up listening to stories about his really cool dreamon hunter uncle, and when he decided to transition, he chose Fundage as his new name. To distinguish him, Sally called him Fundy.

This all accumulates to the Dreamon Hunter arc where Tubbo is certain that Dream’s been possessed. He tried to exorcise Dream on his own, commits Fundy follows after him, curious about the trade his namesake uncle taught Tubbo. They also drag Sapnap into it. After failing and seemingly widening the situation, Tubbo calls in his mentor, and Dage is like “Oh no! My fiancé!” Dream has since realized he’s fucked up and pretends to be successfully exorcised through the power of love.

Anyway, after all this drama is finally over, Dage decides to finally settle down and properly have a wedding. It’s this massive extravagant thing outside of the SMP because of Dream’s SMP’s technological limitations. Dream realizes that he can’t keep lying to Dage, constantly on this tightrope of survival with Damocles sword threatening to ruin everything, so he runs away from the altar and pretends to elope with George.

Thus worsening Dream’s already precarious emotional state 😀

Dage also proceeds to never return to the SMP. Maybe he sends like a birthday present to Fundy once a year, but without Sally there and a broken relationship with Dream, he had no reason to return.

Anyway, thanks for reading! This was probably completely incomprehensible but I’m glad I’ve finally got it out of my system. I’ve been holding onto this for YEARS. Better late than never lol. Might post more Hero’s Journey AU again. This AU is my child

[sing-me-under]

So I made a timeline that spans from Bruce's birth all the way to (events inspired by and roughly dated to) Fear State. 45 whole ass years, my dude.

This whole thing spun off from the concept of “Murder Proto-Batman." This timeline was originally conceived for a fanfiction idea I had last year where the Batfam has to deal with Bruce being periodically de-aged and the startling revelations thereof. It has since taken on a life of its own. The original fic has long been set to the side, but now that I've spent a whole month of my life procrastinating my college hw by working on this 28k+ word timeline, I think I might continue procrastinating by picking up that fic idea again. Who knows. You can have this in the meantime.

There's also some character notes I put at the end. Those are subject to be changed and updated, but I think I've spent enough time on the timeline itself.

NOTE: This is a chaotic blend of fanon, pre-crisis, N52, Rebirth, and everything in-between. Canon is my playground and reality is a sandcastle. The very basis of this fic is inherently AU.

[sing-me-under]

“I didn’t ruin everything,” Tommy murmured.

“You did—“

“Shut up.” Tommy stood firm despite the burning pain of his revival. He didn’t have a weapon anymore. He was completely unarmored against Dream and Punz’s blades. Even so, he stared Dream dead on.

“I know better now. I understand you better. You’re a terrible person who’s done terrible things, and you don’t regret any of it. No, you- you enjoyed it. That’s why everyone sided against you. That’s why you’re still alone here and now.

Maybe I was the one started this, and maybe if I hadn’t been so stubborn, you wouldn’t have gone as far as you did. Maybe this whole everything was my fault, like you and everyone says it is, and I’m sorry. I’m sorry for the shit I’ve done, and I’m sorry pushing it to this point… But Dream, I am not responsible for your actions. That wasn’t my fault.”

[sing-me-under]

(Context: Dream’s shapeshifting was fucked up in his last respawn, so he’s stuck in his original form.)

Dream: Please be gentle with me-

Sapnap: Shut the fuck up! No bullshit. What the fuck did you do to Dream?

Dream: …

[sing-me-under]

“I’m sorry,” he said.

I’m sorry that this is what you’ve become.

I’m sorry you made the wrong choices.

I’m sorry there weren’t any others.

I’m sorry for what you’ve lost.

Hope was lost when the tragedies were released unto the world. Yet here it was, a mere glimmer within Pandora’s Box. Hope made itself known in the understanding that there was another choice that could be made.

All they needed to do was release it.

I’m sorry that this is how it ends.

“It’s too late.”

(And just like that, in a flash of ringing white, it was like Pandora’s Box was never opened to begin with.)

You wake up. This is the world. This is the universe. There is the innate urge to make shelter.

There is a tree. That will be the start.

Someone comes up to you.

“Hey.”

“Hi.”

There is someone else watching in the distance. Why is he just staring?

You know that surviving will be easier with others you can trust.

“Wanna build a base or something?”

The person makes an amused noise.

“You wanna be friends?”

[sing-me-under]

Dream: Velvet, why?! Wait… no. Who are you?

Crimson!Velvet: No need for you to know dreamon, oh, harbinger of The End

Guess who has no self control. This one was just supposed to be a sketch to establish a scene I was stuck on. This scene is the reason I put Hero’s Journey on hiatus despite the fact that I had the entire plot down, but an alteration to my Dream design recently was the missing piece… So here’s me working on my pre-canon fic again.

[sing-me-under]

Questions

Kinoko was mostly inhabited by the newer members of the SMP. Aside from George, Sapnap didn’t really interact with any of the other traumatized denizens.

Sometimes he’d visit Niki every other month or so about trade negotiations since their nations were right on top of each other, but it was dry and impersonal with a buffer of maybe two or so others as council. Sapnap saw Foolish every now and again, but the builder was becoming a rarer sight as his attention went to other things.

Sapnap hadn’t seen Tommy in a long time. The kid sent a message now and again to reassure that he was alive, but that was all Sapnap knew about that.

Everyone else was exactly where they always were, scattered to the winds in their respective safe havens, just like Sapnap was. From Snowchester and the Badlands south and east of the mainland to the Arctic Commune in the far northwest, Sapnap never interacted with any of them.

He sometimes wondered how they were doing nonetheless. Was Tubbo getting support as a single parent? Had Bad and Skeppy made up after the Egg? Was Sam still guarding the prison? How was Eret running the Greater Kingdom on their own? Did Antfrost reopen the animal sanctuary? Was Punz still in business as a merc?

Where was Karl?

How was Quackity?

One of those questions was easier to ask than the other, but both were equally as difficult to answer.

When did it all go wrong?

[sing-me-under]

Researchers and their Bodyguards

George grabbed Dream by the hand and dragged him towards a massive building east of the royal palace. Sapnap pulled out a card from a chain inside his shirt and took his time sticking it against a seemingly bland wall. With a heavy shift of gears and the crackle of redstone powder and pistons, the wall caved in to reveal a set of stairs.

It was  a smooth display of red stone engineering.

“Awesam Dude is one of the leading engineers in the kingdom,” George explained with poorly veiled excitement. “Every redstone masterpiece in this city is his design. You have to meet him, especially since the guy we’re here for works across the hall from Sam.”

“Sam’s a really cool dude,” Sapnap continued. “He’s also the only one who knows about George’s little eye thing.”

“Sorry, I’m colorblind,” George deadpanned in response.

Dream couldn’t help but wheeze out a laugh. The hunters dragged him through the building even as he struggled to breathe at how irrationally funny the joke was.

He finally caught his breath as they approached a door labeled “Velvet S. Cake” with the smaller “Mad Scientist” labeled underneath.

“Before you ask,” Sapnap said as he gripped Dream’s arm. “Velvet did request that label.”

George knocked on the door. There was a loud shuffle and a crash from behind the door before it was thrown open.

A red-haired human grinned at them. “George! Sapnap! Welcome back! Is this the guy?”

Dream gave Velvet a small wave. Upon closer look, Velvet was probably something more than human — maybe vampire if the fangs are any indicator.

“I’m Dream.”

“Hello, Dream!” Velvet cheerfully greeted. “Big fan of your work. Come in! Come in! Don’t mind Ant. He’s my assistant.” He stepped aside with a playful wink. giving the trio a good look at the room.

A cat with human proportions sat on the edge of the office table. He waved at the newcomers. That was probably Ant.

Ant didn’t stick around though. He gave Velvet’s hand a quick squeeze then left the room.

(Snippet from Hero’s Journey, Chapter 4)

[sing-me-under]

Rambling Thoughts At Sunrise

Kinoko was a peaceful place. Pretty, but quiet.

The citizens of Kinoko were mostly new to the SMP. They were kinder and and spoke softly. They filled in creeper holes and talked out their problems instead of drawing swords. Instead of sharpening blades and stacking TNT, they spun lace from gold and made fancy pottery.

Sapnap thought that this was what Soot had strived for. Words over weapons. Art over armor. Bullshit like that. Although it wasn’t really bullshit now, was it? Somehow Sapnap, of all the people in the SMP, ran a kingdom that was just that. (And it was him who kept the kingdom running. George was always asleep, and Karl was always somewhere else. At best, Tina and Callahan kept Sapnap from making poor decisions.)

But Kinoko wasn’t really like Soot’s idealized nation. L’Manberg was loud and chaotic with their nonsense folk songs, and it always smelled like blaze powder and mud. It was fun and exciting and strange. If Sapnap could turn back time, he’d chose to let them be in that flaming hot dog van. They weren’t hurting anyone back then. They were just being pains in the ass.

Maybe that made Kinoko better than L’Manberg. They weren’t hurting anyone, and they weren’t being annoying or obtrusive or pissing off The Man because there was no Man to piss off. All there was a bunch of soft-spoken artists in giant mushroom houses and one reclusive war veteran who protected them from nothing.

Maybe instead, Kinoko was more like the early days of the SMP, back when the only building was the Community House. It was quieter back then too, but maybe that was just because there was only eight of them trying to make something of a life in the middle of the wilderness. Sapnap thought fondly of those days. Kinoko was a lot like the original community, except without animal murder and shitty architecture and an admin that needed to be knocked down from his high horse (although in retrospect, that backfired pretty badly).

As the sun rose and the streets came alive, as Sapnap watched it all from afar, Sapnap wondered if this was Happiness.

[sing-me-under]

Perpetuity

There was something about a cabinet packed with an ever-growing collection of mugs.

It was the same something as the dedicated box for the half-sliced bread loaf or the wall hooks carrying net bags of organized fresh produce. It was the dishes stacked neatly in the sink and the neighbor's wicker basket of dwindling pastries.

Connor had come home for a visit. He was like a whirlwind, dropping by and then departing just as suddenly. In the aftermath, Dream was left with emptier pantries, an extra plate to clean, and another mug to add to the cabinet.

Dream cradled his son's pitiful attempt at pottery. It was uncomfortable to sip from, but the hot cocoa was still warm. There was something about it all that warmed his heart too.

He smiled.

It was an idyllic life.

(Snippet from Chapter One of Hero’s Journey)