Wild

Chapter 20

"Dream! Are you awake yet?!" Dream jolted awake at the loud noise, immediately squeezing his eyes shut at the painful throb in his head. He mumbled a colorful collection of words as he turned away from whatever was making such a racket. shoving his face further into the pillow he was laying on, hoping whoever was calling his name would give up.

"C'mon Dream the suns been out for hours now, are you planning on sleeping the day away?"

Dream sighed against the soft pillow, reluctantly lifting his head up and squinting at the person standing a few feet away. It took a few minutes of slow blinking before his vision cleared enough to see where he was. He was laying on the couch in the living room, closest to the warm fireplace. There wasn't much of a fire going anymore, just smoldering cinders now.

Wilbur was standing next to the kitchen counter, rummaging through an old satchel that was laying on the counter. It was a roughly stitched together thing, made of a soft dark brown cloth with gray stitches messily making it into a bag. Wilbur seemed to be filling it with a random assortment of objects. He could see the black string of Wilbur's hook sticking out of the bag, and a couple jars of water. And what looked like an old piece of paper with all kinds of colors scribbled on.

The thick fog in his head was slowly clearing, allowing him to piece together what was happening. Wilbur was leaving, going on a scouting trip to a nearby common Nomad stopping point. They were hoping to see how recently it was used so they could figure out if they needed to catch up or head back along the route to meet the Nomads in the middle. Dream was pretty sure there was a hideout near here, two days travel to get to it and two days to get back.

And that old piece of paper with scribbles on it was actually a map, one he made to help Wilbur find the hideout. They had initially planned to go together on the trip, but with Dreams leg injury they figured it was safer for Wilbur to go on his own.

Dream slowly pushed himself away from the cushions, regretting the immediate loss of warmth. He wasn't sure why but he just felt so cold, even with the cinders letting off their warmth. And his eyes felt heavy, like all the sleeping he did last night didn't even make him feel a bit rested.

"Dream, are you gonna be good while I'm gone?" Dream snorted, turning to look at him. "No, because I didn't spend the 22 years of my life surviving just fine on my own" his response was a bit sharper than he intended, but the pounding in his head was making it a bit difficult for him to care.

Wilbur just raised an eyebrow, finishing up organizing his bag. "Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed" he joked, slinging the bag over his shoulder. Dream did look a bit worse for wear, with the tired bags under his eyes and how out of it he looked. That spider cut must be taking a toll on him.

Dream caught him up pretty well on the story last night. How he was attacked by a spider and somehow left with only a scratch. But he did say that the human gave him a healing potion so he should heal up pretty well. But hearing about his interaction didn't help his understanding of the situation. It was weird, Dream had put himself in harm's way so many times and given George so many opportunities. But not a single thing had happened, time and time again Dream came back unscathed. It didn't match anything Wilbur knew about humans, and it annoyed him greatly. That's why this trip was much needed, he was making no progress here so he might as well make progress in finding his brothers.

Wilbur watched Dream slowly wake up, taking in the strange sight of no mask. Dream almost never wore the mask in the house, only keeping it on when he forgot it was there. But it was nice that way, with no mask he felt like he could actually get to know Dream. He was younger then he thought he was, not by much but just enough to notice. He had a soft natural tan to his skin, something not often seen in borrowers. Usually staying in the walls and going out during the night tended to give all borrowers a pale complexion. But the tan he had was one thing that truly showed his origins, how differently he behaved compared to house borrowers. He was more reckless, more wild, but in a good way. In a way that you needed to survive in the wild, it probably saved his life countless times.