𝕬𝖓𝖌𝖘𝖙 𝕶𝖎𝖓𝖌

“You said you'd pull out,” Dream pouts, staring down between his own legs. He's spread out on his back across the mahogany sprawl of Hob’s desk, which is now thoroughly marked with bodily fluids. “Ugh, I knew I should have made you wear a condom. Dirty old man. It's like you want me to get in trouble.”

Hob grins, shrugs, and puts his hand in between Dream’s thighs. With two fingers he scoops up the overflow of his own cum, and stuffs it back into Dream’s body. Despite what he's quite literally just complained about, Dream doesn't resist. He just whines and bucks up against Hob’s fingers.

“I say a lot of things, princess. You know better than to believe all of them,” Hob takes his fingers away and sucks them clean. “I've been thinking a lot about keeping you all to myself, lately. Knocking you up, marrying you, buying you a nice little house in the suburbs. Might be nice to have a pretty little thing to come home to after a long day,” he leans down to kiss Dream’s exposed thighs, scraping his beard against the sensitive flesh. “Telling all my students about my pretty little husband, who's no older than they are.”

Dream makes a mournful, desperate little noise. He wraps his legs around Hob’s shoulders tightly, trying ferociously to keep him there. He's so horny, he's sure he could cum again – and it's barely been two minutes since his last orgasm.

Hob laughs good-naturedly and rests his cheek against Dream’s thigh. He's in no hurry at all to give him what he wants, which Dream knows from bittersweet experience. “Tell you what, if you finish up your next essay in time for the deadline, maybe I'll take you off your birth control and put a baby in you for real.”

Of course, no one answers. They’re all too bloody terrified of the creature leaning on Hob’s desk that looks to have grown claws somewhere in the past five seconds. Hob is absolutely convinced Alex is having a fear induced stroke, poor stupid boy.

The figure tilts its head, quick like the fall of a guillotine's blade. Everyone in the front row flinches, and Hob takes another sip of tea.

“They do not comprehend the crime they have committed,” he (it?) says, voice a rumble that settles down Hob’s spine. “They tore open a path to me through their—“ and the voice grates and distorts, a thousand nails on a chalkboard, “— shortcut.”

A trembling hand lifts. Lucy, stupidly brave that girl, will make a killing in defensive magic next year.

“The TA said— he said we could use, umm,” her voice trembles and her shoulders curl inwards when Hob lifts an expectant eyebrow. “He said we could use ChatGPT.”

Hob closes his eyes. Under his feet, the floor shakes and for a moment he feels like his heels are digging into mud before the world rights itself. He pinches the bridge of his nose and sighs the sigh of someone who’s had centuries to get used to humanity’s stupidity and yet still gets surprised by it on a regular basis.

“Brilliant,” he says and gives the lot of them a glare. They all cower even lower in their seats. “Bloody brilliant. I leave for three days with the flu and you all try to bootleg a chatbot into a bloody grimoire.”

The pressure in the room changes and Hob’s ears pop, just as the lights above flicker dangerously. The figure on the desk leans forward, edges of it melting like sea foam, and dark eyes narrow as it hisses, “Do you mock me?”

A few students whimper, and two of them dive under the desks like they’re waiting for the ceiling to collapse. Hob holds the creature’s gaze and takes an annoyingly slow sip of his tea, working his jaw until his hearing rights itself.

“Don’t take it personally, I mock everyone. A personality defect of mine.” He places his thermos on the edge of the desk, and watches as a few strands of darkness curl around it like tentacles, and shrugs his jacket off and drops it on the back of his chair which seems to be slowly sinking into the melting hardwood floor. “Okay, I feel like we’ve started on the wrong foot here. I’m Robert Gadling, Professor of Magical Sociology and sometimes dabber of Magical History. And who do I have the pleasure of meeting?”

Those eyes fix on him, a slow blink, a curl of lips that look like rose petals in moonlight. Another tilt of that face, and it is a face now, a sculpture come to life like the sparkle of starlight in darkness.

It is, Hob has to admit, a very beautiful one.

“I am Dream of the Endless,” the creature, Dream, says, and the air splinters with his words. “The King of Dreams, and the Shaper of Nightmares. I am the warden of sleep and the darkness, and older than your stars. When they gutter out, when you and your kin are ash, I will still be.”

A few of the students whimper, some gag, and poor Alex drops his head to the desk like he hopes that if he can’t see Dream, the opposite is true.

“Lovely,” Hob says cheerfully, words almost like a cut through the rising storm. “It is an honor to have an Endless in my classroom. And please accept my apology on behalf of my students, hope the ride was not too bumpy.” He gestures to the students, like he’s in the middle of a class. “Now, normally I run a very ‘no eldritch horror in the classroom’ policy. It is both bad for attendance and my nerves. But seeing as you are Endless,” Hob goes on, steady and not moving his gaze from the endless nightmare, “I’m willing to make an exception. Temporarily.”

Dream leans forward, hands gripping the desk’s edge, fingers dark like coal and ending in pinpricks of talons. When Dream opens his mouth, his teeth look sharper than they have any reason to be.

“You presume much.”

“Part of the job description,” Hob shoots back, unflinching as he holds that beautiful, terrifying glare. “Welcome to Intro to Summoning Disasters, I suppose.”

A few gasps behind him, a creak of a chair as one of the students looks like he’ll throw himself out the window. Around them, the smell of irons and roses deepens, sharp and cloying and dripping down the back of Hob’s throat.

“You are not afraid.” His voice is flat, even if there’s a hiss under it, a slight edge of curiosity, like Hob’s lack of fear is the true weird thing in the room.

“Correct,” Hob says, leaning his hip on the desk’s corner. “I’ve been doing this for a long time, teaching that is. I’m honestly more afraid of the bureaucratic nightmare that is higher education and a freshman who thinks he can summon a demon with just two books and the self preservation instinct of a gnat.”

He shoots a glare towards the students who look, for a moment, like Hob is the scarier of the two creatures in the room.

Hob turns his gaze towards Dream and holds his hands up in a placating gesture.

“Now, before this gets out of hand and we have a mass fainting, how about we call it a day? Please?”

For one long heartbeat, nothing moves, the world stuck in place like a fly in amber, no breath, no sound. Dream tilts his head in a way that is unnatural, like bones and vertebra are things for other people, and his hair spills over a bony shoulder like ink on wet parchment.

“They are mine,” he says, whispering the words like a threat. “Until I am answered.”

That pushes Hob into action. He claps his hands once, sharp and loud, and the students all flinch, a few gasps broken from parted lips.

“Yeah, sorry, mate. Not today,” he says, still holding that fathomless gaze. “You heard me, come on. Out you all go. No homework, no detention, just the mercy of your survival. Go before I change my mind.”

It’s like someone has finally unpaused the world. The room is suddenly filled with the sounds of chairs scraping back, of rushed feet and small whimpers, as the students more or less run towards the door. Lucy has to drag Alex by the elbow, and Martin trips over his own backpack, but in a few seconds the room is blessedly empty.

Except for Hob and Dream.

Hob takes a deep breath and stares Dream down. For a moment, nothing happens, but then Dream screeches, a sound sharp like glass. The pressure in the room reaches a boiling point, and Dream’s claws drag over the wood of the desk, leaving dark smoke behind them.

“You dismiss them. But you cannot dismiss me,” he says, voice scraping, a threat.

“Didn’t say I would,” Hob shoots back, softly. “But they’re kids. Dumb kids, but still kids. There’s no need for their death, no matter what you say. Scaring the shit out of them, yeah. But nothing more.”

Eyes like the cosmos stare at him, shadows coiling in the air, around Hob’s feet, and Hob sighs.

“Look,” Hob says, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. “I’ve been doing this for a while, longer than you think. And I’ve learned there’s only two ways these things go: either you tear me limb from limb and feel better for five minutes or,” his mouth quirks, “you don’t.”

The shadows slink around him, until the classroom lights look like pinpricks of light a mile away. Dream’s teeth flash, a snarl of too much sharpness in the dark.

“You think yourself beyond consequences.”

“No,” Hob says quietly, unflinching. “I just think you’ve already made your choice, or I’d be dreaming in pieces right now.”

The screeching hushes, cut off suddenly and Dream stills. The pressure in the air is still there, of course it is, but it is no longer a promise of violence, but more like sharp curiosity.

“You… do not beg.”

Hob shrugs, despite the pinprick of pain and shadows climbing up his legs, crawling on the back of his neck.

“Not my style,” he says, shrugs again as he holds Dream’s eyes. “Besides, I don’t think you were hoping for cowards when you were summoned.”

Dream moves then, sharp and violent like the sea. His shadows ripple across the floor, over walls, form leaning forward and the graze of sharp talons over the inside of Hob’s wrists. For a moment, he is incomprehensible, the way the dark depths of the cosmos are, quiet yet terrifying, dark and beautiful.

Hob can feel the air spark with his presence. He’s so close Hob can see the shimmer in the depths of his eyes, so close his hair caresses over Hob’s cheek, the touch cool and soft and not meant for mortals. The air cracks with the scent of him, roses blooming in the air, the crack of a hammer on burning iron

For a moment, it is almost unbearable, the pressure and presence of him, the heat where Hob expected cool night. He knows he should flinch, blink, do something, but he doesn’t.

Dream’s lips hover over his, and he inhales, a slow and long draw of breath. Hob’s pulse jumps in his throat, and he bites back a very inelegant noise.

“You have been touched,” Dream says, voice almost a whisper. “By one of mine.”

Hob lets out a breath he was not aware was clawing at his throat.

“Yeah,” he says, softly. “Death. A long time ago.”

The name hangs heavily between them, a hook in the air. Dream shifts, a slow blink of those predatory eyes, a breath Hob did not know he possessed like a caress over his cheek.

So he slips, like the idiotic mortal that he is.

(Just like with her.)

“You’re—“ he says, throat working and words catching in the softness of his tongue. “You’re beautiful.”

(It ended up better than expected, with her. Immortality has never been sweeter. Hob crosses his fingers and hopes he is still good at charming the Endless that seem to stumble into his life.)

The silence that follows is heavy like lead, and for a moment Hob thinks that maybe this is it, he’s finally put his foot in his mouth and so far down his esophagus that it will come out the other end, and he’ll be turned to ash where he stands.

And then Dream’s lips curl, not a snarl, not a smile.

“…Reckless.”

The word cuts through the air like a verdict, yet Dream does not pull away. The shadows of his self hover around Hob like the terrifying curl of fog against the cliff’s edge, and the room smells like the aftertaste of lightning. Darkness coils around them both, not expanding anymore, but threatening to swallow them both.

Hob just grins though, and says, “Might not surprise you to hear I’ve been called that once or twice before. Mostly by people less terrifying than you.”

Dream’s eyes narrow. “You think flattery will spare you.”

“It’s not flattery if it’s true,” Hob says calmly, even as his pulse beats a sharp rhythm under his skin when Dream’s fingers caress over the inside of his left wrist. “And I’ve always thought truth’s the better gamble.”

How do you think I got your sister’s gift, he does not say.

“Fascinating,” Dream says, this time less sharpness, almost a rumbling purr between teeth, in the skin of his pale throat.

And Hob, mad bastard that he is, grins wider and says, “I’ll take fascinating over ashes any day.”

The smallest sound leaves Dream’s lips. If Hob were a betting man, he would almost put all his money on it being a laugh, the breath of it caught between lips that are slowly melting from inhumanely white to the pink of blossoming roses.

The sound lingers in the air, and Dream’s grip on his wrist goes softer, just the tender suggestion of danger in a slow caress. Hob swallows against his dry throat, and he is close enough to count the sharp edges of Dream’s teeth, close enough to see the faintest hint of color blooming on his skin.

When Dream speaks again, his voice is still a terrifying thing, yet this time it holds a note of curiosity.

“You court danger as though it were a lover, Hob Gadling.”

Hob huffs a laugh. “Not the worst habit I’ve picked up in a few hundred years.”

“You are no ordinary mortal.”

“Never said I was one,” Hob says, his smile crooked and, just as Dream said, reckless. The pressure in the room thrums, but this time it feels like it is waiting, the snap of a chord, the pop of a bubble.

Dream’s lips are so close, just a breath against his. In the corner of his vision, Hob watches the slow drip of shadows, the coiled tension in their smoky edges.

“Reckless,” Dream says again, and his free hand moves to Hob’s cheek. One finger drags over the stubble, the scratch of a claw loud in the suffocating, pushing silence. Hob swallows, throat too dry and heart hammering loudly in his ears, and he lets out a shaky laugh.

“You keep saying that like it’s an insult,” he says, and he sees the widening of Dream’s eyes, the spark in them. Hob’s breath catches, and the world narrows to just the space between them.

And then he moves, mad and unstoppable, and pressed his lips to the beautiful and unknowable creature in front of him. And gods, he is beautiful, and Hob wants to make every unknowable part of him known.

So he parts his lips, and it feels like tasting the night, endless and dark and beautiful, sweet like how he imagines stars sing. Dream makes a noise in the back of his throat, a soft rumble that sets Hob’s nerves on fire.

When Dream pulls away, his eyes are cornflower blue and almost human, if it weren’t for the depth of the stars that shine inside them. Hob’s pulse beats a frantic rhythm in his ears, in the dip between his collarbones, in the place where Dream’s claw ripped fingers still grip his wrists.

He laughs, an exhilarating breath in his throat.

“Bloody hell,” he says, lips curling in a smile. “This is what I call practical magic.”

Dream’s eyes narrow, and the blue of his eyes shines like an infinite sky reflecting in a lake as his gaze moves to Hob’s smile and back up again. His grip on Hob’s wrist softens, the memory of danger still present, but gentler now.

Then a sound leaves his lips, just like before; a laugh, maybe, something warmer than the dangerous rumble of before.

“Practical,” he says, lips curling into a smile of too sharp teeth, but still a smile, almost soft at the corners. “You call this practical?”

“Well,” Hob says, and Dream’s other hand finds his throat, a slide of cool skin and shadows over the edge of his jawline, up the back of his neck. “It’s definitely hands-on.”

That sound again, and this time Hob is convinced it is a laugh, even if it sounds like the grumble of rocks, and Dream’s head tilts with it, following the pleased curve of his mouth.

“Beautiful,” Hob says again, because he means it. A slow blink of Dream’s eyes, more human by the second, even as the blue shines like gems. The word hangs between them and Dream looks, for a moment confused, even as a talon drags down Hob’s cheek almost gently.

Hob’s pulse is a frantic, loud thing, tension dripping down his spine, so he does what he always does when staring down kings, gods and the occult.

He keeps being reckless.

“So,” he says, grin still bright even as Dream’s claw digs in the smile lines around his mouth. “As much as I’m enjoying this, the faculty will probably be here soon with pitchforks, holy water and salt. How about we move this somewhere else, and see where this date will take us.”

A quick blink and the shadows around Dream ripple like he is taken aback by the sheer mortal cheek.

“Date.” The word is spoken like it is something new and confusing, a new taste that he rolls around his tongue.

Hob nods, and turns his head until Dream’s talon drags over his lower lip. “Yeah. Date. You know, two people— umm, one person and an entity, a pub, a few drinks, a conversation. You know, the usual.”

Dream’s grip on Hob does not loosen, but the threat sparks and disappears between one of Hob’s breaths and the other, and the darkness around him pulls close, in wonder.

“You would. Court me.”

“Court, flirt, buy you a drink, whatever you like.” His smile softens, and he places his hand over Dream’s over his cheek. “Point is, we take it out of the classroom before admin storms the place waving fucking magic tomes at us.”

He can feel Dream’s cool breath against his lips, the smell of roses and night almost overpowering, Dream’s gaze piercing and heavy on him.

And then Dream smiles, faint and sharp and real, the kind of smile that feels like it hasn’t been worn in centuries.

“You are a curious creature, Hob Gadling.”

Hob laughs, and presses his lips to those of the Endless being in front of him, feels the small gasp of surprise, the softening of Dream’s mouth against his, the nip of fangs over his lower lip.

When he pulls back, he says, “I’ll take that as a yes.”

When he shrugs his coat on and heads for the door, velvet night falls into step with him, and pale fingers intertwine with his in a gesture that feels more earth shattering than all the claws and teeth in the world.

The hallways light flicker above them, and behind them the classroom still smells of roses and ozone.

"The sixteen year old is having wet dreams about you," Dream says savagely in punishment, grabbing Hob by the face to tilt him this way and that, ignoring his loud complaining disgust. "How many times do I have to tell you-"

"-Stop getting into bar fights," Hob intones dryly along with him, rolling his eyes. The argument lasts well into the night.)

But the next morning when he wakes up, the back of his neck is itching. He figures it's a rash of some kind and goes to work without bothering to check it out, grimacing now and then when he feels the discomfort as the scratchy sweater catches on it.

It continues the rest of the week, spreading to his arms and shins, but Hob Gadling is a man who has been personally skewered in the gut with a rusty lance, chained to a heavy metal ball and drowned in a muddy river and been the guinea pig of his husband's favourite Nightmare. It doesn't even register on his pain scale.

"I know you can do it, dear," He tells his student, clasping her by the hands. Her wrists have unhealed scars, still. "Just keep fighting. It doesn't matter what your grades are, as long as you love what you're learning, you hear me?"

She's famous for being stoic and disdainful whenever anyone tries to help her, but Grace Matty's eyes well up with tears as she nods, breathing hard. The she frowns, tilting her head. "Sorry, uh- did you get a new tattoo, Prof?"

It's such a weird subject change that Hob frowns also. "What?" He looks down to see intricate swirling patterns on his forearms. Great. Another possible curse slash adventure slash assassination attempt. "Oh, yeah, hah, got it last week."

She tilts her head, sniffing and wiping her nose with a sleeve. "Suits you."

"Thanks," Hob says, because they actually kind of do. The bright kind of golden, making his skin look rather nice when he tilts it in the sunlight. "But you can't deflect with me. So, let's talk about a study plan..."

Later, he pulls off his shirt to find the same swirling patterns across his shoulders and shins, beautiful swirls of flora and spirals that stretch down his body and actively grow more as he looks at them, the color of new wheat.

He sighs and goes to bed, yawning. There's time till it reaches his full body. He'll deal with it next week.

("Next week," Dream says scathingly, a couple thousand years later.

He rolls his eyes. "Acting like I don't know you deliberately ignored that fae assassin entering the castle because you wanted me to keep giving you head."

"It was a calculated risk-" )

He gets up the next day, groaning at the fever heat he can feel radiating from him, pushing his hands into his aching eyes. Still, there's the shop to run, so he pushes himself to his feet and keeps going.

Every person who comes in smiles at him, losing the tension in their shoulders as soon as he makes eye contact.

"I think I'm going to do it," one of them leans over the counter to whisper. "I think it's time I started following the damn dreams I've had since childhood."

Hob grins at the stranger, reaching out to squeeze their hand. Oh, but Dream would love to hear that. "Do it," He enthuses, more than used to being on the other side, talking random shite to people he didn't know in his immortal mania. "You'll succeed eventually!"

They grin, eyes crinkling, before departing.

It is a fast day, and a busy one. Everyone wants to chat- leaving Hob thrilled- about anything from their sick relatives to school grades to football matches to confessions. It is a good day, but it leaves him immensely drained, and he's practically falling over by the time it's time to close up.

He takes the longer route to let the brisk air help him, brushing his fingers against the barks of the scattered urban trees, imagining he can see their leaves unfurl wider and prouder as they survive another winter. "You'll make it," he tells the birds huddling together in the nest above, smiling.

What a lovely day. He looks out over the bridge-

"Don't jump," he says suddenly. His eyes feel hot. The man jerks, swirling around to face him. His eyes widen when he sees Hob. Can't be more than 18, barely an adult, and still has misery lining every inch of him.

Hob swallows. "Don't jump," He repeats. "Life is worth so much if you go look for it, kid."

The boy straightens, searching his face, eyes welling with tears. "There is, isn't there?"

"Yup," Hob says. His arms burn. "Come down."

Miraculously, the boy listens, trembling in the winter cold. Hob's heart melts, and he takes off his jacket to drape across the other, ignoring the protests and the feeble whispers that they couldn't afford to repay him.

"Don't need horseshit from you, little one," Hob says fondly. "There's money in the pockets, go grab something warm. And my card is in there, call if you ever need me; you have a place to stay?"

A nod. Fairre wishes for a bigger one, with central heating, but the one he has will be good for the night.

How did I know that? the thought whisps across his mind, then dissolves when he sneezes.

"Ah, hells, I must go home before this damn cold does me in," Hob jokes, patting the boy on the shoulder. "You run off too, and no more bridges for you, understand? Call me tomorrow."

"Thank you!" The boy shouts as Hob walks off. "What's your name?"

"Hob!" He shouts back before he can think it twice.

"Thank you, Hope!" He yells and-

Something in his stomach drops. He stops for a second as he turns the corner, and feels oddly like he's in freefall.

Time slows down, like he's moving through molasses. You are not terrible, I suppose, it sniffs disdainfully, before the world resumes again. The sky flickers, abruptly black as the void. Ah, the first counterpart, it whispers. Always told you our third was too impatient.

The sky turns blue again. No one else has so much as looked upwards.

Something is happening.

The tattoos, he remembers, and breaks into a run, cursing as he sprints the few blocks back to his home.

Food, he thinks, even though they're not his thoughts. Not at all. So many wish for food, hope for prey. From the deepest oceans to the highest peaks, what more can you want from the universe except food?

Shelter, also, although the living usually possess it already. But better shelters are always coveted.

A mate, children. The greatest achievement to strive to- to live on.

"Excuse me," He says, although maybe he says it in the wrong language as he sprints past the bewildered doorman, taking the stairs.

A good wind. A good monsoon. A good life.

"Dream," He says, panting, standing in the middle of his room.

A good winter. A good catch. A good field.

"DREAM!" Hob screams, holding his head in his hands as it starts splitting at the seams. He can't see anything. He can see too much. There is so much more out there- how stupid, to think that it was only Earth, only one universe? And each one comes with its own near-infinite entities, hopes and wishes and wants and-

"DREAM!" Hope roars, sobbing, and his husband crashes into him at full speed in four dimensions, catching the insides of him as they spill over through the cracks of the worlds, sand banking the liquid gold of hope's endless ocean.

(Water is a constant. Anywhere you go, water is a constant. Life always begins in the seas.)

"Hob," Dream gasps, a thousand hands and shadows pushing Hope back into a physical form, like trying to mold a running stream. Dream is scared. His husband is terrified and it is calling the others, and Hope cannot bear for anyone else being here at the moment.

"I want to go home," The last flickering flame of humanity within him sobs. He is scared, and he is everywhere and too big and too scattered, and he can remember every memory he has ever had with picture-perfect clarity, and he wants his ma, his pa, his three elder siblings and one brat of a niece, in their small and filthy cottage in an insignificant village in the middle of the forest. This hurts. "Dream, take me home."

"I cannot," His husband whispers, heartbroken. Hope sobs, even though he already knew this, because they were gone. Long gone. "But I can be your tether, if you open your eyes."

Hope trembles and considers resisting. Does not want to.

Hands cradle his face in fractals. Home fades away, humanity fades away at the touch, so dear and familiar, that his panic abruptly abates. The hurt lessens. "Hob Gadling," Morpheus says. "Open your eyes."

He takes a breath and does.

"Oh," Hope says, tears falling down. He always knew Dream was other, but to finally see him as he was meant to be seen, as all species simultaneously, as a whisper in the shadows and croon in a lullaby, in all dimensions, with all eyes- "You are so beautiful."

Dream shakes his head, horror and grief reflecting back in his eyes, darting through all the places Hob's soul is bleeding from, where Hope burst through. He looks like he is already mourning him.

Hob takes a breath and- pushes himself up, wincing. Stretches and feels the ends of the universe, and recoils back in horror, not ready to face it yet.

It is easy to ignore, really, with the beauty in front of him, crying and whimpering in fear for Hob.

Hope smiles. "So dour, love mine." He whispers, chuckling. Pushes herself up, against their husband, their stranger, their ever-running darling, their complement. Hopes and Dreams. "Beautiful love. Stop looking so sad and bothering Despair, you ninny, I'm still here."

Dream exhales and gives the impression of sitting back on their heels, as they make space for Hope in his metaphorical lap. Arms as strong as uranium bands wrap around all the unending facets of him, clinging on and shaking in fear. "I don't. I don't understand, what has happened-"

"In a minute," Hope whispers, feeling the answer- knowing the answer, knowing their darling concept of a partner also knows the answer and just needs...

They look beyond for a moment, and see the impression of Time. He doesn't finish the thought.

"Hob?" Dream asks, trembling. Hope moves back so they're looking at each other once more, heart clenching in adoration at the resplendent horror all around him, holding him together as he calms down, slotting into his place in the system.

"Still me," Hob whispers. She presses forward and wills them both into humanoid shapes, so he can kiss his wife. "I don't- I don't know why either. Or how. But- still me. Yeah?"

"Love," Dream rumbles, whispers, moans. She's still trembling.

"Easy," Hope whispers. Kisses him again. "Breathe. It's not a calamity. Just something new."

"It is-"

"If the next words out of your mouth are 'my fault', sweetheart, you're going to get slapped," Hob says in a stronger voice, as he shifts himself back into his usual form to glare. "Just- we'll figure it out. Everything's alright, yeah?"

Hope smiles at Dream. Tentatively, half in awe, its spouse smiles back, before it wavers away and Hob is yanked back into the shaking grip, in all universes at once.

Hob chuckles and closes his eyes. Sighs as they rock back and forth, feeling the mantle of a new era of adventure hover over their shoulders, ready to press down, and uses his function to hope fiercely that they'll make it through, until the fear no longer holds as heavy.

"So," It says finally. She grins, flips into a coy brown bird, a skittering shrimp, a playful whale, a swaying stamen, a displaying spider, a rumbling earthquake- flitting around her wife in well-worn paths of enticement, filled to bursting with the hope that the mate acquiesces, accepts. Steps out from under the influence of the rest of the family for a second, so he can push his startled husband backwards onto the mattress of their bed in the Dreaming.

Dream grunts as he hits the sheets, mouth falling open in shock as Hope climbs on top of him.

"I'm assuming we won't be free for ages and ages after this," He says, rolling its eyes. Then she grins, spreads themselves out into a marvellous display across all the space available to him, in which he exists, lapping against the shores of her lover. Preens seductively, watches the essence of the Dreaming flare up in excitement, snorting, bristling, stiffening, dancing, pressing back, trembling from holding themselves back. "Bet you'd fuck so much better at full power, hm?"

"Is this really the moment for a seduction?" Dream demands, even as his hands close on her hips, all eyes end-to-end black in lust. He understands. Now that the panic has abated, arousal is practically burning her alive.

"Yes, of course, now c'mon, quickly, before they get here," Hope kicks its husband lovingly, pressing their weight down harder. "Became Endless just for you, and you can't even give me an orgasm?"