Nightingale - Dreamnotfound

||November Greetings||

"Dream!" Fundy's bark filled the once quiet lounge the moment I stepped foot into the building. It was early morning. The sun barely crept past the horizon, and the night shift would have just arrived home at this point.

Tommy and Tubbo were sitting on the floor playing cards with Bad and Skeppy. Across the couches, Punz and Eret were sprawled. Punz had since fallen asleep, and Eret pulled at a thread in his jacket. Sapnap and Karl shared a seat, Karl sitting on Sapnap's lap and resting his head on Sapnap's shoulder. Both of them had flinched as Fundy's voice broke the drowsy early morning silence.

He rose to his feet, and Niki followed close behind. They had been sitting on the stairs. Fundy had been mad at me quite a few times, and this time was no different. His eyes were weighed down with a penetrating intensity as he immediately met mine. I shut the door behind me with a click.

"Morning, Fundy," I replied. That only angered him more.

"Where'd you go last night?" He asked, and suddenly all eyes went from Fundy to me. Even Punz had woken up, rubbing his eyes before squinting up at me. I leaned against the door, gripping the handle tightly. Techno and Wilbur were nowhere to be found, but they also had the tendency to show up when I least desired.

"I took a walk. You know, like I told you last night I would," I replied with as steady a tone as possible.

"Walks don't usually take all night." He crossed his arms, and Niki poked her head over his shoulder. She was in another one of Fundy's many aged jackets and sweaters. She was always a juxtaposition of her brother. While her brother could kill anybody in cold blood and forget about it the moment he put his gun away, she always believed there was a way out of any situation without violence. How she managed to keep that mentality after all these years, especially with a brother as cynical and twisted as her's, I had no idea.

And even now, after all these years, she was still the contrast of her brother. While he stood eye to eye with me with a cold glare that always seemed to bite more than any other glare I'd look into, she stood a bit behind him, gazing up at me with a warm, sorry look, and I much preferred looking into her blue eyes rather than the almond set directly in front of me.

"Dream, where were you?" Fundy repeated, snapping my full attention back to him.

"Oh, lay off him, Fundy," Sapnap cut in, nudging Karl off of him and pushing himself up to his feet. He approached me and clapped me on the back. "Why does it matter that he took a walk? This is the same guy who never failed a gun test. Techno said he has perfect aim aside from always aiming a bit too low. Dream can take care of himself."

Fundy's gaze shifted between me and Sapnap, and Sapnap sighed, "Look, you never take the night shift so you wouldn't know, but I've been his roommate since I was twelve. He likes walking around at night." He glanced at Bad and Skeppy. "Right?"

"Yup!" Skeppy replied with a wide grin, earning himself a grimace from Bad.

"Yeah," Bad added on slowly.

"Exactly!" Sapnap said with a smile. "Tonight wasn't Dream's first night. He knows how to protect himself."

I had stopped wandering around years ago, and I never left the building. Fundy knew that. Sometimes, back when we were fourteen or fifteen, he'd join me.

But, he was never a confrontational person, and when it was four people against one, he backed down as quickly as he rushed in. He dropped his head and Niki placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Look, you don't have to tell me what you did, can you just tell me where you went?" He asked quietly to where only me, Sapnap, and Niki could hear. "Did you go to the Slums?"