this world we have built is burning down around us | Dream SMP Time Travel Fic

a kind enemy is not my friend (not yet)

The heat of the Nether was suffocating, but Theseus vividly recalled why he'd preferred its warm fingers down his throat, searing ash unto his tongue and deeper more, rather than the cold touch of Dream and his sick imitation of comfort, rather than the memories that clawed their way from the recesses of his mind, gnawing mercilessly at his heart until it ate away at what was left of the poor shattered thing that used to beat so fervently.

Trauma is messy. It changes people, can easily warp them and break them until they're gone or someone else ("Wilbur, I'm sorry! Wilbur, wait—!"), and Theseus has (seen) felt it, in his broken bones and skipping heart and mangled flesh. It heals like the deepest of scars if one survives it, a mark left behind forever that may be hidden at times but clear as day at others; it might hurt sometimes and it might feel like nothing at all otherwise.

Theseus wears the scars of trauma under his skin and under his clothes, and even if Tommy is not quite the shattered soldier Theseus is, the scars of battle and betrayal are still fresh on the young boy as it is on Theseus.

"Eret," he repeated, feeling his tongue become numb. "You want me to trust..."

"Time hasn't healed that one, huh?" Sam sighed, grimacing. "I know what he did was shit, but he regrets it and has been trying to make up for it. He's tired of everything, too. He wants peace just like me, and I swear on all three of my lives that he'll help you."

"In my time, Eret has more than redeemed himself," Theseus admitted, ignoring the fuzziness in the back of his mind. He could only imagine standing before the King once more and being thrown to the wolves again. "Trust has been...a little hard for me recently. I trusted a lot of people, and it backfired nearly every time. I...I forgave Tubbo for a lot of things that happened, but even he never felt entirely safe in the end either. And you're asking me to trust someone who I've already had betray me, who's indirectly taken one of my lives."

Sam winced, silently conceding how insensitive that must have seemed. He pondered the bit about Tubbo, too, and wondered if that was why Theseus had refused to talk to Tubbo instead of him (what had happened to tear the two best friends so far apart?).

"I get it," he nodded, "and I'm not going to force you into anything, but we don't have a lot of other options—and I wouldn't feel good sending you off to fend for yourself outside in the wilderness like exile. And hey, maybe this would be a good opportunity to bridge the gap, work through some of the trauma Eret has caused."

Theseus bit his lip. "Do you know anything about Dream?" Sam frowned in confusion, opening his mouth to ask what that meant, but the blond continued before he could. "I mean, I know you've known him a long time, but I meant if you knew anything about Dream being around Eret's castle and shit. He crowned him, so is he around a lot?"

And, oh, Sam felt stupid for suddenly forgetting the bit about how Dream had apparently gone psycho and killed the teen (to be fair, it was a lot to take in). "I'm not really sure. I don't hang around here a lot, you know. I don't know where Dream spends his free time."

Theseus frowned, and Sam tried to reassure him. "But the castle's huge, and Eret's the one who built it! Even if Dream does visit sometimes, you can easily avoid him, and it's not like he'll be looking for you or anything. He doesn't even know you exist."

That was true, the blond conceded. The potential situation reminded him a lot of when he stayed with Techno, hiding when Dream arrived, but at least he wasn't actively being hunted anymore.

(No, this time Theseus was the hunter and Dream his prey.)

Techno had tried to get Theseus to open up after the cobblestone tower incident; sometimes he did and sometimes he didn't. Techno had never pried, and he'd been grateful for it—was still grateful for it—but it meant that some things, things less recent and long repressed that had bubbled up to the surface, had been left untouched.