A Glitch In The System

Comfort (Grian POV)

"And it's taken SO LONG to build," Grian exclaimed. "There's, uhh, no back yet... but no matter!" The little Hermit was bouncing on the balls of his feet, waving his hands around to demonstrate the scale of his mansion as he talked to Dream. "You can stay in the Hobbit Hole!"

The two were standing in the elevator, reflective metal surrounding them. A panel of buttons glowed faintly and the floor was covered in a honey-yellow carpet. Dream was watching Grian continue to talk a mile a minute, his mouth pressed into a line. "Hobbit hole?" he questioned.

Grian paused and looked up at the other, who stood several inches taller than him. "Well you didn't think I had the resources to build the mansion so early after coming into this world, did you?" He asked, not waiting for an answer before continuing. "Of course not! I hardly had the resources for a sugarcane farm! And then when I did, I didn't build one because god knows I'm absolutely hopeless with those kinds of things and..."

"You talk a lot," Dream pointed out.

Halting his rapid fire speech, Grian laughed. "I'm sorry, I'm just very excited. It's been a while since we've had visitors. Of course, there was Pearl, who we offered to join us, and Gem... I'm getting sidetracked again! What was I saying?"

"Before you started talking about the mansion, or after?"

The elevator jolted to a halt, the doors opening to reveal the entrance which they had come through. A small entrance hallway, barren of decoration save for a yellow carpet that led to the door, awaited them. "Either way," Grian said enthusiastically, then paused. "Sorry, you've had a long day. I'll be quiet now. Just go straight one we get into the woods."

Motioning his hands in a way that made it look like he was locking his mouth shut with a key, then throwing the key away, Grian grinned silently. The two reached the doors, which sensed them automatically and slid open to allow them exit.

Dream didn't seem too bothered by the silence between them as they walked back out into the forest, keeping his gaze ahead. On the other hand, Grian was barely keeping his mouth shut. He wanted to say something- about Dream not having wings, about the annoying trek, about his world, about Dream's world, anything really- but he didn't want to bother the clearly focused hunter.

Dream moved around with stealth, slipping through the undergrowth without a sound. His combat boots were light on the forest floor and ducking agilely beneath hanging branches. Meanwhile, Grian was trampling every poor plant in his path and causing a commotion. A particularly loud snap of a twig underneath his foot sent a bird into a hooting panic somewhere above them.

Dream's eyes were focused forwards as he forged ahead, concentration pulling his features. In contrast, Grian was gazing around at a view he rarely saw from the ground, awed.

In short, the two were polar opposites, and Grian saw it quite clearly.

"Hey, Dream!" Grian called out, rushing to catch up with him messily. His feet slammed noisily into the forest floor and his wings scraped uncomfortably against bark and vines when he ran.

Ahead of him, Dream paused and turned around, face set in a neutral expression. "What?"

Grian arrived next to him, breathing heavily from the sudden exertion. "I was just wondering about where you guys come from. You all seem very..." He let himself trail off, then laughed. "You know!"

"Actually, I don't know," Dream said, words gaining a colder edge, though he didn't invite Grian to explain.

Grian decided to explain anyway. "Well, it's just that you're all very tense and uptight and there's really no reason to be like that unless something happened so... what happened?"