glimpse || DNF

𝚖𝚒𝚛𝚊𝚌𝚕𝚎𝚜

hello beautiful <3

//

"Where to mate?" The pleasant old man asks, beaming back at him. George stares at him quizzically, tears still running rhythmically down his face as he clutches his backpack in his lap.

"As inland as we can get please," He mumbles. This man is one of a kind. The world was probably going to end, and here he is as joyful as children on Christmas Day.

"Alrighty then. Off we trot!"

The roads weren't as packed as they were an hour ago. Still, a sea of vehicles crowded the roads, the people honking and shouting at one another with fear driving their harsh words. "Can I ask you a question?" George turns to the driver, his hand drumming nervously on the side of the car.

"I mean, you already have, haven't you? But go on, ask away!"

"How are you so calm, and—and happy?" He asks, quite bluntly. "You realize the world is ending right?"

"I do feel bad for you younger lot," The driver sighs, putting a grin back on his face after the moment passes. "But when you're as old as me, the world ending is a hell of a way to go yeah mate?"

"I suppose." He murmurs back, pressing Dream's contact for the fiftieth time these last ten minutes.

It fails again. Another sob makes its way up his throat. The last words to his best friend were the worst he could have picked out. He might not ever talk to him again. He's so stupid. So fucking idiotic.

He stares at Google maps with tear-filled eyes, trying to form telepathic apologies in false hope that Dream gets them. They're almost there. He expands the store and street names with his fingers, looking up abruptly.

Heathrow airport. Five miles away.

His fingers fly of their own accord, desperately searching the slow-moving website. His eyes deceive him. George blinks again, squinting at the letters. London to Orlando: Direct flight path.

He couldn't possibly–could he? His heartbeat rises. If he dared to do what his heart suggested, he was practically signing off on his own death warrant. The news had informed that all the states bordering the east coast would be obliterated, with slim chances for survival.

He could just keep going. Ignore the voice shouting at his mind to speak up. He could get to the middle of the country where they had established multiple safe houses to protect against whatever came after impact. He could be safe.

"Sir! Can you please drop me off at the airport?" He asks before he loses his nerve. Being safe meant nothing if everyone he loved weren't.

His older sister, whom he was supposed to meet up with, will understand. He loves her very much, but she knows he'd rather spend the rest of his days with his second family than listening to her have end-of-the-world sex with her boyfriend.

"Sure! Where are ya off to?"

"Florida."

"Mate, you might be more mental than me."

The kind man drops him off at the crowded gate of the airport. George pushes through the mass of people, slipping in and out of giant backpacks and crying children. There's no security, no order, nothing really. He scans the TV, looking for his terminal and walking towards it swiftly. He's not even sure if the plane will be allowed to take off. But trying something is better than doing nothing.

The terminal is completely deserted, as expected. There's no one at the desk, so he walks through the winding jet bridge, shoving away the claustrophobia as he quickly steps into the plane.

The pilot, who was working in the cockpit, stares up at him. "Have family in America?" She asks quietly. George nods, swallowing the growing lump in his throat. "Me too. Let's get going then."

The pilot lets him sit in the cockpit in the co-pilot seat. The controls, he learns, are quite simple. There are a myriad of buttons, round and square, vibrant and dull. They apparently make the difference of whether they live or die. Press the wrong one at the wrong time, and they're pretty much toast.

Her name is Kate. She tells George about her family in Orlando. How she regrets not being home a lot thanks to her job, but how she's thankful that her daughter is young enough that she doesn't understand what's coming for them.

Words slip out of George's lips easily as he spills his morning to the pilot. She listens intently, expressing her sympathies at his situation. Kate assures them if they were as close friends as he had claimed, Dream shouldn't have a problem forgiving him, considering the circumstances. He hopes that's the case. But either way, he shouldn't have let his emotions get the better of him.

They take off, and she thanks the few members of her team left one last time for staying and monitoring the flight.

She asks if he's going to stay awake, and he nods, so she presses a random button, telling him to wake her up in three hours. George should be concerned that he was hurtling across the stratosphere in a million ton box of metal with a pilot who was snoring next to him. But he can't seem to care.

The blue glow of the screen washes over his features, thumb gliding over the cracked surface. A mournful smile mirrors over the vast clusters of texts from their group chats. George closes his eyes as he tries to remember what he was doing when he was texting Dream and Sapnap these messages. Carelessly lying on his bed? At his desk chair, ignoring the editing he had to do for the day perhaps? To be painfully realistic, he was probably fawning over different compilations their fans had made of him and Dream.

The seven or so hour flight didn't feel as long as it should have. But everything feels fast when on borrowed time.

The landing is a rocky one, but she touches down safely, exhaling with relief as she rolls us to the jet bridge. She tells me her husband, an air traffic controller, was on the other side, and he had stayed back to get everything prepared for their landing.

She presses her forehead against the outside of her beloved plane, before turning away, walking at his side as they travel the winding tunnel. Before they emerge, she stops him, giving him a tight hug, and wishing him well. George does the same, stepping aside as her husband and daughter rush forward, tackling her with happiness.

They wave goodbye to one another.

He hopes they have painless deaths.

As if in a daze, he somehow makes it through the chaos of the Florida airport. The air is sweet, and the sun brilliant with its golden rays dripping over the towering airport. But it's the panic of the hundreds of people that make it a foreboding nightmare. It was strangely peaceful, being the only tranquil entity in the mass hysteria.

The whole world was moving in slow motion around him, and he was counting the long seconds, until another miracle led him to his family.

There's not a single cab, or driver or anything. To each their own. George hefts his backpack on his shoulders, dialing Dream and waiting. Nothing. He dials Sapnap too, Karl afterwards. The phone lines must be fried. At least he had their address. He turns on Google Maps, determined to get there by dark.

"George? Georgenotfound?" Two teenage girls cried out, pulling their car next to me. The fresh tears and red-rimmed eyes don't match their shocked expressions, mouths agape as though they couldn't believe their sight. "Are you here to see Dream and Sapnap?"

"Hi," He greets quietly, nodding. "I am."

"Are you seriously walking all the way there?" The other one asks. He nods again. What does it look like he's doing? Flying? "Why aren't they picking you up?"

"The phone lines are dead. They don't even know I'm here." George tells them, glancing at his phone. He has to start walking again. There's no way he'll reach before dark. They look at each other and look back at him.

"Would you like a ride?"