Once Upon a Dream (Golden Guard x Gender-Neutral Reader)

Send It Out

The following day was nightmarish for dear Hunter. He was running on three hours of sleep, bitter crab apple blood in hand, the pursuit of knowledge, and a weird sensation thumping in his chest. He was still reeling from last night. From the deal. From his hands. Repeatedly, almost obsessively, he lifted his gloves to check. Each time he took his eyes off of his hands, a worm of doubt seeped into his brain. Then each time he checked to see if his scars were really gone, he felt stupider than the last.
Hunter couldn't really place why last night was so special to him. It was just like his dreams, except real. Of course, that's assuming that the dreams were all in his mind, which they were.
Weren't they?
The boy rounded the corner. He narrowly avoided charging over two scouts, but he didn't have the attention to apologize. His entire mind was focused on them. Hunter took a sip of his beverage and his eye promptly twitched. He didn't drink this variety of apple blood because it was good but rather because it kept him awake. If he was awake it meant he could spend more time figuring everything out. When he was asleep however, it seemed that he spent more time creating questions.
Hunter found it incredibly odd that not only had he found the exact flower Soltare had given him on his window sill, but also that they themselves had chosen to summon that same flower... To use in a very specific object Hunter had also dreamed of... Yeah this just got even stranger. As odd as this may have seemed from the inside though, it was worse from the outside.
To most, it seemed that Hunter had grown a new obsession with plants overnight. He'd checked out most, no, all the books on plants in the castle library, ran a multitudinous amount of experiments with the flowers, he even questioned Terra Snapdragon for answers! In the end, nothing was helping and Hunter was starting to lose hope that anything ever would! If the leader of the Plant Coven couldn't figure it out, then what else was there to do?
If he went to his uncle, he could start asking questions Hunter didn't have the answer to, which was never good when dealing with Belos. There were many other questions he had about these flowers. One such question was how one managed to turn up on his window sill, but that was something to search for another day. For now, he was just focused on finding out what they were.
Hunter jittered out of the hall and into his room. Dear Titan! In the time he'd been back at the palace, he'd managed to clutter up his room even more than before! Notes were scattered everywhere, there was ink spilled on the desk, test tubes and vials of all shapes and sizes littered any available space, and of course, there were piles of books and diagrams in every imaginable direction. This boy must have been driving himself crazy over these damn flowers. The flowers... WHERE WERE THE FLOWERS???
The desperate teen began tearing through his room at lightning speed, searching for the tiny, miniscule flowers amongst all the eccentric properties of the space. Under the bed? Nope! Nightstand? Also no! The desk? BIG FAT FUCKING ZERO! Hunter shoved his hair out of his face, nostrils flaring wildly. He'd lost it. HE'D LOST THE VERY SUBJECT OF HIS STUDY! OHHHH, HOW WAS HE EVER GOING TO FIND OUT WHAT IT WAS NOW? THEY HAD PROBABLY BEEN SWEPT AWAY IN HIS RUSH TO FULFILL HIS MISSION- oh there they were! Hunter spotted the flower chain resting on one of the massive towers of books. Like a nervous parent, he rushed over and cradled the tender thing in his hands.
The plants had wilted in the time Hunter had had them. The petals were starting to fade from their white freshness to an uncomforting shade of brown. The stems were weak and had darkened to a greenish-black color. Hunter knew that it was common, that it was just how a plant's life went, and yet still part of him felt so hollow because of it. The flowers were dying and there was nothing he could do about it.
He guarded the flowers like they were the most precious thing in the world as he sat on his bed. They were already so delicate when they were healthy, but now that they were wilting? Hunter was afraid that the breeze from a butterfly's flapping wing would blow these things to pieces! Some of the flowers were starting to slip from their place in the chain as well, which added an extra layer of difficulty. It was like holding something made of glass- no, even fragiler- tissue paper! The nerves of it all, the pounding anxiety, the pulsing blood, it all felt so... familiar.
Hunter recalled the strange images he had seen the other day. He could still feel the emotions that overcame him at the sight of them. His eyes gazed past the mess scattered around the room. Past the walls, past the seas, past everything and into the vast forest of his memories. Clawing at the earth. He was clawing at the dirt, rocks scratching against his hands, soil burying beneath his nails, but he didn't care. He had to reach it, He had to find it again. It was screaming for its resurrection day, begging to be set free. He had to remember.
Then the feeling washed over him like the light of a match being lit in the pitch dark. Warm yet bold, calm yet exhilarating, loyal yet free.
Soltare.
He was back in that... Whatever it was. It wasn't a dream, but it wasn't entirely real either. Maybe the best way to describe it was as a vision? Yeah, that seemed to work. He was back in that vision. The palistrom tree stood like an ancient king amongst his people. Most rulers bowed to none, were second to none, had time for none. Maybe that's what made this tree feel so different from all the other grand trees Hunter had come across in his time.
In its own odd way, the palistrom tree was becoming a comfort rather than a confusion. It wasn't a tyrannical elder, but a kind, nurturing one. It had watched all of the trees around it grow from saplings, it sheltered countless creatures from the bitter storms, and now it provided a safe place for two kids.
Hunter knew something was upsetting him, that there had to be some reason why he was here at such an obscene hour. The world felt like it was spinning backwards, not noticeable at first, but still... off. What was the source? His eyes scoured over the scene, searching for his answer.
The boy had never been here alone before, and he didn't feel like he was, but Soltare was nowhere to be seen. He knew they were there, he could feel them! Where were they? He spun around.
Nervous.
Antsy.
Concerned.
How incredibly odd.
He was concerned about the Specter Soltare? Was he sure? Maybe he was just worried about being ambushed, or perhaps it was even the heat of the evening, yes? No, there was no way he was allowed to be worried for Soltare. They were a criminal, an anarchist, one of his personal demons... and yet-
His eyes caught something in their corner. He snapped in that direction. His heart leapt for... something as he caught sight of his criminal counterpart. The image of them was fuzzy. He couldn't remember if they had appeared that way in the vision or if his memory was just failing him. Either way, Soltare was different.
Gripping at the abdomen, hunched over in what seemed to be pain, they cast their eyes to his own. The dull (e/c) of them was breathing like a dying creature, in and out, here then gone. 
"Soltare?" He took a step towards them. For a moment, he thought they were going to walk towards him as well, but instead their leg came forward and then buckled. Hunter felt like his own life was flashing before his eyes as dashed to catch them.
The ghost felt fragile in his arms. He was afraid to let them down too quickly. Would they break if he did? He gazed down at the stranger. It felt the same way it did when you were looking through water, except there were no ripples, no foggy haze, just the feeling. What the hell was wrong with them? Were they sick? The boy shook them a bit, but their eyes stayed glossy.
"Hey! What the hell are you doing?! Stop that!"
Hunter didn't like this feeling. He didn't like it all. His chest was aching, his stomach was twisting in knots, his arms were shaking, what the hell??? He'd never been like this with anyone before! It only intensified as he watched Soltare's eyes close.
"No! Don't close your eyes! Stay awake, Soltare! Soltare? SOLTARE!! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO BEAT YOUR ASS IF YOU'RE ALREADY GONE? SOLTARE!?" He scanned over them in an attempt to locate what was wrong. There appeared to be some sort of abnormality in their ribs, maybe that was the cause? He couldn't find any other reason as to why they might be... Dear Titan, he didn't even want to think about it. Their arms and legs had quite a lot of minor cuts and bruises, but nothing too serious, and their nose was slightly bumped, but-
Wait.
Nose?
Have they always had one of those? Hunter tried to pick out their details, but nothing really stuck in his mind for more than a second. One thing he did recall was their eyes. Even with them opened, they still looked so vacant. A tear fell onto their cheek, one that was not their own.
Why?
Why was this happening? What was happening? What could he do to help them? The hopelessness of the situation was weighing down on him like a sickness, a plague, each tear a bead of fever. His breathing was rushed and all over the place. His shoulders were heaving. His chest was pulsing out of control. Everything was going to h-
Then it happened.
The unexplainable, unthinkable, unforgettable feeling of Soltare's palm against his cheek. His mind and heart stopped racing. Their hand was callused in some places. The tips and faces of their fingers. The base of their thumb. Just beneath their pointer finger and pinky. It was a touch unlike anything he'd ever felt before. It may have been rugged in some places, but for the most part, it was like having a cloud pressed against his face. A warm cloud filled with rain that would never hurt him. 
Hunter bore his soul into their eyes. They bore their own in return. They didn't need to say any words. Their mouth didn't need to move. All they needed to do was look into his eyes. The words found him anyways.
"I'll be back, Blondie."