Abominations for Solutions

Same New Same Old

Four Years Earlier...

"Dream, are you ok! Dream, hey!"

Dream landed with a thud on harsh grey ground, his feet aching from the impact while his entire body tingled with a strange splintering energy. The positivity guardian's body sprawled across a gravelly surface, the cooled surface of spiked stones pressing numbly into his bones. He hardly watched as his hands shook, barely noticing his convulsing limbs. He felt like he was on fire. His own hands crawled, slipped, across his chest and clutched desperately without sense at his soul. There were hands too.

"Dream, hey, can you speak? Shit..."

There was squeezing at his arms, numb tapping against his face. Neon blurs colored his vision against a miserable blob of a sky, but that didn't matter. Pain took full hold. He had to get himself together. He tried to fetch his jaw muscles, to summon his voice. But his jaw wouldn't move, trapping his mind in a state of verbal immobility. That's when he felt the dripping. The metallic taste in his mouth. It wasn't like he could let it out, anyway. The blood just kept pooling and pooling in his mouth.

" Stars." He managed to choke, his chest heaving the top half of his body off of the ground.

"Dream Dream Dream, shit, here." Cold hands gripped his shoulders, a hand went to the back of his skull, gently pressing him forward. "Dream can you hear me? Is there a doctor around here!"

" Fine." Dream gasped, watching the blood spool out of his mouth, trickling into the cracks of the supposed road. He finally felt his jaw move normally, though his soul still throbbed like it had just been dipped in poison. "I'm fine.... Cross."

Cross, however, didn't look all that convinced. His eye lights were still bugged out and his mouth did that little concerned frown it always did whenever he was stressed.

Cross still supported Dream's skull and Dream still stared at the blood.

"Uh, do you mind telling me what the hell that was? I don't know if you noticed, but that's a lot of blood."

Dream's head still felt woozy and foggy, he blinked his sockets a few times, trying his best to hide it from Cross. He mustered a smile and wiped the drippy blood on the sleeve of his glove. It was in fact, a lot of blood. He coughed and discreetly emptied his mouth of the remaining liquid. He inhaled deeply, biting his tongue to stifle a wince. "Trust me, I've dealt with worse things." A trickle of blood slid down the sloped street, leaving behind a rusty splotch of stained concrete between Cross and Dream, basking in the orange artificial glow of a street light.

Cross didn't even flinch. "Dream, if jumping through those portals is going to hurt you like this, then, we're going to have to find another way."

"Cross I said I'm fine."

"Dream please listen-"

"Cross!" Dream instantly felt bad at the sudden force of his voice. He tried again. "I'm fine."

Cross closed his sockets and reopened them, his gaze drifting to the ground. "I said the same thing back there, but you continued to help me. Dream let me do the same thing for you. Don't you think I have that right?" Cross's voice lowered, fueled by this undying need to prove himself worthy of Dream. "Let me help you. Please."