The Chained Watcher

Pumpkin :)

~~~

Settling down on his giant mattress, Grian shuffles his wings around until they're in the most comfortable positions, making sure his pillow is properly fluffed up. Not that he needs to fluff it up, considering how it's enchanted to be the perfect pillow at all times, but the action is one he's made a habit of whenever he uses unenchanted pillows, and he sees no reason to break it.

The last few times he's tried dreaming have just rehashed more recent memories, lacking that feeling of potential the first dream had possessed, but he's not ready to give up just yet. He's patient. For all he knows, the chance for a dream to be a missing memory could be as low as a single percent, if not lower, so why should he be discouraged after only a handful of tries? That would just be silly.

His eyes drift closed, mind settling into the rhythm of sleep.

The first thing he notices in the dreamscape is a feeling of potential. He wants to savor the feeling of triumph drawing it forth again gives him, but he remembers what happened last time when he tried to seize the errant memory. It vanished immediately, preventing him from noticing anything beyond a single idle thought.

He'll try something else this time. Or more accurately, he'll try nothing. For as long as this feeling of potential lingers, he'll let his thoughts go silent, doing nothing more than committing everything that goes through his mind to memory.

His slow, even breathing serves as ambiance in his mind. In... Out... In... Out...

After an irrelevant amount of time, the blank visualization starts gaining color. Just... without any details. It's like an artist overused the blend tool on everything, completely erasing any distinction between... well, everything.

For a moment, he reflexively tries to glean more information from the memory. The edges immediately start to fade away, prompting him to still his thoughts and let go of his focus. He can analyze it later.

Slowly, the color returns, gradually gaining resolution as he leaves it be. In the most disconnected of thoughts, he muses, is this what people who need glasses experience? Though he's starting to get a vague impression of his surroundings, the detail really does leave much to be desired.

Uncaring of his desire for greater clarity, his dream self starts moving.

He's in a tunnel of some sort, walking alongside a metal-lined pathway –no, a railway– going to do... something. Passing out of the tunnel, he spots an oddly clear pumpkin on the side of a hill. How strange. Everything is so fuzzy, and yet a singular pumpkin is rendered in full detail?

He wants to figure out why that pumpkin specifically stands out from the blur of colors, but his dream moves on, bringing him into a long tunnel periodically lit with torches. A vague feeling of accomplishment and reminiscence bumps up against him. Did he make this?

It feels so strange, spectating who he believes to be himself. There's no control over this dream. He's stuck watching this from a first-person perspective, but sometimes vague impressions of *over there* add depth to the memory.

In his distraction, the dream continued on, and now there's a sloped rail leading towards a small pit, with another line of rails leading off to the side and up. He watches as he rides what must be a minecart down the track a couple times, before a distant impression of nervousness comes into focus.

The previously empty waist-deep pit is filled with a glowing orange, lava, and he sends a few minecarts down again before getting in one himself. The nervousness reaches its peak as the minecart hits the turn, and loosens into relief when the cart takes him up to the side. He drops out of the ceiling and back onto the normal track, and things start going blurry again.