Avery doesn’t wake up all at once. He never does, not really. He surfaces slowly, like something rising through deep water, awareness coming in pieces instead of all at once. First comes the feeling—wrong, cold, hollow in a way that doesn’t make sense because he’s not cold, not really. Then comes the sound of his own breathing, too fast, too shallow. Then the memory.
Something laughing softly behind him.
And D3r not answering when he called his name.
Avery’s eyes snap open in the dark.
For a second he doesn’t move. He just lies there, staring into nothing, his chest tight and his core glowing faintly under his skin—dim, frightened light, like a dying lantern. The room is quiet. Too quiet. No wind outside, no sheep bleating, no creaking wood. Just silence and the sound of his own breathing.
D3r is there, asleep beside him, one arm loosely draped over Avery’s waist like he fell asleep halfway through pulling him closer.
Avery stares at him for a long time.
He doesn’t touch him yet. He just watches the slow rise and fall of his chest, the way his hair falls across his forehead, the way he looks so normal when he sleeps. Not golden and terrifying and ancient and unknowable. Just D3r. Just the man who makes cocoa too sweet and pretends he doesn’t love baby animals but still adores them.
In the dream, the doors had opened.
In the dream, D3r had walked through them and never come back.
And Avery had known—knew in that horrible, certain way dreams sometimes give you—that if those doors closed, he would never see him again.
His hands are shaking a little.
He finally reaches out and presses his palm lightly against D3r’s chest, just to feel the warmth there, just to feel the steady heartbeat under his hand.
The relief hits him so suddenly it almost hurts.
He scoots closer without really thinking about it, pressing into D3r’s side, forehead resting against his shoulder. His core glows a little brighter, soft blue-white light spilling faintly through the blankets. He tries to calm down, tries to breathe slower, but every time he closes his eyes he sees the doors again.
He makes a small sound before he can stop himself.
He doesn’t jerk awake or startle. He just opens his eyes and immediately turns his head toward Avery, like he already knew something was wrong.
“Aves?” he murmurs, voice rough with sleep.
Avery doesn’t answer right away. He just moves closer and wraps both arms around him, pressing his face into his chest like he’s trying to make absolutely sure he’s still there.
D3r goes still for half a second, surprised, and then his arms come around Avery automatically, pulling him in tighter.
“Bad dream,” Avery mutters into his shirt, voice muffled.
D3r’s hand moves slowly up and down his back in a steady rhythm. “Yeah?”
Avery nods against him. He doesn’t want to describe it. He doesn’t want to say the words out loud. Saying things out loud sometimes makes them feel too real.
For a long time they just lie there like that, Avery half on top of him, clinging a little tighter than usual.
D3r eventually presses his lips lightly to the top of Avery’s head. “I’m here,” he says quietly.
“I thought you weren’t,” he admits, voice small in a way he hates but can’t help right now. “In the dream. You walked through those doors and you didn’t come back.”
D3r doesn’t move for a long moment.
He knows what doors Avery means. Avery has never seen them, but somehow he knows. Golden doors in a place that isn’t a place, wind that blows without air, a city that exists where nothing should exist.
D3r closes his eyes briefly.
Then he tightens his arms around Avery and presses his cheek against his hair. “I’m not going anywhere, ⎓╎∷ᒷ⎓|:॥,” he says.
“You don’t know that,” Avery mutters.
D3r huffs a quiet breath. “I do.”
“You literally don’t,” Avery says, but there’s no bite to it. He just sounds tired. Scared. “You’re like… cosmically weird. You could get sucked into a different dimension or become a god or something and forget I exist.”
“That’s not how that works.”
“You don’t know that either.”
D3r can’t help it—he laughs quietly, just a little. Avery always does this when he’s scared. Talks too much, says ridiculous things, tries to make the fear smaller by turning it into something almost funny.
He cups the back of Avery’s head and gently nudges him so he’ll look up.
Avery does, reluctantly, eyes glowing faintly in the dark.
D3r reaches up and brushes his thumb lightly under Avery’s eye where there’s a tiny smear of dried salt. “You were crying.”
“I was asleep,” Avery mumbles defensively.
“You were crying,” D3r repeats softly.
Avery scowls a little, then immediately gives up and buries his face back into D3r’s shoulder. “It was a really bad dream.”
Avery is quiet for a long time after that. His breathing slowly evens out, but he doesn’t let go. If anything, he slowly ends up half sprawled on top of D3r, leg thrown over his, arm across his chest, like he’s trying to physically anchor him to the bed.
He just keeps one hand on Avery’s back and the other in his hair, gently combing his fingers through it over and over in slow, repetitive motions.
After a while, Avery speaks again, voice sleepy now. “If you ever disappear into some cosmic horror nonsense, I’m coming after you.”
D3r smiles slightly into his hair. “Good to know.”
“I believe you,” D3r says, completely sincere.
Avery huffs a quiet breath. “You better not leave me.”
D3r tightens his arms around him again, just a little. “I won’t, Aves.”
Avery finally relaxes after that.
His core light dims to a soft, steady glow instead of that frightened flicker from earlier. His grip loosens, but he still stays wrapped around D3r like a blanket, like something that belongs there.
Within a few minutes, he’s asleep again.
This time he doesn’t dream about doors.
D3r stays awake a little longer, though.
He watches the ceiling in the dark, one hand still resting on Avery’s back, feeling the slow, steady movement of his breathing. Feeling the warmth of him, the weight of him, the very real, very human presence curled around him like he’s the most important thing in the universe.
After a while, D3r presses a soft kiss to Avery’s hair and closes his eyes again, still holding him.
He doesn’t move for the rest of the night.
