A Lily Sprouts From Ashes
Lily’s first thought when waking up in the empty, destroyed world, is to run. Run as far away as he possibly can, escape the ruins of his beloved’s mad rage against their old home. So he does. He runs, and he runs, and suddenly he isn’t home. There are strange people staring at him, and snow, and he’s so very scared. The first place he lands is an UnderFell. Everyone looks angry, but it’s not the villagers, surely these people are different. There’s one that looks like him! Oh, but he’s hurt… the bandages around his ulna surely don’t mean anything good for the bone underneath.
Carefully, he approaches, hands in the air to show he means no harm, and he tries to tell the skeleton that, but he doesn’t seem to understand. “I won’t hurt you,” he says softly, though the Sans seems confused and defensive, backing away into a wall and growling at him. Dream isn’t sure how to get his point across, but he frowns and pauses before stepping forward and reaching out to Red (as he had nicknamed the skeleton because of his magic color). “I promise I won’t hurt you.” Maybe Red can’t understand him, but he’s hoping the tone of his voice is enough. It seems to help, Red is a little more relaxed.
“Can I see your arm please?”
“The fuck language are you speaking anyway?”
Dream tilts his head. What is Red saying? He pauses a moment, then holds up his own arm and taps his ulna, then holds out a hand. Red squints, but he slowly offers his arm out, ready to pull it back or attack at any moment. Dream surprises him, however, with a soft hold, and he unwraps the bandages slowly and gently. Red watches, trembling, and does his best not to move so he doesn’t hurt himself by interrupting this golden stranger. He watches, watches, and soon the bandages are unwound to reveal a very nearly broken ulna.
Even more surprising than this goldy’s gentleness is the look of genuine concern and distress when he sees Red’s injury. He looks up at Red, then back down, then up again, before carefully lifting Red’s arm and giving the injury a soft kiss. Healing magic flows from his fingertips, firelike but only pleasantly warm, and as it dances over the damaged ulna, the wound disappears.
“Kissed it better,” Dream says with a smile. Red simply gapes at him a little, and between the strange act of kindness and the language that he knows nothing of, he’s absolutely baffled. Who is this man? Is this stranger even a man? Where did they come from? Why are they being so kind without a thought? Red closes his mouth and jerks his arm away.
“I don’t even know what you’re saying, weirdo.” He glances down at his arm a moment, though, and his expression softens slightly before stretching into a grin. He looks back up and gives a thumbs up. Obviously they don’t speak the same language, that should work. Dream, on the other hand, doesn’t get it at all and looks up to the cave ceiling, face twisted into an expression of confusion, then looks back to Red and tilts his head. Red groans and his grin drops, his hand coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose, or the skeletal equivalent. “Lost cause, nevermind. Do ya understand me at all?”
Dream frowns. No, there’s a communication barrier. He focuses for a moment, then lets his magic display a simple image of a quill, ink, and paper, then holds up his hands. “I have nothing to write with, I don’t know how to communicate with you.” The image flickers and disappears. Red makes a face, then motions for Dream to follow, looking tired.
It’s not long before they’ve made it to Red’s and Edge’s house, and Red manages to find a pen and paper laying around the house and brings it back to Dream. Dream had asked for a quill, but quills are outdated and much less practical. Dream looks at the pen in confusion. The paper is obviously paper, yes, but… Dream lifts a brow and turns to Red with the image of quill and ink again. Red shakes his head and picks up the pen, scribbling a little in the corner of the paper to make sure it works. The ink comes out after a moment and Dream leans in to watch in wonder, then holds his hand out for the pen. The pen is given to him, and Dream presses it to the paper, then pauses. How does one even write? He forgot. Maybe if he closes his eyes… Pictures! Pictures will do.
So he starts to draw. He draws a figure that looks like himself, then draws cracks across it before replicating the image and surrounding it in radiance lines, then points to himself. Then a crying face with an arrow back to the previous figure. The figure is next drawn running with speed lines behind it, into some disc-shaped thing, and then the scene where he had shown up. He then writes [I’m not sure what script your language is in or how to speak it.]
Red doesn’t really understand the first part of the story, but crying and running and ending up in UnderFell is the part he understands. He most definitely doesn’t know this man’s language. Stars, this isn’t a babybones, he’s obviously fully grown and has his own complex language that he can speak and write, but… Red is going to have to teach him Common, isn’t he? Right from the start, alphabet and all. Red gives a slow sigh, then carefully takes the pen from Dream.
A. The first letter is on the paper, uppercase and lowercase, and Red hands the pen to Dream. Dream looks at the letters, then copies them, a nice, curving script that barely mimics Red’s but pulls off the shape of the letters either way. Red nods and smiles a little, then moves on to B. Slowly but surely, Dream copies the alphabet in order from Red, and when they’re finished, Red draws a symbol that equates to “repeat”.
Dream stares at it, processing, thinking, then moves the pen to make A. Aa. Bb. Cc. Dd. He has it, the alphabet is under his fingers. Then he draws a crescent shape and points to it.
“That’s a moon. M O O N, moon.” Red then puts it on paper, writing the name of it underneath the picture. Dream seems excited and writes it down as well, then giggles, cheeks a warm gold. “Moon…” he murmurs, staring at it for a few moments. Okay, so how is he supposed to make other words? He draws a simple version of himself and an arrow to the picture with three question marks. Red writes [me] underneath it. He points to the word, then the picture, then Dream. This brings back memories of teaching Edge as a babybones…
So it goes, Dream draws pictures and puts together letters and concepts to make words. The next few hours run smoothly with Red teaching Dream words and how to make them into sentences, and it’s when they’re taking a break that Edge returns home.
“Sans, you lazybones, you’re supposed to- who… who is that?” Edge stops short when he sees Dream, absolutely bewildered by the appearance of this strange new skeleton in their home.
“Yeah I’m not sure what ‘is name is, he popped up out of nowhere and healed my arm so I’m keeping him. I also found out ‘e doesn’t like mustard. Made a nasty face ‘bout it. Been calling ‘im Goldy but I’m fairly sure the man’s got a name.” Red looks to Dream as if for help.
“Sun! Cloud, sun, sleep, happy. Umm…” Dream makes a face. He sounds like a child. “I hate that I can’t speak well in this ‘common’ you’re showing me. My name is Dream, but your language is… hard to translate to. I know concepts, yes, but this…” He huffs and tries again. “Night thought? Happy?”
“He’s strugglin’, boss. Doesn’t speak our language, I’ve been tryin’ ta teach him.” Red shrugs, then looks to Dream, thinking. “Night thought? Fantasy, dream, nightmare, what do you think?”
“Night thought, sleep, happy.” Dream makes a face, frustrated that he can’t convey what word he’s trying to make. Surely there was something…
“Dream? A dream?” Edge pipes up, boot tapping the floor impatiently.
“Dream! I’m Dream, that’s my name.” Dream seems very happy with himself for this, and he does a little jig in his excitement.
“Okay, so what the fuck are you doing in our home?” Even as he asks this looking at Dream, he gives Red a look to the side. Dream seems to focus, to think, putting a hand on his cheek and scrunching his face up, trying to understand. In the end he gives up and looks to Red.
“What is fuck? And home?” Red groans, looks to Edge with a look of tired frustration, then gestures to Dream.
“It’s gonna take a while. He’s… learning. That’s what he’s doing here.”
“Fine. But only for a little while.”
A little while turned out to be weeks, and Dream was rather attached to Red, no matter how rude he happened to be. He had a voracious appetite for words, wanting to know more and more words until he could actually make proper sentences and put together words.
One day he comes to ask the question he really wants answered.
“Red?”
“Yeah? Wassup?”
“I’m looking for someone, but I don’t know where they are… he is? We didn’t really do pronouns back then. He. If I’m he then Night is he. We’re the same. But I don’t know where he is. I can’t sense him in this place.”
“Night? Don’t know a Night, sorry.”
“Umm… Drippy black skeleton man, has… uh, what are the wiggly limbs called again?”
“Tentacles? Geez, a walking hentai monster.”
“Shut up! He’s not a hentai monster, and that’s not what he uses his tentacles for anyway. He uses them for… to…” Dream’s eyelights shrink to pinpricks as he thinks back to exactly what Nightmare had used those tentacles for. “Hurt, blood, death, destruction. He- He’s not bad, though, it’s just the apples that did that to him! I just… I need to find him. He’s important to me.” His eyelights are back to normal, and he rushes to defend Nightmare even as he feels the dawning fear in Red.
“Yeah yeah he’s important to ya or whatever. Why do you really want to find him? He’s not yer type, bud.” Red lifts a brow, propping an elbow on the table and taking a sip of mustard. “Besides, ‘e seems to scare you.”
Dream decides to completely ignore the comment about what’s his type. It’s not worth pursuing. “I want to be one with him again. He is my other half.”
“Blah blah blah, sappy bullshit, you wanna fuck ‘im. Am I right?” Red waves his hand, a lazy gesture, making very little effort to listen to Dream about anything remotely romantic.
Dream’s face ignites with blush and he looks nearly indignant. “Do you have any other thought in your brain?! It is my fate to be with him. I must, and I wish to. I am his, and he is mine. It’s rather simple. Do you not… understand romance?”
“Nah, I just choose not to participate. ‘M not sappy like you.” Red makes a face.
“...Right.” Dream moves to get up. “Well if there’s any way I can fi-” Dream’s words are cut short as he knocks over the cup of juice he was drinking, and he scrambles to catch it, but it’s already too late. The mess on the floor is… boiling?
A figure rises from the puddle, jumping onto firm ground with a confident grin and looking to Dream. “You there! I knew something felt off, heh. What’s your name, where’d ya come from?”
Dream doesn’t know the name of his home. “...Dream.”
Looking back, Lily wishes he had run.