#librarian dream

[ennas-aesthetic]

Retired!Dream as a Librarian AU part 2

I am SOOOOOO glad that the reception for the retired!Dream as a Librarian AU was so enthusiastic and sweet! Thank you so much for that (and if you haven't seen part 1 one yet, click here). More snapshots of the AU will be added as we go, because a retired!Dream experiencing the full range of human emotions in a place of community has brought so many stories to tell.

Anyway, a good friend on Twitter asked what happens when Lucienne finds out that Retired!Dream has become a librarian (or at least, a library volunteer) in the Waking World. I DO, in FACT, have a headcanon locked and loaded for that, so here we go:

Sometimes Dream wonders how on earth he has gotten here.

It wasn't like he hates the job. Dream LOVES the local library - loves the staff and the stories and the people. It's the best outcome he could have ever hoped for, really. Like someone has given him a second chance, a renewal. A new purpose where his existence could transpose into a life worth living.

But, OH, the circumstances that it took for him to get here. If only his former subjects could see him now. If only LUCIENNE could see him now.

Dream understands, more than ever, how much painstaking effort goes into even MAINTAINING a functioning library. Running the vastest library he knows in existence WHILE managing the Dreaming when he runs off to brood must have been a herculean feat. Morpheus resolves to be more appreciative of her work over the millennia, if he ever sees her again.

And see her he does. Lucienne comes to the library one day, on the guise of looking for a mislaid book. Her face is wreathed with smiles, looking sharp and dapper in her suit.

"Greetings, my Lord," she beams, eyes alight with fondness and mirth. "You look to be in good health."

"Please," he says, and surprises himself by laughing out loud. Laughing comes easier to him now, he notices. (The first time he did this in front of the library staff it was in response to an incredibly macabre joke he found hilarious. Dream had slapped a hand to his mouth, but the damage had been done: the library staff looked on in ACTUAL suprise, and then they cackled in earnest, delighted that their strange new colleague had a fucked up sense of humor and an absolutely ridiculous laugh. So many more attempts to make him crack up started since that day. Not that he minded.) "Call me Morpheus. I am your lord no longer."

"Hmm," Lucienne says. "Very well. Hello, Morpheus." And all of a sudden she envelops him into a bone-crushing hug.

"That was not a breach of protocol and conduct, I hope," she says, mischievous, as she lets a rather staggered Dream go. "Seeing as I am your librarian no longer."

Dream smiles wide. He does not think he has ever smiled this frequently in his entire existence.

He gives her a tour of the library, introduces her to the people behind the counter. After a few conversations the staff has agreed on one thing: Lucienne may be the BEST librarian there is. Some of them had already asked her to stay. Dream has to interrupt quickly, saying that she is already a hotshot librarian somewhere else, before steering her away from her new admirers.

"They adore you, it seems," he tells her. Lucienne rolls her eyes. Even as his librarian she had always been frank with him, but seeing her be openly candid with Dream, without the barrier of his Nobility and his Lordship between them, pleased him to no ends. If any outsiders could have seen them, they would have thought they are just extremely close friends (and they are. They are.)

"And they are COMPLETELY enchanted by you," she shoots back, grinning, "which is honestly quite the miracle."

She teases him about finally being able to handle his books, and jokingly chastises him about not doing it sooner. Dream, to her (non) surprise, takes this seriously, and admits, rather abashed, that most of his bookkeeping skills are only existent because of her. He concedes that she is still the better librarian between the two of them. Lucienne is very smug over this confession (as she should be.)

"I am forever indebted to you," Morpheus says, and finds himself a little choked up at the last syllable. "You have given me a lifeline, in more ways than one." He shakes his head. "I do not know how I may ever repay you."

Her eyes are overbright, but when she speaks her voice is steady.

"Just live, Sire," she whispers. "That's repayment enough."

It's a blessing, almost. An anointment of old, except his birthright is now renewed. Just live. Dream nods, determined to make the boon stick. To keep the oath for as long as he can.

Before Lucienne leaves she hands him a gift. "To complete the librarian regalia," she winks. And just like that she's gone.

Inside the box is a compilation of all the "Sandman Stories" he has adlibbed for the kids during Story Time Tuesdays. A note taped on the book: 'Matthew is gloating because he gets to be a dragon. Name a raven after me, will you?' Dream laughs out loud.

(Sure enough, on the next Story Time Tuesday a new character -- Lucienne the Raven Librarian -- was introduced. The kids instantly fell in love with her, and the book feverishly codifies the stories Morpheus comes up for her.)

But that's not all. In the box is another pouch - he opens it, and a pair of spectacles tumble out. Another note: 'from one librarian to another.'

Morpheus wears those spectacles till this very day.

---

Want to know more about the Retired!Dream as a Librarian AU? Read part 1 here and part 3 here.

[inkplotkey]

Only like two months before my job starts! I am so ready to say goodbye to the employment office! They didn't let me study librarian studies, but hopefully that dream can come true now at some point. I don't plan to be a kindergarten worker for the rest of my life after all, but it's much better than being unemployed all the time. I have been without a job basically since graduation which was before covid!

[zilmart]

"My Lord, you are coming back, aren't you?"

Insta | Twitter

[olillskio]

Our fav Dream being annoyed at work :3

Look at all these colours, pretty proud ngl- Also Mr. Corinthian pls stop annoying Lucienne.

[capinejghafa]

[densewentz]

MS Paint Inktober Day 5 and I was having Matthew and Jessamy feels~ (This made me want to cry. I don't think i could regularly cope without layers or opacity) Bonus:

[bisexualhobgadling]

Dream of the Endless would be a great professor, but you know what else he'd be amazing at?

Children's Librarian

Kids are full of stories. He would absolutely love to hear them and help nurture that creativity. The really young ones could be read to and have nap time. Parents would love him. Kids would love him. Hob would love him.

also it would just be really cute 😌

[joytherabbit]

I finished. weeeeeeee～

[fishfingersandscarves]

brief lives: a scott pilgrim page redraw

[to-proudly-go]

That one art meme

[gabessquishytum]

So since there's no official Kinktober this year, I thought it would be fun to put together a few unofficial prompts for some Sandman shenanigans. Whatever pairing you'd like to do, whatever prompts you'd like to choose - even if it's only one of them, or all of them - it's completely up to you! This is really meant as a little inspiration in the hope that the wonderful Sandman community will create some fun and kinky content! Please feel free to reblog this - and it would be lovely if we could tag stuff with #Sandmankinktober to share the debauchery, too!

[alexxuun]

Endless chemistries…yet…

[bludpudding]

SANDMAN FUNKOS ARE GOING LIVE THIS WEEK APPARENTLY?????? I HAVE BEEN WAITING SO LONG I CANT BELIEVE IT

WILL UPDATE WHEN MORE INFO COMES OUT

[writing-for-life]

Sandman Sneak Peek Analysis

There is Brief Lives in this, but you’ll miss it if you blink…

Is everyone recovering? 🤣

So we obviously got our fill of thirst traps, but I wanted to analyse the sneak peek (click to watch) a bit more closely.

Many people were commenting they only see Season of Mists and Song of Orpheus in the clip, but I don’t think that’s true. We obviously don’t know what exactly they did to the arcs and what might have changed, but I still predict that the first batch will be Season of Mists and Brief Lives (with other stuff thrown in, I wrote about it here). [I think we also saw a clip from Thermidor in the sneak peek, and that Lady Johanna Constantine was in it, but that just as an aside.]

So let’s start with stills I think are definitely from

Brief Lives

I honestly think it’s this (they’re lighting his face from below for a campfire effect, there are candles etc):

Edit 22/09:

We sleuthed a bit more across several platforms, and some clever people pointed out this:

These two frames appear in different places of the sneak peak, so we can’t know for certain if they are from the same scene. It is possible though. And if they are: He is wearing his ruby on the one to the left. It’s hard to tell if it’s the same thing to the right, but it could be? If so, that would mean this could be from Song of Orpheus instead of Brief Lives.

He does wear a clasp in Brief Lives all the way through, so that’s also possible, but again: If these shots are from the same scene, which it honestly looks like, I’m now leaning towards Song of Orpheus, and this particular scene (there’s a fire there, too):

Plus, if you zoom in and squint really hard, he seems to be wearing something on his shoulder here, too:

What else?

We see Despair’s Realm. But we don’t in Season of Mists. So this is either Brief Lives, or they give us a bit of Three Septembers and a January (which I’d love tbh, but I’m not going to hold my breath).

Next:

I think this could be Ruby’s/Wanda’s death/the fire. It’s really hard to see, but that could be Indya Moore sleeping? Let me know what you think…

Then this one:

I bet my bottom dollar this is Suffragette City and Ishtar’s dance. Now, the bottom panel is a tricky one because in the sneak peek, it’s actually right after the shot of (presumed) Wanda, so my initial response was it’s the fire. But the curtains look exactly the same as in the one with Ishtar’s dance, plus I think the glass is also in both shots. Which makes me think they either just put those scenes randomly together in the clip despite them being separate, OR that they changed the arc a bit and pulled Wanda/Ruby and Ishtar’s dance together. Either way, we’re definitely in Brief Lives I think.

Over to…

Season of Mists

I cackled like a lunatic when I saw this. IYKYK, but I somehow didn’t expect them to give us that one. Hurray (or not, depending on whether you like spiders I guess 🤣)

Angels looking modern…

Shame really, I wouldn’t have minded a more comics accurate look, but hey. Also: Is that your man Edward, @marlowe-zara ? Hard to tell from this angle, but I think it could be?

That’s also Andre Flynn in the background (also an Angel then).

Shivering Jemmy with the balloon! 🎈 If she doesn’t dump it on Dream, I’m gonna riot!

These ones with Lucienne are hard to place, and they could be anything, but they somehow give me stronger Season of Mists than Brief Lives vibes, although both is possible.

I have a hunch it’s this one:

Then there’s naturally all the obvious stuff (Cluracan, Susano-o-No-Mikoto, the family dinner etc etc), but I don’t think I have to get into those because they jump out at us straightaway.

More in the realm of

Casting

I think that might be Ella Rumpf as Eurydice, @tickldpnk8 What do you think?

This is definitely Wil Coban, but who he? Fae (the ears suggest so much)?

So what’s everyone thinking?

[designtheendless]

Besties! At the Inn 🍸

[densewentz]

Pinterest Art Base Inktober Day 7! When Dream gets out of his box they're all fucked tbh (I have no idea if this is what this prompt means but I did it anyway so shrug)