#this does have a happy ending for baby Morpheus dont worry

[ibrithir-was-here]

Its almost 2 AM. And instead of sleep I wrote Baby Dream AU drabble, cuz Calliope only graces me in her time zone I guess. Might be a part two. Anyway here ya go xD

Baby Dream Drabble (part 1?)

Jessamy was a raggedy, much mended, button eyed stuffed raven. She was Morpheus's only friend, and he loved her more than anything in the world. 

Teleute had given Jessamy to him on his first birthday, though of course he didn't remember that.

She'd made Jessamy with her Gift. He knew that, even if he didn't know how. He didn't really know how any of their Gifts worked. He just knew that they all had them.

Portos could See, 

Teleute could Give--and Take Away

And he could Dream

The others were too small yet for their gifts to be clear. Olethros was just four, the twins were barely  two, and baby Euphoria hasn't even reached a full year yet. 

But Morpheus thought Portos already knew what their Gifts would be. After all, he had been the one to give them all their names, though he was only ten himself. He'd looked with seemingly unseeing eyes at each one of his siblings as they'd lain blinking up at him, hours old, and had Seen the shape of who'd they become, the outline of their life written out like a page within a great book that only he could read. 

That was how he'd explained it to Morpheus anyhow.

The explanation seemed to be enough for Mother and Father as well. They'd just nodded and agreed, and then handed the newly named child off to their nanny, free now to pursue their own interests within the scope of their own Gifts, until those interests crossed to include each other again, in which case another child was added to the Aterenus family.

Another small bassinet to line the nursery, which would become a small bed within a few years, shuffled over to make room for another small bassinet. Each one set up and left to the care of the nanny who'd been taken on that month. 

They never stayed long. They found the house too lonesome to abide,  the masters too difficult to appease, and the children too strange to love.

The children learned to make due.

Portos spent his time wandering the gardens of the estate, keeping out of everyone's way, his fingers tracing over his books. 

Morpheus, at six, wasn't technically allowed in the library, but sometimes he managed to sneak in, and when he did he'd pour over the pictures of every book he could reach. He didn't understand all of the words, but he'd make up stories around the pictures and the words he could read, whispering them allowed to Jessamy. 

Teleute, always the most outgoing of the three eldest siblings, and though she was only eight and the nanny should have been watching, she managed to always find a way out of the  manor house and out into "the real world" as she called it, though it was only the local village. 

She would come back with tales of such fantastic things as shops and cinemas and other children to play with, children who were called home at last by mothers who smiled and fathers who laughed and hugged them close. 

Morpheus drank in her stories like he was someone's dying of thirst.

And at night he'd Dream of them.

The shops and cinemas and happy children with happy parents. As vibrantly and fully as he could. And for a few hours each night he'd wrap himself in a bubble of warmth that he'd never felt in the waking world.

Sometimes he'd even be able to pull bits out from the dreams. Only little things though. A wrapper fromna sweet he'd never tasted, a  stub from  a film he'd never seen, a flower from a feild he'd never played in.

He never could seem to pull out the big things. The friends, the smiling families, the warm feelings.

He thought perhaps, if he could see them once himself, in truth, then maybe the next time he Dreamed them he could make them real.

If he could see them just once, he knew he could. 

That was how one day he'd found himself, Jessamy in tow as always, ducking through the underbrush, scrambling through the hole in the fence Teleute had told him of, and running as fast as his small legs could carry him down to the village. Towards sunshine and smiles and maybe even a friend who could speak back to him. 

He got to the bottom of the hill when the men in the dark car grabbed him.

They put something on his mouth that muffled his scream and made him feel strange and sleepy--and when he did sleep he didn't dream.

When he finally woke, feeling sick and fuzzy, he was somewhere dark and cold and hard. There was a strange painted circle around him, and that made him feel more sick and fuzzy. 

There were people all around him also, and their shadowed faces were as cold and hard as the room they were crowded in. 

The man they called Mr. Burgess was the hardest and coldest of all. He shouted at the others for "grabbing the wrong one" and several other things about the difficulty of spells and alignments and other things Morpheus didn't understand.

And then he'd started shouting at Morpheus.

He wanted to know what he could do, what his Gift was, what he was good for. 

Morpheus didn't answer. He was too afraid to. In case his Gift was not what they wanted. In case it was.

He wasn't supposed to tell people about his Gift. None of them were. It was one of the few things his parents had ever told him, besides to stop bothering them. Never let anyone know what he and his siblings could do. They would be in terrible trouble if they ever did. People would do horrible things to them if they found out about their Gifts. 

Morpheus didn't want to know what could be more terrible than being in this place, with these people.

So he kept quiet. He kept quiet for three days. He thought it was three anyway, it might have been more. He couldn't tell, here in the darkness.

He kept quiet, and ate the little food they gave him and drank the little water, and hugged Jessamy to him tightly when he got too hungry and didn't want to cry, for fear he wouldn't be able to stop.

He felt like that more and more often. 

Each day Mr. Burgess came down to yell at him. To yell and demand and threaten. And Morpheus felt fear locking his mouth shut tighter with every horrible word that spilled from the man's mouth. And he spent each night cowering from nightmares of the man; towering over him as he shrank smaller and smaller, chasing after him in the darkness, locking him in a glass bubble with no air, suspended naked for all to see. 

And on the third or fourth or seventh day, Mr. Burgess snatched Jessamy out of Morpheus's arms.

And he tore her into pieces.  

He dumped the pieces outside of the painted circle, where Morpheus couldn't reach them. He could only stare, thick, silent tears running down his thinning cheeks as he stared at the tatters that had been his only friend. 

He thought, dimly, that he didn't think he could talk now even if he wanted to.

And he didn't want to. He didn't want to do anything but be somewhere else. Somewhere far, far away. 

Somewhere warm, and safe. Where Mr Burgess couldn't be. Where there would be softness instead of hard stone, and enough to eat, and…and…

Morpheus curled up on the stone, as tightly as he could, and let his mind drift off. He hadn't tried to Dream, properly Dream, the whole time he'd been here. Worried his Dreaming might give his gift away, worried it would make things worse.

He didn't think things could get worse now.

At least if he Dreamed, he might see Jessamy again.

If he was very lucky, maybe he wouldn't even wake up.

And so he let the Dream wrap around him, hoping that wherever it took him, it would never end

***

It was the smell of pancakes that woke him.

He didn't really wake of course. Morpheus could tell he was in a dream, he always could. But in the dream he was waking up, and there was warmth and softness all around him. 

A pillow and mattress beneath him, a blanket tucking him in. Both more comfortable than anything he'd ever had at home. More colorful too. As he blinked open his eyes, Morpheus saw a room filled with a galaxy swirl of color. The walls were covered in bright paper, the ceiling in little plastic stars, something his parents would never have allowed in the nursery lest they peel the paint. 

 The windows were a riot of color, stained glass that the warm sunlight filtered through to send a rainbow down onto Morpheus's equally star-covered blanket. 

And there were toys. 

Toys of all shapes and sizes and descriptions, in bright and cheery colors, scattered on shelves and in woven baskets and some simply scattered on the floor, another afront his parents would never have stood for, though Morpheus couldn't remember the last time they'd actually been inside the nursery. 

In permeating it all was the wonderful smell of pancakes, coming through the door on the other end of the room.

Slowly, afraid that at any moment he'd take a wrong step, trip over a toy and take a tumble and wake with a jolt back in his waking nightmare, Morpheus tip-toed his way across the floor, the starry blanket pulled about his shoulders, determined to keep its warmth about him as long as he could.

He took a breath, turned the handle, and walked into a large open room. There was a comfortable looking , a few bookcases filled with interesting looking books, and a television set turned off, but a radio was playing somewhere.

And at the far end it opened into a kitchen space, where a man stood, his back turned to Morpheus, flipping pancakes and humming along with the radio. 

Morpheus stopped in his tracks, frozen at the sight of the towering adult. He was broad and strong looking, with longer hair than Morpheus had seen on a man, with a reddish tint to it that reminded Morpheus of his father's hair. He wondered how loud this man could yell, how hard he could hit. 

Morpheus gulped, took a step back. wondered if it was too late to sneak back into the wonderful bedroom, lock the door and hope he wouldn't be noticed. If he was very very quiet he could probably get away and--

And right then his stomach gave an almighty rumble. 

It would have been loud in the waking world, in a dream it practically echoed.

Morpheus froze up like a deer in headlights, hunger displaying as icy fear flooded his stomach as the man froze, and then turned…

The warmest, softest, kindest eyes Morpheus had ever seen settled on him, widening in surprise for a moment and then crinkling up into a happy welcoming smile.   

Morpheus had never known that people could smile with their eyes.

"Hullo"  The man said, crouching down to get on eye level with Morpheus, "Who might you be then?"

Morpheus opened his mouth to answer--and then shut it again, looking down at his feet as he felt his cheeks flush under the attention.  He hadn't  spoken much to adults even before he'd been taken, afraid of hearing once more that he needed to be quiet, to get out of the way. He'd never had someone approach him like this, on his level instead of towering over him.

It was strange and disconcerting and…and nice.

And yet he still couldn't make himself speak. He'd gone so long without using his voice by now that he was almost afraid of what he'd hear if he tried. 

But he knew if he didn't say something the man would start to get angry. He'd start to yell and then then--

Morpheus felt his chest tightening again, his throat felt thick even as he tried to summon up something, anything to say before the tears burning at the edges of his eyes could fall.

"Hey hey, it's alright"

The man's soft voice broke through the ice of Morpheus's panic like the sunshine of Spring thawing a frozen lake, its soothing tones sinking down into him, pulling him up from the depths he'd been sinking into.

"Bit shy? That's alright then. Suppose it's rude of me to ask before I've even introduced myself."

He held out a hand, slowly, so that Morpheus wasn't even startled into thinking it was coming towards him.

"I'm Hob, Hob Gadling. Would you like some pancakes then, little dream?"

Morpheus looked at the man, Hob's, hand, open in invitation, held steady, not gearing up for a slap. He looked at his warm smile, his kind eyes. And for the first time in more days than he knew, Morpheus felt warm all through.

He reached out his own hand, and placed it cautiously in Hob's. It curled over, dwarfing his small one, cupping it gently but not squeezing, not trapping in anyway. And Morpheus nodded his head. Yes, he would love some pancakes. He was so, so hungry.

Hungry for food and warmth and the kindness in Hob's face, a kindness he didn't think he'd ever seen till now, had never known could exist outside of his older sister and the comforting softness of his lost Jessamy.

Hob's smile became even brighter, and he gently, so gently, took Morpheus's hand as he led him to the table, where a plate of steaming, golden pancakes lay, stacked and waiting.

"Well come on then, I'd love the company. Stay as long as you'd like"

Morpheus wondered if he could stay forever.

***

When Hob Gadling woke up that morning, there were tears in his eyes, and a smile on his face.

He'd long since gotten used to the tears.

But it had been a long while since he'd woken up smiling.

Not since Eleanor, not since Robyn…

The little dream boy--he hadn't looked like Robyn at all. Dark where Robyn had been fair, quiet when he's never been able to get Robyn to stop talking.

He wished now he'd never tried.

But he was glad all the same, of the chance to be there for a child again, to make food to share, to read a silly picture book with ridiculous rhymes while the small dream boy had curled up next to him, wide eyed over some silly simple story Hob couldn't even recall now.

It had been a silly simple dream too. He'd played silly simple games and made silly stupid jokes he hadn't played or made in years and though the dream child hadn't laughed, he had finally smiled. And oh, it was such a sweet little smile, it lit up his whole face.

And he'd gotten to tuck a child in for bed once more, in a room that certainly did not exist in his real flat but fit so perfectly into his dream one, just as the dream child had seemed to fit perfectly into his existence as well, filling a space he'd long tried to avoid remembering was empty.

Hob hoped he'd dream the same dream again. He wouldn't mind seeing the sweet little dream child again.

He never expected to start dreaming it every night.