Almost But Not Quite Human

Continued Adventure

A couple of weeks passed fairly uneventfully, and the three finally made it to the river. With the map, this probably would have taken a week and a half maximum but it was found to be lost in the scuffle of George and Sapnap's first mob encounter. Luckily for the boys, Dream's knowledge of the area made it so they weren't completely lost. He also taught George and Sapnap how to fight better which they gladly utilised in the increasing frequency of mob encounters. Also it turned out that Dream - despite his self proclaimed lack of social skills - made fast friends with the other two. They jokingly named their trio the Dream Team.

At one of their rest stops, Sapnap, George, and Dream decided to have a splash about in the river seeing as it was fairly clean. Trying to play tag, George had just beat Sapnap again when he complained, "This is no fair! You've got goggles George!"

"Well, yeah dummy I need them too see."

"Hey why don't you come and help me Dream?"

Dream looked up from the bank where he was splashing his feet in the water and pointed to the mask, "It would be kind of awkward for me to swim with this don'tcha think?"

Treading water, George paused questioningly and asked, "Why do you wear that mask anyway Dream?" and was immediately hit by a big splash of water from his best friend "Oh my god George you can't just ask someone why they wear a mask."

George was seemingly embarrassed and blushed a little. "Oooh someone's blushing!" Sapnap teased, then screamed as George began to swim over claiming he was going to drown him. On the bank of the river, Dream almost fell in the water wheezing with laughter.

After George and Sapnap had finished trying to kill eachother, Dream decided it was only fair for him to explain why he wore the mask, which lead to George and Sapnap becoming super curious about Dream's 'mutations'. Despite what you might think, this didn't make Dream uncomfortable.

"I um- I didn't want to tell you about it before because uh, I guess I was a bit insecure about it."

George laughed, "Dream that's fine! You know how messed up my eyes are too. Now we just need Sapnap to join the crew."

"Hardy har," said the boy in question, "you too can go bond over you're strange eyes while I prefer to have fantastic vision thank you very much"

Dream thought for a moment. "Aren't George's goggle prescriptions like, way crazy strong? So technically you still don't have the best vision"

"Yeah actually. Hey George, I don't remember them always being that strong, did you get new lenses shortly before we left?" Sapnap decided to brush past the jab which made Dream snicker.

"Nope, I've had the same prescription pretty much my whole life"

"Huh"

The conversation slowed, and soon everyone came to the mutual decision to get some rest. Now that they were out of the cave, Dream admitted that he preferred to sleep in a tree than on the ground.

"Like a bird" Sapnap had commented once Dream was out of earshot.

"a pretty cool one though" George countered.

"Maybe you should go sleep in a tree too George, then you can be lovebirds"

"Sapnap what the hell!"

Banter aside, everyone slept pretty peacefully. George felt he was finally used to sleeping outdoors and no longer flinched at every sound. Sapnap too felt more at ease, though the fate of BBH still ate away at his mind every night and left sour dreams in its place.
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Morning came, and surprisingly George was the first awake. Now that they knew how to defend themselves, the Dream team had settled into a fairly normal sleep schedule and George was up in time to see the sunrise. It made him sad that he couldn't see the vibrant colours everyone else could, seeing as he was colourblind. Ah well, it was just another eye problem George had had to deal with his while life. No big deal. Nope. Not at all.

The morning brang a chilling breeze, and George rummaged around for a jumper in his pack. Finding a nice grey one that might have been Sapnap's, George slipped it on to protect from the cold. He could worry about Sapnap's anger later and to be honest he might not even notice.

Feeling strangely productive, George decided to get some water from the river and get it cleaned for their water skins. At the same time he could look for berries and nuts if there were any about.

George was partially successful in his foraging expedition and tucked most of what he found into a pouch, nibbling on the rest as he set the water to boil. Sapnap murmered something in his sleep and turned around, but was definitely woken up when George almost dropped the mini kettle and it clanged against a rock.

"Oh um, Sorry Sapnap. I was just boiling some water."

"Nah dude it's fine," Sapnap yawned, "I was gonna get up soon anyway"

"Oh cool"

Neither noticed the eyes in the canopy and in the thick of the forest  watching them.

Sapnap and George gathered their sleeping bags up and stuffed them into bags. And packed up the rest of the camp ready for their continued Adventure. The boys always did their best to leave each camp space as they found it. Happy with what they had done, Sapnap and George turned to find which tree Dream was still laying in.

Whoomp

Someone landed in front of George, and he had horrible flashbacks of BBH trying to gore him, but the figure did not attack. It was a man, but with large wings that spread behind him menacingly. His face was contorted into a scowl, framed by dirty-blonde hair that came just past his shoulders and a green-and-white stripped bucket hat.

George heard Sapnap shout behind him, and assumed he must be confronted as well. George risked a quick peek and saw Sapnap with his hands up in surrender being help at knife-point by a pig-human with a crown and royal gown. George wondered if maybe he was still asleep, because this all seemed too absurd.

"Techno, back off. We don't know why they're here yet." The blonde man said.

The pig-man - supposedly 'Techno' - grunted in annoyance and reluctantly sheathed his knife. The blonde turned back to George and opened his mouth to talk when someone else fell through the canopy. George heard Sapnap mumble,"Is it raining people today?" As Dream dusted himself off and put one hand up to the blonde who had a look of shock on his face.

"Wait, Phil. They're with me."
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Oof longer chapter today. Do you guys prefer the longer ones that take more time or the shorter ones I can do faster?

Sincerely, a fuzzy balloon