God of Ruin

Part Seven

Alloy is still unsettled by the dead grass that surrounds the meeting hall in Dream's AU. He wants to fix it. Dream and Nightmare's homes was beautiful once, and it can be again. Alloy sees his friend visibly shudder when stepping into the AU. Nightmare hasn't been back since the incident. Dust looks around curiously. He's never seen outside the building. Blue happily walks beside his murderous acquaintance. Dream must have seen them coming, or sensed his brother's sickening aura, because he runs out to meet them.

"Brother! I didn't think you were still coming." Dream had assumed that the bad guys had already decided to go after Alloy's attacker on their own.

"I said I would, didn't I?" Nightmare growls.

"Dream! It's great to see you!", Blue shouts. He rushes forward and catches the Guardian of positivity in a tight hug. Alloy blinks. That looks....... kinda nice.

     "I've been trying to get into the office for the last few hours,"Dream explains once Blue lets go, "Come on, I'll take you to it. Ink put some type of lock on the door."

Dream leads the way into the meeting hall. Alloy looks all around as they enter and leave the main room where he had revealed the balance. He hasn't had the time to explore this AU further. He didn't realize it was used for anything but meetings. Alloy is curious. He found the Destroyer's trunk of dolls and captured souls, but there was nothing is the DoodleShpere. Did the Creator reside here instead? The meeting room runs parallel to a long hallway that the group moves through. Dream ignores many doors before stopping at an unmarked room towards the hall's end.

"I'm not sure what Ink did to this door, but it has to be linked to his magic. I can't see where any lock is," Dream sighs, slightly frustrated. He jerks the doorknob, but it doesn't open. There's no keyhole or visible latch keeping it closed.

"HeRe, let mE try," Alloy offers. He moves next to Dream and tugs on the knob himself. It doesn't budge. Alloy thinks for a moment before slipping the brush off his shoulder. "StanD back, plEase," he tells the others. Then, the God Balance slams the butt of his paintbrush down on the doorknob with all his strength, breaking off. Dream jumps and squeaks in surprise.

"Wh-Why'd you do that!?", he stutters. With Ink starting to disappear for good, Dream doesn't like the idea of ruining the last pieces of his friend.

"It's teChnically mY office, right!?" Alloy wears a mischievous smirk that's so much like Error's that Nightmare forgets, for a moment, that Alloy isn't Error. "I can do whATever I want wIth my oWn stuff."

     When Dream said that Ink had an office, Alloy expected a small little room with a few sketch books. He was wrong. Ink's office is more like a large work room. It's nearly 30 feet from wall to wall! The room is a perfect square with shelves and filing cabinets taking up every bit of wall space. A few tables are shoved together in the middle. There's only one spinning chair in the entire room. Papers and some art supplies are still scattered about. This scene makes Alloy feel odd. The room doesn't look neglected at all. It looks like Ink could walk in at any time, but he never will again. Despite that, Alloy does feel at home.

     "Office? More like an elementary school art classroom!" Dust laughs.

     "Whoa.... that's a lot of crayons." Blue stares at one six foot shelf that is literally just a giant crayon rack. Every imaginable color and shade is perfectly ordered, black rising to the purest white at the top. Similar setups are nearby for colored pencils and markers.

      "What's this?" Nightmare walks into the room and picks up a small object off the table.

     "O-Oh! That's mine. I asked Ink to fix it, since I couldn't figure it out, but..... I guess he never got around to it," Dream rushes forwards and tries to take it back. Nightmare shoves him away to get a closer look. The object is another music box, this time turquoise and ivory.