Three Futures Enslaved | Dream Team

Chapter Five

George was not accustomed to the cold.

Living in Superiora all his life, he knew he should've been. Superiora's winters were chilly, but still, he had spent most of his childhood behind the safety of the walls of its castle, firmly seated in front of a fireplace with bundles of blankets around his body.

Sapnap had grown up in a small cabin on the outskirts of the kingdom. Hail, rain, snow --- he'd seen it all. The first time George had yelped at the sight of snow and rushed back into the house, he'd laughed at him for days.

Even now, his cloak tightly around him, the fur-lined edges of his hood scratching at his cheeks, he just wanted to run back to the castle and bury himself in thick clothes.

"We should sweep all the villages in Superiora," Sapnap was saying, his voice drifting over to George from a couple feet in front of him. "Just in case Dream is in any of them. We'll ask Ant to help us with Suspiro's villages, and we'll do a sweep of Guerrier soon after."

George nodded mutely, even though the warrior couldn't see. He hugged his cloak closer to his body and sighed quietly. He was prepared. Dream had been wearing a shirt when some magical force had zapped him out of Bad's home. Had that same force given him some warmer clothes? Or was he freezing somewhere by himself, and when they found him, they'd be stumbling over his dead, blue body?

His feet tripped over themselves. George yelped as he tumbled forward, catching himself before he hit the ground. 

"Such a clutz, Gogy," Sapnap laughed. "Come on. There will be plenty more things for you to trip over later."

"Shut up," George mumbled, pulling his goggles over his eyes. His heart was pounding. All that thinking about finding Dream's body at his feet had spooked him out completely. Even though he was dressed warmly, he was shivering.

The snow was fluffy and wet, making crunchy sounds beneath his boots as he walked. Boots were another thing he wasn't used to. His father had kept him inside so much during the winters that the bare minimum he was able to do with boots was lace them on. His feet were unaccustomed to walking in the clunky shoes, and his soles were already complaining of the hard bottoms.

Sapnap looked like he was perfectly at ease. His cloak swished around his legs, not even buttoned up fully. His hood was down. Flakes of snow drifted down from the grey sky above, coming to a rest on top of his dark hair. George could just barely see the ends of the white bandanna wrapped around his forehead peeking out from the fur on the hood.

George envied how comfortable the man seemed in the cold. He envied the life Sapnap had lived. His own had always been a sheltered one, and now, he was getting to see all the things he had missed out on. Like freezing in the chilly air and tormenting his feet with boots.

He knew it could've been worse. Summers in Superiora were comfortable, but occasionally, they'd get a couple days of extreme heat. On those days, there wasn't much George could do but wallow in the lake nearby and hope that the heat wouldn't roast him alive. At least with the cold, he could add on layers. With extreme heat, it wasn't as if he could take his skin off.

"I wonder how he is," Sapnap mused, shaking George out of his thoughts.

"What?" George asked blankly.

He could feel Sapnap's eye roll. "Dream, I mean. He's probably in a foreign place right now, right? I wonder if he's finding food and shelter all right. It's not fair to dump him somewhere and not give him that, right?"

"Fate's not very fair in the first place," George said off-handedly.

"I know," Sapnap grumbled. "But at the same time, it's got to be, if it brought Dream back."