Ganymede Complex
Set me free, I've been caught in you
Overcome with a heartsick voodoo
You remember when he was cold as old cliffsides. When he was bitter and jaded; lip curled in the ghost of a sneer and a roll of eyes that held untold aeons. an eldritch tyrant regent and now, here he sits...
Dizzy and dangerous, smiling and serene in the way a serpent on the hunt was.
A Ganymede made of stained glass and arsenic.
Diplomacy was an ancient art- and Lucifer prided himself on his ability to make himself a welcome guest with nothing more than a smile an a veneer of charm. In the old days- back before this fae pale reincarnation lounged on an old throne- the air would become stuffy in Dream’s throne room.
Stuffy and thickened with dust and forgotten promises, the air of a crypt built of cracked stone and forgotten names etched on tarnished plaques.
The lights would be dim, the ceilings dark far before the rafters, the lights flickering and dull and swallowed down by naked and unpolished stone.
Lucifer straightened his collar, jacket folded neatly over an arm as he approached; flanked by a humming Lucien with a rumbling Matthew on his shoulder.
The Devil looked about, raising eyebrows at the multicolored tapestries strung from deep cherrywood rafters that had crystalline lighting hung from it in drifting trails like the arms of old galaxies and the tails of distant comets.
“Things have changed I see, sir Librarian.”
“Indeed. With our Lord’s rebirth it seems he has... changed. Like he has broken a chrysalis of his own making.”, said the Librarian easily, pulling a pocket watch from a pocket and checking it, “The changes have been mostly pleasant. Mostly.”
The door opened, and a familiarly regal voice growled from the center of the room, “...FUCK.”
Lucien jolted, frowning deeply, “Sire.”
Dream turned, guilt absent from his stormcloud expression, “I am allowed to express myself how-so-ever I see fit in my residence, Lucien.”
“It is RUDE to use such vulgar language in the presence of guests.”, said Lucien flatly.
“It’s quite. Quite alright, come now. I’m something of a vulgar creature myself, after all.”, soothed Lucifer with his winning smile and a prayer to himself that it wasn’t shaky.
He was. Displeased at his current form’s reaction to hearing so well spoken a man swear so crudely.
Dream’s smile was unreadable and calm- something glimmered blue-green-violet in galactic eyes as he turned away with a flutter of his robes.
“Vulgar is a way to put it, Morningstar.”, he said, and Lucifer wondered if the croon was intentional.
The devil cleared his throat, “It seems I am early-”
“Oh, no. Fashionably late as always.”, said Dream amicably as hands moved in front of him and he stared up- to where a geode-decorated chandelier slowly creaked into position near where Mervyn stood on a rafter.
“We simply began entertainment in the Garden, is all.”, said Lucien easily before he pocketed his watch, “Speaking of, Sire- I daresay it is time to invite your guests into the palace.”
“Of course, of course.”, said Dream before the thunk of a chandelier dropping onto a heavy steel hanger-hook resounded through the room, “There.”
Lucien took Lucifer’s coat, startling the demonic royal with a raised eyebrow and suspicion in his gaze.
“May I ask what we are celebrating?”, asked the Devil, clearing his throat firmly as Dream reached out to pluck a glass of wine from a tray that drifted by.
“The anniversary of my rebirth. The first one, at least.”, he mused before taking a sip from the crystal glass and visibly relaxing at the taste, “Obviously, I won’t impose this upon everyone every year- but it would do good for distant allies to know that I am, in a way, still here.”
“A wise decision. Threats are always best delivered with a smile, dizzy Dream.”
“Of course, Samael.”
A narrowing of impossibly blue eyes, “....Mind your use of my old name.”
“Shall I use it only in private, then?”, chuckled the Dreamlord as he moved closer and the grand doors opened distant from them, “Or should I stick to calling you songbird when I make you sing for me?”
Lucifer’s spine straightened with a soft crackle from the suddenness, “Dream.”
A wink and a laugh as he passed by in a billow of iridescent cream-and-snow robes and spread arms wide as guests began to pile in. His voice boomed out from so slim a frame- birdcage chest and whispered hips as he greeted his visitors.
Lucifer swallowed hard, glad his kind could not blush as he moved to the side with ease to watch.
Seeing Destiny almost smile beneath his eternal cowl as Death giggled with a light in her eyes Lucifer swore she’d never had before. As Desire and Despair slunk in with polite nods before Delirium tore in with a squealed greeting and threw herself at Dream with a gale force.
Watching the whispers spread in waves as Dream laughed, actually laughed, and let the young Endless’s arms encircle his middle as he gently pet over her ever changing hair.
“Welcome! Welcome honored guests and distant visitors- Please, take your comforts as you will; tonight you are all my esteemed guests! My kingdom welcomes you with open arms!”
The whispers increased easily as the crowd moved in and ghostly trays drifted out- topped with wineglasses and beer mugs and mead horns and all manner of things and delights.
Lucifer watched Dream greet the Lord and Lady of the Fae, intrigued that they made an appearance in the Dreaming. He saw strange figures- ones he couldn’t recognize and only a few he did. He heard more than saw the ruffling of angel’s wings and knew a few delegates were sent; could smell the woody and earthy scent of Odin’s incense-haunted garments and Thor’s thunderstorm laughter.
The shuffle of headdresses and the whisper of gowns and raiment fashionable and strange.
He watched Dream warmly greeting his visitors, fascinated at the change in the King of Dreams from his once stuffy and frigid demeanor.
The gala wore on- feasts and sweets aplenty as music drifted through halls so used to mourning bells and haunted steps.
Color and life in a once so... sterile haven.
Lucifer frowned before he huffed and plunged into the crowd, prowling about as he sought his target- the center of attention. He found him, speaking softly to Destiny and a strange entity with a face decorated in tattoos. They glared softly at him, and the woman beside them hissed something in a lilting language before the figure rolled gem-colored eyes and returned to conversation.
Lucifer drew closer until the conversation was audible.
“...frankly I am intrigued; I was unaware my sister visited such distant lands! I would be honored to see them one day, General-”
Dream noticed Lucifer from the corner of his eye, and turned- wineglass still half full and he raised it in brief greeting.
“Ah! Morningstar, come closer- the subject is quite fascinating and I daresay you may be interested-”
“Ah, hm. Perhaps a... another time, dizzy Dream. I was actually hoping to pull you away for a brief word, if you would?”
Destiny hummed to himself, fingers drumming against his massive book, “It is nearly time for a toast- Thor and Odin will be calling for one in exactly 47 seconds.”
“I take my leave then, He Who Knows Eternity. He Who Knows All Secrets.”, the one called General said- Lucifer raised his eyebrows upon realizing they were a deep voiced woman when they and their attendant bowed from the waist. Another glare shot in Lucifer’s direction, and the women faded into the crowds as Thor’s bellow rang over the assembled masses in a demand for a toast to Dream’s newfound vitality.
Dream smiled at the gesture, drifting through the crowds with a flutter of iridescent robes to ascend steps to his throne.
Lucifer watched as he dropped into it with a swirl of color and cloudcover and he raised his wineglass-
The gesture was answered in kind by the crowd, languages old and knew and not yet found belting out good tidings and health to the reborn Dream King- a few more vulgar wishes called forth and it happened yet again.
Lounging in Dionysian madness, a glass of razorblade tart white wine in one hand and the other gently covering his mouth as he laughed from his concave belly in tones low enough to make faultlines shudder.
The sound made you tremble.
The universe turned around the gathered ones- Desire and Despair the first ones to leave without so much as a goodbye. But, Lucifer knew, Dream noticed. Dream watched them leave with something not-quite-disgusted in those infinite eyes. Something angry, dangerous. Something slighted.
Lucifer swallowed hard, remembering the last time he encountered a soul who had slighted the King of Nightmares.
As guests trailed out- yawning and red-faced from drink and company and food- they thanked Dream grandly; many leaving behind gifts or offerings that he accepted with a graceful nod and quiet smile; nearly shy, nearly coy.
Lucifer hated how he watched the gentle gestures of polite court with uncomfortable jealousy snarling in his chest. A lingering smile here, a too-long touch to aristocratic hands there. Soft embraces and low bows and lips against knuckles Lucifer has heard creak as they curl into silk sheets.
The lights dimmed slowly as the crowd thinned, as the invited ones took their leave and soon it was only Death and Delirium remaining. Delirium, in girlish delight and ancient glee happily skipped up to her brother’s throne and dropped onto his lap with enough weight to make him grunt softly and shake his head.
“I appreciate you visiting me this evening, little sister.”, he said, his voice ancient and young all at once, “I hope to see you more frequently, should time and space permit.”
“Of course Dream!”, she laughed before flopping against him to hug him tight once more as Death scolded her with nothing behind it but a fond smile, “Now that you don’t walk like rainclouds anymore I won’t step on the shards!”
“Oh?”
“Yes- He used to leave shards all over, remember Death? Sharp and angry and old.”
“Yes, I did drag my old heartbreaks about like badly patterned luggage. I remember being lectured about such behavior once- while feeding pigeons.”
Death laughed- sharp and chilled like icicles but fond all the same, “Yes, and it’ll happen again, you ever fall back into old habits.”
“Please refrain from covering my hair in breadcrumbs.”
“Don’t have a baguette for me to throw then, little brother.”
Lucifer watched her kiss his temple- affection the old Morpheus would never allow; all of this he’d never allow. Touch and fondness and kindness and laughter and light and so many foreign things in the throneroom of the King of the Dreaming.
And even they left. They were alone.
Lucifer approached the throne, trying to school his face stoic and failing to hide the fire in his eyes.
“...What is this.”
“Hm?”
Dream looked up at him as he drained his wineglass and set it aside to fade into dreamstuff before he folded his hands in his lap, “What do you mean, Lucifer?”
“What is all. THIS! throwing parties and cracking jokes and being all. Touchy feely with family all of a sudden.”
“That is what happens when someone changes, Lightbringer.”, said Dream flatly as he got to his feet- brushing invisible dust from his robes before tugging at them in perfectly exact angles to change them once again.
The coat now over the Regent’s shoulders swayed as he walked. Lucifer followed- Eyes roving over the narrow back and silhouette of his favorite and greatest aggravation.
“I have always been... a hopeless romantic, I believe it is called?”, continued Dream as he exited the throne room and began wandering down roving hallways with intent, “But I was desperate to cling to the stability of my station- my duty kept me level. Or, so I thought.”
The creak of a cherrywood door, opening into an artist’s workshop suite.
“I am the King of Dreams. I am the Ruler of the Dreaming- but that does not mean that is ALL I am.”, he mused as he pulled his coat from his shoulders and let it drift into glimmering stardust and sand that vanished into the minute crevices between marble and wood and decoration, “In all ways- I am Dream of the Endless. I am the King and Lord of this realm. I am the one who creates the dreams and the nightmares of all living things.”
He approached a wide table, decorated in odd tools of the trade and stained by muddy clay and old precious metal and the shards of rare stones.
“But I am also, in some tiny ways... Daniel Hall. I have shards and slivers and miniscule veins of his humanity racing all through me like the mineral trails within old marble. I have... Experienced new things, as him in a way, that I have not lost. Things like love. Affection. Gentleness.”
Lucifer leaned back against the closed door as he listened, as he watched the Dreammaker do what he did best- create.
“Before my rebirth- there was no childhood. No smallness, vulnerability. I simply... Was. There were dreams, and then there was Dream.”
Lucifer tilted his head.
“And so... I changed. I had been changing, throughout the turmoil that haunted me up until my encounter with The Kindly Ones, but everything has... an end, I suppose. And that version of me, that era of my eternal existence... reached its finite point. And I shed that particular chrysalis.”
Dream had been shaping something- something small and gentle in its lines and faceless in it’s design. Made of pale grey clay and molded by hands both ancient and new at once it stretched little taloned feet.
“And so that is what All Of This is, Morningstar.”, he said quietly, nearly gentle, “I know you saw a glimpse of my old displeasure- when the Twins left with nary a word of well-wishing from either side.”
“...I did.”
“I have not shed all of my old ways, dizzy Devil.”, he laughed, “There are still broad bands of my old ways within me- I simply do not dwell in them as often, anymore.”
“...And you swear.”
“And I swear.”
“You really shouldn’t, you know- it’s unbecoming.”, said Lucifer with his voice lightly lofty, “A time and place for vulgarity, sure-”
“And why the fuck should I take the Devil’s advice on when I can fucking swear?”
Lucifer choked on his voice- and Dream’s eyes lit up in wicked glee and the starling he’d created trilled wildly before flittering up high and darting out through a painting Lucifer knew was a doorway in the right light.
“...Aha, and the truth will out.”, said Dream, his smile made of shattered mirrors and white wine, “It is not anger nor disappointment that drives your... accusatory tone.”
“Shut up, Endless.”, hissed Lucifer.
“Behave, demon- you are in my realm, after all.”
Lucifer swallowed hard as the old edge of Morpheus’s rasped voice flickered around that demand for a moment- and then Dream was far too close.
With his glimmering eyes and playful smile and the cloudy halo of untamed hair. His birdcage chest and hidden depths and slim wrists Lucifer’s fingers could circle in the right moment.
“You do not dislike my vulgarity- you want it.”
“I said nothing of the sort-”
“You do not disapprove of my... giving of affection. You. Want. It.”, a smooth chuckle, “All for yourself, no doubt.”
With a growl, Lucifer’s hand gripped Dream’s sharp jaw and held it firm- knowing the only reason his grip stayed was because Dream allowed it, “And what if that’s the truth, hm? What if that’s exactly it- Would it matter, Dream King? You and I both know we are no starcrossed romance, this isn’t one of your pet mortal’s plays where eternity begets anything more than another round of undying.”
“You overstep, Samael.”, said Dream, his voice sharp and commanding and familiar, “Do not assume to know my demands, desires, or preferences. You know what I allow you to know, to see.”
“Then show me more of this new Dream.”, said Lucifer. He intended to drip his charisma and command over the uttered sentence, intended to cow this reborn Endless into giving him what he wanted (because he still was unsure what that was) but to his disdain the words came out... pleading.
“...Your new Dream.”, whispered the King with a raised eyebrow, “I can taste the words you meant to say.”
“Shut UP.”
“Fucking make me.”
Vulgar words and a coy smile and Lucifer hated the weakness he was developing- how human it was, how mortal, how FAMILIAR this kind of desperation was. He remembered it from a time fondly forgotten, lovingly despised.
The desire for the love of one who shone like dawnlight and new snow.
Dream smiled, reaching up and easily removing Lucifer’s hand from a marble-hewn jaw, and tilted his head.
A hand curled into the front of Lucifer’s shirt, gripping tight and pulling him along as Dream stepped back until the table he had been working at thudded as it shifted; Lucifer pressed against his favorite aggravation, his rival made lovely by time and sacrifice and death and rebirth and an unholy hand buried itself into snow-white hair.
“Kiss me then, Samael- Kiss me and have me and know me in ways no one else ever will in this body untouched by time and whatever an Endless has in answer to a heart- unscarred by self-sabotage and terrible timing.”, whispered Dream as he let himself relax against Lucifer, relax into the Devil’s hold and the fallen angel hummed as he did just that.
The kiss was burning and bright and passionate and Lucifer remembered when those words described him when he felt and heard the shuffle of silk sheets and broke the contact between their lips to give a quick look around-
Seeing the expanse of a grandiose bed and the artful tapestries of a madman artist of aeons long since passed.
Lucifer leaned up on his knees, Dream looking up at him with a muted shine in galactic eyes as he sprawled against black bedcoverings with lips swollen and gently dotted in too-red blood from the tips of fangs Lucifer’s glamour no longer covered.
Dream laughed then, his hands resting against the sheets as his birdcage chest rose and fell in little rapid breaths.
“Come then, Morningstar, Samael, mighty Fallen One-”, he whispered, the sound wrapping around the burning center deep behind the Devil’s ribs, “Come to me and know me in the way you’ve known no one else.”
A careless wave of a pianist’s hand, and the soft white shirt draped over Dream’s torso fluttered open to show the curve of ribs under soft and near-translucent skin; a man of porcelain and iron, a finite being of infinity.
“Your duties.”
“Perhaps, tonight- I will not be the Dream King.”, whispered Dream before beckoning his Devil, “Perhaps tonight- I am simply a new Morpheus.”
A flicker of the light, a whisper of the shadows, a lock here and there of hair darkening like it was dipped in ink.
“Come, know me Samael.”
“With pleasure.”
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