The Children of Hypnos

S^A^N^D^M^A^N

                   

The Sandman has never felt so tired.

First he lays in the quad, staring at the green sky, and hangs in that strange space between awake and asleep when nothing quite seems real and thoughts and memories slip from his grasp before they're fully formed.

Then he lays beneath the dim lights of the Fenhallow clinic. The scenery changes the way it does in a dream, without warning and without confusion. He wears paper clothing and feels the distant throb of an IV in his arm. People move around him. He knows them by their voices. Each time someone comes near, their presence is warm.

It doesn't matter who it is. In this strange liminal space, the presence is always his mother. He knows it's not possible—she's been dead almost as long as he's been alive—but he lets himself believe it because he is tired.

Then he lays beneath the dim lights of the Fenhallow clinic, but someone is above him, saying his name and putting drops in his eyes. Just a little bit of waking water. It draws him out of the liminal space. He blinks and groans against a throbbing headache.

Marcia leans over him, putting the drops on the bedside table. He jerks away, but his arms are strapped down and his body moves sluggishly. She hovers away from him, letting him relax.

"Is everyone okay?" he croaks.

"A few students got nipped by your bats," she says, "but we tried the baby oil in the ear again, and that worked."

He falls silent. Not because he wants to, but because it takes too much energy to speak. So soon after even a small dose of waking water, there's no chance of falling asleep, so the Sandman closes his eyes and lets his mind drift off. All he sees are nightmares. Green fire. Scratches in a stone wall. Limbs hanging from the ceiling. Even awake he can't escape them.

A light touch brushes along his temple, down his cheek. He stays very still, because for all his fears, he is not poisonous, and for all her posturing, Marcia is easy to spook. Marcia's finger follows the same path again and again, and his heart flutters each time. He is easy to spook, too. He gathers up his courage and tilts his head into the touch.

Marcia pauses. Then pulls her hand away. The Sandman bites down on his whine, but still feels his expression crumple. He opens his eyes and finds Marcia still there, turned away, looking down the clinic.

"This was bad, Mar," The Sandman says.

Marcia looks back at him. "We'll deal with it."

"There were a lot of them."

"We'll deal with it."

There's a hard look in her eyes. They both know this isn't about Ares or Argos anymore. This isn't about the State's secrets. The storm was only the beginning of something much worse, and though the Sandman hasn't seen it yet, he knows it exists.

He knows what has been carved out of his dreams.

He knows the man who stands atop the stairs.