Pinkgothic played:

Adrethyrian and Noko

A fiery pinch tore him with a gasp out of his doze, stirring his unbound companion. His eyes lingered a blurred gaze on the unchanged landscape before him. It already consisted of more patterns than were conceivably there. Maybe in another week that's all it would be - one tangled medley of patterns upon patterns, grotesque faces amuses themselves on his behalf, aching expressions on others like the echoes of others conceivably as foolish as he'd been.

"Do you need any form of assistance?" Adrethyrian's concern crept up and into his perception.

It was strange how quickly he'd gotten used to the Demon God's freshly unrestrained communication. With the language barrier gone, it seemed like there had never been one to begin with. That trick of the mind only affirmed their familiarity with each other. "No," Frederick exhaled the syllable. "But thank you," he concluded the social ritual, bound to repeat many more times than it had already as it was. His eyes drifted back closed.

"Your rest is becoming more and more punctured," the Puppet commented, glancing up from his sit near those root-encased feet. "Perhaps some nourishment would do you good?"

"...unlikely," Frederick responded, left cheek cradled against the respective arm. "I just don't sleep well."

"But you have slept well in the past," Adrethyrian observed, neutrally, a hint of anxiety in his voice that seemed unfitting given his steadfast reputation.

"In the past, I had dreams between my nightmares," Frederick explained, tone winding into self-deprecating cynicism. He shakes his head lightly, rolling his cheek against his arm absent-mindedly. "It'll pass."

"Why do they plague you now?" Perhaps it was the lack of group dynamic that let Adrethyrian's distress leak into his demeanour - it seemed unlikely the symptoms he was witnessing were strong enough to write home about or nurture concern about. Frederick and nightmares were like old friends. Just because the friend had now been expelled from his home and refused to leave did not make the dynamic any less practised, surely.

"...habit," Frederick hazarded the guess. Silence. "Maybe," Frederick added with uncertainty, and his right shoulder rolled slightly to denote a helpless little shrug trying to pass itself off as indifferent.

"And yet you are certain they will pass?"

The evidence was incriminating. Eyes closed, Frederick considered the enquiry, battling with the sliver of doubt it instilled. But why would it be anything else? They were like a retinal burn, temporary after-thought lingering on his synapses; plants at most, who's source of power they'd been uprooted from - soon they would dry out and crumble.

They didn't seem to be abating. They certainly hadn't abated the past two days. If anything, his entrapment here, his vulnerable posture, had only intensified them by giving them a framework to readily distort. Paralysis and loneliness, powerful and central puzzle pieces of the worst of his unpleasant dreams both past and present, both induced and natural.

Dry lips pressed to a thin line, only to detach reluctantly a moment later. A shaky breath drew through them, paving way for a bitter, desperate and yet resigned answer: "Not really."