Work Text:
The Pippins has a reccurring dream. Maybe it's a nightmare—he can never really tell. Sometimes he's scared. Sometimes he's not. Usually, he doesn't think about it enough to know.
He's Mike. He's standing in the Green Room. Nobody is there. Not even Ramb. (He's relieved—what a weirdo.)
He needs to work. He has so much to do. He needs to get to Tenna's office, and quick.
It's okay. He has time. He can make it.
He walks through the labyrinthine corridors of the studio, a winding path. He knows it by heart initially, but becomes less and less sure as he continues. He's losing time.
Somehow, someway, he always ends up in the desolate, snowy wasteland. It's cold, he notices every single time. I should've layered up.
(But would he still be in costume, then?)
Then, with realization, he stops. Why is he here? How did he get here? This isn't the right way. He fucked up.
Can he still make it there in time?
He turns around, the door over the horizon, clouded by the now-heavy snow. He treads back, shoes crunching against the ground.
He walks toward the door. He runs toward the door. When he gets there, he's out of breath.
The door swings open to Mike's room. It's still cold.
Fuck, does he have to start all over again?
He walks toward his corkboard, hoping for answers. Hoping for some sort of salvation.
He feels watched. He turns around, slowly.
The last image he never remembers for long enough after he wakes up. Sometimes, if he falls back asleep right after, he even forgets he dreamt in the first place.
Pink and yellow eyes—yellow and pink, actually—stare at him like it knows something he doesn't. He can never make out its body. The room is always too dark for him to distinguish between it and the dimmed surroundings.
Sometimes it takes a while for him to wakes up. He talks to it, yells at it, begs at it: where does he need to go? How can he keep going? It never responds, though, instead grinning wide like it's about to devour him whole.
No matter quickly or slowly, though, he wakes up. The cold still lingers in his body before it realizes it's meant to feel warm.
There's no time to think about it. He needs to work. He has so much to do.