1 - 20 of 501 Bookmarks by PretendOracle
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In 1989, Hob Gadling gets stood up. He waits.
A story about meticulously constructing an inn with soft focus, 80's goths and Berlin, a folding chair, The Princess Bride, blondes, blood, fear, Fates, and what was always written. What will always be.
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 390,159
- Chapters:
- 56/56
- Collections:
- 2
- Comments:
- 4,631
- Kudos:
- 3,278
- Bookmarks:
- 966
- Hits:
- 139,531
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
20 Feb 2026
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“You bring me low,” Dream whispers against his neck, licks along the reddened lines he’s left. “You make me burn for you. I enter this place and feel what it is to approach godliness."
Hob Gadling plants some poppies, pays his servers overtime, and navigates the complicated maze that is an anthropomorphic representation of dreaming with PTSD.
Takes place after "aulon raid."
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 8,170
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 1
- Comments:
- 232
- Kudos:
- 2,832
- Bookmarks:
- 720
- Hits:
- 18,677
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
17 Feb 2026
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The manner in which an animal routinely casts off a part of its body (often, but not always, an outer layer or covering), either at specific times of the year, or at specific points in its life cycle.
The door swings open, and Hob looks up, as automatic as a blink or a breath. He’s not expecting anything. It’s been three months and four days, six hours and thirty-nine minutes, and all he had been told was more than once a century.
Dream is standing in the doorway.
He looks like hell.
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 8,647
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 3
- Comments:
- 284
- Kudos:
- 3,782
- Bookmarks:
- 855
- Hits:
- 23,350
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
17 Feb 2026
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Dream finds himself lost in London, in the middle of a winter storm, with no memory of how he got there. There is only one place he can think to go.
Set six months after Blue Moon and will not make total sense without it (but that and this can stand alone from the rest of the series).
Series
- Part 9 of Standing Invitations
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
15 Feb 2026
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On his sister's advice, Dream spends 24 hours as a human. He and Hob have a wonderful day (until they don't).
Can 100% be read as a standalone.
Series
- Part 8 of Standing Invitations
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
14 Feb 2026
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“Yes,” he says. “But—humans, do you have it where you are hungry, and you only remain hungry so long, and then you stop being hungry?” His blue eyes meet Hob’s brown ones, and it feels as though they hold a memory between them of Hob at the old inn, wolfing down food. Do you know how hungry you can get when you can’t die?
“And then it comes back,” Hob says. An unpleasant feeling gnaws at his gut, not unlike the sensation of hunger itself. “But yes, it comes and goes.”
His friend nods. “I have found that after…some time, it is no longer a unique sensation.”
“What does that mean?”
“Do you feel your skin, Hob Gadling? Your bones?”
“No,” he says.
“Hunger, too, can be a part of you,” he says.
---
Episode tag to "The Sound of Her Wings."
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 4,092
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 3
- Comments:
- 285
- Kudos:
- 4,567
- Bookmarks:
- 996
- Hits:
- 22,421
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
13 Feb 2026
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As much as Hob likes this job, will be sorry to lose it, he’s not sorry for the punch.
Worlds collide at the British Museum. Hob Gadling gives into old instincts. Paul McGuire has regrets.
Series
- Part 1 of only the register
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 1,842
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 1
- Comments:
- 176
- Kudos:
- 2,518
- Bookmarks:
- 385
- Hits:
- 14,163
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
13 Feb 2026
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Calliope once asked to visit him in the Dreaming to speak about their son. Years later, Morpheus finally sent her an invitation.
There was no love between them anymore. They were just two parents mourning their son. But as Calliope decides to stay in the Dreaming for a bit longer, she realizes just how much Morpheus has changed. A tiny ember inside her begins to spark to life once more.
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 55,473
- Chapters:
- 7/?
- Comments:
- 348
- Kudos:
- 1,038
- Bookmarks:
- 211
- Hits:
- 17,288
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
11 Feb 2026
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Summary
Dream has always been able to recognise the vortex for what it really is—a test.
(A curse)
Series
- Part 6 of Sandman Fics
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 3,392
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 1
- Comments:
- 32
- Kudos:
- 326
- Bookmarks:
- 62
- Hits:
- 2,048
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
11 Feb 2026
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The world’s population jumped to seven billion in the time Dream was trapped. For a century Burgess’s binding circle held back the tide of what that might mean, but once Dream is free, once his power is restored, the additions to the unconscious take some getting used to.
For the first few weeks, Dream just feels really, really high.
Series
- Part 1 of Sandman Fics
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 9,154
- Chapters:
- 2/2
- Collections:
- 1
- Comments:
- 67
- Kudos:
- 925
- Bookmarks:
- 189
- Hits:
- 6,090
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
09 Feb 2026
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- Words:
- 155,844
- Works:
- 15
- Bookmarks:
- 124
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
09 Feb 2026
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Dream's existence and past relationships have taught him that needing comfort from others is a weakness; learning to accept it from Hob is a challenge.
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
09 Feb 2026
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What if the story we saw was the story he intended for them to see?
(AKA Fuck the Kindly Ones all my homies hate the Kindly Ones.)
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
08 Feb 2026
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you can be me, when I'm gone by starsniper for Wandererofthewilds
Fandoms: The Sandman (TV 2022)
31 Dec 2025
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Looking at Puck now, Dream realizes that in a strange and convoluted manner only befitting of their kind, Morpheus ensured that Dream of the Endless would never be bereft of that feeling ever again. He ensured it by incurring Lyta’s wrath, and by letting Puck grow attached to an infant Daniel. He ensured it by releasing Alex Burgess from his prison, and by resolving other matters that were Morpheus’s to settle, even if they were also done in Dream’s name. All so that Daniel would be painted in a kinder light when he finally became himself.
What a terrible thing, Dream thinks, to let yourself be hated so that someone else could be loved.
Puck and Daniel reunite in the Dreaming after the events of Season 2. They find a way to move forward with everything that's happened.
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
08 Feb 2026
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Lady of Unnamed Forces by ladykivuli
Fandoms: The Sandman (TV 2022), The Sandman (Comics)
06 Jan 2026
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Another version of the ending of Sandman season 2 - probably not as graceful in the storytelling sense but definitely happier. One where there's healing instead of calling it a day and taking Death's hand because I'm having this cognitive disonance where I absolutely loved the ending of Sandman's story and hated it at the same time. So I'm gonna have some fun with it here and hopefully you'll enjoy it as much as I did writing it <3
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
08 Feb 2026
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turn your face toward the sun by wytch-lyghts (flight_on_broken_wings)
Fandoms: The Sandman (TV 2022)
22 Feb 2026
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Summary
“I bought you quite more than your drink, in 1689,” Dream countered, the turn of his lips and pinched brow suggesting he hadn't yet decided whether to be offended.
“And I’ll never forget it,” softer, real, Hob promises, until overtaken by a shit-eating grin. “Which sufficiently made up for the time before that when I barely got three words in before you walked out on me altogether to go make a decent playwright out of Will fucking Shaxberd.”
And there was the preening, subtle though it was. An elegant eyebrow twitched upward as at some amusement. “You would fashion me in your debt, Hob Gadling?”
“Nah. I’d see you Tuesday.”
A beat passed filled with genuine consideration, enough to make Hob’s heart leap, his weight shifting forward in his seat. “Tuesday, then.”
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
08 Feb 2026
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you can always find me here (extended edition) by Xenomorphic for ginoeh
Fandoms: The Sandman (TV 2022), Constantine (2005)
31 Jan 2026
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Summary
Hob asks although the sinking feeling in his gut should tell him more than enough: "What do you mean?"
"Dream's gone," Thanatos clarifies simply, eyes dark and gold and fixed, locked onto his own.
Hob wants to scream.Or, Dream is presumably missing in action, Death stages an intervention, and Hob saves the day with the power of family and friendship. More or less.
Or, a full rework of the original you can always find me here for ginoeh.Bookmarked by PretendOracle
07 Feb 2026
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Thought I was waitin' for you by spookyserpent
Fandoms: The Sandman (TV 2022), The Sandman (Comics), Dead Boy Detectives (TV), Good Omens (TV)
02 Feb 2026
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Summary
“He’s not really scary.”
Hob glances at the girl beside him. “Who isn’t?”
“My brother. He likes people to think he is. It’s… easier, I think.”
“Easier than what?”
Her gaze flicks to him, mismatched eyes catching in the moonlight. For a heartbeat, she looks older than the strange, restless girl she appears to be. “Than letting people see the soft parts. The parts that hurt. The vulnerable, gooey ones. If you’re frightening, people don’t touch you. Don’t want to know you. They don’t get close enough to break you.”
AKA: Hob Gadling sees much more than he lets on, befriends a couple of anthropomorphic entities, considers crimes and maybe saves his Stranger along the way.
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
07 Feb 2026
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she's the one that they call old whatsername by kaydeefalls
Fandoms: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
05 Aug 2013
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Summary
"You gotta plant your flag in the dirt and declare victory on your own terms. The winner is whoever survives long enough to write the history books." (Always-a-girl!Kirk.)
- Language:
- English
- Words:
- 9,959
- Chapters:
- 1/1
- Collections:
- 2
- Comments:
- 162
- Kudos:
- 4,345
- Bookmarks:
- 1,065
- Hits:
- 48,365
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
23 Nov 2025
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Teaching Tarsus by AnEscapeFromReality
Fandom Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
09 Oct 2019
- Words:
- 9,389
- Works:
- 2
- Bookmarks:
- 1,582
Bookmarked by PretendOracle
21 Nov 2025