A/N: Well here you go. A long awaited and sometimes asked for sequel to Private Universe. The story is also inspired a wee bit by a Crowded House song, this one a little more familiar. Chapter titles will come from the lyrics, but will not necessarily be in order (as you can see by the first chapter –messing around already). The original story was based on The Cage and influenced a bit by Inception. There may be some elements creeping in here from both of those sources.

Thanks to mattsloved1 and johnsarmylady for looking this over.

1. They Come to Build a Wall Between Us

The air was full of alien sounds and redolent with tropical flowers, not the familiar and homey sounds of traffic or the strains of a melancholy violin. There was no smell of wet pavement after a summer shower or car exhaust. Fatigue weighed his feet and each step taken felt one too many, with the lift and pull of tired and aching muscles becoming unbearable. Although the water would be cool on his toes, walking through the surf would be gruelling and exacerbate his thirst. Humidity was thick and warm, a heavy blanket unwelcome on a steamy summer night. There was a desperate urge to sleep, but he needed to find clean water, soon. Then he would curl up on the shore and let go.

It was a draining, this heat, unrelenting and constant, a whine of a mosquito in the dark. The warmth of the desert had been more his style. He'd almost relished the way the moisture evaporated off his skin as soon as it formed. As long as you drank plenty and weren't stupid out in the sun, it was bearable. There was a saying, one from somewhere. He remembered laughter and the sound of it as it crossed his lips. Nostalgic. Every time you said 'yeah but it's a dry heat' you had to buy a round.

(But…

When was that?

When had he been in the desert?)

It was all rather muddled at the moment.

Sweat gathered and trickled down from his temples. It was tickling the back of his neck as well; a slow constant drip, annoying and itchy. He could feel it leaching the moisture out of him. An urgent, if not outright dangerous need to find a source of water hummed through him.

The problem was…

The problems were he didn't know where he was, he didn't know how he had arrived here, and most importantly he still hadn't decided if it was real or imagined. If imagined, if dreamt of (in heaven and earth) he had no anchor. He should have an anchor. That thought scared him more than the thick, canopy of trees and the temperature. He knew this, intrinsically, intimately. There had been a time, once…

There was nothing else he could do except continue to trudge up the beach. It had taken him days (had it?) to reach the beach.

That was not possible. He'd only been here minutes. If he'd been here days he would have succumbed to dehydration. It was not days, then.

He stopped and took a good look around.

Sand underfoot, pinkish rather than beige or white, dry and fine against his bare feet. Although it had seemed close to midday, a huge, luminous moon, full and ripe, hung low on the horizon. It was out of place and out of season. Bigger than he remembered, like a harvest moon, but with an odd greenish hue darkening its features. The sky was painted, like Turner, bleeding and changing, blended together in a sunset palette of colours, vibrant and glowing. It didn't feel like nightfall. A constant rumble and murmur of the waves as they marched against the shore was soothing, but there was a discordant note underneath. Something was telling him he should not be here and this wasn't right. Loud screeches and calls carried through the trees. Most likely birds, but possibly animal life teamed through the undergrowth. Strange mutterings, almost understood whispers travelled on the breeze gusting from the ocean. An incessant beeping noise. Strange. It seemed man made on an island where nothing was artificial (was it?).

Hands on hips, he took stock of himself (his name was?). He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt; his feet were bare, pale from lack of sun. Well they didn't get much in England (England) this time of year. He wiped his brow and felt a wave of dizziness. He needed fresh water, now.

Looking down the beach, out to sea, he could see where the water appeared to be a slightly different colour and the foliage was thicker. He broke into a tired jog. It could be an indication of fresh water, perhaps a stream or river heading to the ocean. Before he could understand a lot of what was going on, before he could really think about it, he was where the stream came out of the trees. Trees were thick here but there was an almost path he could follow. He followed the water source away from where it mixed with the ocean. His thirst was becoming unbearable and he almost threw himself down. He waited until he was far enough along and started to slowly drink. He wished his hunger could be so easily assuaged. There was something tickling at the edges of his mind. A book, a children's book. Finding the water under a canopy of trees, following the river up until it was no longer salty, wishing for food to eat.

The children had found an orchard, ancient and abandoned in the ruins of a castle. Apples.

Hope rose in his chest. It should be here. He turned swiftly looking. But it wasn't.

It should be there. It was always there.

An apple tree.

Its absence ached through him, a pain swift and sure, the loss of something large and gaping.

The loss of someone. He could almost grasp it, flickering in front of him like the light sparking off of the river onto the undersides of the swaying branches.

No time for this. Thirst slaked, he knew it would be sensible to build some sort of shelter and figure out how he was going to survive…here. For now, he would sleep on the beach. Tomorrow would be soon enough for his needs. He was so tired, like he'd been sick for a very long time and was just now getting better.

He found a place to sleep, far enough from the waterline to not be worried about high tides encroaching, but not too close to the jungle to be concerned with animals coming out and eating him. Sleeping naked was not an option, although that was a preference, not clothes or covers in the summer. He lay in the shadow of a large chunk of driftwood he hadn't remembered seeing when he first came down the beach.

Heavy with sleep, puzzled thoughts straggled after, chasing around in his brain. One thought wouldn't quite leave. Everything was just a bit surreal and the colours were too bright. Maybe it was like that in the tropics. Eyes finally closed and mind still, he began to fall into a deep sleep. He missed the feel of long skinny arms clenching at him, a hand splayed across his chest. The sounds of someone breathing deeply and shifting behind him, a deep voice whispering in his ear, words he couldn't quite make out.

Something about, something about love, about meeting in dreams…

That made him wake up and stare out across the water.

That was ridiculous. He (his name, what was his name) would have never said that. He never remembered meeting in dreams.