I am much more inclined to write Serena's POV than Dan's, but here is my attempt. This was actually inspired by a conversation with chiba, another DS writer I'm sure everyone knows. Thanks for the reviews, they keep me motivated :)

There's this part in Inside where Dylan is sitting in the family suite overlooking the lights of the city- one of the perks of his father's token marriage status- and wrangles with the most peculiar, senseless of feelings.

The walk-in robe is open enough so shadows are cast across hanger after hanger, row after row of Armani, Gucci, Versace, other names Dylan once knew only from billboards and magazines. He only showered a few hours ago but already fresh towels lay at the foot of his bed and the bathroom is clear of steam and spills.

There's a watch worth a small car on his desk, shoes who've seen more miles in shipping than they ever will in use, cufflinks and cologne, sunglasses, maids, butlers and drivers and servants and more. So much. More things than Dylan's ever been surrounded by in his entire life, enough things to drown in.

And it's the queerest thing.

He's never felt more empty.

It was written to deride the materialism of the Upper East Side, a moment where Dylan and the readers truly appreciate how little their secular world is worth. It is supposed to show that Dylan had more in Brooklyn than he ever had across the bridge.

Dan sits in the loft, surrounded by very little by the standards of that passage. There's a few plaid and plain shirts in the draw, a corduroy jacket thrown over a chair, clean jeans floating around…somewhere. All of the things in the loft might add up to the cost of a small car. A very shitty, unreliable small car. There's not a lot of things, and not a lot of people. Blair's gone (Chuck) and Serena's gone (Steven) and Rufus' gone (ugh…Ivy…) and Dan's not really sure how he became so lonely.

So much emptiness. Enough emptiness to drown in.

Georgina is at him incessantly, but he really doesn't count her as company and her presence seems to highlight how tragic his life is right now. It's like she has a sixth sense for his misery and shows up when he is most corruptible. Or so he tells himself, he's really enjoying blaming other people for his failings right now.

Because, it's Blair's fault their relationship failed. Blair chose Chuck and Blair chose Louis, Blair wanted moremoremore and despite his best efforts he could never give it to her. He threw everything he had into it, he catered to her whims and her insecurities and bent over backwards to be the person she wanted. And by the time he had become that person, she was gone and all she left was this warped, false unprincipled Dan Humphrey. This person he doesn't know.

See! His brain says to itself, Blair created that person, and together you destroyed all the good things in your life. That person heard Serena say she loved him always have always will, and that person saw Blair through Serena's pain. That person is single-minded and careless and destructive. That person hurt the one person in his life he'd sworn to her and himself he'd always be there for.

Serena did that! He tells himself, she wanted to break you and Blair up, she taped you together, she pushed you to this too! Yes! Serena planted false doubt about Blair wanting Chuck.

Because it's not like Blair actually did want Chuck.

Serena tricked him into sleeping with her, she got him drunk and dropped her dress and he's a little hazy on what she did between that and running her knee up his side.

And it's not like he wanted to sleep with Serena, to feel the generous sweep of her curves against him, to run his hands over the velvet skin of her thighs.

It's all so hideously interwoven, confusing and messy and painful, and Dan's really not sure how to separate it all in his brain. All he knows for certain is he's bitter over Blair and disappointed in Serena and has such a sucking vacuum of loss-for whom he isn't sure- that when he sees them both happy it's easier to tell himself they wrought this upon him. Because he's so fucking miserable, and cannot reconcile the idea that he's done this to himself.

Dan remembers telling Serena he was hardest on himself, that Dylan Hunter sacrificed his principles and sold out to the decadence of the Upper East Side. He remembers no-one's ever looked me the way you just did and I wasn't wrong to believe in you and I always will. I don't want to be your friend Blair, I want more and you'll still have me are in there too. Somewhere between the two, he's lost himself. He's not who he used to be.

He's Dylan Hunter. And it's empty.