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I had all and then most of you,
Some and now none of you,
Take me back to the night we met.
Sirens long since faded from distance ring softly in the silent forest. Soft chirps from birds and the occasional rustle of leaves from the wind echo. A figure lays slumped against a tree, heaving breaths and coughs shaking his fragile frame.
Having escaped from the prison at the first opportunity he got in almost a year, Dream was very much not physically well enough to have made it this far. But Dream was always known for doing the impossible.
It had always been the plan to be thrown into the prison following the confrontation with Tommy and Tubbo, as well as with the rest of the server, but his unexpected variable, his one mistake, led him to his downfall. Quackity, someone he miscalculated for, undervalued, and thought was weak, grew mad with potential knowledge.
It had never been Dream’s intention to give his one and only power away, not even to his most trusted companion. While Punz was with him through the thick and the thin, Dream’s fear of attachments still haunted him as he slept. Nightmares of knives and arrows in the back left him sweating and paranoid in the early mornings.
Yet, Quackity managed to evade his radar, staying undetected as a potential threat. The torture he enacted daily chipped, chipped, chipped at Dream until he truly began to doubt ever seeing the sun again. That was, until today, of course.
In exchange for one line of the Revival Book, Dream would get to walk around in the courtyard for an hour.
Having been desperate and feeling Quackity’s patience running thin, Dream wanted to breathe fresh air, see the green trees, feel the soft grass on his feet, and the warmth of the sun on his skin one last time.
Yet, Sam miscalculated. In the furthermost corner of the courtyard, far enough from the Elder Guardians, warped and rusted metal bars lay in wait. And when Sam wasn’t looking, Dream made his way out of the prison, not looking back, even when the sirens permeated through the foliage.
Now, the orange-jumpsuit-clad figure shifted with a hiss of pain, the cuts on his feet from the rough forest ground stinging with a vengeance. Running for the first time in a little over 9 months took its toll on the former speedrunner.
Pressing against reopened wounds, Dream tilted his head up, gently closing his eyes with a breath as the sun seemed to envelop his form. Warmth covered him and settled through his soaked jumpsuit, removing the chill of a setting sun.
Dream didn’t regret what he had done. It had been necessary.
Exiling Tommy for his grief and destruction was necessary. He wasn’t letting the server heal.
Threatening to kill Tubbo was necessary. Tommy didn’t listen to him, didn’t understand the importance of no attachments.
Destroying L’manburg had been necessary. It was an empire based on drugs and child soldiers. Dream hated what L’manburg stood for since the moment of its creation.
Dethroning George was necessary. He had lost his life once already, he couldn’t lose another. Dream couldn’t let that happen.
Removing everyone’s attachments had been necessary. That way no one could use them against each other.
The server needed to become a family again, and if he was the villain that the server needed to reunite against, that’s what he would be.
He just wished it could have been different.
Just because he didn’t have attachments didn’t mean he did not love with his entire heart. He loved and loved. It was in his nature.
Just not the nature he made himself out to be.
*Snap*
Whipping his head around, Dream looked wildly around the small clearing he had found himself in.
The forest had gone silent, gone were the bird’s song and the gentle chirp of crickets.
The sun was cresting on the horizon.
Gingerly raising himself from the ground, using the tree as support, Dream looked around, heart beating out of his chest and pounding in his ears.
*Snap*
Head swiveling to the sound, Dream was able to spot the glint of netherite armor before a figure suddenly threw themselves from out of the forest and towards him.
It was only adrenaline that allowed Dream to dodge as he did. Ducking under the blade that sliced through the tree where his head was.
Erratic breathing and wild eyes rolled upwards, to the netherite-clad figure. A white headband caught his eye.
Dread encompassed Dream’s heart.
Sapnap’s heavy gaze bore down on him as he grunted, wrenching the sword out from the tree’s bark. A snarl contorts his features as he wildly swings once more, with aimed and practiced precision.
A gush of blood spurts out from Dream’s cheek, a long, narrow slice from the end of the sword. Muscle memory and previous sparring sessions allowed Dream to predict and evade Sapnap’s movements.
“Dream!” Sapnap roared. “I swore I would kill you if you got out!”
Dream let out a heavy breath, weaving and evading Sapnap’s meticulous and graceful movements of the sword with practiced ease. Yet, Sapnap’s rage allowed him to hit Dream a few times.
“Sapnap.” Dream murmured. “Let me go, I won’t return, I won’t bother you or anyone on the SMP again.”
Sapnap swung down, embedding his sword in the soft grass between Dream’s feet.
“So you can do what? Get your armor back? Plan to destroy us later on? I don’t think so Dream. This is it.”
“Just come back to the prison and I won’t have to kill you,” Sapnap offered.
“I- I’m never going back there,” Dream growled.
“Then you know what I must do.”
And with those words did Sapnap lunge, slicing forward with his sword. Dream once more danced around Sapnap’s strikes.
However, fatigue and his wounds began to overwhelm him. His movements became sluggish and slowed.
Knowing this was a losing fight, Dream did the only thing he knew how. He ran.
He ran, as fast as he could.
While being in the prison certainly didn’t allow for him to be anything near what he used to, Dream still was faster than Sapnap in his heavy netherite armor.
Trees and mobs blurred by as Dream ran, the sun’s final rays of light almost dipping past the ocean’s horizon.
He ran past trees and large rocks, jumping from tree to tree occasionally, but eventually running out of options. He headed in a random direction, quickly finding the trees to become scarcer and scarcer. He was almost to the treeline.
A branch jutted out, tripping Dream and causing him to fall flat on his face. Scrambling to get up, Dream could hear the heavy pants of his opponent quickly coming closer and closer.
“Dream!” Sapnap called.
Dream’s chase only led him to a steep cliff drop-off, jagged rocks and gentle lapping waves await his tumble to the bottom, lest he tips over the edge.
Turning back, Sapnap waited on the treeline’s edge. Glancing between the cliffside and Dream, Sapnap’s hands twitched.
Would it be better for Dream to jump off the edge, praying he stayed alive, or take his chances with Sapnap?
There was only one thing Dream could do, really.
With a shaky breath, Dream took a step back.
Sapnap immediately started running, watching with terror-stricken eyes as Dream’s form tumbled off the edge.
Dream felt weightless, squeezing his eyes shut against the onslaught of wind.
Waiting.
Waiting.
How long had it been?
Surely he should have hit the ground by now.
Opening his eyes, Dream saw that he was barely a foot from the drop-off of the cliff. Sapnap’s arm holding on to the front of his jumpsuit.
“Sap…” Dream whispered as he looked up.
“You’re not getting out of this that easily.”
And with a grunt of exertion, Sapnap hauled Dream above the edge, form too light for a man his size.
He threw Dream from the edge, quickly scrambling to get up himself and restrain him.
Dazed, Dream lay there for a moment. Laid there even as Sapnap straddled his waist and pinned his arms to his side.
“Last chance Dream. Come back with me to the prison.”
And how could Dream say yes to that? How could he say yes to willingly going back to that small black box, to screaming his head off in pain, to losing track of the seconds, minutes, hours of the day. How could he say yes to Quackity?
And with these thoughts did Dream’s voice let loose an animalistic sound, something between a snarl and a shout.
“Never.”
*Thunk*
.:.
A soft gasp rang in the clearing.
Looking down, Sapnap saw the small dagger he kept on his tool belt embedding in Dream’s stomach.
“No. No, no Dream. This wasn’t–This isn’t what I–” He sputtered out.
Dream gave him a small smile.
“I was never going to go back there.”
“Why? Why! It was supposed to help you! It was to keep you and everyone safe!” Sapnap shouted in rage.
“Don’t…don’t act like you didn’t know, Sapnap.”
“K-know what, Dream? What do I not know?” He pleaded.
“Si–Quackity. He told me you knew, that everyone knew.”
Dream gaze became confused, muddled. What had happened with Quackity? What was he supposed to tell everyone?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dream.”
Dream huffs out a small, bitter laugh, “Torture.”
“He tortured me every day. It became my new clock after I lost mine.”
Sapnap didn’t know what to say. Even if he did, the lump in his throat made it impossible.
Dream looked up towards the sky.
“The wound isn’t fatal. Please finish it. Please, Sapanp, I can’t go back there.”
“No, Dream–we can do something. I can…I can–”
“Pandas.”
Dream was looking back at him. Eyes pleading and mouth set in a firm line.
“Please.”
Sapnap grasped the dagger in his hand, looking into Dream’s eyes.
With a shout, Sapnap ripped the blade out of Dream's stomach. Dream let out a hiss and tensed beneath Sapnap.
“Dream…I wish things could’ve been different.” Sapnap whispered.
“I do, too, Pandas.”
“Then why?! Why do all this? Why cause so much chaos and pain? What happened?!” Sapnap billowed.
Dream paused for a moment, looking away, expression unreadable.
“I just wanted the server to go back to the way it was. Way back before L’manburg, when it was just you, me, George, Callahan, and Alyssa.”
“And if the server needed a villain to unite against so it could be that way, that’s what I would be.”
Soft grass swayed with the wind, the clouds gently flowed and ebbed in the soft blue sky above him. Half-lidded eyes slowly rolled around until landing on his gaze. A choked noise erupts from his throat suddenly, startling both Dream and Sapnap. Something wet slides down his face.
Sapanp reached up to touch his cheek. A warm wetness greeted him.
“Dream…”
“Please, Pandas. There’s nothing left for me to do. Just–I’m glad I was able to see the sunset one last time.”
Dream gently grasped his hand holding the dagger. Slowly moving it towards the center of his chest, until it was prodding at his skin.
Like Dream was showing him how to fucking kill him.
Prime, this was…
This was real.
With a shaky inhale, Dream smiled.
And the dagger sunk in.
The sun’s rays dipped below the icy blue waters.
The bird’s song faded away.
The wind stopped blowing.
Sapnap squeezed his eyes shut, tears leaking out still.
“C-can…yo-u sing to…me, Pa–ndas?”
His eyes flew open, landing on Dream’s face. Tears fell silent from his eyes, rolling down his temple and into his long, brown hair.
Prime, it had grown so long.
It had been longer since he had seen Dream’s face.
Did it always have that many scars?
“Of course, Dream.”
He silently readjusted Dream to be laying in his lap.
Deep in the meadow, under the willow
He looked into Dream’s emerald green eyes. Memorizing what they looked like.
A bed of grass, a soft green pillow
Dream hummed quietly beneath him, the vibration traveling to his own chest.
Lay down your head and close your eyes
Dream’s eyes slid shut with a finality that made Sapnap choke on the next line.
And when they open, the sun will rise
His voice cracked, as Dream let out a particularly long exhale.
Here it's safe, here it's warm
Sapnap counted Dream’s breaths. Each movement of his chest grows longer in intervals.
Here the daisies guard you from every harm
Dream began to relax in his hold, a quirk of his lips twitching his face.
Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true
Dream let out an exhale.
Here is the place where I love you
Dream had gone still.
His chest no longer rose and his eyes stayed closed.
A small smile adorned his features.
Sapnap let out a sob.
Tears fell steadily onto Dream’s sleeping form.
He was just sleeping , Sapnap reasoned.
He’ll wake up in the morning , Sapnap reminded himself.
Dream was always a heavy sleeper , Sapnap reminisced.
He stayed vigil above Dream, holding his cold and stiff body like a lifeline.
Even as the sun rose from the dark waters, Sapnap waited.
Dream liked to sleep in , Sapnap remembered. Back when we first started the server.
It wasn’t until Dream’s head lolled unnaturally off Sapnap’s chest did he let go.
It wasn’t until Dream didn’t so much as twitch at the uncomfortable angle of his neck.
A sharp intake of breath was all the warning Sapnap had before a sob burst forth.
And then another.
And another.
Until he was openly sobbing, loud and ugly.
Over the body of his best friend.
In a fit of grief-filled rage, Sapnap threw the dagger and his sword over the cliffside. Screaming in agony.
It wasn’t until Sapnap began his walk back to the SMP did he spot roses. Dream’s favorite flower.
He took as many as he could find, bringing them back to Dream’s body.
He carefully and intricately placed them around his body like an outline, even taking a few to put in his halo of hair and in his hands.
It was a beautiful image.
The sun was cresting in the soft blue sky. The grass glowed a green hue of the sun’s reflection. Clouds drifted silently.
And Sapnap walked.
I don't know what I'm supposed to do,
Haunted by the ghost of you.
Oh, take me back to the night we met.