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The first thing Dream registers is the cold stone under his fingertips. Where is he? What happened? He’s lying on his side, one hand sprawled out next to him, the other one feels numb.
That is, until he tries to move it. Pain shoots from his shoulder to his fingertips and his neck, and he hisses through his teeth. Very slowly he rolls himself onto his back, running the fingers of his other hand over the bruised skin of his shoulder. The skin under his hoodie has a weird bump and he groans. Yeah, that’s a dislocated shoulder. Shit.
He forces his eyes open and immediately closes them again. Black sky, obsidian towers, an army of Endermen. It’s the End.
Of course it is. How could he forget. He ran here himself, panicked shouts behind him while he jumped in the portal and-
His blood runs cold. Where are the hunters?
He flips himself on his good shoulder and starts lifting his torso off the ground. Eyes locked firmly beneath the eyes of Endermen he glances around, and almost slams his head on the floor when his vision swims.
But he has to see. If he’s safe. If they’re gone. If his plan worked. If he can allow himself to take a moment and recollect himself.
But the swaying horizon almost makes him throw up, so he listens for a moment, and only hears the warbled noises of Endermen while they stalk around him, curious about this stranger in their land. No hunter sounds. That’s at least one good sign.
He pushes one leg underneath him, sitting up halfway and opens his eyes again.
There’s a crater about twenty feet away from him. Ashes smolder on stone that can’t keep it burning. Items are strewn about like artificial corpses. Dream tries not to think about the scars left by explosions and fire.
There’s a slight moment of victory, a hope of success, when his eyes focus enough to spot a mess of something dark across the site of destruction.
It’s not an Enderman who was caught in the crossfire. They don’t crumple to the ground from pain. They don’t yell their friends names before the world gets engulfed in fire and white.
On the other side of the crater, BadBoyHalo lies still on the ground.
Bad, who was the last one to go in. Who told them to be careful, holding back while George and Sapnap charged at Dream, weapons at the ready.
Dream tries to not think of the time when he made his last stand in the End, winning a three on one, only to be left with an inch of his life. Standing on swaying feet with blood dripping down his face and axe, a small moment when everything felt it was going to be okay.
And then Bad came out of nowhere and killed him with one measly punch.
Well, can’t exactly call it a measly punch when it ended everything Dream had worked so hard for.
Either it’s a trick from his fucked up vision, or Bad has started moving.
Dream curses and sits up all the way, disregarding the way his stomach flips and ignoring the stings of pain that desperately beg for him to lay back down. But that would mean giving up. Would mean-
No, he’s come so far. No way is he giving up now. Even if he has to drag himself to the dragon, even if all his nerves are on fire, he is going to finish this.
He tries not to think about the time Sapnap nudged his fingers from the edge of the End Island. A smirk on his face as Dream tries to hold on for dear life, the void beneath him ready to swallow him whole.
He reaches with his left arm – god dammit, why did it have to be his dominant hand to be the one to get fucked up – and grasps for the handle of his axe. He finds nothing.
Where is it? He’s sure he put it away for a brief moment. He must have. He couldn’t have held the TNT and ignited it with one hand.
It’s lying a few meters away from him, at the base of one of the towers, the light of the crystal reflected in the blade.
Dream rises to his feet, and immediately sinks down again when his leg gives out under him.
Right, he twisted his ankle in the Nether. Back then it wasn’t a big deal, when he was running on pure adrenaline after George accidentally stumbled upon him in the Fortress.
‘Oh- what the hell- Guys, he’s right here!’
Even when he made it out, leaving the hunters in the dust and putting enough distance between him and the trio to take a moment to lick his wounds, it hadn’t had enough time to fully heal. Now it stung every time he put his weight on it.
Something so small could be the difference between life and death.
Between winning and having to do everything all over again.
Taking a deep breath Dream forces himself up again, taking his pickaxe from his inventory to lean on. If he could just reach his axe-
But pure spite is not enough to push through the hurt. He’s halfway to the tower when the roar of the dragon forces his attention away from “keep going and don’t fall” to “don’t get bulldozed by a creature seven times your size” and he stumbles.
‘Fuck,’ he breathes. He can almost hear Bad yelling at him for swearing, but right now fuck is the best word to describe all of the everything that is happening right now. ‘Fuck. Fuck.’
This time, as his shoulder sends sparks of fire through his veins when he catches himself on the way down, he doesn’t try to get up again.
He should have let go of the TNT sooner, should have lit it later, should have-
A foul taste lingers in his mouth. When he spits, it leaves a dark spot on the floor. He stares at it before his mind registers what it means.
Oh.
He’s not going to make it like this. He can’t stand on his right leg. He can’t move his right arm. His chest aches and he definitely has some internal bleeding.
Yeah, this is game over.
Dream takes in a ragged breath, and then another one. Slowly he crawls forward on his hand and knees until he can lean his back against the cold obsidian. He closes his eyes again.
What is going to kill him first, he wonders. His injuries, or will the hunters find their way back fast enough to finish him off? Or neither, and he’ll just die of hunger, alone and in pain. He grimaces. In that case a quick stab through the heart would be merciful. Or he could just look at an Enderman, that would probably be the fastest way to go. No way is he dragging himself all the way to the void; he barely has enough energy to keep his eyes open.
Something stands in front of him. Even through his closed lids Dream sees how it blocks the light from one of the crystals.
Just an Enderman, he tells himself. Then he hears the rustle of fabric, and he lazily glances at the ground.
Black shoes and pants, caked with dirt and mud. The blade of a sword pointed at his throat as Badboyhalo stands before him.
Oh right, he was still there.
His hood is partially burned, no longer able to rest on his head. One of his arms hangs limply at his side.
‘Took you long enough,’ Dream says with a shaky laugh.
Bad doesn’t say anything, he simply looks at Dream. Faintly Dream realizes the hand holding the sword is trembling slightly.
‘What are you waiting for?’ Dream says. ‘Just finish me off already. Are you afraid I’m gonna, like, pull off some sick stunt with half of my bones broken? I don’t have any tricks left, Bad. You win.’
Bad just looks. Looks at him. Slowly, he lowers the sword. Dream can only stare as the tip of the blade reaches the ground.
Bad mumbles something under his breath.
‘What?’ Dream says.
‘I don’t want to do it like this…’ Bad mumbles, barely loud enough for Dream to hear.
‘What?’ Bad has shifted his gaze to the floor. ‘Oh, I get it, you don’t want to kill some poor defenseless person who can’t fight back,’ Dream jokes. He tries to sit up more and hisses when he accidentally moves his injured shoulder. Bad lets the sword fall over and sits down, crossing his legs.
Dream dares to smile. ‘George and Sapnap are probably screaming at you to finish the job.’
‘Yeah, probably,’ Bad says. ‘I don’t really care.’ He looks back at the crater left by Dreams TNT. It was a stupid plan. A last ditch effort to take down as many people as possible. It didn’t matter how bad Dream would get hurt. If he just got all three of them out of the way he would at least have some time.
Dreams eyes glance over the items that lay abandoned. Even though there are no bodies, it feels like staring death in the face.
‘What’s it like?’ Dream asks quietly. ‘When you die?’
Bad just blinks at him for a moment and then gets a look on his face. ‘Oh, yeah, you wouldn’t know,’ he says. Something inside Dream stings. ‘It’s… I dunno… it’s kinda weird to explain.’
‘Try.’
‘It's… it’s kind of like falling asleep, I guess. It hurts for a second and then- y’know when you’re really tired and you keep dozing off? And then suddenly someone starts talking to you and you wake up.’
‘Hmm.’ Dreams mind returns to all those moments of half-sleep. Quick naps between moving and running and sleepless nights fighting off Endermen for their pearls. Never really resting. Keep moving. Always have a plan. Be ready to run.
God, he’s so tired.
‘-probably seen it sometimes,’ Dreams mind comes back to Bad talking. ‘The scars. They always go away after you win, though. Still, it feels weird knowing you died and you have something to prove it even though you’re pretty alive when you respawn.’ Bad finishes. He’s pushed up his hoodie to point at something on his side. On Bads dark skin the scars are a pale white, like veins of quartz. This one is about the size of Dreams hand.
‘This is where you got me with your axe. Kind of hurt, y’know.’ Bads voice is filled with faux disdain, but Dream just stares at the fabric that now hides the scar from view.
‘Sorry,’ he mutters.
Bad shrugs. ‘It’s okay, it doesn’t hurt anymore.’
‘Still,’ Dream insists.
‘You were only doing what you had to.’
Dream doesn’t have anything to say against that.
He’s seen their scars. He’s seen more than Bad could ever imagine. White lines scattered across arms, torsos, legs. Patchy spots of healed skin where fire has touched too long, too hot. Dots from arrows and eyes that no longer focus like they should.
Suddenly his mask feels too tight, like he’s suffocating.
Dream reaches up with one arm, and Bad instantly tenses up, like Dream did have something up his sleeve and he’s going to kill him. But he doesn’t. He just fumbles with the clasp on the back of his head, but his one left hand can’t get it open.
He looks at Bad. ‘Little help?’
Bad looks uncomfortable. Dream can understand that; he hasn’t taken off his mask in a very long time. The first few times the hunters would commentate on it. Poke fun at him for ‘not showing his pretty face.’
‘I just want to show you something,’ he says softly. That seems enough to convince Bad.
The hunter shuffles over and reaches out to help with one hand. Now that he’s closer Dream can see the weird crook Bads other arm has. It’s almost hidden in the loose fabric of his sleeve, but from his new point of view Dream can see it’s definitely broken.
Something clicks behind his head and his mask shifts. Dream takes the front of it in his hand as Bad leans back.
‘It’s not very pretty,’ he warns.
‘I’m sure it’s not too bad,’ Bad tries to reassure him.
With a shaky breath Dream lowers the mask, and right away, from the way he sees Bad try and hide the shock on his face, he knows it’s definitely not not too bad.
‘Pretty terrible, isn’t it?’ he tries to joke. He gives Bad a weak smile. One side of his mouth doesn’t reach as high as the other.
He has seen his reflection more than enough times. In rivers, in blades. The first few times he would study them, run his fingers over the rough edges of healed skin. His mask would just be hanging around his neck. Eventually he stopped looking, kept his mask on even when he didn’t need to. In the end he barely takes it off anymore.
There’s a long one that runs from one cheek over his eye to his hairline. A wild swing from George when Dream had him cornered. He couldn’t see out of that eye for the rest of the game. He didn’t even get to the End with half of his vision gone. Shooting the crystals with no depth perception was going to be impossible anyway.
On his other cheek there’s a patchy scar from the fireball of a ghast that Sapnap pushed him in front of. That part of his mouth doesn’t move as much anymore.
There’s twin scars on his back and stomach from when Bad pushed his sword through him.
Three dots mark a triangle around his heart from George’s arrows.
His body is a map. They’re marks of failures.
Dream tries to not look at his reflection anymore.
‘Wha- How did that even happen?’ Bad exclaims. He stammers, starting sentences and trailing off in the middle until all he can say is just. ‘What?’
‘Every time you die you get a scar, right?’ Dream says bitterly. He’s not really in the mood for jokes anymore. ‘Well, I died. A lot.’
‘…I can see that,’ Bad says. ‘But… how? We never…’ he trails off again, eyes scanning Dreams face over and over. ‘We never killed you before,’ he says quietly.
‘You did,’ Dream says. ‘You just don’t remember.’
Bad is quiet. He stays quiet. Dream doesn’t mind. He wouldn’t know what to say either if he was in Bads shoes right now.
Endermen wander past, curiosity lost now that there isn’t a battle to the death going on anymore. Dream glances past Bad to the deactivated portal frame in the middle of the island. The dragon has landed, her eyes boring into his. When she notices he is looking at her, she spreads her wings and shifts her body, raising her back in order to look bigger; trying intimidate him.
It doesn’t really work, not anymore.
He wonders if she knows.
He looks away.
‘What happens when you die, Dream?’ Bads voice startles him. ‘Why don’t we remember it?’
Dream exhales. ‘I don’t know. It’s similar to what you said. About falling asleep and waking up. Except I don’t…’ he stops. ‘Why am I telling you this. It’s not as if you will remember it anyway.’
‘I don’t care,’ Bad says. ‘Have you ever told us before?’
‘No. I mean, I tried- Sapnap didn’t really care to listen and just pushed me down a ravine.’
‘That’s-’
‘George thought I was joking. I don’t really blame him. It sounds pretty stupid. I didn’t try again after that.’
‘So what’s different now? Why'd you show me?’
Dream stops. What’s different? ‘Uhm…’ he starts. ‘I guess the fact you’re not actively trying to kill me.’
Bad snorts. ‘Yeah, I guess that’s a pretty big difference, huh.’
Dream smiles for a moment until it slips from his face. ‘Why didn’t you?’
‘I-’ Bad looks a little taken aback, maybe the slightest hint of flustered. ‘I don’t know… It just felt weird. Seeing you like that.’
‘Like I’m dying?’
‘Yeah.’ That surprises Dream. To be honest, he was joking. Bad has seen him dying before. He didn’t stop then. So that’s what he says.
‘You didn’t care about me dying before, though. Isn’t it you guys’ objective to get me to die?’
‘I mean, yeah. But- I thought… I thought you were already dead.’
For some reason, Dreams stomach drops at the thought. The thought of being dead, and the world not doing anything. Just a dead Dream, or his dead friends, and the world continuing on without them. A broken loop in an empty world.
‘When nothing happened,’ Bad continues, ‘I thought maybe we did something wrong.’
‘Well, sorry for not dying fast enough,’ Dream says.
‘You do that a lot,’ Bad says. ‘Somehow still living even after everything we throw at you.’
Dream grins lazily. ‘I try.’
‘You still didn’t answer my question, though. What happens when you die?’
Dream falters. What’s the point in telling if he’s just going to die anyway. He can feel the thrum of his heart slowly lessen. He’s dying. He’s going to die and it won’t even make a difference.
But if Bad isn’t going to remember this anyway…
Fuck it.
‘It restarts,’ he says. ‘Everything restarts. The world changes, and I’m back with you three. And either I defeat the dragon and it stops, or you kill me and it restarts again.’ It feels surreal, saying it out loud. When the game is on there’s no time to think about it all. Now that there is time, it feels like he’s sharing something even he isn’t supposed to know.
‘How long has it been like that?’
‘To be honest, I don’t remember.’
Bads eyes flicker over Dreams face again, like he’s only now realizing the weight of them that Dream carries with him.
‘There’s more,’ Dream says when he notices Bad beginning to understand. ‘It’s not only my face. I would show you, but… I don’t feel like that’s necessary.’
‘No, not really.’ Bad says quietly. ‘Dream, you’ve just been stuck in a loop? This entire time?’
‘I guess.’
‘Wh- ah- You guess?’ Bad stammers.
‘I got used to it, kind of.’ Dream shrugs. ‘It’s just the way it is.’
‘Still, that sucks.’
‘It does.’
There is a long moment of silence before Bad unfolds his legs and stands. He shuffles over to where he’s sitting next to Dream, leaning against the tower.
‘Careful,’ Dream says with a slight smirk. ‘I could kill you.’ Bad hums.
‘I know. I could kill you too, you silly muffin.’ He lays his head on Dreams good shoulder, taking his hand in his own. Bads fingers trace over the raised skin of reminders from spilled lava in buckets.
‘You literally had a sword pointed at me. And then you put it away.’
‘You’d rather have me use it?’
‘…No.’
Dreams eyelids slowly close, leaning his head against Bads, concentrating on the soft touches of Bads hand on his own. It’s nice, being able to rest whilst not fearing for your life.
His heart softly thumps in his ribcage.
There’s nothing to fear when you know it’s going to end soon, anyway.
‘Thanks,’ Dream mumbles.
Bad moves his head. ‘Hmm? What for?’
‘For listening, I guess. And not killing me.’
‘You’re welcome,’ Bad says. Dream can hear the smile in his voice.
‘…Can you stay here? With me?’ It’s a dumb question, Dream isn’t sure why he asked. Bad answers it anyway.
‘Of course, silly. I’m not going anywhere.’
Dream smiles. Feels himself slipping away.
‘Hey, Bad?’
‘Yeah?’
‘I love you.’
‘Aw, I love you too.’
-
The pull is slower this time, not forced by a blade through his flesh or fire licking at his skin. He sinks into it like a wave, pulling him under with a fake sense of ease that never lasts long enough. His body is weightless as he drifts through the void, his only solace the numb feeling of his body piercing itself back together. There will be a new scar waiting, a mark of white, a memory of another failed attempt. He tries to hold on to the feeling of warmth of Bads hand, but it slips from his fingers like sand.
He doesn’t bother to open his eyes; there would be nothing to see anyway.
‘It’s like falling asleep.’
Dream wishes he could sleep longer.
-
Slowly, his senses come back to him. There’s warmth on his skin, sunlight shining down on him as a gentle breeze tousles his hair. Solid ground forms under his feet as the weight of his mask settles on his face.
‘You’re going down, Dream!’
He turns in the direction of the voice. The hunters are back, standing only a few feet away from him, their movements restricted by the almost invisible barrier surrounding each one. Sapnap has his hands cupped around his mouth whilst George just stares at him, grinning smugly. They look like they’re ready to run.
Around Dream is a similar barrier, slightly rippling like water. As soon as he steps through, the barrier surrounding the hunters will vanish, and the game is on.
Looking away, Dream takes in his surroundings. They’ve spawned on a plains biome, on the edge of a spruce forest. There’s a river on the other side of the plains where a few animals have gathered to drink. A fox screeches in the distance.
Sapnap is still mocking him from his contained spot, at some point George has decided to join in.
‘Yeah, you don’t stand a chance!’
Taking one last look at the trio, Dreams eyes glance over to Bad. His posture is lax, face contorted in a mixture of determination and discomfort.
When Bad notices Dream’s looking at him, he shifts and takes on a similar stance as his teammates.
‘We’re so gonna win this,’ Bad tells him.
Dream pushes his feelings down and forces a grin on his face.
‘We’ll see about that,’ he says.
He runs.
The game is on.