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The leaves were starting to turn bronze, Sapnap ruefully discovered one early-fall morning. Soon they’d wilt and decay and wither away as the days grew shorter and darker.
He wished he could be there when it happened, that he could watch nature's breath be stolen as the fall bled into winter and the warmth melted into merciless cold. There was a bitter beauty in knowing that he might have finally reached his end as the world around him was slowly dying.
He'd never been one to fear death. But now, as he tightened the straps of his armor and holstered his weapons, he couldn't help the sorrow that nestled deep in his bones, graving itself a home in the hollows of his ribs.
He let out a sigh, drawn out and arduous, finishing off tying the knife holster to his leg before straightening his spine and walking over to the opposite side of his room.
The axe he drew out of his enderchest was already starting to collect dust, and yet it still managed to catch the glow of a torch, glinting in the dim lighting. Carefully, he let his fingers glide over the handle, the runes carved into the netherite buzzing with the power of old sorcery.
Nightmare.
He let the name linger on his tongue, not daring to speak it out loud, carefully brushing his fingers over the curved blade, as if attempting to elicit all those tales of death he knew lay under the cold steal. How many hearts had this weapon brought to a still stand? How much blood had it spilled?
Abruptly, as if the netherite had burned him, Sapnap pulled his hand away, almost cutting his fingertips in the process. He slid the axe into its sheath without another glance.
He was a warrior, a mercenary; there was no place for fear on the battlefield.
Sapnap set out for the mainlands as the first rays of the sun were creeping over the horizon, sprinkling the sky in a rusty copper hue. The grass below was burned yellow from hot summer days long gone. There was something melancholic about this time of the season. A smile ghosted over his lips, weak and fleeting, as he strode over the molding planks of the Prime path, the dull thud of his feet hitting the wood the only sound daring to breach the frail silence of early morning. No one was awake yet, not even the birds in the canopy of the trees or the cicadas hiding away behind the long blades of grass.
It was better this way. He'd never been good at goodbyes anyway.
With every step he took, dread began to pool into his stomach, festering and making him nauseous. But it just acted as a fuel for his determination, teeth gritting and hands curling into a fist.
The world seemed to hold its breath when Sapnap finally reached the hilltop, feet buried in dry soil and armor weighing down his shoulders as his eyes settled on the man standing down below.
There he was, in all his bloody glory.
The porcelain of Dream's mask glinted in the faint morning light and for a moment, Sapnap allowed himself to marvel at how beautifully taunting it looked, tinted red by the rising sun. Dawn was a marvelous yet dangerous painter that could turn even the vilest into something ethereal.
Standing there, the weight of Nightmare mockingly pressing into his hip bone, Sapnap couldn't help but wonder with growing horror whether he had been the one to forge the monster at the bottom of the hill with his own craftsmanship.
Slowly, he raised one hand, letting it rest against the cool handle of the axe. He didn’t need to see Dream’s face to know he was watching every movement with the precision of a hawk. They were equal, him and Dream. He'd been aware of the gravity of his decision the moment he'd accepted the fight.
Maybe Dream would die today. Maybe he would die today. No matter the outcome, he had made his peace. And as he started to move down the slope of the hill, he bowed down under the watchful eyes of heaven, venerably putting his fate into the hands of the Gods above.
Not once in his entire life had he ever broken a promise.
“There you are,” Dream hollered the moment Sapnap reached the foot of the hill, arms stretched out and head tilted to the sky, a gesture terrifyingly similar to a sacrificial offering. Sapnap could hear the wolfish grin he was wearing. “Come on, Sapnap! One last time. Just like the good old days.”
Sapnap didn't answer, only tightening his grip on the axe's handle. When he drew it out of its sheath, he made sure to do it slowly, forcing Dream’s eyes to follow his motion. In the low flicker of the torch, the axe had seemed perilous. In the crimson glow of the rising sun, it looked murderous.
Sapnap saw the exact moment Dream recognized the weapon, body going rigid, before a deeply unsettling laugh ripped its way out of his chest, the sound resonating through the quiet of the air, “You’ve always been one for sentiments. I should have seen this coming.”
“Thought you’d appreciate the irony,” Sapnap bit back dryly, “Caged in a prison of his own making, killed with the blade forged by his own hands.”
He'd always known which buttons to press to get the right reaction, always known how to further fuel Dream’s heat, how to catalyze his smoldering flames into a raging inferno. And maybe this time, he’d gone slightly too far.
The second the words left Sapnap’s tongue and hit the open air, Dream was on him, axe grasped with both hands as he whirled it down on him. If Sapnap were any less of a good warrior, if he didn’t know Dream like the back of his hand, the blow would have been grievous.
But Sapnap was one of the best warriors on the server, and if he was feeling daring, he might even go as far and say he knew Dream better than he knew himself. Letting pure instincts take over, he met Dream’s blow with vicious force.
A few years back and he would've said the rush of a fight was the only thing still managing to make him feel alive. Now, there was nothing that brought the vile taste of death quicker to the tip of his tongue than the sound of two blades clashing together.
“You are going to die here today, Sapnap!" Dream shouted, pulling his axe back only to swing it back down in the next breath.
“Maybe,” Sapnap growled, lips pulling into a wry smirk, as if he couldn’t feel his heart hammering away in his throat. “But so are you.”
Neither of them showed mercy, each blow and swing and hit fiercer than the last, and the first drop of blood drawn from a jab to the side felt more like a promise than a call for cessation.
It felt almost nostalgic - the way their breaths blended together, their blades seemed to melt into each other, and the earth beneath their feet yielded under their weight – if it weren’t for the pain biting through the flesh of his arm and hip and thigh, and the familiar scent of copper and ash clogging the air. This wasn’t one of their play fights, this wasn’t a choreography they were following with childish glee and recklessness.
They weren’t kids anymore, foolish, and naïve and blind to the horrors of the world.
Cold agony set his veins on fire as Dream managed to get another hit against his calf, muscles straining and screaming under the abuse when Sapnap pushed through the pain with gritted teeth instead of taking a break. He couldn’t stop, and he knew that.
He had a promise to fulfill.
Clenching his jaw, he took a few steps back, blocking another attack before whirling to the side and letting his axe fall between Dream’s ribs, blade easily sliding through a slit in his armor and etching through flesh. A scream broke its way out of Dream’s throat, but Sapnap didn’t halt, ripping his weapon away and up above his head, like a guillotine ready to snap through bones, before letting it crash down again.
Something cracked, something split. The sound was almost deafening in the silence surrounding them. For a moment they just stood there, arms still raised and bodies locked in a fighting stance. Neither of them moved, rooted in their places as they slowly let their gaze fall to the ground.
It didn’t look taunting anymore, or threatening or scary. Lying in the dirt, sprinkled in blood and split in half, Dream’s mask looked almost woeful.
A choked off sound was enough to snap Sapnap out of his stupor, eyes flicking up just in time to see Dream’s face twist and contorted into an expression of abject horror, his body staggering, before his legs suddenly gave out underneath him.
Sapnap didn’t know what possessed him to move in that moment, but his instincts took over before his mind could even process what was happening, fingers letting go of the axe and arms shooting forward to catch Dream as he fell.
The sudden addition of weight forced him to his knees, a shard of the broken mask cutting into his leg but Sapnap payed it no mind, too focused on the disgusting feeling of blood sticking to his hands as he tightened his grip around Dream who had gone awfully limp in his grasp.
“Fuck,” Dream cursed lowly, eyes screwed shut and brows knitted together as a cough shook through his body, dragging a wave of pain behind. Then, quieter as if it wasn’t meant for Sapnap’s ears to hear, he muttered, “I hope Punz will forgive me for this.”
Sapnap stayed silent, could only stare at the thin trail of blood running down from the corner of Dream’s mouth. There was a hollow feeling in his chest, as if someone had carved his insides out and left him behind in an empty shell.
“You’re dying,” he said numbly.
A chuckle escaped through bloody lips, choked and wheezy, “Don’t act surprised. It’s what you came here for, isn’t it?”
“Gods, Dream,” Sapnap breathed out, fingers curling around Dream’s shoulders until his knuckles turned white from the force. “I didn’t- It didn’t have to end like this.”
Slowly, Dream shook his head. There was something unsettling about how calm he seemed to be, despite the blood soaking his side and the tremors ripping through his body. “Me and you both know that isn’t true.”
“No that's not- if we- I know we could have-“
“It’s fine,” the sudden softness in Dream’s voice hurt more than any blow of an axe ever could.
A trembling hand brushed against his cheek carefully guiding Sapnap’s head up, forcing him to lock eyes. The vulnerability he found almost made him flinch.
“Don’t blame yourself. It was always meant to be like this.” A new surge of pain forced Dream to close his eyes, but he fought against it, voice breaking as he choked on blood to get the last few words out, “I’m just glad it was you, Pandas.”
A cruel iciness filled the newly carved hollow in his chest as he stumbled home that day, in the dying light of the sun, not knowing if it was tears or blood straining his cheeks. Once he arrived at Kinoko, he would have to confess to George what he’d done so they could go and bury him. Maybe they could lay his body under the old willow they used to sit under when they were younger. Its leaves would be falling off soon, so it wouldn’t look as beautiful as it did in summer, but that was okay.
It was fall after all – a season where the cherished found their end, as he came to learn.