After a long, hard battle against their enemies, John and Dave were lying on the ground, staring blankly into space. John turned his head over to Dave's almost lifeless body.

"Dave...?" he asked, his voice low.

"Yeah?" Dave responded.

"You okay over there?"

"Yeah, you?" the blond turned his head toward John, his sunglasses tilting at an odd angle.

"I'll be fine, just gotta rest," the brunette replied, smiling slightly at the other, coughing a little after.

Dave sighed and fixed his sunglasses, "Great, I can hardly see out of these anymore."

Suddenly, John started coughing, a lot. Dave sat up, grunting from the pain, and moved over to his friend.

"John, dude, sit up," Dave commanded, helping John sit up, but he was still coughing madly. The blond coughed into his hands and his eyes widened, he was coughing up blood now. He continued coughing madly as Dave started to panic.

"John! Stay with me dude!" Dave yelled as John continued coughing, moving onto his back. Blood started spurting out of his mouth every time he coughed. At this point, Dave knew there was no turning back. Dave was almost crying. He was trying to stop, cause cool kids don't cry, but he couldn't, he was losing his best friend, his buddy, his pal. All because of a stupid game they decided to play.

"Dave..." John muttered, still coughing.

"Yeah dude?" Dave sniffled, trying to hide the fact that he was crying.

"I...I know you're c-crying, you-you don't gotta hide it...a-anymore," John coughed out. Dave looked into his lifeless eyes, bursting into a wave of tears.

"Dave..." Dave looked up at his friend, who was trying his best to smile.

"Y-Yeah...?" Dave stuttered, wiping away his tears. John took Dave's hand lightly, smiling up at his friend with almost lifeless eyes.

"I-It's just a g-game, dude..." John told his friend quietly. He squeezed Dave's hand as he started coughing violently. He forced himself to stop coughing, shutting his eyes tight as he did so. The boy breathed heavily as he opened his eyes once more and looked up at his friend, who was bawling. He brushed his thumb against Dave's hand, making his friend look at him.

John looked up at Dave, a single tear running down his cheek. Dave brought his other hand to his cheek, wiping away the tear. John smiled up at his friend, for the last time, and his eyes went completely lifeless.

Dave clung to his friend's lifeless body and continued crying. He didn't even notice anyone walking over to him. He felt a tap on his shoulder. Looking up, he saw a dark figure, he thought he recognized them, bur he couldn't quite figure it out. The figure then started talking.

"Dave, dude, wake up," everything started getting blurry then. Dave blinked a few times as everything got brighter and brighter around him. He closed his eyes from all the light and the voice got louder and louder.

The blond opened his eyes, squinting at the light. His brother was yelling at him, trying to wake him up.

"Dave! Wake up!" Dave's brother yelled and threw a smuppet at him. He caught the smuppet and threw of back. His brother left the room, knowing Dave was awake. The boy sat up in his bed, staring off into space.

/It was all a dream.../ Dave thought, brushing his hair out of his face. He instinctively jumped out of bed and ran to his computer, signing onto Pesterchum. Seeing John online, Dave sighed happily.

turntechGodhead [TG] started pestering ectoBiologist [EB]

TG: hey

EB: hey!

TG: sup

EB: i'm just lying in bed, i just woke up! haha!

TG: same here dude

Dave mentally smiled to himself. John was safe, the same way he always was, the geeky boy Dave loved. Well, loved as a bro, at least.