(Disclaimer: I do not own Over the Garden Wall or any of its characters, all credit goes to the original creators Patrick McHale and Cartoon Network. Please support the official release)

~A Brother's Promise~

Where...am I? Why...is it so...cold?

"Hey! Hey, Wirt?"

Wait...Greg?

"Okay, you sleep. I'm sorry I got us lost, Wirt. Will you take care of Ronald for me?"

What? Greg, what are you saying?

"Okay, I have to go now. Goodbye, Wirt"

Go? Go where? Greg? What's going on?! Why is it so dark? Why can't I see anything?

"Yes, come Gregory. There is much to be done".

Who...who is that?

"And then you'll show us the way home, right?"

"Of course. We made a promise, didn't we?"

Promise? Wait a minute...that voice, it's the...the Beast! It's the Beast! Greg, no! Don't go with him!

Wirt's eyes flew open as he found himself at the base of a tree near a river, he was back in the Unknown and, once again, he was all alone. Greg was nowhere to be found, as was Beatrice, even Greg's new pet frog wasn't anywhere in sight.

Wirt was all alone in the empty, snowy forest.

"Greg? Greg! Where did he go?", he asked out loud.

That's when he heard the distant laugh and singing of the Beast, a feeling of dread entering his body. "No! No, no, no! Greg!", Wirt shouted. He tried to get up but found his body slightly constricted by Edlewood branches slowly growing around him, he attempted to pull them off but only succeeded in detaching himself from the ground.

The rest of the branches stayed on his body and even continued to grow, "Wha...what's happening to me? No, I can't focus on that now! I need to find Greg!", said Wirt as he stood up and began running through the forest.

As he ran, the sunlight began to slowly diminish until the forest was suddenly thrown into pitch black darkness. "Wait, what happened to the sunlight? Why is it so dark all of a sudden?", Wirt asked. Suddenly, a spotlight came on from seemingly nowhere, and in the light, Wirt saw Greg.

His brother once again had an Edlewood growing around him, only this time his face was the only thing that was visible as the rest of his body had already been consumed by the tree.

"Greg!", Wirt shouted as he tried to run to his brother but abruptly fell over onto his face. He looked down to see, to his horror, that his feet had transformed into tree roots and he was quite literally rooted to the spot, unable to move.

"No! No, no, no! This can't be happening!", Wirt shouted as he tried to free his legs. Just then, the Edlewood branches encircling his body began to grow rapidly, twisting and wrapping themselves around Wirt's body until his arms were tightly bound to his sides. "Ugh! I-I can't move!", he shouted.

As Wirt struggled to break free, he looked up to see a few familiar faces step into the spotlight, one at a time. The first was the Woodsman, who looked down on Wirt with both anger and disappointment, "Woodsman? Please, please help me! Help Greg!", Wirt pleaded.

The Woodsman shook his head, "You are the elder child! You are responsible for you and your brother's actions! Well, welcome to the Unknown, boys. You'll never leave this place!", he said before he slowly turned around and walked away.

"What? No, wait! Don't leave us like this!", Wirt shouted.

Then, someone else stepped into the spotlight: it was Greg's frog, and riding atop his back was Beatrice. She looked at Wirt with eyes filled with tears of regret and sorrow, "Beatrice! Please, help us!", Wirt begged.

Beatrice turned her head away as she started crying, "Wirt! It wasn't what it looks like! I was just...please come back!", she said.

"Come back? Beatrice, what are you talking about? I'm right here!", Wirt said in confusion. Beatrice seemed to not be able to hear him as the frog, who also wore an expression of sadness, slowly trudged away taking the sad little bluebird with him. "No, wait! Beatrice, come back! Please!", Wirt shouted desperately.

It was too late, though. Beatrice had already vanished into the darkness.

Then one last figure appeared, it was the Beast himself. He slowly came into view but did step out of the darkness, he stayed hidden where only his eyes could be seen as he placed a hand on top of Greg.

"Hello, Wirt", he said.

"The Beast! What are you doing to us?! Let me go! Let Greg go!", Wirt shouted.

The Beast laughed, "I'm afraid I can't do that, Wirt. All who perish here will become trees for the lantern, and besides, Gregory did make a promise after all", he said.

Now Wirt was beginning to panic, he could feel his heartbeat increasing in speed and his breath hitched. He would've started hyperventilating had the Edlewood not started to wrap around his throat, making it difficult to take in any oxygen.

"Please! Please, stop! I'll do anything! There has to be another way, please! You can have me but let Greg go, I'm begging you!", Wirt demanded as his voice began to crack with emotion.

The Beast merely shrugged slightly as he looked at Wirt, his two eyes glowing brightly in the dark. "You were the who got yourself and your brother lost out here to begin with, you were the one who said you wanted nothing to do with him. I'm simply giving you what you wanted and deserve.

"And there is no other way, there is no hope for you or Gregory. No, there is only me. There is only my way. There is only the forest, and there is only surrender. Are you ready to see true darkness?", the Beast said before slowly walking away into the darkness.

Wirt looked over at Greg as the Edlewood continued to grow around his head, his body was already incased within a tree trunk. As he stared, Wirt watched as Greg weakly opened his eyes and looked in his direction, a lopsided smile appearing on his face.

Wirt couldn't hold back his tears any longer as he began to cry but his tears weren't normal tears. As he sobbed, he looked down to see that a black substance was falling from his face to the snow; it turned out that Wirt was crying Edlewood oil, the same kind the Woodsman used to light his lantern.

"Greg...I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! This is all my fault!", Wirt sobbed.

Greg smiled as his eyes slowly slid shut, the Edlewood growing up over his face until it finally consumed him in his entirety. Wirt gasped as he saw this bit it only made him cry even more and harder. Then the Edlewood continued wrapping around his head, tightly sneezing his throat to where he could hardly breathe.

The last thing Wirt heard before he was completely consumed by the darkness was the Beast singing in the distance.

[Time Skip]

Wirt shot up with a gasp as he abruptly woke up, he panted heavily as his heart thumped in his chest. He looked around frantically to see, much to his relief, that he was in his bedroom; it was about one in the morning, the room was dark save for the sparse moonlight that flooded in through the window.

With a sigh, Wirt laid back down in his bed. "It was only a nightmare, just a nightmare", he said to himself. It had been a whole year since that incident last Halloween, when Wirt and Greg had fallen into the lake near the cemetery and nearly drowned.

Greg had told everyone about they're "adventures" in the Unknown but everyone had chucked it up to his wild imagination, especially their parents. Greg had seemingly forgotten about the whole ordeal, and was even allowed to keep his new frog which he finally named "Jason Funderberker".

Wirt, however, had never forgotten about it. Even if he tried to tell himself that it was all a dream or a delusion, the experience had felt all too real. He felt as if he had been truly lost in a deep, endless forest with Greg, that all the people he had met were real, that he...he nearly lost his brother because of his carelessness and lack of consideration for Greg.

Just then, Wirt felt a slight movement in his bed. He looked down to see something was crawling beneath his blanket, he reached over to turn on the lamp on the bedside table; Wirt was shocked when he lifted the blanket to see Greg underneath, holding his pet frog.

"Greg? What are you doing in my bed?", asked Wirt.

"Me and Jason Funderberker had a bad dream, can we sleep with you tonight?", Greg answered.

Ordinarily, Wirt would've declined and told Greg to go back to his room but after the horrible nightmare he just had, and the fact that he and his brother had actually grown closer since the incident last year, he didn't have the heart to turn him away.

"Of course you can. Here, make yourselves comfortable while I go get an extra blanket", Wirt said with a smile. He stood up from the bed and walked over to his bedroom closet to fetch the blanket; when he turned back, Greg was already settled into his bed and was already fast asleep with his frog curled up under his arm.

Wirt smiled as he crawled into the bed, draping the extra blanket over himself and his brother. As he reached over to turn off the bedside lamp, Wirt made a silent promise to himself. He had promised to never bring danger upon Greg again, to never push him away, to stop blaming him for problems that he caused, and to always watch over him.

That nightmare had reminded Wirt of how close he had came to losing his brother and how it was his fault it had even happened, but never again. From now on, he would be a better older brother to Greg, even if it meant putting up with his often annoying antics.

Wirt cast one last look at his sleeping brother as a smile slowly graced his face, "Goodnight, Greg. Sweet dreams", he whispered as his eyes closed and he fell asleep again.

[The End]