Chapter 2

[ Applesauce ]

Stormy gusts of wind struck their bodies, whipped their bones, and formed a barrier between them so that they could no longer strike each other. This umpteenth confrontation had been violent, terrible, more powerful than anything they had ever known before.

"YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND ME! YOU'LL NEVER UNDERSTAND ME!"

Nightmare was trembling with rage, his tentacles flailing, ready to fall as soon as the wind blew. And Dream could only watch helplessly as his brother's anger was met with his hateful gaze, his gaze that screamed, "I want you to die, I want you to disappear for good.

[The world would be a much better place if he disappeared.]

"YOU'VE ALWAYS HAD IT ALL! BECAUSE YOU ARE THE GUARDIAN OF DREAMS, OF POSITIVITY! YOU'VE ALWAYS BEEN THE SPOILED BRAT! AND ME IN ALL THIS?!"

Dream lowered his eyes, his throat tied, his limbs trembling before this terrible truth.

"WHERE WERE YOU WHEN I NEEDED YOU? WHEN I WAS BEING HUMILIATED, HARASSED?"

Dream wasn't there. It never had been. He'd screamed to the world that he'd protect his twin, that he'd always be there for him, that he loved him more than anything. But how can you protect your loved ones when you don't know they're in danger, when you don't know they're suffering? Nightmare had so many times concealed his pain, only not to worry the guardian of dreams ...

But Dream should've seen it coming. Even if he hadn't been told, he should have seen the marks on his body, heard the insults. But Dream was naive, living in his bubble, seeing only the kindness and gentleness that was brought to him, not seeing the horrors lurking in the shadows.

The fall had been all the more painful.

"DON'T TELL ME YOU UNDERSTAND ME! DON'T GIVE ME ANY MORE OF YOUR BULLSHIT! DON'T TELL ME THAT YOU TRUST ME, THAT YOU LOVE ME, THAT YOU WANT WHAT'S BEST FOR ME! YOU'RE A LIAR!"

[He was just a liar]

[A pathetic, stupid, ridiculous liar]

That's why Cross had managed to make Nightmare smile, to bring him back at least a little on the right side. Because Cross was a trustworthy man. Cross wasn't a liar.

Dream looked with a dull eye at the memory that had played out before his eyes, recalling perfectly that conversation, that fight that had widened the chasm that separated him from his brother. That moment that had completed the guardian of dreams: he was not able to change his brother. He had never been able to change his brother.

"I understand you, Dream."

Shattered made the memory of a finger snap disappear so that his counterpart would pay attention to him again.

"I'm probably the only one who can understand you."

He approached the little skeleton who was suffering, wounded and feverish, trembling and exhausted. His phalanges coated with black ink came to caress his cheek to go down to his chin, raising his face to look him straight in the eyes.

"We're similar, little keeper. We've been through the same thing, the same pain. Both of us ... we just wanted to do our best, for ourselves and for others."

Dream hiccupped, tears streaming from the corner of his eye sockets. Shattered came to gently wipe them away.

"Yes, I understand you, Dream... People are only interested in us because of our aura, and it's our brothers, our Nightmares, who receive real love. Isn't it unfair?"

He sticks his forehead against his own:

"After all the evil they've done, isn't it unfair for others to turn to them? We are the ones who should receive all the attention, we are the ones who should be loved, loved for real.

- ... No."

Shattered, it tensed.

"... No ?"

He pushed his face back, looking at Dream in confusion. The young guardian held up his look of incomprehension, the pain twisting his being, his soul. The words were struggling to come out, his throat hurt so much, his mind was troubled, but he could not let the corrupt being continue to say such things:

"We have always received everything while our brothers suffered... Nightmare always wanted to protect me, always did everything for me. If he's become this way, if he hates me, it's all my fault. »

A poor smile stretched his lips as he let himself slide against the wall behind him. Shattered stood up, fists clenched:

"What are you talking about? That bastard stole everything from you! Your world, your family... even your friends turn to him! Even Cross gave you up for him! »

Dream closed his eyes, a salty tear beaded once again, slipped and crashed against the damaged ground. He was pathetic, half unconscious in his devastated living room. And Shattered's cry resounded once more:

"YOU JUST LEFT THE BATTLE IN A PANIC! AND NO ONE'S COMING TO SEE HOW YOU'RE DOING! EVEN INK STAYED THERE! YOU THINK THAT'S FAIR?

- I hurt Cross. They have to take care of him.

- WHA... AND YOU DON'T MIND? THE BAD GUYS CAN HANDLE IT! INK COULD...

- Ink doesn't like me."

He opened his eyes again, a tearing gleam in his eyes:

"Nobody loves me. You said that, didn't you?"

Shattered widened his eyes:

"Isn't that reason enough to make them pay?

- Make them pay for what? Make them pay for my mistakes, make them pay for who I am? They had nothing to do with it. Shattered... We can only blame ourselves for being... for being us."

Dream uttered a scream, surprised by the tentacle that pressed him violently against the wall, which almost broke his spine, wrapping itself around his throat to squeeze it tightly, half suffocating him.

"DON'T FUCK WITH ME! WE HAVEN'T DECIDED WHAT WE ARE! WE DESERVE TO BE LOVED! WHILE NIGHTMARE'S JUST AN ASSHOLE, NIGHTMARE HAS DECIDED TO CORRUPT HIMSELF! AND WE'RE GOING TO MAKE THEM PAY, THEM, THE WHOLE MULTIVERSE, HIS PEOPLE WHO USED US WITHOUT EVER GIVING IT BACK TO US!"

Dream froze, his soul tightening more as he was running out of oxygen.

"N... no…" he articulated. "I don't want to... I don't want to hurt anyone anymore…"

Shattered tightened his grip as another tentacle wrapped around the arm of the smaller one:

"Do you even think you have a choice? Do you think you are in control? Ah... Ahahah…"

His cynical laughter resonated darkly as his counterpart's arm cracked softly beneath his grip. His pupils orbits gauged Dream without a word, making him squeak with terror, while he spoke again in a hoarse, terrifying voice:

"You're crazy, Dream... Totally crazy... You don't know what's good for you. But don't worry, I'm here, I'll help you."

The young goalkeeper was suffocating, trying in vain to struggle without any success. He couldn't think, couldn't understand what was going on. He could hardly discern the silhouette of his double, this silhouette that dominated him and made him tremble, that would soon kill him.

"I'M GOING TO OPEN YOUR EYES"

Dream bent down, eyes filled with horror, his mouth open in a silent scream, a scream that had got stuck in his throat at the moment the throbbing pain had torn his body apart, at the moment he had felt his arm being snapped off.

Shattered pushed a tentacle into his mouth, forcing him to swallow an unknown element, tearing a panicked sob out of him, and striking a deep wound in the puck.

He let him go.

Dream collapsed to the ground, coughed, spat, holding his broken arm while screaming, his cries so violent they could have drowned him. He tried to catch his breath, each breath aggravated the pain that ran through him, worsening the suffering in which he had been imprisoned. He watched his tears rushing down the floor, the blood dripping from his mouth, but most of all ... most of all he watched this. That thing he had spit out, that element that belonged to the thing he had swallowed. That little black spot that was so cruelly familiar.

"No... !"

Dream had groaned, horror seized his being, his anger and grief becoming even more violent than before as he became aware of what he had swallowed.

"NO!"

Shattered's smile came back, widened, almost ran across his entire face as if to demonstrate the immense joy, the pride that ran through it:

"Yes Dream, yes. Let yourself go, get carried away, and become like me. Join me!"

The guard struck his skull against the ground, screaming, his tears redoubling in violence.

Shattered had dared...

[He had swallowed a black apple]

Dream felt himself burning inside, consumed by a powerful evil, an acidic anguish that only wanted to corrupt him, to make him fall into darkness. He hit himself again, saw white dots dancing in front of his eyes, tightened his grip on his broken arm. The external pain seemed to be the only way to hold on to reality, not to twist, not to lose what little lucidity he had left.

He nodded, raised his skull again, but before he could inflict another wound he was seized by Shattered, by his tentacles which lifted him up, preventing him from touching the ground. His tentacles grabbed every part of his body, immobilizing him, preventing him from harming himself. Forcing him to look at the expression of madness that deformed the face of his double.

"Stop fighting Dream, it'll be much less painful!"

Dream didn't care.

What did he care about suffering? He could suffer a thousand torments if it prevented him from hurting others, from hurting his friends, those who loved him. He had already made Cross suffer, he wasn't going to make the same mistake again!

Shattered shattered by his resolute air before a pure rage took hold of him.

"You poor bastard, I warned you!"

The guard became livid, livid in front of the black apple that his counterpart had just pulled out. Did he have any others? What's that? How many others? His questions escaped him, evaporated as he stubbornly closed his mouth and tried to remain in control of himself.

But he was unable to do so, he cried out in horror when he felt his patella break, his tibia fracture, and his complaint was stifled by the second apple that came sinking into his mouth cavity, which he tried to regurgitate without being able to. He felt this filth hitting the bottom of his throat, flowing inside him, obstructing his soul with spikes, icy blades. He made himself violent to vomit, to reject this intrusion, until he was interrupted by a third apple, a third horror which passed as with difficulty as the first two, which petrified his soul of terror, his soul which beat much too hard, much too quickly, which shouted and begged while himself remained mute, with empty eyes, as if ready to fall into dust in the instant.

And he fell. But not in the way he'd hoped.

He discerned a distant crash, a bright light, a gust of wind.

Shattered widened his eyes, taking the tentacle that hit him in the chest and sent him crashing against the opposite wall, making him groan with surprise and pain as he released Dream in spite of himself.

The Dream Keeper felt himself fall but never touched the ground. He collapsed in powerful arms, arms that came to hold him firmly, arms far too familiar for his poor battered body. Slowly he looked up, unable to say a word, and in spite of his suffering body, in spite of his tortured soul, he knew he was dreaming, that it was all an illusion, an invention of his imagination.

For it was simply impossible for Nightmare to stand beside him, holding him like a princess as if he were the most precious thing in the world. It was impossible for his brother, his twin, to look at him with such eyes, with that gleam of panic, that expression full of anger and worry.

[It was impossible for anyone to come to his rescue.]

But it warmed him up. What a sweet and cruel irony, to think of his brother at that moment, to believe that he could still come back to him and support him ... Dream would have laughed if his body had allowed it, smiled if it hadn't been painful. But he thought that for his last breath, seeing his brother wasn't so bad. That for his last vision of this world, seeing his brother loving him was the greatest gift.

And he lied again. That's all he knew how to do.

[All is well]

He doesn't live anymore. Nothing but darkness.

Nothing but the darkness of unconsciousness.