Chapter Text
Nightmare irritably paced the halls of his castle. Rumors spread quickly in the multiverse, even if they often aren't the full story. The most interesting details and snippets traveled first, so that was obviously what reached Nightmare first. Eavesdropping always proved fruitful and got him useful information. That, and the sickeningly positive feelings that followed people who spoke of it.
"Have you heard," they gossiped in crowds, "the Guardian of Positivity is coming!"
"I hear he's so nice and helpful!" they said, "What a kind soul!"
"Have you heard how adorable he is? How sweet and kind?"
"So polite!"
Nightmare's tentacles lurched and twitched in agitation at the mere thought. His brother, who had the audacity to just show up after five hundred years, here? In the King's multiverse? Absurd. He would not allow it. He would not let his pathetic brother sweetly swindle away the attention Nightmare so rightfully deserved.
Dream was kind. Selfless. Worked too hard to be the best and be the most helpful. The last time Nightmare saw that child, he was a statue--turned into an inanimate object from the negativity exuding from Nightmare's then-newly reborn form--and from shock. And horror, and devastation. And before that, Nightmare remembered being a hated child with his annoyingly perfect ball-of-sunshine brother. He remembered villagers obsessively doting on his brother while they beat and abused Nightmare. But the king's memory was fuzzy around the edges with the finer details; it was centuries ago, and he had been six.
The thought just made him more bitter. He had been six. The villagers, awful and arrogant--demanding and scorning--they deserved to die. And Nightmare deserved to kill them. And, in Nightmare's opinion, Dream had deserved to watch.
He recognized that it was petty--that it was mean.
Years ago, he would've been more upset than he is now about his twin. But he had since reflected. It was foolish and beneath him to hold a grudge against someone who was a child.
Nightmare's memory of the time was poor at best now, anyway. Five centuries was a very, very long time, even for a being such as himself. And he was very young when it all happened. At some point, he found he didn't care as much as he used to--about the villagers, about his AU--it had all been done. He got his revenge, and it was sweet. He had the rest of the multiverse's torment to feast on now.
Still, he never forgot about his brother. (He never truly forgave him, either.) He visited him occasionally, though he'd never admit it, not even to his subordinates. But eventually, he stopped going to his AU altogether and stopped visiting Dream. A dead guardian of positivity who couldn't guard their namesake didn't matter.
And now his dumb brother had the gall to come back?! A loud crash echoed through the castle hall as Nightmare's tentacle bubbled and swept out aggressively behind him, independent and unintentional, launching a porcelain vase from its stand, across the corridor, and onto the floor, breaking it into what might as well have been a million pieces. Purple roses and soil spilled from the shattered pottery and onto the black carpet and wall. Nightmare turned to look down at the flowers. Unfortunate; he liked those roses. He could clean them up off the floor later.
Nightmare warped himself into his office instead of simply walking there. The hallways of his castle were winding and long, dark, and hard to navigate by design. Most of them looked identical. They branched into areas and took turns into rooms in ways that were visually impossible from the outside. The halls changed routes if you looked away for too long. The castle was a labyrinth, a maze of Nightmare's making, and it twisted and contorted to his every wish. Of course, that meant he could just will his office into being around the corner--but teleporting was faster, and he didn't care enough to walk. He was above such things.
All this brooding and lamenting had worked him up an appetite. He craved a very specific flavor as well--the negativity that bled out of being terrorized and inconvenienced. Fear was always particularly tasteful, in his opinion.
It was especially sweet when shared with his henchmen--though, of course, he was above such sickly emotions. Never mind the soft, fuzzy feeling he felt with them near; how disgusting...
"Killer," he called first, and the halls shifted outside the door. Killer peeped out from around the corner and sauntered right up next to his boss, greeting Nightmare with a sassy snap and finger guns, and his usual cheerful smirk--clearly sensing Nightmare was in a mood by some deep-rooted ability to read him somehow. "Acquire the others for me, will you?" Nightmare requested lowly (an order, he told himself) and watched as Killer teleported to do just that.
In the following half-hour, with a little struggle, Nightmare's other henchmen were rounded up and brought to his office as the king festered and brooded behind his desk. Horror had been caught up in the kitchen planning lunch, and Dust was cooped up in his room as per usual; both of them had to be dragged out of their respective areas. And then Killer had to go hunt Cross down in the training room. The group found themselves in Nightmare's office afterward.
"We," Nightmare started from his seat in his office chair, elbows resting on the wooden top of his desk. His hands were folded together and used to prop his head up. "We will go to an AU. I would appreciate entertainment after the harrowing news that has reached me through the grapevine." The king didn't fail to notice the bite to his own word, the seething anger just barely concealed beneath his brooding exterior. "I require a merriment to refreshen my spirits." The others shared a glance and didn't interject.
Nightmare stood with a huff, his tendrils and tentacles whipping out behind him as he warped himself and his subordinates to an AU. Not an inherently negative one, but this one was slowly inching along the path to becoming one--not with any of Nightmare's influence, of course. Of course. The office bled away into an inky black, and the details of the forest now surrounding them were slowly blotted into detail in their vision. Voices whispered through the trees, cries heard despite how far away the owners of the voices were. The king bathed in the inpour of negativity, sweet in its invasivity of the otherwise positive AU.
Delicious.
Time ticked onward as Nightmare basked in the glow of negativity, pleased with this outlet for his urges. He pestered and terrorized how he saw fit, and then moved on to the next town in the AU, moving from Snowdin onward.
Nightmare strolled through the dark forests he and his henchmen found themselves in, walking amid their conversation and bickering. He was much calmer now, having taken the worst of his rage out on the Snowdin townspeople. His tendrils waved lazily behind him--they twisted and curled loosely around his men; Killer's ankle, Dust's wrist, Cross's belt loop, the handle of Horror's wielded axe...
This loose grip tightened when he felt it.
That sickeningly sweet feeling, foreign but dizzyingly familiar. Nightmare could feel his strength slip ever so slightly, even while still near the lingering terror of his previous victims. He subconsciously yanked back on his soldiers, pulling them closer to himself before his tendrils uncurled from them, his irritation renewed.
His entourage watched their boss slip past them, his strides purposeful and single-minded, the others having also felt the alluring surge of positivity from the direction Nightmare was now headed. The aura was pleasant and warm just the same as it was sickly and repulsive, in sharp, uncomfortable contrast with the negativity floating around. Nightmare weaved through trees as he followed the warmth, his single eye socket narrowing--his single pupil sharpening--as he considered his suspicions. His henchmen followed, equally curious even if they did not hold the same contempt Nightmare had for the figure they were met with.
"Are you hurt in any way?.. here, let me heal you," a soft, gentle voice carried through the air between the trees. "please do not feel bad for accepting my aid! I am just here to help!.." Nightmare's form blocked out the moonlight filtering through the leaves as he watched the small figure carefully. Very, very carefully. Killer was the first one to peek his head around Nightmare, peering around his tentacles, which were now curling and bubbling agitatedly. Cross, Dust, and Horror soon followed suit--in that order.
"Thank you--thank you, thank you so much," another, noticeably more mature voice responded gratefully to the first, "our hero! I've heard so much about you! How can we ever repay you? Please--come get something to eat and drink, after helping us--on the house!" Several other voices seemed to agree.
The small, gentle voice seemed to belong to a short figure clad in a yellow cape and golden circlet that shimmered coldly in the moon and starlight--and yet, their whole being seemed to illuminate with a soft, warm, inviting glow. They spoke to an older monster, one who had just been terrorized and injured by Nightmare and his gang hours earlier, alongside others who were also scattered around and tending to each other with concern.
This "hero" also seemed inclined to decline the offer. Nightmare and his group could not see their face, with their back facing them, but they could feel the humble smile as the little one shook their head vehemently and waved their hands with equal passion. "Oh, no! No, no, I could not accept such a thing! You all clearly need it much more than I do..." The rest of the conversation blurred together in a meld of uninteresting dialogue and the small hero trying to excuse themselves from the conversation--preferably without causing a scene. If Nightmare paid close attention (which he was), he would've caught the worried glances they cast over their shoulder at the forest, in Nightmare's general direction.
He caught their eyes at some point.
So brilliant and bright and golden--it was hard not to remember such a familiar face. One that, not too long ago, was cold and frozen in time, standing amidst a field of dead flowers and charcoal grass.
It was hard not to recognize the face, with how little it changed. Had it changed at all over the centuries?
"Boss, who's that?" Killer whispered up to his king. He and the others could see the recognition in Nightmare's widened eye socket and narrowed pupils. When Killer did not get an immediate response, Cross spoke up next, his voice cautious but not entirely cold. "Nightmare, who is that."
The silence stretched on for a moment that felt far too long.
... "My brother."
"That's the Guardian of Positivity?" Killer whistled, the note cutting through the cold air as he followed alongside the others. By now, they were all pretty resigned to Nightmare's inevitable, violent freak-out. "I thought he'd be taller, y'know. But then again, boss ain't that tall either--" Killer was cut off by a sharp elbow to the side from Cross.
Dust spoke up lowly as his two teammates began to argue to the side of them, "I didn't expect to see another guardian... And I thought you said your brother was turned to stone?" Dust's hooded head gave a slight tilt to the side after his inquiry, peering up at the angry king who was again stalking through the forests, following the moving sense of positivity that emanated from his brother--Dream. "What, did the...statue-ification or something wear off?"
Nightmare, walking ahead with long strides, did not spare a glance behind him, single-minded in his goal at the moment. "Rumors have been circulating of my brother and his...recent appearance," the king bit out the words bitterly. "His presence here was unexpected. And inconvenient."
"Wonder what he's doing here," Cross wondered out loud absent-mindedly, his words quiet but loud in the silence of the forest. "It's not like there's anything really special to this AU, unless he was sent here by someone..."
They eventually reached the other end of the trees, seeing the tree line where the flora thinned out into a snow-caked clearing. Just in time to watch Dream hurriedly walking through the cold, covered grass, having somehow managed to free himself from the interest of the townsmonsters he helped. His boots crunched against the snow, packing it more tightly under his small, fast-moving feet. He held a staff tightly in his gloved hands, the stars at either end illuminating his poorly-lit surroundings. The little guardian's golden eye lights swept over the forest multiple times, uneasily.
How inconvenient, Nightmare mused to himself, his dark thoughts, if only my aura could slip unnoticed just this once.
"Hello?"
The small voice carried through the frozen air. Dream's eye lights flickered across what he could see--the tree line, the snow blanketing the ground in front of him, and the moon--the only light in the black sky. He held up his staff to illuminate his sights better, and caught a tall, moving silhouette step out in front of him. Someone he couldn't recognize, but felt that he should. The shade of cyan in the singular eye staring him down seemed to mock his forgetfulness, but it reminded him of memories still raw in his head.
It was enough to scare him.
Dream held up his staff a little higher in an attempt to see who he was talking to. The tall figure stared him down intensely, and Dream could feel his frame shrinking underneath the scrutiny. "E--...Excuse me, sir? sir? are you--? I apologize, I do not mean to assume your--" Dream was cut off by his own squeak--a sharp snag and pull to his ankle yanked him forward sharply.
Nightmare held Dream up upside down, several feet off the ground. He stared up at the little figure (who was quite obviously panicked and more than a little frazzled) fumbling with his staff that he almost dropped when he was roughly hoisted into the air. There was a sudden flash of light that encompassed Dream's staff, replacing it with a set of dual daggers that Dream held defensively.
Nightmare hummed, "How unsightly," he said. "I expected a more pacifistic approach to a reunion. Hm. No matter." His tentacles weaved and curled behind him, and the king's men came up beside him, looking up at the smaller, golden guardian suspended above the ground. The contrasting, conflicting auras were hard to ignore when they were both so pronounced up close.
"I am so sorry-- quién?..." Dream's unfinished question hung in the air, his gaze moving worriedly between the king and his subordinates. His sight caught Nightmare's once again--the cold scrutiny, looking at Dream as if he remembered something Dream might've not.
The viscous liquid dripping from the tall, dark figure was awfully familiar.
The recognition of who, exactly, this was dunked on him like a bucket of ice water. "Nightmare?"
"Yo, Boss," Killer interrupted from next to Nightmare, jabbing the point of one of his knives up at Dream. His head cocked to the side, a bony brow raised as he squinted. "He's even tinier up close. Has the pipsqueak always been so small?" Nightmare hummed, his cyan eye socket narrowing into a slit as he peered at his twin. His tentacle tightened around Dream's ankle. "I find myself wondering the same thing."
Had Dream always been so small?... Now that Nightmare considered it, he couldn't recall Dream ever changing while he was stone.
There was never anything different about the statue, back whenever Nightmare visited. Was Dream any different now than he was hundreds of years ago?
Lowering the positive guardian (who was thoroughly spooked), Nightmare leaned forward up close to his twin and spoke lowly. "I will inquire once.
How did you get here? And who sent you. I would like to have a word with them..." Dream swallowed and seemed to shrink away from the thinly veiled, threatening undertones of his brother's words. "And I would like to point out to you--it would be unwise to lie to me."
Dream didn't respond initially. Killer made some snide remark about Dream being "soft," interrupted by him catching Dust's sharp, sidelong glance of mild annoyance. Cross rolled his eye lights. Horror seemed more concerned with observing Dream, noting the little details--mainly how small (and slim) Dream was, especially compared to Nightmare's height. Then again, Nightmare could shapeshift, so that wasn't a very fair comparison...
"... The people in the... The Omega Timeline, they said... they said," Dream fumbled with his quiet, worried words. "They said you were...hurting people--I just came to help..."
Dust shared a look with Horror, curious. Killer's vantablack eye sockets narrowed on Dream with an intensity that belied the carefree expression he adorned. Cross looked up at his king.
Nightmare, for his part, took to closely analyzing his little brother.
He was small. Just as small as he remembered him to be. Just as childish, too. Dream was frightful beneath the sharp stare of his twin—Nightmare could feel it, could feel the familiarity.
Could feel how...confused? Confused. Confusion poured from Dream, mingling with the contrasting auras already in the atmosphere.
confused frightened confused confusion fear worry worry scared Nightmare brother concern fright worry The inpour of emotion in his field of power was intoxicating. He should be relishing in the fear, in the fright, in having his younger brother—always the perfect little angel—at his mercy.
Strangely, Nightmare felt nothing at all. Not the thrill, not the satisfaction, not the sadistic joy that would normally rush through his warped bones and settle in his cold ribcage.
The king watched his twin carefully. The image he expected his brother to be when he returned beared very little resemblance to this small figure in his grasp.
He expected calm. Poised. Perfect. Spoiled and high-strung—but still soft and generous and selfless. Kind.
And this Dream was. He'd been faced with proof of that earlier.
He expected a fair fight.
But this Dream was small. He was careful, he was nervous, and he was certainly not any bit as accompanied as Nightmare thought he would've been, seemingly by himself helping the residents of this AU.
There was a moment of hesitation from Nightmare.
He looked at this pathetic guardian—He looked at this child and found himself wondering has he always been this small?...
Nightmare could feel the sudden startledness from his men as they registered their boss's next sharp decision—
"He comes with us.'"