Chapter 6

"It's not a yes or no question pal. You know how to undo it so you better do it right now," Cross growls, causing Nightmare to open his eyes. '..Wh-where am I now..?' He thinks to himself, trying to move. He realizes that his hands are tied above him, small strings keep his fingers together and his legs are also tied against the pole-like thing he lays up against. "L-like I said already! I don't know how!" A smaller skeleton growls as he stays pinned against a table by Killer. "Ugh! First Horror and Dust bring Nightmare here, and then you refuse to speak up!"

Nightmare looks around and realizes they're in a lab. Horrors voice makes him flinch as he turns to the other skeleton standing by him. "Hey! Dust's the one who blabbed out we're bad guys, not me!" Dust, on the other side of Nightmare, starts growling. "I did not you b—rd!" "Oh really? Name one good guy that tries to destroy the Multiverse!" Dust doesn't respond, he instead looks at Nightmare. "..Look who's up," He says, causing the others to look at Nightmare as well. The purple skeleton hides his fear as he looks at them all, this time as enemies.

"You lied.. why are you actually doing this?" He growls, mainly looking at Cross. In response, Cross shakes his head. "That's the thing I didn't lie about," Nightmare flinches and tries to break free, when suddenly an axe aims straight at him. "Hold still, Nighty," Horror says, his voice has a small hint of amusement in it and something about it anger Nightmare, but not enough to do anything. Cross turns back to the other skeleton and speaks again. "One last chance doc.. how do you reverse this?"

The little skeleton doesn't respond, and Cross summons his knife. "So be it," Before Cross strikes the final blow, he's hit back by a bone and tripped by another. Killer releases the small skeleton and pulls out his knife, turning to the two figures standing there. Ink and Blueberry. Ink has his paintbrush out and Blueberry summons some more bones. "Y-You!" The glitched skeleton Nightmare still doesn't know the name of growls, creating strings in his hands like the ones holding him. Cross gets back up, and his knife glows red as he turns to Blue.

"Release Nightmare right now," Ink says, his tone full of authority, shocking Nightmare a bit. 'They're here to save me..' Cross smirks, and then charges at Blueberry with extreme speed, barely giving him time to dodge, but he does. Ink dodges strings fired at him before jumping at the glitched skeleton, only to be blocked by Killer, who pushes him back before trying to swing at Inks chest with his knife. Ink dodges as Horror and Dust also join the fight and attempt to outnumber the brown skeleton, but Ink manages himself by creating clones of himself with paintbrush, confusing the four skeletons surrounding him.

They each fight a different Ink, and nobody seems to know if they're fighting the actual one because Ink switched them all around. Meanwhile, Cross is going against Blue still, aims at the small skeletons soul, swinging nonstop. Blueberry seems to be managing, but is growing tired fast. Nightmare suddenly looks up when he feels someone untying his wrists and sees Dream. "Dr-Dream! I-" "Sh!" Is all his brother says in response as he finishes untying him. "Quickly, untie your legs! I'm going to help Blue," Nightmare nods, and starts doing as Dream told him to.

Dream quickly summons his staff and hits Cross back right before he hits Blueberry, and turns to the other group. Dream does a small wave and the Ink fighting Killer breaks from the group, the other ones turn to puddles. Ink grabs Nightmare, who has now untied his legs, and snaps his fingers, teleporting them to the same house from before that he first woke up in. Dream and Blueberry appear moments after and then everyone turns to Nightmare. "Why did you do that?! What if they killed you!" Dream gasps out, worry covers him.

Nightmare doesn't respond and he suddenly senses anger in Ink. "Where did you teleport to that they found you?" He asks suspiciously, and Nightmare tries to hide his fear like before. "I appeared in a forest, the ones named Cross and Killer found me," He lies, forcing himself to sound as serious and honest as possible. "Hm.. Killer did see it happen I guess.." Ink says, giving Nightmare an open opportunity to ask the question is his mind. "What did happened? Cross told me I fought you in the past.. why?"

Dream flinches a little and looks down, and Nightmare senses a pang if guilt in him. "Th-That day.. at the Tree of Feelings... y-you.. ate the dark fruit and.." Suddenly, Nightmares eye flickers blue again, causing Dream's eyes to shrink. "What? What happened? Why are you scared of me, what did I do wrong!?" Nightmares voice starts to darken a little, and Ink pulls out his paintbrush, ready to fight. "...Nightmare, calm down! It's in the past, don't worry!" Dream says after a while, hugging his brother. Nightmare's fists clench and he closes his eyes tightly.

'This is all his fault.. don't you realize how much pain he deserves? Why don't we give him it...' The voice in his head repeats this, getting louder each time. 'This is your chance... kill him.' Suddenly, the outer layer of his hand cracks a little, causing Dream to hold him tighter. "You can fight this Nightmare..! I don't want to lose you again.. please!" He whimpers, tearing up now. Nightmare opens his eyes again and looks at his brother and almost tears up as well. 'No.. it isn't his fault. It was mine for listening to you.'

His eyes turn lavender once more and his fists unclench as he looks at his brother, fear flows in his eyes. Dream gives him a small smile and puts his hand on Nightmares cheek before speaking. "Don't worry.. it's ok, you're safe now, I promise," Nightmare knows this isn't true though. As long as he's like this, he's in danger and he knows that. But he finally has his brother back, and that's what he cares about now. As long as Dream's here, he can make it, and if anything happens to him, he will make sure that whoever did it will fall to their knees before him.

                                  ~{TBC}~