Dreamcrash

Twenty Eight: Hurting and Healing

Pen's grabbed Seed and I and we're in Crashtale before I can react. Seed automatically assumes his flower form and we take off, me tracking Thread's aura. We end up at Mount Ebbot, and I can see Thread standing on a ledge above us.

"Well well well, look who turned up. That was fast."

Pen and Seed ignore him, ready to attack. I summon a silver arrow, trying to push down the worry that I'll lose control. 

"No talking? Just want to get started? Alright then." Thread looks at something behind us. "Well, you know what to do."

I feel a sharp feeling in my Soul as blackness descends all around me. Fear threatens to take over as I feel the aura of Blackout walking towards us.

"Night, you've fought this guy, how do we defeat him?" Seed asks, vines ready.

"Blackout uses the darkness as camouflage. Be on your guard or he'll attack you. He uses bones and strings, which seem kind of short ranged," I respond, trying to keep my voice steady and probably failing.

"Short ranged? Good." Pen's tone changes to confident, and his eyelights shift to red teardrops. "Night, tell me when he's about to attack, then get the hell out of here."

I lock on to Blackout's aura, feeling his every move. It disappears for a moment and I blink, confused. Then it reappears, right above us. 

"Above!" I yell, quickly moving out of the way. Pen's eyes flare and he slams his fist onto the ground. An explosion of ink hits right where the two of them were. The darkness around me flickers and I focus on the world outside. I hit the ground in Crashtale, Seed popping up next to me. Thread's nowhere in sight, but I can feel something's wrong.

"Uhh... Night? Take a look at this." 

I turn around, scared by how alarmed Seed sounded, and saw a very odd sight. Pen was behind us, limp, eyes closed, floating a foot in the air. There were teal strings, the same Blackout uses, wrapped around his legs, arms, and neck.

"What's more alarming, the fact that he's floating or the fact he's caught in strings that are supposed to catch your Soul and therefore wouldn't work on him?" I asked, creeped out.

"Both..." Seed responds. "How can he be ca-"

"Shush," I say, suddenly sensing something. It felt almost like... an aura, inside of Pen, that wasn't his. "That's it. We aren't fighting Blackout in some sort of void, we're fighting him in our heads. In some sort of dreamscape," I realize.

"Correct," An all too familiar voice behind me says. I roll my eyelights and turn around to see Three behind me, standing on a web of stings in the sky. "You're a smart skeleton, Night."

"He's not smart, he's just nosy," Says Thread as he teleports next to Three. I found it kind of funny that Three was at least a head taller than him. "Blackout, release Pen. I want him to see this."

"Must you always be such a showoff?" Three asks.

"Must you always be so annoying?" Thread shoots back. I hear a thump behind me and turn around to see Pen drop to the ground and immediately summoning a Gaster Blaster. Blackout appears next to Three, and I see him for the first time in the real world. His colors look a bit more muted and his eyelights less noticeable, but the main difference is his right eyelight has gone from orange to red. 

Pen holds out his hand, ready to fire the blaster at a moment's notice. I summon a few arrows and Seed whips out his vines.

"Alright, just put down the weapons and no one gets hurt," Three says, an ominous glint in his eyes.