The Blinding Light of Sunrise - Full Tome

Chapter 30: The First Battle of Kinoko

Ranboo crouched in a dark room. "No, I don't want to. Don't make me do it," he cried.

"Oh, but Ranboo, you've already done so much." Dream's voice echoed in the darkness. "You don't want him to find out, do you? Isn't he better off not knowing what kind of monster he's married to?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Don't tell me you've already forgotten?" A book appeared from nowhere with Do Not Read printed on the cover. "Why don't you open it?"

Ranboo opened the book. "No... No... No..." he murmured as he flipped through the pages. He slammed the book shut. "No! I didn't do these things! I couldn't..."

"Oh, you did. You did so many wonderful things. And now I need you to do one more."

"No. Not Tubbo. I won't do it! I won't!"

"You will."

Ranboo's eyes glowed. He rose like a marionette pulled up by a string. "No... No... Not Tubbo... No..." his hollow voice repeated inside the black prison of his mind.

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Sapnap checked the coordinates on Tubbo's letter again, he frowned. It was just a bunch of rocks and craggy hills. He shook his head. There was no one there. It was just like Quackity, say he was going to f-ing show up and then not be there.

He let out an irritated sigh. Karl had looked so sad when he left, he hated leaving when he looked at him like that. He just wanted to get back home to him. "Quackity!" he shouted. "Quackity! I'm going to f-ing leave if you don't f-ing show up in the next three minutes."

"Shhh! Not so f-ing loud!" Quackity's voice hissed from... somewhere... Somewhere near an especially rocky part of the hill. "Did you come alone?"

Sapnap squinted into the shadows. He saw a flash of red. "Quackity?"

"Yeah. Get the f-ck over here." Suddenly, Quackity seemed to appear from the shadows. He waved him over. He looked rough, rougher than he could remember ever seeing him, but his red tie still hung loosely around his neck. It'd be sexy if this was half a year ago, before everything went bad.

Sapnap followed him through a thin crevice concealed by a strange, spikey rock formation. As he slid through, he saw a sliver of warm, orange light and then it abruptly opened up into a cave where Tommy and Tubbo sat by a small fire munching on apples.

"Hey Sapnap," Tommy said. Tubbo echoed the greeting.

"Is this where you've been hiding out?" Sapnap asked, surveying the small cave.

"I mean, today," Quackity said. "We got here pretty f-ing late last night. Here, have a seat." Quackity tossed an empty backpack to him.

He didn't need it, but he recognized Quackity was trying to be nice so he sat down on it. In the distance, he thought he heard the first rumbles of thunder. It had just been clear moments before. It was amazing how fast storms could pop up around here. He might as well settle in, it was going to be a bit. "Why the f-ck are you here?" he asked.

"We got some information from a... a f-ing reliable source, that Las Nevadas is going to attack Kinoko Kingdom."

"When?"

"Probably pretty f-ing soon. Frankly, I was f-ing surprised it wasn't already on fire when we got here."

"So you came all this way to warn us?" Sapnap could feel his heart rising in his chest.

"Well, yeah. Sh-t, I'm not about to let anyone f-ing hurt you or Karl."

Sapnap could feel the pounding in his chest. So Quackity did care about them afterall! He'd spent so much time convincing himself that he didn't when he didn't join them in Kinoko Kingdom. But maybe, just maybe... Quackity needed a place to live now that he'd been kicked out of Las Nevadas, why not back with them? He'd face Dream and Wilbur a hundred times if-