Dream a Nightmare

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"Wait," Dream said. "You have what?"

"Recordings," Technoblade said. He handed each of them a small, thin black rectangle. Dream looked at it in confusion, until shapes moved along the front of it. It was like a picture, but moving. It showed the first other Dream reacting to the enderman's appearance. He had rolled away, out of the creature's reach, and then turned on the spot, while attempting to draw a sword that he did not have.

"Well?" Technoblade asked him.

"What?" Dream said. "I already know this."

"But what does it tell you about him?" Technoblade pressed. Dream watched the video again, and he noticed something.

"Untouchable," Dream muttered.

"Louder, please," Technoblade told him.

"Untouchable," Dream repeated. "This is a man who knows that he's better than you, so much so that you will never be able to beat him. This is not someone you should face."

The first other Dream looked at him, surprised.

"That's what you see?" he asked. Dream nodded the affirmative, then looked over the the first other Dream.

"I see surprise and jumpiness," the first other Dream said. "An exact movement, designed to keep him inside the enderman's reach, but also at an awkward angle to be hit. Every move, created precisely for the purpose of directing the tempo of a battle, while appearing to only just survive."

"You two just described each other," Technoblade said. The two Dreams looked up at each other with surprise.

They both nodded at each other after a few moments of hesitation. That was exactly the image each had wanted to project.

"You saw through me easily enough," Dream said.

"That's only because I was you," the first other Dream said. Dream didn't have a response to that.

"The only thing we need to do is fuse the Dreams," Technoblade said.

"What?" Both of the Dreams present looked at him, not understanding.

"What does that mean?" Dream asked.

The enderman teleported behind them with the girl Dream and Mexican Dream.

"Are you ready?" it asked solemnly.

"Hold on," the first other Dream said. "What is it that we are doing?"

"You will be combined into one," the enderman explained. "Then you will all be sent back together, in one body."

"How?" the girl Dream asked. "How can you combine different people?"

Realization dawned on the first other Dream's face.

"We are not different people," he said. "All of you are me. Except..."

The first other Dream frowned, and looked at Mexican Dream.

"Except you."

"This is what must be done," Mexican Dream said gravely. "But I will not participate."

The first other Dream nodded to himself.

"It is to be three then," he said. "The perfect number, in my world."

"It will be so," the enderman said, who had not appeared confused at Mexican Dream's refusal. "Then, are you ready?"

Three of the four Dreams nodded hesitantly, one after the other. But not Mexican Dream.

"Then stand in a triangle," the enderman said. "And put your hands on the shoulders of the people next to you."

Dream took a step forward, and the first other Dream walked up beside him, angled kind of toward him. Then the girl Dream walked up on the other side, and the three of them were standing so that if each of them had been looking straight, they would have been looking over the shoulders of the other two.

"Step back a little," Technoblade advised. "You're too close."

All of them took a step back, and then they all looked around at each of the others. Each of them nodded to the others in turn, and then they all put their hands on the shoulders of those next to them, so that they were all connected.

/perspective shift Technoblade

After they put their hands on shoulders, the enderman stepped up near them, behind the SMP Dream, so that it was towering over them at more than twice their height. Then it raised its arms up, and a little to the sides, dwarfing their group even more, so that they looked very small indeed from the outside. But Technoblade knew each of them totally trusted the others. And that made them all giants.

Then nine glowing eyes of ender came out from the enderman, and began pulsing in unison. Glowing lines sprung up between them, forming a triangle over each of the Dreams' heads. The triangles began spinning, getting faster and faster as they went, until eventually, all Technoblade could see was circles over each of them. And then the eyes all burst at once, releasing a cloud of purple smoke, hiding them all from view.

Technoblade saw a flash from within the smoke, but he only saw one silhouette in front of it.

It had worked.