Chapter Text
There was an intrusive little thought that Nightmare would have every once in a while.
Dream didn't seem to have very clear memories of their past, Nightmare couldn't blame him he watched with his at the time singular working eyelight as his brothers skull fractured into hundreds of pieces held together by the molten gold that coursed through him before his several century long coma, it made sense he wouldn't remember anything clearly.
But it always made Nightmare wonder if his brother truly loved him, even back before his ghost became an angel. If Dream couldn't even recall why he had loved Night in the first place, was the burning endless well of love and obsession he felt real? Did he really love Night or the idea of him that morphed from the broken shards of his memory? Or was it just that he felt attracted to the last apple Nightmare had selfishly taken from him, the last little sliver he needed to reach his full power or the only thing that could cool his burning mania.
Nightmare couldn't bring himself to dwell on that too much though. For all his self deprecation he just couldn't imagine his brother didn't love him. He had always held on to the memory of his brother before everything for motivation and the feel of the old magic woven into the threads of the flag always grounded Night. One day they would be free from it all, together .
Now that it's true though he didn't know what to do with himself.
Ever since they encountered their alternate forms everything was… different. Nightmare couldn't use his own name anymore, and really he didn't mind being Lune or Swan. The other him, the King Nightmare, had a reputation to uphold and subordinates who swore their loyalty to him and Lune didn't mind going by an alias, he was already doing that both to hide and because telling people his name was Nightmare tended to be more trouble than it was worth. He was glad the other him had managed to take some pride in it, to claim it as a point of strength even if Lune didn't exactly agree with the multiverse terrorism fiasco. The other him couldn't even bear to look at Lune so he would excuse himself as quickly as possible as though he were caught intruding in the King's own castle.
He didn't expect his brother to start calling the other Nightmare all of Lunes names. My moon, sweet thing, my Night, moonlight, even Darling. Even the way his brother would say the word Nightmare felt like it was stolen from Lune. The gentle reverent tone his brother used on the rare occasion he'd choose to use his name rather than one of his many pet names had always been reserved for him.
However, Lune wasn't Nightmare anymore. Dream didn't keep his name either, choosing to go by Sol instead, but to Lune he would always just be Dream, his brother. Lune never was one for the excessive pet named his brother loved to use and he wasn't going to start using nicknames now.
It… hurt more than he expected, he could feel the pain in his chest even as he did everything to minimise his aura and numb himself in preparation. Dream couldn’t be distracted once he locked eyes on Nightmare, so Lune naturally had nothing to worry about as his brother chased down the other him with the same glee he did Lune, except this Nightmare was his perfect match and could engage with Dream where Lune could only desperately hide.
The other Dream, the little Sunflower one that came with the other Nightmare, also eventually gave chase.
They had created a dynamic among themselves that Lune had no place in.
Even when Dream called him Swan it didn't feel like the affectionate way he'd call him his precious Swan before, it was just- what he was now. Just a cowardly hermit who only knows how to run and barely scrape by to survive, someone Dream does not remember, someone who isn't enough to balance him anymore, someone just as easy to forget again.
Lune was at least glad the extra free time let him roll out more of the blend he used to keep his aura as low as he could manage and maybe find the same contentment as he once thought being able to be forgotten and having some peace and quiet would give him.