tw/cw: reader is very much feeling guilt for shedding so much blood, this is a nightmare so dw our pookies ain’t dead, reader remembers very very vague stuff from mk11 timeline (aftermath and being Shinnok’s spawn carries onto the next timeline), it’s like not making sense? Ig cause it’s a nightmare lmfao, gorey scenes and descriptors, body horror, light religious? themes, drowning, neck snap, shits painful in general bruv, third person pov (you/yours), dw shits dark but it’s a bit happy at the end. Mostly.
notes: first time writing a fic that delves into gory descriptors and I’m doing research in how to write nightmares lol so forgive me if it’s unrealistic, corny or smth
summary: A nightmare that comes back every time you fall into dream land.
characters in focus: Liu Kang mainly (father figure), Earthrealm champions, Shirai Ryu duo, Edenian sisters, and Syzoth x Ashrah and the rest are just rlly implied but they still are nightmarish in descriptions lol
ׂ╰┈➤
Heavy breathing. You heave as your feet connect with the cold, stone slate as opposed to the smooth, soundless wood of your bedroom floors. It’s the same. The same. The same nightmare tormenting you for weeks.
Everything around you is hazy. Blurred lines of dull clouds gloss over the supposedly clear night skies, the stars whispering words of goodbye as they disappeared from your sight. You blindly reach for them, stumbling forward as your feet loose its footing despite there being solid ground in front of you.
A scream escaped you as darkness swallowed you whole, your yells echoing against the stone around you, your hands mindlessly scraping the walls that seem to grow further from you, your fingers scraping them desperately, the pain searing as you feel your nails peel and scrape away.
You prided yourself for being the level headed one, the one who didn’t scream while everyone else was panicking, a trait your dear father… your father. He was in the distance. No wait, no, you’re falling. You’re supposed to be falling.
A gasp. Your standing in front a temple. Deep in the forest, in front a worn down temple, the walls crumbling ever so slowly as you step forward. You don’t feel good. You don’t feel like yourself. Your legs are stumbling forward onto the stairs.
The incense burner is abandoned. Everytime you came here, to watch the mortals worship the God of Fire, people pile up in lines to pay their dues. The ash is pale and white as you pick it up and let it crumble in your hands.
The temple is too silent. You stumble through empty halls of prayer halls, staring straight ahead. There are eyes in the shadows. They follow you. Judge you. Whisper about you. It makes you feel nothing.
There’s a small pond in the temple. You remember. Orange… blobs… float around. There’s no lily pads. There’s a statue of him in the temple. A dragon accompanies him. His marble eyes make contact with yours, half of his face having crumbling into fine dust.
You feel parched. You grasp your throat with bloody fingers, the nailless fingers clawing the skin so hard you think you’ll tear out your trachea. Your legs stumble mindlessly to the pond, and you can feel the marble statue crumble and his eyes following you.
Your knees slam into the pond’s edge as you feel them crack and snap as you cup algae infested water into your mouth, the liquid tasteless and stale as the familiar man’s marble feet crumble as it fell forward. The crash is loud. Your ears ring and there’s warm liquid leaking out of your eardrums.
Your head turns, and you come face to face with those familiar glowing eyes, blood seeping and dripping where his jaw should be. His teeth are bloody, his tongue moves in a weak attempt to speak, and his eyes are glassy and bloodshot.
A empty wail escapes his mouth, and you scream in pure terror as he reaches out for you with cold, bandaged hands, scrambling back as you crawl and scrape the floor, gagging as you feel bile rise up in your throat, a sob of sorrow for this familiar man and fear as your vision blurs.
You can’t run. Faces stare back at you. Their faces. Their names. Their voice. It’s a blur. There’s so much blood. Too much blood. The blindfolded man’s throat is torn out. There’s blood flowing and dripping in front of your feet like a river. If you could hear past the heavy ringing, you’d guess he’d be straining whatever words he can make out.
There’s black shards in the American man’s face, his face looking like it was torn apart by a serated knife you stare blankly into his lifeless eyes as a duo step out from behind him, one decapitated as it stumbled forward, blood spurting out of his neck, and the other was split in two, crawling towards you as he cried out in agony.
Your knees are broken. The bones are jutting out of your flesh as you writhe away from the familiar, mangled states of people you’re begging forgiveness from. Why are you begging forgiveness? You don’t know. The words are tumbling out of your mouth, you know they are despite the ringing.
Unbeknownst to you, your frantic movements edging you closer to the pond’s edge as flashes of bodies, bloodshed, and carnage as you shake your head in despair. Why do these memories torment you? Is the Elder Gods punishing you?
You feel your body being shocked as freezing temperatures drag you down. The water is disturbed as your legs scrape the floor, trying to surface to scream and breathe the stale, dusty air. Your legs cramp, and with that, the icy water swallows you whole.
You struggle. There’s an invisible force dragging you down, you thrash and writhe in its grip, your eyes forced open as your faced with bodies floating around you, bubbles escaping your mouth as your hands weakly struggle to locate them, or locate anything alive at all.
Your lungs are burning. Your legs are useless, limp and floating along with the force as your hands slowly cease your struggling, the overwhelming feeling of helplessness as your dragged deeper as the surface is further and further out of your grasp.
You turn your head as you come face to face to a bloodied face. Two of them, lifeless and floating limply in the dark depths of the water. A scarred right eye housing empty eye sockets and missing limbs, and another man with bloodied gray hair had his mask floating not far from his mouth. Or whatever it was supposed to be considering his entire lower face was torn off, the loose flesh making you almost vomit.
There’s too many faces around you. Mangled, bloodied, grotesque. They are familiar. Some… some you know well. Friendly. Some are those you can feel are enemies. People you’ve battled against before. People whose blood you’ve splattered before, and people who’ve sunk their weapons into you as well.
You feel your neck strain as your slammed against the stone hard floor, gasping weakly as bubbles escape your mouth, your eyes darting around to search for a futile escape. You see two ladies. One dressed in blue, one dressed in pink. They look similar. Their faces are intact, leaving your to stare at their beheaded forms as the sharp teethed lady’s face passes too close to your face.
You gag, your vision blurring as you gain a burst of adrenaline, your hands scraping hard against the stone and dirt of the water, trying to move against the force pushing your neck harder and harder against the floor.
There’s bodies beside you, their necks wrangled as you see a green cloaked man with tattoos lie beside with a black eyed lady as the force on your neck becomes unbearable, your vision blurring as you feel the last of your life leave you.
There’s a crack, and everything goes silent.
You jolt awake, a strangled gasp escaping you as your hands grip the covers, your nails intact and neatly cut, your knees are still in place, and you’re not being drowned and chased by abominations of the dream.
Your father is beside you, worriedly feeling your forehead as he wipes the cold sweat with a comfortingly warm cloth, a shiver running down your back as you remember the harsh, bitter coldness of the pond’s water drowning you.
“Are you feeling alright?”
Liu Kang’s voice rings out gently as he pats your back, coaxing the fear out of you with ease as he brought you into his arms, kissing your forehead.
You nod barely as you hug him back, flashes of that statue of him staring at you, his jawless form trying to embrace you into his cold hugs. This is warm. And it feels like home.
Blood is not uncommon in your life. Your father has always trained you to be one of the consistent Earthrealm defenders. You just hope your battles don’t end up shedding blood of people you cared about.
