When someone is trying to defend the person in their dream, this could mean there are some distressful feelings still in the person’s thoughts. The person may flip about defending or getting out of a bad situation. If there is pain involved, then this could be related to an abuse incident from long ago, which might also have left scars that now come back up as flashbacks or memories.
In dreams, defense takes many forms and can represent many things. It is not always related to an attack or physical confrontation; it also refers to defending themselves from hurtful memories or be bounded by wounds their have experienced in life.