paradisalogs | [closed]

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Who: Dairine Callahan (

fearbringer)
What: Nightmare stalking and another nasty surprise
When: 5/5, night
Where: 404, Dairine's bedroom
Rating: PG for now

Barring castle-wide losses, Pitch spends most of his nights making the rounds through residents' bedrooms, lurking around and watching dreams. Not being able to cause and influence nightmares is frustrating, but it's not hard for him to adjust-- they had been a relatively new power of his, and before he'd discovered that he could influence the Sandman's dream sand, he'd spent untold millennia without them.

This isn't his first visit to Dairine's room. Tonight, he enters through a darkened corner and immediately heads over to the bed, carefully stepping around errant stuffed animals to avoid tripping over them. He leans over the sleeping girl, hoping that it's a nightmare she's having to night.

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The Power, for his part though, smiles casually like He is meeting an old friend.

"He raises a good point, you know. Your friend... what was his name again?" A tilt of the head, and a slightly colder smile. "Oh well, he's gone now, so I suppose it doesn't matter."

"Wrong on two counts, but I suppose you don't have many friends to compare it with so I'll let that one slide." Dairine counters, giving the Lone One a strong glare. "What are you doing here anyway?"

The Lone Power's gaze hardens, becoming knife-like and dangerous. His voice though stays the same rich friendly tone. "Same thing I'm always doing. Sitting here, waiting for you to mess up. You wizards really are a forgetful bunch. 'Where a creation is, the Creator will be there also.' Just because I'm quiet does not mean I left."

Dairine thinks to herself that no, they really haven't forgotten. So much of her last week back home had been reserved to top secrecy because of that clause. The Lone Power existed wherever entropy was, and thus could possibly eaves-drop on them at any time. Keeping secrets from It was hard, but not impossible. She only hoped she could keep them while she was stuck in Paradisa.

Well, this explains why Dairine thought Pitch and this guy were in league together. They kind of... talk alike.

He keeps watching.

The Lone One paces over to casually look over the ledge to where Dairine's friends have vanished. Dairine watches him closely, mentally preparing spells in case this goes south.

"A pity. You wanted to save them so badly yet they wouldn't even give you the chance. Do you ever wonder if it is really worth the effort?"

Dairine squares her shoulders. "Not really. After all, you are part of the reason why they're not asking for help in the first place. Every effort that might take you down a notch is worthwhile, if it saves one life or hundreds."

The Lone One stills, deadly quiet. Then It whispers, "Is that so."

With a flick of his hand, the shadows rush at Dairine, wrapping around her. She shouts angry as she fights against them, furiously enough that she almost misses what the Lone Power says next.

"It won’t make a difference, you know. No matter how you try to change the inevitable, I will still get them in the end. Sarah, Bucky, Rue." It's face darkens. "You should have learned after your mother. You can't save anybody."

Dairine yells, livid at the Power for bringing up her mother, but the Power is unmoved. With a final push, Dairine falls into the chasm, seeing nothing but darkness around her. The shadows seem to be pressing in around her, and all she can hear is the Lone Power laughing, malicious and amused. Above her, the Lone One still stands out of sight, watching her as she falls.

Suddenly the man turns, looking towards the vantage point that Pitch is watching the dream from. Slowly, he smiles.

Pitch doesn't realize that anything is off at first. Sure, the guy is looking at him, but there's no way he can see him. It's just a coincidence.

Coincidence? Perhaps. But then the Lone One speaks again, and it's certainly not to Dairine. After all, he sounds far more pleasant than he did with her.

"Well, look who dropped by. The Boogeyman himself."

... Well, this is unexpected. Pitch doesn't quite know what to do with himself at first, but he recovers quickly.

"I'm not used to people realizing that I'm watching."

"I reckoned as much. You were lucky; this one is more perceptive than most."

A glance towards the hole in the floor makes it clear who "that one" is.

Pitch shrugs, just a little.

"This is what I do. I'm not afraid of being caught."

He clears his throat.

"But I must admit, I'm confused about how we're interacting." Dreams are just figments of people's imaginations, after all. They aren't really real. "Is this the Castle's doing?"

"No." The Lone One admits. "This is not the Castle's doing, no more than it was the last time someone deigned to visit. We are able to interact merely because when wizards dream," and It says the word 'wizards' like Its speaking a curse, "they tend to toe the line between real and fiction far more than your average dreamer."

It smiles.

"Of course, our nature helps too."

"There is no 'we' or 'us'," Pitch says smoothly. "I am entirely my own, just as I assume you are."

"Of course." The Lone One replies good-naturedly, smiling.

"But individuals can have similarities. For example, we are both immortal beings tied to our duties, are we not? You can see into human dreams and fears. That is part of your nature. As for me," It shrugs, "I like to keep a close eye on my creation. A very close eye."

He makes a thoughtful sound. "This girl, you mean? Is she important to you?"

"You could say that." Important enough to try killing constantly at least.

"However, she is only one small part of my work. For every being who exists within entropy, I am with them. This girl just happens to be more self-aware than most."

Pitch looks thoughtful. "You and I really do have some similarities."

The young man turns to look at one of the shadow centipedes with a thoughtful gaze. "You could say that."

That is, unfortunately, all he gets out before the Lone One is interrupted by a loud "NO." Back in the real world, Dairine's pet Bit (which looks for all purposes like a levitating cube) has woken up and discovered the intruder in the room. The Bit, now a ball of red spikes, continues it's string of "NONONONO," launching itself at Pitch's head.

With a shout of surprise, Pitch reels backwards, scrabbling at the thing and trying to pull it off.

"Let go!"

"NONONONONONO..." It keeps saying, following Pitch. The Bit doesn't have arms, so it can't latch on, but it will float as close to him as possible to get its point across.

Except the Bit might be the least of Pitch's worries right now. With all the racket it is making, the sleeping figure begins to stir. Dairine's eyes blink open. "What's the matter now--"

Her words stop as the scene comes into focus. Suddenly Dairine is sitting up with a livid expression on her face. Within seconds, an invisible push of momentum hits Pitch hard. Hard enough to slam a grown man into the wall.

"You," she hisses. Someone is pissed.

Once he realizes the Bit isn't actually attacking, he stops smacking at it, only giving it an irritated shove every so often. That push, though-- that's not something he was expecting either, and he careens across the room, landing on his back.

He slowly picks himself up with a groan. He's a spirit, so no broken bones or bruises-- but it still hurt.

"Yes, it's me," he says irritably. "Just doing my job."

"Not in my room you're not!!"

Dairine stands on her bed, her expression the epitome of rage. The expression alone makes her ten times as intimidating than normal, though the little green jedi on her pajamas sort of cut the effect back a bit.

"How did you even get in here?! The door is locked!" In more ways than one. Dairine had put in great pains to protect her room, though apparently there were some holes in need of filling.

"Yes, in your room," he retorts. "You aren't more special than everyone else here. I'm the Boogeyman; watching the fears and nightmares of mortals is what I do. If you don't like it, you're welcome to stay asleep."

Bad choice of words there. If there is one easy way to make Dairine dislike you, it's pointing out her lack of specialness. Because as far as she is concerned, she was more special once, long before she arrived her. And she didn't like reminders of her demotion.

"Oh I don't think so! Right now I wouldn't care if you were the freaking Sandman. You'll stay out if you know what's good for you."

He scowls at the mention of the Sandman, but doesn't comment on that part.

"I am really not scared of you, little girl. I feed off of the fears and nightmares of the residents here, and I'm not going to make an exception of you simply because you threw a tantrum."

"Yeah? Well, you should be."

She fully intends to make his life a lot harder, starting with making sure he can't get in her room.

"Because I'm not scared of you either. I'm annoyed." Understatement. "And when I'm annoyed, my actions make a tantrum look like a walk in the park. I warned you once that you don't want to underestimate me. I'm not going to warn you again."

"You feel fear. That's tantamount to being scared of me." ... Sometimes. He considers it to be, anyway.

"And if you really don't want me to underestimate you, you could start by telling me what makes you a threat. Because really, all I've ever heard about is your friendship with the Guardians, and they aren't here."

"It's not the same, and you know it." Dairine is fairly certain of that, like she's heard it somewhere. That Pitch was most powerful when people feared him, not just random fears.

Ohhhh, Pitch, you are treading on dangerous ground indeed.

"They aren't, but I don't really need a Guardian to kick your butt. I can do that myself." She flexes her hand and suddenly there is a bright light in her grasp. It writhes like she were holding a live lightning bolt. "I prefer showing over telling."

"Why wouldn't it be? I bring fear. I am fear." Though not necessarily in Paradisa, he's realized. People felt fear here before he came, and they'll feel fear if he leaves. It's weird, and it contributes to the feeling of powerlessness that he feels here sometimes, but he also gets something in return: more believe than he's had in centuries.

"And I'm not interested in a fight. I don't fight humans." He's done it, of course-- when those kids back home had decided to with the Guardians, he hadn't backed down from attacking. But for the most part, he considers humans in a completely different domain from himself. There's no reason to fight them. They aren't worth it. They aren't threats.

... But this girl clearly has some sort of power.

"Are you human?" he asks. Because if she's not-- or if she's from a place where humans can be powerful enough to go toe-to-toe with spirits-- he'll need to be more careful. He's perfectly willing to get into fights when he thinks he has a chance of winning, but he doesn't particularly like antagonizing beings that are more powerful than him (he already leaves Will and the demons alone). He hopes he won't have to add Dairine to that list-- her fears are interesting, and she annoys him enough that, even if she isn't a mere child, he bristles at the idea of backing down to her-- but ultimately, he knows he'd prefer it to setting himself up for an unavoidable ass-kicking.

Edited 2014-05-22 17:25 (UTC)

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