--

[chaospath]

Ah, actually thinking of wanting to find me a game?

I wonder if that'll work out as well as you think it will.

After all, nightmares and fears can be quite unpredictable.

Comments

[thefirstguardian]

[Nightmares, sir? Sandy was pretty sure the two of them already had a "talk" about those nightmares.

Dis face.]

[chaospath]

Now, now...

You can't get rid of them completely. It's hardly my fault if some come slipping through.

[thefirstguardian]

[Nightmares happen, sure. There's nothing Sandy can do about that, but he worries more about Pitch's particular brand of them.

Golden sand swirls above his head to form a small, stamping nightmare, easily differentiated from a normal dreamsand horse by shape and mannerism. Sandy wags a finger in Pitch's direction.

Do not ever let him catch you pulling those shenanigans again.]

[chaospath]

[ He holds his hands up in surrender. ]

Please, I never use the same trick twice.

[thefirstguardian]

[Sandy lets the nightmare dissipate, crossing those stubby arms over his chest and raising an eyebrow. His dreamsand reforms into a bed with odd, shifting shapes beneath it.

Preeeetty sure Pitch has been using that one for centuries.]

[chaospath]

Ah, that is hardly a trick... that's a fear that lives on within the hearts of all children and some adults.

Something that they can't stamp out with good dreams, I'm afraid.

[thefirstguardian]

[Sandy rolls his eyes a bit. A shining sun rises from behind the bed, and the shapes beneath it disappear.

Maybe what Pitch says is true, but it matters little once the sun comes up.]

[issen]

Perhaps, but nightmares are not real, and thus, are not to be feared.

[chaospath]

Oh, but there is more things than just that which plague the mind at night, little one.

[issen]

['Little one.' He can't help it if he's small, okay? It's a condition! The child-thing bristles at the monicker, not out of fear, but irritation, and he puffs up his chest with a huff.]

Such as?

[chaospath]

The things that go bump in the night.

[issen]

[The boy looks less than impressed, placing a hand on the hilt of the sword at his waist that's easily twice his size.]

Wolves? Bandits? Demons? I fear none of them. [Cats, on the other hand...]

[chaospath]

There is more than that out there.

Come on... think harder.

[within_the_dreaming]

Oh, I think they're rather predictable, always trying to scare someone and picking at whatever scraps they can. And there's always something to fight them off.

[chaospath]

Oh yes. Foolhardy individuals will always stand against that which others fear for the sake of protection and the like, I won't deny that one bit.

What I will say is that they are there to fight, but they do not always win.

[within_the_dreaming]

"Foolhardy"? Now there's a word I don't much associate with fending off nightmares.

[It laughs, sprawling out to "lie" in the air, propping rounded face against its fist. It gestures lazily with the other hand.]

There will always be the courageous ones who stand up to nightmares and fear. No one side will ever truly win, no, but that doesn't make it foolhardy. It means that there's a greater strength in those who fight than any can imagine.

[A shift, lacing its fingers together, edges of index against its mouth and just grinning away.]

They can do it with their own courage, but nightmares always have to cheat.

[chaospath]

Cheating, you say? Well, that's an interesting way to put it. Simply because nightmares and I have a power that you do not -- that is cheating?

I do think that you would get along with the Man in the Moon. Both who believe that the rules must be set so that you are the ones who are in the lead, but that's hardly how things should be. There is no leader in this match, no great evil that people are standing against...

For fear is something that is purer than your courage and your violent intentions. In fact, I daresay that the courage is in response to fear. It is breeding off of it more than any other emotion. Something that is taught through nightmares and horrors... but heroes seem to forget that... they seem to forget the point of the scares that burn deep in the hearts of all.

And in doing that... there is indeed no winner... for you take the courage from them to make it be in you... when you fail, when you do not win... the fear becomes overwhelming... when perhaps, they should have tried to stand on their own. So really... where is the fairness in that?

[everyonelovesgames]

What's not to love about games?

[chaospath]

Why, nothing at all...

Only people who don't like them are sore losers.

[everyonelovesgames]

There can be quite a few of those, demanding things like hints or chances.

And you do everything you can to make them enjoy the game. [And lose.] And they go and cry when it doesn't go their way.

[chaospath]

Always a shame.

Personally, I hate giving chances. Why should they be given them when I'm not?

[ofdiscord]

Such is the essence of unrest and despair.

My compliments to your mundane. An excellent choice in name.

[chaospath]

Why thank you.

I personally feel as though there is some order in the chaos which fear brings to people. There are things understood when that cold chill runs up that paralyzes and brings about hysteria. Understood and remembered. But, I suppose that for those that are outside that understanding... it does seem like pure destruction of all sense of balance.

[ofdiscord]

There is, somewhat. You can chart chaos. You can draw all kinds of lines through it. The correlations you find sometimes make no sense.

Others look like me. And you.

The scale tipping isn't nearly as important to most than what's tipping it. And vice versa.

[chaospath]

It's just a new balance that they have to get used to... simply because it is not theirs, they cry.

Which is just so delicious sometimes.