revenance_rpg | Alone in the Darkness

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Alone in the Darkness

Who: Roxas, Emizel, and whoever dares enter Twilight Town
What: Experimenting with nightmares. For Science.
Where: Twilight Town
When: Sometime after the dreams start
Warnings: Copious amount of nightmares, Roxas's Hayner-worthy idea, and potential yelling.

It seemed like a good idea at the time.

At least, that's Roxas's rational. Emizel had been worried that if they defeated all the nightmares, he'd be in trouble, so what better way to test if there was a connection than if they could get a lot of nightmares.

The plan was simple. Get treats, and then get the nightmares to follow them to a location, see if Emizel felt more energetic, and then fight off the nightmares before it got out of hand.

Roxas supposed he underestimated how many nightmares they could summon with a few treats, but they could manage, right? It's not like there were any big ones or anything.

They'd be fine.

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"What have your dreams been telling you?"

All of Celestia's dreams here were about her sister -- either reliving the moments in which Luna had become Nightmare Moon, and Celestia had been forced to banish her, or more recently, simply their dichotomous existence. Day and night, light and darkness, sun and moon. In that respect, the more recent dreams had been less horrifying, but not so significantly different that she truly felt they were on a separate topic.

Here, Eraqus chose to add nothing...there was little for him to add. His own dreams had been nightmarish in near all aspects...from journeys from when he was young, to his confrontation with Xehanort over Xehanort's ambitions, to facing down Terra using his own darkness. None of it was anything he wanted to discuss.

Ma-ti sensed that there was something awkward and wrong here, and paused mid-collection, a dream piece still in his mouth.

These dreams had been the worse of them yet. Unlike before where most of them simply make him miss home even more, these ones were truly terrifying on multiple levels. Failing all his duties as a demon; A fear now of this 'Light', so to speak. And all dreams seemed to end with him either being hunted down for what he is, or what he's meant to do. Or starve.

"I'm...a failure."

Emizel made a slight choking sound. One that sounded, wait, yeah, he was shaking and tearing up.

"Demons can't survive if there's no Fear Energy! If the Nightmares are the ones making it, and they stop, then I'll...I'm..."

"...I-I'm scared. I don't know what else I can do."

"...I-I don't wanna die..."

Celestia reached both a hoof and a wing out to the young demon, the former to rest on his shoulder, the latter to encircle his back.

"Emizel... you have friends here, and we will not let you die. Whatever happens, we will find a way to prevent that. I promise."

Again, Eraqus said little. Even after all these years, he was still uncomfortable with one of his students crying, let alone a demon he only barely knew. It explained much about this setup, but that didn't stop it from being foolish and ill-thought. And he couldn't help but find it ironic that a reaper demon was frightened of death.

He added just one thing, low and not too loudly. "I don't think that's something you need worry about here." Nothing to worry about from a lack of Nightmares, anyway.

...True, though Emizel is a little different than most demons. Much less other reapers. Then again, dying was never a fun thing for anyone.

It was slightly awkward to be back rubbed by, well, by a hoof. But it also was...actually pretty comforting once he started to snap out of it.

Well, that and Celestia said the magic word helped. ~~Dammit Val.~~

"...How can you promise something like that?"

Oh, Eraqus. As much as Celestia respected the Master, times like this told her plainly that he had perhaps become too mature, too quickly.

"Because you are my friend," she said, as calm and serene as ever.

That was probably an understatement. But it was a natural hazard of being a Keybearer...and especially of being one that grew up with Xehanort.

Again, Eraqus said nothing. He couldn't really claim Emizel as a friend, although he was certain there were some that did, aside from Celestia. He was mostly concerned with making sure that things like this didn't happen again.

Ma-ti finished gathering up the rest of the dream pieces, and tossed them into a pile by Eraqus's feet. This was quite a collection.

"....Heh?" Friend? Boy Celestia, aren't you taking this relationship a little too quickly?

Hey, Moxie wants to help cheer the tiny demon up too~ He'll do it the best way he knows how too: Sloppy licks. No need to be sads now.

"Would you explain more about Fear Energy, and its relation to you and the Nightmares? It would help us understand the problem, and why this happened."

She glanced back at Eraqus, who she knew perfectly well had no real personal investment in this, but whose opinion she nevertheless valued when it came to such matters, given the subtle importance of the Keyblades to so much of what they were going through.

Eraqus would have commented that 'fear energy' wasn't much of a makeup of this sort of darkness, but he didn't understand the workings of this reaper demon's needs, anyway.

Eraqus noted her glance back at him, and gave her a quiet and gruff sound of acknowledgement that yes, he was paying attention, and would chime in as necessary. This was more for Celestia's benefit than anyone else.

"It's created depending on how much fear there is of darkness. Terrorizing humans used to be the easiest way to get it, and it helped everyone else in the long run anyway," the further this explanation went on, the more awkward Emizel felt about it. "The Nightmares are the closest things to demons here, so if anything had been making it, it'd be the first place to look."

"....Although, gathering them all together was really more of Roxas' idea."

And there goes Roxas, under the bus. She made a note to have a word with him, too.

Fear of darkness... At times like this, she wanted a different word to represent one of the two very difference concepts that 'darkness' represented. Darkness as her sister knew it was nothing to be afraid of. Darkness as Sombra or Nightmare Moon knew it was different indeed -- and even then, in very different ways.

"And demons rely on it for their existence?"

Well, none of that sounded good. Although to Eraqus, fear was more a symptom of darkness than a cause of it. Some fears could be healthy, or necessary...but the kind of fear that true darkness bred never was.

He missed commenting on this, however, with the next statement. Eraqus's frown deepened. A reaper demon he wouldn't expect to fully understand how darkness affected those that had to live with it, but Roxas should know better. Especially if it came to something as foolish as trying to summon more Nightmares! "What do you mean, it was his idea?"

He gave a slight nod to Celestia's response. Mostly he didn't have time to add anything more thanks to Eraqus.

"It's just as I said: He came up with it."

"But you summoned many, many more than you intended. Roxas would not have put anypony else in danger like this, even if he had overestimated his ability to defeat a group of Nightmares." Celestia frowned thoughtfully as she considered what he'd said earlier.

"Master Eraqus, I think we ought to investigate this further. Either more Nightmares are attracted to the bait they used to lure them in general, or adding additional bait had a multiplicative effect rather than an additive one. If it's the former, that might mean something greater is at work, and either way we ought to know so we can warn others."

"There shouldn't have been a need to summon any at all," he grumbled. Nightmares were perfectly capable of summoning themselves without anyone trying to lure more in and then face them while completely ill-prepared.

He certainly hoped that Roxas wouldn't be that foolish, but knowing that he wasn't Ventus, maybe he was hoping for too much. He crossed his arms. "I agree this warrants investigation. Although I do not think it necessary to repeat any of these actions for it."

"-Hey wait a minute," Emizel spoke up again with his usual shakiness, but there was also something more assertive about it. "You're not gonna punish him, are you?"

"He may be responsible for this, but he did it to help me," and as such, Emizel was in no way going to allow Roxas to get hurt.... Since that is normally what happens, right?

"You both made a mistake that could have harmed many other people and caused suffering and misery," Celestia said, not harshly but very serious indeed. "Let alone the two of your. It was a mistake born out of fear, and concern for a friend, so it was an understandable mistake, but it was still very dangerous."

"I'm not going to punish him," Eraqus replied, fighting the urge to completely roll his eyes. Roxas wasn't his student to discipline. And even with his apprentices, 'punishments' usually amounted to extra chores or homework. Eraqus wasn't raised on corporeal punishment, and he hadn't raised his students that way, either.

"But we do need to talk to him, so that this doesn't happen again."

Poor little demon was still a bit defensive about this. Worst case scenario, Emizel still did not want to loose a friend over this. While he thought he made a displeased noise, a mix between a low whine and a growl.

Until finally he just glanced away without saying anything. Whether or not it means he finally agreed to this remains a mystery.

"If nothing else, we really ought to go find him and make sure he's all right." Celestia glanced over her shoulder at where the Nightmares had been with a frown. "Do you know which way he went?"

That was correct enough. Eraqus glanced around, as if looking to see if any other Nightmares had been left around that they hadn't gotten, but the square seemed to be empty.

If they were going to go looking for Roxas, they may as well pick up here. Eraqus started retrieving some of the gathered dream pieces, leaving enough there for the others to grab if they wished.

Still, Emizel didn't want to say much. At least not for awhile.

"...I don't really know where he went, but I do think I know where he might be."

((Continuing here!))

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