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foreteller-ava · 2 years

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In My Dreams I Can Hear You Call On Me

AO3 | FFN

Summary: Reala calls NiGHTS to have a talk about their loyalties now that Wizeman is gone, and attempts something he never would've before.

A/N: I return to writing with a one shot for a fandom I am willing to bet 95% of my following has no idea about but like...NiGHTS is up there with SPM for being one of my first loves. And so here we are, I'm writing for it.

NiGHTS looked over the letter in his hand, triple checking that he had arrived in the location specified as he entered the warm forest of Helen's dreams. The location where he'd been captured and almost lost his new friend. He hadn't planned on going, he was almost certain it was a trap. It wasn't normal for any Nightmarens to want anything to do with him after his defecting unless it was to capture him, and so returning to this spot without Helen or Will beside him was dangerous enough that Owl would chew him out as soon as he got back.

It was also, however, the first time Reala had reached out to him since he'd defected from Wizeman in a way that wasn't simply throwing him in a cage. NiGHTS wasn't going to give up this chance, not when he'd missed his brother so dearly after so long.

Sure of the location, NiGHTS glided into the canopy covered clearing, landing hesitantly in the center and watching for any tricks or traps Reala might have employed.

"Well, I was starting to believe you weren't going to show." Reala's voice echoed around the clearing, setting NiGHTS on edge.

"Reala, show yourself!"

Reala simply laughed. "You really don't know how to have fun anymore, do you brother."

It was, of course, false. If anything, NiGHTS was the one who had learned what fun really was, but it was unlikely Reala would believe him on anything that went against Wizeman's decree. "You called me here for a reason, either talk, or capture me, but I'm not here to play games."

"And here I thought that was all you could do." It seemed Reala finally listened as he lowered himself down from the tree and into the clearing, his steps even and methodical, as though he believed just by showing up here he would win.

NiGHTS tensed, expecting an attack from Nightmarens, or for the cage to suddenly appear, but no attack came. He hesitantly approached Reala. "I'm surprised to see you after…" Even with no love between him and Wizeman, it was difficult for NiGHTS to speak of the death of the man who had created him.

"I was surprised to survive," Reala admitted, a rare moment of weakness from the proud Nightmaren. "I had assumed that your foolish stunt had doomed us all."

NiGHTS nodded. Even he had been surprised to have survived. "I hadn't expected to survive, I just knew Nightopia would be better for Visitors without him. It was a cause worth dying for."

Reala scoffed. "Why? What could Visitors possibly offer worth dying for."

"Everything!" NiGHTS couldn't stop himself from blurting out the answer, but now that it was said, it could only remain hanging in the air. "You wouldn't understand it. All you've ever done is hunt them."

"As I'm aware." Reala simply acknowledged his statement.

Not for the first time, NiGHTS wondered why he had bothered to show up to this meeting. It hadn't ended with him in a cage, but if Reala was going to be as unyielding as ever, then all it did was prove that there was no point to him showing up.

As NiGHTS was about to bring that up and leave without another word, Reala spoke up once more. "It's something I want to understand."

NiGHTS looked at Reala, unable to believe what he was hearing as all he could do was stare blankly. Reala, his brother, the one Nightmaren who was more loyal to Wizeman than anything, wanted to understand. "Understand what?"

"What made you want to help the visitors to the point that you would choose to betray your own kind for them."

NiGHTS didn't know how to understand. In all of his wildest fantasies, he could never have imagined a world where Reala had actually wanted to listen to him on what he had to say. "It's complicated."

"Until we leave this clearing, you have my undivided attention."

NiGHTS hesitated, unsure of how to answer to Reala's genuine curiosity after so many years of hostility between them. "Visitors have something that we don't have, something that we'll never have no matter how many times we take it." NiGHTS reached for his heart, resting his hand over it. "But it's something that we can still try to understand, to feel."

Reala crossed his arms, dismissive. "Are you telling me that you're doing this because of ideya?"

"When you dualize with a Visitor, for a moment, you can experience everything they feel." NiGHTS closed his eyes, imagining the red Ideya of Courage filling him with its light. "Once you do, you start to understand why everything Wizeman told us was wrong."

NiGHTS had hoped that Reala would listen, but instead his cautious expression had turned into a frown, and his eyes narrowed in disgust underneath that hateful Persona showing where his loyalty still lay. The dialogue had closed. "You would ask me to dualize with a visitor, to betray our master upon his return, for the sake of what?"

"Your master." NiGHTS had long stopped listening to or following anything Wizeman said. "And yes, I would, because you deserve freedom too. Wizeman lied to us about so much. The fact that we can even have this conversation right now is proof of that."

"It's time you stop following everything Wizeman says so blindly, and start thinking for yourself." NiGHTS turned away from Reala. "If you're ready to do that, you know where you can find me."

He didn't wait to hear Reala's reply. The conversation was over, and NiGHTS left without another word.

-x-

Reala had hoped that his conversation with NiGHTS would allow him to return to serving his master when he inevitably returned from death without question, but if anything it had left him with more questions than ever before.

"You deserve freedom too." It was difficult for Reala to imagine just what NiGHTS had meant. Freedom didn't matter, what mattered exclusively was stealing the ideya, something that had always been his purpose.

Except what if he could find a new one, just as NiGHTS had in guiding the visitors. NiGHTS himself had said that the reason he had been able to find freedom in the first place had come from dualizing. Was that all it took, to reach out to a visitor and understand? Was it this same confusion that Reala was feeling now what had driven NiGHTS to leave the Nightmaren ranks during his initial defection?

The sound of crying had pulled Reala from his thoughts as he wandered around the dark expanse of Nightmare. He had expected to see a wandering Nightopian by following the noise, but instead, he was surprised to find a young visitor, crying in the corner.

He looked at the visitor, the red glow leaking from her hand likely the only ideya that remained, and simply stared, unsure of what to do.

His first instinct had been to reach for the ideya, to do what he had been created for, but his conversation with NiGHTS was still fresh in his mind, and he simply hesitated, watching the visitor.

Perhaps it had been the fact that he hadn't been hostile, but the visitor looked up, stopping her crying to face Reala. "Are you here to help me?"

Unsure of the answer himself, he chose to sit down next to her. "What happened?"

She sniffled. "I was so scared. There's this new girl at school and I want to be her friend but she…" She buried her head in between her legs again. "She turned into a monster and I…"

He went to reach out, but hesitated. He was a Nightmaren. He wasn't supposed to feel empathy for the visitors who found their way into this realm.

Yet a part of him could only empathize. If nothing else, he understood what it was like to reach out to somebody in an attempt to connect, only to be shot down time and time again. "I understand…"

He wasn't used to this whole comfort thing, it had been ages since he'd sat and comforted NiGHTS after Wizeman had hurt them to provide it, still, he wanted to do it. "It wasn't real though."

The girl looked at him, her eyes wide. "H-Huh?"

"This place is called Nightmare. It's meant to scare human visitors away, so they lose their ideya. It was nothing but a dream."

The girl looked down. "Why are you here then?"

Reala wasn't sure how to answer. It was his home, of course, but if he told her that, then there was no doubt in his mind that she would just run away. She'd be safe, of course, she'd eventually find her way back to the Dream Gate where she'd meet with NiGHTS and safely reclaim her other four Ideya, but if that happened, then he'd never truly understand what NiGHTS meant.

He took off his Persona, looking it over and suddenly wondering if it would still have meaning after the night's events. "I'm a guardian. I look for visitors in Nightmare to take them to a safe place."

He reached out his hand to the girl. "If you'd like to get out of here, I'll take you to my brother, NiGHTS. He resides in the Dream Gate, and he's very good at getting visitors back their ideya so they can return home."

The girl looked at him, the fear still visible in both how small she made herself and how stiff her movements were. "How?"

"We'll dualize," Reala said. "It's a process that will allow us both to combine, and we'll be able to fly out of here. Only if you're willing, of course."

The girl hesitated, but her fear outweighed her distrust, and she closed her eyes before nodding, and reaching out to take Reala's hand.

And Reala understood.

#NiGHTS into Dreams #NiGHTS Journey of Dreams #NiGHTS #Reala

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uninocent · 4 months

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Falls apart

As the final echoes of SPM exam faded away, so did the tight bond that had held them together for more than five years. The group of friends, once inseparable, found themselves standing on the precipice of an uncertain future.

The first cracks appeared subtly, like fissures in a foundation that had long been taken for granted. Each member of the group, armed with dreams and ambitions, embarked on their individual journeys. The shared laughter and inside jokes that once defined their camaraderie now became distant memories.

Distance played its part, both physical and emotional. College acceptances scattered them across different cities, and the digital messages that used to flow effortlessly now felt forced and obligatory. The group chat, once a lively hub of banter, became a barren wasteland where messages lingered without response.

With newfound independence, each friend discovered facets of themselves that had long been hidden beneath the shadow of the group identity. As they pursued diverse interests and formed new connections, the once-tight-knit circle unraveled further. The unspoken understanding that had bound them together began to wane.

The annual reunions, once eagerly anticipated, became awkward affairs. Conversation felt stilted, and the laughter, though familiar, echoed with a hollow resonance. Unresolved tensions lingered beneath the surface, but no one dared to breach the fragile peace that remained.

The gradual erosion of their friendship left a void that none of them could fill. Nostalgia weighed heavy on their hearts as they reminisced about the days when the world seemed smaller, and their dreams felt intertwined. The realization that they had become strangers to one another, mere acquaintances with shared memories, hung in the air like a bitter aftertaste.

And so, the once unbreakable bonds of friendship fell apart, not with a dramatic rupture, but with a quiet and inevitable fading. The chapter of their lives that had been written together closed, leaving each friend to navigate the subsequent pages alone. The echoes of their shared past lingered in the background, haunting reminders of what once was but could never be again

by Jae sol

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stripestheboar · 7 years

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Harbinger

Alright, now that SPM is done and over, time to get onto my to-do list. I’ve decided to do this first, but tomorrow it will be back to requests.

So, I fell in absolute love with @melle-d‘s Mythtale, but by god, once I saw the Horrortale version of that AU, I went straight to writing. I was given permission to pretty much do whatever the hell I wanted with the AU version.

So, enjoy.

Genre: Psychological/Fantasy/Mythology

AU: Mythtale (Horror)

Word Count: 1,412

Summary: A seer of bad omens finds a starving god to seek out his purpose.

Sans sung himself a simple tune as he traveled unaccompanied through the dead valley, the crunching of the crisp plants the other only noise to ring through the silent environment. With a set destination, he was careful to look for any and all signs of a presence nearby. Well, a presence other than a god. Giant trenches carved onto the earth showed to all that the end was near. The sun was just about fully set behind the distant mountains, but still he pulled his hood over his skull further, trying to hide himself in his bundle of robes, the only thing he brought with him.

Finding this place wasn’t so hard for the small skeleton; all he really had to do was follow the terrified directions of villagers, the ginormous drag marks, and his own visions. Occasionally he would turn from the past to look into the blurred future, looking for a sign of anything, but he only received the same sights as always.

Born a seer, Sans had a gift of glimpsing into the future, though they were never clear to him. All he really knew was that these visions only brought about bad events. He would sometimes see flashes of orange light and heat days before a wildfire, or perhaps he would only see a splatter of red minutes before an attack on another monster. Some considered it a gift, though most thought he was a bad omen, meant to only bring about bad luck and tragedy. Sans himself had begun to believe it, wondering why he would be given the gift in the first place when he could barely see anything within them. Isolation became the norm for his life, and attempts on his life were soon a regular occurrence. When one of the attacks left a good chunk of his skull missing and the inability to see in one socket, he had completely resigned himself to defeat. However, his vision had only begun to strengthen, as he had begun to receive clearer images. Torn valleys, decimated villages, and scarred bones were just a few of them. He could tell right away that they were no omens or predictions of events, but instead a purpose; his purpose. It was the reason he was put on this world, and so he found himself obligated to follow it.

And so here he was now, not a single soul in his sights, his blurred glimpses of the future only coming more frequently. He was so close. He would find him soon.

And there he was. Crossing over a destroyed hill, Sans finally saw him: Papyrus. Once a god that defined the kindness and good-natured spirit of the world, he was now a completely emaciated skeleton, no longer with any legs or a bottom working jaw due to the effects of his starvation after not eating for centuries. His teeth were chipped and uneven and he lacked any eyes or sockets, and boy was he huge. About the size of a mountain and with an arm span totaling a few hills and valleys, he was more than a sight to be feared. Giant trenches in the earth trailed from his pelvis from where he had dragged himself with his large talons staking into the ground. He laid on the ground, limp and helpless. He looked so pitiful, and yet more than deadly. He was the epitome of entropy and death, and yet he was still so…

“Beautiful,” Sans whispered, a hand coming up to hook around the curve of his destroyed eye socket. He felt as though he was being shrouded in understanding for once in his lifetime, as his mind began to piece together vision and memories and foretelling glimpses that he could never explain. This was an answer to his question of purpose, he knew. A grin stretched across his skull, growing only wider as he moved from his place atop the hill and towards the god. For all he knew at this point, he could be heading for certain death right now, but it wasn’t like he had much to live for anyways. The visions had completely ceased at this point, allowing him to see the beast before him in all its glory.

The beast seemed to sense his presence nearby, as he turned his skull in the direction of the much larger skeleton. A hungry rumble emitted from within his ribcage. Or was it a whine of loneliness? He could not tell yet.

Sans felt no fear as he approached further, his hands fiddling with his robes to tighten them in some vain attempt to appear pleasing in the presence of the starving god. At any moment, Papyrus could just snatch him up and have the smaller monster provide him with the little sustenance he was worth. However, he did nothing of the sort, his skull laid flat against the earth as another pained moan echoes through his ribcage, which held his large soul that seemed to be losing its glow.

Sans was just before the god’s skull before he finally stopped, looking up at the blank, deformed, but still so white canvas that usually contained the sockets. The two monsters said nothing to one another, not that one of them could, and for a moment, Sans could only feel his excitement that beat within his soul. He slowly raised a hand, his robes falling down his radius and ulna and reached forward, his feet moving to step him forward and get him up close and personal with the beast before him. Papyrus did not move to stop him, instead letting the tiny skeleton get close enough to touch him.

There was hesitation at first. Logic kicked in at the last moment, stirring within Sans’ skull as his phalanges holding just centimeters away from the god’s skull. He stilled for a moment, contemplating his final choices, before finally laying his palm flat against the marred skull of the god.

In an instant, everything just became so clear to Sans. Visions he had experienced in the past were now crystal clear, with fire and destruction no longer blurred by the limitations of his talents. As for the future, it was just as comprehensible. Decimated villages and screams of agony rang in his mind as though they were playing out at that moment. He could feel the shadows fill his robes, listening to them begin to laugh, but not to mock or to poke fun, but instead to celebrate and rejoice. Shadows filled his skull through the hole that had removed his eye, filling his head with laughter and voices and thoughts and visions and purpose. He could hear a voice, his voice, speaking to him, the scratchy and hoarse sound of him soothing him like a lullaby to a child. He finally understood now, seeing the glimpses of destroyed villages and ruined lives, feeding the god and leading the world into entropy little by little. And the forefront of it was Sans, bringing the good news that Papyrus, the starving god, his god, would finally be fed through the world’s gradual demise. He would be his harbinger.

Sans slid a hand into the robes he wore, entering the laughing darkness past the sharpened ribcage to gently touch his whitened soul, glowing brightly at the contact with his god. It could feel the direct connection formed with Papyrus. It almost felt like home now. For the first time in his life, Sans felt as though he finally belonged somewhere, and that he could finally be happy. For once, the god and his harbinger no longer needed to be alone. Sans could feel his god’s hunger, his pain, and loneliness, while Papyrus tried his best to fix Sans’ own. With his voice and shadows, Sans knew they would stay connected, no matter how far they became.

The conversation was short. He only needed a little prodding to convince the larger monster to eat.

The smaller skeleton removed his hand from Papyrus, turning and walking away from the god and towards the nearest town. His skull full of visions of destruction and dismay and robes at the brim with laughing shadows, Sans finally knew his purpose. He walked away without a word, as there were no words that were needed to be said. He hummed a tune to himself, rejoicing over the times.

It was time to bring people the good news of the end. His god would finally be able to eat.

#Mythtale #Horrortale #Sans #Papyrus #ht!Sans #ht!Papyrus #Coonfics

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hsews · 6 years

Link

Rome (AFP) – Italy doubled down Friday on its new tough stance against migrants, insisting it could not take “one more” refugee and warned the migration crisis could put the bloc’s survival at stake.

Just two days before a mini summit on the issue in Brussels, Italy’s three-week-old populist government dug its heels in on campaign promises to stop the influx of migrants, threatening to seize rescue ships or barring them from its ports.

“We cannot take in one more person,” hardline Interior Minister Matteo Salvini told the German weekly Der Spiegel. “On the contrary: we want to send away a few.”

The far-right Salvini, who heads the anti-immigration League party and is also Italy’s deputy prime minister, has come to personify Rome’s new confrontational and unbending stance.

It was he who barred the French NGO-run Aquarius rescue ship, carrying some 630 migrants, from docking in Italy earlier this month, triggering an EU-wide row.

On Thursday, he turned his sights to the German NGO, Mission Lifeline.

“The illegal boat Lifeline is now in Maltese waters with its cargo of 239 migrants. For the safety of its crew and the passengers, we’ve asked Malta to open its ports,” Salvini wrote on Twitter.

“Clearly, the boat should immediately be impounded and its crew arrested,” he added.

But a source close to the Maltese government quoted by the Times of Malta newspaper said later Friday that Malta was “neither the coordinating authority nor one competent to carry out rescues”.

Salvini reacted strongly, saying: “If even one person was to get hurt on board this boat… we will hold Malta accountable.”

He also reiterated that the boat would not be allowed to dock in an Italian port.

– Europe’s future ‘will be decided’ –

Just two days before the informal talks on the migration issue — called by Berlin and being attended by some 16 EU leaders — Salvini warned that nothing less than the EU’s future survival was at stake.

“Within a year it will be decided whether there will still be a united Europe or not,” Salvini told Der Spiegel.

Upcoming EU budget talks, as well as European Parliament elections in 2019, would each act as a litmus test for “whether the whole thing has become meaningless”, he said.

Sunday’s talks are supposed to prepare for a full summit next week, where all 28 EU leaders will discuss plans to overhaul the bloc’s asylum system, which has been under severe pressure since the migration crisis exploded in 2015.

Nevertheless, German Chancellor Angela Merkel — who is facing a ferocious political backlash for letting in well over a million asylum seekers into Europe’s biggest economy — played down expectations that a solution could be found quickly.

Speaking on a visit to Lebanon, Merkel said that “we know that no solution will be reached on Thursday and Friday at the level of the 28 member states… on the overall issue of migration”.

Instead, she said, “bilateral, trilateral and multilateral” deals must be reached to tackle the issue.

But Salvini’s uncompromising line found an echo Friday when Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said he was also ready to start turning away migrants if Berlin and Vienna did so, as Germany’s interior minister proposed earlier this week.

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer warned on Monday that he would give Merkel a fortnight to find a European deal to curb new arrivals by the June 28-29 EU summit, failing which he vowed to order border police to turn back migrants.

– ‘Never touch Italian soil again’ –

“Italian ports are no longer at the disposal of traffickers. Open the Maltese ports! Open the French ports,” Salvini said earlier on Friday.

And in a Facebook post on Thursday he vowed that “foreign NGO boats will never touch Italian soil again.”

Rome had briefly weighed boycotting Sunday’s mini-summit, but finally agreed to attend after reassurances from Merkel.

Italy had been riled because a leaked draft statement focused more on the redistribution of the migrants once they had arrived in Europe, rather than on securing Europe’s borders.

But the government was placated after Merkel told them the text had been shelved.

Nevertheless, tensions continue to simmer very close to the surface, and tempers can flare up very quickly.

On Friday, Italy took offence when French President Emmanuel Macron likened rising nationalism and anti-migrant sentiment in Europe to “leprosy”.

“One day, he’s saying that he doesn’t want to offend Italy, and then the next, he’s talking about leprosy,” said Italy’s other deputy prime minister and head of the populist M5S party, Luigi Di Maio.

“We may be leper populists. But I take the lessons from those who open their own ports. Welcome thousands of migrants and then we can talk,” said Salvini.

ob-burs/spm/har

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