TaP Campaign - Detrimental Nightmare

The sun was setting and the group was settling into their chosen areas. The opossum watched and judged the group on where they chose to sleep, how quickly they drifted off into slumber, and what position they slept in, but that was just theorizing, it really was their thoughts that betrayed them and who they were as people. Not that it mattered, anyway. They were a day’s journey from Adversity and soon there would be none of them left to tell a story.

Restart slowly climbed into one of the vacant trees in his city. Once he was at a satisfying height to see the entirety of Aureate City, he pinpointed and sharpened his sight to focus on the windows in Audio’s home. He never could do that thing Signal could where he could sense people’s presence through the pressure of their paws against the trees, earth, or water, and not being able to get inside her head made it difficult to see if she was even there. Her curse was so much stronger than Restart could have ever wanted, but he supposed that was the power of Satisfaction’s artifact.

Finally, he saw the little white tip of her tail shoot up through the window at one of the higher floors in her treehome and he could settle down in peace. Video’s presence…was not exactly known. The ambitious courier/slayer was too busy thinking about Film from the things she was finding out, but the group could stay blissfully unaware of that, and frankly out of sight and out of mind was likely best for Restart, too. The travelers just needed to focus on getting torn apart by Adversity so he could have their corpses and auras. If one of them could get their paws on that staff…Restart would be set. The opossum tapped his fingertips together before snuggling up against the tree and drifting off to sleep.

Externally, he couldn’t harm anyone, but Video had the intent of physically when she said that, spiritually, mentally, the mage could invade their dreams and make them suffer that way.

That was something he was deeply looking forward to.

Except…the one he wanted to kill the most was difficult to reach. Restart’s aura tried so hard to push up against Adgie’s own, but the small gray feline’s aura was impossible to seep into or strike. Restart tried to fight it, but the tom’s orange aura was absolutely impenetrable. The frustration was overwhelming. He growled and slammed his “hands” against the cat’s aura, but nothing would budge, if anything, it was like the more he fought against it, the stronger the feline’s innerself became, like he was fueled by the mage’s anger.

That little pest! He enjoys making me angry, getting under my skin! I will let Advi have a field day with him… I’ll even point him out!

He snarled and drifted back to his body, smoldering with fury at the cat’s willpower. How it reminded him of Video…even the same color and taste of the aura…but alas, there were others to have fun with! He couldn’t let himself get caught up on the gray cat and see Video in him, he’d get obsessed again, and that frankly wasn’t healthy. He needed to focus on the rest of the travel group. Who was…weak? Restart’s aura slunk through the shadows and began feeling for the strength of others he could invade the minds of. They didn’t know he was the Shadow Advisor, so the “beast” known as Paradox could rip them apart as much as he wanted to in their dreams. Gif, Connection, Walkman, Trophy…Oven…no, not Oven, that was a good being that could feed him, quite literally and aurally.

Gif, Trophy, Emoticon, Connection…those were the weakest, but Trophy and Connection were the ones who really were low-strength, enough for Restart to be able to seep in through the shadows, if not with his own aura. His arcana was weak, but the darkness beckoned to him per usual. He was a conduit of Death now, and he had to embrace this fate until his magic of Life returned to him naturally.

He slid up by Connection through the shadows first, because he truly wasn’t angry at the tom, but he could recognize one of Ampersand’s bloodline anywhere. Oven was also a victim of the lineage, but she was focusing on the right things. Connection however, had Restart’s type of magic, and was trained in it. The ability to control life and vines and shapeshift, absolutely delectable. The sorcerer was going to pass aside Oven’s cyan aura and instead focus on Connection’s lime green, he needed it, it was his favorite color after all, and tasted utterly fantastic.

The mage slid into Connection’s conscience and watched him dream of growing plants in a field, creating things with his vines the way he did for that sling Restart used to get the Guardians back up to the surface. He growled, taking the form of the giant, fluffy, gray-patched tabby he became when he was with Consolidation, the form when Video kept calling him “Paradox.” Once there were no marks left of the opossum form left on the new form, he slunk out from the shadows, feeling the extra fur between his paws and drifting off his legs and tail brush against the soft grass and plant life. He could destroy and stomp on that here too in his dreams, and he savored it. He hated the language of plants, it seldom worked in his favor to listen to their gossip, but he needed to get back on task, he needed to destroy Connection.

He let the shadows crawl under the green mage before he pounced on the speckled brown tabby, taking him by surprise with his silent approach.

“Wha—wh-the-the shadow–” Connection stammered before Paradox drove his jaws into the other cat’s throat, squeezing tight so he didn’t have to hear the physical protest.

The sorcerer could silence his mewls of protest, but Connection’s thoughts flooded his mind. No! The shadow advisor is back!? Encourage will be in danger! I need to warn Walkman…Emoticon, my friends!

Please, don’t think of others right now, worry about yourself, don’t panic…they’ll live another day. Just think about the suffering you’re enduring personally, I beg of you, Paradox assured the tomcat as he began to drive his fangs down into the feline’s neck, feeling the warm blood gush into his mouth and fill his senses with the flavor. He missed the sound and force of tearing apart meat with his own jaws. There’s few people he can ask to just deliver a killing bite of a prey animal, much less another individual they see as sentient, so he could tear apart the body once the aura was released. He got a good grip on Connection’s neck muscles and ripped down, pulling apart the cat like he was prey and whipping his head to the side so the dark feline’s blood would rush out of his body, taking in his aura as the shadows lapped and seeped up the blood that was underneath the unfortunate feline. Connection tried to bring vines over to stop Paradox or to pull him away from the mage with his last, dying breaths, but the black pool beneath him kept him from escaping, and the larger feline was able to feast in peace.

He ignored the cries and struggles of Connection, it became easy once his thoughts and words became incoherent from the pain, and finally he reached his fill and backed away to let the feline slowly sink into the puddle that the mage set beneath him, watching the last bit of life pleadingly gazed at him, begging for help before he was absorbed into the darkness, losing health from the shadows he was unaware he was sleeping in. There was slight curiosity as to what the tom was thinking as his final thoughts before he sank into the darkness of a deep sleep, but he had already tuned Connection out. There’s more thoughts to listen to, more fun to be had, and there was still Trophy…

The Trophy Star… Paradox took in a breath in anticipation of devouring the noble, feasting on the Source Seer’s teal aura was going to be so delightful.

“Why don’t we see what’s underneath that hat of yours…” Paradox licked his chops, finding the noble and looming over him. He went to take a bit of the aura, but an even weaker aura caught his attention. It was his old apprentice, Pride…?

No…what got you so soft, friend?

Paradox walked away from Trophy, leaving the old man to sleep and snore soundly as he slunk through the darkness to find the orange feline instead. He wanted to torment the noble tom so badly, but Pride was an obligation he had been putting off for a long time. He entered his dream to see fire everywhere in Calotype’s Forest spreading into the Unending Labyrinth, where Signal killed him for a second time. It shook him to his core and made him shudder and try to escape, but there was no use, his aura was trapped inside Pride’s dream…he must have been pulled in by Pride’s aura, which means Pride’s thinking of him.

He looked over to see Pride was trying to save his younger brother, Pictures, in the fire, yelling in his thoughts about how he could have been the one in the fire, the one to die instead. The mage was shocked to hear such thoughts. He watched as Pride went to attack Signal who was responsible for the dreams in his mind and gasped as suddenly he was the one being pinned.

Pride seemed shocked at first, but then his brow furrowed in anger, “It’s all your fault!” the young tom snarled at him.

Paradox panicked when Pride went to slam his paw into him and quickly sank and dissipated into the shadows and reappeared a small distance away, trying to catch his breath as Pride broke down, heaving and sobbing with heavy emotion.

Oh, what have I done…? The dread flooded through Paradox, hearing Pride more quietly say, “It’s all your fault,” again.

“I’m sorry…” Paradox mouthed, but no words came out.

“If you had just told me and let me help, I could’ve saved him. Maybe it could’ve been me instead of him!” Pride choked out, “He still had so much life left to live.”

The mage watched in horror as his apprentice curled into a ball to hold his tail comfortably the way he did as a kitten. He was so vulnerable…this was so much worse than he ever imagined. He heard Pride’s thoughts in the back of his head after he “died,” but he was too focused on his own grief to ever seek out the impressionable cat and assure him he was okay, because in his mind, he hadn’t been okay, he hadn’t been the same since the first fire set by Signal. Obviously, however, neither had Pride.

Paradox walked over to him, his paws extending into furred hands as he lifted up one and rested it on Pride’s shoulder, trying to come up with the words to say, anything to say more than just, “I’m sorry.”

Just as the phrase was about to escape his mouth, Pride shot away from him and cried out, “Leave me alone!” and exploded with fire from his chest and mouth and eyes and paw pads, setting everything ablaze in sight, and lighting Paradox alight as well. Defensively, he shot out his hand and struck Pride, grateful the tom was waking up already and wouldn’t notice the pain of damage striking against his frame, but Paradox felt the orange aura flood into him to strengthen him before he was consumed by the fire.

Restart woke up, shaking and gasping for breath. He messed up so badly. He had to make it up to Pride somehow, but if he told Pride who he was, it could all go wrong. He could out him and then he’d be back at square one, Consolidation could be put in danger, Antipathy could turn on the group, and everything could be for nothing. He had to stick through it, maybe just pull Pride out of the fray when the time came for Adversity to kill them all, but that was all he could do…what a mess. I guess I have more work cut out for me than I initially thought.

Restart sighed and curled up in the tree, deciding to wait until the group was up before he did anything stupid. He just needed to focus on the task for now, his days of meddling were put behind him. Pride would just have to suffer for a bit longer.