The Sixth Paladin

Chapter Five

You woke up, expecting to be dragged out of your cell for another fight. Instead, you sat up tangled in the covers of a bottom bunk. You looked around in confusion, then you remembered. You were rescued. You escaped. You saw...

"(Y/N)?" Keith said, groggily.

"Hey, man."

You heard footsteps. You looked over to see him climbing down the little ladder.

"You ok? You were talking in your sleep a little. Did you have the nightmare again?" he asked, concerned. You knew what he was referring to.

You'd never told him what happened, now you were, but he knew you had a terrible nightmare every night, the same thing.

"Hey, Keith?"

"Yeah?" he sat down next to you in the bed.

"I-I never told you what the nightmare was about."

"You don't have t-" he had a worried look on his face.

"I will, whether you want me to, or not. I'm warning you, it's a little disturbing."

He nodded and you put your head on his shoulder.

When you were a little younger, almost 13, you were trying to crack the code to a laptop with one of your friends. His twin sister had ditched him because "It was for love.". Basically, she had the hots for a puppeteer and wanted to impress him by doing a sock puppet rock opera with lights, original music, and pyrotechnics by that Friday. Not very hard to tell she was completely nuts. Anyways, you and your friend were going through 8-letter words in a cryptology book, when the computer beeped. It gave the warning: "Too many failed entries. Initiate data erase in Five minutes."

The two of you were gonna lose everything. Then, an annoying dream demon named Bill came and told you two to make a deal. One of Mabel's sock puppets for the password to the computer. You and your friend were stunned by his demands. Just a puppet, cause, I mean, "Everyone loves puppets!".

You were warning Dipper not to take the deal, but Bill gave him a point that you had never wanted to hear.

"What has your sister done for you lately? How many times have you sacrificed for her, and how many times has she returned the favor?"

You felt hot tears spring to your eyes at this, and your friend shook hands with him. He asked Bill what puppet he wanted.   "Let's see. Eenie, meenie, miney, YOU." Bill pulled back on Dipper's hand and disappeared, slamming your friend into the window-seat. You ran to see if he was okay, but came to a shock when he opened his eyes and grinned.

They were golden yellow, with slitted pupils. It was Bill.

Later that evening, you were convinced to work backstage at the show. Suddenly, during the wedding scene, Mabel and Bipper (as she so called him) crashed down onto the stage from the rafters, fighting over Dipper's journal. The Journal was a book filled with spells, creatures, and magical items. And how to defeat Bill. They were gonna hurt each other, so you threw your headset behind you and dashed towards the scene. You ripped Bipper off of Mabel and she tossed the book to you. He turned around and tackled you, pinning you to the floor.

He held your left wrist against the floor, he crushed the right one, making you almost drop the Journal. He let go and his hands immediately went to your neck, closing around it. His grip tightened. He was choking you. You were gonna die. You weakly threw the Journal behind Bipper to Mabel, who was screaming at him to let you go. You clawed at his hands, attempting to loosen his grip. He didn't even care that you didn't have the book. He just wanted to kill you. He just wanted to make you never see the light of day again. Everything went black. The last thing you saw was the no-longer-innocent smile on your "friend's" face. Bill was going to murder you, in Dipper's body, so that was the last thing you saw.

You had finished your story and looked at Keith. He was shocked, then, something happened. No words were said, he just wrapped his arms around you and held you close.

"You can't keep things like this from me. I never knew-"

"It's ok, Keith. I'm fine now."

"I'm so sorry. No one's ever gonna hurt you, not again. We need you here- I need you. You mean too much...I can't lose you again." he said softly in your ear, hands running through your hair.

You nuzzled your face into his chest and fell asleep quickly.You realized that you hadn't missed home.

You had missed your friend.