Negative Love (A Marenight Story)

Sixteen

So, the greatest thing literally just happened to me.

My sister was grating cheese, and I told her to put it away, because if it's out too long it goes bad.

She responds with "No, if you're out too long then you'll go bad!"

I'm just laughing because I've already come out of the closet. This is literally just homophobia in a nutshell. "Gays are more likely to commit crimes the longer they're out of the closet!"

And then she doesn't understand and looks at me with a confused face, and I just laugh harder because it is the greatest thing that has ever happened to me.

--------------------------

Nightmare left his office a few hours later, and was feeling slightly better. After a slight existential crisis and a couple of coping mechanisms, he was pretty sure he could handle whatever was going to happen.

Pretty sure.

He ignored Horror and Killer- who were basically the same person anyway- and did not slap them both for being idiots and actually brainstorming ideas for ship names.

Nightmare was pretty pleased with his own self-restraint.

Cross and Error weren't the types to obviously call any attention to the quote-on-quote "secret", but Nightmare could tell they were both internally dying of laughter.

Dust... Dust was just his normal emotionless self. He didn't care about anything but getting EXP. He would care if it had something to do with him. Other than that, he just stared off into space, unseeing and unsmiling.

Nightmare wouldn't ever actually admit it, but Dust's emotionlessness kind of scared him. Even Cross, who wasn't completely sane, had emotions. The only type of person with no feelings whatsoever was one who had given himself up utterly and completely to insanity.

But Dust was useful, and was rarely ever a problem. So Nightmare let him stay. So long as nothing bad happened, he was fine.

Horror grinned at Nightmare. "So... when's the wedding?"

"When's the what?" Nightmare asked.

Killer, Cross, and Error all smiled. Dust just stared out the window impassively.

Jeez... I can't deal with this right now, Nightmare thought. "Nope. Whatever all of you are thinking, don't. Just. Don't."

"You're no fun!" Horror cried. 

"D0 y0u th!^k y0u (0u|d $t0p u$ !f y0u tr!ed?" Error asked at the same time.

Unwisely.

Nightmare was across the room in an eyeblink, pulling the glitching skeleton to his feet by his scarf. Error didn't glitch out- the adrenaline was making sure of that. His eye flaring, Nightmare forced Error to meet his gaze.

Normally, Nightmare wouldn't attack his team. But occasionally- today, for instance- a number of factors demanded it. One, Nightmare was mentally strung out by Night's sickness and refusal to stay still. Two, his word wasn't supposed to be questioned. If they forgot it, he had to remind them who exactly they worked for.

And three, everyone here was a freaking idiot and Nightmare really, really wanted to bash some heads together so they learned basic common sense.

"Oh yes," Nightmare said quietly, but no less dangerously for all that. "I think I can."

Error held up his hands. "@|| r!ght! 0k@y, f!^e. Ju$t... |et mE g0? Bef0re ! (r@$h?"

For a moment, Nightmare was tempted to let Error crash. Then his natural instinct to protect his childr- team prevailed, and he let Error go.

Error kind of just collapsed back into his chair, burying his face in his scarf. Nightmare felt slightly guilty for touching him, but then the feeling disappeared. Take me for a fool again, he thought, I dare you.

"Anyone else have any utterly stupid comments to share?" He growled to the rest of them.

The other three would-be shippers all shook their heads quickly. Dust, who had looked at least mildly interested by the fast-moving almost-violence, returned to staring out the window without a word.

"Good. Dust, go lead a raid on whatever AU you guys feel like," Nightmare said, intentionally changing the subject. "If the Star Idiots get there, retreat. I don't feel like having another Outertale incident."

"Th@t w@$^'t mY f@u|t," Error muttered, his glitched voice almost impossible to understand while his voice was muffled by his scarf.

"I'm not saying it was. I just don't want it happening again." Nightmare looked at Dust, who had stood up. "Get going. All of you."

As his Gang started arguing over which AU they should visit, Nightmare turned on his heel and walked out into the hall, a small smile touching the corners of his mouth. 

They were all good kids at heart.