Nightmare And The Babybone Sanses

You're gonna have a bedtime

Getting these boys settled in and teaching them to obey him was proving to be more difficult than Nightmare anticipated. It's like these skeletons have never had a proper authority figure in their lives, so anytime he tries to reprimand them, they just give him a lazy smirk or a scowl. In only the first day, he's already learned that they don't just use one method of causing problems. Each one of them had their own unique way of driving him insane.

The one with a large hole in his skull, Horror, has an insatiable appetite. It seems that he will try to devour anything that even remotely looks edible. Anytime Nightmare summons his tentacles, the little brat immediately pounces on them and tries to chew through them. The skeletons tiny jaws couldn't even hope to do any damage to the boneless appendages, but that doesn't make it any less annoying to have something constantly chewing on them. He'll have to find something for small skeleton to teeth on – maybe a dog's chew toy. It's also surprising how this babybone is able to function properly with such a massive injury to his cranium. Perhaps he's a lot tougher than he looks.

The skeleton that always has the hood of his jacket up with red and blue eye lights, Dust, seems to have an almost uncontrollable urge to attack things. He seems very lazy and uninterested in anything at first glance, but as soon as Nightmare turns his back on him, he's shooting needle like bone attacks at whatever is closest to him, whether it be alive or not. In only a day, the chair cushions and walls have been littered with many tiny holes from his onslaught. He will need an attack dummy of sorts to keep him occupied and prevent further damages for the older skeleton to repair.

Then there's the one without eye lights and black streaks running down his cheeks, Killer. His soul is constantly exposed and vulnerable; although, it could be seen as more of a challenge than a vulnerability. It was also misshaped from what a normal monster soul would look like, and it glows red with determination like a human's. This skeleton seems to have an obsession with knives, particularly stabbing things with them. Nightmare has caught him on several occasions already, trying to climb on the counter and steal one of the kitchen knives from it's holder. Maybe he can just give him a plastic knife to at least sate his need to hold something sharp. Nightmare doesn't need another skeleton putting holes in the furniture.

Finally, there's the black and white clad skeleton with a red scar on his cheek, Cross, was the more vocal one out off all of them, and he has no problem with voicing what he thinks of the larger dark skeleton. He always has a glare on his face, and it's always pointed to said dark skeleton. He doesn't seem as volant as the others, but that doesn't stop Nightmare from being able to sense his malicious intent. Cross always watches with a calculated glare anytime he looks at him, as if he's planning out a way to strike. There's no doubt that this one is a natural born strategist, and it's no question why the others seem to follow his lead, asserting him as their leader.

Nightmare has already figured that if he could gain the loyalty of Cross, then the rest will follow him, but that won't be easy. The little black and white skeleton has already proven to be quite stubborn and doesn't trust the larger evil skeleton. It will be a difficult feat to get this one to corporate. But that's something that Nightmare will have to think about another day, because right now, he's exhausted. The sun has only just set, and he's already aching for his bed.

"Alright brats. Bedtime," he said with a sigh.

Wrapping the boys in his tentacles, he didn't wait for an answer so that they wouldn't have the chance to run off.

"We're not even tired yet," Cross argued while struggling to get out of the dark appendage's grip.

"Yeah? Well I'm tired, so we're ALL going to bed."

The small skeleton let out a huff, realizing that struggling was pointless – he was no match for Nightmare's strength. The older skeleton carried the boys into a hallway and set them down. With the same tentacles that he used to carry them, he opened four bedroom doors at the same time.

"Pick a room and go sleep, and if you don't, then I'll strap you all down to your beds."

"Like in a crazy hospital?" Killer perked up and asked at this, seeming truly interested in talking about mental hospital practices.

"...yeah sure, like a crazy hospital. Now enough talking and go to sleep." With that, the dark skeleton turned and walked down the hallway to the master bedroom. He didn't bother looking back to make sure they did as they were told and just hoped that he instilled enough fear in them to make them go to bed. As soon as Nightmare was in his room with the door closed behind him, he flopped onto the king-sized bed with a heavy sigh of exhaustion. He knew that taking care of children was hard but looking after little heathen for children seemed much harder. Curling himself under the blankets, he already started dozing off to sleep. Maybe tomorrow would be easier.

Nightmare slowly stirred awake from the sound of a door opening and rustling in the room. He let out a tired hum, as he groggily sat up and looked to see what the noise was about. He froze when he saw small lights staring back at him at the end of the bed. He slowly reached over to the lamp and clicked the light on revealing four tiny skeletons peaking over the foot of them bed. As soon as the light was on, they pounced on him. Nightmare had to restrain him self from lashing out at them with his tentacles and risk doing major damage to them. They couldn't do any real damage to him – there was only one thing that could and these boys didn't have it.

"What the hell! What are you brats doing!?" Despite how enraged the evil skeleton was, the boys didn't seem phased by it and snuggled close to him, or three of them did anyway. The fourth, Cross, just sat next to him on the bed, keeping his distance while also being close enough to the others. The small skeleton crossed his arms with a glare.

"We don't like sleeping alone," Cross answered angrily.

"Then why don't you just sleep with each other?" Nightmare glared right back to the black and white clad babybone.

"None of the beds are big enough for all of us to fit in comfortable, and you have the biggest bed." Nightmare and Cross now seemed to be having a glaring contest, but they were interrupted by Dust.

"Come on, it's not like we're going to do anything, and besides, bad things could happen if we sleep by ourselves...," Dust had a lazy grin on his face as he spoke, but at his last words, all of their expressions seemed to drop. For the first time since they've been here, they actually looked nervous. The fear of the unknown was a powerful one indeed.

Nightmare was tempted to make them sleep alone just because it actually seemed to scare them, but with a sigh, he decided against it. They were not the ones that he wanted to cause negative emotions with, and only four babybones wouldn't even be as much as a crumb to sate his need for negativity. Looking at all of them for a moment, he relented.

"... fine, but only for tonight. I'll figure something out for this tomorrow." Flopping back down on the bed, Nightmare rubbed at one of his temples in frustration as the boys cuddled in. He had a feeling he wasn't going to get much sleep tonight.