Burning Pile

All Lit Up and I Start to Smile

Error stood in front of the bandaged forms of his friends. JR had once again attacked one of their bases and sent it caving in on itself. It was only luck that they all managed to make it out. It was a couple hours after the event and an argument had broken about between the three of them.

"We can't keep doing this! All of this running and hiding without fighting back in any meaningful way is just not working!"

"But what else can we do?! We are three people against the whole fucking multiverse!"

"If we attack anyone it will just prove Dream right about negativity, and all of this would have been for nothing. We can't do that!"

The argument continued on, devolving into meaningless yelling before Error had snapped and started to storm out. "The Hell are you going?!" Cross called after him. "To find a fucking way to not get us all killed!"

That had been ten minutes ago, and now Error was wandering through the woods of a random au.

Error kicked the stick in front of him, sending it flying into the underbrush. He grumbled under his breath as he trudged through the mud, burning off residual anger. The scrapes and cuts that he never got around to wrapping stung in the cold fall air, which helped give him something to focus on.

"Deities above, what are we gonna do..." He muttered. "There's just the three of us. Cross, with some minor weapon magic. Nightmare, the physical embodiment of negativity, but refuses to step up and actually do anything major for fear of 'proving that all negativity is bad and needs to be eradicated. And me...mine's too destructive"

He continued his walk, breathing out his frustration only for it to be replaced with a tired numbness. The daunting task of what was to come seemed impossible to get through.

Settling down on a only slightly damp rock, he looked up through the canopy at the twinkling stars. Each universe had their own constellations and arrangement of stars. He would love to study them all. Too bad he probably won't live to be able to get to.

A shaky breath escaped his mouth and he dragged his hands down his face before rubbing his temples.

Suddenly the surroundings faded to black, replaced with a blank void of dark emptiness.Whispers seemed to fill the space, conversations and echoes swelling around him in a disjointed harmony. Error jolted at the shock before turning around with a sigh. The floating prismatic array of eyes stared at him. "Hello voices. It's been quite a while."

The glimmering scarlet of one of the eyes flared. A voice, louder than the background cacophony, rang out in a hissing tone. "Little Glitch, why don't you use what we taught you so long ago?"

A shiver ran down his spine. "What..?" He croaked, voice shaking.

A green eye moved closer, squinting a little. "You remember, right? Where to knock out support beams. Where the best times to sneak around unnoticed are. How to send a message. How to send a whole building crumbling to the ground."

"I-I swore not to use my magic-"

"Then don't." A tendril of sickly magic wrapped around his arm. "Just a few well placed explosives and you'll be able to broadcast a message to the entire multiverse telling them to not screw with you." Chuckling came from his left. "After all, isn't that what you want? For them to stop hurting you and your....friends?"

"Y-yes but...how would I even get the firepower? Also the amount of people -innocent people- caught in the crossfire would be catastrophic..."

"That will not be an issue. Trust us, Little One, this will give you a great advantage."