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Ideas are dangerous things.
It was a perfect, sunny day in June, and Wilford wanted to go to the beach. Of course, Dark figured, rolling his eyes, it was Wilford. “It doesn’t matter to me where you go,” he’d scoffed, folding his hands behind his back. “Just leave me out of it.”
“Got ya, Darkipoo,” Wilford said, winking. “You won’t hear a peep from us.”
He’d vanished in a puff of pink glitter, and Dark sighed, stretching his neck. At least, he’d thought, the others would be out of his hair for a while.
Wilford gathered Bim, the Doctor, and the Googles in the living room. He’d knocked on the Host’s door, of course, but there was no response from within.
Wearing a bathing suit-- long and striped and positively repulsive, Bim thought-- Wilford called them all to order.
“Excuse me!” he yelled, over the top of the Doctor’s insistence that they all wear sunscreen, the Googles protesting that they couldn’t be sunburned. “Excuse-- ATTENTION PLEASE!”
“LISTEN TO WILL!” Bim shouted over the rest of them, and the room fell silent. Bim cleared his throat, blushing a little. “Uh, please!”
“Right,” Wilford huffed, straightening his hat. He looked like someone’s crazy uncle, sunscreen smeared on his nose, a beach ball under his arm. “I’m poofing us there two at a time, so buddy up, kids!” Wilford grinned, tossing a bag filled with towels, guns, and sandcastle-building equipment over his shoulder.
Bim and Dr. Iplier reached for each other, the only human Egos in the room, both in swim shorts and button-down shirts. Google_R and _G caught each others eye, and Google_B sighed as Oliver took his hand: all four of them in color-coded wet suits.
In pairs, Wilford took each of them to the beach. They appeared out of thin air, a deserted stretch of sand, and even the Googles looked around, impressed.
The moment the seven of them stood on the hot sand, the breeze picturesque in their hair, Bim scooped up a bucket and sprinted for the water’s edge. Laughing, Google_G, then Oliver, followed. Google_B held up the umbrella as Google_R began to lay out towels, and Wilford and the Doctor sat back for a moment, staring into the waves. It was almost peaceful-- well, as peaceful as could be, considering that their party consisted of a serial killer, four murderous androids, and Bim.
And the sun was hot and bright overhead, but the water was cold and there was already laughter in the air, and everything was okay.
The Host, Dark found, wasn’t in the office at all. No doubt, he’d disappeared to a cabin in the woods that routinely flickered in and out of existence. It wasn’t anything new, but it did mean, for once, that Dark was alone.
He rooted through the Host’s room for a few minutes more: it was rare that he had the opportunity to go through their rooms, these days.
It had been so long since he’d checked all the usual hiding places, looking for the markers of a threat. For the first time, it almost felt like an invasion of privacy. Dark told himself that the other Egos didn’t have privacy, but for the first time, Dark could feel eyes on his back as he went through his neighbors’ secrets.
That was all they were, he told himself. Neighbors, co-habitants. Living with them was a necessary evil.
And even so, it seemed as if there was a cloud hanging over his head (in addition to his own).
Dark turned to leave the Host’s room, taking stock of everything that had changed since the last time he’d been in here. The Host’s books, half braille, half text, were piled against a wall, out of the way, the stacks almost bitter. By the light of a candle, the Host’s broadcasting station. Screens dark. Microphone, a headset, a script lying abandoned on his desk.
Ideas are powerful things.
Mark had tried to help the Host become more established with the audio work he did, the radio show he tried to keep going. The fans never lost the idea of the Author, though, and Dark supposed that he hadn’t, either.
They were all figments, after all, ideas made solid. While a handful of people still remembered the Author, the Host would never be free of what he used to be. He would always be haunted by something else, the ghost of a figment long since past.
Dark shook his head, chuckling, a little sadly, to himself. It was a shame, really. The Author had had so much potential. Wasted, in the end, in the Host.
Dark stepped over a few piles of books, papers cast aside in anger. Old transmission equipment, monitors, wires. They rustled under his feet, and he kept his aura close. Confident and controlling as Dark was, the Host’s room was unfriendly, at best, and caution was paramount.
A rustling, behind him, and Dark whipped around.
His aura turned with him, almost flinching at the sound. It whirled, a cape around his shoulders, snuffing out the lone candle.
Dark froze, a chill going down his spine. He shouldn’t be terrified of his namesake, but here he stood, looking into the moving shadows, perfectly alone.
Perhaps he was wrong, and the Author was still here. “Hello?” It was a sneer, mocking the darkness, even as his eyes flicked from outline to outline.
A moment passed, and Dark stiffened his shoulders. Nothing was in the depths of the room, after all, and if it was, it wasn’t about to face him. A scoff, but despite himself, Dark kept looking.
He thought he saw it, whatever it was-- the outline of a man, something less than a man, leaning heavily against one of the bookshelves. He stared, for a moment more, glaring into nothingness.
It seemed to take more effort than it should have, but Dark tore himself away, nearly stumbling on the messy floor. His lips lifted, baring his teeth in a sneer. He was the scariest thing in this room, in this office, and he damn well knew it.
He was the only thing in this room, in this office. Dark left, shutting the door behind him. Not a thing in the room disturbed, everything as he’d left it. He was alone.
Dark took a breath, even though he didn’t need to. It’s always the steadying of nerves, the resettling of his aura on his shoulders. The body he puppets no longer needs a heartbeat, lungs, even to blink. It’s a matter of keeping up appearances, more than anything.
He paused, gathering the sudden uneasiness in his stomach. He breathed, he pulled his spine back into place, and he blinked.
Unsure, counting to three, Dark blinked again.
Whatever heartbeat he’d used to have was pounding in his chest, and he looked left, then right, blinking again.
On his retinas, an afterimage.
A red man, floating in the hallway besides him, floating behind his eyelids.
And suddenly, for the first time in a long time, Dark wished that he weren’t alone.