COMM: shifted_prompts - binary system
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 1471




A delicate balance had been struck between all of them: it wasn't something that ever needed saying or elaborating on when in the company of each other, but it was there. It bound them together with invisible chains, the kind that couldn't be cut through or even simply shrugged off. They were a cohesive unit, and they only achieved remote functionality as said unit. It was a fact Nathan knew about; when he met Pickles, he felt it. He felt it with the rest of the band- he even felt it with Charles. Just this nagging at the back of his head that these were the people he was meant to be with.

Synergy.

That was it, that was the word. Synergy. Perfect fucking synergy that made them a force to reckon with. Alone, none of them had much power. Together, they could (more or less) make countries bow to them, make armies defer to them, make gods kiss their hands in reverence. They had endless power at their fingertips and god it was great.

But the synergy broke for bits of time now. He knew that as well. On the plane, standing amidst the stars, the ties that bound them were severed as if they were nothing. He didn't have power there, not by a long shot. He was a regular jackoff, a normal human being there. Or as normal one could be in the middle of space. There was no influence to be had, no one to admire him, no one to respect him or fawn over him or proclaim how much they loved him.

He hadn't really experienced that since when he first started out, playing in failures of bands, living with whatever bandmates were willing to let him stay with them. Those were bitter memories mixed with some disgusting smear of idealism; the naivete of youth and the passion of someone brimming with creativity. That part of him was all but dead, but in return, he had a place, a purpose. One that switched off and on now.

Feeling that synergy die every time he left home was odd, to say the least.

Nathan twisted a pen in his hand. Things were shaping up different now, though, weren't they? There was Toki. There was Charles. Things were ending up how they were supposed to- him with his family, with the people who made everything just fucking work. He wasn't one to typically leap at mysteries or get intrigued by anything at all, but he couldn't resist thinking about shit when he wasn't otherwise preoccupied.

He had been told that the selection of people was random. There was no control over it, there was no way to pinpoint who could come and who couldn't. But within like, a month or two, it wasn't just him anymore. He had been fucking alone for ages and then suddenly, he wasn't. The synergy was back in a crippled form, but it was there; it's pulse thready but alive. That was Toki. It was almost like when he first met Pickles.

And then Charles, and the pulse went from thready to stable.

How the fuck could that be random? Nathan clicked the pen as he thought to himself. Maybe- maybe they were overriding it. Whatever it was. They were Dethklok, after all, and things eventually always went their way; even if it was crazy space technology that flagged people from multiple universes to go out into space. Nathan had wanted it to do as he wanted, and finally the randomization must've bowed to him. Oh yes, Mr. Explosion, the error of our computerized ways has been realized, we'll get right on getting your family up here.

Nathan mulled over it. That sounded like absolute shit, that couldn't be what it was, but hey, no randomizer randomed itself like it was doing now. That shit had to have been rigged. Someone in charge was rigging it, that was it, that was totally it. His first thoughts went to Roe- she knew that even though he had his moments of absolutely fucking hating his band mates, he wanted them up there so they could hang out.

But it wasn't her.

He was sure of that much. She wouldn't have lied to him, no way, not her. And even then, he had been peeking in the shop off and on; he hadn't seen her in ages. He hadn't seen much of the twins that hung around either, which was bizarre. He had mentioned it to Irving in passing: why the fuck would they leave the store unlocked if no one was there? Who the hell left their valuable shit just laying around where anyone (Nathan) could steal it if they felt so inclined?

He flung his pen at the wall. It didn't matter, did it? He didn't give a shit about them (he stomped his feelings for Roe with his boot then and there, he didn't feel like thinking about some dead girl he may or may not have wanted to take out on a date); what he gave a shit about was getting what he wanted, and it seemed the universe was lining things up just so. Nathan could accept that, fuck, he would accept that. It was how it ought to have been from the start. Him and the band and also Charles.

Synergy.

That was what mattered here. The balance had to be reestablished somehow, not left swinging all over the damn place without any care for where it was going. Nathan was prepared to mull things over for a bit longer when the thought dropped from his head entirely. All at once he felt like he had managed to turn off all his thoughts, and in that thoughtless stage, he wandered off to where he kept the blank book (now just a notebook for his half formed lyrics to be written).

He stalked down the hallways and slammed the door open to the room, then immediately flopped down in the chair at his desk. Nathan grabbed the book and flipped it open, rubbing one of his temples. He had to take one of his way way way earlier thoughts back: turning off thinking wasn't as fun as it may have seemed, because now he was caught in a minor struggle to pull enough cohesive sentences together to form paragraphs and complete concepts. Why the fuck did he have to stop thinky my god in heaven what was wrong with him.

"Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhh, what am I in here for," he said, staring down at the book in his hand. "Okay. Book. What the fuck do I want this for. I don't feel like writing. I can't fucking read it. It's a fucking door stop and paperweight and absolutely fucking useless."

Nathan flipped to a blank page and stared wordlessly at it, as if somehow his willpower alone could make words appear. Of course, it couldn't, and the blank pages just stared lifelessly up at him, mocking him for thinking he could make words appear. With willpower. Everyone knew books didn't work that way; you had to be a moron to think they did.

But he grabbed a pencil regardless, and without much thought, he began to sketch on the page. It wasn't anything specific, just some old remembered sigils ascribed to demons and the like. Runic imagery, things one might expect to be on a movie set where a summoning ritual was being enacted. Just simple things, things to keep the page from being blank. Soon it all spiraled into itself, weaving together into some cohesive, combined image that he still couldn't quite make out.

He kept on, mostly just to keep himself busy. He wasn't an artist, but sometimes it was fun to do something other than write lyrics. Though he couldn't quite describe this as fun, it was more just... there. He felt no compulsion to do it, but no real reason to stop. If it could be described as mediocre, he would have described it as such. Unfortunately, the word didn't apply, and he was left thinking (ah, there we go, things are firing up again) on what the proper word was.

All he could think of though, was a different word. One single, solitary word.

Synergy.

Synergy between the band and Charles.

Synergy between the images on the page.

There was something going on, he could feel it, but he couldn't pinpoint it. This was part of it somehow, he thought as he dropped the pencil to the floor. Whatever he was doing was done; the picture was completed. Though he couldn't make heads or tails of it. The things that looked like summoning diagrams merged with demonic sigils merged with runic inscriptions in one gigantic - but combined - mess.

Nathan stared blankly at what he had drawn in the book.

Somehow... he got a feeling he had only managed to waste precious time. And he wasn't quite sure what that meant.

COMM: shifted_prompts - mutual destruction
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 1278
NOTE: AHAHA using Charles again without asking.




Alcohol was always his drug of choice. He started the habit when he moved in with Pickles as a kid, where it was just around constantly. There were other drugs, sure, and he did them from time to time, but it was never his thing. Alcohol was all he was interested in doing constantly.

Nathan had put some thought into Pickles' advice, and the conclusion he came to was that he didn't want to talk to anybody about his problems, but... he wanted something done about it. There was only one solution to this problem. Pickles. Pickles could score him exactly what he needed, in massive quantities, whenever he wanted it. God, it was great having Pickles as a best friend, he always came through even if he didn't know he was coming through because he hadn't even been asked about it yet.

But that was quickly taken care of. Sedatives. A fuckload of sedatives so he could just completely shut the fuck down. It made sense to him: as long as he was out of his mind on them, he couldn't manage to realize he's asleep, since everything was down, or whatever the exact mechanics were. He didn't know the details, he just knew it put you out or just toned you down. Good enough for him.

Pickles tossed him a bag of pills. "Dere ya go, Nate. Got enough dere ta throw a party fer like a hundred people." He smirked as he talked, obviously approving of the quantity, or just the fact that there were some kind of abuseable drugs within ten feet of him.

"Thanks, Pickles." He caught the bag and poked at the pills inside. "I, uh, appreciate it."

"Yeah. Must be a special occassion, huh? You don't usually go fer dat. Or like, you do but only once inna while. An' I'm pretty sure you already had yer once inna while thing, ya know?"

"No, it's- it's for my sleeping problems, alright, I didn't feel like going to see any body about it. I just figured... you could get what I wanted."

Pickles shrugged. "Well, yeah. Though dude, really, yer still havin problems? It's been like a week or two, shouldn't dat be over with?"

"I'm hoping this'll do something."

"Good luck with dat, Nate'n," Pickles said as he started to talk off, then stopped and turned around. "Hey, if you got any of dat left when yer done, just, uh, leave it in my room or somethin, I dunno. And hey. Try naht ta OD, dude."

He didn't think he would have any left by the time he got through with this. It would suck to not be a part of the typical routine of shared dreams with the rest of the band (it was totally fucking weird how he almost looked forward to that now), but things had to be done. There was a threshold to shit he could stand, and it had been met and exceeded.

Armed with drugs, he headed back to his room. Might as well get a head start, no need to waste any time on this. He flopped down on his bed and opened up the bag, getting a handful of pills and tossing them in his mouth. Without thinking, he swallowed most of them, cringing as he did so. Oh dear lord why did he do that, dry swallowing pills was terrible, why did he dry swallow like fifteen of them. What was going through his head-

Automatically he reached out to grab a 40 he had left unfinished earlier in the morning, and guzzled down the remainder of the alcohol. Thank god, that helped; now it only felt like he had swallowed a mouthful of gravel an hour or two ago instead of immediately. The booze was a lot nicer than pills; it tasted a whole lot better too. That was one reason alcohol was his drug of choice.

It wasn't long until he felt the effects kicking in, and damn he was glad he had already laid down in bed. Everything seemed like it was spinning, ramping up in speed with each passing second. He stared blankly up at the canopy of his bed, the dark fabric seeming like some sort of angry whirlpool or something equally retarded. Yeah, that's exactly what it looked like, he was certain. A retarded angry whirlpool hovering right above him, almost prepared to drown him except for the fact it was cloth, not water, so it couldn't drown him, just suffocate him.

He laid there for a few moments more, his thoughts becoming wildly more erratic as time passed. By the time he fell unconscious, he wasn't quite sure he was even thinking in full sentences anymore.

When he came to, he was in the hospital, hooked up to a bunch of machines.

Oh.

"I OD'd, didn't I?" He asked the ceiling, not particularly expecting anyone else to be in the room. When he got a reply, he was mildly startled.

"Mm, yes, you did."

He pushed himself up with his elbows to see Charles, who was standing in the doorway. "Yeah, uh, I thought I was before, you know, unconscious. Man, my room was fucking spinning. That was... pretty cool."

Charles stepped over. "I had your stomach pumped and your blood cleaned while you were unconscious."

"How long?"

"Two days."

"Fuck," he muttered. "But hey! It totally did what it was supposed to, so, you know, that's good."

"Oh? What was it 'supposed' to do, Nathan?"

"No dreams." He yanked the IV out of his arm while Charles made a piteous protest over it, and he swung his legs over the side of the hospital bed. "And. And. I totally slept. Sort of. Being unconscious counts as sleeping."

Charles sighed. "I'm assuming you're going to do this again?"

"Fuck yeah I am!"

"Do you think you could, ah, maybe not take so many at once, Nathan, if you're adamant on taking sedatives? Or not combine alcohol with them?"

Nathan crossed his arms. "Why."

"I can't guarantee that someone will go into your room next time you OD, Nathan, that's why."

"I was fine this time."

"Yes, but-"

"So it's totally cool if I do it again."

Charles pinched the bridge of his nose, clearly frustrated. "No, Nathan, it isn't. Just- don't take so many next time."

He grunted dismissively in return, then decided to tune the rest of what Charles was saying at him out, giving only one word replies in response at best. Eventually, Charles left, and Nathan slipped out of the bed. Where the fuck were his pants and his shirt. He wanted to get out of here; spending two days unconscious in a hospital was two days too many for him.

But there was still a plus side.

Unconsciousness was close enough to sleep for him, and he hadn't become aware of anything. He hadn't seen that Rita bitch, he hadn't been honed in on by something aiming to toss him out of his own dreams. All in all, the sedatives worked. He may have OD'd, but the results were the same. Nothing had happened. Nothing interrupted him.

For a minute he briefly pondered if that was what it was like for Pickles every time he OD'd, but the thought quickly passed. It wasn't all that important. What was important was figuring out how to do this next so he wouldn't OD again. He may have been dismissive of Charles' suggestion, but with consideration, he knew he was right.

He needed to figure out the right amount where he could 'sleep' peacefully without being interrupted, but not end up overdosing. That was going to take some experimenting. Or he could ask Pickles. But experimenting was way, way more fun. But he did make one mental note to be attached to all his future sedative experimentation.

Leave alcohol out of it.

COMM: shifted_prompts - peppermint
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 805



That wasn't the last he saw of her, not by a long shot. It didn't matter who the dream belonged to. Rita seemed to show up regardless, lurking in the dark corners and abandoned places. She never showed when the rest of the band was around - save for Toki - but just when he seemed to get separated from the rest of them. That was happening more often. Normally they would have stayed close, they'd be near each other. But something... seemed to drag him away.

And then there she was.

Pointed heels, a short dress, the neck of her top cut low. Fuck, he had to have been getting horny at night to keep dreaming her up (he was certain she was from him, after all, she only showed up to him, or so he believed). It was the only way to explain it.

Rita slunk around him, a delicate hand walking across his shoulders. "You remind me a bit of Jacob. He's built like you. Shorter hair... blond... but there are similarities. So much that could be worked on, so much that could be improved. It's a real shame."

He recoiled. "Hey, lady, I don't give a fuck about whoever that is. And seriously, I am- I am getting tired of seeing you."

"Oh, shut up, Nathan." She chuckled. "You want me to leave? I can go. But you know, I'm the only thing keeping you from getting thrown out right now."

"What?"

"You really do remind me of him. You're about as smart as he is. Don't tell me you haven't noticed that you aren't tossed out of here until I leave." Rita stepped away, smoothing out her dress. "I could stop showing up, if you like. Though it may get unpleasant. I heard insomnia is a terrible thing."

Nathan snatched her wrist and pulled her close, his nostrils filling with the smell of her perfume. "What the fuck do you want, then? Or are you here to just fucking dick around?"

She hissed between her teeth and glared up at him. "You interest me, that's all. Aside from the similarities to Jake, there's something... alike. I can't quite pinpoint it, but I can sense it. I have a... knack for these sorts of things, Nathan."

"Ugh, fuck, I'm not going to bother," he said, releasing her. "I've had it up to fucking here with cryptic bullshit and mysterious notes and that kind of crap. Yeah, let's totally follow what the letter says, go find some fucking books. Here's your reward! Don't get any good sleep after that. That's totally what you wanted, right? Not sleeping?"

"He sent you a letter? But I thought he-" She cut herself short. "Nevermind. I wasn't involved in that, but I have to admit," she smiled, "it does make it much easier to get in here. It's like an open door."

He cocked his head to the side, waiting for her to elaborate.

"Shared dreams are such a pain to get into." Rita brushed her hair over her shoulder. "Shared with one is hard enough, but four? That's so messy. I wouldn't have touched it if there wasn't a welcoming mat. So to speak."

"Soooo... what. You're some bizarro dream lady or something?"

"Not quite," she replied. "But let's not get into that. It's all a lot of things I've put behind me. It isn't who I am anymore."

"Except for the fact you like going into dude's dreams, oh, okay."

"Don't give me that tone! I said I was interested. I meant it. But fine. I'll leave. Have fun, Nathan." A pause. "By the way. It's three in the morning."

With that, she disappeared completely. And the dream reared it's ugly head, turning it's venomous stare right on him. Like every other time, the sound of clockwork and gears roared to a murderous cacophony. The sound echoed in his skull, forcing him to snap awake. At least he was still in bed. Thank god for small miracles like that.

Nathan shoved himself into a sitting position with a heavy sigh. He wasn't sick either, so that was... good. But he had a sinking feeling that Rita's three am thing was right; it felt early, it felt too fucking early to be awake. Not even Charles would be up now - only those on the Graveyard shift would be up, and anyone in the band who for whatever reason hadn't gone to sleep at all. He was pretty sure they were all asleep though, he thought he had seen them.

He slipped his legs over the side of the bed and stood up. He had made a split second decision to take a shower, but immediately stopped in his tracks. His room smelled like perfume. Expensive, heavy perfume.

It smelled just like what Rita was wearing.

"Oh my fucking GOD, I'm going crazy, aren't I? This is bullshit." He groaned. "...Great. Yeah. Just what I need."

COMM: shifted_prompts - last dance
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 1023
NOTES: Can anyone notice a pattern here yet?




Everything was too surreal.

That was what tipped him off. The sky was ashen at the lightest; everything seemed to be made of charred and rotting flesh. Some of it was melted, oozing like some sort of sick paste down vague shapes of buildings and onto the sickening musculature of the ground. He knew where he was, but only in a general sense. He was asleep, and he was in a dream of Skwisgaar's. His were always the worst.

"Oh, fuck me," Nathan muttered as he braced for an impact. He was aware of things, and it would be soon enough that something would turn a hateful eye his way and expel him from the disgusting landscape he was stuck in. To be honest, he was hoping for it; these dreams were bad enough when he wasn't aware he was asleep. He didn't fancy staying in being stuck in there.

The impact didn't come. There was no grinding halt, but there was certainly the sound of grinding in his ears, steadily increasing in volume. Nathan shook his head as if it could dispel the noise, but to no avail. Great. Now he was aware he was asleep, couldn't seem to wake himself up, and was stuck in one of his least favorite dream lands.

Wait. Was that...

"Roe?"

No fucking way. He couldn't have seen her, at least not in a dream that wasn't his. He had to have been imagining it... even more so since, you know, he was asleep and aware of it. That had to do something weird to dreams. He had no idea how, but he was pretty sure things worked like that. Maybe because he was in the reins a bit, he could control things here and there.

It was impulse that drove him to follow her. Melted flesh oozed around his boots like watery mud with every step; the cloying smell of rot almost overwhelmed him whenever he took a step. God, he hated this place, he hated being here, where the fuck was the band, why the hell was he following something he wasn't even sure actually existed. Which, actually, he was positive she didn't exist. For one, she was a fucking ghost. For two, he was asleep, so by default, none of this was real. Regardless of how vivid it was.

He turned a corner around some rotten meat structure and almost slammed into someone. A woman; too tall to be Roe, different hair, different build. Whatever, maybe she had seen something...

"Hey, uh, have you seen a-"

The woman turned around, revealing an angled but attractive face. Her smile had an almost predatory edge to it, and he could feel the hair on the back of his neck stand straight up. "You're Nathan Explosion, aren't you?"

"Uhhhh... yeah. How the fuck do you know that."

She brushed black hair over her shoulder. "This place is absolutely disgusting, don't you agree?"

"I asked you a question. ...And a half."

The woman's expression flattened into mild disapproval; her green eyes fixated on him. "I know. I decided not to answer them, Nathan. I think even you can get that through your thick skull, or you would eventually." She sighed. "Why do I always end up having to deal with the knuckle-headed ones..."

Nathan stepped forward, taking some measure of offense. "What the fuck? Who the hell are you to, uh, talk to me. Like that."

Without care for his physical space, she reached out and twisted a finger in his hair. "I'm Rita. But I don't think this is the time to talk, sweetheart, I'm afraid time's up."

Before he could say anything else, the grinding of gears raised to a deafening screech, piercing his brain like a lance. His hands went immediately to his temples as the dream came to another jerking halt like all the ones before. The last thing he saw before he woke was Rita, smiling with white teeth and her fierce eyes staring right on through him.

At least this time he hadn't fallen out of bed. It was a jerking end, but he was still in the comfort of gigantic bed. His head was ringing from the sounds and he tiredly rubbed his temple. "My god, this shit has got to stop." He let his arm fall limply at the side of his head. "Maybe I should listen to Pickles, get some fucking pills or something for this. If I don't get a good night of sleep soon... ugh."

He closed his eyes. He wouldn't be able to go back to sleep now; ever since this started happening, once he was awake, he was awake. It was annoying and cut out on the option to nap, but he was adjusting to it (although against his will). But he wasn't sure if it was just that keeping him from falling back asleep.

Nathan wasn't quite sure if he wanted to bump into Rita again. Something about her just made him feel odd, a bit ill at ease, which sounded stupid when he thought about it. She was just something in a dream, but-

She had basically called whatever it was down on him, didn't she? As soon as she said time was up, the grinding of gears hit the peak of volume and he was thrown out. Maybe she wasn't just a thing made up in a dream, maybe she was... fuck if he knew. "Yeah, no. I am way too fucking tired to think about this. Way, way too fucking tired."

He yanked his blanket over his head. "Fuck this."

He'd think about it later; maybe this time he wouldn't miss breakfast. Maybe this time he could talk to the rest of the band, not just Pickles, to see if they had noticed anything. Other than Nathan just getting thrown out like unwanted garbage - he knew that already. Maybe one of them had bumped into Rita. Maybe.

Man, why the fuck was he still thinking?

They really needed to invent something that turned off thoughts. Nathan added that to the list of things to get done today: stop by the science department and harass those guys down there. If anyone could make anything that could mute thinking, they could.

That would be pretty cool.

COMM: shifted_prompts - morpheus
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 1011
NOTES: WELL... now we kind of know when this is all set I guess.




It wasn't often he was possessed by his own creativity. Sure, he was a man who could ooze it, but he could never say he had a 'muse' of sorts. That was bullshit, people didn't have those sorts of things; they just either got things done or didn't. A lot of his days were like that- he either was brimming with the need or desire to write or just completely dead in that department. It was turning out to be one of his more creative days.

Ever since leaving Charles' office, his thoughts had turned to sitting down somewhere and just banging out lyrics. It was early, but fuck if he could tell himself to not write. He wouldn't be interrupted for a few hours; no one else would be up for a while. At least there was that.

He had a room to himself where he went to write. Nobody except himself and Charles had the key - he made sure of that. He didn't want to be interrupted when he retreated to there, and that was about the only way to do it. Lock everybody else out; lock himself in.

On the desk was a book. Physics of the Impossible. He, Toki, and the Doctor had picked it up but it seemed to be completely useless. It was blank, cover to cover, with almost nothing of note to it. He had idly flipped through the pages, seeing if there was anything to read or look at. When there was nothing, well, he had decided the only thing to do was to write in it. Things from space were pretty fucking bizarre, so maybe that was how to get it to work. After all, the letter that they had gotten mentioned both books, both of them being important somehow...

It didn't matter. He pulled out the chair, then sat down in front of it. He pulled out his glasses and grabbed a pen. Nathan flipped open the book to a blank pages, passing by Toki's scribbles and some of his own half-assed attempts at writing lyrics. There were some gems in there, but he wasn't sure he'd be expanding on any of them now. It wasn't the right time for those ones.

As soon as he pressed his pen to paper, he wrote like a dervish.




And when he was done, light was blaring in through the window; the torches and candles had long since died out. He squinted over his glasses and out said window, trying to see if he could gage the time from it. All he could gather was, well, there was the fucking sun, and there were some clouds. Either way, it was deeper into the morning than he could probably guess. Nathan flipped the book closed and pushed himself away from the desk.

Fuck, he needed some breakfast.

So he walked back to where he had started this morning: the kitchen, where he was promptly greeted by Pickles. He was only half dressed, having managed to put on pants it seemed. And he had a sandwich. Nathan silently cursed Pickles and his entire existence because man, he was hungry, and it was simply uncool for Pickles to be eating in the kitchen right now.

"Hey, Nate'n. Where were you? You missed breakfast."

It was definitely later than he would have guessed. "I was, uh, writing."

"What, really? But we already got everythin written fer da record, don't we? Charles hasn't said anythin about it fer like, a week."

He yanked the fridge open. "Yeah. We already got all that fucking shit done. I just felt like writing, you know?" He pulled out something left over from dinner. "And I thought, hey, maybe if I write all this shit now, in like, a year when Charles is complaining about us not working, bam. Already got a whole bunch of songs... that I wrote like, ages ago. At that point."

Armed with some degree of food, he stepped over to the table to eat. Pickles nodded his head a little, seeming to agree or get what Nathan was talking about. "Oh, hey, was dat dream last night yers? We were all talkin about it. It was pretty weird, like, kinda not a normal one fer you, ya know?"

"Uh, yeah, that was me."

"Dude, what da hell was dat all about? Like all of a sudden it just stahped. It wasn't a wakin up sorta stahp, I know what those are like."

Nathan shrugged. "Okay, it's gonna sound weird? But like, I know when I'm asleep now."

"Well yeah, you kinda know dat from layin down..."

"Not like that. It's like, I'm totally sleeping hard and shit, and caught up in dreams, then someone takes a baseball bat to my head and I know it's a dream. And I'm still asleep... while knowing it's a dream."

Pickles put down his sandwich to vaguely scrutinize Nathan. "You doin drugs without me, Nate? You've been actin kinda weird since you, ya know, went trippin balls and thought you were in space'n shit. Like not all da time, but like, every once in a while."

He sighed rough and quick. "I'm not, okay? Fuck, I know it sounds like I'm high, but I'm not. Trust me on that, alright, Pickles."

"You gotta admit, it's kinda hard ta believe yer hangin out in space, Nate'n..."

"That's why I don't fucking talk about it. Except to you. Sometimes. Like now. I'm talking about it now, and you know, I've been having fucked up sleep like that since a fucking space scavenger hunt."

"So, what, it's been happenin fer a while?"

"Yeah."

"So dat's why you kinda just disappear for a while, huh? Yer wakin up early?"

He nodded. "Seriously, it's like, as soon as I know I'm asleep? I get fucking kicked out! It's fucking gay."

Pickles finished up his sandwich and stood up, scratching at his side. "I dunno what ta tell you, Nate, but, ya know, you might wanna talk ta somebody about that. Like, get some drugs fer dat sorta thing. Sleepin pills, I dunno."

He stared down at his plate. "Yeah." Maybe Pickles was right. If anything, that shit might just make sure he'd stay asleep.

COMM: shifted_prompts - darkling
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 914
NOTES: HAHA I AM USING CHARLES WITHOUT XEL'S CONSENT. Because. Granted no one knows when these prompts are set so oooooo mystery.



The light of his bathroom made him look paler than normal. His dark hair was tangled, strewn around his shoulders and face in a chaotic mess. Man, he really had been sleeping rough. There was enough tossing and turning that he had somehow thrown himself out of bed just moments ago, regardless of the fact his bed was some ten feet wide. That, he concluded, was some fucking bad sleep.

Nathan brushed his hair out of his face with one hand; his other was keeping him balanced via the sink. He still felt a bit off- he had spent the past few minutes vomiting bile, and the minutes before, what was left of dinner. His mouth still tasted terrible, and he stuck his tongue out in some measure of disgust. At least that way he'd taste the air or something, not the inside of his mouth.

He fumbled at the faucet, awkwardly splashed some water in his mouth, and stared back at his reflection.

"I look like fucking shit," he said to himself as he pushed himself away, balance now fully intact (and put to the challenge - which challenge wasn't remotely the right word - via him taking a moment to scratch his ass). "Should take a shower... no. Maybe later."

He wasn't sure what time it was, but there was a nagging sense that it was way too early for him to be up. Maybe it wasn't too early for some people - Charles was the first name that came to mind, followed right after by Toki, but him? He made it a practice not to get out of bed until at least 8 am. Then he could get the double bonus of sleeping in and getting breakfast, which all worked out in the grand scheme of things.

No, no, it felt more like it was around six AM now. But he was up, and after that nightmare, he didn't exactly fancy getting his ass back in bed to catch a few more zs. He couldn't remember much about it now; just this fucking uncomfortable sense of whiplash and the sound of warping clocks. Something like that, he wasn't sure.

Once dressed, Nathan made his way to the kitchen. The halls of Mordhaus were dark at this hour, lit only with the orange glow of torches and candles. It was definitely still early; the few klokateers he passed were Graveyard shift members. It was fucking before 6 am. He hadn't woken this early for years, maybe not even since he was a kid and first having the dreams that would become a staple in his life. Jesus, he had to find a clock now. Too bad he didn't carry a watch.

The kitchen was abandoned. It didn't even have the orange glow of flame. It was just cold and dark and alone until he stumbled in there and yanked open the fridge. He sniffed at the milk before drinking that shit from the gallon, finally getting rid of that gross taste in his mouth. At least one problem was solved, now to deal about that fucking time problem. Where the hell was a clock around here, there was one somewhere, they did fucking have clocks after all, didn't they? By god he did not want to have to trek all the way up to Charles' office to see what time it was.

It was what he had to do anyway. It was who the fuck knew what time it was, he wasn't going to spend the extra energy to jump start his memory to figure out where the hell they hid all the clocks. (Or if they were even in a working state, sometimes it was just fun to take a hammer to things that you bought.) Like he had thought, Charles was up; he could see the glow of too many lamps from the frame of the door even when he was what was certainly fifty miles down the hallway.

Nathan stuck his head in. "Hey."

Charles peered up from his paperwork at him. "Nathan. You're, ah, up early. Any-"

"What time is it?"

"It's a bit after five AM," he replied, giving Nathan a bit of a curious look. Nathan could figure that one out, he guessed, even though Charles so courteously vocalized what his expression was already asking. "Is there any... particular reason you're awake?"

He stepped into Charles' office fully and grabbed a chair to flop down into. If he was up, he might as well kill time somehow, or at least for a few minutes. "No," he said automatically. "Yeah. I dunno, just had some fucking shitty sleep, I guess." He reached out to grab a pen to play with as he spoke.

"Mm. You want to, uh, talk about it?" Charles asked awkwardly, as he did 99% of the time when it came to anything of a personal nature.

Nathan grunted. "Nah, it's nothing, just- probably drank too much or something before bed, you know?"

He shot down any conversation from there; he hadn't come to talk, he came for the time, and just because he was hanging around didn't mean he felt like socializing. A few minutes passed before Charles accepted that Nathan apparently had no desire to leave him be - but also no apparent desire to be disruptive. It was something he could work around.

By the time Nathan left, an hour had passed in relative silence; not that there was much to talk about.

Besides, his thoughts were elsewhere.



And they were set to the sounds of an angry machine.

COMM: shifted_prompts - nightmare
VERSE: realityshifted
WORD COUNT: 555


He's never quite been a stranger to nightmares. Fuck, for as long as he could remember, those were the staple of his sleep. It was just something he adjusted to as a kid and never thought about - as simple as that. They never made too much sense but who gave a shit, it was nightmares, dreams, a bunch of crap your mind came up with because it had nothing else to do while you were just laying in bed. Nothing of note.

Even when things shifted to shared dreams when Dethklok formed, Nathan took it in stride. Okay, it was pretty fucking weird, but hey, it wasn't doing any harm. Sure, it meant sometimes he was stuck in some bizarre, surreal bullshit from Skwisgaar or something that seemed like Lisa Frank on acid, but eh. No big deal.

But ever since he could get to space-

The sound of clockwork. Gears. That's new to him, that's something a bit weird, a little off. It's a fucking constant and even when he's not having a nightmare (even if it is as simple as buying hats - he never questioned dream logic) it's there. It's a thready pulse; something lurking in the back of his head, clawing its to the forefront. It's angry, it's powerful, it's fucking brutal, that much Nathan can figure out, and he sure as hell doesn't talk about it. It's nobody's business if he's hearing shit in dreams, besides, the rest of the band probably hears it too.

Fuck if that wasn't enough though, wasn't it?

He hasn't been sleeping as well lately. Ever since they got those books - one of them completely useless - he's been lucid dreaming. He even looked up the term on the internet just to make sure, but no way is it as nice or enlightening as all the jackoffs on the internet seem to think it is.

All at once, he realises he's asleep. Right now. Everything smacks him in the face in a split second. This is one of his dreams, the lighting is darker red, blue highlights. The rest of the band isn't here right now, but they're nearby. He knows that because he knows this is fake, he knows this isn't real.

"Ugh, fuck..."

The dream seizes without warning. The sound of gears amplifies, and then warps; it's the sound of gears being twist the wrong way against each other, the painful grind of metal, springs, wheels, everything at once. For a moment it feels like his heart stops beating as a sense of being watched or monitored strikes him.

It knows he's awake. Oh jesus christ, it knows he's awake, doesn't it? He doesn't even know what the fuck it is, but he's pretty sure it knows he's awake- no, dipshit, not awake, aware, that's the right word. It's aware that he knows this thing is a dream.

And of course, he does the most brilliant thing he can think of. He flips off his surroundings.

The gears stop.
The grinding stops.




The dream lurches violently and he's thrown off balance and-






He's awake. On the floor. Nathan lays there for a few seconds before pushing himself up so he's at least sitting. Christ, he feels sick, ugh. A simple bit of effort and he's to his feet, and he stumbles to his bathroom to vomit.

He's getting tired of waking up this way.

Really fucking tired.

What are five ideas/concepts/etc you keep in mind while writing your character that you believe are essential to accurately depicting them?



First and foremost, Nathan is aware of his shortcomings. Especially his intelligence. Nathan unfortunately has the burden of self-awareness, in a sense. He knows, at every moment in his life, everything he isn't good at, everything he fails at, everything he's done wrong. He knows without doubt that he's stupid, and that's actually a sort of heavy burden. It's something he can't get away from and tries to ignore, but fails at, unlike the rest of the band who manages to go on in blissful ignorance over their own stupidity, and at times their own flaws. He would kill to be able to be unaware of how dumb he is.

Nathan is a perfectionist. Which in part ties to the bit above. Nathan is a perfectionist when it comes to things he does to the point of irrationality. He's destroyed thousands of songs because one thing was off. There's no retooling, no reworking, no compromising. Everything must be perfect on the first attempt or it's garbage, complete trash. He's amazingly creative, and he loves to harness that creativity, but things override him. He destroys his work over and over and over. It fucking pains him but he can't stop, no matter how he tries.

He's not as brutal as he seems. To be quite honest, Nathan's a nice guy. He's friendly, he's a bit nervous, he's social, he loves to hang out and pal around. But he's spent over ten years having to maintain an image of brutality, and sometimes even though he just wants to be a normal guy, that tough, brutal persona is just smeared over everything. It can be a bit off putting to start with, but when given the chance, the fact he's not that bad can really shine through.

Friends and family are the most important things to him. As materialistic and dismissive of any sort of relationship he may seem to be, it's really just a ruse. Nathan cares about the people in his life like nobody's business. He'll run into a burning building to save Toki. He'll leap into the fray (sort of) to try to save Charles. The band and the people he befriends are the things he truly loves other than his music, and he would do just about anything to save them or protect them. Nathan will risk life and limb for the people in his life without a second thought.

Despite everything, he's still a force of apocalypse. As human as he may seem, as normal as he may try to be, it's a fact he can't escape from (though he doesn't know it's even there). He's a herald of the metalocalypse; wherever he goes, a trail of destruction is left in his wake. He's been the death of millions, the ends of countries and states. Natural disasters, monsters, bizarre mass deaths, all of it happens whenever he's around. Nathan (along with the band) has been prophecized as the ender(s) of their world. Multiple cultures from around the world have prophecies depicting them. The earliest known one mentioned in the show is from 3000BC. It's something he may never be able to escape from - his fate is to end the world.

So, I was worried I might've had Nathan using 'fuck' too often. I just acquired bluray S3, which is uncensored, so I decided 'hey, I'll keep track as I go along'.

Results: my worries were completely unfounded. Under the cut are...

( PIE CHARTS. YEAH. )