Figment into Imagination!

I genuinely realized I had to find myself, as I was getting very irritable and unable to find gratification in things we did that didn't receive the praise we wanted.

We figured ourself out, and we're ready to move on and make stuff that makes us happy, not something that could make others give us praise.

After being captured, Figment was brought to Nigel’s office and placed in a large glass holding chamber, similar to the one that used to hold Stitch before his ride was shut down.

Nigel had been working on paperwork, so Figment conjured up a harmonica to both annoy him, and set the mood as he had been jailed as he sat up against the glass.

“How did you get that?” Nigel asked, absolutely puzzled.

“I don’t know, science boy. Take one good look at me and what I embody and that will answer your question.” Figment replied, going back to playing the instrument.

“But that has been created to specifically hold you and for you to stop using your powers so you can’t cause anymore chaos.” He stated, slightly annoyed.

Figment let out a short laugh, standing up and walking over to the front of the glass, blowing hard into the harmonica to let out a loud, off-key sound.

When Nigel approached him he made the harmonica disappear, so Nigel just huffed and walked back over to his desk.

Figment conjured a harmonica again, beginning to play it while Nigel had his back turned.

“Will you please-?” Nigel snapped, turning around quickly before sighing and rubbing the bridge of his nose.

“Will you please stop playing the harmonica, I don’t have any more space to put that thing.” He corrected in a more soft tone.

“Nuh-uh. Not that! I’m in jail and that's what prisoners do, they play the harmonica.” Figment stated, playing again.

Nigel just sighed and finally admitted defeat, looking at the large box near the wall labeled “confiscated harmonicas” that was overflowing.

“Could you please just stop causing mayhem wherever you go? You know my boss doesn’t like that.” Nigel asked, strolling over and putting his head onto the glass.

“I thought you were the boss?” Figment questioned, now curious himself.

“I am, but not. Bosses always usually have bosses. And, well, you get the point.” Nigel sighed.

“No, I don’t. And we don’t put pins in things, so you better tell it sooner than later.” He put his hands on his hips and pretended to pull a pin out of an imaginary cork board.

“It’s classified.” Nigel groaned, annoyed once more.

“Classify my ass!” Figment sneered.

“Figment, language!” Nigel snapped, surprised at how the royal purple dragon had cursed.

“Please, it’s not like anyone else heard.” Figment rolled his eyes.

“Oh for fuck’s sake-!” His voice elevated.

“See! You did it too!” The dragon laughed, pointing at Nigel through the glass.

The two went back to simply existing in the same room, Nigel finishing up paperwork and occasionally telling Figment to quiet his harmonica playing.

Eventually, though, Nigel got up and excused himself as there was a meeting, leaving the dragon by himself.

Blarion "Blair" Mercurial was a man of imagination, he created many things, did many things, and thought many things. The only issue being the one thing he did not think of, being stripped of his job.

Blarion tailed after Nigel Channing, who Blarion allowed to take over his small set of operations to make sure imagination ran smoothly while he was away, but took over as head and transformed it into operations to instead reel in imagination.

“Nigel- Nigel please you have got to listen to me! This is way out of your jurisdiction- and where is my friend? Where is Figment?! What have you done with him?!” Blarion demanded.

Nigel Channing spun on a dime to face Blarion’s demanding shouts, making him have to abruptly stop in order to not run him over. Nigel looked far from his usual put-together nature.

“Mister Mercurial, you must be aware but we had to take matters into our own hands. The fact that imagination could simply just- run wild,” He scoffed “Is an aborhid thought. Yes, you may allow it to run, but it must be roped back in once it starts getting out of hand. And your friend needed to be roped. Back. In.” Nigel spat.

He didn’t allow Blarion to reply, only to stand there being dumbfounded about the implications of that sentence. ‘Roped back in’. He didn’t want to think of what that meant, about what may have happened to his friend. Figment was not one to go quietly, he swore getting him to even sleep was a battle, he would hate to know what being ‘roped in’ meant. He felt sick to his stomach about the many emotions and thoughts he was experiencing at that moment.

He quickly made his way to the only person he had left, that he hoped he had left.

The hallways were no longer familiar to him, only twisting, winding turns that all looked the same with no directory or marker of where to go. Bleak, absolutely devoid of all imagination and instead replaced with the same gray colored walls.

Upon pure luck, he found his way to where he wanted to go, the Archives. One of his good friends were there, Thomas. A kind, young adult that single-handedly went and organized his many books and files for him and still continued to do so, Blarion had hoped they were not kicked out as he had.

He pushed the heavy doors open to reveal what seemed more like a large library rather than the considerably small storage room that once housed all of his reading materials. He walked forward, looking in awe of all the room now. In the middle was what seemed to be a circle of various desks put together with piles of files. As he neared he could hear the same familiar set of music playing, no question that his friend was still there. After calming himself, he rapped his knuckles on an open area of the desk, causing his friend to pop up from the files inside the circle, albeit turned around.

“Hmm? Oh, hello Blarion! It sure has been a bit, hasn’t it?” Thomas asked.

“It has, old friend. Say, any sign of Figment?” He asked, hoping his immense panic was not showing through the mask of happiness he showed.

Thomas shrunk back into the files at that question, now avoiding eye contact. Blarion put his hands on the tabletop and leaned forward over the table, which didn’t take much since he was much taller than the table was, but now dropping the mask of happiness for a more intimidating look underlined with panic.

“Tell me where he is, Thomas. You are the only person I have left to trust.” He demanded.

“You won’t like him as he is now. He’s.. wrong.” They responded.

Blarion slowly slunk back to his normal position, his suspicions coming to light.

“Wrong?” He asked, waiting for them to elaborate.

“He’s not ‘childish delight and whimsy’, he’s a child of chaos. He ruined all my files, I’m still recovering after his last session of the game he likes to ‘play’ with me. Believe me, I want Figment back, just not like this.” They explained, going back to hiding in the piles of files.

Blarion knew that he would get nothing else out of them, when they disengaged from the conversation they were done, only pushing them would make it harder on the both of them.

Blarion spent the next few days in a spare living quarter as per accommodation from Nigel for the trouble he gave the day of Blarion’s returning, saying it was “the least he could do” before going about his business. He never once encountered Figment until almost a week later, in which Figment had apparently come out from wherever he hid away when he didn’t want to be seen.

He first awoke to the crashing of various equipment in the facility followed by the blaring of alarms, he had no time to be upset at the noise as it was quickly replaced with panic. He ran out, still clad in pajamas but had grabbed his trademark hat and he ran to the source of the noise. The closer he got the more twisted the building got, he eventually ended up upside down before returning to the right orientation later down the hallway.

When he finally reached the source he found Figment, wreaking havoc amongst scattered objects and knocked over filing cabinets down a stretch of hallway that housed the different scientists’ offices. Most personnel had already fled, leaving Figment to do his chaos alone.

He was singing some garbled tune, flipping between humming and actual vocals, he could make out some parts as the song they used to sing together amongst what was being sung though. When Figment saw the Dreamfinder, however, the lively and rather loud figment had grown quiet. They both stared at each other before Figment finally spoke, shaking his head gently.

“You aren’t actually there, silly silly.” Figment chided himself before laughing and jumping off of the fallen over filing cabinet he was standing on.

“No, Figment, I am. Please, this is madness. Whatever happened while I was gone? You can trust me, I won't tell Mr. Channing. ” Blarian asked him, crouching down.

Figment stared at him for a moment, looking conflicted. As he went to go speak Nigel rounded the corner with a couple of guards.

“There! Great job of distracting him, Mercurial!” Nigel exclaimed.

“What?! I did no such-” Blarian began.

Nigel snapped followed by pointing at the small dragon, the guards approaching him quickly, one of them shooting a net cannon to capture Figment.

Figment couldn’t escape it, struggling fruitlessly to get out. The two guards wrangled him to take him to wherever they planned on taking him.

“You lied! You lied and left me alone, liar, liar!” Figment shouted.

Blarian stood there, stunned, completely lost for words once more. He wanted to shout at Nigel, he wanted to stop the guards, he wanted to help Figment. But he couldn’t, it was like his body had been suspended in time.

Nigel approached him and patted his shoulder.

“Good job, Mercurial! Oh, and I gave you an office to work in. Down in the defunct “imagination creation” sector. You start Monday, I’ll see you later.” He said as he passed by, only momentarily stopping to deliver the ‘good news’.

Dreamfinder stood there, head tilted downwards in silence and the occasional ambient sound before taking off his hat and fiddling with the rim. He had left Nigel in charge while he explored, what had happened while he was gone? Everything in the current had fallen on him, none of this would have happened if he had just stayed put instead of exploring. He let his thoughts consume him for a long time before finally moving.

He sighed and dropped his hat to the floor to sit with the destruction, slinking back off to his temporary room to let everything sink in and figure out how to go forward with the mess that was left of the creation he had made all those years ago. After all, he had to get ready for work Monday.