mystery

and man, do i feel seen whenever she feeds my nightmare-is-pathetic agenda <3

i know killer is often framed as the impulsive one, and i do enjoy seeing and even writing him as this reckless, unhinged lunatic. but that never feels complete to me. he’s too cool-headed - or knows how to seem it - most of the time, too aware and too sharp in ways people overlook.

nightmare, meanwhile, is the one i love imagining as ruled by whatever feeling finally breaks containment. externally composed, controlled, reserved - yes, for sure, but internally? one really bad push from complete disaster.

i’m talking smashing objects in frustration, screaming when furious, losing all dignity in the middle of a breakdown, crying when he’s genuinely overwhelmed and at the end of himself - just full, humiliating emotional collapse after trying too long to be above it.

and i feel especially vindicated today considering a certain someone would canonically destroy a whole ass piano in his crashout because his favorite henchman got to have a happy ending :)

what gets me even more is that nightmare would want that side of himself buried desperately. he wants to appear self-sufficient and untouchable...except he isn’t. not. at. all. if anything, he feels like someone built entirely around denied need. dependency dressed up as supervision.

and really, let's be honest...who would be more likely to catch a glimpse of those breakdowns than the king’s very own right hand man?

that adds such an intimate ugliness to their dynamic. killer becoming witness to the parts nightmare cannot tolerate in himself, and nightmare growing attached under the guise of professionalism because killer now occupies a place no one else does.

Let me teach you the many shapes of sorrow