(A/N: I'm not a horrible person, I swear! There's not gonna be any blackice in this one, so if you're looking for smut you're in the exactly wrong place haha. This started as a headcanon drabble that turned into...this.)
Pitch took a sharp but deep inhale. The air was crisp around him as the wind lightly tousled his hair. He sat on a Nightmare high above the ground, enough to get a decent view of the area he had transported himself to. He had no army, no battalion ready for battle, he simply watched, waited, soaked in the scenery from his viewpoint in the clouds. The Moon behind Pitch was just beginning to shed its first light over the horizon as the sun in front of Pitch disappeared. Tendrils of Night reached thin fingers across the sky as the sun faded behind the earth and Pitch couldn't help but smirk as the fear below him spiked, a low chuckle emanating from his lips.
It was delightful, the scent of this place he now stood over. For miles the only smell that rolled over his tongue, infected his body and washed over him like ocean waves was the smell of fear. Fear oozed out of every crack and corner of every broken building, occupied all corners of the grounds, leaked out of the iron gates and wire fence that encompassed this place. Even the trees and sky seemed to shrink away from the bleakness of this place.
Pitch had not felt this powerful since the Dark Ages, and this place was only one of many others he had discovered.
Pitch rolled the memory of the Dark Ages between the crevices of his old mind. It had taken him so long to gain power back then. Gaining so much patience while waiting for people to bring fear back into their lives, Pitch had bided his time, waiting for the perfect chance to pounce like a hungry predator.
The man called Emperor Augustulus had proved to be the start of Pitch's reign back then, although at the time neither of them had realized it. Augustulus' fear was small. The man's ego had proven difficult to crack. Armies stretched thin, resources low, starvation and barbarism and attacks on the borders of his vast empire, Augustulus had turned a blind eye to them and continued enjoying the perks of being Emperor. Oh what an awfully wonderful mistake. With his western empire collapsing and dissolving like sand through open fingers, Augustulus was the last Holy Roman Emperor to ever rule. His fear stirred Pitch from his hole in the ground, brought him out like a baited fish into the world of the living.
Pitch didn't regret coming back outside. The power, the rush, the fear, was overpowering.
Then the Guardians came along and made belief in him fade, brushed him off as a bad dream, and Pitch slunk back in the shadows once more.
Pitch rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck as stars began to light up the sky. The grounds below him were quiet for the first time since the morning; the bustling of all the people below had finally stilled, the barking orders of the uniformed men all but quieted, the fear had receded into silent cries for help, the weary had finally fallen asleep.
Pitch flew downwards to the earth. He had been watching this new discovery with the upmost interest all day, but his spot in the clouds had been getting his nightmare restless, and she needed to trot around in the shadows instead of wade in the moonlight. He didn't blame her.
Touching the ground, Pitch was fully immersed in the ocean of fear. It was a low tide at the moment, but still wonderfully sweet against his tongue, the taste was strong, potent and thick.
His nightmare calmed down as he dismounted and ran his fingers through her sandy mane. The sand was a new technique he had been toying with, but hadn't quite perfected. The half shadow half sand creature trotted off by herself into the shadows, head whipping around in excitement.
He chuckled low in his throat at the mood of the grounds. He could turn any which way and a new shade of negative human emotion would color his senses. The array of hues of fear before his senses covered the entirety of his being, all on top of a large collective uncertainty.
Shadows played at his feet and spread out along the ground, wanting to reach out at the plentiful source of fear infecting this place like a gorgeous disease.
Pitch walked along between buildings, running his fingers along the rough concrete. Tendrils of sleeping children's fears made their way through the crumbling walls. He sensed the nightmares of their small minds just barely out of reach. They ebbed and flowed like water over rocks, just out of his reach and slipping through his fingers but steady and unending. Glorious.
Pitch inhaled sharply and tensed as a soft sound of sand sliding over rooftops disturbed the deathly silence. Sanderson floated several feet above the ground on a cloud of sand, and Pitch shuddered. He had not forgotten his last beating from this stout man, still sporting some slowly healing bruises on his body from the pummeling. Pitch quickly turned around, expecting the golden whips to grab him and fling him into the air.
He was met with silence as the sandman floated up into the air and past Pitch. Confusion crossed Pitch's face as the sandman blatantly ignored him and floated above the rooftops of the houses and several stories into the air.
Pitch snarled and called his nightmare to his side. He took to the skies, flying up to Sanderson's cloud and stopping beside the Guardian of Dreams. Perched on his nightmare, Pitch leaned forward.
"What, no attack Sanderson," Pitch questioned with a grimace pulling at his lip. Pitch didn't like being ignored, much less from the enemy that attacked him every chance he had. Sandy continued looking down at the buildings, hundreds of sand trails making their way down to the ground. The golden man shook his head, not taking his eyes off the streams of golden sand that floated and twisted their way down. Sandy seemed to be taking his time carefully prepping each dream for each specific child, his movements slow and careful, but he responded to Pitch nonetheless with the symbols above his head depicting that he thought the children's dreams were more important than beating him up.
Pitch winced. The dreams had reached the children, and their fear faded as their misery and dismay were replaced with happiness and hope. Pitch glared at Sandy. "What if I just turned all their dreams into nightmares then? The second you leave you have no control over what turns their dreams take."
Sanderson froze and slowly turned his head to look Pitch dead in the eyes. Golden eyes locked with glinting silver and Pitch almost missed the symbols forming above his head.
"Telling me not to makes no difference…." Pitch paused as the symbols became more frantic. Sandy's eyes were concerned, but held an element of exhaustion to them, as if he had been paying attention to the world far more than he normally would, over working himself by giving the children as much hope as he possibly could. Sandy continued his method of communication but Pitch felt his anger rise.
"Of course I know everyone in this place is already living in a nightmare! Why would I possibly want something like this to end?! I have…oh." Pitch sighed. Sandy was right, once again. Symbols appeared in a final statement as Sanderson looked down on the buildings with a sad and longing stare.
"Fine, I won't corrupt their dreams," Pitch spoke softly. Sanderson nodded and floated away, off to another part of the world to give good dreams.
Pitch remained on his nightmare. Despite Sanderson's good dreams, there was an undercurrent of fear consuming this place. Pitch drifted down to the ground towards the front gate of the grounds. He didn't realize the wrought iron had words written across the top, he had gotten so caught up in the rushing waves of fear. Pitch read the words to himself and smirked at the irony of them. "Arbeit macht frei, how interesting," he mused. Pitch tapped his fingers to his lips in thought. The people trapped here would never be free…