"To your left! Your left! No, your other left you im—"
CRASH
Pitch rubbed his forehead, listening to the sound of cascading sand and confused whinnies. Another two nightmares had crashed into each other at speed, dissolving themselves, bringing the total up to fourteen. Fourteen. His nightmares had crashed into each other seven times chasing that blasted fairy around.
The other three nightmares involved in that leg of the chase had crashed headlong into a wall, but had not, thankfully, managed to obliterate themselves. One sat squarely on its hindquarters, back legs splayed out. Another pranced sideways, shaking its head as if to reposition its nonexistent brain. The last stood lock-legged, head hanging and ears flat.
No more than an arm's length in front of them, the bloody fairy chittered in amusement, flying little circle-eights toward and away. It turned to Pitch, pulled its left bottom eyelid down and stuck out its tongue in a very obvious 'nyah!'
Pitch ground his teeth.
Why was good help so hard to find these days?
"Well, as they say, if you want something done right, do it yourself," Pitch murmured. He summoned a tendril of sand, wrapping it around his hand lazily. The fairy watched curiously, hovering. Without warning, Pitch shot the tendril at the creature.
Without changing expression, the fairy dodged to the side.
Pitch directed the tendril of sand to turn around, but the fairy dodged up. He followed it, but the fairy dodged sideways again and chortled. Then it seemed to make a game of it: flying at the tendril only to flit away like the hummingbird it resembled, flying spirals around the sand as it dodged, even skimming its small hand in the flyaway grains and then flitting backwards before the sand could mold and catch it. In frustration, Pitch summoned more tendrils, approaching it from multiple vectors at once, but the fairy delighted in making the strands collide and tangle. Behind and around him, the captured fairies twittered and encouraged, cheeping high warbling cheers every time the free one evaded Pitch's attack.
"ARGH!"
Pitch clenched his hands and the nightmare sand fell away.
The fairy smirked at him, then shook its backside tauntingly.
"Oh, you—" The violence of his cursing was only eclipsed by his creativity, and the fairy covered its mouth in righteous indignation. "Oh, go suck a lemon, little bird."
The fairy tittered a laugh, its feathers irridescing like a butterfly's wings in the low light of his lair. That gave him an idea. But no-that was ridiculous. It was demeaning. He would not—would not—stoop to that. Ever. He was the Boogieman, the King of Nightmares. He would not swing a butterfly net around like some hyperactive child. The nightmare sand would do the trick, he just had to try harder.
Four hours later, he pulled out the butterfly net.
No one would ever learn of this, he vowed.
He never counted on the little fairy getting free and telling her 'mother' all about how she almost beat the Boogieman. Watching Pitch run about waving a butterfly net and cursing was totally worth getting caught.