Pitch found himself walking alone through the dark woods. Walking. Like some sort of common peasant he thought bitterly to himself as he heard the cold ground crunching beneath his feet. This was not The Nightmare King's idea of fun. He had been walking a long time, but he knew it had to be around here somewhere. He hadn't been gone that long…had he? Just as he started to doubt himself, he began to spot square amber eyes in the distance: windows. He found something comparable to excitement stir in his gut as he quickened his steps, approaching the grey building with a spark of anticipation in his molten gold and silver eyes. Even from this distance there seemed to be a gentle but steady buzz of fear emanating from the building tucked away in the woods.

It was Burgess State Hospital, or as some people would call it, Burgess's "Nut-House" or the "Funny-Farm". There was a section of the hospital that was especially for the children: children who had already lost a grip on reality. It wouldn't take too long convince them of his presence. Was it cruel to torment the tormented? Yes. Of course it was. But Pitch didn't care. The place would be flooded with the sharp, shrill shrieks of children in no time. In fact, Pitch pondered if he should try to scare some of the weaker minded adults as well just for a good kick.

Pitch felt the years of tension in his muscles ease up, and he gritted his teeth at the pleasurable pain that this entailed. This was all he needed: to be back in his element. Pitch Black didn't feel fear, he manufactured it.

Using his limited strength, he drifted through the walls like an inky phantom leaving behind remnants of unease and unrest until he reached a door that caught his eye. He read the sign on the door with an arched brow.

Patient: Daisy A. Matthews

Doctor: R.B Towle

Doctor's assistant: S.C Bennett

He pressed a large, grey hand to the door. The girl was awake. And she was afraid. Her fear gave him the sensation of slipping into warm water. With a dark smirk he casually walked through the closed door. He took a quick, uninterested look around. The room was pretty bare; a few crayon drawings on the white walls, a pile of stuffed toy animals on the small child's table…a white bed with a little girl shaped lump in the centre. The lump was shivering, and quietly sniffling while she wept as quietly as she could, afraid that someone or something might just be listening. With a cruel chuckle, Pitch settled himself into the corner opposite the bed and next to the door. This would be easy. Gently, he began to tap the wall in a steady rhythm with his long index finger: tap tap, tap tap, tap tap. The girl's ears, obviously tuned to listen out for any danger, existing or non-existing, real or imaginary, must have heard him for she let out an audible whimper. Pitch continued to tap, picking up the speed: tap tap, tap tap, tap tap. The girl called out a name "Miss Bennett?" she squeaked, half praying half hoping that she was just knocking the door in a very odd fashion. The tapping continued, drumming itself into her fragile mind. With a heart crushing realisation, she noticed that the knocking wasn't coming from the outside of her door like she had hoped. Whatever it was, it was tapping from the inside of her bedroom wall. "Where are you?"

"I'm in the corner." Pitch answered in his soft menacing voice, grinning manically as he waited for the inevitable. The girl screamed, and the sound was music to Pitch's ears. Oh how he had longed to hear the beautiful symphony of screaming again. And her fear? Well, her fear was delectable.

"Miss Bennett! Miss Bennett!" she screamed at the top of her tiny lungs. Pitch heard a heavy door swing open followed by the rapid footsteps of a person running. In no time, the door swung open.

The woman who had interrupted his fun cut off Pitch's smirk dead with a razor blade. She had to be at least twenty years old, at least. She hit the lights on and scooped the frightened blanket girl up into her arms, leaving her to keep her quilted comfort wrapped around her body like a caterpillar while she cooed "Daisy, Daisy it's alright, I've got you." The woman was the Doctor's assistant, no doubt at all. A tiny, shaking hand reached out of the blanket slowly to stroke the young woman's beautiful, long blonde hair. Daisy loved the way she wore it down so that she and the other girls could play with it. "What's wrong, Daisy? What happened?" she asked, almond shaped emerald eyes swimming with worry.

"There's a man in the corner." Daisy croaked without breath. The blonde's searching eyes glared into the corner. She looked right at him, right into his stunned, furious eyes, but right through him. "There's no one here but us, Daisy, you can trust me."

"But he was right there! I heard him, he was right there."

"It was only a bad dream, Sweetie. Do you think if someone was here I'd ever let them hurt you?" The blanket child shook her head from under the blankets.

The woman continued whispering gentle words to the girl she rocked in her arms. Pitch was no longer listening; he was far too busy seething. How could it have been that long? How could The Guardian's have left him to his miserable fate for that long? It couldn't be her. It couldn't. But it was, it simply had to be. Pitch approached her to get a closer look, like a vulture hopping towards a sleeping creature to check if it was dead. Yes. It appeared that the little mite of a girl he had known had blossomed into a young, aspiring, intelligent woman. She was indeed Sophie Bennett.


Sorry it took me a while to actually getting round to uploading this chapter, I took a mini trip to the seaside and couldn't find the time. I was touching up the long list of imperfections in this chapter on the half four (in the Godforsaken morning) train out of Wales and planned to use the free Wi-Fi on said train to upload. I had internet connection for all of five minutes before it died on me, so apologies guys.

So Sophie's finally made an appearance, and you'll be seeing a lot more of her next chapter when I explain exactly what she's been up to while Pitch was having his ass handed to him by the Fearlings and how she and Jamie have been getting along with The Guardians despite being adults. Stay tuned folks and thanks for reading and reviewing!

SamanthaSamma I'm so glad you liked it! And it's been a tad longer than Pitch first thought ;) Although years are pretty trivial things to immortals, years of torture however are still quite infuriating to say the least, and let's face it Pitch is the kind of guy who'd flip a table over milliseconds.

InfamousTricks, I'm happy you're looking forward to the evolution of this fic because I've got a shed ton of ideas for it!