Chapter One: The Sandman

Yugi stared at the guy in blue-striped pajamas who'd appeared and proclaimed that he was a sandman. True, he'd had plenty of encounters with other magical creatures like sirens, Medusas, gods, and shape-shifters which lowered some of his disbelief in such things, but even this seemed a little ridiculous.

"You're the sandman?" Yugi said incredulously.

"No, not the sandman," the guy shook his head. "A sandman. Dormiro's the name. There are thousands of us out there in the many different worlds, all of whom work for only one purpose: to deliver the necessary dreams to the citizens using our magic-enhanced sand." He reached into his sack and pulled out a handful of white, glittering sand.

That certainly does have strong magical properties, the Pharaoh told Yugi telepathically, even if it does look like normal sand.

Yugi took some of the sand into his hand and rolled it around a bit. "Hmm," he said. "So this is the stuff that makes us dream."

"Yes, but be careful with that," Dormiro said. "You don't want to risk spilling more than a pinch onto yourself."

"Why not?" Yugi asked.

Dormiro's eyes strayed away from Yugi and he drawled out, "Uhh…you don't want to know."

Suddenly, Yugi heard soft footsteps coming down the hallway. "Oh, no, my Grandpa's coming!" Dormiro quickly let himself turn invisible again and Yugi slammed back down onto his pillow, shut his eyes, and tried to feign sleeping.

He heard the door of his bedroom slowly creak open. "Yugi?" he heard his grandpa's voice whisper.

Yugi slowly opened his eyes and sat up, trying to look as tired as he could for his grandfather. "Grandpa?" he murmured. "What are you doing up?"

He let out a rather loud yawn. "I had a bad nightmare, that's all." He looked around the room. "I'm sorry I woke you, but I could have sworn you were talking to someone in here."

Yugi shook his head. "No, Grandpa. I must have just been talking in my sleep. I do that sometimes."

"All right, well, you go back to sleep." He slowly pulled the door shut and whispered as he did, "Good night, Yugi."

"Good night, Grandpa," Yugi murmured.

As soon as his grandfather left, Yugi quickly sat up in bed. He couldn't believe he'd just said a bold-faced lie to Grandpa. Then again, he couldn't exactly say, "I woke up and had to keep one of the sandmen from getting blown to pieces with my force field"-his Grandpa would probably have had him committed.

Strange, Yugi thought. He used to be someone I could always talk to about our odd adventures…and now…

Yugi didn't have time to dwell on this, for Dormiro reappeared in front of him and said, "That was a bit close for comfort, huh. Well, I have others whom I need to send to the dream world. Would it be quite all right if I returned to you in the morning once the daylight has come?"

"Are you sure you'll be okay?"

"Oh, yes, don't worry. That man-Nightmare's his name-has rather weak magic; he'll remain incapacitated for the rest of the night after the blow you dealt to him. And besides, it would probably be better if all of your hero allies heard this; my destruction could have vast affects on them as well."

Yugi stared at Dormiro. "How do you know my friends have powers?"

Dormiro laughed. "Haven't had magic for all that long, have you? If you did you'd know that all magical creatures of one world are well aware of the other gifted ones there-after all, revealing ourselves to the non-magical would create quite a calamity, wouldn't it?"

And with a final laugh, Dormiro vanished once more.

Back in the Dimension of the Gods, Nightmare was inside of his pad far off in the woods of the world. The entire place remained in near darkness even in the daytime due to the thick black curtains which completely covered all of the windows. The only sources of light came from candles placed in various corners of the room. The rather messy place was decorated with all sorts of creepy knick-knacks, from the posters of emo rock bands and horror flicks and African masks all along the walls to the bearskin rug which still had its mouth wide open and snarling.

Nightmare himself stood at a gothic sink in the corner, washing off the space where Yugi had blasted him with magic with a black cloth. "Darn it…" he muttered angrily to himself, wincing a little as he pressed the cloth against his injuries. "It was just a sandman…easy target! No magic but the accursed sand in its sack! Should've been able to take him down in a matter of seconds! But no…" he snarled. "I had to find him right when he was at the house of some hot-shot hero!" He threw the cloth down into the sink and clutched the sides of it furiously. "Of all the accursed luck…"

He stood there for a moment heaving deep breaths of anger. Suddenly, though, he paused for one moment. "Say…a hero…" A plan started forming in his head. "Perhaps once I get my hands on that sandman's magic…I could use it to take down that little brat and any other friends he's got…" His eyes 

flashed with delight. "Yeah…taking down the defenders of a dimension…I'd get worldwide recognition for that! It wouldn't matter if my powers aren't even close to Spencer's or former king Resheph's…I'd be seen as a hero!" He paused. "Well, an anti-hero, but whatever."

He grinned with delight and quickly picked the washcloth back up and pressed it onto his injury. With his renewed determination, the blast wound didn't hurt nearly as much as it had before.

"Look out, punk," Nightmare said to himself, "because you're about to meet your worst imaginable nightmare."