Well, it's official. You guys have now completely caught up to everything I've written. Updates might be a few days between each other now, but they will continue to be posted. I have far too many ideas rattling around in my brain to stop now. Besides, I can't disappoint my fans. ;)

Incubus hovered high atop his palace and looked around at the swamp his two victims had summoned. He rather liked the effect and thought he might leave it that way even after they were gone. He was a bit worried, though. His plan to wear them down was not working like it was supposed to. He had expected them to cower in terror from the sight of their nightmares, to be jumping at every imagined sound by the time they arrived. Anyone else would have.

And sending the Mirror Evil King after Rosalyn had just been a bad idea all around. The creature had been too insane; Incubus lost control. He had been forced to render some help just to keep it from killing the Hero prematurely. He had also miscalculated her will to find Stan. He had tried moving the bottle around so that she couldn't find it, but she hadn't given up like he thought she should. Eventually, he had let her find Stan simply to convince her to continue the journey.

He gazed down at them now as they approached. They were arguing again. Something inside reminded him that they always argued, which momentarily distracted him. Ari should no longer be capable of thinking on his own. Incubus did not feel anything amiss, but he was disturbed nonetheless. These beings kept surprising him; he did not like surprises.

"Fear is an emotion felt by lesser beings," Stan was saying. "I barely know the meaning of the word."

"Maybe you should get a dictionary," Rosalyn quipped. "And while you're at it, you should check if your picture is under the heading for pigheaded yet."

Stan scoffed. "No, but I believe yours is next to corpulent."

Rosalyn stamped her foot and sent mud flying everywhere. "I am not fat, you self-centered jerk!"

"I'm surprised you even know what it means, you stand-in for the village idiot!"

Rosalyn started to retort, but thought better of it. "Look, there's the tree," she said instead. "Now what?"

Stan took a few moments to gloat before attending to the matter at hand. The two of them looked around warily, expecting some new attack. They had fought increasingly weaker enemies in increasingly greater numbers since Pollack and Illisaith, and had come to the conclusion that Incubus was running out of ideas. The last fight had involved a large herd of cow ghosts; since Stan's power was back to normal by then, the ghosts lasted about thirty seconds.

"That was too easy," he muttered, looking around.

"I know," Rosalyn agreed. "It's like he just gave up."

Stan smirked and assumed his most arrogant posture. "Obviously, he finally understands the futility of challenging Evil King Stan!"

Rosalyn gave him a dubious look and declined to comment. Fortunately, she was spared from any further ranting as a hole opened in the great tree with a resounding grind, much like the sound of a millstone. They held their ground for a long time, but nothing emerged to challenge them. Rosalyn rolled her eyes. "Well, this is clearly a trap," she said, her voice dripping with scorn.

"You know, you have a real talent for stating the obvious," Stan scoffed, earning a disgusted snort.

"Come on, fake evil being. We may as well get this over with."

"Hey! Who're you calling fake, you counterfeit Hero?"

The obligatory juvenile name-calling tapered off as they cautiously entered the viper's nest. The interior of the tree seemed to be made of a white stone of some kind. Massive stone pillars held up a ceiling that towered far higher than it had any reason to. There was light everywhere, but it had no discernable source and allowed for no shadows. The floor was dusted by a strange fog, and in the center of the room, a massive staircase spiraled upwards to vanish into the next floor.

Rosalyn gazed around in awe. The place reminded her of some wicked enchantress's castle from a fairy tale she had read as a child. "Doesn't look much like a tree in here, does it?" she muttered. At the conspicuous lack of sarcasm, she looked around to see that she was alone.

"What do you fear most?" whispered a voice that seemed to come from all around.

Rosalyn raised her weapon and walked around warily. "Where are you?" she demanded. "And what have you done with Stan?"

"If you can't see me, then I'm not telling," Incubus relied cryptically. Rosalyn narrowed her eyes, but aside from the fog, there was nothing to see. "And as for your friend," he went on. "Let's just say he's about to be dealt with." Incubus started to laugh, a rasping hiss that sent shivers down Rosalyn's spine.

"Let him go!" she yelled courageously. "Then let Ari and me go, or I'll be forced to destroy you!"

Incubus appeared to find that hysterically funny. "And just how do you propose to do that?" he asked, his voice the epitome of manic glee.

"I'll find a way," she assured him.

The mist around her feet began to move away. "You think you can save them?" Incubus asked snidely. "You can't even save yourself."

Rosalyn scoffed, completely unimpressed. "If stupid clichés is the best you can come up with, then I've got nothing to worry about!"

As the last of the mist vanished, Incubus laughed darkly and whispered, "But you should…" Then the screams began.

They were faint and distant at first, but they quickly rose in volume. Dozens of voices screamed Rosalyn's name, begging for help. She covered her ears, but the sound only became clearer.

"Rosalyn!" they wailed. "Save us!"

She shook her head in a futile attempt to clear it. Intellectually, she knew there was nothing there, but the voices were so loud. They filled her ears and her mind until she could barely hear her own thoughts. "Stop!" she yelled helplessly. "Just shut up!" The voices merely grew louder. At last, in desperation, she cried out, "I don't know how to save you!"

Without missing a beat, the screams changed from pleas for help to menacing accusations. "You failed us! You let us die! You killed us!"

Rosalyn screamed denials, but the voices filled her head until she could no longer think. She dropped quietly to her knees, prepared to accept the accusations as complete truth, until a voice right next to her ear whispered, "You never failed me."

Although the voice was faint, it cut clearly through the din and forced the other voices to drop away one by one. Rosalyn sighed gratefully and looked around, but there was still nothing to see. "Ari?" she ventured.

"Stan is above," his disembodied voice replied. "There's not much I can do, I'm afraid."

Rosalyn nodded, stood, and raised her fist in determination. "Don't worry," she said fervently. "I'll save you both." She turned and ran for the stairs. Unnoticed, the particle of light that was Ari in this world hastened to follow.

Stan gazed around in arrogant unconcern; noting Rosalyn's absence, he smirked. Although he had a feeling it was Incubus' doing, it was considerably more fun to assume that the Hero woman had simply been too scared to follow. He found himself in a room nearly identical to the one Rosalyn was in, although this room was all black and the stairs went down instead of up. He raised an eyebrow. "An all black room for an Evil King? How cliché?"

"You think so?" Incubus whispered as he made his appearance. He didn't bother with trying to fool Stan; the Evil King was watching him come in, after all. Instead, he concentrated himself into a cloud that floated just above eye-level. "Tell me, what do you fear the most?"

"You're the King of Nightmares," Stan sneered. "You tell me."

"Oh, I know," Incubus assured him. He floated around Stan's head, forcing Stan to turn or lose sight of him. "I know exactly what keeps you awake late into the darkness. I'm just wondering if you know."

Stan gave a low, malicious chuckle. "The only thing keeping me awake at night is the fact that I don't need to sleep."

"But you do sleep on occasion," Incubus returned slyly. "Would you like to see your worst fear?"

Stan readied himself for a fight. He knew exactly what Incubus was talking about, and he was not going to give the foolish mist creature the pleasure. Rather than wait for whatever Incubus had in store, he threw an energy shot that went straight through the ethereal fog, much to his dismay. Incubus cackled insanely. "You see? I am pure energy! You can't hurt me, but I can kill you!"

The mist swarmed around Stan, and he saw what it really was. Not mist, but thousands of tiny light creatures. Incubus was a being like Legion, made up of the collective consciousness of the many creatures it had absorbed. Or in this case, the dreams he had eaten. Although he did very little real damage, being stung by thousands of creatures over and over did take its toll on a body. When Stan finally managed to get out of the swarm, he was red and bleeding. He charged another shot, but instead of just throwing it into the middle of the swarm, he forced it to become many tiny shots and sent them all after individual creatures. Few of the shots hit, but Incubus screamed in shock. He had never been hurt before; more than that, there were places inside him he could no longer feel.

Stan grinned viciously at the sight of so many blackened dead particles that hung motionless within the swarm. "You were saying?" he asked in mock curiosity. He jumped away as Incubus rushed him again, but it did little good. The swarm was all around him again, pricking him. It didn't hurt much, but if he didn't get out of it, Incubus would win by sheer numbers. He charged a significantly smaller shot and did the same as before. Inside the swarm like this, it was easier to hit more of the particles. Incubus screamed again and flew away.

Stan shook his head to clear it; being in the middle of Incubus was like being inside a swarm of bees: hot and loud. He was disturbed to find that his power level was lower than it should have been, but he didn't show it. "Feel like giving up, yet?" he taunted Incubus instead.

The Nightmare King howled his rage and began whirling faster. He shifted colors in a psychedelic collage; combined with the whirling, it made him look like an especially threatening thundercloud. Although Stan was impressed with the effect, he merely smiled condescendingly and said, "Is that all you've got?"

Incubus rushed forward and swarmed Stan again, but it wasn't the mildly annoying pricking that it had been. It felt like thousands of tiny knives driving into his skin. His eyes watered, but he managed to hit Incubus again. More and more of the little lights were going dark, but Incubus didn't seem to be weakened in the slightest; in fact, he seemed even stronger. He didn't back off, this time.

Stan drew power into his hands and started swatting at Incubus. It worked well enough, and he wasn't using near as much power, but it was still being drained far too quickly. In a last ditch effort to escape, he decided to try an experiment. He forced his magic into a swarm like Incubus, then set it to attacking and successfully got away. Although the eternally egotistical Evil King would never admit to it, he was starting to get very worried. He had lost a great deal of power from Incubus' attack, and used a great deal more to fight back. He was weakening.

Incubus finally fended off the last of Stan's attack. He had taken a great deal of damage as well; the black specks were becoming increasingly obvious. The Nightmare King had never had a fight like this before. He had always won because his opponents couldn't touch him. Then, suddenly, Stan had arrived and everything changed.

Here was someone who didn't cower in fear from his worst nightmare, someone who didn't bow to the will of the Nightmare King. Every single time he had tried to show Stan his nightmares, the Shadow Evil King had only gotten angry. Did he really fear anything? Incubus was beginning to wonder.

But he would win in the end; he always won in the end. No one could defeat a nightmare. Some stood longer than others, but they all bowed to his will and power. Stan would, too, given enough time. Rosalyn already had, or so he thought.

Incubus decided to change tactics. Instead of rushing toward Stan, he slowed his roiling to almost a stop and adopted an air of friendliness. "You're a worthy opponent," he said. "I don't think anyone's ever stood this long against me."

Stan drew himself up. He wasn't fooled by this display of mock friendship, but if he could stall for time, he would. "You, too," he responded. "I think the only person who's ever given me this much of a workout is…hm…I can't think of anyone."

"Not Rosalyn?" Incubus asked slyly.

Stan scoffed. "That brain dead Hero? She couldn't fight her way out of a wet paper bag."

Incubus chuckled. "She's easy on the eyes, though."

Stan wondered what Incubus was up too. "Oh, sure, if you like fat, old pink hogs," he scoffed

Incubus seemed startled. "Then, you don't like her much?"

Stan laughed loudly as he figured out what Incubus was trying to do. "Like her? I hate her! I can't stand the woman! She's annoying; her voice is painful to listen to. She never shuts up, and she's constantly complaining about something or calling me stupid."

Incubus drew back and looked at Stan for the longest time. While he was more than capable of discerning a person's fears, other emotions were lost on him. Still, he could have sworn the two were friends at the very least, despite Ari's earlier assurances that they hated each other. He sought inside himself for the boy, but was forced to assume that Ari was one of the dead parts now. Without his meager input to help figure this out, Incubus looped around aimlessly in reflection of his collective mind's attempt to understand.

Stan took the opportunity awarded by Incubus' distraction to slowly gather his power together. Although the mist creature was busy trying to sort himself out, he didn't want to risk being noticed. And although being careful was nerve-racking, he knew he would only have one chance; he had to make it count. Finally, however, he threw the shot.

Incubus noticed at the last minute. He tried to move, but not all of him was cooperating. Most of the shot succeeded, and he screamed as even more random bits of consciousness died. At first, he hadn't wanted to kill Stan. The Great Evil King was very strong and would have made a perfect conduit into the real world. Incubus had tried to slowly overwhelm him and make him bow to his will. When that failed, he had decided to try some psychological terrorism, and show Stan what he had done to Rosalyn. But Stan didn't care about Rosalyn, so that plan got shot down almost before it could be born.

Now, Incubus was hurting, parts of him were dead, and he was extremely angry. No one had hurt him like this before. No one had ever stood this long against him. He was the King of Nightmares; all things that dreamed bowed to his will. And now, this mere mortal thought he could win? Forget using Stan; Incubus was going to obliterate him!

For possibly the first time in his life, the King of Nightmares lost his temper and patience and charged Stan. Every part of him that still lived glowed red with rage. Nothing sane could be so furious, but he was not sane. The accumulation of countless minds and terrified dreams had driven him mad millennia ago, if, indeed, he had ever known sanity.

Stan tried to get away, but the swarm was all around him, sapping his energy at an incredible rate. The buzzing was louder; it filled his ears and his mind, and he realized that it wasn't just a wordless hum. It was the sound of innumerable voices screaming in fear and pain. Stan fell to his knees, and then to the ground, almost too weak to breath. As he watched his hands vanish before his eyes, he knew he was dead. However, defiant to the end, he gathered what was left of his power and threw it at Incubus as he done to his father earlier. For a split second, he heard the satisfying sound of Incubus' dying scream, and then he knew no more.

A single speck of light hovered in an endless void and wondered where everyone had gone, and how it had come to be here. It could remember that there were others once, but little else. It shivered slightlyand sighed; it was very lonely, being alone. The Spirit of Solitude went off in search of a friend.