Nightmare Before Halloween

Disclaimer: I don't own Nightmare Before Christmas...

Chapter 2: Nightshade's Requiem.. Sorrow Of the Deepest Kind

Nightshade walked the streets longer than anyone had ever remembered her to do before. She was not happy, her eyes a grey blur. Loneliness was taking its toll on this four hundred year old witch, and she could feel it in her bones. The life she had before Oogie was gone, she could see it just by looking around. What she knew was that she could forge a new one from ash, like raising the dead...

No, she didn't want to remember. The longer she stayed there, the longer she felt the unwelcome memories reclaim her. Days, nights, and weeks passed as Nightshade watched the people patiently, caring only for her dear Lock, Shock, and Barrel. They seemed like a family, Sally had noticed, when the witch came outside with them.. Was there something everyone did not know about the triad of Halloween's fiercest trick-or-treaters?

Nightshade had rarely spoken since Halloween, and it was now nearing Christmas. The people were wondering, and so was Jack. What made Nightshade so quiet when on Halloween night she seemed more than eager to speak? Someone knew, but wouldn't say anything, and that someone was Doctor Finklestien.

Jack walked into the doctor's lab expecting answers, but what he was about to get, he did not expect. It seemed the doctor had been expecting him though, as it seemed that various things Jack had never seen before were set up all around the room.

"I suppose you are wondering about Nightshade's silence?" The Doctor said turning his wheelchair to face Jack.

"I am, Doctor Finklestien. What could possibly make her so quiet? She was never like this from what I remember..." Jack said.

"From what you remember is exactly right Jack. I promised her I wouldn't remind you of this. You must have forgotten for a reason, but I feel it is necessary in order to preserver her from death. Broken hearts kill, Jack, it did her in once, I refuse to loose my dearest colleague to heart ache..." The doctor set a photo album on the experiment table and motioned for Jack to approach.

The page was opened to a wedding photo, and Nightshade was the bride, Jack did not recognize the man in the picture, but he had a feeling he knew who it was..

"Don't recognize him, hm? Not a suprise, after you get used to being bones, you forget your own face..." Doctor Finklestien smiled.

"Thats me? (the Doctor Nodded) Nightshade and I were married?" Jack asked in suprise.

The doctor laughed a little bit," Oh yes, and Nightshade was a very happy woman back then. Two years later she was pregnant, but you died, and became what you are now and didn't remember a thing... Imagine how crushing it must be to realize than your children's own father wouldn't remember them and your husband wouldn't recognize you..."

"So she just ignored me?"

" Ignored you is on the other end of the spectrum to what she did. She came back every Halloween to watch you, to visit her children, and came around July to visit as well. She never let anyone but the three of them and myself see her," The doctor said.

" Who are her -our- children?" Jack asked.

"Lock, Shock, and Barrel."

"Then why did they call her Auntie?" came Sally's voice from the door as she approached Doctor Finklestien and Jack.

"I suppose there is some sort of method to Nightshade's madness. Of course, we may never know it, but its her that made Lock, Shock, and Barrel stay as young as they are, and they like it that way. The reason they were in Oogie's care is because he owed Nightshade for saving his life," Doctor Finklestien said," After all, everyone would have liked it better if he was excecuted, but Nightshade's descision overruled the public, so he was sealed."

Sally held Jack's hand in comfort, and noticed that something was wrong...

"Why did she just let me forget?"

"She said you would be better off forgetting her. No one would like a King that had ties to her, because they'd think you'd be more like her. Of course she wasn't a tyrant, but she never agreed with the people."

Little did they know, Nightshade was outside the door, quietly listening to the whole thing, feeling a deeper sorrow than ever before. Why was it so compelling, the way Jack seemed so bothered by the conversation he had gotten himself in?

"If you want, you can have the photo albums, they were your's in the first place, Jack. Please don't speak to her of this, as I had said before, I had promised not to tell you," the doctor sighed.

"I'll take them doctor," Jack said quietly.

He picked them up, and left the Doctor's tower, not noticing the ever so silent Nightshade following him...