Glidel- if we have the same definition of "dramatic breakdown," then future posts of mine will not disappoint. If we don't, maybe you should elaborate. Read my mind!

To everyone else: I love you guys. Seriously, you're… you're just great.

Nawrocki had an entire army ready in just two days. They stood at attention, unmoving without his command. He had them all lined up orderly in the lab, spilling out into the hall and into the surrounding rooms. The walls didn't disturb their perfect grid; they were simply avoided.

"Isn't it beautiful," he whispered tearfully as he crawled down the aisles of Yaridoviches. Count Bleck was following behind him. The other minions had gone to bed hours ago. It was two in the morning.

"It's an abomination," said Count Bleck, without bothering to hide his disgust. "What you're doing is an abomination."

"Don't start with me." Nawrocki pointed at him menacingly. "Don't even. I'm not in the mood."

"You must be happy," said Count Bleck. He clasped his hands behind his back and looked over the army indifferently. "Your dream is about to come true."

Nawrocki took one of the inactive Yaridoviches by the hand and looked over it. "Sturdy," he said to himself. "Useful. The prototype's hands were brittle, but these are just fine." Then, to the Count, "I've had dreams since I was a sapling, but never have I been close to having them come true."

"What sort of childhood would someone have to have to grow into dreams such as these?"

"Buh?"

"Why?"

"Because the world is a sty," said Nawrocki. "It's a hellhole from latitude to longitude. But a world full of weapons, doing my bidding, would be gorgeous. And I will be king."

"You don't have anything better to do than make sure everyone else is miserable?"

"Why should I sacrifice my happiness so everyone else has a chance to be moderately less miserable?"

"Because all life has value."

Nawrocki snorted. "Are you freaking kidding me? Didn't you just wipe out existence a while back? Ring, ring." He pretended to answer a phone. "Hello? Hi, Kettle. This is Pot. Guess what?" He crawled to the back of the room to his tiny closet.

"I was wrong!" the Count called after him. "And somehow, I'm going to make you realize you're wrong, too."

"Good luck. Better psychiatrists than you have tried."

"If you don't care about anyone else," said Count Bleck more thoughtfully than angrily, "then why did you agree to help Timpani?" He was moving closer to Nawrocki now, close enough to talk but keeping his distance.

Nawrocki rolled his eyes. "Even you can't be this clueless. Did you see the amount you were paying me or did your assistant just take it out of the safe? I needed cash. You think all these Yaridoviches were free? You think scrap material grows on trees? No sir."

"You have your money. Why are you continuing to make the potion?"

Nawrocki gave him a weird look. "Because that's how it works," he said as he opened the closet door.

"Why, though?"

"Stop asking dumb questions," said Nawrocki. "And go to bed." He stepped into the closet and slammed the door.

Count Bleck left the room, but he didn't go to bed. He had other things to do.

Meanwhile, the girls were carrying out their own plan. Mimi warped herself onto a balcony on the side of the building. The Count had made it so that you couldn't warp into the building, for security purposes, so she settled for the closest balcony with an easy entry. There was a pair of French doors on the wall, slightly ajar. Quiet as a mouser, Mimi slid her hand into the gap and eased the door open. There was no moonlight, so all she had to worry about was the sound carrying.

She tiptoed carefully into the room, hugging the wall until she got into the corner, and then walked forward slowly. She was so used to the space in front of her being empty that when she found her first piece of furniture she went tumbling. Mimi went head over heels over a small bed and landed flat on her butt on the other side.

Dimentio jumped up and clicked the light on with magic. "I told you, I didn't mean to spill it! Don't tell him I spoiled the afghan!" He saw Mimi sitting on the other side of the bed. "Good morning, Mimi. Nice burglar getup. Is Madame Felon's spring lineup already out?"

"Shut up," she said, "this is my home still."

"A woman sneaking into a man's room though the balcony, though? It doesn't look good."

"Maybe if you didn't leave your dumb old windows open it wouldn't have been the only way to sneak in here."

"First of all, my dear," he said, "these are not windows, they are French doors." He got up and latched them. "And second of all, you haven't yet apologized for waking me."

"Yeah, I'm not gonna," said Mimi. "I'm sneaking in to get some weapon stuff Nassy said we left in here, cause I can shape shift into something secret if I get caught."

"I'm quite ahead of you," said Dimentio. He knelt down and reached under his bed. Then he pushed out a small square, lying on its side. It was the same square he'd used to trap other people or teleport around. Dimentio lifted it up and spun it 180 degrees. It left a trail behind itself so that the turning caused it to become a cube. Inside the cube was a treasure trove of items.

Mimi started pawing through them. "Wow. Fire flowers, shooting stars, thunderbolts, starmans, sleepy sheep…"

"And all of the mushrooms we found in the woods," finished Dimentio. "I took the liberty of liberating them from the pantry. They're mostly the standard kind, but here's a few super shrooms and a mid mushroom."

"That's a 1-up shroom," said Mimi. "I found it under a bush."

"Oh, really? Then I'll just hold onto it." And he made it disappear. "I have no use for these. If you're going to take them anyway, I won't bother to try and stop you."

"So, you're being helpful now?"

"No, I'm simply not being hinderful."

"That's not a word."

"I just said it, didn't I?"

Mimi took the box and re-folded it clumsily until it was just how Dimentio had given it, although the dimensions were a bit askew. She picked it up and hugged it to her chest. "I didn't know we had all of this junk. Where'd you find it?"

"In the closets, in the cupboards," he lied. Actually he had been stockpiling and swiping things for as long as he'd been there, in case he ever had an emergency and needed an item. "Now go away, please."

"Right," she agreed. "Before I get caught."

"No. Because it's two o' clock in the morning and I'm very, very tired." He turned her around by the shoulders and began to push her out of his room.

Mimi scowled and turned into Bowser. "Alright, alright, I'm going! You don't have to push!" Then she spat a fireball on the ground right in front of him. He hopped back and up in the air, but not before getting his curly toes a bit singed.

"Go ahead," he said, "wake up the whole castle. I'm not the one who'll hang if Mister Nawrocki finds you."

Mimi turned into a Puni. "I'll just sneak out real quiet-like," she whispered. Then she grabbed the item box, somehow, and skittered away, squeezing under the French doors.

Dimentio sat back down on his bed. He was wide awake now.

This is atrocious, he thought. Here he had just done something that Count Bleck had encouraged his minions to believe in, to do, what he seemed to base his life and code of ethics around- to do good for someone else without anything in return. In such a case, he assured them, the feeling of doing good was greater than any reward.

And what did Dimentio get in return?

Absolutely nothing, like he expected.

Resentment, at least; now she had those items, and goodness knows what she would do with them. Ruin everything, most likely. Years of hoarding down the drain.

You can't be a villain. You can't be a hero. You can't be Dimentio.

Count Bleck was leaning on his windowsill, thinking carefully. He was looking at the purple stain in the sky, a permanent blemish from where the void had first emerged. In this dimension, that mark of shame would be visible up there until the end of everything.

Perhaps this was a tortured, painful blessing in disguise. He'd thought about it for a long time. This was his chance. He would stop Nawrocki and save the world. Was that enough to redeem himself from trying to destroy it? Somehow he had been able to convince himself that yes, it would be fine. He could be redeemed.

He tilted his head to the side. He had thought he'd seen something brush past the stain. A glittery glint of sorts. Was something out there? He squinted and then widened his eyes, but whatever it was had gone.

No matter. He decided to go to bed. As it was, he'd be exhausted when Nawrocki threw them all out of bed to go to work in the factory. This deal he'd made was a real pain. Hopefully it was paying off- that his dear Timpani was safe.

I was asked this before in a review but forgot to answer- yes, there is a such thing as French doors. Google it and see the pictures. For some reason, I really like them. I want some someday. Although that might interfere with my dream to have a townhouse…