A celebration was in order, the children decided a few days later, and they feasted on sugar one afternoon after lunch, each selecting from their personal piles. Lock favored sour candies and gummies, and he was happily munching through some hard candies, taking the time to suck every bit of sour from the outside before crunching on them. Shock's candies of choice were jelly beans, peanut butter chocolates, and nuts, and she savored every bite of each treat. Barrel was fond of chocolate, and he had every kind that did not include anything with nuts or nut butters in front of him; he especially loved caramel, and he loved it when it was covered in chocolate with a bit of crunch with it.

As they ate, they chattered about past mischiefs, sure the future would be just as fun with Jack out of the way. They didn't dare speculate about what would happen to Jack with Oogie in the house, so they chose a great series of mischiefs to reminisce about: the week that Oogie went crazy and allowed them to do whatever they'd wanted. It was a moment of mischievous glory that they hadn't managed to surpass yet, though they thought that their plan against Jack might possibly top it in extravagance.

"Those skeletons were the reason I lost," Lock argued, gesticulating with a gummy bear as he chewed on a sour candy with great vigor. "They just weren't scary enough."

"At least they were corporeal," Shock pointed out, popping a jelly bean into her mouth. "My ghosts couldn't even touch him. They did far less damage than I thought they would."

Barrel sucked on a caramel, frowning. "I think we underestimated Jack. Again," he sighed. "You know something? He's way more than we ever thought. We all fought him, separate and together, and couldn't win. Besides, we must have been easy. You heard him fighting the Boss last month. And we went to see the damage. We shouldn't cross him."

"Where's the fun in that?" Shock asked, pouting.

The stairs creaked, signaling that Oogie was coming. They didn't care too much, but Shock sliced her finger across her neck then pressed it to her lips as she looked at Barrel. Barrel made a face then grabbed a Hershey's bar and carefully snapped off three of the squares. Oogie pushed their door open and looked around. Barrel held up the chocolate with a messy, caramel grin. Oogie laughed and took the chocolate, studying it.

"Bribery?" he asked. "What mischief are you three up to now?"

Shock smiled sweetly. "We're not making mischief."

Oogie snorted. "I don't believe you," he said then sat down and opened his mouth.

The snake that was his tongue nibbled on the chocolate, hissing with pleasure, then Oogie tossed it in and swallowed it. It was genuinely incredible how their boss ate, they thought. Even now, after almost three hundred years of being with him, it astounded them. He had no teeth, so he swallowed everything whole, yet somehow, even with a snake for a tongue, he could taste and enjoy many types of food. He had likes and dislikes and could experience the full range of taste and texture, but he had no organs or even a stomach. It was bizarre, but they were well used to it.

"What are you three up to?" Oogie asked, glancing around at their sticky faces.

Shock shrugged and Lock replied, "Talking about fighting Jack."

"Oh really?" Oogie asked, not smiling or teasing. "And how exactly did that go?"

"Poorly," Barrel admitted.

"We almost had him," Shock said firmly.

"Mm," Oogie said.

"All three of us almost had him on the Mayor's roof," Lock bragged.

"Really? You've never told me what happened."

The three children brightened, and they fought over who was to tell the story, talking over each other until Shock gave a hellish shriek that nearly burst their eardrums again and silenced both Lock and Barrel. The girl primly smoothed down her pink dress then settled down with a smile and began to speak.

"After he rescued the Mayor, Jack headed up to the top of the roof and we were ready for him. We used our bathtub to run circles around him."

Lock cut in, ignoring Shock's withering look. "He was so mad! He couldn't catch us to save his life!"

"Until he broke the tub," Barrel added blandly.

They both wilted a bit then perked up and continued.

"We took him on! All three of us!" Lock said proudly.

"We used all of our mischievous tricks to fight him," Shock recalled fondly. "We beat him around and infuriated him! He had a whole spiel about how naughty we were! I've never seen him so angry!"

Lock and Shock laughed, but Barrel didn't. He glanced at Oogie then popped a piece of chocolate into his mouth. Oogie watched them laugh, but it didn't last long. They seemed to want him to join in, but he didn't. When the room fell into an awkward silence, Oogie spoke quietly.

"Do you think it wise to make him angry?"

The children's smiles disappeared, and they all focused on their candy. Then Shock broke in.

"Why do you care so much?"

"About?"

"Jack."

Oogie reached over and took one of the sour hard candies and held it up to his snake tongue as a peace offering for all the talking he was about to do. The snake wrapped its mouth around the little round ball and settled in to enjoy it.

"I know you're not so fond of Jack," he said solemnly. "And that's mostly my fault. You've only been around for about three hundred years. That's not nearly long enough to understand Jack and my friendship with him. Until recently, we haven't spoken civilly in five hundred years. Because you're so young, you never saw anything before I was so angry. So naturally, you became angry, too. You also didn't have a good experience with Jack when you first got here, which set you against him to begin with. Add in how I acted and felt, and that was a guaranteed recipe for you to turn against him. And for that, I'm sorry."

The children stared up at him, glancing at each other before looking back at their guardian. Oogie watched as they tried to process this. Then Barrel wiped his fingers on his costume.

"Boss? Can I ask you something?"

"Sure. Don't mean I'll answer."

"Why were you guys not talking to each other? I mean, for so many years, you didn't even like us to mention him. You said you were angry. But I don't think it was at Jack at first, was it. We saw you angry, I mean really, really angry at him when we stitched you back together after Jack left. And you did something about it. And I've known you long enough to know that if you're angry, you don't just sit around and brood. So… who were you angry at?"

Oogie sat silently, thinking hard as the delicious sour tang turned to sugary sweetness. He finally sat up and looked at his three charges.

"I've lived outside of town for over a thousand years, so even before Jack and I stopped talking. Never did like mingling with so many people, and the town was already buzzing with a couple dozen citizens. Jack lived in town because he does like mingling. And one of the people he mingled most with was Riker."

Barrel cut in. "Who?"

Oogie took the interruption in stride. "Dr. Finkelstein. His first name is Riker."

"German?" Lock guessed.

"Thereabouts," Oogie said. "Way before it was the way it is now."

"When?" Barrel asked.

"Twenty-two hundred years ago, give or take."

"He's really old," Shock said, her eyebrows raised.

"Oldest besides me and Jack. And he's the reason I left, the reason I was angry." Oogie looked away and his face pinched as memories played through his mind. "He was the first one to come here, after Jack. He was the first citizen. And we started fighting immediately. I didn't like sharing Jack. We had a nice life together, going wild every Samhain and learning about the other world the rest of the year by sneaking through. Oh, we had to be careful. Jack has a powerful enemy that isn't to be trifled with, and we had a few run-ins with him. We were bruised and broken sometimes, but it wasn't so bad. Then…"

Oogie went quiet for a few minutes before he changed the topic abruptly. "Anyway, Riker and me, we never got along. And it took its toll on Jack. He cared for both of us equally. At the time, we both had over a thousand years of time spent with him. He loved us both, but we were threatening to rip him apart at the seams because we were fighting. Some of the older citizens like the vampire brothers will remember the time. It was not a good time to be here. And Jack… poor Jack was in the middle of it all."

"What were you fighting about?"

"Jack," Oogie replied, shrugging. "What else? I was trying to understand his friendship with Riker, and Riker was trying to get Jack to send me away. Riker was so jealous of my relationship with him. By that time, I was trying to make peace, trying to be his friend so that Jack wouldn't be hurt anymore. But it didn't work. I eventually exploded to Jack, complaining that I was trying, that he knew I was, but that it just wasn't working. I finished by telling him that he had to make a choice between the two of us. And then I saw pain again as he went quiet. And I knew he couldn't choose. So I chose for him."

The children could tell that it hurt Oogie to remember that decision. Their boss was not prone to emotions like sadness, and they had never seen him cry, not once in all their three hundred years. They had actually debated whether it was possible for him. But as he spoke about that memory, of choosing to leave Jack, they could tell that he was close as the burlap beneath his eyeholes became damp, just the very edges. He closed them, taking a shaky breath as the bugs that made up his insides made a noise like a shiver of shells brushing together.

"Why?" Barrel asked.

Oogie opened his eyeholes, and he seemed calmer, but his voice was hoarse and shaky as he answered. "Because it would hurt him far less to have me stay away than to continue to rip him to pieces with Riker and me fighting."

"But why?" Barrel repeated.

With a soft chuckle, Oogie brushed Barrel's hair out of his face and tapped his nose with his point. "Because I love him. He's my brother. I love him as much as you three love each other, and probably for similar reasons."

The three children looked at each other, surprised. They did indeed love each other, now that they knew what love was. In life, they thought love was butterflies and happy times, but it was far deeper than that. Their love for each other eventually led all three of them to die together on the same horrible night instead of living without one of their own, and it had bound them together in their three hundred years of death. They looked up at Oogie with big eyes and questions swirling in their minds.

"Do you hate the doctor?" Lock asked. "After all that?"

Oogie considered this seriously. "I don't hate him. I know what hate is, and I don't feel that way about the doc. I don't like him at all. I do pity him, though. He's so lost in the past, locked in a straitjacket of memories and fears that he can't even grasp. And it's been getting worse for over two thousand years. He's never faced it to the point that he's detached from the memories and speaks as if it's somebody else's pain he's recounting. He needs help."

"And that's not hate?" Shock asked.

"No. I know hate. I've seen it for a long, long time in Jack. Sweet hemlock, I hope Jack never sees that creature again. I don't like to see him drown in hatred."

"Creature?" Lock asked, a tight ball in his stomach.

Oogie shook his head. "No. I ain't gonna give that beast the honor of being spoken of. He don't deserve it. Not at all. And Jack still suffers from what that thing did to him. Night terrors he don't deserve…"

The children looked at each other with wide eyes. They knew in that instant that they had messed up. The doctor said he'd go to him whoever he was. And if that him was the same creature Oogie was talking about…

"Boss, we need to tell you something," Barrel said hoarsely then froze as a soft hissing filled the air.

Oogie reacted so fast that they were reminded again that he was far more than just a bag of bugs. He stood by the window, brushing aside the cobweb curtains and peering intently into the afternoon air, which was no longer full of their Jack-o'-lantern sun's cozy rays, but full of the gloom of a storm cloud. Oogie stepped back and swore so violently that all three children jumped at the ancient oath. He jerked down the blinds and leaned against them, sucking in great gulps of air.

"Boss? Boss what's wrong?" Barrel demanded.

"He got in… How? How could he have gotten in? Snakes and snails, how is this possible?!" Oogie muttered quickly.

"Who? Who got in?" Shock asked, frightened by how scared Oogie sounded.

The Bogeyman turned to them with terror in his burlap face and said only one word.

"Bodach."