~With Free and Luna~

Free and Luna ran from the cave as fast as they could. Luna had long stopped looking back in case the Cloaked man came after them because she knew that he wouldn't be coming, at least, not yet. YET.

After they had reached the fork in the path, they stopped.

"You think we're safe?" Free asked, breathless from all the running they had just done.

Luna closed her eyes and sensed for the Cloaked man's energy. She sensed that his energy was still at the cave, so that meant that they would be safe. For now.

"Soooooo, are we safe?" Free asked again

Luna nodded, averting her gaze from Free.

Deep inside, Luna was confused. Much more confused than she had been when Lana had treated her so kindly, when Autumn and Nightmare had saved her. She, literally, just met Free! And that lady! Who was she and why did she save Luna?

Everything was just so confusing. Not only that, but she was terrified. Terrified of the idea of going back to the cave, the pit, everything.

Would she end up there again? Will she ever get out of there? When will the Cloaked man come back and take her?

Questions filled Luna's mind. Doubt and anxiety hailed dominance and nearly made Luna want to give up and cry, but she didn't.

Luna was unaware that Free took her hand and lead her away from both the left and the right paths. He was taking her someplace new; someplace only he had been before. Luna didn't mind. She was too preoccupied with the many questions she was asking herself.

Along the way, Free talked to Luna and tried to get her to talk, but she remained silent. Luna didn't feel like talking, especially with the recent past events. Eventually, Free stopped talking to her and just walked beside her.

Why did he save me...? Why WOULD he save me?

"Because you're my friend, Luna. I could never leave you in a place like that, especially since I knew there was something I could do to help." Free stated with a blunt, serious expression

"Wh-what...? H-how did...?"

Free rolled his eyes and cracked a smile at Luna "You were voicing out your thoughts, weren't you, Luna?" Free asked as he laughed. His laugh seemed to make Luna's troubles go away. It brightened her heart. Compared to her, Free was the happiest person in the whole universe.

Luna laughed, too, as she realized that she was voicing out her thoughts. "It's a habit I got from the Cloaked man."

Free smiled,  then his happy-go-lucky expression turned to one of seriousness. "By they way, Luna, can you explain to me who that guy was?"

Luna sighed. She didn't want to talk about it, but she knew that Free wouldn't stop asking if she kept it away from him.

 "It's kind of hard to explain..." Luna stated, hoping that Free would just leave her alone.

However, Free wouldn't let up. He wanted to know who the Cloaked man was and what his relationship with Luna was. This was his friend for God's sake! He needed to know!

"Just try your best, kay, Luna?" Free assured Luna that he would understand and wouldn't ask any questions until the story was over.

Luna thought to herself for a while, gathering her thoughts and where she would have to start. When she finally got a general idea of how she would explain things, she took and deep breath and faced Free.

"Let's go someplace to rest first. This story will take a while and I'd rather speak to you in private."

Free smiled, a bright, excited glint appearing in his eyes as he did,. "Private, huh? I know just the place!"

Free took Luna's hand and ran down the path. He  turned right at an intersection. On the sides of the path were wide, tall trees that towered over everything! The further they went, the taller the trees got! They were so tall that they covered the sky!

Eventually, the path ended at a dead end. This confused Luna even more. She knew that where ever they were was deep in some kind of forest, but why here? And wouldn't a Number pass by thus listening in on their conversation?

Free saw the confused look on Luna's face and laughed. "It's this way!" Free pointed up, but that made no sense either. There wasn't anything up but the sky.

Luna shrugged "I don't get it. Is there supposed to be something there?"

"Yush, there is!" Free flew up and as soon as he did, he disappeared.

Luna gaped in shocked. "H-how did?! When did!? Free! Free, are you there?!" Luna called out, looking around wildly for the winged boy.

"Over here!" Free called, perched high up in one of the tree's branches. He waved Luna over and gestured for her to follow him.

Luna didn't know how to get up there, though. She glanced up at Free, then at the trees surrounding her.

Luna found that some of the branches were low enough for her to use as handholds, so she grabbed one branch and pulled herself up till she was sitting on it. She then repeated this process again and again.

She was about halfway up when Free spoke up "Why don't you use your wings and fly up here, Luna?" This time, unlike his usual happy tone, Free sounded confused.

Luna realized this and smacked her face. Why didn't she think of that in the first place?! It would have been a lot easier and a lot faster than climbing up a tree.

Luna lifted her wings, but stopped. At the moment, Luna was looking down. She hadn't realized how high she was until now, and it frightened her.

Where did this come from? Why is this so scary? And why was it happening now? I never had a problem with heights before.. Why? Why is this happening?! And why now?!

She wasn't afraid of heights before, in fact, she loved it! But now, looking down, the ground seemed to reach up and swallow her. Luna was hyperventilating. She couldn't stop staring at the ground. She couldn't bring up the courage to look away.

Luna reached her hands out until she felt the tree's trunk. Quickly, she wrapped her arms around the trunk and held it as tightly as she could.

"Luna?" Free called out. He saw Luna hug the tree and wondered why she was doing this.

"Free.." Luna started out, taking in deep breaths to calm herself "C-can we go somewhere else...?" She asked, finally mustering enough courage to glance up at Free, who was high above her.

"What do you mean, Luna?"

"I-I just don't think this is a good idea..." Luna panted, hugging the tree tighter.

Free frowned. He could see that Luna was afraid of heights, but he didn't want to go back down. It was night time and that meant that the night creatures and the Dark Numbers will be coming out soon. Hiding high up in the trees was the only way to ensure their safety.

"Sorry, Luna, but we can't. There's a tree house a couple more branches up. We'll stay there for the night and then you can explain who that Cloaked man is."

Luna sighed. She understood why they had to hide in the trees, but she still didn't like it "Free..can you carry me up there...?"

Free didn't question this. He flew down and picked Luna up bridal style, then began flying up as slowly and quietly as he could.

 After minutes of flying upwards, Free reached a tree house hidden in the tree's thick branches. It was a medium-sized tree house and it seemed like it had been there for quite some time.

The entry way, which was just a empty doorway in the wall, had a curtain hanging over it. A window was placed on either of the entry way.

Free landed on the small patio and gently put Luna down. She still held onto Free. The view from before still haunted Luna's mind and from so high up, Luna definitely did not want to fall.

"In here." Free ushered Luna inside, holding the curtain aside for her.

All over the interior of the tree house, a bunch of junk and knic knacs was piled everywhere in a careless. Everything was in disarray! It looked like the was place was never clean in the first place!

There was also a horrid smell that hung in the air. It made Luna want to empty her stomach over and over again!

Free didn't seemed bothered by the mess or the smell. He strolled around the tree house with a kind of confidence in his step.

He kicked some kind of do-hicky aside and pulled out two folding chairs out. He unfolded them and sat on one, patting the other one for Luna to sit.

Luna sat down, holdings her hands together as tightly as she could.  She sat up as straight as can be, trying to have perfect posture.

Free laughed at Luna "What are you doing?"

Luna thought about it for a while, but nothing came up. For some reason she felt nervous, but it wasn't like the nervousness she experienced when she was in some kind of danger, no. It was a different kind of nervous feeling.

'I-I don't know..." She finally answered

"Luna, you can relax!" Free chuckled "No one knows about this place, but me and you."

Hearing Free's careless words, Luna felt herself relax only a tad bit.

Free grinned from ear to ear ridiculously "Good! Now, smile! Like this, see?" He pointed at his own face, showing Luna his big, ridiculous smile.

Luna couldn't help but laugh. Free was so silly! He had some kind of effect on Luna. He made Luna feel like everything was okay and that nothing bad would happen again, plus he made her laugh and smile. He made her feel happy, a feeling Luna could not remember feeling.

When they stopped laughing, Free grew serious yet again. "So, who is that Cloak man?"

Luna frowned. Again, she didn't want to talk about the Cloaked man, but after what she went through with Free, she felt that she could at least give him an explanation to clear things up.

Luna took in a deep breath and held it in for a few seconds, then exhaled. She was ready. "The Cloaked man is a devious and malicious man. He's really strong and I guess in a way, he's my guardian."

Luna paused to let Free absorb that little piece of information before starting up again. "He does a lot of experiments so that one day he could create the perfect specimen that would fulfill his dream. I don't know what his dream is, though, and so far I'm his only successful experiment.

"I guess I should feel a little proud about that, but..." Luna suddenly choked up on her words, trying her best to prevent tears from falling. She felt all the pain from the past well up. All her pain was threatening to burst forth, but Luna didn't want to cry in front of Free. She didn't want to worry him.

Free scooted his chair closer to Luna and rubbed her back "Go on." He said gently

Luna found the strength to continue by Free's small words "It feels like it's more of a curse. Everyday the Cloaked man makes me go through all these kind of horrendous exercises and whenever I fail to pass he punishes me... Even when I haven't done anything wrong the Cloaked man still punishes me...!"

Luna finally let the tears go. Her tears were streaming down her face. It was like a small waterfall was coming from her eyes.

"I never asked for this! Why?! Why do I have to go through this? Why couldn't I have been a failure like all his other experiments?"

Free gave Luna a hug and comforted Luna as best as he could.

~Nightmare's POV (still Third Person POV, though . 3.)~

Nightmare was taking a normal stroll in a random direction when he saw two children running.

Because of the distance between them, he couldn't see the children quite well, but one of them did seem familiar. He stood there, watching the children as they ran. He felt suspicious of the children and an overwhelming desire to find out who they was took over.

Who is that...? Nightmare thought. The children were beginning to move out of view, so Nightmare ran after them as quietly as he could.

He kept a safe distance between them, but he could still not see their faces since it was night.

He took a right at an intersection, just as the two children did. The trees around the path blocked the moonlight, which made things hard to see,

Nightmare tripped over a root sticking out of the ground and fell with a soft thump. When he got back up, the two children were gone, out of sight.

"Dammit!" Nightmare swore softly. He leaned against a tree.

Where did they go? There's no way two kids can move that fast. They must be close. Nightmare got up and searched around him,

So far, there weren't any signs of the the two children, but this didn't frustrate him. He was used to finding things in the dark; this was no different.

Minutes later, he made it to a dead end in the path, Nightmare observed his surroundings and found a pair of footprints on the ground near a tree's trunk.

He examined these footprints. I bet these belong to one of those two kids I saw earlier He examined the footprints more, then heard something.

It was faint, but he could definitely hear it. It sounded like someone was crying and it was coming from above.

Nightmare glanced up. He couldn't see anything, but he knew there was something there.

Grabbing onto a branch, Nightmare began to climb the tree. The higher he got, the clearer and louder the cries became.

"Why do I  have to be the one the Cloaked man picks on? Why can't it be someone else?" Luna's voice yelled from above,

Nightmare nearly released the branch he was holing onto. LUNA!?!? Luna's here!?! Why's she here and why the hell is she crying!?

Nightmare quickened his pace and climbed the tree faster and faster until he saw the bottom of the tree house before him. "What the hell?"

"The Cloaked man is a jerk! I hate him! I hate every single inch of him!" Luna yelled through sobs from above.

Nightmare scowled "Hey! Why they hell are you crying, Luna?!" It was obvious that Nightmare was mad. He hated when people were crying! Not only was it pitiful, but it was just plain annoying!

People shouldn't cry unless they were happy and tears of joy coming out of their eyes! Nightmare did not like seeing people sad and he would certainly not accept Luna crying like this!

Luna and Free jumped at the sound of his voice. Hearing the voice, Luna already knew who the voice belonged to. Nightmare.

"N-nightmare...?" Luna asked

"Why the fuck are you crying!?" He sounded mad, no, he was absolutely livid.

Although Luna was fearful of people when they were angry, she felt reassured when she heard Nightmare's angry words. It was strange, but she was glad that Nightmare was here. Even if he was mad and yelling at her, Luna was happy nonetheless.

"I'll go get him." Free offered and flew out of the window.

Moments later, Free came back through the window and as soon as he did, Nightmare came barging through the entry way.

His mad gaze landed on Luna, who was still wiping her tears away. Nightmare's anger faded away when he saw Luna. Without even thinking, he ran to Luna and hugged her as tightly as he could.

"Who did it?! Who made you cry?!" Nightmare asked ferociously

Luna hugged Nightmare back and a huge wave of relief washed over her as she did. Luna didn't speak, she simply hugged Nightmare and let all the feelings she had been holding in out.

For the rest of that night, Luna cried and cried until all her locked up feelings were out. Afterwards, she felt as if a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders. It was a strange and foreign feeling to Luna, but she liked it. 

Nightmare was still awake, comforting Luna, while Free was sleeping on a makeshift bed made from  all that junk lying around.

When Luna's stopped sobbing, Nightmare held her at arm's lengths and smiled "Are you done?" He asked gently

Luna sniffed, then nodded her head. "Thank you..."

"Anytime, Luna." Nightmare said as he wrapped Luna in his arms again.

Luna snuggled into his arms. She felt safe and secure there. She felt happy. It was the same happiness that Free made her feel with his silly behavior. 

Just like with Free, Luna felt that if she stayed here, in Nightmare's arms or anywhere near him for that matter, she would be safe and all the bad things would go away.

But, unfortunately, doubt creeped in as soon as the feeling of security did. This would never last forever. This peacefulness and happiness that Luna felt would go away as soon as it had come and she knew it. She didn't want to admit it, but she knew the Cloaked man was coming back. He would come back and take Luna away and this blissful feeling would never come back nor will it be remembered.

A low rumbling sound snapped Luna from her thoughts. She looked around, wondering where that sound came from.

She closed her eyes and listened. The rumbling sound came again and again and again, but it didn't sound menacing. It sounded tired and serene.

Luna opened her eyes and realized that the low rumbling sound was coming from Nightmare. The young lad fell asleep with Luna in his arms and he was snoring, too!

Luna wiggled out of Nightmare's arms and laid his head on her lap. She watched him sleep, feeling a content and tranquil feeling run over her.

Why do I feel this way? And why now? Is it because of Nightmare and Free? Is it because I'm away from the Cloaked man? Or is it both? 

She asked herself these questions over and over again, but came up with no answers. Feeling that all these questions were useless, Luna gave up. She leaned back on a pile of junk and stared at the ceiling above her.

The whole ceiling was covered with a drawing of a strange, but majestic-looking creature. It was a four-legged creature with a long snout. Its wings were like her own, but a different color, and its blue eyes were reptilian. Scales of every color covered its long slender body and a tali with a sharp point at the end protruded out of its behind. The creature's neck had a long white mane flowing down.

The creature seemed to stare at Luna as though it was alive right in front of her. Luna stared back in awe, entranced by the creature's majestic and beauty. She didn't know why she was so drawn to the creature. To her it was just a drawing, but it felt like the drawing was alive right in front of her, trying to tell he something.

Moments later, it finally dawned on on her. This creature Luna was looking at before her was familiar in some way. Luna had seen this creature before, but where? And when? Luna searched the depths of her mind, but found nothing.

She sighed in disappointment. Everything was happening way too fast for her to process things. She was terrified, horrified, disgusted, and most importantly, confused. 

Why is the world so confusing? With that simple question in her mind, Luna fell asleep, hoping her dreams would wash away all her negative feelings.

Yayyy~ :D Nightmare is back~ X3

Mahalos nui loa for reading, commenting, and voting! ^^ May your days be filled with dreams, ya weirdos~