ok this is up to all i have for now, Nightmarionne requested by Toady

The Dog House’s engines still hummed in everyone’s ears as the Mission Five crew staggered back through the docks — salty, wired, tired — when the strike happened.

Scream. A silver flash. A shadow lunging. Kris went down like a puppet with a snapped string.

Kris (gasping, panicked):
“WH— WHY— WHO—”

A knife sank toward him.

DAMN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The shout tore through the night, an absurd, almost prophetic interruption — and the mole’s hand lost its grip. The blade clattered across concrete and slid into a drain.

Scoop Dog barreled forward like a cone of chaos, twin ice-cream blasts detonating from his hands — soft, sticky projectiles that hit the mole’s torso and froze the attacker mid-lurch.

Scoop Dog (yelling):
“ICE CREAM BLAST! GET FLATTERED, FOUL MAN!”
(he fired another barrage, scoops denting armor, slowing movement)

Vadrina was already there — silent, swift. She fell on the frozen figure, claws ripping at a cloak.

Vadrina (cold, ripping):
“Who the hell—”

The cloak came away.

Beneath it: CassieLyn. Dead-eye calm. A ritual’s shadow on her palms.

Cassie (flat, almost bored):
“Well. This sucks.”

She didn’t scream. She didn’t plead. She flicked her fingers twice, tracing archaic sigils that hung like steel in the air.

Pale King froze mid-command on the radio, crown tilted.
Pale King: “Cassie? You— that’s impossible.”

Cassie (eyes blank, voice small):
“Not impossible. Necessary.”

Chains—black, writhing like living iron—shot from the sigils. They snaked across the dock like vipers and slammed around Kris and Vadrina both.

Kris (struggling):
“No— no chains—!”
(his voice cut off as the bindings tightened; his eyes went wide, then glassy)

Vadrina’s reflexes were instantaneous. She twisted, slashed, tore the chain from her own limb with a savage snap; metal shrieked, sparks flew. She wrenched free and threw Cassie backward — fierce, animal.

Vadrina (spitting):
“You will not take me.”

But Kris was not so lucky. The chains constricted too fast, the ritual too precise. His legs folded. No theatrics — suddenly he was still.

Kris (last, weak):
“...I’m s—”
(gone)

The dock fell into an ugly silence.

Scoop Dog swore, a high spray of cones and confetti. Endogeny let out a low, confused whine and nosed the frozen body with solemn curiosity. SpongeBob pressed both hands to his mouth, eyes huge.

SpongeBob (sobbing):
“No no no no— Kris— you weren’t supposed to— we were supposed to—”

Rewrite was already moving, face a mask of fury and delight mixed.
Rewrite: “Well. That escalated. Dammit, Cassie. You had to pick the freakin’ puppet, didn’t you?”

Big D Randy snarled, fists clenching.
Big D Randy: “Who the— Who messes with a muppet?! Where’d the blade go?!”

Diolson clicked and whirred, phone-head dialing through a hundred recordings in a beat.
Diolson (mechanical): “V1olation: INTRUDER ID: recent access token: physical proximity confirmed. Perpetrator identity: CassieLyn. Motive: unknown. ACTION: lockout attempt failed.”

Cassie’s eyes were empty when they met Vadrina’s.
Cassie (still soft, a voice like frost): “You all… didn’t notice? The mole wanted you distracted. I finished the job.”

Then she vanished.

One blink — a ripple in the air, a peel of shadow — and she was gone. The sigils winked out. The last echo of routine and rasp left on the salt air. No scream, no chase; only the residue of a ritual and a dock that smelled like copper and old ice cream.

Vadrina dropped to her knees beside Kris, tearing at the chains with shaking hands, but it was already too late. Her fury became a quiet, grinding thing.

Vadrina (voice strangled):
“No. No— Kris— I’ll— I’ll—”
(she didn’t finish; the sob was a low animal sound)

Tiger Cub arrived like a weather front, ears flat, tiny claws clicking on metal. She took one look and — for a heartbeat — she was small and furious in the way only she could be.

Tiger Cub (ice-laced, furious):
“Cassie. You traitorous— You —”

She stopped. She didn’t order a replacement. She didn’t bawl. She looked to the crowd with a tiny, dangerous smile and said:

Tiger Cub: “Alright. New policy: replacement zones are open.”

Lace sauntered in seconds later — always on cue — pale silk rumpled like a dancer’s cloak, pin glinting. She sniffed the air and produced a soft, delighted clap.

Lace (amused):
“Ohhh, murder in the moonlight. How quaint. And how inconvenient.”

She flicked a remote on her wrist. A little capsule thunked to the concrete from somewhere unseen. It cracked open with an oily hiss.

Lace (pouting, theatrical):
“You're all so dramatic. Fine. A new toy for the broken parts.”

The capsule unfolded like a black bloom and a tall, needle-limbed shape stepped out. It moved like shadow stitched through a music box.

Ńi͏g͜h̕t́m̶a̴r̷i̕o̵n͘n̷e̴ blinked — or whatever served for blinking on that mask — and a distorted, glitched whisper squirmed out across the dock in a wave of Zalgo-static:

N͜i̵g̡h̨t̕m͝a͞r̴i̸ǫn̷n̴e̕ (s̡p̸e̛a̷k̨i̷n͠g):
“H̵̡e̴̶l̸͡l̸̢o͏… ̶c̢h̷i̶l͡d́r̶e̸̴n… ̶s̕o͝m͞ęo͝n̛e ̨w̵a̕n̵t̴s ̛t͞o ̴ḱi͏l̷l̢?̶”

(translation unnecessary — the music-box footsteps and the glitching punctuation carried meaning all their own.)

Lace (to Nightmarionne, casual):
“You’re programmed: don’t kill unless someone asks for you to. Be theatrical, be cruel, be a nightmare, but don’t end lives unless told.”

Ńi͏g͜h̕t́m͝a͞r̴i̸ǫn̷n̴e̕ (glitch-voice, amused):
“Y̨e͠ś. I̸ ̛w̨ìl͜l͡ b͠é… ̛p̴a̴t͞i͏e̷n̶t́.”

It swayed, a warped marionette; its fingers — three to each hand — curled and left thin, black scratches across the concrete like notes on a stave.

Lace (shrugging):
“Do what you want. Don’t be boring.”

Toy Freddy stood a few feet away, mechanical eyes reflecting the dock’s lights. He watched Kris’s body with a small, robotic tilt of the head. He played a tiny, melancholy melody on a built-in music box — a refrain so out of tune it made people flinch.

Toy Freddy (softly):
“I don’t know how to… fix people.”

Bibliox, clutching a soggy book, whispered to no one in particular:
“Mum-mumble… replacement… page-turn. Who gets a bookmark now? Who gets a footnote?”

Herbert — gone. The memory of his ceiling-flight still glared in the rafters.

Dijital, who had earlier rage-quit, skid back into the room at the sound of the commotion, eyes wild behind his digital fur.
Dijital: “WTF! What happened? Who stabbed who?!”

Endogeny nudged Kris’s body, then sat down with a heavy, hollow thud; it looked like a creature trying to grieve in a language with no words.

SpongeBob vomited a squeal of grief and anger and then flung himself at the body, hugging Kris like a sponge that wanted to never let go. He hiccuped.
SpongeBob: “No! Don’t leave! Kris! Don’t—”

Big D Randy sank down on a crate, face gone flat for the first time.
Big D Randy: “Why are the good weirdos always the ones who get cut down first? This is— this is messed up.”

Madame Odius watched from the shadowed edge, eyes like knives.
Madame Odius (softly): “Chaos is a tool. Predictable responses make it useful.”

Jotaro simply folded his arms and stared at the place Cassie had vanished. His jaw worked once. He didn’t speak.

Diolson activated a recording loop, fingers clacking as he pieced together the timeline: the fall, the interruption, the ice-cream shots, the cloak tear, the ritual spike.
Diolson: “TIMELINE: 00:23:41 — blade drop. 00:23:43 — ice-cream freeze. 00:23:44 — cloak removed. 00:23:45 — ritual activation. 00:23:46 — victim deceased. 00:23:47 — Cassie: disappeared.”

Rewrite (sardonic): “She pulled the vanishing trick and left like she’d been late for tea. Cold.”

Vadrina (breathing, raw):
“She’s the mole. She’s been the mole. How many times does she get to look like she’s on our side?”

Kaibi (quiet):
“We suspected some earlier. This confirms at least one traitor acted on our people.”

Tiger Cub (small, measured):
“Cassie is gone. Kris is dead. That’s on her.”

She paused, then turned to Lace and Nightmarionne, who stood as if the world’s shadows had always been their second skin.

Tiger Cub (slow):
“Fine. Nightmarionne stays. But under two conditions: one, you are watched; two, if you kill without being asked, you’re shredded into spare parts. Understand?”

Nightmarionne’s music-box steps creaked as it lurched forward, head cocked. The Zalgo whisper surfaced like breath over a well:

Ńi͏g͜h͕t̡m̵a̕r̴i͘o͘n̴n̷e̷ (glitched, soft):
“ơb͏èy ͡t͠o̷ ̸y̵òu̶r ͢w̨i͞s͝h̵s̷… ̧ǫr̨ ̡b͏e͏ ͝s̴a͢d͜.”

No one laughed.

Skrunkly padded up to the rim, tiny feathers drenched in a consoling puddle.
Skrunkly (small): “We should float Kris in water. Water is… quiet.”

Pale King watched the new creature with a scholar’s eye.
Pale King: “Interesting. A puppet of nightmares, bound by contract. Useful. Terrifying.”

Tiger Cub (final, cold little purr):
“Lock down the docks. Lock Cassie’s files. Nobody touches evidence. We bury Kris properly. We put the ones who fell where they belong. And then we find every place Cassie ever touched.”

Rewrite (leaning forward):
“And when we find her?”

Tiger Cub (tilt of head):
“You do what you do best. Invent suffering.”

A thousand tiny, furious voices filled the docks — anger, grief, vows, threats.

Toy Freddy hummed an off-key lullaby in the corner, impassive, while Nightmarionne turned, music-box footsteps fading, and walked into the base as if none of the bodies on the dock mattered.

Nightmarionne (soft):
“s̴h̷a̸l͢l̀ ̨wę ̛p̴l̴a̴y̡?”

burning markiplier