"I know. I know," said Dipper and his eyes narrowed as he thought about the welt on his leg. It still throbbed. "I know it's serious. One of them tried to go after Sam and I and --"
And he didn't have a way of articulating how traumatic that had been, those few horrible moments stolen by a Yellow Lantern that no one else saw. All of a sudden, it wasn't fun or funny anymore, but what Dipper said definitely didn't demonstrate the kind of change in attitude they were probably hoping for.
"They should be the ones that are afraid. They deserve it."
It wasn't just hate that he felt and that was why it wasn't a red ring that found him the way one had found Sam. No, he wanted them to feel fear. He wanted them to feel powerless.
That was why a yellow ring zipped onto his finger. An explosion from the fight obscured part of what the ring said.
[--PINES, OF EARTH. YOU HAVE THE ABILITY TO INSTILL GREAT FEAR. WELCOME TO THE SINESTRO CORPS.]
For a moment, the yellow and green rings battled each other.
[CONFLICTING EMOTIONAL RESONANCE REGISTERED.]
[CONFLICTING EMOTIONAL RESONANCE REGISTERED.]
He could feel them both, fighting over him. Willpower versus fear. The power to defend versus the power to intimidate, the power to hold power over others. But the yellow whispered louder. It said:
"You don't have to ever feel powerless again. You can hurt the people trying to hurt you and everyone else. You can make them afraid -- the way things like Bill always try to make you afraid."
Yellow light flickered in Dipper's eyes as the ring stoked the fires of his own natural aggression -- rarely ever expressed -- and made them burn brighter. The kind of righteous hate he reserved only for monsters like Bill Cipher filled his heart and along with it came the delight he felt anytime he'd heard a tremor of uncertainty in Bill's voice.
Yes, this ring was better. Why fight it? So far, a couple of his teammates had looked at him as if he was strange, as if his constructs were scary. Too much. Something to dial back. But why? They were working. Fear was working. And fear was something he understood from all the times he'd felt it himself. He knew how powerful it was. Now he could use their power and turn it against them.
He could fight fire with fire.
[DESIRE TO CAUSE FEAR OVERRIDING WILLPOWER. TARGET SENTIENT REJECTED. SECTOR SCAN FOR REPLACEMENT INITIATED.]
The green ring left his finger and flew away. The yellow light spread over Dipper, giving his costume yellow accents instead of green ones. Yellow light quickly replaced all his constructs before they could fully fade, keeping his prisoners still trapped. Dipper looked up at Hal and Hiccup, his eyes glowing yellow.
"There's nothing wrong with disturbing as long as the right people are being disturbed."
The construct monsters didn't go away or dial down -- they only changed color and got more horrifying, springing more limbs and teeth and claws and parts they didn't need. They swarmed the reds and yellows, scattering them, sending them flying away screaming even more. The way his constructs were attacking them made it clear that even though he was using a yellow ring, too, he wasn't holding back just because they had the same color.
"I'm tired of feeling like I'm some kind of weirdo just because I happen to be comfortable with scary things. All of you would be comfortable with them too if you'd seen the things I've seen, if you lived through the end of the world the way I did --"
His fighting got more and more vicious, coming dangerously close to causing damage he couldn't come back from causing.
"-- If you had to do it without any powers, without being a superhero, without having a dragon, without having any way of really fighting back. If you had to do it all as just a scared, powerless kid. I don't need to reign anything in, what I'm doing is working. None of you understand that because you don't know what it's like to feel that kind of fear. You don't know how powerful it is."
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And he didn't have a way of articulating how traumatic that had been, those few horrible moments stolen by a Yellow Lantern that no one else saw. All of a sudden, it wasn't fun or funny anymore, but what Dipper said definitely didn't demonstrate the kind of change in attitude they were probably hoping for.
"They should be the ones that are afraid. They deserve it."
It wasn't just hate that he felt and that was why it wasn't a red ring that found him the way one had found Sam. No, he wanted them to feel fear. He wanted them to feel powerless.
That was why a yellow ring zipped onto his finger. An explosion from the fight obscured part of what the ring said.
[--PINES, OF EARTH. YOU HAVE THE ABILITY TO INSTILL GREAT FEAR. WELCOME TO THE SINESTRO CORPS.]
For a moment, the yellow and green rings battled each other.
[CONFLICTING EMOTIONAL RESONANCE REGISTERED.]
[CONFLICTING EMOTIONAL RESONANCE REGISTERED.]
He could feel them both, fighting over him. Willpower versus fear. The power to defend versus the power to intimidate, the power to hold power over others. But the yellow whispered louder. It said:
"You don't have to ever feel powerless again. You can hurt the people trying to hurt you and everyone else. You can make them afraid -- the way things like Bill always try to make you afraid."
Yellow light flickered in Dipper's eyes as the ring stoked the fires of his own natural aggression -- rarely ever expressed -- and made them burn brighter. The kind of righteous hate he reserved only for monsters like Bill Cipher filled his heart and along with it came the delight he felt anytime he'd heard a tremor of uncertainty in Bill's voice.
Yes, this ring was better. Why fight it? So far, a couple of his teammates had looked at him as if he was strange, as if his constructs were scary. Too much. Something to dial back. But why? They were working. Fear was working. And fear was something he understood from all the times he'd felt it himself. He knew how powerful it was. Now he could use their power and turn it against them.
He could fight fire with fire.
[DESIRE TO CAUSE FEAR OVERRIDING WILLPOWER. TARGET SENTIENT REJECTED. SECTOR SCAN FOR REPLACEMENT INITIATED.]
The green ring left his finger and flew away. The yellow light spread over Dipper, giving his costume yellow accents instead of green ones. Yellow light quickly replaced all his constructs before they could fully fade, keeping his prisoners still trapped. Dipper looked up at Hal and Hiccup, his eyes glowing yellow.
"There's nothing wrong with disturbing as long as the right people are being disturbed."
The construct monsters didn't go away or dial down -- they only changed color and got more horrifying, springing more limbs and teeth and claws and parts they didn't need. They swarmed the reds and yellows, scattering them, sending them flying away screaming even more. The way his constructs were attacking them made it clear that even though he was using a yellow ring, too, he wasn't holding back just because they had the same color.
"I'm tired of feeling like I'm some kind of weirdo just because I happen to be comfortable with scary things. All of you would be comfortable with them too if you'd seen the things I've seen, if you lived through the end of the world the way I did --"
His fighting got more and more vicious, coming dangerously close to causing damage he couldn't come back from causing.
"-- If you had to do it without any powers, without being a superhero, without having a dragon, without having any way of really fighting back. If you had to do it all as just a scared, powerless kid. I don't need to reign anything in, what I'm doing is working. None of you understand that because you don't know what it's like to feel that kind of fear. You don't know how powerful it is."