It was an ordinary day on the Positive side of the kingdom. Though there was a quaint dark little thrift shop that was filled with things from the Negatives' side. It was filled with all sorts of mystical items. From creepy and unique antiques to right down to tarot cards. It had it all. If a Metaphysical store married an Antique show, their child would be this Thrift Shop. Otherwise known as "The Raven's Nest." And just like the store, the owner was equally dark, gloomy, and had a mysterious beauty to them. 

This person was named Raven Winchester. Long black straight hair, midnight blue eyes, and a pale reflection that could rival a vampire. She had dark makeup skillfully painted on her face, painted black nails, and had this dark version of a gypsy's outfit on that made her more curvy and appealing to customers. And honestly to her, it was comfy and expressed her personality more.

But she was currently dealing with a dilemma. She was having a drought in terms of customers. Apparently some stuffy Positives won't even go near her store. Saying it was ABOVE them. She just merely gave them the bird and then slam the door in their faces. Not the most ideal approach for a business practice. But it was her store, so it was fine. It's not like she physically assaulted them. Yet. Still…

"Uggggghhhhh!!!!!" She slumped over the counter. "I need to pay my bills soon and these pricks aren't making this easy!" Not that they ever gave her a break.

As she was muddling over her options. The front door rang with a mystic chime signalling a customer. She visibly perked up and straightened herself out. But once she saw who it was she visibly deflated.

"Oh, YOU'RE, here." She muttered at the tall brunette male that, to the ordinary eye, was just a normal bystander. When in reality he was the one giving and dealing with multiple of assassin contracts for her to do. A manager of sorts. His name was David Crutch. 

You see, in order to deal with her income and the occasional negativity fits she would have. She did the side business of a secret assassin that would make the killings look like either an accident or suicide. As long as she only killed cheaters, scam artists, and other unpleasant people. She didn't care. As long as she didn't ruin or kill happy families or friends and such. She made that abundantly clear to David and he respected her morals for being a Negative.

"My, my, don't sound so happy to see me." He replied sarcastically before going serious. "There's a new job request for you, Raven. They want you to kill the Guardian of positivity himself." He said the last part in a hushed tone. Even though they were alone. It didn't mean that they weren't being listened to. "Will you do it?" He asked warily. 

Raven looked shocked but at the same time wasn't surprised. Amongst the Black Market there have been rumors of an underground mafia that had illegally settled in both kingdoms and that they wanted both Guardians dead. And to keep their hands clean and take over the kingdom they were going to hire the best of the best of assassin's to kill them off. 

'I guess they're deciding to target King Dream first.'

She huffed as if she was being sent on a chore.

'And apparently I fit their quota'

She looked David in the eyes. "One. What're they offering? Cuz I'm not doing this if it weren't for my while. Second. Am I the only one? Or are others joining me? If so, regardless of it being solo or not, you KNOW that I have to keep my disguise."

"One," David replied unflinching, "You will be getting 15% of the treasures that he has. Second, you as far as I am aware are going solo." He concluded, waiting with an impatient tap of his foot.

Raven thought about it. At first she was going to decline. But then she thought of all the problems she's had since she was a kid with all of the stuffy Positives had given her and made her life a living Hell. And out of all that time, their Kings chose nothing to deal with this. But then again, if she killed the King, then it would either ruin this world or start another war of sorts. Neither outcome was good. 

But then an idea struck her. She didn't have to kill the King. Just make it LOOK like the job was done. That way she would get the money and possibly stop a Mafia takeover. And she had the right resources for it to work. 

She told this to David but not with some hesitation and sparing some details. Like how she was going to do it. To say he was a bit surprised and worried was a bit of an understatement. 

"I kinda fig-WHAT? Really?" He toned himself down quickly, as not to be heard. "You're seriously gonna do it?" 

"Well… sort of…" she nervously stated.

He narrowed his eyes. "Sort of..? You know what, I'm not even going to ask. Just.. whatever you are going to do, be careful. I can't lose my best assassin." He sighed, running his fingers through his hair. 

She chuckled. And went into the backroom where she had her more advanced items. She knew through experiences of how to make a semi deadly concoction of herbal poisons that could put someone in a near death state. But not kill. Just symptoms of an extreme flu and delirium. She didn't want to put him through Hell with this. But this is the only way that she can send the message that something was wrong in the kingdom. 

After she crafted her poison, she took some additional items to make the wax symbol of the gang that infested the Black Market. Maybe his brother could look into the mark. It was that of an open mouthed serpent being held by the base of its head. They called themselves The Venom Fists. She of course made an antidote for the poison to end sooner. She just had to make the fake ransom note with the seal on it in order to frame the gang. 

Once everything was set up, it was already the beginning of night. She then got dressed in her dark outfit, cloak and black skeleton mask to cover her face. (Oh the irony). She locked up her shop and took off her way throughout the almost dark empty streets. 

She finally neared the beginning of the woods that surrounded the castle. She narrowed her gaze behind her mask, thinking. She decided to follow beside the common trail to the front entrance but still hid in the cover of the trees. 

Once she saw the front entrance with very tough looking guards. She speedily and stealthily moved through the forest surrounding the walls, looking for a weak spot that she could find. And after 45 minutes of circling through the woods like a mountain lion. She managed to find a back entrance with only one guard. She guessed it was an entrance for the supplies for cooking or such. 

She saw how tired the guard was seeing as how he kept dozing off into space. She dug through her bag and quietly but quickly rolled a special smoke bomb that quickly put the guard into a deep sleep. But she knew that wouldn't last very long. So she stealthily ran in but was careful on where she stepped in which room. 

She stepped through what appeared to be a kitchen and on the wall appeared to have a meal schedule planned for both kings. She saw an oversized fridge and easily found the meal that she needed to poison for Dream. She took out her syringe filled with dark purple liquid. The needle was small enough to go unnoticed when injecting it into the food. Surprisingly it didn't look like it made the food suspicious. She then slid it back in the fridge and through some trial and error, finally made it back out the castle and back to her home without being seen by any guards or any bystanders. All she had to do now was wait.

-----------------

Dream came to the dining hall in his usual perky fashion, greeting all his friends and custodians as he always did along the way. Nightmare wasn't far behind, limbs dragging because at the moment, like most moments, he hated the world. And waking up. He grumbled his own version of good mornings, usually using a threat or ten. They sat on opposing ends of the table so Dream's positivity couldn't affect Nightmare that badly and Nightmare's negativity couldn't affect Dream's positivity. It was also to keep the peace between their friends/companions. Nightmare preferred companions. Dream preferred friends, but I digress. 

Their meals were served not too long after the brothers came down, while waiting they discussed affairs on their side of the kingdom. At the moment, it was Dream's turn. "there seems to be a bit of.. restlessness among the people. nothing i can't handle myself of course!" He assured in case Nightmare was actually worried. Sometimes it was hard for him, even if he was the Guardian of positivity. Nightmare grunted. "of course you can." Was he being sarcastic? Nobody could tell. "well there's a thief bothering my side. it's annoying." He sighed heavily. It was then that the meals were served. 

"thank you!" Dream chirped. "i'm sure this will taste amazing!" 

"or like shi-"

"not at the table nightmare!" The king of nightmares grumbled and took a bite of his own meal. It wasn't the worst. He wouldn't call it good either though. "just as i thought! delicious!" Dream praised while Nightmare rolled his eye. What a liar. "i can practically read your mind, brother, i'm not lying. this is good." 

"then your taste buds suck." He scoffed. Dream sighed. "i'm not getting into another fight with you over breakfast. let's just finish up and…" 

"and?" Nightmare quirked a goopy brow. "huh.. i can't remember." Dream looked confused. What'd he been saying? Nightmare found it a tad weird, his brother's memory was usually better than that. He'd expected that from Ink, not Dream. Maybe it was just a bad night's rest or something. "you were saying we should finish up."

"finish up what?" Ok, that had Nightmare's attention. "dream, are you ok?" 

"i feel kinda sick, actually.." Nightmare tensed. Poison? "Blue, Ink, get him to a bathroom, boys bring me the people that served and cooked his breakfast. we need to have a… chat." 

After several denials of having done anything to Dream's food, Nightmare and the boys went to security. "check it all. we need to find who's responsible for this." Nightmare hissed as he started going through last night's footage. They needed to know if this poison has been happening over a long course of time or just over night. Then something or SOMEONE caught his eye. "you. there you are." His voice had went dark and echoey as it had been before the universe was reborn. It'd normalized since, but when he was pissed, it came back. The others in the room flinched. "f-found something boss..?" Dust asked nervously. "that," He pointed at the dark clad figure, "that is what we are looking for." They nodded, Horror bringing up a valid point that Nightmare didn't want to hear. "we can't tell anything from that, boss." 

"find them!" He roared, not caring that Horror was right. They all scrambled to escape before they became targets to their boss' fury.