I do believe this is the lowest one can get. The characters were stolen from Jhonen Vasquez. The story was stolen from Charles Dickens. Even a large fraction of the dialogue was stolen. Whatever. As the saying goes, writers are liars. On that scale, I'm an amazing writer.

Naturally because of his severe insomnia, Johnny wasn't sleeping when the first ghost

arrived. Nor was he reading, pissing, juggling, or bargaining. He was pacing around his

filthy living room, wondering if he had fallen asleep and dreamt that the ghost of Jimmy

had visited and talked to him. He kept at his pacing until it was 1:00. At that exact

time, a shrill scream was heard from the basement, like a poor substitute for a bell.

Johnny's ears perked up at the sound. He finally stopped his pacing and stared at the

basement entrance. He could see a small light coming from it. A small, levitating light.

The light slowly floated towards him, until he could see a familiar figure inside the light.

A familiar, long-eared, body-lacking figure. "Nailbunny…" Johnny whispered.

"Hello, Nny. It's been a while since my severed head has floated alongside you, hasn't

it?" Its voice had a downhearted tone to it, almost as if he was unhappy to peer upon the

young homicidal maniac.

"Yeah…" Nny replied. "You're glowing,"

"The light you see upon my fragile bunny head is the denied truth of mankind. The glow

is symbolic," Nailbunny sighed. "I'm going to take you on a life changing journey to

your past. You're about to embark on a mission of self discovery; You'll revisit

important moments that have made you are today." Nailbunny considered this. "Well,

important recent moments that is. Things that you remember. We'll save the unveiling of

your mysterious past for another time."

Nny furrowed his brow, turning to his small bunny companion. "Fuck," he said simply,

"Fuck whatever god, person, or devil sent you and that ignorant little tick of a ghost; if

you are my real voice as you claimed to be, you should know that I am far beyond

redemption."

He stared into the little dead bunny's eyes, swearing that he could see a flicker of sadness

in them.

"Were you or were you not the one who stuck that label of 'your voice' on me? For all

you know, I could be a guardian angel in bunny form."

Nny pondered this for a moment.

"Or I could be another figment induced by crippling insanity. Or maybe I'm the

Energizer Bunny. I just keep going and going and going…"

"You know, I don't remember you ever being silly." Johnny stated, staring at the specter

skeptically.

"Yes, I know." The bunny replied. "I'm sorry. Sometimes I just turn into another

character. It's like someone else is writing my dialogue, only doing a poor job of it.

Anyway, it's time for you to view the shadows of your recent past. So, it's time. Look

over there!"

"What?" Johnny quickly looked behind him. All he saw was the cracked wall of his

slummy home. Damn, Nailbunny was acting immature. He groaned and turned his glance

back towards the bunny. What he saw nearly made him throw-up his previously devoured

brainfreezy.

"Why are people so…unpleasant?" A very familiar voice questioned. Johnny saw that he

was in his basement. It was different though. Something was different about the basement

he was in…

"I don't know," Another man replied. This one was trapped in a menacing machine.

Johnny remembered him.

"Edgar?" Johnny whispered in awe.

"It is." Nailbunny replied, hovering at his shoulder. "Edgar Vargas, that pleasant young

man you met so long ago…" Nailbunny considered what he'd just said. "Well, I guess

not that long ago." Nailbunny gave Johnny a hard stare. "You remember what you did

don't you?"

"Yes…" Johnny sighed, glumly watching the familiar situation take place.

"I would rather not die, but I don't seem to have much say in the matter. But I'm also not

like you; I'm not clouded…" A shiver ran through Johnny's skinny body as he heard this.

"I have no family, no friends really: nothing. But I do have faith; you know, God and all

that. A heaven for me and a hell for you. So fuck fear." Johnny closed his eyes. "I have

nothing to fear."

"I envy your conviction…" Johnny recited along with his former self. He opened his eyes

and watched as he flipped the switch, watched as Edgar was torn apart.

"Why did you murder him Johnny?" Nailbunny asked innocently. "He seemed like a nice

man. You could have been friends. He could have helped you."

"I needed to feed the wall, remember?" Johnny muttered, staring at the bloody floor.

Seeing these things all over again made him feel uncomfortable. "I needed his blood."

"There are so many others out there," Nailbunny replied. "You always rant about how

many worthless people are running about, taking up space. Why not use one of them?"

Johnny said nothing. He couldn't find an answer to that one.

"We must move on ." Nailbunny grimly stated. "Shut your eyes."

Johnny shut his eyes, although relunctantly. Upon opening them, with Nailbunny's

permission of course, he saw that he was standing outside of the old movie theater. The

large sign above the entrance read "KAFKA". Two vaguely familiar people departed

from the theater, one looking annoyed, and one looking annoying.

"Man! Can you believe that guy sitting alone in front of us? God! He must've told us to

be quiet like ten times! We were probably disturbing his masturbation or something." The

male snarled. Johnny definitely remembered him.

Johnny scowled. "If you think you can possibly make me feel ANY remorse for flushing

out that piece of human sewage, than you are a very mistaken phantom bunny."

"Maybe he was just trying to watch the movie." The female responded, almost

mumbling.

"She seems nice enough though," Nailbunny observed.

"Hey look at that fat girl!"

Nailbunny stared at the ground, as though he were, believe it or not, embarrassed. He

wished he had skipped part of this shadow. "Ignore that outburst. That woman is

generally a good person."

"True," Johnny tried not to smirk at the bunny's blunder. "But I didn't kill her."

"No you didn't," Nailbunny looked up. "You did however kidnap her, lock her in that

vile basement for several months, force her to watch the torture of her horrible friend, and

caused her to be chased up several flights of stairs by that hideous demon from the wall.

That was bad."

Johnny looked down, once again, at a loss of words.

"We've more to see…" Nailbunny turned to Nny. "Close your eyes,"

Johnny shut his eyes. He wondered what was happening. Where were they going?

"NO PEEKING!" Nailbunny shouted, and Nny shut his eyes, all the way this time.

"Open…" Johnny opened his eyes. He was in the old bookstore he used to always visit.

He used to come here at least once a week. He'd buy one book each time, usually a cheap

one, one he wasn't really interested in. Other times he'd buy petty things like notebooks

and candy. His purchases were all merely excuses to stand in line and get a chance to talk

to the clerk.

"Hey Nny," Devi said warmly, as she ran up the puppy calendar Johnny had randomly

picked out.

"Hello Devi," the old Johnny replied shyly, smiling a bit. Johnny had always loved that

bookstore. "Working on any new paintings?" He tried to sound casual.

"Actually yeah," Devi said enthusiastically. "I just started one a few days ago. It's

turning out pretty well." Devi smiled at Johnny. "You should see it." She seemed to be

hinting something at him when she said this.

He looked at the floor. "Um...Sounds great." He took his bag and receipt. "I guess I'll see

you later."

Devi looked a little disappointed at this. "Yeah. Bye Nny…"

"There's more to this mirage," Nailbunny stated. Johnny shut his eyes. When he opened

them, they were back at his house.

"I really enjoyed tonight Nny; really. We should've done this sooner! Why didn't we do

this sooner? I mean, we've known each other for what, about three months now? And this

is the first time we've actually been out together! What would you have done if I had

never asked you out?"

"No…" Johnny thought. Anything but this…

"I would have been happy just to go to the bookstore and see you there. I always like

doing that." Johnny really wished that was all he had done.

"Nailbunny I get it…" Johnny pleaded. "Can we just stop here. I'd really rather not relive

this experience. Please."

"No Johnny, you need this."

"But I see your point. It would be useless for me to watch this. I understand already."

"You don't. No be quiet." Nailbunny hushed.

"Yes! Don't let the beautiful moon set! Capture it! Freeze it! Forever in time with never

the memory of losing it to another day!"

"Nny? Oh there you…are…Nny? Nny what are you doing?"

"Immortalizing the moment…"

Johnny shamefully watched it happen all over again; the event that was replayed most

often in his mind, in his memory. He began to breathe again when Devi finally left him

twitching on the floor in a bloody heap. He was far from relieved however.

"I'm a monster…" He whispered, hanging his head.

"You're not a monster." Nailbunny's tone changed. "However, you are running down

that path at a rapid pace. You're bound to fall at any second. You're sill human Nny. You

are a confused, tortured human."

Johnny sighed. "How do I lead away from that path?"

"That isn't for me to answer. Shut your eyes once again. We must return. The second

spirit will arrive shortly."

And just like that they were back at the house. Johnny searched for Nailbunny, but the

rabbit had vanished. It was almost 2 o'clock.

Well, I did it. I finally updated this thing. I really want this fic to be a good one, so I'm taking much more time with this one than my other fics. Hopefully it won't take me so long to write Staves 3, 4, and 5. This one's pretty much planned out. I can't wait to write Stave 4. I don't know if anyone's picked up on this, but I'm trying to write this the same way as Charles Dicken's did. He wrote them in staves, as am I. At the beginning, he also took up several paragraphs explaining the fact that Marley was dead (JIMMY IS DEAD!). I probably won't do anymore little things like that, since it's been a while since I've read the book. Hellama Tamer helped out with this chapter. Any non-Jhonen line in this that sounds poetic at all is hers. I really hope this fic seems somewhat serious. I'm terrible at writing serious stories, so this is my attempt to get past that. Review please, constructive criticism is GREATLY appreciated.