The Fanfiction Post-MU: Life's a Scream! has quite a number of Nightmare Fuel moments, with examples below:
Prologue:
- Like in the movie, Ms. Lawrence's fears when young Laura Sharp pulled a "Mike Wazowski" move to slip into a human child's bedroom (which was assigned to "Frightening" Frank Mc Cay instead of her father Fillmore Sharp) in the introduction to this Fanfiction. There is even the reference to Mike's little adventure in the prologue of Monsters University. The sheer fact that the entirety of the Scare Floor immediately mobilized with Monsters Incorporated Personnel running around with fire extinguishers, first-aid medical boxes, walkie-talkies, and panicked expressions on their faces can tell the readers exactly how SERIOUS this incident is. (which is just like "Mike Wazowski's" little adventure in the movie.) Fillmore Sharp's assistant even nearly called the Child Detection Agency (CDA) when the incident happened.
- To put it plainly, it's the monster equivalent of a human kid doing some death-defying stunt like jumping into a shark tank.
Chapter Four: Explosive Difficulties
- YOU DO NOT want to see Terry of the Perry Brothers angry. He delivers quite a brutal "Reason You Suck" Speech to Naomi Jackson of PNK in Chapter five, essentially ripping her to shreds verbally and stomping on her heart into a million pieces.
- His angry face also frightened off the Librarian, as in the massive kraken-like Librarian who tosses students out of the library literally at the slightest amount of noise, and she actually retreated in fear from the elder Perry Twin.
- Remember the pinkish poison urchins from the movie? In this Fanfiction, they have been upgraded by the MU Biology Department to become INCREDIBLY EXPLOSIVE. The results of being hit by the concentrated poison, as seen in Chapter four, aren't pretty.
- Laura having a panic attack on the spot when she found out that Colette was left behind in the explosive poison urchin sewer. The descriptive text of the whole scene, with the Oozma Kappa Fraternity members trying frantically to get her to breathe, gives people fear in the sense that she may need to be sent to the hospital.
Chapter Five: Heart Pains
- Laura Sharp giving Sulley a stern You Know What You Did speech when they were both alone in kitchen of the Oozma Kappa Fraternity House, calling him out on his arrogance and over-inflated sense of ego, as well as his disregard of fellow friends in the events of the film. Laura's hurtful yet truthful words during the whole scene was eventually made Sulley fall down on his knees and break into tears in front of her, begging her to believe he's a changed monster now.
- Luckily, Laura can see that he's changed and it was later revealed that she was only testing Sulley.
- The Cliffhanger at the end. The Perry twins get into an argument about Naomi Jackson which escalates to the point that Terry accidentally shatters the beaker of hydrofluoric acid they were working with in a science experiment which then splashes onto the Bunsen burner (and also themselves) which then EXPLODES!!
Chapter Six: Old Sufferings
- It has been mentioned that the CDA (Child Detection Agency) keeps an eye on everything happening around the monster world through a worldwide surveillance network which includes both visible and several hidden cameras. This means that they know what the government personnel and citizens are up to at any moment at any time. While this was presumably done to keep the monster world safe by quickly responding to potential threats, it is literally the Big Brother Is Watching trope taken up to eleven.
- Does this seem familiar? This example has shades of Captain America: The Winter Soldier coloured all over it.
- Mr and Mrs Carlton's reactions when they both heard that the Perry twins were hospitalised and in critical condition.
- Terry Perry's reaction to Johnny Worthington's insult to Mike and Sulley could be counted as Nightmare Fuel. He essentially loses his temper, gives Johnny a severe dressing-down in the form of a "Reason You Suck" Speech, and threatened to do him harm if Johnny EVER insults Mike and Sulley again.“And if you ever, I mean, ever talk about Mike or Sulley that way again...I will take you down!”...“You hear me? I will tear those stupid horns off...! Shove them under your tail...! Jab them in your eyes...!”
- Cliffhanger fun again. We're confronted with the possibility that Terry got his wish and now the Perry twins have been separated...possibly permanently.
Chapter Seven: Recollections and Infiltration
- Yet more Cliffhanger fun. We're confronted with the idea that Terri didn't make it out of surgery alive.
Chapter Eight: Causes and Consequences
- Even more Cliffhanger fun. Terry Perry, vaguely overhears someone saying whether to break the supposedly bad news to him.
Chapter Nine: Problems and Solutions
- Things got From Bad to Worse. The Perry twins suffered a nervous breakdown after ironically, a heartwarming flashback memory.
Chapter Nine and three quarters: Healing the Mind
- Small hints of Katy Mc Crea's past has been given by the author, which explicitly mentioned she expressed brooding emotions on a daily basis. What has happened to her previous life before coming to MU to cause that?
- Two simple words: Emotional Overspill. When Pyapi (a Troll Shaman) and Seya Sephira were healing Naomi's mind, a sensitive word spoken by one of the monsters inadvertently activated Naomi's subconscious to form some form of telepathic attack on every monster present. (Naomi was known to be most telepathically powerful of the PNK Sorority) The sensory overspill was so much that even Nadya, Carrie and Crystal were affected quite painfully. Thankfully though, Nadya managed to cut off the mind-link before any real damage was done, but we can see that a few seconds' worth of exposure gave every monster present severe headaches.
- Pyapi had even hinted that if proper action was not taken, the damage would have been far more severe. Sephira got the worse end of the deal as she was helping the Troll Shaman, resulting in high blood pressure and migraines.
Chapter Ten: Bittersweet Awakening
- All the nightmares (planted by Pyapi) the student body of MU suffer as punishment for mistreating OK. We don't see all of them but the ones we do see are terrifying with many focused on the twins dying and coming back as ghosts to punish the dreamer personally and the ones we don't see drive the dreamers to complete terror, even the brave and sturdy Big Red and Dirk. One can only wonder about the latter dreams...
- Do we have to even mention Johnny Worthington's personal nightmare? Carla in his dream left him to be contaminated by human children while he pleads for her help in vain, while calling him out on his Jerkass attitude.
- Also, Naomi has shown signs of being possibly suicidal due to her worsening mental condition and what she had suffered in the dream with the dead Perry twins. Since all the PNK Sorority sisters had a mental link to each other, it's reasonable to say that they all experienced that very same dream from Naomi's perspective. If Naomi were to commit suicide out of serious depression, it's possible they would feel the same emotional pain through the mental link they all shared...
- A Nothing Is Scarier example: what happened to the twins to force doctors to put them in separate bodies?!
Chapter Eleven: Return of the Twins Part I
- Imagine if you are either Terri or Terry Perry, and listening to the following news: You are going to need crutches in order to walk (as you cannot depend on your brother anymore), you need to recuperate for at least a week and a half more, you have new hands to get used to (not to mention a new body), and that's not mentioning the various medicines that you need to take to avoid infections and such.
- It has been hinted that Dean Hardscrabble has called up both the Hospital and CDA authorities to inquire about why the OK Fraternity aren't promised (and allowed) their visit to see the Perry twins. Judging from the current doctor's words, she might have used very harsh and strong language during those telephone conversations. We haven't seen Hardscrabble blowing her top before, but her Tranquil Fury state can pretty much speak for itself.
- A bit more of Katy's life before she came to MU has been hinted, and she haven't felt this relieved upon hearing the good news about the Perry twins since the day she left for MU. What has happened to her life to make her feel that way?
- Johnny has some Nightmare Fuel when Carla threatened to leave him forever even it's just to improve her sorority's relationship with Oozma Kappa. It was then revealed that she was his only friend among the various Fraternity and Sorority presidents since the day they have come to MU and risen through the ranks of respective sorority and fraternity, and she's the only one who know both the good and bad sides of him. It's also highly implied that Carla's on the verge of dumping Johnny should his behaviour remain the same in the future, as even she had enough of his Jerkass
attitude.- Bonus points for giving Johnny flashbacks to his nightmare in the previous Chapter, which was planted in his mind by Pyapi.
Chapter Thirteen: An Unforeseen Revelation
- The fact that the entire monster world has demoted history to an obscure novelty no one really bothers with is...unsettling.
- We now have confirmation that the headaches caused by the emotional overspill were a best-case scenario. Grand Pabble won't elaborate on worst case, but given hints in the chapter suggested that the consequences were probably too terrible to contemplate.
- Grand Pabble can inflict Laser-Guided Amnesia. Chew on that for a while.
- Nadya mentioned that she doesn't think Grand Pabble would do it even if he wanted to, but still...
- It's been revealed that in order for Naomi to recover, she'll need to reconcile with Terry and if that doesn't happen, she'll keep getting worse, with Driven to Suicide being a real possibility. Since Terry isn't really in a position to reconcile with Naomi due to his loathing of the PNK girls, not to mention the trauma of the accident and what Merida did to him, it's quite possible that there's a risk of him being responsible for someone else killing themselves; just imagine how badly he'd take that.
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