You've chosen to stay and apologize! If this isn't the decision you wanted, feel free to return to Chapter 20!
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The story you are about to read was written by Pride, SuperNerdsCosplay

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Roman took a deep breath in. Patton smiled kindly at him. "What's up kiddo? You look like you want to say something."

Roman frowned. "I just... I wanted to tell you how deeply sorry I am for what I said to you this morning. It was very unprincely of me and I regret it so much. Can you forgive me?"

Patton's smile fell a bit. "Of course I can forgive you, kiddo! I didn't even think that the news Thomas had received would affect you like it did. Honestly, I shouldn't have taken it to heart. You were upset. I can't blame you for Thomas not being in a stable mood."

"Thanks, Padre." There was silence for a moment and the others outside wondered what was going on for a brief second. "What about the others? They all said some things that they didn't mean, including Deceit."

"I... none of them are here themselves to apologize. Why should I?" Bring him back, Roman. Don't let him sink again.

"Virgil didn't come because he felt so guilty that it would have hurt him to see you the way you were," Roman explained. "He was nearly on the brink of an anxiety attack thinking that you wouldn't forgive him."

"Oh..." Patton dropped his head, looking at his feet as they swung off the edge of the bed. His fluffy dog-patterned socks scuffed against the pale blue carpet. He lifted his head a bit. "Well, I do. I don't blame him. I know how much he disliked being a dark side, so it's no doubt that seeing one of them brings back old memories. I may not know everything about it, but I try to help. Sometimes I just can't and I have to learn to accept that."

"If there's one thing I've learned from being a prince, it's that you can't give happiness if you don't have any for yourself." Roman set a hand on Patton's shoulder with a soft smile. Patton brightened up as well.

"What about the others?" Patton asked.

"Well, I can assure you that whatever Deceit said or did was probably unintentional. You know as well as I do that words just kinda slip from his silver snake tongue, especially if he doesn't mean them.

"I'm not sure about my brother if he said anything to you. I wouldn't trust a word that man-baby says anyways."

"He didn't, thank goodness," Patton sighed. Remus rolled his eyes from outside the door. "I'm still kind of scared of him anyways, so his presence may have made things worse." Remus had to nod to that with a shrug. Deceit stifled a laugh while Virgil and Logan glared at him.

"Thomas's state of mind is not very stable right now. He just found out that he may lose his brother and he can't even see him before he passes. Anyone would be as devastated as he is. His stability has plummeted and it's as if he's in a constant state of panic and severe anxiety. It's like he's having an anxiety attack and a panic attack at the same time. He has no filter, no thought process, nothing. I am one hundred percent positive he didn't mean any of it."

Roman paused and Patton looked him right in the eyes. "And Logan?" Roman and Logan both held their breaths. Despite not getting along very well, Roman knew a lot about Logan that Patton did not. "It wasn't anything he said, it was more... what he didn't. His actions didn't help much either."

"You mentioned feelings and he flinched, didn't he?" Patton nodded solemnly, the event replaying in his mind. Roman frowned, then turned to face Patton, crossing his legs on his bed. He then reached over and turned Patton to face him like a parent would do to their child. It made sense. Patton felt so small because of everyone's words. And just like a good parent, Roman had to step in and build him back up. It was normally Patton who did that, but since Patton was out of commission, someone else had to do it for him.

"You know as well as I so that Logan has a hard time with emotions-"

"Yeah, but the way he acts every time I get all melodramatic about something, it just... it makes it seem like he doesn't want me around. He hates emotions, but I am the physical embodiment of Thomas's emotions. I feel like he hates me and-"

"He in no way, shape, or form hates you. I can promise you that. Emotions are so hard for him to deal with because he doesn't like being wrong, and there are so many ways to be wrong with emotions. To take somebody's body language the wrong way, to catch a hint that wasn't a hint. Patton, there are far too many ways anything could play out.

"Take Dr. Strange for example. He looked into the future to see which way they could defeat Thanos. There was only one way and so many possibilities. Logan's job is to find that one possibility, but with such a large number of things being thrown at him to throw him off and confuse him, he can't get there. That's what emotions do to him. They throw him off his path."

Patton had never thought about it like that. That... made a whole lot of sense... It explained everything. Everything dating back to when Logan first started pushing away emotions. When he first started pushing Patton away.

"So he doesn't hate me?" Patton asked.

"Far from it." Patton reached out and hugged Roman tightly, and Roman hugged him back.

"Thanks, RoRo," Patton smiled into Roman's neck. Roman smiled back.

"I'm glad you're back, Padre."

"I'm glad to be back."

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