Thomas sat in his living room with his laptop, looking through different plays and musicals with a much more cheerful mood than he'd had for a while.

He'd been sitting there for hours and had completely forgotten about his phone which was still up in his bedroom.

His phone, which had been going off for an hour, finally fell silent where it sat next to a small bottle of pills on Thomas's bedside table.

Thomas continued browsing and no one appeared to remind him of the alarm he'd set so he remained that way for the rest of the day.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Romans eyes fluttered open and he pushed himself up off the floor with a groan. He was still in his bedroom where he'd collapsed after puking but he had no idea how long he'd been unconscious.

He sat on his bed and ran a hand down his face, trying to remember what exactly had happened. He smiled at the memory of Virgil but pushed that away to focus on why he'd felt so tired and dizzy.

He'd only ever felt like that a few times and that was usually after a long strenuous session in the imagination forest where he liked to create weird hybrid animals and things.

His face went pale as he remembered that Virgil and Preston were in part of the imagination forest which meant one of them must have created something complex enough to drain him. He knew it wasn't Virgil so that just left Preston.

He went to open his door, ready to warn Virgil, but his door seemed to have merged with the wall. It was completely sealed shut and he was stuck inside. He hit the place where his door should have been but made contact with hard stone.

He tried to teleport but it didn't work so he instead tried to sink down only to find he couldn't do that either. Panic started to set in slightly as he realised how bad this was. He knew Preston had created something but couldn't warn anyone.

He suddenly remembered his phone and quickly pulled it out. He dialled Virgils number and waited, forcing himself to remain calm.

"hello?" said a croaky voice and Roman felt his heart ache at hearing Virgils voice like that.

"Virgil, it's me. I have a real big issue and I needed to warn you..." Roman started but was cut off.

"Have you calmed down now?" Virgil asked in a shaky voice.

Roman frowned in confusion "Huh? What do you mean?"

"You... You were so angry and loud and you... You left me." Virgil said, his voice breaking on the second to last word.

Roman was instantly alarmed. "When was this?" he asked, trying to hide his panic.

"about an hour and a half ago." Virgil said. "Why are you asking me? You were there."

Roman made a noise of distress "That wasn't me Virgil. I got really dizzy as I was walking past my room and ended up puking then passing out on the floor. I only woke up five minutes ago and my doors completely gone. I can't get out of my room. I don't know who you thought you were talking to but it wasn't me. You've got to believe me."

There was a moments pause and then "Oh my fucking god."

"What? What happened?" Roman asked desperately.

"I... Don't worry. I'm not sure why you called me because I can't exactly help."

"Wait! Virgil." Roman exclaimed.

Virgil sighed "What?"

"I... I... Lo.."

"Oh shit! I have to go, bye." Virgil rushed out, cutting off Romans words and then hanging up, leaving Roman staring at the phone with tears running down his face.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Logan opened his eyes and glanced around, taking note of Patton slumped in the chair by the bed and silently slipped out of the bed.

He crept towards the door and opened it, making his way to his own room.

The nightmare he'd had reminded him of a certain box of things he still had. He carefully opened his wardrobe and shifted a bunch of stuff until he caught sight of a wooden box.

He pulled it out with shaking hands and gently prised it open to reveal the paper inside. He shuddered and hesitated, not sure if he could bring himself to go through this box again.

Eventually he plucked up the courage to do so and pulled out a couple pages.

These were all the memories he'd ripped out of the others memory books. He'd never actually been able to destroy them and he was debating whether or not to try and put them back.

The sudden gain of these memories would probably cause the others to turn on him but he needed them to know exactly what had happened or he'd never be able to look them in the eye.

His eyes flicked over the page in his hands and shuddered as he remembered what had happened.

*flashback*

Logan was walking down a corridor when suddenly Roman appeared out of nowhere.

"What did you do?" he demanded angrily.

Logan stopped and tried to rack his brain to figure out what Roman was referring to.

"I know you and that other trait are up to something and I'm pretty sure I found out what but my memory of the last few hours is completely blank. You must have done something." Roman was right on Logans face now.

"I.. I have no idea what you're talking about." Logan spluttered out and Roman growled and shoved him into a wall.

"sure you fucking don't! Tell me what you did to me or I swear I'll...."

"ah ah ah, not so fast Princey boy." a familiar voice said cutting off Romans threat.

Logan and Roman turned their heads to see Preston leaning against the wall with a cigarette in his mouth, casually smoking as if he hadn't a care in the world.

Preston pushed himself away from the wall and approached Roman with a mocking smile "I'm afraid I can't let you harm Logan, he's mine and you have no right to have your hands on him"

Logan flinched as Prestons arm shot out and pulled Roman away from him.

"let me go!" Roman shouted but Preston let out a cruel laugh. "I don't think I will, you have quite the set of lungs on you and I love listening to a good scream."

Logan closed his eyes as Roman suddenly let out a small gasp of pain which turned into a loud scream, he didn't need to look to know Preston had pulled out one of his knives.

Logan only opened his eyes when Preston had done and all he could hear was the pained sobs from Roman.

There was blood all over the place and Logans stomach churned as he looked at the nasty slashes Preston had inflicted on Roman.

"Aw Logan what's wrong? You look like you're going to be sick. Come here, I'll make it all better." Preston said in a convincingly concerned sounding voice.

Logan was pulled into a hug which meant he also became covered in blood. "Red is definitely your colour. How about you clean up this little situation and I'll meet you back in your room to continue what we did yesterday." Preston purred this in Logans ear and placed a demanding kiss on his lips before sauntering away with a smug smirk.

Logan approached Roman, shaking and trying to stay strong. He placed a hand on one of his wounds and healed it, silent tears slipping down his face the whole time.

"W.... Why?" Roman gasped out and Logan closed his eyes as he responded "I'm sorry."

Romans betrayed expression was plastered to the inside of his eyelids as he healed all the wounds but he managed to stay focused. Roman had passed out from blood loss so it was easier to clean up the blood and meant he was able to sneak to the memory library so he could rip out what had just happened.

*flashback end*

Logans hands shook so much he could barely hold the paper in his hands. He quickly put it down but his hand brushed against something else in the box and he gagged.

Slightly hidden amongst the paper was a set of photographs that Logan didn't even know why he'd kept them.

He pushed the box away, trying to control the urge to puke that had hit him when he'd noticed the photos.

A morbid curiosity came over him after a while and his hand inched back into the box and pulled out the collection of photos.

He took a deep breath and looked at the first one, just about stopping himself from puking as he saw his own bloodied up body. He knew why he'd kept these now. He'd kept them because Preston had demanded him too.

Every single one of the pictures were taken by Preston and nearly all of them were of Logan after a particularly bloody punishment and there was even one which had to have been taken while Preston had been torturing him during sex.

Logan immediately flipped that one over so he didn't have to look at it and glanced at the last photo. He frowned in confusion as it wasn't of him. It was a random photo of the mindspace and he could just make out a blurry figure that was just enough out of focus that he couldn't recognise them.

He pried his eyes away from the photo and put his head in his hands. Going through all this had definitely brought up some painful memories but he was adamant about restoring them for the others so they could know the true extent of what happened last time.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Virgil dropped his phone, his eyes locked onto his arm in terror.

His skin had always been unhealthily pale but now it looked grey and seemed to be flaking like he had some sort of skin disease.

He'd noticed it while on the phone to Roman and had actually seen the greyness spread from his upper arm down to his elbow which is what had made him hang up on Roman so abruptly.

He couldn't even remember what Roman had been saying, he was too focused on what was happening to his arm.

It was the same arm that had felt sore, like it had been friction burned and he was freaking out.

"That doesn't look good." a voice said and Virgil spun around to face the barrier, his energy going wild as he panicked.

"Roman? What?" Virgil said in confusion as he saw Roman standing in front of the barrier and sent a glance back at where his phone lay in the dirt.

"ah I'm guessing you're wondering why I'm here when you just got off the phone with me." Roman said with a small smile.

Virgils head felt fuzzy as he tried to remember what exactly Roman had said via the phone. He knew it was important but the more he tried to remember the more he forgot.

"I thought you said something about feeling sick?" Virgil said, making it more of a question as he was unsure if that was what had been said.

"Yes, I did. I said that the way I reacted earlier made me feel sick and I was going to apologise but you hung up before I could so I decided to come apologise in person." Roman explained.

Virgil frowned, he was convinced that wasn't what happened but he couldn't even remember what had been said so maybe he was just being paranoid.

"What's up with your arm?" Roman suddenly asked and Virgil cringed.

The greyness wasn't too bad, a little off putting but Virgil could deal with it. The worst part was the flakiness, it was like pastry and it made Virgil feel nauseous at the sight of it.

"I don't know. I think it might be a side effect of the tablets." Virgil said, too focused on his arm that he missed the way Romans eyes seemed to flash a different colour briefly.

"If that's happening to you do you think it's happening to Preston?" Roman asked.

Virgil frowned again as he both considered that and wondered why Roman was suddenly referring to Preston by his name again.

"Depression crawled away at some point while we were distracted and I haven't seen him since so maybe. It's actually concerning that we haven't seen a sign of him." Virgil said, looking over at the treeline as if he expected to see Preston pop out from behind a tree.

"Yeah, that's really worrying." Roman responded, his eyes also flicking over the treeline.

"Maybe I should go see if he's up to something, him having all this time alone to scheme is definitely not good." Virgil said, taking a step towards the trees.

Roman immediately shouted "No don't! I don't want you getting hurt. What if this is his plan? He could be hiding in the trees waiting for you to go looking for him and then he could ambush you."

Virgil jumped at the sudden rise in volume and his energy instinctively attacked the barrier like it had when Patton made him jump.

This time when the energy hit the barrier it made a strange creaking noise and the barrier flexed slightly.

Roman took a few steps back, his eyes wide as they focused on Virgil who looked absolutely terrified.

"What was that?" Roman asked, the corners of his mouth twitching.

Virgil was speechless as he stepped closer to the barrier and ran a hand across it. The barriers reaction had spooked him.

"I think somethings wrong with the barrier." Virgil eventually muttered.

"Or maybe your energy is getting stronger." Roman commented in an odd voice.

Virgils panic spiked at the thought of his energy being stronger which resulted in his energy going crazy.

"Virge what are you doing?" Roman asked as the energy started causing several trees to shake.

Virgil noticed and tried his hardest to stop it but he couldn't, his energy seemed to have a mind of its own.

One of the trees was suddenly uprooted and sent spiralling into the barrier.

Romans face flickered slightly as an evil grin tried to twist its way onto his lips.

Virgil was now on the floor gasping for breath as he started having a panic attack so he didn't even notice that 'Roman' was acting out of character.

The black energy was leaving scorch marks and scratches along the ground as it ravaged the area. The barrier was warping and bending everytime it collided with it.

'Roman' kicked at the barrier and smirked as it creaked like before and the tiniest of fractures appeared.

Virgil raised his head and was horrified as Romans face melted away to reveal mismatched eyes and one side of his face covered in snake scales.

"Deciet!" he gasped out before collapsing, his lungs feeling like they were on fire as he struggled to breathe.

Deciet chuckled "Who else did you expect? It's funny that the others never made the connection between me and Preston. Did they honestly think it could be any of the others? Please, those incompetent fools haven't got the brains."

Virgil lay on the floor unable to respond as he fought to breathe properly.

"Logan is one tough guy, I'm shocked he's not more messed up. The number of times Preston came to see me covered in Logans blood... Phew it was a nightmare getting it out of the carpet let me tell you." Deciet said reminiscing about old times.

Virgils energy was still attacking the barrier and Deceit smirked as he produced a cane that matched his outfit.

"You might want to cover your head, things are about to get messy." Deciet said to Virgil and swung his cane as hard as he could at the barrier.

A large crack began to zigzag its way up the barrier and time seemed to freeze for a second before the entire barrier shattered like glass.

Virgil let out a scream as he was showered with shards of the barrier and Deciet let out a raucous laugh.

His part of the deal was done, now it was time for Preston to hold up his end.

And there you have it. The barrier has been destroyed and the mysterious person has been revealed.