Antisepticeye was done playing around. 

But he knew they all didn't stand a chance how they were now. They were weakened.

Even with how angry he was, Antisepticeye grinned.

He still had one little trick up his sleeve.

That insane smirk on his fucking face, "Oh . . . . Jameson~"

Everyone glanced back to Jameson who stared back dead in his tracks. Terror was welling up inside of him at the thought of being solely targeted by him again.

Chase walked in front of Jameson to block Antisepticeye's view but the mad-man just chuckled regardless.

"Jameson . . . . . . do you remember my little trick I played with you and that lovely audience?"

Henrik gasped, "Jameson! Look away from him! Do not look in his eyes!"

"You think that'll help?" Antisepticeye spat his own blood out of his mouth onto the ground, suddenly frowning, "It won't . . . . . But I don't plan on possessing HIM just YET .  . . . . No . . . I want you all to suffer just a little more. . . . ."

He locked eyes with Anti, "Especially you"

Suddenly, Anti realized what he was going to do but he was too late. . . 

again.

Antisepticeye's eyes shone that bright neon green and a rumble vibrated out of him and through the others in that very split second.

Jackie's ears rang, screeching a loud, high-pitched whine that hurt that hell. He gripped his ears and tried to yell to Marvin but he was holding his ears, too. They were all hearing it. They could all feel it.

Jameson blocked his ears, too, but he couldn't look away from Antisepticeye's sinister expression.

It drew him in.

And suddenly just as quickly, it swallowed him whole.

Just like everyone else in the vicinity.

Chase's eyes shot open and what he saw before him melted in his mind, cementing itself in.

The house . . . . . where his family was murdered.

"No . . . . no, no, no, this isn't real" he clamped his eyes shut, trying to envision where he was before.

But it was fading.

"Ace!?"

Chase opened his eyes again and turned around. 

'I know that voice . . . .'

No one was there but just down the hallway, he could see a light was on in the bathroom.

And suddenly just like that, he was back where it all started, all memory of everything that had happened after this gone from his mind.

"S . . .  Stacey? Jack!?"

He ran down the hall to find them.

Jameson hugged himself. He was back at the theater. 

It was dark and cold but he could hear laughter. There was singing and joy and love in the air.

And yet he was terrified. What was this place?

'This isn't right. Where is everyone? Where are all the voices coming from!?'

But just as the thought crossed his mind, the moment he blinked and opened his eyes again, the seats were all full.

The laughter was louder and the cries of joy so much heavier.

On the stage was a ballerina and some puppets.

Jameson was so confused. 

'This is wrong . . . where are the others? Henrik . . Chase, Jackie, Marvin and Anti? And Sean?'

The ballerina on the stage smiled  and danced so gracefully, beckoning him to come closer.

'That's . . . Antisepticeye . . . . he's trying to . .. I can feel it  . . . everything feels so strange. Like the others are getting farther and farther away'

And then he realized what was happening, 'I've felt this before! On the day he possessed me and made me kill everyone! I can't let that happen again! NO!'

But it was easier said than done. He tried to envision the other's faces'. So similar to his own and yet so different. 

'It can't be that hard! Why are they going away!? Why can't I see them!?'

Jameson opened his eyes again but the ballerina was now in front of him, frowning.

She looked so sad.

"Jameson . ." she spoke to him, "Why aren't you happy? Is it because I'm dead?"

Jameson glared at her, 'She's not Emily. It's Antisepticeye. He's just playing with you. You can't let him get to you! Not again!'

"Jameson" she spoke again, "It's alright. Just look at me. Look at me . ..and we can be together forever!"

Jameson closed his eyes tight.

'I have to figure out how to get out of this! If the others are in trouble, too . . . maybe Marvin could . . . but what if he can't?'

Tears escaped out of his eyes, 'What am I going to do?'

Jackie opened his eyes to see a burning car in front of him.

He could hear the screams.

And then silence.

Over and over again, it played like a broken record.

He had first opened his eyes to see Sammie and Benny in front of him. They were so happy and laughing with him.

And then everything turned for the worst . . .. just like it had that day.

He didn't remember where he had been before this.

All he knew was the pain in his heart. 

Every time he opened his eyes, it started all over again.

He had ran to the car and tried opening it but the metal was so hot, he burned himself.

He had tried to call 911 but no one answered. He was the supposed to be the hero.

HE had to do this.

He tried to smash open the windows but by the time he got to them, they were burnt to a crisp, dead.

He had tried to break open a fire hydrant but the water only seemed to make it worse when he KNEW it should have put it out!

'What is happening?! This isn't right!'

Jackie opened his eyes again and the car was burning in front of him once more.

But he had already tried everything he could think of.

He couldn't save them.

Jackie heard a laughter all around him.

"Why is this happening?!"

He cried and dropped to his knees.

"SAMMIE!!!!!"

He laid hunched over the rubble, unable to stop sobbing as his sister and nephew repeatedly lived and died in the burning car. . .. over and over and over and over again. . . . . . 

Henrik saw how his father was murdered.

The brutal slashing of his throat by that knife. 

Antisepticeye laughing  as the blood sprayed and Henrik's father gripped his throat trying to stop the blood.

The old man was a doctor but he couldn't stop this. 

Henrik could only watch through his tears as his father slowly died in front of him.

And then just like many times already before, the scene jumped to his basement. He looked into Eva and Olivia's eyes as they slowly vaporized in front of him.

Eva screamed.

It rang in his ears hauntingly.

That laugh bounced around the walls, filling him with both anger and sorrow.

There was no way out of this.

He was lost.

Marvin held Evan's decapitated head in his hands.

Bee and Sampon's bodies were strewn around the room but he couldn't see them.

All he saw was Evan's dead eyes looking back at him.

He couldn't recall what happened before or after this.

This was his purgatory.

'I. . . . . this is it. . . . I deserve this . . . . . . Evan . . . .don't I?'

Tears created red marks on his cheeks but he couldn't move.

The thought that he created this whole reality. . ..  he caused the entire magical government in his reality to be erased. . .  his friends to be murdered without cause. 

Evan . . . Evan didn't deserve this. To be murdered TWICE.

He MADE this all happen. 

The others.  . . . . what others?

He couldn't even remember now. . . 

All he knew . . .. 

was that he DESERVED this.

Anti was different. 

He couldn't be affected by Antisepticeye's powers like the others.

His mind couldn't be swayed but he could still be tormented.

Surrounded by his brothers . . . . the corpses laying lifelessly on the ground.

Blood pooling all around him.

But they spoke to him.

Anti held himself, hugging his own arms around his body, tears flowing freely.

Yes, he made up with them in death but the picture of it happening all over again was still terrifying for him.

"You're pathetic" Jackie croaked with blood running out of his mouth.

"I told you to destroy the reactor" Henrik's glassy eyes bore into his very being, "But you just broke it. . . . . you WANTED this"

"No" Anti shook his head furiously, "No, I didn't! I love you!"

"Love is for family" Chase uttered, his body cut into ribbons, "And you're just a monster . . . just like . .  just like HIM"

"You came to kill us" Marvin whispered, a piece of his mask lodged in his head, "You were just like him . ..  you ARE just like him. . . you didn't do ANYTHING to save us"

"THAT'S NOT TRUE!" Anti yelled at them, "I DID EVERYTHING! I TRIED! YOU KNOW I DID!"

Jameson couldn't say anything.

He was already dead.

Anti screamed, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! JUST STOP IT ALREADY! I KNOW THIS ISN'T THEM! I KNOW IT! JUST FACE ME ALREADY! COME ON!  . . .. ." he gasped for air, "COME ON!!!!"

Jameson stared back at Emily. Griffith and Wiles, his old friends, stood on either side of her.

Their throats were all cut and blood was oozing out of their mouths and gashes.

"You let this happen" Emily spat.

Griffith sputtered out, "Why couldn't you have just asked her out? Now she's dead and so are we. You did this"

"I could have been happily alive with my cats, retired and grown old" Wiles glowered at him, "Instead, I was too busy helping YOU . . . and look where that brought me"

"You let his happen" Emily repeated, "You deserve this"

Jameson found he wasn't really listening, though.

He should have been terrified out of his mind like the others.

He should have been begging them all for mercy.

But he KNEW this wasn't them.

It was Antisepticeye.

And even if it was hard to envision the others, he still held their names in his heart.

He wouldn't forget them. 

He had hope.

Jameson took a deep breathe. 

'All the others are so great.' he thought to himself, 'They all have such neat quirks about them. Chase is great with guns . . . Henrik is a master doctor and physicist . . . Marvin is a magician and Jackie is a literal superhero  .. . . but what am I?'

He NEVER had any confidence in himself before all of this happened. He was always so shy and anxious, afraid to put the real him out on the stage. Instead, he used his puppets as a buffer so he wouldn't get hurt.

"I've never seen you sad before. . . . I didn't wanna see it. The others, I'm used to seeing it but . .. but not you. You were always the optimistic and happy one"

Jameson blinked, remembering Antis' words to him.

He remembered the conversation he had with him the other day.

'That's strange. Why can I remember his face and not the others?'

Suddenly, he could hear the ticking of his clocks in his head . . . all around him.

'Tick . . . tick . . . . . tick'

It seemed to drown the talking corpses out so he could finally think.

'My clocks . . . . I wish there was a way to go back. To snap out of this nightmare. Maybe I could.'

He reached in his pocket and his heart skipped a beat.

'My pocket watch!' he took it out and opened it. The hands on  it were twirling around like crazy but it suddenly gave Jameson an idea.

'Snap me out of it . . . .' he thought, ' . . . like an alarm!'

Antisepticeye's puppets screamed louder and louder at him, trying to get in his head but Jameson couldn't hear them anymore.

He smiled.

His watch snapped to twelve o-clock and suddenly blared a loud alarm that shook the building!

It was like an earthquake but Jameson wasn't afraid.

All around him, he watched as the illusion crumbled away into a dark space.

He was back at the battlefield but  . . it was different. Like he wasn't fully awake just yet and space around them was inverted and dark. But he could see the others. They were all frozen into place, hunkered on their knees. Time seemed to go by slowly but he moved as fast as he could.

'Anti!' Jameson saw him first, 'He could bring us out of Antisepticeye's possession just as easily as the monster put us in it! If Marvin hasn't been able to, then Anti is our best shot!'

He ran to Anti, not even sure if Antisepticeye knew Jameson was free yet or not. Perhaps he didn't actually know yet because his attention was so divided between them all?

Jameson reached Anti and shook him but nothing happened.

'What do I do?'

He shook him again but it didn't even look like he was moving him at all.

Looking around, Jameson saw the others just as still. They were all upright but you could have sworn they were dead, they were so frozen.

'It's like . . .  they're frozen in time?' Jameson thought to himself, 'But how is that possible? I know Antisepticeye possessed me and he's capable of great power but  . . . but this? This is just insane. What could I do against this?'

He looked back at his pocket watch again. The time was still on twelve o'clock.

He took a deep breathe.

'Sean's not here. . . . . why isn't Sean here?'

Meanwhile, outside in the real world.

Sean swallowed, watching with horror what just happened.

They all just . . .. froze.

'What are they doing? They could attack him now! Why don't they?'

But he saw that Antisepticeye was still and quiet, too. His eyes glowed that neon green and he seemed to be in a daze.

'Is he . . . controlling them somehow?' Sean's gaze wandered to Henrik's canon, 'That thing really did a number on him . . . . it stopped whatever he was trying to do before.'

Sean thought deep and hard, trying to remember everything they had told him.

'Is he . . . is he trying to buy himself time?' it clicked in his head, 'As long as he's keeping them still and doing . .  whatever it is he's doing . . . Henrik can't load the canon to shoot at him again!'

But this is where Sean stayed frozen, 'Why am I not like them right now, though? I don't understand any of it but . .. but maybe I could do something?'

Sean started to shake and ran a hand through his fluffy green hair, "I'm definitely gonna die"

He carefully and slowly started to make his way to the canon.

Jameson took another deep breathe, 'Anti  . . . . . I can't wake you like this. I have to get in your head. Like Antisepticeye is doing. If I can do that . . then I could get you out and then we could get everyone out!'

Jameson leaned down in front of Anti and looked at him. His face was in turmoil, tears running. There was so much pain in his features.

He didn't know what he could do. 

But Jameson leaned his head against Anti's.

'Please, Anti . . . let me help you. Let me in . . . please just let me in and I can help.'

He didn't know if it would actually work or not but he kept Anti's words in his heart.

"I've never seen you sad before . . . . you were always the optimistic and happy one"

Jameson took another breathe.

'Maybe on the outside . . . but on the inside, I hurt just as much as you-"

He blinked and suddenly he was somewhere he recognized even if he didn't expect it. But it was better than the theater.

'Henrik's house . . . but why-?'

And then he turned.

There Anti was laying in the pool of blood, crying. The previous one's dead bodies across the floors jeering at and mocking him.

Jameson ran to him but he didn't seem to notice.

Anti rocked himself in his own arms, eyes tightly closed.

But he mumbled to himself, "Just face me already. . . . come on . . . . please just . . . face me"

Jameson's heart pulled but he wouldn't give up. He shook him but it didn't seem to do anything just like in the other reality.

'If I can't wake him up then we're all screwed!' Jameson was losing his patience.

He shook him again and again and ran his hands through his hair, wiping his forehead from his anxious sweating.

'Come on! Come on, wake up already! We need you!'

He shook him again and again harder and harder but Anti didn't seem to budge.

He was just stuck in this world, unable to snap out of it.

Jameson was running out of options. He had to do something quick!

'Come on! Look at me!' he snapped his fingers in his face. He clapped and even tried to pinch him but Antisepticeye's hold was STRONG.

He didn't know what else to do.

Jameson was running out of hope, patience and options.

Finally he just lost it.

"ANTI!!!"

Honestly, he didn't expect it himself. 

Did he just . . . yell?

Anti jolted and blinked, looking up at him.

There was a moment of shock and Jameson held his hand over his mouth.

"J- . . . Jameson?"

Jameson cleared his throat and tried again, " . . . . . A-Anti?" he started to grin, "Anti! I can talk!"

Anti was surprised but shook it off, "Must be because we're in Antisepticeye's head. How did you get here?"

"I have no idea!" Jameson grinned ear to ear, "Isn't it great?! Come on! Let's go! We have to rescue the others, too!"

"The others?"

"Yes! They're all in a trance, too and I knew if I could get out, then you could, too and then you could help me save them!" Jameson helped Anti up to his feet.

Anti looked around the room again to notice the bodies were no longer there.

"Shit" Anti cursed, "They're gone"

"Isn't that a good thing?"

"No." Anti shook his head, "It means Antisepticeye knows and is accelerating his plan"

"Which is?"

"I have no idea. Let's go"

Sean was finally up to the canon, side-stepping away from Henrik, who was still on the ground staring at nothing.

'This is so fucking weird!' Sean stared at the machine's screen, 'Fuck! I don't know how this thing works! What am I gonna do?!'

But he had to do SOMETHING.

So he pressed the first button he saw, hoping it would do the rest for him.

Nothing happened.

"Oh come on! Where's the damn START button!" he smacked it.

Little did he know, that's what set it off and the screen changed.

"Canon initiated. 3% completed"

"Oh, look at that. I did it!" but his celebration was short-lived. How would he aim and fire it?

Suddenly, Sean heard a rumbling and he looked over to Antisepticeye where it was coming from.

His mouth fell agape, looking on  in absolute horror.

'Oh . . . . .. no. . . .maybe I should run and take the canon with me?'

Chase's heart practically vibrated in his chest, "No! Get away! Where are they?! What did you do to them!?"

That laugh sang in the air like death.

In the bathroom, he could see the blood pooling across the floor but he couldn't believe it.

It couldn't be that.

They couldn't be . . .

"NO!! GIVE THEM BACK! NO! NO! NO!!!!"

He banged his fists on the floor and wall behind him.

A shadow peered from a corner.

'This is it. . . . isn't it? This is hell?'

But suddenly, two other versions of him stood before him.

"CHASE!!"

Chase blinked but as soon as Anti shoved him in the chest, a rush of memory and feelings came back to him!

"Whoa. . . ." he couldn't take it all at once and ended up puking on the floor.

"Are you okay, Chase?" Jameson tried to comfort him.

"JESUS CHRIST!" Chase flinched, "SINCE WHEN CAN YOU FUCKING TALK!?"

"He can't." Anti clarified, "Just here . .. . in this . . . place. Now come on! We have to get back to the REAL world and stop Antisepticeye!"

"Fuck" Chase stood up wobbly, "This is so fucked up"

But just like before, Anti was able to teleport to the next one.

Jackie shuddered, the screams of his family echoing in his ears.

He had tried everything but there was nothing he could do.

'Nothing. . . . I'm nothing. What am I if I can't save my own family? I'm worthless. . . nothing'

He felt so weak. So pathetic.

Antisepticeye's laughing hung in the world around him.

He couldn't even be angry. All he felt was his own pain.

"JACKIE!" 

He turned his head a little and saw three people running towards him.

'Wait . . . . I remember now . . .'

"Anti? What's going on?"

Anti ran do him immediately and helped him up on his feet, "It's gonna be alright but we need to get to Marvin and Hen fast. You ready?"

"Get me the fuck out of here"

It was all he needed to say.

Chase and Jameson's eyes were locked on the burning car but they didn't get the chance to say anything as Anti glitched them next to Henrik's head.

Henrik wasn't faring very well, either, really. 

He was throwing anything and everything he could at the reactor's glass, trying to bust his family out.

"Scheisse! Fucking bastard! Give them back!!!! I'll kill you! I'll fucking kill you!"

Henrik, in his adrenaline fueled rage, grabbed his computer desk and threw it against the glass.

But it didn't matter.

Once, again, they disappeared into ashes.

And once again, the scene changed and he was back in that office with his father bleeding out.

Henrik didn't think. He just got down on his knees and held his hands over his father's bleeding throat, trying to stop the bleeding.

"Damn you! Damn you! Vhy couldn't you have just TOLD me!? Instead of writing zhat damn letter! You could have just TALKED to me!!"

His father just gurgled, spitting up blood until he died.

And then the scene changed again.

But Henrik was beyond pissed.

He grabbed the mask out of the container and threw it at the glass, "Fucking useless piece of shite! LET ZHEM GO!!!!"

Henrik grabbed the first weapon he saw, which was a hammer, and went to strike the glass with it.

Until Anti and the others glitched in front of him and Jackie grabbed his hand to stop him from striking one of them.

Henrik stared at them all.

And everything rushed back, " . . . . I . . . it's you"

"It's us!" Jameson chirped excitedly.

Both Jackie and Henrik stared at him.

"He can talk in our heads." Anti tried to clear up, "It's a long explanation that we don't have time for! Let's go! We have to rescue Marvin and get the hell out of here before Antisepticeye kills us in the real world!"

Henrik blinked, staring at him for a moment.

" . . .alright"

And then there was Marvin.

'This is all my fault' the thought kept playing in his head over and over and over again.

'If I hadn't been watching them all, Antisepticeye wouldn't have come for us so soon. . . I would have had more time with you'

He stared over at Evan's decapitated head laying on the floor next to him.

'You warned me . . . . and I just wouldn't listen. I thought I knew better. But I didn't. And I paid the ultimate price'

He couldn't bring himself to cry anymore. 

His tears had run out.

All he felt . . . was self-loathing.

'That death card makes a lot more sense now' he remembered when Evan had given him that tarot card reading so long ago. 

After he met Evan and started learning more about magic, he just thought it may have meant 'rebirth' or 'evolution' like Evan had suggested.

But he was wrong.

No. . . . THIS is what it had meant.

The true death.

And it was coming for him. . . finally.

Marvin sighed heavily, knowing he couldn't get out of Antisepticeye's hold, "Just fucking kill me already . . .  maybe the next batch can kick your ass and-"

"Marvin!"

Marvin really didn't expect to get hug attacked by a talking Jameson Jackson.

He had been so lost in his thoughts, he hadn't even seen them all appear!

"Uh . . . ."

Anti refused to look anywhere but him, "Come on. It's time we got out of here and face him again. Get up, Marv. Let's give it one last shot!"

Marvin stared at Anti who had all the others at his side.

They were all looking a little worse for wear but at least they weren't dead.

'His marble eye I gave him is still glowing . . . he's still got a little juice left in him with it. . . . maybe we DO still have a chance.'

He glanced back at Evan's head and then back at Anti, softly pushing Jameson off of him.

"Alright" he sighed dramatically, "I mean, I sort of wanted to finish my riveting conversation with my boyfriend but fine. Let's go save the fucking world, instead"

Antisepticeye blinked in the real world, anger rolling off of him, 'Fucking little parasites! How'd they get out!? It's impossible! How the fuck did they  . . it doesn't matter. With this last shot I have, they won't survive, even if they snap fully out of it right now!'

He grinned ear to ear, laughing to himself, "You think you have a chance!? You're fucking wrong!"

He ignored Sean for now, focusing all of his power and energy to the last big attack he had.

He looked above him at the mountain his Pheno energy carried for him. It was so massive that even he'd have to run so it wouldn't kill him.

"I WISH I COULD SEE YOUR FACES! BUT REALLY, I DON'T GIVE A FUCK ANYMORE!"

Just as he spoke,  they all blinked and looked around. They were all on the ground in the real world again in the spots they were before.

Everything they had experienced in Antisepticeye's mind-game seemed like it had been for years when in reality, it had only been a few minutes.

A shadow hung over them all.

Jackie was the first to look up.

And once more, he felt all hope leave his soul.

"WHERE'S ZHE FUCKING CANON!?" Henrik shouted but no one had an answer for him.

The canon and Sean were missing and they had a giant mountain hanging over them ready to drop.

They all huddled together closer to one another. There was no time to run and Anti was out of energy to glitchn them far enough away. 

Jameson clung onto Chase's hand and Chase held his hand on Henrik's shoulder.

Marvin, Jackie and Anti were the only ones who had a chance at making sure they'd all survive.

Not that they had the time to think about it.

Antisepticeye waved his arms down, "IT'S TOO FUCKING LATE!!! FUCKING DIE ALREADY!!!!"

As quick as they awoke, the mountain came crashing down on top of them all.