How do you destroy anxiety?

Silence him.

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Virgil had been missing, he wouldn't appear when summoned, he wasn't even in his room. They scoured the mindscape constantly looking for any kind of sign of the anxious trait. Deceit was obviously the top suspect, and Roman kept him under close supervision, even though several times, truthfully Deceit explained that he had nothing to do with Virgil going missing, no one believed him. It wasn't like when he had ducked out either, it was almost like he was working more than he ever had, Thomas was almost always in a semi-constant panic, and he didn't understand why, at all. He knew there was no reason to be overly panicking like this but he couldn't control it.

That luckily dissuaded them from thinking the worst had happened to their friend, they just couldn't find any trace of him anywhere. Roman looked through different scenes in the imagination, seeing if he just got lost or stuck in one of them, Logan walked through his library multiple times knowing that both he and Logan spent time there to calm down, Patton continued to search around the more home-like areas of the mindscapes daily checking in his room to see if he rose back up in there. Reluctantly, Roman even went into the dark sides area of the mindscape, he hated it there, it was pitch black, and cold, unbelievably cold. He was nowhere to be found.

It wasn't until exactly two months had passed that they found him.

It had become Patton's daily routine to check in Virgil's room, he stayed optimistic, he didn't want to even entertain the possibility that Thomas' anxiety just now didn't have a physical representation. He slowly creaked open the door, his eyes widening as he noticed something incredibly different, there was another door that had not been there ever. It was large and painted pitch black, a gray door frame lined it, with what looked like a purple button, with Virgil's symbol on it on the top, out of reach from him. There were also three other buttons, one on the left post on the door frame was dark blue, and had Logan's symbol on it. The one on the right post on the door frame was light blue with Patton's own symbol on it, and the one right in the middle was red with Roman's symbol on it.

Patton slowly walked more into the room and over to the door, there wasn't a handle on it or any other way for it to even open, except, of course, the buttons. He put his hand on the red button only to immediately feel a violent shock travel from his hand through his entire body, he jolted back with a yelp, it hurt and slightly burned, as if he had been struck by lightning. "Patton?" He heard one of the others call for him downstairs, "Guys...." He responded, "Are you quite alright?" That was Roman, "Come here" His voice was loud enough to be heard, but it was shaky, he wasn't sure what this was, he had never seen anything like this before, none of them have ever mentioned anything like this!

Soon enough, Roman and Logan enter the room, seeing the door they stop their questions before they even fully get to ask them, "That's new...." Roman stated as he walked closer to the door, examining it. Logan did the same, "They have our symbols and our colors on them," he pointed out before a realization hit him, "Why did you scream a minute ago?" He asks looking at Patton. "I tried to press the red one, and it shocked me... Like more than just a normal static shock, like, lightning, it burned," Patton responded not breaking his gaze from the door. Roman stepped closer to the door, "Well, it wasn't the one with your color and symbol, what if I press it?" without waiting for the other's response he did just that.

The button glowed red, and there was a loud screeching sound, like an old, metal lock unlocking, but nothing happened. He glanced quickly to Logan and Patton, "Maybe he's in here?" Roman asked. "Maybe, but it could be dangerous, we don't know what this is," Patton stated, Roman hummed conjuring his sword, "It can't be that dangerous, this is Thomas' mind, after all." Hesitantly, Patton walked over and pressed the light blue button with his symbol, this time he didn't get shocked, and the same metal screeching lock sound happened when he did so.

Logan also hesitated before pushing the deep blue button, when he did, the purple button at the top with Virgil's symbol on it glowed, and an almost deafening sound of thunder filled the room, startling the three, and making them jump back. A black handle appeared on the door, it had sharp jagged edges and looked almost like a lightning bolt. The three traded glances before Roman slowly grabbed the handle and pushed open the door.

Inside was what looked like an endless pitch black hallway, the walls and floor were all the same color as the door, and there was no source of light in sight, besides the light from the bedroom that seeped in from the door. Roman conjured a flashlight and began walking inside, with the other two following behind him. They walked in silence until they heard something.

Whispers, they couldn't make out what the whispers were saying at all, they just knew there were whispers that weren't coming from any of them. "Virgil?" Patton called, there were a few moments of silence before there was a scream. A scream that was familiar to all of them, as it matched their own, it sounded strained, like it hurt. Patton's eyes widened, "Virgil!!" He yelled before dashing off into the darkness, not bothering to wait for the others.

"Patton!" Roman yelled as he chased after him, Logan quickly followed behind them trying to keep up. As they continued down the hallway they began to notice the scratches on the wall, they looked like they were from someone's nails. The whispering didn't stop as they ran either, it only got louder, and was now coherent.

"You're too late!"

"You can't help him"

"Too late!"

"Too late!"

After what felt like hours of them running, the whispers had turned into shouting that was so loud that they couldn't hear one another speaking, it only grew even louder as they progressed further.

They reached the end of the hallway and stopped dead in their tracks at the sight before them. Virgil was curled up in a ball on the floor, sobbing, his eyes were shut tight, visibly coughing up blood, his nails were dull and so short that they were bleeding, it didn't take that long for them to figure out why because of the scratching in the walls, they weren't normal scratches like the ones beforehand, they were words.

It seemed like hundreds of them, "Help me" "Please" "Get me out of here" They got more and more indecipherable, "Please please please help" The one that made Patton's heart shatter was the one that had blood on it, which looked fresh, "Miss you guys." Patton tried shouting his name but he couldn't hear himself and the others couldn't seem to hear him either, so he reached forward and grabbed onto Virgil's shoulder.

Immediately the voices stopped and were replaced by Virgil's own screaming, and his weak attempt to hit Patton. "Virgil!" Roman said grabbing onto his arm carefully to stop him from hitting him, Virgil's eyes opened, they were red and puffy. He looked at Patton and tried to say something his voice was strained too much to be coherent and he just ended up coughing up more blood. "Kiddo it's okay, we gotcha," Patton said as he picked Virgil up, cradling him in his arms.

"We gotcha kiddo, you're okay now, you're gonna be okay," Patton whispered, Virgil again tried to speak, "I-I-" yet again, coughing up blood. "No no no no... Don't try to talk kiddo, let's get you out of here okay?" Virgil nodded, clutching onto Patton's shirt tightly as if he were to let go, he'd disappear. Patton looked to Roman and Logan and nodded, slowly they began walking out of the room. Virgil's eyes slowly shut and his breathing steadied as they walked. When they reached the door, it was still open but looked like it had been slowly shutting and was incredibly close to shutting. Roman pushed it and held it open for the others to walk back into Virgil's room. Roman shut the door once the three had left and slowly it disappeared.

Virgil wasn't able to talk at all, luckily he and Logan knew sign language so he could still communicate as long as Logan was there to interpret. Whenever he'd try to eat or drink anything, he'd sign that it hurt. From what the others could get from him, they assumed that Virgil was screaming so loud just trying to hear himself over the shouting, and for so long that it almost completely destroyed his throat and voice. After a couple of hours of Virgil wrapped up in a blanket and sitting on the couch slowly eating soup and drinking tea to attempt to help his throat, Logan decided to go tell Thomas that Virgil was found and to explain not to summon him.

He rose up and glanced over at Thomas not saying anything, Thomas perked up, "Logan! Any news on Virgil?" He asked, Logan, sighed and looked down trying to figure out how to word his next few sentences correctly, "We found him..." Thomas smiled "Oh thank goodness! Wha-," he stopped himself as he noticed Logan's expression, "What... What's wrong, is he okay?" Logan again said nothing for a few moments, "He's, alive... but, please refrain from summoning him for a while, he's not... He... He can't speak, his voice is completely gone and his throat is in an immense amount of pain, figuratively ripped to shreds if you will..."

Thomas' eyes widened, "What happened? Where... Where was he that his happened?" Logan shrugged, "We don't know anything too specific as he doesn't want to talk in depth about what exactly happened, all we know is that where we found him is called 'The Panic Room'"