Not requested.

Ship: Romantic Logicality

Category: Angst

Warnings: Self deprecation, nightmares, wound and death depictions

Summary: Patton has nightmares about his friends. Virgil is in the first one.

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"Hey, Virgil, could you toss me that pen really quick?"

Virgil remains still, staring stiffly at the TV. He doesn't look at Patton, who is in the middle of sketching a cartoonish fish.

"Virge?" Patton sets down the sketchbook, frowning. "You okay?"

"...okay..."

"Virgil?"

Patton pushes himself up and leans forward, but Virgil turns his head away even further.

"What's wrong?"

"...you left me..." Virgil's voice is low and grating, a distorted sweeping hiss.

"Left you?" Patton blanches. "I didn't leave you! I helped you off that bridge! Virgil, what are you-"

In one swift movement, Virgil whips around and roughly grasps Patton by the shoulders, eliciting a cry of pain from the latter. Then Patton screams.

Virgil's face is a mess of pulsing muscle and bone, his jaw hanging at an irregular angle and blood trickling down his ruined cheeks. One eye hangs from its socket, held up by only a thin quivering nerve. His teeth grind together as he spits out, "YOU DID THIS TO ME!"

Patton jerks awake with a shuddering gasp, his whole body trembling as he presses his fingers into his eyes to withhold tears. A broken sob escapes him, his heart fluttering in his chest.

"No, no, no no no nononono..."

His breathing erratic and panicked, he tosses his comforter away and stumbles out of bed, the taste of salt on his tongue. He bolts into the kitchen and shakily fills himself a glass of water, fingers white around the glass. He lifts it to his lips. He's trembling so badly he can't take a drink, the water spilling onto his nightshirt.

"It's not real it's not real it's not real it's not real..." He repeats the mantra over and over, but it doesn't cement.

The only thing he can think about is Virgil's ruined face and groaning voice.

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