<Half of this was made in one sitting, and I'm proud of myself for that. So I hope you all enjoy this! And I have a few things that I want to say, but I'll save them for after the chapter.>

Everyone was getting up to see yet another memory, but they got distracted by other things.

Zedaph had been preparing himself for whatever unpleasant thing was to come next, he was doing this by hiding behind his boyfriends. Everything seemed normal until he got a good look at Tango, and saw the wall in front of him. He screamed, jumping back in shock, eyes still locked on Tango. His yell got everyone's attention, corned eyes looking at him intently.

"What's wrong?" Asked Tango moving closer towards his shorter boyfriend. It was then that Impulse noticed what Zed had seen.

"Tang, oh my god."

The demon turned and looked at his other boyfriend then, finding that he now had a look similar to Zedaph. "What's going on?"

"Am I the only one seeing this or is Tango kinda transparent?" Asked Taurtis, motioning towards Tango.

Said demon immediately looked down at his hands after that was said, and sure enough his hands were semi-transparent. "My god."

"I don't think he's the only one." Said Cleo, holding out her own semi-transparent hands.

"Make that three." Called Doc, holding up his hands which were now also a bit transparent.

"But why are only some of you Hermits fading?" Asked Netty, checking her own hands.

Shrugs went around the group, no one really knew how to answer the question.

And then another question arose, what does it mean? What would happen once they faded completely -would they even fade completely?-? Would they wake up, stay asleep forever, or maybe even die? They all decided to save it for later, as they wanted to see themselves be given five hundred more reasons to kill Fallacy. But when they turned back to the screen nothing was on it, they had missed it.

Doc was going to comment about it when the screen turned on once more. They all expected to see Hills or Sam walk in to torment Grian, what they weren't expecting was two pairs of red and green eyes to look at Grian from the outside.

Grian looked up and met the eyes head on, and all he gave was a small flinch.

"I'm impressed, you don't react violently. Why is that little bird? Why aren't you scared of me when I'm like this?"

Antlia shuddered at the voice, hands shaking at her sides. Whilst the others wouldn't know the voice, she did. "Fallacy."

Everyone paid attention then, eyes and ears all focused on the scene.

Grian glared up at them, a sneer in his face. "I've seen deadlier."

Fallacy laughed loudly at his answer. "Do you mean Death? Please you could tell they weren't going to hurt you, so you felt safe with them. So, yes, you have seen deadlier." They leaned out of the shadows here, bringing their face into view for everyone to see. "But it's not the threat that kills, but the strike that follows."

They slammed down their hand, making the clawed appendage stick into the ground a bit. This made Grian, and everyone else, jump, though Grian looked downright terrified whilst everyone else just looked startled.

"Isn't that right, my little bird?"

To the outside world it looked like Grian was just super scared, but Mumbo and Iskall knew better. They could see the pure terror coming off of their boyfriend, and they didn't like it. Not one bit.

Fallacy then dragged their hand through the ground before finally dragging them through the bars, damaging them heavily.

"I'm giving you a choice little bird. And I'll be eagerly awaiting the results." They backed up after that, eyes never leaving Grian. "Don't disappoint me."

They left after that, the chains around Grian doing the same. The dirty blond rubbed at where they had been, there was no visible damage but it obviously still hurt. He looked at the bars, flexing his hands as if to feel how sharp they were, before turning away and moving into a corner far away from the damaged bars. Grian glared at them, distrust shining in his eyes.

"Why isn't he escaping?" Asked Zedaph. "He's been given the perfect opportunity to run!"

"True." Agreed Cub, mulling over what he just saw. "But to where? Not only is he in a castle full of people who want to hurt or keep him captive, the only portal he knows where it goes is the one to the place where he killed a high profiled man. As much as I hate to say it, that cell is the only safe place for him at the moment."

Iskall growled deeply. "So the only safe place for him is in Fallacy's hold? Now isn't that just rich."

Wels looked intently at the damaged bars, and then he thought backto what Fallacy said. "But what's Fallacy trying to do?"

"What do you mean?" Asked Impulse, looking back at the knight.

"I mean, why go through all this trouble? They mind control him, but now hold him like this? What's their plan? To get us through him maybe, but why not get us when we were first reunited with him? Why keep him locked up? And why did they not order for us to be killed, we are very heavily in the way of their plans after all."

EX narrowed his eyes in though, but he soon snapped his head up with a gasp, eyes going wide behind his visor. "Their keeping Grian here to get too Death, since they are one of the few things that can stop them. I don't know why they're keeping us alive though."

"Fuck." Swore Doc, ears twitching anxiously. "And I'm sure we're kept alive for them to mess with Grian."

"And that just raises another question!" Said Wels, motioning towards Doc. "Why does Fallacy want Grian?"

"Maybe something to do with the whole Grian-is-now-part-dragon thing?" Suggested Mumbo, wringing his hands nervously.

Cleo looked towards Antlia. "You work -uh, used to?- for Fallacy, and you were on Grian's team for a bit, you must know something."

The sorceress nodded a little. "All I know is that in the project involving Grian his codename was "Void-D" and that's about all I know."

Iskall groaned. "Right, and this helps ever so much. If we didn't know that Fallacy knew Grian's last name was Void then maybe it would have been some sort of clue, but we do know that they know."

"And why should this change how we look at this information?" Asked Ren, bringing the attention to him. "It could still be a big clue. I mean, what does the D stand for? We don't know that, now do we?"

Mummers of agreement filled the air, they couldn't fault the man's thinking. Doc grinned proudly at his boyfriend, and Ren returned it tenfold.

The talk and speculations made them forget all what happened before, at least for a while. No one would talk about some Hermits fading, ignoring it whilst they had excuses to do so. And for the first time in a long time, playful banter filled the air. Zedaph throwing out every D word he knew that totally wasn't the right one, Joe followed it up with more plausible words.

Xisuma basked in the gleeful atmosphere whilst it lasted, not knowing when the next time to be happy would occur. It probably wouldn't be until Grian was back. But how long would that be? In a few days? Weeks? Months?Or maybe never.

As much as he hated it, he couldn't rule the last one. And X thinks that's the scariest thing, knowing that there's a high chance that they could lose. And there was nothing he could do about, because in the end all he was a mortal man with slightly overpowered admin powers.

And against a deity that would be like a thorn; annoying, but easy to get rid of.

He was startled out of his thoughts by TFC's hand on his shoulder. He looked up at the older man questioningly. But the gray haired man just gave a small smile, a knowing glint in his eyes.

Xisuma smiled back at him, comforted by the silent show of unity that the other showed.

He wasn't just an admin that was up against Fallacy. He was also a driven man with a group of friends and family who were just as determined and driven as he. And that was what would give them the win in the end. Or, that's at least what he'd like to think.

They shouldn't have missed the third day. 

<Passive-aggressive much me? Anyways, I have things to say here! One, tomorrow will be a writing day for me! So there's a chance that work on chapter 38 will start as soon as then. And not just this book, my one-shot book (Which you should really check out) and New dawn (also something you should check out if your interstate) too! And yeah, that was it.

Stay safe and have a wonderful time everyone!>