Friend, Please

Chapter 1: Hate Me

Deceit ran down the hallways, his body being thrown against the walls as the floor tilted, gravity seeming to work in all sorts of ways it shouldn't have. Red alarm lights illuminating the hallway, a noise like a tornado warning blaring from seemingly nowhere. Deceit jolted at the noise, clamping his gloved hands over his ears. "Virgil!!" He screamed, his voice lost in the alarm. The floor suddenly gave way again. He fell to the ground, pushing himself against the wall. He tried to make himself as small as possible; the room began to grow sticky hot like the deepest, darkest jungles.

Deceit couldn't breathe. He was choking on the sticky air. Everything was so loud- so bright. He tried to push himself up again, but the ground pulled him back as if he had cement blocks on his feet, tugging him to the bottom of a river. the noise grew ever louder, the halls ever brighter, and the heat even worse. "Virgil!!!" He called again, his chest burning as he wasted his breath. "Somebody!  Please!!!"

Just as Deceit felt as though he was going to pass out from the sensory overload, he jolted awake, still screaming. He was covered in his own sweat, hot and sticky and rare, as he was part-snake, and hence, part cold-blooded. (It was confusing, even to him.) He couldn't seem to stop wailing. He tried to silence himself, taking deep breaths, tearing the tangle of blankets from his person, pushing his back up against the wall. 

He had only been awake about 15 seconds when his door burst open. Deceit flinched. He hadn't meant to wake the other dark sides. What had he done? Two very startled-looking sides barreled in, rushing over to him. It was Remus and Wrath.

Both were in their pajamas, (it must have been very early morning) and looked distressed. Remus sat on the side of the bed, putting his hands on the liar's shoulders. "Hey, hey, hey! It's alright. Calm down."

Despite the dim light that barely lit the room from the hallway, Deceit could see Wrath roll his eyes. "Telling him to calm down isn't going to just magically *poof* his distress away, Creativity!" The side whisper yelled, seemingly trying to be courteous of Deceit's clear hyper-sensitivity.

"Alright, alright..." Remus glared, shaking his head and turning to smile sympathetically at Deceit, who was still a sniveling wreck. "Breath in for 4 seconds... hold for 7... release for 8. Is that good, Rat? Did I do good?"

Wrath opened his mouth to yell at Remus for the rude nickname but resisted the urge. He instead sat down at the foot of the bed, reaching out and interlacing his fingers with Deceit's. A very intimate gesture, compared to the usual amount of physical affection anyone showed each other around here. It was very soothing. Deceit continued the breathing until he was somewhat calmed down.

Finally, Wrath spoke, trying his very best not to sound pissed off- something that he could not easily manage. "Deceit, this is happening every night now. You need help."

"Yes, I totally do,"  Deceit snapped, but his heart wasn't in it. The lie was so sloppy. He knew he should probably seek help. But he didn't want to.

Remus tilted his head. "I hate to say it, Dee, but Wrath is right. You can't go on like this. Eventually, you might get really sick from losing all this sleep and stuff, and you could get a parasite that feasts off your organs, and you'd be too weak to fight it off and-" Wrath smacked him rather lightly, truly making an effort not to do anything that would really upset the snake side.

"Shut up, you'll make him feel worse!" He hissed. "Look, Deceit. This is getting out of hand. You need to consider it. It's your choice, but if you keep getting worse I will be seriously pissed off. You got me?"

Deceit nodded, not really able to speak.

"Good. I'm going back to bed. Try and feel better. I suggest you take a bath or something, it might level your head." And Wrath was gone, content with the contribution he had made.

Remus stayed, however. His voice was cautious, and he spoke very softly. "What was it this time, Dee? You don't have to tell, but-" he trailed off, shrugging.

After a long moment, Deceit managed to speak. "It was about Virgil. Sort of... I was looking for him, but everything got-" The habitual liar weakly through up his hands,  looking for the word. "Bad, I guess."

Remus frowned. "You adored him, didn't you? Loved him. And now you're pinning. It's like some tragic Shakespearian romantic shit."

Deceit relayed an expression of shock and disgust. Or at least he hoped he did. "I am, and never have been in love with Anxiety! And that's the truth! Nor am I pinning," he hissed, carefully getting up. Remus gave him a look, clearly not believing him. "It's the truth!"

Remus shrugged. Deceit could see it was taking everything he had not to make some horribly sexual-themed taunt about the liar and the anxious side. Sometimes, Deceit couldn't help but thank his lucky stars that Remus wasn't completely at the mercy of his creative impulses.

"I suppose one might say his abrupt leave traumatized me a bit, but I'm fine. I'll be fine. Don't worry."

Remus did not object. He walked to the door, his expression weary, and sad. "Okay, Dee. I'll trust you. You gonna be good alone tonight?"

Deceit shrugged, not daring to answer in case Remus decided not to believe him and closed the door.

He slid down against it, his heartbeat picking up speed. Was he so obviously in love with the anxious side? Clearly, if Remus had seen it. He felt this hot embarrassment boiling in his chest. It wasn't just Virgil though. Deceit was terrified, now that Virgil was gone. It was a never-ceasing turmoil that followed him everywhere.

What's keeping Remus or Wrath or anybody from leaving him? He wasn't enough for Virgil, apparently. That's why Virgil had left. A panic attack built within him. "I'm not good enough for any of them. None of them like me. I'm a burden-" Deceit choked out, hugging his knees and he stuttered through this teary road of self-discovery.

"He hates me now. Virgil. Hates. Me." The words hung in the air as if the world had frozen over. Deceit sat, with his back pressed against the door for hours, the terror of being alone a horrible ache within his heart.

What's the point of living if the people you live for don't love you?

The words burned in his skull, the thought bouncing around relentlessly. "They. Don't. Care. About. Me. They only want me to get help so I'll stop waking them up in the middle of the night, r-right? The Light sides certainly don't like me- and Thomas... he never listens. he doesn't care. None of them do. But why would they?"

Deceit was spiraling, his thoughts going a hundred different ways, nonsensical. He tried in vain to bring himself back to the ground. "Lying is important sometimes..." he tried to convince himself. But the words just didn't sound right. He felt like he was lying to himself, but everything was so muddy he couldn't see the way up. He felt the burn of pain in his heart, his whole being hurting.

"They'll all be better off without me..." Deceit whispered. "If Thomas wants to be honest, I think I'll help him with that. It's the least I can do, after everything I've put him through."

Deceit reached into his closet, fishing around before finding a hoodie to throw over his sweat-sticky pajamas. It hurt so much more when he realized it was Virgil's old one. He pulled up the hood, zipping up the hoodie. It was a bit big on him,  which Deceit found comforting, but it also let off a deep aura of paranoia, left there by the last wearer.

Deceit did not leave a note. This was all hitting so quickly. They would figure it out sooner or later that he wasn't coming back. He didn't need to draw any attention to himself by leaving some messy scrap of paper. So he left his room, treading silently and barefoot down the hallway, past Remus and Wrath's rooms, past Where Virgil's used to be and the direction to the Light Side corridor.

And So he trecked on to the outer reaches of the subconscious.