“This is our new home. For now.” Tris' voice trailed off and lowered, as if he got distracted.

Divi let out a disappointed sigh, after hoping he could receive some more specific information.

Looking around again, he tried his hardest to understand why he felt the place was so familiar.

“It's...A lot like the other place.” he voiced his thoughts tho Tris.

He remembered something, without really remembering. Just like the things that came up in his dreams; fading visions.

Looking around again, the kid tried to check again for something else that may jog his memory, and once he didn't find any, he decided to turn his thoughts to the fact that at least they're safe now.

His lips curled to a faint smile and he stared back at the glass door, that only just showed Tris' reflection through all the filth. “It's not so bad...”

This time, he didn't answer. Not even a gesture to express his opinion.

Divi cocked his head to the side, feeling his heart rate spiking. He got up, slower this time, and walked to him, gently tugging at his clothes, hoping he just didn't hear him.

Trying to grab his hand, Divi felt a strange, uncomfortable cold touch, radiating under his glove. A touch that immediately threw him back to the day they first met, when he woke up at that house.

It was very similar, but this time it felt somewhat ominous. Back then it was still winter, everything was cold. But now...

Divi flinched, thinking he had heard something crack.

“Tris?” he called again, carefully pulling on Tris' arm, when his body suddenly swayed back a little, before leaning forward.

Panicked, Divi fumbled to try and grab him with both hands, but he was much heavier than the kid expected. Every piece of clothing he held onto was torn away from his fingers and his arm quickly slipped his weakened grip.

Tris' body crashed through the glass door down to the cold, moist earth outside, sharp pieces of glass leaving small cuts on his perfectly smooth face.

A cacophony of shards grinding one against the other and against the floor filled the room when Divi used all of what little strength he had to pull Tris back inside. The crackling sounds kept blaring on even after most of the shards were left in a trail behind them, as if coming from within Tris. Divi felt a sickening sensation twisting his guts in a knot.

It was almost like how Vince's case started.

“Tris!” he roared at the top of his lungs, hearing his call echoing back to him from the walls surrounding them.

He tried to lift Tris from the floor, but his body became so cold all of sudden that he couldn't even bear to touch him.

“Wake up, Tris!” he pleaded in terror.

Unable to shake or slap him awake, all Divi could do was scream.

At some point a hint of hope ignited within the kid when Tris rolled on his side, his body contracting into a fetal position in an almost rustic creak. He looked like he was in pain.

The spark of hope quickly died down. This never happened before.

Divi mustered up all of his strength and endurance to drag and lift Tris to the couch he was previously sitting on, shivering at the intense cold even after he managed to lay him on the couch.

He kept screaming until his voice died out, and turned to silent pleas.

He didn't move from his side, hardly even sleeping. More than his fear of being left alone if something would happen to Tris, he feared waking up and finding yet another monster in his stead.

But as hard as he tried, Divi was eventually overcome by sleep, dropping next to Tris' curled up, motionless body.

Shining, red, endless thread.

Two crosses at the base of the skull, and the thread went on to mark the seams of his suit, vibrant red turning everything around it black and dark gray; the long coat shrunk and parted into a fitted suit around the seams, as the thread moved along.

The hat, as if withering, turned black as well, black ribbon turning red as blood.

His gloves aged in an instant, tanning into a brown hue; vertical stripes flashed through the dark suit, visible from one side and hidden in another.

The thread continued sewing its way through the suit, seemingly through his very body, almost as if the only reason for its color as that it's moving in and out of the skin, making its way back up and wriggling out of the brand new suit of...

Divi woke up abruptly from his nightmarish slumber, dreading to find out Tris was no longer next to him.

“T-Tris? Tris?!” he panicked and jumped to his feet, fighting the dizziness that came with the lack of proper sleep and nourishment, just to find Tris standing at the same exact place, in frond of what's left of the glass door. The yard outside was full of unkempt weeds. The sun was setting, coloring the horizon red.

But while he was identical in posture and stance, it was obvious to Divi he was looking at the back of an entirely different suit.

Slowly, he uttered the question he hoped he wouldn't have to ask again. “W-who are you?”

The man in the dark suit peered over his shoulder, only moving his head to exposed the familiar, featureless profile, that at the same time was so, very foreign. There wasn't a single sign hinting that he crashed through the glass.

“You know who I am.” even his monotonous was the same, yet different somehow.

“N-no...I don't...” Divi whimpered, feeling the vice grip of fear on his chest.

The moment he was slammed against the wall flashed before his eyes, and he could see Cavalier's predatory eyes staring him down.

“Think harder.”

Divi could have sworn he had a smirking tone, but he might have imagined it. He somehow felt like he really did knew the answer – just like he felt like he remembered this place – but this time a sinking sensation made him feel like he doesn't want to know it. To acknowledge it.

And still, another name resurfaces from the depths of his innermost memories.

Memories he did not recognize.

“Y-you are...” Divi's voice cracked. He shivered. “Stitches.”

He exhaled something that sounded like a laugh. “Good boy.”

Divi couldn't tell why he knew this strange name, or why it's the name he remembered but not the one it is attached to.

He only hoped that Stitches wasn't the same vicious beast that Cavalier was, assuming that the fact he wasn't attacked yet was a good sign.

But this sense of relief didn't last long...

Before he could even open his mouth again, a crashing sound tore through the room as the front door flew through it, crashing against a wall not too far from where the two stood. They both turned around, seeing Cavalier jumping in.

His wide, manic grin was of beastly satisfaction, like an animal cornering its prey.

“We meet again, brat!” he screeched, but before he took another leap in, a booming sound exploded in the room with deafening volume, making him jump to the side instead of forward in their direction.

Divi lost his balance and fell back, looking at Stitches to find him holding a smoking pistol, seemingly appearing out of nowhere.

Was he...Protecting him?

“Run.” he instructed, some harshness added to the monotonous voice, as his gun was now pointed at Cavalier. “Now.” he added, noticing Divi was frozen in shock.

Divi barely remembered what happened next.

He remembered himself, hardly, running to the dreary garden outside and hopping over a dying hedge, cutting his legs on the prickly branches that tried to grab him, hold him back. He ignored them and kept running.

Blinded be tears and flashes of fatigue, the frightened child was guided by an unknown feeling to somewhere else in town – something in his memories told him it was safe.

He didn't know how long or how far he ran, or how many confused people he bumped into on his way there. There was only one image that kept resurfacing in his mind, rising from the same depths from which Cavalier and Stitches' names came from.

It was a brightly lit circus, painted in warm, happy colors, full of happy people roaming around, laughing ecstatically.

When he finally stopped at his destination and wiped away the tears, he found that it was nothing like in his memories.

The only color was that of a yellow police tape stuck to his body, after he tore through it when running in.

All of the colors were gone now, everything was gray and dull.

All of the stalls were broken and scattered, empty; the tents were torn and collapsed.

Dark stains on the ground began to regain their color in his mind, a dark, thick, crimson puddle, and he hurried to shake his head, trying to rid himself of the images.

These weren't the colors he wanted to see.

It was no longer the warm, safe place he could escape to, but a dark, melancholic ruin.

Clinging onto hope that his memory hasn't betrayed him completely, he let his feet lead him on, perhaps to find somewhere that is safe.

Tears welled up in his eyes again until he once more couldn't see where he's going. It wasn't long before a stinging sensation at his feet told him the floor was covered in something sharp, but he didn't care. All he wanted was to be safe again.

And then he stopped. His legs wouldn't take him further.

Divi wiped his eyes again and looked around.

All he saw was himself, over and over and over again, surrounded by his own reflections.

The mirror behind him was shattered long ago, and shards of glass painted with dark red were scattered on the floor. His feet were red, too.

The kid collapsed to his knees. There was never somewhere safe.

Emptiness spread withing his body, just as darkness began creeping around, from the corner of his eye.

He couldn't tell of something else entered the place or if his consciousness was leaving him too.

Not bothering to find out, he let his body drop limp, like a marionette whose strings were cut off.

He let the darkness engulf him completely.

He didn't care anymore.

They're gone...