“They're...gone?”

A dreadfully familiar voice echoed out of the surrounding darkness.

Divi fought under the crushing weight of his own surrender to lift his head to where the voice came from. It sounded amused, words followed by a pitying cackle; childish, yet inexplicably menacing.

“Are they, really...gone?”

“Y-yeah...” the kid sniffled, wiping his face with the sleeve of his coat. “It's like what Tris said when Vince turned like that...They won't be back...”

“Tris? Vince?” the voice's cackle turned to an unsettling laughter, almost like reveling in how silly something is. “They were never real!”

“What do you mean?” Divi couldn't find the strength to get up, so he just looked around, trying to pin where the disembodied voice came from.

It circled around, surrounding him, slowly inching closer. “They never existed in the first place...” the voice grew exponentially stronger, almost with each syllable spoken. “Nothing more than byproducts of repressed memories, strong enough for them to lose their form and identity...And you're no different, 'Divi'..”.

“Repressed...memories?” Divi lowered his head, too afraid to encounter the source of the voice face-to-face as it grew closer and stronger.

“Precisely.” it purred in the kid's ear. He tensed up, eyes widening. “Cavalier and Stitches aren't really names you could just guess in the top of your little head, aren't they?”Divi felt it knocking on his head. The hand didn't feel like flesh. “You'd have to know someone with those names to even consider them as such...and you know both very well.”

Divi felt that if it was speaking the truth, it would explain why Cavalier's name sounded so familiar, or how he just guessed Stitches' name, but...

“Th-then...what does it make me, if I'm like them?” his voice turned hollow.

He feared the answer.

“It's just as I said – merely a byproduct of repressed memories.” it gleefully repeated, enjoying the confusion. “You can easily regain those, you know. You just have to remember your name, and what Cavalier and Stitches are to you.”

“M-my...friends...” Divi wasn't even sure of his own words. “N-no...” he took it back, shaking his head.

Cavalier was certainly no friend of his, otherwise he wouldn't have found himself a victim of an attempted murder.

They voice hummed, waiting.

Keeping his head down and feeling the weight of the unseen gaze, Divi stared blankly at the ground, trying with all his feeble might to reach those memories that he did not know.

But he couldn't.

They were repressed far beyond who he was now, and there was nothing in the abyssal darkness to trigger them.

“I c-can't remember...”

“No. You don't want to remember.” the voice huffed, as if anticipating the reaction.

Divi felt something touching his sides, seeing two snake-like creatures slithering in the corners of his eyes, patterned with rings of black and white and black and gray. They were soft, plush, but at the same time oddly mechanical in their movement.

“What about them? Still can't remember?” the voice sounded disappointed, almost offended.

Divi shook his head, feeling a shiver going down his spine.

He felt like he should remember these slithering serpents, they were similar to toys he may have played with in the past.

But...which past?

“You're fighting this too much.” the voice sighed, growing somewhat impatient.

Divi felt something with the texture of smooth, polished wood brushing against his face and resting under his head.

“Look at me, Divi.” the polished wood turned to a hand, pushing up from under his chin to make him look up, but the kid resisted, too scared to look up and face the source of the voice that made him shudder to his very core. It wasn't long before it lost its patience completely. “I said look at me!”

The gentle touch under his chin turned into a single handed vice-grip on his face, a firm hand with fingertips sharpened into claws that dug through his flesh, forcing the frightened child to look up, meeting a pair of black, hollowed eyes just inches away from him, threatening to consume him whole.

Just under the eyes, its teeth were revealed in a thin smile, and two, black lines were etched from the corner of its eyes down to under the jaw, giving the face the feel of a combination between a wooden puppet and human skin.

Divi couldn't look away from the voids it had for eyes, as memories whose existence he couldn't begin to understand were quickly resurfacing, each causing him sharp pain, like daggers flaying the flesh off his bones.

“Remember.” it commanded, mouth twisting into a vicious grin. It knew there was no going back now. “What are Cavalier and Stitches for you?”

Divi's mind went dull trying to endure the pain these obscure memories lashed at him, and he stared expressionless into the darkness in the piercing, empty eyes. “They were...sent after me...to kill...You...”

“Very good, Divi.” the voice settled back, calming down, and its grip on Divi's face loosened up a little. “Who sent them? Who was trying to get rid of you?”

“My...Father...”

It released Divi completely, satisfied. “Now...Who am I? What is your real name?”

The answer was clear now. The one thing he never wanted to remember for the rest of his life.

“Valen.”

The old body was completely ripped off of the dense core of memories that have been repressed for longer than anyone could remember, dissolving into the darkness of the maze, but not to be forgotten.

The darkness rebuilt the old body anew.

A muffled rattling sound of swaying wood came echoing from the hard floor of the building as a skeletal form slowly walked through the thicket of shadows. It brandished the body into anatomical perfection in every little detail.

Once finished, it turned to weave itself into the colorless attire. The long coat fitted to his new size, now featuring long, stripped sleeves; similarly patterned knee-high socks whose end was hidden by dark-gray shorts; the shirt underneath the coat was dark as a moonless night.

The hollow, void-like eyes opened once more, and his lips curled to a smile as two black lines dug from its corners through the wood-like flesh, disappearing under the jaw.

At his feet wriggled two stripped snake-like creatures, the ones terrorizing him just moments earlier, their head but a simple sphere with nothing but a gaping, jagged maw; the side of their body was sewn with a thick, black thread, giving them a doll-like appearance.

Hissing and cackling, they affectionately greeted the new being.

The weighing darkness slowly dissipated and the two slithering plush creatures made their way out, welcoming the face of their old master, once again wearing his true form.

Valen walked through the the deformed frame, his soft steps making little to no sound on the pavement, and inhaled a lung-full of the musty circus air.

"This was a really long path this maze took...” he hummed, amused, stretching his arms down and letting the creatures bump against his hands. “It's good to have you again, Ponte, Vecchio...”

The creatures growled contently and slithered in circles around him. They were clearly excited about something other than his revival.

An explosive sound of a gunshot thundered through the area, and the three simultaneously turned their heads the direction it came from. Another shot was heard soon after from a little closer, suggesting a chase is going on.

The explosive gunshots continue in varying intervals, until soon enough their source was visible. Valen didn't need more than one guess to recognize Stitches trying to chase down Cavalier, pistol drawn, as the manic man ran through what's left of the yellow police line, most likely for the same reason he himself was drawn to this place.

"I wonder,” Valen hummed to Ponte and Vecchio, resting one hand on the side of his face, “if he remembered to count his bullets.”

It wasn't long before the silver pistol ceased its explosive bangs, clicking faintly instead. Not wasting anytime, Cavalier picked up the pace, his bare, metallic feet leaving sparks on the stone pavement whenever he made contact with it.

Gotta admit that he runs fast for a dead man, Valen thought, as the bloodthirsty killer darted towards him, leaping forward to close the distance. Once at the point of no return, the boy saw his dead, golden eyes widen behind the grayish-blue hair.

Lifting his hand from the black and gray serpent, Ponte lunged like a spring a Cavalier, wrapping around his body and bringing him to a halt.

"This place sure brings back memories,” Valen mused at the sight of the clawed man's struggle to break free, walking past him in teasingly slow steps to where Stitches now stopped, his empty firearm still in hand.

Stitches was frozen in fear, having no clue as to where the turnout would lead. So he just straightened up and put the pistol into a holster under his jacket, showing he's unarmed now.

Valen giggled at the gesture. “I remember you well...” he smiled, but his expression wasn't as foreboding as before, and his voice softened too. “Started out in order, doing as you were told...but you knew better than to murder a defenseless child.” once right in front of him he reached for Stitches' shirt collar, fixing it and smoothing the folds formed on the shoulders of his jacket. “I recall you never having any regret for not doing your job...However-” Valen's voice grew cold in an instant, expression unchanging as he brought his hands to Stitches' neck, claw digging into the artificial flesh. “If you ever do so much as think of pointing that gun my way, I'm going to put you through so much pain you'd wish you could have died from it.”

Stitches body tensed at the sheer ruthlessness of this threat, slowly and carefully nodding once. Seeing the message was clear, Valen let go, patting his arm.

"And you...” He then turned to Cavalier, who still struggled with Ponte's games as she mockingly loosened up a little just to coil around tighter when he thought he could get out, until she released him completely to her master's command.

Cavalier lunged again, ready to cut Valen into bits and pieces with his own, two clawed hands.

Without a single gesture out of place, Valen effortlessly interlocked his fingers with Cavalier's, using the momentum of his attack to pull him down to his knees.

"Did you miss me~?”

"You little fucking bastard!” Cavalier gritted his teeth, writhing on his knees when Valen pressed down on his hand, starting to bend it backwards in an agonizing, metallic creak.

"Watch your mouth, screecher...” Valen's voice turned into a dissatisfied hiss and he pushed his hand down again, curving Cavalier's hand back to the point the joints might snap. “Even now, you're blindly determined to kill me.” the childish tone disappeared, and his voice was now harsh and toxic. “You even jumped at the first opportunity to put an end to the old, weaker me...”

Cavalier let out a distorted snarl. “That's what I live for, to kill you! And I swear I'll put an end to my-” his threat was cut short when Valen twisted his wrist.

"You're in no position to make any threats...or even be one.” the childish smile returned to Valen's face for a moment, showing just much he enjoys inflicting pain to him, after years of being haunted. “Don't you remember why you, a ruthless murderer without a hint of conscience, had to be paired up with Stitches to hunt me down?”

Up close, Valen saw the golden hue of Cavalier's eyes disappear behind the strands of colored hair covering it. He knew the man closed his eyes, not only from the pain but from the shame, as well.

Smiling contently, he pulled the man up to his before swinging him around, slamming his body into the outer wall of the mirror maze, claws digging into his neck, right around any major artery.

He wouldn't want it to end so fast.

Pressing him against the wall with both hands, Valen leaned closer.

"Any of this feels familiar, Subject #1?” his childish giggle was perhaps the scariest thing in that surreal moment; blood slowly began to trickle underneath the claws digging into Cavalier's neck.

He coughed in pain, feeling it mostly at the back of his head after being slammed to a wall, and tried to grab onto Valen's arms in order to loosen his grip but to no avail. No matter how much his claws dug and scraped through the wooden arms, the grip didn't loosen.

Valen didn't even flinched, like he didn't feel a thing.

"You remember...Don't you?” he laughed and slammed Cavalier against the wall again, and then several more times once he realized he was truly enjoying his revenge. Valen repeated the action until blood trickled from his mouth and stained the back of his hood.

"Of...course... I remember.” Cavalier clenched his jaws at the pain, coughing again. A few droplets of blood flew unto Valen's face, instantly turning black.

"So how about you jog my memory...hm?” Valen opened his mouth to reveal a dark, segmented tongue, licking off the blood from his face.

Cavalier opened his eyes, staring into Valen's dark, empty sockets. The repeated hits to his head dulled his senses, subduing his killer instincts.

He remembered the exact day when he as paired up with Stitches.

He remembered the exact reason he was given for that.

He experienced it on his own flesh.

"Because on our own...none of is had the power to stand against you...”