[✔️] 𝑇𝐻𝐼𝑁𝐾 𝐹𝐴𝑆𝑇 | 𝐃𝐈𝐄𝐆𝐎 𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐆𝐑𝐄𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐒

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐄𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓

𝐖𝐎𝐍'𝐓 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍
"𝐴𝑠𝑠𝑎𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑛𝑠 𝑡𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑛𝑜 𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑑𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝑓𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑓𝑎𝑖𝑟𝑙𝑦. 𝑊𝑒 𝑡𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑑𝑒 𝑖𝑛 𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔."
—𝑅𝑜𝑏𝑖𝑛 𝐻𝑜𝑏𝑏, 𝐹𝑜𝑜𝑙'𝑠 𝑄𝑢𝑒𝑠𝑡

𝐈
— 𝐷𝑖𝑒𝑔𝑜 —

𝐀𝐒 𝐇𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐂𝐇𝐄𝐃 his mother continue to gaze lovingly at the portraits, Diego sighed. He had a feeling that he wouldn't be able to change her mind, so he turned and made a small gesture for Mara to follow him as he headed toward his room.

He rubbed his eyes as they began to walk down the stairs, letting out a deep exhale while Mara caught up to his side. Her eyebrows were furrowed in concern, and she was biting on her lower lip as she put a hand on his arm.

"Y'know, Mom is—"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Okay," she said quietly, folding her arms as they headed down to the landing of the second floor.

Diego couldn't get his mind off of his mother. How was she so convinced, so brainwashed into thinking that Reginald was a good person? Could Vanya be right? Behind the façade of a kind, tender mother, really was the repulsive Reginald and his programming?

No, Diego knew it couldn't be that. It was impossible. It didn't make sense. Every helpful, loving, caring action that his mother did was an act that opposed every cruel, evil, harsh thing that Reginald stood for.

Lost in his thoughts, Diego barely even noticed when Mara stopped right before they went into the hallway of their rooms, nor when she grabbed his arm and pulled him back.

He did notice when she slapped him though.

"What?" he questioned irritably, rubbing his stinging cheek as he turned to her and raised his eyebrows.

"Shh!" Mara put her hand over his mouth, her worried eyes flickering past him before she whispered, "Something's off. I think someone's here."

He gave a small scoff, shaking his head as he gently grabbed her wrist and pulled her hand down. "You're just paranoid."

She grabbed his arm as he turned around and pulled him towards her again. Her gaze was pleading as she looked past him once again and murmured, "Diego, I'm serious."

He stepped closer to her, ignoring the fact that his heart rate had picked up from the lack of space between them and the strong urge to just pull her in and kiss her.

Instead, he put a hand on her shoulder and softly spoke, "It's fine, Mara, no one's here. Don't worry."

She bit her lower lip, obviously not convinced in the least, but gave a small nod nonetheless.

He spread his arms out as he took a few steps forward, raising his eyebrows at her to prove that nothing was wrong.

Suddenly, he paused when he heard the cock of a gun, and turned his head to the right to see two strangers at the end of the hallway, both of them wearing masks. Creepy kids' masks.

The shorter, slimmer figure had a pink, bunny-like helmet with black ears drooping down on either side. The taller one had a blue, bear-like helmet with two short stubs for ears.

And both of them had guns facing Diego and Mara.

Diego leaned towards Mara, swallowing before he admitted, "So I was wrong."