Bad Moon Rising | Sanders Sides

The Twelfth

I really don't know what this chapter is supposed to be????? I'm so sorry for how this story is turning out, but I'm really struggling to write at the moment. 

Also it's NOT the last chapter!!!!!!!!!!!!

See, depending on who you thought the hero was, the story started like this:

Deceit had known for a long time before Virgil left that there was something broken in the Dark Sides. 

It wasn't a loud broken, and it didn't stand out amongst the other heartbreaks and hairline fractures that made them who they were. No, it was an internal injury, like broken ribs. It caused pain, but that pain blended into other pain and then that pain bled into anger, and it all became a giant tangle of feelings that nobody wanted to feel.

That thing that was broken only grew more so. Inner balance shifted, like a scale that couldn't find equilibrium.  All at once, the Light Sides had the high ground and the Dark Sides sank down into further darkness, branded and labelled and shut away like unimaginable horrors.

The thing that was broken broke some more. 

Bitterness crept in. Resentment. Fear. Anger. 

Betrayal.

They tried to bury those feelings at first. All of them flung the excess of emotion and power behind a Wall, hoping that this would lift them back up and they could mend whatever had gone wrong. They sank lower.

Deceit clung to Virgil, because he was scared of that broken thing, but Virgil drew away. Deceit saw the signs, wanted to plead his friend to stay with him, but he knew that the broken thing was breaking Virgil too. So he let him go. And he watched as Virgil slipped between those cracks, escaped into the brightness of the Light Sides, and he mourned.

The scales tipped further. Virgil's escape pushed the Light Sides higher and the Dark Sides lower, and the broken thing crumbled into nothing but glittering pieces of glass. Deceit's felt them stab into his vulnerable skin with each breath he took after Virgil's leaving. Ragged grew to protect him. He became a monster.

A monster who wanted to leave. A monster who longed for his friend, for equality, for freedom.

A monster who began to plan.

.

But see, depending on who your hero was, the story went like this:

Remus never knew Deceit's real name. Not for a long time. For a while, he entertained the thought, writing down guesses to keep himself occupied as the cracks around them all grew. Because Remus wasn't an idiot. Change was coming. And it would be Deceit and Virgil that brought it down round them. 

So Remus waited, and he watched, and when Virgil left, and Deceit was alone, Remus became the shadows. 

And was was breaking broke.

Deceit grew scales, and remus grew to understand that Deceit's name was a lost thing. Because Deceit had only given his name to Virgil, and then Virgil had taken that knowledge and walked away. So learning Deceit's name was pointless, because that name didn't belong to Deceit anymore.

Deceit grew scales. Deceit started to change his behaviour.

"He's going to leave," Remus informed the others dryly. "He's going to follow Virgil to the Light Sides."

"Impossible."

"Not impossible," Remus corrected. "Just unlikely."

The day that Deceit tried to escape, Remus grabbed him by the arms and dragged him to the Wall, where the others had gathered. Heartbroken were they, willing to lend an ear when Deceit thrashed and pleaded to be heard. 

"You don't understand," Deceit begged, on his knees, because he was weak without Virgil. Remus's lip curled in distaste. "We can leave. We can all go back to the Light Sides, and it'll be okay."

Remus shook his head. "This is another betrayal," he said. Deceit's eyes widened. "We've already lost Virgil to the traitors. We aren't going to lose you to them too."

They found a loose spot in the Wall, threw Deceit behind it, and patched it up so they couldn't hear his screams.

And then they all went away, because that was another one who had chosen to leave. That broken thing twisted and morphed until it was inside all of them; until they were all broken too. So broken, in fact, that Remus began to ache for Deceit to come back. It was impossible, of course, the energies behind the Wall would ensure that Deceit would never be whole again, but he wished.

So he sat by that Wall, and he read those names to the swirling energy.

"Lochlenn," he guessed one day. He shook his head. "No. Alex? Mason? Lillian? I don't know."

Nobody answered him.

Until they did.

Remus was tired the day it started happening, the day that the Wall cracked and wavered. He'd reached the bottom of his list, and so he was just sitting and listening to the sound of nothing. 

"Janus," a voice rasped, crackling with both pain and power. 

Remus whirled around, staring into manic yellow eyes and felt his lips split into a grin that was too wide for his face. Deceit, no Janus, mimicked the smile with far too many teeth. Shadows hissed and steamed on his skin. His scales glimmered with the remnants of what was roiling behind the Wall. 

And then Deceit went back, more broken than any of them.

A gate slammed down between them and those who had forced them down there to begin with.

.

So no matter who the hero was, it was all going to end like this:

The Voice was all around them, furious and flickering. Because Deceit had been behind that Wall, and he'd become something else, but he'd never stopped planning to get away. He'd bided his time and he'd played the bad guy, and he'd pulled Remus along too, but he was going to get them both out.

"What is the meaning of this?" The Voice hissed.

Deceit shrugged. "You were never very clear on what you wanted us to do, so we fixed it."

"You fixed it? It was meant to be unfixable."

Remus cackled. "Fuck you."

Probably not the best answer, Deceit mused as the crackling storm around them seemed to darken, imploding in on itself and manifesting whatever shadow had been trailing them all along. The Voice didn't have a shape, had lost it to the Abyss, but it still had a presence.

Which was what Deceit had been relying on.

He gestured for Remus to hand him the final chunk of the Wall. "You see," he purred over the noise of the clock running out, to the final startling eruption of all those carefully laid plans. "I have spent years waiting for this. We took some detours to get here, but here we are. Finally."

The Voice snarled. Something latched onto Deceit's skin. Remus howled somewhere in the background. Deceit took another step forward.

"You are impudent," the Voice accused. "You are a traitor to the cause. How dare you!"

"How dare I?" Deceit thundered. "How dare you! You stole my body and my will! So I will do what I must to ensure that you never bother anybody again."

He shoved, with all his power and all his strength and all his anger and hurt and tears, and then he slammed the piece of the Wall back in place and made a stitch. And then another stitch. And another and another and another until he was sobbing while he was forcing his power out.

Remus didn't touch him. Remus just added a stitch beside him, staying silent until Deceit crumpled to his knees and it was over.

It was over.

The ticking stopped.

It was over.