Chapter Text
Normally, it would be normal for someone to shut themselves up in their dorm room at the manor for a few days, not leaving for a reason other than getting food to provide for their own nutrients. Maybe even more so for an artist. After all, the truth behind this terrible reality was awful. Everyone’s smiles seemed fake, even if it were truly real. You can’t learn to trust anyone, because everyone is competing to win against another. But that doesn’t stop people from seeking friendship, even more so relationships.
But this felt wrong. More so than wrong. Edgar hadn’t come out of his room for 3 days straight, not for food, not for anything. He isolated himself there, and would not come out. Yes, he was an asshole to everyone - arrogant - and constantly looked down on them. But during breakfast this morning, everyone was silent - because Edgar hadn’t shown up for the 4th day. They didn’t like him, being the arrogant asshole he is, but they obviously felt some degree of worry and anxiety for him.
“I’ll get going first then.” Norton said, picking up his dish and putting it in the dish bin - the place they had always put their dishes when they were done eating. A few of the others followed, and the only people left were the ones who hadn’t finished their breakfast yet. It was pure silence, until.... “After all, I’m going to go check on him.” Victor wrote down, ripping off the sheet of paper and placing it on the table for everyone to see. He stood up before he was even half finished his food - and followed in the other’s footsteps, putting the half - full dish in the dish bin.
“I-I’ll come too.” Andrew said, following Victor as well - Victor nodded in response with a small smile of relief, which Andrew returned. The others watched them as they made their way out of the dinning hall, continuing in their silence.
(Pardon the intrusion…) Victor thought to himself, as he quietly opened the door to Edgar’s room- he was surprised the doorknob even turned, as he had thought it would be locked. This would be the first time anyone had stepped foot in Edgar’s room as he had always kept it locked, whether he was in it or not. But he paused, when he felt a strong metallic smell gush from the room upon its opening - a smell so disgusting he had to suppress the urge to vomit. Knowing how keen Andrew’s smell is, he pushed Andrew back slightly.
“Y-you go back, I’ll deal with this myself.” He had wrote quickly, handing the notebook entirely to the grave keeper behind him. Andrew himself had already gotten a whiff of the smell, and backed off without hesitation, wishing Victor to be careful.
(What in the world is going on in here..?) He noticed that cans of paint were everywhere. Well of course… he’s a painter after all. He noticed a few paintings, and a big pool of dried up paint. No, that’s not paint….. It’s…. Blood! The red paint blotches scattered around the dorm were not paint, but blood! But.. whose? Was it Edgar’s?
His suspicions and questions were answered when he saw the petite painter laying in the corner of a room, not moving a muscle. This immediately came to Victor’s attention - and he rushed up to Edgar’s side, frantically searching for a pulse. It was faint… but he definitely felt something pressing up on his finger. But he didn’t know what to do - he’d never had to deal with someone this close to death’s door. (A doctor… that’s right, Emily!)
He immediately picked the boy up with his raw strength - he noticed how skinny he was and how pale his skin became. There were cut wounds from his wrists up until at least how far Victor could pull Edgar’s sleeves up - but he didn’t have time to worry, he had to get to Ms. Dryer as soon as possible. He frantically ran into the dining room and steered himself away from bumping into the wall with the heels of his shoes.
“E-Emily! Please, I- he needs your help.” He had wrote down in a daze, his hand messing messily portraying his panic.
“Wh-what on earth happened..?!” She stood up immediately, and rushed over to the two - analyzing the situation. Leave this to me.. I’ll take care of it, I think.” She said, obviously not new at dealing with these sorts of things. Everyone else in the room looked at the three with visible confusion, worryness and a sense of guilt for not looking into things sooner. They all watched the three silhouettes disappear from their vision, and you could see how bad they felt just from the way they were sitting fidgetively - even more so from their expressions.
.....
It probably took a few hours for Edgar to gain full consciousness. When he came to… it seemed like a hospital’s patient room. He sat up and scanned his surroundings. Though it looked all run down and broken, as well as dirty, he had been visiting hospitals all around the city, and came to recognize the stuff inside them. But the room itself wasn’t familiar. He didn’t know where he was at all. He had just fallen asleep in his own bed at the mansion…
”Argh..!” He clasped a hand on his head, where he felt a throbbing pain that hurt too much to explain. He noticed his arms were covered in bandages. He wanted to unwrap his arms to see what was underneath the cloth, but he had a bad feeling and held back his curiosity, since his arms burned terribly, enough to say he’d rather cut them off than deal with the pain.
He didn’t remember getting hurt. He didn’t remember why he was here. He didn’t remember who changed him into these clothes. He was living a normal life in his mansion.. So why? The more he thought about it, the more his head felt like it was about to explode - so he gave up his pursuit through his memories to try and understand, and lay back down on the bed.
He heard the door creak open, and he flinched, and immediately sat back up on the bed. “Oh my god..!!” The person who had came in let out a surprised gasp and ran back out. (What’s his problem?) He asked himself in his thoughts. He was about to lay back down when… a bunch of people busted into the room. He jumped up in the bed, shocked and surprised by the sudden amount of people who decided to come in.
“You’re finally up, Eddie!~” A boy with black hair tied up at the back, an outfit that looked like.. a prisoner, who also had a black eye, most likely from getting punched, jumped onto the bed and sat beside Edgar.
“L-Luca stop, he just woke up-” Andrew tried to steer him away from Edgar, but it didn’t work, of course… Luca latched onto Edgar’s arm, hugging him tightly - he winced, the pain in his arm skyrocketing to nearly his limit. “Let go of me!” Edgar pulled his arm back, rejecting said hug. For some reason, that made everyone else happy - it looked like the painter was back to normal - though that small hope quickly came crashing down on all of them. After all, this is a story with an unhappy ending- nothing pure will stand tall forever.
“And who the hell are you? You must be a filthy prisoner, so keep your hands off me. Know your place, peasant.” He dusted himself off.
Everyone else looked at him, shocked. They didn’t know if he was being sarcastic or not. Naib was the first one to speak up.
“Hey, are you oka-”
“Don’t talk to me like we know each other.” His response was immediate, and he stormed out of the room, without a second thought, more or less glance. He then felt a hand tugging at his. He immediately turned around to shake it off. “Don’t touch!-” His voice drained when he saw who it was. “...me..” It was Victor. What was he, what was he doing here? He shook his head, and looked at Victor in the eye.
“Victor.” He had a million things he wanted to ask, a million things he wanted to know. Where they were. How they ended up there. And who all these people were. And why.... why Victor’s mouth was stitched so.. horrifically. His vision clouded up, and he felt the sharp pain throbbing inside his head once more. How much he yearned to get out of there and go back to his studio, to paint all the pain and stress away on his canvas like he always did. But he had no idea where he was.
As much as he was trying to figure everything out, the others were trying to figure out his weird behaviour. Why didn’t Edgar remember who they are? Why is it that he only remembered Grantz’s name, out of all of theirs? It was strange, and they got a bad feeling, which was nearly if not completely stomach-churning.
.....
“Man, if he was going to lose his memories why couldn’t he lose his attitude too?” Kevin scratched his head and sighed, stroking Helena’s hair gently. She pushed up her glasses slightly, only to readjust them to fit on her face properly. She was blind, so she couldn’t see out of them however.
She just smiled without moving her gaze. “It’s fortunate that we didn’t lose him completely, isn’t it? After all, none of us will ever be able to leave this place - it would be such a shame if he died before we even figured out even the smallest hint as to why we’re forced to do this everyday.... I don’t know how he got hurt but, since he’s in pain we should try to support him.” She spoke slowly at her own pace, and Kevin was understanding. “Why don’t we prepare a nice dinner tonight?”
Kevin just nodded. “Ah, Helena, you’re just too nice.” He said, wiping a non existent tear from his left eye, continuing to pat Helena’s head with his right hand. “Yes, if you say so we should. After all, he’s going to go for a match in a few days anyway, and it’s a shame we aren’t given a choice on whether to attend or not.” She would nod to Kevin’s statement in response.
“Oh, we’re talking about Edgar, right??” Lucky guy popped in, standing up right in front of the two that were talking to themselves. He had overheard them as he was making his way to the kitchen to grab himself a snack. “He is pretty curious...” He would lift his index and thumb to his chin, as if getting lost in thought. “I was curious about it, so I went to ask Joseph about it!”
“COUGH-“ Kevin almost fell backwards in surprise, despite sitting down and having perfect balance. “You, a survivor, went to ask Joseph- the photographer, a HUNTER about Edgar?”
“Yeah? What’s so strange about that? I often go to the hunter’s side and play with Robbie and Luchino - sometimes Michiko makes tea for me, and Mary has been teaching me how to dance lately!” He then realized he hadn’t really told many people about that, so it’s no wonder he’d be surprised.
“I’m just surprised - how can you play with them even after being clobbered by them..” Kevin shook his head, getting to the point. “What did you learn about his amnesia?”
“Oh, well nothing, other than either it will, take a long time to regain his memories, unless it’s permanent - then there’s nothing we can do.”
“Yikes, that’s a big blow for our matches though...” He sighed and stood up, and Helena did the same - with the help of her cane.
“Do you think he’ll do alright? He won’t remember how to play, right? We should tell him how.” Helena suggested, tapping her cane on the ground twice. The other two nodded, accepting her proposal. “That would be a big help rather than explaining it on one go before the match. She smiled.
“....”
Edgar would pull back from the corner, done with eavesdropping on their dumb conversation. What game were they even talking about? Whatever it is, he was sure he’d be able to win without trouble. Maybe it was linked to escaping this place. About escaping... what did she mean by “None of us will ever be able to leave this place”? He didn’t understand anything. More mysteries. He just wanted to go home.
Though maybe he’d be able to leave this place soon.