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Chapter Text

Virgil groaned as his phone vibrated violently against his ear. He usually fell asleep listening to something, so his phone was always next to his face when we woke up. He glared at the bright screen.

Incoming call: Teach

He ignored the call, put his phone back on his pillow, and brought his hands to his head. He felt like crap. After the seemingly endless ordeal that Deceit put him through the other day, it kind of made sense for him to get sick. He had been exhausted. But the timing sucked. He phone vibrated again, but only once this time.

Teach: Are you aware of the time? You did not answer my call.

Virgil sighed when he realized he had two other texts.

Princey: Rise and shine Sleeping Beauty! Today’s the big day!

Pat: Wakey wakey, kiddo! We tried to let you sleep in a bit, but it’s getting a little late. We just wanna make sure everythings ok… And we kinda need you before we can start…

Late? How late could he have slept? He checked the time on his phone and gasped when he realized it was almost noon. Well, it started as a gasp, but it turned into a coughing fit. Great. Day one of the new training would be extra fun now. He threw on his hoodie and some black sweatpants—hopefully they wouldn’t notice the lack of effort—and watched in the mirror as his eyeshadow darkened a few shades. Perfect.

***

Logan looked at his watch impatiently. The others didn’t know this yet, but Logan would be doing as much training as Virgil would. He had practiced with Virgil some over the past few days and realized pretty quickly that Virgil could throw off his radar fairly easily if he wanted to. All he had to do was focus on something that was making him anxious, and Logan wouldn’t be able to sense anything else. It was frustrating. He was startled out of his thoughts by the sudden appearance of a rather disheveled Virgil. He immediately tried to read him, but only picked up on some anxiety. Well, that was useless. Wait. Why would Virgil be blocking him already? He narrowed his eyes at the anxious side.

***

Thank goodness he had learned how to block Logan. He knew the others would never let him practice if they knew he was sick. It was just a cold or something because he had lost so much sleep over Deceit. He could still practice. Actually, he should definitely train when he wasn’t completely up to it, because Deceit would never attack under circumstances that were completely in Virgil’s favor. He would never pick a fair fight. They had to be ready for anything. He looked up and caught Logan’s glare. He had probably figured out Virgil was hiding something. Great. He should say something. “Sorry I’m late…”

“No problem, kiddo! Everything ok?”

“Yeah, you look a little… gloomier than usual.”

“Roman!” Thomas looked at his creative side in surprised exasperation.

“What? I’m just saying…”

“I slept in, ok? Sorry for not spending an hour on my hair like some of us…” Oops. That had more bite to it than Virgil had meant.

Roman looked hurt, and Patton scolded, “Enough. Both of you,” in his dad voice.

Virgil shrank back and looked down, but Roman spoke first. “I’m sorry, I just meant that I wanted to make sure you’re ok.” He gave Virgil a weak smile.

Virgil was about to apologize with a half-truth as an excuse, but Logan was faster. “What are you hiding?”

The others all looked at Virgil in surprise. He sighed, but stuck with his half-truth. “I’m still pretty tired from… everything. I haven’t been sleeping that well.” Before Logan could grill him, he stopped blocking and gave the logical side a look that said, “I’ll keep your secret if you’ll keep mine.”

***

Logan tried to focus on reading Virgil again, but he was too distracted by the realization that Virgil was blackmailing him. No wonder he hadn’t shared the secret. It was leverage. Maybe Virgil really was a Slytherin. Finally able to concentrate, he looked Virgil in the eye for several seconds before he found what he was looking for. Virgil was ill. He thought about how best to approach this situation. “If you’re not up for this today, we can always postpone.” Virgil’s glare was piercing. He glared right back, sending the message, “What? I didn’t say anything.”

“But Deceit would never attack when we’re all 100%. I need to be able to do this even if I’m tired.” Virgil gave Logan a “you know I’m right” look, and it occurred to Logan that they were basically having a silent conversation as well as the obvious one. Interesting.

He conceded. “Virgil is right.” One look stopped Patton and Thomas from arguing. “Besides, we’ll make sure not to push him too far.” He gave the youngest side a very pointed look.

***

“So how does this all work?” Patton thought he was probably the most nervous out of all of them. Not that he didn’t trust Virgil, but being anxious made Patton feel all kinds of other feelings too, and Virgil’s power couldn’t take those away. He was also worried that this would all be too much for his dark, strange son—especially if he was already tired.

Virgil seemed to tune into Patton’s nerves. “I need to practice taking each of your anxiety until it gets easier,” he summarized. “Pretty simple. Just try not to kill me.”

Patton didn’t think that was very funny, but Roman spoke before he could scold the negativity. “But how do we start? How do we get anxious?”

Virgil smirked. “That depends how much you trust me. We could go to my room, or I could do it.”

“But wouldn’t that be extra hard on you, kiddo?” It sounded like twice the work to Patton. Besides, surely he didn’t need to practice that power.

“Not really. Making people anxious barely takes any energy. It’s much easier to be the bad guy.” The smirk had lost some it its humor.

“But your room would assist you with the anxiety you take on. However, I was hoping you could practice some control today, and that would be harder if we were all growing anxious at once. What do you think, Virgil?”

Patton’s gaze shifted from Logan back to Virgil just as the younger responded, “I can do it, but first… Who’s already anxious? Be honest.” Virgil closed his eyes. “Don’t tell me, just raise your hand.” Patton wasn’t sure what the point was, but he looked around at the others for a second before raising his hand.

***

“Last chance to raise your hand before it’s cheating,” Virgil warned, keeping his eyes tightly shut. There were two main reasons for this exercise, and one of them required them to make up their minds and not change halfway through. “Ok, no changing now. Give me a second.” He took a deep breath. “Roman is a little nervous about whether or not this will all make a difference if Deceit attacks again.”

Roman started, “I-”

“Don’t say anything until I go through all of you. It’ll mess up my experiment.” He paused briefly before continuing, “Logan is worried about me. Specifically…” Well, specifically stuff he wasn’t going to say out loud. “Specifically that I’m starting the training with a disadvantage by being tired.” He thought he saved that one pretty well. Now it would get harder, especially with this headache. “Thomas… Thomas is also worried about me. I’m sensing a pattern. He’s more focused on how this whole thing will affect me in general. He’s also a little nervous about how anxious he’ll get during this process. Self-preservation, I like that. Patton-” He pulled in a sharp, deep breath that aggravated his already sore throat. “Geez, Pat… Give me a second to untangle this.” He took decidedly longer than a second, but there were a lot of other emotions in the way and a lot of anxiety-related details to process. “Patton is worried about all of us being more anxious because of this training, but especially that it will be hard on me for the obvious reasons and hard on him because his anxiety amplifies other overwhelming emotions that I can’t take away.” He opened his eyes.

Only Patton was raising his hand.

Roman, Logan, and Thomas all started arguing with him at the same time, but Virgil cut them off. “The problem is, you all failed. Sort of. Patton is just too anxious right now for me to practice with him without risking corruption. You might say he doesn’t qualify this time around. But the rest of you…” He glared at each of them in turn. “You severely underestimate the importance of complete and total honesty with me. Can any of you guess why?”

Roman spoke first. “So you trust us?”

Thomas chimed in. “So we’re different from Deceit.”

Virgil looked at Logan just as his eyes widened in realization. He had a pretty big advantage in that he did not have to guess, but the others didn’t know that. He shook his head, letting Virgil explain so as not to look suspicious. “I can’t use more than one of my powers at once without shutting down.” Everyone but Logan looked confused. “So if I’m making you anxious, I can’t read how anxious you are—how close you are to corrupting, panicking, whatever—I just have to trust what’s obvious from your behavior and eyeshadow and what you tell me. So if I can’t trust you not to lie to me, you can’t trust me not to kill you.”

***

Logan was pretty sure Virgil knew none of the sides could really die, but he figured the phrasing had been for effect. Looking around the room, it seemed to do the trick. Virgil was wearing a very intimidating expression until he looked back to Patton. Morality did appear rather anxious. Virgil stepped towards the father figure and took his hand, immediately closing his eyes at the force of the other’s anxiety. Logan finally broke the silence. “I was unaware.”

“Yeah, Virge, I figured I wasn’t super anxious, so I was ok to help you…” Thomas looked shaken, but Roman looked worse.

“I behaved dishonorably. I have been trying to earn your trust, and I failed to complete a simple test of honesty.”

“Virgil, I understand your point, but I think it is unwise to delay the training. Unless you want to rest-”

Virgil glared at him. “I’m fine. Just promise to be completely honest with me.” Everyone nodded. “Then I’ll start with Thomas.”

Chapter Text

If he was skipping Patton, Thomas would be the easiest to make anxious. He was the second most emotional. Virgil was trying to practice each skill from easiest to hardest with each side easiest to hardest, but the order of the sides depended on which skill he had to use. For instance, Patton was the easiest to corrupt but the hardest to read and pull anxiety from. “Patton, you don’t have to stay…”

Virgil caught a glimpse of relief in Patton’s eyes before he said, “I wanna be here, kiddo! Besides, I feel much better now!” It would’ve been a convincing act if they didn’t all know him so well.

Still, he should feel better. Much better, judging from the amount of borrowed anxiety Virgil was now holding. He shivered. Why was it so cold in here? Logan was staring at him. He stared back, carefully positioning his most defiant “what do you think you’re looking at?” face.

***

In the back of Logan’s mind, he figured the others were starting to be unnerved by the staring contest. No one had spoken for a full 30 seconds. He finally read that Virgil was shivering despite the rather warm living room and his heavy jacket. Fever, then. Perhaps he should put an end to this. Suddenly, he had an idea. “I think Patton should be allowed to participate.”

Virgil’s glare deepened. “He’s too anxious. It’s dangerous.”

“No, he was anxious. You fixed that. Besides, ‘Deceit would never attack when we’re all 100%.’ If we are giving Patton the day off when you are also less than full strength, why would we not simply postpone?”

“Because there’s no chance of me getting corrupted!” Virgil’s scary voice echoed around the room, and he was shaking with what looked closer to rage than anxiety.

Logan felt his heart rate increase suddenly. It seemed Virgil could lose control of his scary voice when angry as well as during a panic attack. The logical side pulled at his tie, trying to pull it further from his neck. He was having trouble getting enough air. Had he caught Virgil’s illness? They had been spending a lot of time together recently. But no, this didn’t feel like his throat was swelling. It felt like his chest was tightening.

***

“Logan? Is something wrong?” Thomas had been the first to notice. For one thing, it wasn’t like Logan to back down from a challenge. He also looked a little fidgety.

Thomas saw Logan’s eyes light up in realization. “Virgil, stop.” He gasped. “Please-”

Thomas thought he had never heard such a desperate plea. Then it hit him what was happening. “Patton, help Logan calm down. Roman, we need to get Virgil to his room.”

“What? Why? What’s going on?” Roman looked like he wanted his sword.

Thomas saw Patton guide Logan to the couch, and he took Roman’s and Virgil’s hands and started sinking out.

***

“Will someone please tell me what’s going on?!” Roman shouted. When will they start informing him of these important events? He was never in the loop around here.

Virgil gave him a sinister and terrifying glare, and Roman felt his breath catch in his throat. He brought his hands to his neck, rapidly trying to pull away whatever was constricting his airways. Virgil’s glare practically screamed at him to get out. He was so desperate for relief and terrified of what was going on that he obeyed.

Stumbling back into Thomas’s living room, he whimpered, “Patton…” and felt arms around him as his knees buckled.

***

Virgil knew someone was trying to talk to him, but he was too dizzy to process the words. Why was he dizzy? He didn’t remember a recent panic attack…

“Virgil, calm down. It’s ok. You’re ok, just take a deep breath.”

But he wasn’t panicking. Why was someone talking to him like he was panicking? He realized it would be easier to tell who it was if he opened his eyes. His ears were ringing, so he couldn’t tell just by the voice. Besides, they all sounded pretty similar. He hissed in pain at the brightness of his purple nightlight even though he knew he had left it on the dimmest setting because of the headache he woke up with. Oh. Right.

“Virgil? You ok?” Thomas. It was Thomas.

“I’m-” Virgil coughed suddenly, doubling over in what he now realized was his bed. When did he get in bed?

“Whoa, Virge, what’s… Are you sick?”

Virgil simply nodded as the apparently endless coughing fit continued, but choked out, “Sorry…”

***

“I had just assumed… Your breathing was strained and you were clearly lightheaded…” And you started corrupting the others, Thomas thought. Why would that have happened if Virgil wasn’t panicking? And why had Virgil apologized? Oh… After that whole thing about total honesty with him. Or, better yet, during that whole speech…

Virgil’s coughing finally subsided. “We needed to train…”

“Do you know what happened?”

***

Virgil’s whole body tensed at the whispered question. What had he done? He forced his breathing to stay calm. He knew hyperventilating would make him start coughing again. “Logan was trying to tell me to postpone…” He remembered guiltily. “Then… I don’t know. I got really dizzy and… angry? I knew we needed to train, and Logan couldn’t get in the way of that. We don’t know when Deceit will be back, and… I’m not ready.”

“I don’t know if it was the anger or the desperation or even because you’re sick, but… You lashed out. At Logan.”

Virgil felt his breathing stop. No no no…

“And…”

There’s more?

“Once I got you to your room, Roman started complaining about never knowing what was going on.”

Oh. Oh no.

“I had assumed he was just being too loud because I had assumed you were panicking…”

Virgil cleared his throat. “How bad?” He wasn’t even sure he wanted the answer, but he had to know.

“I didn’t see much of it for either of them, but I know they were struggling to breathe. Patton should be calming them down right now. At least, I assume that’s where Roman went.”

“Can… Can I…?”

“You wanna see them?”

Virgil nodded, but quickly stopped when he realized it made the room spin. He knew he should sleep, but he had to make sure they were ok.

Chapter Text

Virgil stumbled when he reappeared in Thomas’s living room, barely catching himself on the wall. When he was sure he wouldn’t collapse, he surveyed the damage. The only sign that Logan had experienced anything outside of his norm was that his tie was slightly loose, but Roman hadn’t completely calmed down from the attack yet. Patton was still breathing with him on the couch, Roman’s head leaning on his shoulder.

Logan approached the stairs, followed closely by Thomas. “What was that?” There was a surprising amount of venom behind the words. Maybe he wasn’t as far out of the attack as Virgil had thought, but he couldn’t sense much anxiety from him. He was probably just angry.

Virgil had a death grip on both cuffs of his jacket, but he tried to appear calm with the right amount of apologetic mixed in. “How bad?”

“8. Roman hit 9.”

Virgil grimaced. He and Logan had worked out what each number from 1 to 10 meant when it came to Virgil’s anxiety awhile ago in order to help them both keep track of how he—and Thomas—were doing. 8 was the point where everything tenses up, and 9 was where he started hyperventilating. He didn’t like to talk about 10. He was about to apologize, but Logan wasn’t done.

“You went straight for our breathing. I’ve never seen you be that direct, even on bad days. It always creeps up or overflows straight to 10 if you’ve been at 10 too long, but you weren’t panicking.” He took a deep breath to regain control of his anger. “I know you didn’t just attack us for spite, Virgil. What happened? Are you ok?”

Virgil was currently looking guiltily at 4 separate and blurry Logans, but he supposed that counted as ok. It was better than the guilt. “That’s… That’s how Deceit used to get me to lash out. He would make sure I stayed tired and run down, even sick half the time. Then it’s harder to stay in control. And not just of my anxiety. He would make me so… so angry at all of you for not caring, and-”

“Kiddo, Logan was arguing with you because he does care. He wanted you to be safe. And Roman was trying to make sure he knew what was going on so that he could help. We all care about you, Virgil.”

Virgil blinked back tears. “I know, I know that, but it’s really hard… I just, I think I fell into old habits, and I was getting defensive, and we really do need to practice because I’m not ready, I can’t take on Deceit yet, and I don’t know what to do-”

“Virgil, breathe. Slowly. Focus on my voice. Nothing else. Just breathing and listening.” Logan waited for Virgil to acknowledge him before gently offering the same counting technique that Patton had just finished with Roman, who was now sleeping on the couch. He never handled panicking very well physically. “Good, Virgil. You are doing very well.”

Logan looked tired. Patton kept glancing between Virgil and the sleeping Prince, worry clear on his face. Thomas looked shaken from having so many sides have back to back panic attacks. Virgil somehow paled even further. What had he done?

“Stop that.” Logan’s voice was as effective as a slap across the cheek. “Just think about the plan going forward, not mistakes of the past.”

Thomas looked at the logical side curiously. “How did you know what he was thinking about?”

***

Logan paled. He looked from Thomas to Virgil, and the latter had a sympathetic look on his face. He couldn’t tell them yet. He wasn’t ready. He hadn’t practiced enough. After glancing nervously around the room, his eyes met Virgil’s. Something was wrong. Ignoring his own building anxiety, he focused on the younger side, only to feel him practically screaming one word. Help. “Virgil…?” He was staring blankly at the empty spot next to Patton. Crap. “Virgil, it’s just us. He isn’t here.” Logan shifted slightly to block Virgil’s view. “Talk to me.”

Patton looked confused and concerned. “What’s going on, kiddo?”

Virgil was visibly shaking now and took a sudden step back when Patton shifted closer.

Silently holding up his hand so Patton would stay put, Logan took a cautious step forward with much more success. “It’s just you and me. You’re safe here.” He took another step. “Can I touch you?”

Virgil’s breathing skyrocketed as he took two frantic steps backwards, his back pressing hard into the wall by the stairs.

One hand up to show Virgil he wouldn’t force contact and the other keeping Thomas and Patton at bay, Logan switched tactics. He gently pulled out his phone, careful not to move too quickly, and started shuffling his “Virgil” playlist consisting mostly of Emo and PG-13 music.

The younger side visibly relaxed a fraction. He now looked like he was leaning on the wall more for balance than to keep his distance from the other sides.

“You look tired, Virgil. Do you want to head back to your room? Maybe watch a movie?”

At the mention of his room, Virgil’s breathing calmed significantly. That was the good part. Unfortunately, the decrease in adrenaline also impacted his already shot equilibrium, and Logan was too far away to catch him.

***

“Virgil!” Thomas and Patton exclaimed in unison, waking Princey in the process.

Logan immediately checked his head, but it didn’t look like he hit it too hard. He’d have a bruise, but he should be fine. Patton was more worried that he had been this sick and wasn’t in bed.

Thomas sighed in relief when the others didn’t appear worried, but the reprieve didn’t last long. He brought a hand to his head and hissed in pain before quickly moving to the couch and collapsing into the cushions.

“What’s going on?!” Princey shouted, making Thomas wince.

“Thomas? What’s wrong?” Patton couldn’t handle much more of watching his family in pain.

“Too many of us have been in too much… turmoil,” Logan said, “for lack of a better word. We’ll make him sick if we don’t all calm down.

Chapter Text

Logan forced himself to take a deep breath. He was feeling a bit lightheaded, and he hoped it was just the stress and that he wasn’t catching whatever Virgil had. “Thomas, try to calm down. Virgil will be fine.”

“Thomas, buddy, what do you need? How can we help?” Patton put a comforting hand on his shoulder, but Thomas flinched and pulled away. Patton looked helplessly at Logan. “What do we do?”

Logan steadied himself on the wall Virgil was still collapsed against, hoping no one noticed how off he was. He focused as much as he could on Thomas. “He seems to be very overwhelmed. He needs less stimuli. Roman, go to your room.”

Roman looked offended. “I’m not a child, Logan-”

“I did not say that you were. Your room will help you relax, and your added influence is overwhelming Thomas.”

“But-”

“Now Roman, we want to help Thomas, don’t we?” Patton looked pleadingly at the Creative side.

Roman looked like he wanted to argue, but he just sunk out without another word.

“How are you holding up, Patton?”

“I’m alright, kiddo. You?”

“Could you help Thomas while I attempt to wake Virgil?” Hopefully Morality wouldn’t notice the avoidance tactic. He didn’t need the attention right now.

“Sounds like a plan!” Logan thought the energetic response sounded a little forced, but Patton was trying. He nodded before turning his attention to the youngest side.

***

Virgil shivered. Everything hurt, and it felt like his brain was swimming through choppy waves. He just felt off. Why couldn’t he just go back to sleep? He liked sleep. Sleep was good.

“-irgil… Wake up. We need you to help Thomas.”

Virgil bolted upright, but immediately leaned back against the wall when the room started doing summersaults.

“You’re ok…” Logan sounded hesitant.

“What’s wrong with Thomas?” Virgil blinked rapidly in an effort to force his eyes to focus.

“Too many of us have been panicking. It’s wearing him down.” Something was wrong with Logan, but he wasn’t anxious, so there wasn’t much he could do about it. Besides, Thomas had to be the priority.

Out of nowhere, Virgil’s anxiety came crashing back down on him. “I can’t-”

“What? Why?” Logan knew better than to question him like that when he’s panicking. Maybe he doesn’t know he’s panicking?

“Thomas, look at me! Focus on me, come on…” Patton sounded wrong. Too emotional. Why would he think Patton sounded too emotional? Of course he’s overwhelmed. Thomas is falling apart.

Thomas. Crap. Virgil pulled himself away from the wall and stumbled towards the couch as Patton kept begging Thomas to focus and stay awake.

“You need to take his anxiety.” Wait. Patton wanted him to take Thomas’s anxiety? He must really be desperate.

Taking another look at Thomas, there was a bigger issue. “Pat, he’s not anxious.” I am, he thought to himself. But that’s irrelevant.

“Well, do something!” Virgil flinched at the sudden use of the dad voice. He couldn’t handle the dad voice right now.

“8,” he muttered, hoping to get some help from the unusually quiet Logan.

“Hmm…? What?” What the heck was going on with Logan?

***

Patton was freaking out. He wasn’t panicking. He knew the difference. This was a pure, emotional overload. He felt hot tears rolling down his cheeks. He shouldn’t be using his dad voice on Virgil. Virgil needed his help too, but he couldn’t see Thomas like this. Why was Virgil so focused on Logan? Couldn’t he see it was Thomas who needed his help? “What do we do?!”

“I could help…” A side Patton didn’t recognize was standing at the foot of the stairs. Virgil flinched and looked at the newcomer, but then visibly relaxed.

“…Who are you?” Patton wasn’t sure if he should feel scared or relieved. None of the others looked worried. Thomas still looked overwhelmed, but not more so than he did before.

“Calm. I’m here to help.” The new guy—Calm, Patton reminded himself—looked a little like Virgil, if Virgil had forgotten his jacket, skipped eyeshadow, and hadn’t brushed his hair. He also wasn’t wearing any purple, just a combination of the kinds of earthy colors you’d see in camouflage. Other than that, he could’ve been Virgil’s twin. “Virgil, are you ok now?”

Virgil shrugged and then nodded.

“Good. I can’t focus on all of you at once. Can you handle it in your room while I help the others? My effect won’t last once you leave, but your room will help you.”

“Sure.” Without another word or so much as a glance around the room, Virgil sunk out.

“Can you help Thomas?” Patton was desperate. If this guy could calm Virgil down that easily…

“You first, Patton. Thomas needs you to calm down before I can help him. How did you all get so worked up, anyway?”

Patton was crying again. He couldn’t help it. “We were trying to be ready for the next time Deceit comes… Virgil wanted to practice taking away our anxiety, but…”

“It all fell apart?” Patton nodded miserably. “And Logan, you didn’t even consider this outcome as a possibility?”

Logan shrugged. “We were scared.”

Calm sighed. “Well, it can’t be helped. Maybe think it through a little more next time? I’m sure this hadn’t been the plan going in, but, whatever the plan was, it couldn’t be worth this, right?”

Patton whimpered.

***

Roman paced his room, fuming. Why did none of the others include him in these big, important things? Surely his ideas could help any situation! Excluding him is simply impractical! Why would they do this to him? “They don’t know how I’m feeling…” he muttered to himself. But that wasn’t quite true. Virgil knew. This is what he panicked over a few days ago. And Thomas and Logan knew enough from his outburst in the video, too. And Patton isn’t clueless. Then why are they constantly making him feel unneeded, even unwanted?!

“Hello, Roman.”

Roman jumped. Someone was standing in front of his still-closed bedroom door, smiling. He looked… dramatic. His aesthetic appeared to be midnight blue. His hair was frustratingly perfect—every lock in place. He had Thomas’s face, of course, but it, too, looked impeccable. None of this, however, clued Roman in on who the handsome stranger was. “Who are you?”