Work Text:
Ever since he split when he was only twelve, Mike hasn’t been alone in his head. When he tried to sleep, he’d hear his alters arguing in the back of his head. It had annoyed him to no end and had caused insomnia, especially in the early years of his condition. He had wanted nothing but to shut them up.
Now, lying curled up on his luxurious bed in the winners’ cabin, he wished more than anything that they’d come back. The silence that consumed the headspace made Mike too paranoid to sleep, and he had been trying to trigger his alters all night. He was both shirtless and clutching his fedora on his head in an attempt to rouse either Vito or Manitoba, but neither of them had uttered a word let alone tried to front.
Glancing at the other beds in the room, Mike confirmed that Sam and Duncan were both asleep. Though he was glad neither of them were awake to hear his accelerated breathing or near-silent whimpers of distress, it only cemented in the feeling that he was more alone than he’d been in years.
“…Chester? Svetlana?” He whispered to himself, hiding under the covers. He felt like such a child, but he couldn’t help it. He didn’t like being alone. It was such a foreign feeling. “Manitoba? Vito, I— c’mon guys… where are you?” He gently hit his head with a closed fist, biting down hard on his lip. He didn’t care who, he just wanted someone else to let him know they were there.
He really didn’t care who.
“…Mal?” The name was like a bad omen in itself, but Mike was desperate. “Mal, please, if you’re the one that’s causing this— I don’t— I’m not mad, buddy, just talk to me…”
At the lack of response even from Mal, Mike gave up. He tugged weakly at his hair to distract himself from the anxiety that was devouring him from the inside. Glancing at the clock at his bedside, he saw that it was only 1:24am. That meant it was at least another five hours before he’d be woken up by Chris ready for the next challenge, and there was no way Mike would be able to sit in the darkness for that long without having a panic attack. That was definitely not something he wanted his teammates to see, or the world to see, for that matter. Mike was still recovering from having his identity crisis broadcasted for the whole of North America to watch.
Slowly, Mike slid out of bed and into his slippers before tiptoeing out of the bedroom. He’d rather explore the mansion while his team still had access to it than continue pretending there was a chance he was going to get some sleep.
Emerging from the room, Mike moved down the corridor like a shadow. He felt like such a freak. Honestly, he always felt like a freak (even when Zoey was trying to convince him that wasn’t true) but it was worse now. Here he was, feeling like a stranger in his own body as he felt his feet push him forward and his hands support him on the wall.
As he clawed his way down the hallway, he eventually was able to drag himself into the bathroom and clumsily shut the door behind him before letting out a harsh gasp for air. The same kind of gasp that would normally precede a switch of fronting alters. Unfortunately, no such switch occurred. Mike was still alone, and that only worsened his panic. He leaned against the sink and turned the tap on, splashing water in his face purely to calm himself down.
Definitely not to hide the tears that had sprung from his eyes. No way. Mike wasn’t crying over what seemed to be the miraculous disappearance of his mental illness. That was ridiculous.
Mike caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror and let out a shaky sigh before tangling his fingers in his hair again, sharply pulling his front tuft of locks over his eye.
“Mal! You fucking loser! You come and front this second, or I… I…” He pulled tighter on his hair. Almost desperately. “…I’m crying, Mal. Come and stop me. Come and- and yell at me for being a whiny bitch… please.”
He glared at his reflection: at the body that didn’t feel his. Those abs were Vito’s. Those slim yet muscular arms belonged to Svetlana. The ever so slight wince he had in his right eye was from Chester. He owed his hair that refused to stay fluffy without hairspray to Manitoba for wearing his hat too much. Even his eyebags weren’t his originally. Looking at them only reminded him of Mal.
Frightened eyes met Mike’s in the mirror as he choked back a sob, taking in the sight of the image before him. His body was nothing but a Frankenstein’s monster of his alters. Nothing was Mike. Mike was nothing. Not without his alters, at least.
Suddenly, Mike’s fear manifested into a loud cry of frustration. For a moment, he didn’t care that everyone else was asleep. He didn’t care that he might wake them up and that they’d all see what a mentally ill psycho he was. He screamed and drove his fist into the mirror.
Before anything else, Mike saw the blood staining the newly-formed cracks in the mirror. Not his blood, though. It wasn’t his body, after all. Maybe that’s why he couldn’t feel the pain or hear his screams or smell the coppery stench of the sheer amount of blood that his hand was losing. Something like panic swirled in his stomach, but he was too dazed to act on that panic. He stood frozen, staring at the fist which was embedded with shards of glass and painting the bathroom floor red.
Great. Chris would probably charge him for that.
A sound was echoing in the back of his head, but Mike didn’t bother trying to decipher it. His sobs were coming freely now, and he didn’t bother holding them back anymore. It took too much energy that he simply didn’t have. He kicked the wall and pulled at his hair, gasping for air and hoping more than anything that any one of his alters would let him know they were there. As he grabbed his hair, he acutely noticed that his hat had fallen off his head. He didn’t care, though. Manitoba wasn’t coming. Nobody was coming.
The distant sound was still reverberating in Mike’s ear, and if anything it was becoming louder. He spun around to scan the room, but his vision was blurry with tears and dark around the edges. Despite that, he managed to somewhat focus on the silhouette of the figure before him. He backed away a little, biting his lip to forcefully slow his breathing, but the lack of oxygen in his lungs only made his panic worse.
Mike watched as the figure took a step closer and he let out a cry, raising his hands to cover his face, but he only succeeded in nicking his forehead with the glass shards still lodged in his palm. He didn’t feel the pain, though. He didn’t feel anything. He could, however, see crimson corrupt the vision in one of his eyes as his forehead began to bleed like a waterfall.
Much to Mike’s distress, the figure in the room quickly approached him and grabbed the wrist of his bloody hand, pulling it away from his face. His breath hitched and he made a variety of noises of protest, though he never succeeded in getting any actual words out. He fought against the grip of the person holding his arm, but their hand had an iron grasp on his wrist and didn’t seem to be planning on letting up.
He heard shouting coming from close by to him and for a horrible moment he was terrified that the shouting was directed at him. He deserved it for being so weak and not controlling his emotions better, but he still didn’t like it. However, he quickly realised that the figure before him was shouting out of the bathroom. For the first time in a few minutes, he understood what was being said.
“Zoey! Let Sam get the bandages! You need to come here and hold him down!”
It was Duncan’s voice. Duncan, who was so dead set on being a villain and hating everyone. Duncan who was in juvie with him (even if he hadn’t noticed yet). Duncan was the one trying to help him.
“Yes, I’ve got him right now, but he’s fighting me! He won’t fight you. Come on!” He barked, still wrestling with Mike to keep him from injuring himself further on the glass.
Mike stopped resisting as much once he realised it was Duncan holding him down, and he was only trying to stop him from cutting his skin up even more than he already had. The haze was lifting off Mike’s mind, and with it the numbness to the pain.
He noticed instantly when he could feel the pain. It felt like a round of bullets had just torn through his hand, and the cut on his forehead wasn’t exactly small either. Mike let out a blaring scream of pain, staring at his bloody hand in terror.
“Woah! Hey, calm down, man.” Duncan held Mike’s bleeding hand down by his side so he couldn’t look at it. “Adrenaline wearing off?”
Mike let out an affirmative groan, choking his way through each raspy breath. “I— I didn’t… m-mean t-to..!” He sobbed, his teeth clamping down on his front lip again.
Duncan was quiet for a moment, clearly unused to comforting people. He tried, though. “Didn’t mean to punch the mirror? Yeah, I get angry like that too, man. I understand.” The ex-criminal sighed. “That doesn’t make you bad or dangerous, though.”
“I am dangerous!!” Mike protested, scrunching his eyes shut. “I-I-I—”
He couldn’t even get his words out and just resorted to crying harshly into his non-injured hand, which he had clasped firmly over his mouth in favour of breathing like a dragon through his nose.
Duncan opened his mouth to talk again, but he caught sight of Zoey in the doorway and swiftly switched places with her, moving to the other side of Mike to keep holding his wrist down as Zoey shuffled Mike into her lap, hugging him around his waist with one hand and wiping his tears away with the other hand.
“You’re not dangerous, Mike. You have never once made me feel unsafe, nor anyone here.” She murmured into his ear, which seemed to make Mike deflate against her, burying his face in her shoulder as he cried out all his anxiety from the day.
Eventually, Mike felt his face be held by Zoey and gently guided upright as she pressed an alcohol wipe to his cut, wiping away the blood. The alcohol mixing with his skin tissue burned even worse than the wound hurt already, but he refused to complain. The fact that Zoey was holding him made everything better.
“I know.” She whispered as he winced with each dab. “I know…” She eventually retracted the wipe and replaced it with a plaster, which Mike was incredibly grateful for. “Mike? We’re gonna have to get the glass out of your hand now, okay? Duncan’s gonna hold your arm still while Sierra pulls the shards out.”
Instantly, Mike shook his head, opening his eyes and meeting Zoey’s gaze with a pleading expression. He tried to pull his hand away, but Duncan had clearly restrained someone before because he wasn’t able to even tug at it. “Zoey, I— I can’t— I can’t do it, please don’t—”
Zoey winced at his pleads, but ultimately shook her head. “It’ll be quick. Come on… look at me, yeah? It’ll be over before you know it.”
It took a few seconds for Mike to work himself up to accept his fate, but after a few seconds he obligingly looked up at Zoey and nodded, clinging to her so tightly he was worried he might break her ribs.
Zoey kissed his forehead and glanced over at Sierra, giving her a quick nod, which she returned before gently holding Mike’s hand. “First one.” She warned before pulling it out as quickly as she could, which Mike was extremely thankful for despite the shriek of pain that followed.
He let out a shuddering breath into Zoey’s chest, but didn’t say a word (other than pained curses under his breath). Sierra waited to make sure Mike wasn’t going to suddenly try to pull away again before plucking another shard and discarding it into a plastic tub beside her. Mike hissed in pain, but he didn’t scream this time. Zoey was stroking his hair to try and distract him from the pain, though she knew it wouldn’t do much.
“You doing okay, Mike?”
The teen shook his head, face still pressed against her collarbone. He let out another sharp whimper of pain as a third piece of glass was retrieved from his hand.
“Do you need a break?” Zoey offered, cradling his head, but Mike gave a disagreeing shake of his head.
“N-no. Keep going.” He managed to force out, breath hitching as he tried to withstand the pain, still mumbling swears with each removed fragment. “It’s fine. I’m fine. I’m fine…”
Zoey didn’t believe him for a second, but she gave Sierra the nod to keep going, which she did. With her strangely adept fingers, she had all the shards out of Mike’s hand in no time. The pain had become easier and easier to tolerate, but that didn’t mean it was completely painless. By the time his hand was glass-free, he was writhing in pain and Zoey needed to hold him against her to prevent him from disrupting Sierra’s careful work. Once Sierra finally pulled away, Mike’s entire body slumped against Zoey and he started crying quietly again.
“I’m s-so s-s-sorry!! I didn’t– I didn’t mean to–” He gasped as he clung to Zoey’s pajama shirt. “I didn’t mean to wake you up. I was just… it was so quiet and I was scared, but I was being stupid…”
Hearing his cries of apology broke Zoey’s heart and she instantly shook her head, cupping his face in her hand and gently brushing away a tear before planting a kiss in the same spot.
“It’s okay. You did nothing wrong. If you were struggling to sleep, you could’ve come into my room.” She reminded him, though her thoughts were interrupted as she watched Sam walk in with the first aid kit, pulling out a large cotton pad and pouring some rubbing alcohol on it. The sight of it instantly upped her protective instincts and she held Mike tighter, but she knew he needed the disinfectant. “Mike? You just need another quick wipe on your hand and then you’ll be all done. Okay?”
Mike’s eyes widened and his neck spun around abruptly, taking notice of Sam and zoning his gaze in on the dreaded alcohol pad. He turned back to Zoey with a panicked look. “Zoey, please, it hurts bad enough already!” He instantly protested, fighting to pull his hand back for what must have been at least the third time tonight. He shot a glare at Duncan, who simply glared right back.
“Don’t look at me. I’m not the one who punched a mirror.” He snapped, his grip on Mike’s wrist tightening. Mike looked away at that accusation, knowing it was true.
Sam took the opportunity of Mike being distracted to start wiping down his hand, which was met with a sudden yelp and Mike’s whole body jerking away. “No!! I said no! I said—”
“Shhh…” Zoey to the rescue. As always. “It’ll be over quicker than it took to pull all that glass out, then we’ll wrap it up in a bandage and then it’ll be over. Okay, Mike?”
God, that girl made him weak in the knees. Well, currently the blood loss was making him weak in the knees, but Zoey’s presence was certainly contributing. After a lengthy pause, Mike nodded once and closed his eyes.
The moment the pad touched his cuts again, his body involuntarily twisted in a futile attempt to escape the pain and his lips let slip another shout of pain, followed by a stream of apologies. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m trying not to yell. I’m really trying, I’m sorry.” Although, he was quickly silenced by Zoey pressing a finger to his lips, shaking her head in response to his apologies.
“Not your fault. You can’t control it, so no apology. Understand?”
Mike met her eyes for a moment, then quickly averted his gaze to the ceiling. He had a real problem with apologising too much, but he wasn’t about to give that up so easily. It was an unhealthy habit that he had been struggling to break for years.
“…sorry.”
“Mike!” Zoey groaned, but she couldn’t help but let out a laugh.
“S-sorry!”
“No, stop— you know what? Never mind.” She let out a sigh and continued to stroke Mike’s hair. “We’ll talk about it another time.”
Mike hummed a little, then nodded against her neck. It was then that Sam pushed the pad over a particularly deep cut, eliciting a jerk from Mike’s body.
“Sorry, dude. I know it hurts, but an infection would hurt worse.” Sam apologised profusely with each wipe over Mike’s hand.
A glance down at Sam made Mike see just how red the wipe was stained and he felt himself gag and look away, shoulders twitching. Zoey rested a hand behind Mike’s head to direct his view away from the gory sight before them. Mike had never reacted badly to blood before, but Zoey assumed it was a combination of his panic and pain that caused his stomach to turn at the sight of his blood.
Finally, after what felt like hours but was realistically closer to a couple of minutes, Sam pulled the cotton pad away from Mike’s hand and began wrapping a bandage around his palm. Mike let out a long breath and the tension that had coiled up in his body like a spring finally released. He tried to turn his head to look at the others, but Zoey held him still.
“There’s still a lot of blood, Mike. Just hang in there. We’re gonna move to the living room.” She explained, slowly pushing off the floor to get to her feet and pulling Mike with her.
Mike’s legs trembled under his weight, but he followed Zoey out of the bathroom, clutching the wall for support. He glanced down at his newly bandaged hand and sighed. “Sorry, this is gonna make winning challenges harder for us…” He was apologising again, he realised, and quickly bowed his head. “Sorr— n-not sorry. You know what I mean.” He murmured, his gaze fluttering up to Zoey’s face. He regretted it immediately, because he suddenly became aware of the concern on Zoey’s face.
“What happened tonight? Could you not sleep?” She questioned in that soft, warm tone that made it harder to withhold the truth from her. Mike couldn’t help but feel secure with her. She kept him tied to reality, even when he was trapped in his head.
Mike let out a long, defeated sigh. “…no. Couldn’t sleep. I… I don’t know…”
“You do know.” Zoey pointed out, resting a hand on his shoulder as they rounded the corner into the grand living room. “You were really afraid when Duncan found you in there. What made you feel so scared?” She asked, guiding him down onto one of the lavish couches and tucking his hair behind his ear. “…why did you break the mirror?”
Mike’s legs gave out as he collapsed onto the couch. He made a wild gesture with his hands, frustrated with his inability to simply communicate to Zoey what was wrong. Zoey perched on the couch beside him and took hold of both his hands, albeit holding his bandaged one ever so gently.
“I’m right here, Mike. Just say what’s on your mind.” She coaxed, tracing circles in his palm with her thumb, which never failed to soothe Mike’s nerves.
A shaky sigh came from the teen in Zoey’s arms before he spoke. “They’re gone. They’re gone, Zoey. I can’t— I can’t find them and it’s just so quiet in my head and I— I don’t like being alone!” The words came out like a flood and the waterworks sprung from his tear ducts again.
Zoey tilted her head in confusion, but hugged Mike close anyway. “Who’s gone? Your alters?”
There was a weak nod of confirmation followed by a pitiful sob. “I’ve been trying to talk to them all day and they aren’t fronting or even responding to me! L-look!” He gestured to his shirtless self. “It’s been ages since I’ve been able to go shirtless without Vito fronting! A-and Svetlana didn’t appear during the challenge today and Manitoba isn’t— and Chester—” He broke off into more cries and pulled his knees up to his chest.
Gently, Zoey began to trace her fingers through Mike’s adorably long hair. “Hey, hey… you’re okay. At least Mike is still here, yeah? My Mike is here.” Mike didn’t respond to that. He was still alone in his head. After being greeted with silence, aside from the quiet whimpers that Mike was fighting to contain, Zoey continued. “As soon as the filming for this season is over, we’ll go talk to your psychiatrist, yeah? Until then, we’ll deal with it. This is only a short season, too, remember?”
After a few seconds, Mike nodded shakily in confirmation. The knowledge that he’d be able to speak to his doctor after the season was finished comforted him a little, but he still wasn’t sure how he’d cope being alone in his head for that long. “Y-yeah. That’s… fine.” He bit his lip as his eyes darted around the room, looking anywhere but Zoey’s eyes.
Zoey didn’t seem satisfied yet. She sighed and looked down at him. “Why did you break the mirror, Mike? I know it was an accident and you got overwhelmed, but you really hurt yourself.”
Mike visibly recoiled as she brought it up. He climbed out of Zoey’s hug and shuffled to the other side of the couch. “I… I wasn’t fully aware of what I was doing. I felt weird, like… like my body wasn’t mine. I just wanted to feel something to prove that I was… real.” He forced out a hoarse laugh. “And Chester normally comes out when I get hurt, so I thought it might rouse him.” There was a tense silence for a few seconds. “…it didn’t, though. Nothing worked.”
“So you did hurt yourself on purpose?” Zoey clarified, not angrily but definitely in a slightly firmer tone than she had been using, which caused Mike to glance up at her nervously.
“I-I guess so..?” He admitted uncertainly, but he was speedy to contextualise. “But I wasn’t doing it in an ‘I’m depressed and want to feel pain’ way! It was more of a way to ground myself.”
Meeting Zoey’s gaze informed Mike that his excuse wasn’t helping his case. “That’s still not good.” Zoey lectured him softly. “You shouldn’t use self—”
“Don’t call it that.” Mike interrupted frantically, grabbing her arm. “P-please, just don’t.” His eyes were glassy as his pupils focused on Zoey. “Y-you know how hard I worked to quit… that. This wasn’t a relapse, it was an accident.”
Zoey was still as Mike pleaded with her, but she eventually nodded and squeezed his good hand before prying it off her arm. “I know. I’m sorry. What I meant was, you shouldn’t use pain as a sensory tool to ground yourself. At least, not extreme pain like that.”
A protest was on the tip of Mike’s tongue, but he knew better than to argue about something as serious as this. Instead, he closed his mouth and nodded, looking away again.
The pair of them sat in silence for a minute or two before Mike became hyper-aware of the absence of voices in his head, reminding him of his missing alters. He felt alone again. Zoey was right there, but he was still so, so alone. He let out a quiet, anxious breath before speaking up, his words slurring together with his nervousness. “I’m sorry. Sorry, can you just talk to me? About anything. Please, I can’t— the silence…”
Zoey took a moment to process his words, then spoke. “What about the silence? What’s bothering you?”
“It’s too quiet.” He replied hastily. “They— they’re all so quiet in my head, and I’m not used to it and it just messes with me so please just talk.” He hated how desperate he sounded, but he needed the white noise of conversation to keep him from going crazy.
How ironic was that? The disappearance of the voices in his head that made him legally crazy in the first place made him even crazier than he already was. He would’ve laughed if he wasn’t still terrified.
Sensing Mike’s intense need, Zoey smiled at her partner and began to talk like there was nothing wrong. She talked about how many people had recognised her from Total Drama season 4 when she went back to her small town. She talked about how excited she was to receive that email inviting her back for the All Stars season because it meant competing with Mike again. She talked about her applications to study literature at college and her favourite classic novel.
Throughout all of this, Mike didn’t say a word. He had crawled back over towards Zoey and settled back in her arms, closing his eyes and falling half asleep against her.
Although his eyes were closed, Mike was certain he heard the other members of the hero team entering the room, and that was only concerned when he felt the couch cushions shift as someone sat down beside him. Eventually, they all began to talk. Mike was much too exhausted to listen to what everyone was saying, but the background noise was comforting. It was almost like his alters were back.
He smiled weakly against Zoey’s chest and finally allowed himself to fall asleep, pain and panic forgotten in the midst of his friends’ conversations.