Prisoners of Dreams - Day 3 of 12 Days of SS (06/12)
sorry for the bit of a delay. my internet was acting up yesterday x Word count: 2008 Synopsis: The Sides wake up to find Logan is gone. And someone else has taken his place.
"I'll stay awake Cause the dark's not taking Prisoners tonight." -Twenty One Pilots 'Ode to Sleep'
Roman yawned, stretching in the sunlight coming through the window. He rubbed his eyes and trudged out of his room. He walked into the kitchen and opened the fridge.
"Morning, Virge," Roman glanced at the figure by the coffee machine, wearing a pair of pyjama pants with a leather jacket thrown on.
The smell of coffee woke Roman up. He did a double take. Virgil doesn't wear leather, he thought, narrowing his eyes.
Not-Virgil turned around, revealing a face identical to Thomas', yet wearing sunglasses and a tired grimace. He had a mug of steaming coffee in his hand.
Roman drew his sword and leaped to not-Virgil. Even with a blade pointed at their throat, the stranger's tired face didn't change. He looked up at Roman, then at the blade and continued walking.
"Stop, intruder! Who are you?" Roman yelled, chasing after the stranger, who sat down at the table. He lifted his sunglasses and looked at him with a bored look.
"Remy. Why?" he raised his eyebrow.
Remy had the same face as Thomas - as all of the Sides did. Except there was something off. He wasn't a usual at the Mind Palace.
"I don't know any Remy," Roman pointed his sword at him. Remy cowered.
"I'm Sleep. As in a vital function in Thomas' life," the apparent Side said, "what is this place anyway?"
Roman looked at him incredulously. "It's the Mind Palace!"
Remy stared at him with a confused look in his eyes.
"I'm done with you, fool. I need backup. Virgil! Patton! Logan! Come and help me with this villain!" Roman shouted, eyes fixed on Remy.
Virgil and Patton ran into the room, breathless and stricken with fear.
"What's-" Virgil stopped in his tracks, "who's this?"
"Remy." He waved at the two new arrivals with a bored smile plastered on his face.
"I'm going to sit down," Patton heaved, plopping down onto the chair opposite Remy, "I'm exhausted."
"Who's Remy and why is he here? He isn't one of us," Virgil said, avoiding eye contact with the intruder.
"I'm Sleep. The most vital function in Thomas'-"
"Oh, shut up. Tell us the truth!" Roman shouted, stepping closer to him.
"I am!" He moved away, scraping the chair against the floor, "Can anyone tell me where the heck I am?"
"The Mind Palace, kiddo," Patton piped in.
"What's that?"
The three Sides glared at him.
"Logan, help me out here," Roman said, touching his forehead in an exasperated gesture and pointing at Remy with a sigh.
"Um... Ro... Logan isn't here," Virge said.
Roman gasped and looked at Sleep again. "What have you done to Logan?"
Remy raised his eyebrow, "Who's Logan?"
"Logan, come here! We need your help!" Patton looked at the door to the Logical Sides' room.
"He's not here, Pat. I can't feel his presence. Logan... He's gone," Virgil muttered.
"What. Have. You. Done. To. Logan. Confess now or I'll take care of you like I did with the Dragon Witch." Roman yelled.
"Geez! Chill out! I don't know what happened to your Luigi. I just woke up in that bed," he said, pointing to Logan's room, "thought I'd redecorated last night and forgot, then came here to make coffee and then youattacked me."
"Maybe-" Patton's eyes lit up.
"Shush, Pat, I'm trying to figure out what happened to Logan," Roman interrupted.
"That's what I'm trying to say," he said cheerfully, " maybe Logan and this Remy got switched and Logan is wherever Remy is supposed to be!"
Roman gasped, "Patton that's genius!" He turned to Remy, whose bored eyes had just become thoughtful, "Where do you usually reside?"
"Dunno. It's an alternate universe or something." He shrugged.
"That's it! We have to find a way to switch back Remy and Logan." Roman exclaimed.
"I wish Logan was here. He'd know how to do that," Patton said, frowning.
"No. We can figure it out without Logan. We just need to be creative. Let's get to work, guys!"
***
The atmosphere in the Mind Palace was stuffier and duller than usual. The three Sides and Sleep sat in various positions on the floor, either sleeping, panicking or looking through books and other resources. Even though it was barely after midday, the research had exhausted them all.
Suddenly, Remy shot up from the floor, unusually energetic.
"I'm going to Starbucks," he said, striding towards the entrance door.
"We don't have-" Virgil started, but the Side was already out the door.
He came back a minute later with just a frown on his face.
"You don't have a Starbucks. What's a Mind Palace for if it doesn't have a Starbucks," he groaned, flopping down onto the couch.
They went back to their jobs, but, to no avail, there was no satisfying answer. With that in mind, they relaxed against the pillows.
"I'm going straight to bed after we find Logan," Roman said sleepily, but no one replied. Even so, Roman wouldn't hear it, because he had already drifted off to sleep.
He woke up to a buzzing sound and blinding light. Roman opened his eyes and saw a metallic room with glowing bulbs flickering overhead as well as rows of shelves along the walls. Virgil and Patton were right by him, also on the floor, rubbing their eyes and looking around, shock painted on their faces.
A crash sounded from behind Roman. He shot up and tried to draw his sword, but it was gone. He felt Virgil's and Patton's presence behind him. And what he saw made his heart leap out of his chest. Logan sat in the middle of the room, surrounded by something that looked like advanced Lego pieces and a machine-looking item in front of him. His face was twisted and focused on the machine.
"Logan!" Patton shouted.
Logan didn't even flinch.
"Lo! Logan, we're here!" Virgil waved at him.
No reaction.
Roman creeped towards him, his hand automatically moving to his missing sword. Before he reached Logan, a dragon-chimera with three heads appeared in front of him. Somehow, his sword appeared in his hand and he slashed at the beast. Virgil and Patton, with weapons materialised in their hands (Patton had a crossbow slung across his shoulder, Virgil, a whole belt of butterfly knives), arrived to Roman's aid. They slashed and attacked the beast. A fight broke out between the beast and the Sides. Arrows flew, the butterfly knives dug into the beast's scales and the sword cut the air. Masterfully, the Sides fought and the beast slowly lost.
The dragon-chimera clamped its teeth inches from Roman's face. He slung his sword forwards and dug into the beast's leg. Then, one of Virgil's butterfly knives flew into the dragon-chimera's chest and it disintegrated, second before one of its heads chewed Patton's head off.
They ran up to Logan, but as soon as they touched his shoulder, he disintegrated too.
A laugh sounded from behind them. They twisted around to see Remy standing at the edge of the room with a smirk on his face.
"This is so fun!" He laughed again, a distorted kind of laugh, like a radio with a bad signal.
"What are you doing?" Roman asked, his sword disappearing from his hand, "Where are we?"
"You're in my home. And you're trapped. Until I figure out a better plan," he said the last part to himself.
"Is Logan here too?"
"Maybe," he smirked.
"You took Logan! You kidnapped him!" Roman gasped.
"Why?" Virgil asked.
"Because I needed to take control of Thomas. He needs to sleep more. Logic was the only thing that stood between me and my goal. Logic stops you from sleeping all day. So I had to take care of him," Remy laughed.
Roman ran up to Sleep, to the "Sides"' surprise, a knife conjuring in his hand, and swung at him.
"Where is Logan?" He shouted, "tell us where you hid him or I won't hesitate to destroy you."
"Fine," Remy rolled his eyes and strolled away from the Creative side, urging them, to come with him, "You're still all trapped here."
They followed him to the other side of the room. He snapped his fingers and a doorway appeared in the wall. The door swung open.
Roman and Patton moved towards it. They glanced back at Virgil.
"I'll stay here. Make sure he doesn't pull any tricks," he said.
They nodded and ventured into the dark doorway.
The other side was bathed in sunlight. Logan sat in the middle of the room. It was a simple room, four even sides, a window in the middle of each wall and a carpet covering the hardwood floor. The Logical side was sitting cross legged in the middle, face in hands, muttering to himself.
"Logan?" Patton said softly.
Logan jumped and looked up at his friends. His face lit up.
"Are you real? You have to help me. I mean- I just need your help with something. I mean-"
"Shh, Logan, it's okay. We know Sleep trapped you here. We're here to help." Roman smiled.
"I tried to escape, but there's no logical way to get out of here. I'm not programmed to think illogically," he grunted, "it's a prison."
Just then, the light from the window dimmed and metal bars grew over them. A un-mattressed bed popped up in the corner, while the carpet disappeared.
"Come on, Logan, let's get out of here," Patton grabbed Lo's hand, "there's a door right there. We'll walk right through and go back home."
"No, we can't. There'll be another room there. I'm trapped here. I can't escape."
"Logan, don't you see? Remy isn't trapping you here. It's your own mind. He made you believe you're trapped and this room responds to that. He's just a manipulative villain."
Lo looked at Roman. His glasses reflected the light from the windows, still he could see he was processing the information.
He stood up and walked towards the door.
"This is a way out," he muttered to himself and stepped through.
Virgil and Remy were still there, in the metallic room with flickering lights, when the three Sides stepped out. Logan sighed in relief, then blushed at Sleep's winning grin.
"I fooled you. Sleep fooled Logic. Who'd have thought?"
"Begone, villain." Roman said, waving him away.
"You still won't escape this place. You can't. It's beyond your imagination," he said before disappearing.
"Does he realise he just told us how to get out of here?" Virgil smiled.
Everyone looked at him.
"He just said, 'it's beyond your imagination'. We have to imagine our way out. This is a Dream Palace and dreams can be controlled, so all we have to do is create something we believe will get us out of here."
"Just like he trapped me," Logan said in disbelief, "that's genius."
"But what will get us back?" Roman asked.
"A mirror!" Patton exclaimed.
"What?" The three Sides looked at the Moral Side.
"We can go through a mirror. Like in Alice Through the Looking Glass!"
"Sure," Virgil said.
Roman nodded and, after a minute of thought, so did Logan.
A pop sounded behind them. They turned back and saw a mirror had appeared on the metal wall. It was a black antique mirror with swivel ends.
Roman stepped closer. He touched the glass. The reflection rippled. He looked back at his friends, nodded and stepped through.
The mirror disappeared with a pop behind them. The four Sides stood in the middle of the living room in their Mind Palace.
"We made it safely home," Roman sighed.
"I have to go work out how Sleep managed to steal me from the Mind Palace," Logan said, sauntering away into his room.
"I need to go sleep all this stress off. I'm not made for fighting," Virgil grumbled, stepping into his room, too.
"I'll go help Logan," Patton said and followed the Logical side.
Roman was left alone. He looked around the room, now bathed in afternoon light. He took a deep breath. The smell of coffee still lingered in the air.
***
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