(Y/n) had felt something boiling up inside of her the moment she collapsed. Barely escaping death, of course she wanted to flee. She wanted to run as far as she could, even if it meant leaving Takuya behind. The fae would have done anything to avoid experiencing her past all over again. But she was trapped. She might have had full comprehension of being in a dream, but she had no power in it, nor was she able to escape it no matter what she did. Kota had inadvertently stumbled upon how to tear her apart from his best friend.

She was already exhausted. He was just pushing her to the brink of what little sanity she gripped onto. Even in a dream, her body felt heavy, dragging her down as she ran away from the scenes Kota was forcing her to see. Crying did nothing. No, less than nothing - it only made the little bastard toy with her more. He brought up every little thing he could, not even realizing what terror he was inflicting on her. The male only assessed the effectiveness of each nightmare by the blood shrieking screams she would let out, hiding where she couldn't reach him to watch in delight.

"Going to try and kill me again?!" she yelled, full of anger, fear, and grief, "Put Takuya in danger?!"

"He's not in danger," she heard the baku chuckle, his voice echoing around, "Just because some monster wants to come and eat you doesn't mean they'd touch him. I mean, they wouldn't try it or they'd starve to death."

"You think it'd be capable of understanding that?!"

"I dunno. But I'm protecting Maya, so he'll be fine. You're the one who's in danger."

(Y/n) shook, trembling at the realization that she wasn't going to get through to the male. He rambled about how horrible she was for taking advantage of the bunny-like male, lecturing her about how she was the root of everything terrible in his life. All it solidified for her was that Kota was wholly uninterested in expending even a bit of effort to understand why Takuya was in pain. He had already "figured it out", so he wasn't going to listen to her at all.

"Wow," the male giggled, "If you weren't already ugly enough with those bags under your eyes, you look like you're going to throw up. Are you that scared? That's hilarious!"

The younger girl gritted her teeth, darting her eyes around the vicinity in an attempt to catch a glimpse of the brat. Though, she only ended up screaming at the sight of her "adoptive parents". Kota cackled at finally managing to outsmart her, watching her cower and attempting to cover her ears. Being sleep-deprived and continually in a state of heightened terror and stress for two days straight really drained all of her intelligence right out of her. He very much enjoyed watching her get weaker and weaker. She could almost hear his smirk.

Every little thing he did to drive her insane was only amusing for him as long as he was entertained. The moment he got bored of watching her experience the same nightmare was the moment he switched it up. At any given moment, something else would have come out and attacked her. So, of course, though it was hard to muster up the will to stay in one place, the younger girl forced herself to sit on the ground, motionless as she shut her eyes and ears, trying to pretend nothing was happening.

Kota didn't like that. She wasn't supposed to have any courage left after how long she'd been trapped in her nightmares and after the attack the previous night. Most people's wills and sanity didn't last that long in the dream world. The nightmares he had been plaguing her with wouldn't be enough to break down her defences again. Though, there was probably one way to get her to respond.

"(Y/n)?" a small voice called, unsure and cautious, "Are you alright? Did you...get hurt again?"

The younger girl flinched. She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to ignore who was in front of her. If she so much as looked at him, she would have subjected herself to illogical actions. She always did when it came to him. Far from the put-together, rational, self-serving person she was, if that boy was in front of her, she would have opened herself up to countless hours of pain just to hug him. And, though she wanted to, she couldn't open herself up to that when Kota was circling around like a vulture.

She didn't know how long the torture went on. The boy kept speaking to her, trying to elicit a reaction out of her, but she had to hold on. It was even harder trying to block him out than the monsters that had been chasing her. One minute of it felt like an entire day of blocking out the other nightmares. That was probably the point. The only thing she knew for sure was that he couldn't force her to open her eyes to him. He was just a figment of her imagination, not a real entity. But Kota was real. He was very real, and, in his frustration with the lack of anything entertaining, he moved to rip her hands away from her eyes.

"There ya go!" he snickered, watching as her paralyzation was instant.

Truth be told, Kota didn't know what the boy looked like. There was only so much information he could gather when he was uninvited. Unlike Takuya, she never gave him permission to enter her mind, so while he could plant a little seed of a nightmare and watch it grow, he wasn't really sure what she was seeing. It was all a big blob to him. All he knew was that he brought up a recurring nightmare buried deep in her subconscious, so it had to have been something that stuck with her whether or not she was dreaming.

The male gave a curious hum and a wicked smile as she directed all of her attention towards the boy. So many emotions were bouncing around her unstable heart, forcing tears to escape her eyes despite the contradictory smile on her lips. She looked happy. At least, she did look happy. Seeing a bit of heaven before she fell to hell, the girl forgot her reason, staring at the little angel she loved so dearly.

"Crying?" the boy panicked, wholeheartedly affected by her pain, "Y-You promised you wouldn't cry! Oh..."

He was right. The sensitive thing would burst into tears at the slightest indication of her pain - of anyone's pain, really. She had to promise him she would never cry to get him to stop, too. Even in a dream, the second he saw her tears, he started bawling, his eyes like a fountain that wouldn't stop. She always thought he didn't suit crying. Far from being an ugly crier, he was always so ethereal, but she always hated how moved he made her - like his emotions were hers, too. Well, actually, she didn't hate it. She didn't hate any part of him, even how weak he was. He had always been the only exception.

"It's...you," she chuckled deliriously, "Still so tiny. And skinny. And helpless."

"Helpless? Was I...helpless...? Because I was weak? Or...because you killed me?"

(Y/n) snickered. She smiled. The visage of the little boy flickered a bit, and, slowly, little by little, his tears started to turn red. Blood began seeping from his eyes, staining the water red and pooling under his feet. She was unbothered even as he pulled up his shirt to show her his back, revealing the aether symbol she punctured into all of her victims. As she reached up to touch it, her hand slipped past his body, reminding her he was only a dream. Even so, she marveled at it, her smile being returned by the boy, who turned around again to show her the puncture wound in his neck, complete with her weapon of choice.

"You can't be mad at that," she smiled, "You begged me."

"I begged to be your masterpiece."

"You are."

"For now. But you want to make a new masterpiece. You want to pretend like I never existed; like killing me meant nothing. Just like all the others. You'll forget about me just like everyone else forgot about me. I'm just going to be a corpse no one knows the name of. Not even you. How long would you remember someone who doesn't have a name?"

It took a moment for his sentiments to hit the younger girl at full force. She tried denying it, forgetting, once again, he wasn't real, but her desperation didn't matter. More accusations came about her trying to replace him, and, though she could fight some, her heart still knew he was right. The ground shook underneath them, the emptiness distorting around them and revealing scenes from their past, all of which tore her apart with guilt.

"I-I'm not replacing you! I've never - "

"Fae aren't supposed to lie. You have thought about replacing me. Isn't that what you promised yourself? You only keep one at a time, and they have to be stronger than the one that came before."

"You were never part of that! You're different! I-I told you that!"

"What about the blonde one? You thought he was different. You were going to replace me with him."

"No - "

"Fae aren't supposed to lie. You could always go back to him, if you wanted. You've been thinking about it, right? Or are you going to replace me with 'Takuya'? I know you want to. He's alive, right? And I'm not?"

"I-I told you it was only ever going to be you!"

"Fae aren't supposed to lie!"

The nightmare started showing its nasty self, trapping the younger girl into failing to appease the boy she cherished so much. She was forced to confront her desire to replace him, but was unable to tell him that, valuing the dead little boy's happiness above her own sanity. He began yelling, accusing her of abandoning him; of killing him just to get rid of an annoying weakling. The words hurt more than the sight of any monster. But, just as she thought it couldn't get any worse, suddenly the boy disappeared.

Frantically, she called out for him, but, with no name, he could not respond and she could not force him to appear. She sprinted around the endless black void, looking for a glimpse of white hair, only to become exhausted and fall to her knees, spilling apologies over and over again and begging him to come back. Only when she was about to give up did he reappear, a familiar scene playing out. The moment he said he had to "sneak back home", (Y/n) began to beg for the opposite - for him to just disappear. But the scream still rang out and she was forced to see one of her worst nightmares all over again. Kota forced her to watch it for hours.

. . .

(Y/n) screamed. She screamed as loud as possible, snapping out of the nightmares and into the real world, only to feel all of her stress and exhaustion hit her like a truck. The younger girl tried to hold it all back, but everything poured out of her, forcing her to keel over and start dry heaving. Having eaten nothing at all since the last time she choked everything out, only a yellow acid spilled onto the floor in between her gasps for air and sobs.

"(Y/n)!" Isao panicked, opening the door in a hurry to come to her side, "You're alright! You're safe! T-Take deep breaths, okay?!"

The younger girl wasn't responding to anything the male said, the overwhelming pain her body and mind were in forcing her to stare at the ground and shake. Isao, of course, had no idea what was happening, chalking it all up to the stress of the previous night and the near death experience. But she was well aware of the constant torture, the scenes of the nightmare fresh in her mind and curdling her stomach.

The ravenette insisted she needed water, trying to get her to drink something, but, even though she had stopped throwing up, she was still not reacting to him. No, her brain was working overtime past all the stress and terror to come up with a way to escape Kota. She could have killed him. After everything he had done, she no longer cared if Takuya felt a bit sad. Killing him would have stopped the nightmares, but that was only if she found him.

The only other thing she could come up with was resisting the urge to fall asleep. Though, when her eyes began threatening to close, her body screaming in pain, she realized she would fall asleep soon if nothing was done. Eyes darting up in desperation, she scanned the room for anything she could use. Isao could only watch as she grabbed a pen, giving a scream of his own when she plunged it into her thigh. He had to force himself to not focus on the other scars littering the area to run to get Takuya, shouting his name through the halls.

Desperate, the ravenette burst into Ichika's room. At the time, Takuya had been kneeling on the floor, only to flinch at the sound of the commotion behind him. He gave a look of anger to the older male for interrupting, not unlike that of his mother's, the woman gripping tighter onto her whip. It pained Isao to just ignore the bruises and cuts on the white-haired male, but he had to. It wasn't like the younger male wanted his worry anyway.

"You have to come downstairs!" the ravenette shivered, pulling at the male's arm, "It's (Y/n)!"

Those were the magic words to get Takuya to listen, or, at the very least, stop resisting the older male's tugging. Thankfully, his mother didn't shout after him to return, allowing the white-haired male to focus solely on his girlfriend, but Isao knew it was just so she could have an excuse to do even more to him later. Though, it probably wouldn't have mattered to Takuya. He was far too focused on getting to the (h/c) haired girl to think about whatever "consequences" there would be.

When he found the younger girl, too, it was the same; the male wholly fixated on her, darting straight to her side. While she might not have responded to Isao, she certainly did to him. Her eyes went straight to his hair before she violently pulled him closer, the male giving a little peep of surprise. She pulled Takuya into her even closer, glaring at the ravenette like she had forgotten who he was entirely.

Her gaze towards the young butler was a stark contrast to the way she was treating Takuya, her attentive embrace making the male soften. She was protecting him. That had to be the explanation behind the way she cradled his head or why she held him so tightly. Softly, he smiled, accepting the care she so kindly gave him, the male nuzzling into her with sparkling eyes. Despite the fact he knew she was in distress, he couldn't help but wish for more moments like that.

(Y/n) gave a sound of pain as a headache started tearing her mind apart. Her hands moved from Takuya to her head, the girl taking in sharp breaths as pounding started driving her insane. She didn't remember the last time she had actually forced any water down her throat. No, she didn't need water. She needed coffee. Hating the bitter taste made very little difference to her since the caffeine was a necessity to fight off sleep or else...

Wait. Who was tormenting her in her dreams again? It was...some idiot getting the best of her - the boy with pink hair and that obnoxious smirk. She couldn't remember the name. It started with a "K". She knew it did. No, but, before that, who was the person with black hair standing across from her? He looked familiar. A sharp pang was sent through her head as his name flooded back to her. That was Isao. Isao!

Taking in a sharp breath, she realized she was forgetting things again. The stress the pink-haired male was putting her through was threatening a reboot. She was reacting poorly to it, and, if she wasn't careful, she would forget everything. He could kill her easily if that happened. Perking up, she first demanded Isao get her the strongest coffee possible before she stumbled to grab a paper and pen.

"Uh?" Takuya flittered, wondering why he wasn't being coddled anymore, "(Y/n)? Are you..."

The male trailed off as he noticed how frantically the girl was writing. He figured asking about it would only make her mad, so he shyly peeked over her shoulder, squinting his eyes at her writing. It made little sense to him why exactly she was writing down details about her life, let alone why she was listing out full names.

He never did get his answer when she kept writing throughout the day, only ever stopping to chug down massive gulps of coffee. Isao would give him looks of concern whenever he came back with another cup for her. They could only look at one another, really, since trying to do anything to stop her resulted in violence. It had only resulted in vague but firm threats from the girl to Isao when she discovered a cup of decaf he tried to pull off as caffeinated. And to the males' concern, she proceeded to stay awake for another two days straight. Things...became unsettling.