TW: Talk of suicide and suicidal ideation
(This is mostly a filler I'm sorry)

"What's going on with you?" Zianna's voice said.

In the weeks that passed since the Forever Potion was administered, Michael followed through on his promise. He was going to erase the memories of Garroth's cancer from everyone.

Except, Michael had one catch: Garte, Derek, Elizabeth, Zack, and himself had to remember. He outright refused to erase the memories of the five before any of them could even ask.

In turn, Zianna's life went back to what previously was. Her memory was filled with false ones of mundane, everyday life. Garte, on the other hand, was stuck with the memory of the turmoil that his family endured.

"Hm?" Garte unintentionally said as he snapped back into the present.

"Were you listening, G?" Zianna asked, but not angrily. It was a gentle tone with genuine concern.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm sorry," Garte mumbled and ran his hand over his face.

As he lied, he tried to regather in his mind what they had been talking about. They both sat in his office, the world quiet and calm as the boys were in bed.

He couldn't think of a damned thing either of them had said.

"It's alright," Zianna responded.

She knew full well he wasn't listening. She was hardly shocked by this. Mixed with her husband's attention issues, and whatever was going on in his mind, she hardly expected Garte to be fully engaged in the conversation.

"Why don't you get some sleep?" Zianna asked.

"I'm good," Garte shook his head. "I need to make a call and then I'll get to bed."

"This late?"

The husband and wife simultaneously looked at the clock. It was hitting about 9:30 PM, much later than either of them would consider polite for a call.

"I know, but it's Michael. It won't be long," Garte tried to explain.

Zianna hardly bought the argument. She was already disliking Michael. Even though her memories of her son's illness were erased, she knew that Michael was manipulative and someone that they should be cautious about associating with.

"I'm sure it can wait, love," Zianna tried to convince Garte. "You should get some rest."

Ever since she had known Garte, he struggled with anxiety induced insomnia. Sleeping was something that was hard for him, be it falling asleep or staying asleep. Those past couple weeks, she would wake up to Garte just staring at the ceiling, or to the sound of him getting up and leaving the room.

"Zianna, please," Garte looked up at her. "I'll be in bed soon."

Zianna sighed. She could only do so much. But, sometimes trying to convince Garte to do something was like trying to negotiate with a brick wall.

She nodded, standing up and exiting the room. As she was leaving the room, she glanced back at her husband to find him so drowned in his own thoughts that he was barely able to think or move. She sighed again and left to go to her own room.

Garte shook his head and stood up. He shoved his hands in his pocket and stared out the window.

"Irene, I'm a shit husband," he mumbled to himself.

He took his phone out of his pocket and unlocked the screen. As he did so, the text from Michael asking him to give him a call was the first thing to pop up on the screen. Garte drew in a long breath and pressed the button to call him.

The phone rang several times. Garte was hoping somewhat that he wouldn't answer.

On the final ring, Michael picked up the phone.

"Garte!" Michael exclaimed, uncharacteristically enthusiastic.

"Hi," Garte managed to mumble out. "What's up?"

"Somebody sounds down in the dumps," Michael laughed.

Garte shook his head, though this was not visible to Michael. He was annoyed. He had been hearing this comment for weeks and was growing sick of it.

"Why do you want to talk, Michael?" Garte asked, unintentionally snapping a bit.

"Hey now," Michael patronized. "Don't give me that tone. Don't you remember what I did for you and your family?"

A twang of regret hit Garte. He never forgot, but he felt he owed Michael his life. He didn't want to upset him for fear that Michael would reverse the potion, effectively killing Garroth and forcing his entire family to plan a funeral again.

"Sorry, I'm sorry," Garte spoke more clearly.

"All good," Michael chuckled.

Garte hated the way Michael laughed. There was always the nuance of control and manipulation in what was supposed to be a friendly action.

"Anyways," Michael continued. "Garroth is good?"

Garroth was doing incredibly well. Slowly but surely, his energy was returning. The color was back in his face and he was gaining weight back again. He was walking, running, living the life that his parents had dreamed for him.

"Yeah, he's great," Garte said.

Michael attempted to divert the conversation a little, "Are you planning for his fifth birthday?"

"Well that's not for a while, but he's planning the most," Garte chuckled. "He keeps going on about how he's going to be a 'whole hand' old."

Even Michael, a sadistic sociopath, found this cute. However, to him, Garroth was not a child. Garroth was a subject and an experiment in something that would become great.

"Alright, well," Michael cleared his throat. "Since his cancer is officially gone, we need to conduct more experiments."

Garte couldn't tell which word he flinched at more: cancer or experiments.

"Experiments? Like what?" Garte inquired, turning away from the window.

"Oh, nothing dangerous, just some testing," Michael explained. "Things like intellectual testing, you know."

Garte breathed a sigh of relief. He thought it would be some kind of testing that caused physical harm.

"Yeah, I think we can make that work," Garte replied.
Michael smiled. He was looking in a mirror and stared at his sadistic smirk. His eyes were slowly turning a shade of purple.

The two said their quick goodbyes and hung up the phone. Garte truly didn't expect the call to go so shortly. Had it been longer, he would have called Derek to ask for his opinion on it.

Garte shoved his phone back into his pocket and walked into his bedroom. Zianna was sitting on the bed and watching some television show on the TV across from the end of their bed.

"That was shorter than I thought it would be," She commented as Garte walked into the room.

Garte shrugged. He couldn't look at any object in the room without remembering specific memories of Garroth near death. The counter where he coughed up blood, and now the bed where he layed in as he screamed for peace from his life shattering pain.

"What are you watching?" He asked as he put on his pajama shirt.

Truthfully, Zianna didn't know herself. She just wanted something on as she drowned in her own thoughts.

"I'm not really sure, I just put it on as background noise really," she stated as Garte laid down next to her.

Garte nodded, quiet as ever. Zianna turned to him and gently placed a hand on his shoulder.

"I love you, G," She said. "But, I know when you're lying when you say nothing is wrong."

Years prior, before they were even married, Garte had broken up with Zianna. His excuse was that he needed to be ready to take over the company and had little time to focus on a relationship at that moment.

However, both Derek and Zianna knew much better. After a suicide attempt that almost succeeded, he admitted that he figured it would be better on Zianna if he had broken up with her to lessen the impact and burden of the death he had been planning.

So, as Garte would now live with the fear that his son would relapse every day for the rest of his life, Zianna lived with the fear that Garte would do the same thing again years later.

"Just tired, I guess," Garte shrugged again. "I think I just have a lot of work piling up."

Zianna nearly cut him off, "Garte."

Garte turned his head to look right into her eyes. Her eyes, that no matter what was happening he found beautiful.
"Are you struggling again?" She asked him, trying her best not to freak out on him.

Garte froze. He truly wasn't in a suicidal headspace, and hadn't been since Garroth was first diagnosed with leukemia.

But, he couldn't explain anything with the Forever Potion. That was off the table from the start.

So, he lied. The lie was easier than the truth, even though Zianna would never know so.

"I guess," He pressed his lips in a line.

While Garte had to explain himself and his headspace to Zianna, Michael had only just stepped away from the mirror and exited the bathroom in his house.

He made his way to his basement, where Elizabeth and Zack were working.

"Michael," Elizabeth said right when the wizard walked into the room.

Michael snapped his attention to Elizabeth, who was already prepared with questions.

"In regards to the physical pain you want us to use in the experiments," Elizabeth began.

"Yes?" Michael anticipated.

"Is it okay if we increase the severity of the pain for the children so that we get more accurate results?"