In a Manor of Speaking

The District Attorney

WARNING: there are mentions of suicide in this chapter! Please be weary reading this, and if you have ever contemplated suicide or are currently planning to, please don't! There are so many people in this world that care about you, OK? I care about you, and the people on the helplines below care about you. Please please please, if you are thinking suicidal thoughts contact someone on one of the helplines.

http://www.suicide.org/international-suicide-hotlines.html (entire list of hotlines for various countries)
http://www.suicide.org/suicide-hotlines.html (entire list for hotlines in various U.S. states)
https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ (their phone number is 1-800-273-8225)
https://www.suicidestop.com/call_a_hotline.html (another list of hotlines for various countries)

~ ꕤꕤꕤꕤꕤ ~

It was cold. No, actually, it was warm. Or maybe it was both? Y/N couldn't tell up from down, left from right, let alone what the temperature was.

They were... falling. They think. Yes, they're sure of it. They were falling, but where to? Y/N started to slightly panic. They never did like being kept in the dark.

...Y/N was starting to get tired of being in the nightmare void, though, once they figured out that's where they were. This was their third unexpected visit. If this was going to happen every time they fell asleep or lost consciousness, Y/N was never going to close their eyes again.

Although they were interested in seeing what was going to be in the mirror this time. Maybe it will have another memory, something from Y/N's life and not the other Y/N's.

Thump.

Seriously? That was way quicker than last time. Y/N took a deep breath as they prepared themselves for the pain of the murder.

...

Something was wrong. As the stairs and balcony became visible, Y/N realized they were standing at the top. In the position of the person who was pushed off.

They saw the shadow of the other person approach with a gun. So the victim had been shot?

Y/N tried to move out of the line of fire but they couldn't. All they could do was watch as the bullet passed through their chest, and they tumbled off of the balcony.

The pain felt ten times worse than that of their other two visits. The grief seemed amplified as Y/N tried to scream out. It lasted for just a bit longer, too.

The pain subsided and Y/N was, once again, kneeling on the ground. They stood up on shaky legs and turned toward the mirror. As they approached it, they realized that it was acting like a normal mirror for once.

...Nevermind. As Y/N stopped directly in front of the mirror, they noticed that their reflection was grayscale and wore a completely different outfit then what they were wearing. Their hands were gloved, and they began waving and signing frantically as soon as they saw Y/N coming towards them.

Y/N tried to say that they couldn't understand them, but remembered that they couldn't speak, either. They tried making as exaggerated of a confused face as possible, and the other Y/N seemed to get the point. They stopped and looked like they were thinking. After a few seconds, they made the classic "I-have-an-idea!!" gesture with their index finger and huffed air onto the glass.

Y/N didn't immediately understand what was going on until the Y/N in the mirror started to draw with their finger. The first words read, "Hello! Im Y/N the District Attorney!"

They looked again at Y/N and waved, and Y/N gave a silent laugh and waved back. The other Y/N erased the message and wrote a new one: "Do u remember who we r?"

Y/N did not know how to answer that. They... weren't sure what they remembered. Yeah, they saw the murder and the events of their photograph, but they don't remember it actually happening.

They started to make an "I-don't-know" hand gesture before realizing the other Y/N had wiped away the message. Y/N blew on the glass and wrote, "IDK. Its a little fuzzy"

They cleared it away once they were sure the Y/N in the mirror had read it. The other Y/N looked deep in thought. Suddenly, they stuck their hand out through the mirror , like they were asking for a handshake. The Y/N outside of the mirror was not shocked, but they were a little surprised since they had just been writing on solid glass a second before.

They hesitantly took their dopplegänger's hand, and they were instantly pulled into the mirror. Their vision went black and white and black again, as various images and clips seemed to pass through their brain.

They saw the Colonel and 'Dames' and someone who looked identical to Fischbach, they saw Abe—the detective's name, they remembered it!—bending over the robed ego, they saw the Colonel shooting the detective. They saw 'Dames'—no, Damien. They saw Damien and his sister, Celine, playing, fighting, crying. Y/N saw them get killed by the house, they saw themself get killed by the Colonel. They saw themself reunited with them, in some sort of afterlife.

They saw themselves pushed into Damien's corpse, saw themself being pushed back out, into the mirror. The same mirror in their room, the same mirror in their nightmares, the same mirror in that damn House . They saw their best friends walk away, unbothered by the banging and mute sobs of Y/N in the mirror.

And suddenly Y/N was back in that mirror, with the District Attorney, and before they had time to really register what they saw they were pulled back into remembering.

Y/N saw their old life. Their old life.

They saw themself being happy, angry, sad. They saw themself sadder. They didn't see friends, didn't see family. They didn't see themself happy anymore. And then they saw—

...

...No. No. No, no, no, no no no nononononono—!

They saw themself jump off of the highest bridge in town.

...They didn't see themself get out of the water.

Y/N gasped and was back in the mirror. They were shaking and sobbing silently, and the DA looked on, a watery smile on their face. Y/N was confused and hurt and so extremely, extremely saddened by the memories that came back to them. Y/N wondered if the DA saw what they saw, felt what they felt.

The DA signed something, and Y/N found that they could understand them. Do you remember who we are now?

Y/N laughed and continued crying, as the DA embraced them and the two fell to the ground, a puddle of tears and anguish.

It seemed like forever that Y/N sat there and shared their grief with the DA. They cried until they couldn't cry anymore, and even then they sobbed dryly in the arms of the District Attorney. Finally, Y/N sniffed and sat up, and they discovered that they could talk again. "W-Why did they leave you there?"

The DA frowned and shook their head as they signed, I may never know. Dames promised he would come back for me, but he never did. And I don't blame Celine, in case you were wondering. C was like a sister to me, I would never suspect her of keeping Dames from coming back.

The DA smiled sadly and hesitantly signed, Why did you jump?

...

Y/N knew the answer, but it was a while before they said anything. "I was so... tired. I was tired . Tired of being sad, and of being alone."

The DA put their hands on Y/N's shoulders. They took one off and signed, You're not alone anymore. I'm here. And everyone else in the Manor is, too. We're here for you, Y/N.

Y/N laughed again. There was nothing funny about this, but it was all they could do at that moment to express their gratitude. And the DA laughed too, and the laughter of two Y/Ns was what Y/N heard as they woke up back in the studio.