Welcome to Hell {Prinxiety}

Chapter 15

Virgil's POV

I'm awake when the door is opened by a guard, this one being silent as I stand up. He may be surprised when he found out that the door was unlocked, but as far as he seemed to care, I was in here all night. He also failed to notice the picture tucked into my waistband and the locket hidden under my shirt.

Wordlessly, I stand up and he, thankfully, leads me out of the hallway to a random part of the mine after looking at my generation and number. If he had dragged me than one or both items would have fallen out into the open, so at least he's nicer than the other guards, but that's also not saying much.

Once inside I take a random spot, knowing I won't be able to really get anything done around the guards. The work still sucks, and my empty stomach isn't helping that fact but I knew what I was getting into yesterday. At least I can look forward to Jacob's reaction when I give him the picture, assuming it's the right one it was hard to see it in the dark. Roman's reaction to the locket might not be as positive considering his reaction to me talking to him in general, but hopefully along with my journal, he'll remember something. Probably, hopefully, maybe...

Or maybe it's all pointless because he'll never remember me because he didn't care about me as much as I did him. So much for thinking some of Patton's positivity has rubbed off onto me. It could be true thou- It's not, I'm just being paranoid. Roman wouldn't just pretend to be someone's friend, he was just as clueless as I was on the boat! So unless he's some kind of criminal mastermind, I can at least count on the fact that we were friends.

I roll out my shoulders, looking at the progress I've made. It's not much, and it's definitely not worth the effort. I can see why Castillo would want to get other people to do this for him, but it couldn't be that hard to pay willing adults could it?

Okay, it's not gonna do me any good to sit here and complain when there's nothing I can do about it. For now, all I can do is wait until I get the chance to talk to Roman, so I get back to work.

"Are you okay?" A quiet voice asks me.

I realize it's Jacob when I look over, "Yeah," I decide that it wouldn't be smart at all to give him the picture now since he probably wouldn't be able to hide it, or accidentally sell me out for giving it to him.

"I'm sorry, you got taken to the dark room didn't you?" He asks apologetically. Oh shoot he blames himself, no wonder Patton hates it when I talk bad about myself I feel so bad for this kid.

"Don't worry about it, I got out of work because of it," I tell him, hoping my smile looks reassuring.

In reality I probably looked like a child predator trying to get a kid to come inside their house, but he probably doesn't even know what those are so it's fine. Except for the part where it's definitely not but I can't focus on that unless I want to have a panic attack. Of course if I do have a panic attack here then the guards won't care they'll just yell at me, not realizing that'll only make it worse.

"That doesn't sound worth it," He points out, still looking slightly upset.

As long as my stomach doesn't sell me out here, I can convince you otherwise, "Trust me, it is."

- - -

Back at the bunks, I stop Jacob and hand him the picture, hoping to any and all gods that it's the right one, "What? When? Huh??" He stutters.

"Don't question it, seriously don't. Just make sure you keep it hidden this time," I tell him, going to my own bed before he can decide to ignore me and ask questions.

I lay down on my side, not even risking a glance over there. After what must have been hours of pretending to sleep, I look over and see that Roman is still awake too. This is what I wanted, right? Everyone else is asleep, or at least they're really good at pretending to. I get out of bed quietly, still drawing his attention.

Even in the dark I can see him tense up so I put my hands up in surrender, "I just want to show you something," I whisper, which is true enough. He stares at me, probably trying to decide if he should ignore me, "Please?"

"Fine," He mumbles, getting up slowly.

Slowly, I walk over to where the wall safe is opening it. If he decides to sell me out this would be the perfect time considering how 'incriminating' the safe would be. He frowns when a section of the wall swings open, but stays quiet as I grab the key and my journal.

I take the locket off as well, holding it up first, "You probably don't remember, but this is your locket, inside are both of our names," He stiffens, "It was your idea," I add. I unlock the pendant of the necklace and hand it to him, letting him see that I wasn't lying. After a minute or so I hand him my journal, "Every week I wrote in this, it'll probably help fill in some of the blanks for you," I explain.

"I don't- This can't be real, it can't you must've-" He mutters, flipping through it.

"When would I have had time to forge all of this? You're the creative one, not me," I joke, watching anxiously as he gets to the page where I drew him.

He trails his hand over the page gently, as if he's scared of ripping it, "That's me."

"It is," I confirm, not sure if he even meant it as a question, "You always seemed to like my doodles in the corners of pages, so one night you asked me to draw you."

He goes through the notebook again, stopping occasionally to read a bit, "And this, you're-" He mumbles as he reads, and I can see tears in his eyes. That's a good sign right? It's not that I'm glad he's about to cry, but he wouldn't look so upset if he wasn't close to remembering right?

"Ro?" I ask gently, after he dropped to the ground while reading.

He looks up at me, full-blown crying now, "Virgil?" 

A/N: Oh sh!t, oh sh!t, here we go bois!!