He couldn’t sleep. Vincent tossed and turned in his new bed. No matter how much he tried to force his eyes shut, they continued to remain active. His restless mind wouldn’t let him drift away, and he remained awake. Thoughts of his fight with Zander kept replaying over and over. The image of slight uncertainty remained ever-present in his psyche.

Finally giving up a night’s rest, Vincent hopped out of bed. It took him a moment to find the door, seeing as there were no windows that let moonlight into the room. Since he had never stayed in this room, he even struggled to find his sweatshirt. Eventually, however, he managed to get what he needed and walked out.

While he did bump into a few things, like a few of Archard’s portraits and a couple of small busts, Vincent managed to not-so-stealthily make his way to the front door. With the chill of the night breezing past him, he opened the front door and walked out Libra’s headquarters.

He mindlessly wandered the empty, darkened streets of the city. His head was down and his thoughts were somewhere else. They continued to bounce all over the place, jumping from one subject to another via loose connections. The leaps of logic he made to get from one idea to another were borderline nonsense, but they made sense in his head.

As he continued to ponder and wonder and ask himself many questions, numerous emotions ran through him—many of which were hot and angry. However, the open cold of the night served to cool down his body and mind. But he didn’t want that. He wanted to feel, no matter how hard it was at the moment.

Why did I say that? Vincent asked himself. He then turned a corner and into an alleyway. Like, I shouldn’t have, but…I don’t know.

He stuck his hands in his pockets and kicked a stray can against a wall. Without breaking stride, he continued to mess with the can like a soccer ball.

What’s wrong with me? He thought. He then stopped for a moment and shook his head. No, no, nothing’s wrong. I mean, I’m still me. He’s the one that changed, so it’s alright that I said that. He began to walk again, but slowed down as soon as a tear started to form in his right eye. It’s alright…

With clenched teeth and flexed muscles, a rush of emotion flooded his mind and body. With instinctual movement, his fits flew against the alley wall, colliding with it. After a few seconds of heavy breathing, the rage continued to burn, and he screamed.

Over and over and over and over, he punched the wall. His fists connected with the stone structure at least a few dozen times. He wanted to feel—both pain and emotion. He let his anger flow through his hands in order to release it. He didn’t know any other way to cope with it.

However, after only a minute or so of doing this, he gradually slowed to a stop. The throbbing hands of his that were hurting began to grow numb. The sensation of pain started to lose meaning. His nerves unnaturally grew accustomed to it. It was nothing but a hollow feeling now—it was devoid of anything.

“No! No! No!” he yelled, staring at his cut and bruised hands.

He then went back to his punching ways, but it felt more and more pointless the more he did it. His body refused to acknowledge the suffering. For all he knew, he could’ve been punching pillows, not walls…and he would’ve felt no different.

As he thought about what he was feeling, he realized that all the tears that were forming in his eyes were dry. In fact, the complex sense of sadness that accompanied it was very nearly lost to him. The anger that was trying to wrestle with was unceremoniously gone. Although perhaps that’s not right. Unlike every other time in his past after he had let his anger fly, this time there was an oddity to the aftermath. Normally after he found a sort of release, the emotions would cool down and would gradually find the balance of normality. This time, however, it felt like his cool down was forced, and that he wasn’t able to fully release his emotions.

The more he looked inward, the more terrifying the truth became. His anger was not gone, but rather forcibly subdued. It felt as though there was an unsatisfied edge to his emotions. There was an unresolved feeling behind his composure. And he did not understand why.

Finally, he ceased all action and just stood in the still of night. Looking up, he saw that the stars were completely covered by darkened clouds. All that remained in the sky was blackness—a color devoid of light.

“What’s wrong with me?” he said to himself, his face completely neutral. As he spoke, misty breath escaped from his mouth.

***

In the middle of the same night, inside of the Libra library lounge, Fang stood eerily still. They were inspecting the various shelves, paintings, and other such adornments. The room itself was proper, but not overly ostentatious. The art pieces were not gaudy, but they did have a slight bit of elegance to them. Their eyes passed over such superficial things rather quickly.

When they looked at the bookshelves, however, their interest was peaked. Immediately they made their way over to the back wall, where five of these shelves were lined up. Most of them were filled with all sorts of books of various heights and thickness. Although some of them had loose stacks of paper piled on them, showing how used the space really was.

After glancing through three of the shelves, Fang’s eyes landed on one particular book that was labeled: For a Greater Purpose. They reached out for it and began to pull it free. As they did, the book latched in place, like it was a part of the shelf. As it did, a number of clicking sounds could be heard coming from the wall behind.

“He never changed,” Fang said out loud.

They then pushed on the bookshelf and it swung back, revealing a hidden passageway. About twenty or so feet in, the end of the tunnel was marked by a dim light. Without hesitation, Fang made their way in.

As they stepped out of the other side, they were greeted with a familiar space. Pale-cream walls encased every side, decorated with crawling vines and other hanging greenery. The ceiling was made of a similar material, while the floor was completely composed of grass and dirt. The square room was small, but wonderfully quaint. Multiple bushes, shrubs, and flowers were planted all throughout the room—both in the ground and inside of flower pots, stacked on thin, metal racks.

As Fang took their first few steps inside, they heard the constant sound of trickling water. Their eyes beelined towards the noise, and as they did, they saw a small stream—no wider than a foot—that flowed from one side of the room to the other, before draining into a small pond. It was peaceful, and the lavender scent that filled the air also contributed to that sensation.

Eventually, Fang found themselves in the middle of the hidden garden. However, they weren’t the only one there. Clipping a few stray and dead leaves off his plants, stood Archard with his back turned to Fang.

“I see you’re tending to the plants again,” Fang said. “Is something stressing you out?”

Archard snipped off another slightly wilting, albeit not yet dead flower. Without turning around, he replied, “No, not exactly. I just needed to think in a different place.”

“I see.” Fang then looked at the ground and saw dozens of clipped flowers. “You really seem to enjoy cutting these off.”

“To some extent,” Archard replied, holding a vibrantly red rose. “But those were flowers who were starting to wilt away, and I don’t feel like exerting myself to save them. I'd much rather put my energy towards supporting the ones that are already thriving.”

“Well, alright,” Fang said. They then casually cracked a few fingers. “So what did you want to talk about? And why couldn’t we discuss it when we talked a few days ago?”

Archard stopped his gardening and attempted to place his scissors down on a shelf. However, they stuck to his mechanical hand. He chuckled, shook his hand, and then the scissors fell onto the shelf. He then turned around and faced Fang.

“There’s some…important things I need to talk to you about,” Archard answered, “and I couldn’t risk being heard by any of the others.”

“So you needed to wait until you could be alone in the garden, huh?” Fang rhetorically asked.

“Exactly. Now come follow me—let’s go for a walk,” Archard said with a neutrally serious expression.

The two of them began to take a stroll around the garden, passing by the perfect-looking flowers and shrubbery. They walked along the perimeter, with both of them keeping pace with each other. Archard had a somewhat relaxed demeanor, with his hands folded behind his back, while Fang was constantly on guard.

“You know as well as I do that I trust you,” Archard stated, glancing at Fang. “It’s not the same kind of surface trust I give to other Libra members.”

Fang narrowed their eyes. “I do,” they slowly replied.

“And you know why that is, right?”

Fang didn’t answer right away. Something painful started to resurface in their mind, but they quickly pushed it away. “Yeah…” they finally answered, “because of my father.”

“Exactly,” Archard exclaimed, raising a fist. “And I believe in family—blood or otherwise—because of how powerful it is. Familial bonds are stronger than anything else, which is why I try to foster that kind of atmosphere here.” He then chuckled to himself. “But I ain’t a fool. It’ll never match up to you, because your family, well,” he cynically smiled, “yours is something else.”

Fang sighed. “Is that why you wanted to talk in private? Just for this?”

“No, no,” he laughed. “I just wanted to remind you of our relationship, because what I’m about to discuss with you stays between us. Do you understand?”

“Fair enough,” Fang answered. “So let’s cut to the chase. What are we talking about?”

Archard stopped walking just as they made it back to the center of the garden. “We’re going to talk about the next step in…dealing with Aries. It’s a bit more extreme, so I’ll need your help.”

“It can’t be more extreme than—”

“And,” Archard continued to say, cutting Fang off, “I wanted to talk about that friend of yours.”