(A/Ns: I am so terrible! Yah, I didn't update in 9 days cause I am crap. I planned on finishing this on Tuesday but I got sick :'( and then I had to professionally procrastinate out of doing revision for my GSCE, which sadly did not include writing. So I've finally done the exam and I'm writing again! This takes place straight after chapter 9. It's a mix of Break, Rufus, Oswald and Levi. Next chapter is going to be sooo sadddd! Yeh... I have planned this fanfic out now. I have plans for 20 chapters, and I hope to finish this by Christmas. But that probably won't happen tbh.

Please review and tell me what you think; I take any kind of reviews! I also love hearing what my readers think about the story so far, and any possible predictions for ch 12?

Trigger warnings: Mentions of drugs and addiction

Disclaimer: I do not own Pandora Hearts or any of the characters)

~Chapter Eleven: Hangovers~

All of a sudden, a silhouette emerged from the shadows, and Lacie stepped out, shining a light on the two of them and smirking.

"Well well well... Who do we have here then?" said Lacie, finding the faces of shame expressed by Levi and Oswald to be quite amusing, "Hehe… got you!"

Levi and Oswald continued staring in fear, instantly sobering up slightly as they registered her piercing gaze. As intoxicated as they were, even they knew that they were screwed.

"So what are you doing here?" she asked them, waiting for their reply as she took the bottles they were currently drinking from and jerked them at the wall, watching as they smashed on the bricks into shards of glass; all whilst still expressing the same cunning smile, "Surely you knew you'd be caught?"

No reply.

"Giving me the silent treatment, are we, eh?" Lacie mocked, laughing at the frozen shock displayed on their faces as she continued confronting them, smashing the remaining booze on the wall, "Well whatever. As long as you can pick yourselves up and get in the car, you don't have to tell me anything." She grinned, turning on her heel and gesturing for them to follow her, "… well, until tomorrow morning, that is."

Levi and Oswald hesitantly stood up, shakily walked over to where Lacie was turned to them and following once she began to walk again. Oswald exchanged a look to Levi, which simply indicated 'We're fucked, aren't we?' Levi nodded promptly.

Lacie continued walking until they reached a grey car, opening the door and waving to the inside, "Get in and don't speak."

The two obeyed immediately, acting somewhat like two children who had just been caught doing something they shouldn't have. Except, this time, it was two fully grown men who had been caught relapsing after they'd managed two weeks clean.

Oswald frowned at Levi weakly, accusing him of the trouble they were in. Levi responded with a look of apology, registering that their current predicament was his fault. Despite everything though, they were still both extremely glad that they'd got their fix after so long without it.

Unfortunately, neither of them had accounted for the aftermath.

….

Once they had arrived back at the centre, Lacie lead Levi and Oswald back through the halls to their room. It was dead silent, everyone being asleep apart from those three. It was about 2am, after all.

"Now," Lacie whispered harshly, leaning on the door of their dorm as if she were about to open it. Instead, she just glared up at the two of them, speaking in an extremely intimidating manner; "Go in there, sleep, don't even think about waking Rufus and Break up, and once you've sobered up a bit, try and think of some of the suitable consequences we might give you in the morning." And with that, she left.

Levi and Oswald looked towards each other, sighing and clicking the door open slowly and walking inside. They collapsed onto their beds, not seeing the point in changing their clothes or doing anything like that. Instead, they passed out almost instantly, the toll of the drugs and alcohol hitting them like a sack of rocks.

The second they had passed out, Break sat up, having hardly slept at all like usual. He stood quietly, tiptoeing over to Rufus' bed, where he watched the red head sit up and run a finger through his locks as he let Break sit down next to him.

"So they broke out then, huh?" Break whispered, a saddened smile spread across his face, "Almost wish I'd have gone with them."

"Tch," Rufus scoffed, neatening his hair as he sat back against the headboard, "Don't stoop as low as their level. They were stupid to make that much progress and give up."

"Well then," Break smirked, inwardly irritated by Rufus talking about addiction as if it were an easy process, "You've clearly never felt the toll of a 5 year addiction, have you, hm?"

Rufus scowled at him, "I was addicted to cocaine too, you know."

"Aha, but for how long?"

"Two years…" he replied after a short pause.

Break suppressed his frustration, "See now, you wouldn't know what it's like."

"Whatever," sighed Rufus, but then his tone of voice shifted, "I never realised you were struggling so much."

He froze, eye slightly widening as he turned away from Rufus and frowned, "Somethings are better kept as secrets."

A few seconds later, Break stood up abruptly to avoid further questioning; he didn't want to talk about this right now. Or at all, for that matter. He stalked over to the bathroom, grabbing one of the buckets tucked away under the sink and placing it down beside Levi and Oswald's beds. He then proceeded to fill up two glasses of water, requesting for Rufus to come over to him.

"What is it?" Rufus asked, stepping into the bathroom with the other and partially shutting the door behind him. Immediately, he saw Break holding the medicine cabinet door open, eye squinted as he attempted to read the labels, "Do you need any help?"

Break glared at him, sheepishly facing his head down and stepping away, leaving the cabinet open, "I'm trying to get painkillers. And sleeping pills. I can't see them."

"Here you go," Rufus chuckled under his breath after handing Break the aspirin, "Why do you need sleeping pills? Are you going to try and drug them or something?"

"No…" Break grunted, leaning against the counter as he began feeling weak, "I didn't take mine earlier… I-I forgot…"

"Well… um okay," he responded, rustling around in the cupboard and passing Break the pills, "Why do you like you're about to collapse?"

"I'm fine."

"No you're not. I'm not stupid."

"I'm alright, just a little weak."

Rufus eyed him suspiciously, "I don't believe that the heroin addiction is the only thing putting strain on your body, but I'm not analysing you right now. Just take your pills and get into bed."

"Good," Break expressed a pained smile as he swallowed the pills dry, knowing full well that he had taken them earlier as well. They weren't working, "The more I have to talk about things, the more I have to remember."

Fortunately, Rufus didn't hear him as he placed the painkillers on the bedside table between Oswald and Levi beside the water. He didn't turn around once to look at Break as he climbed into his bed and faced the wall, not caring whether Break was trying to sleep or not.

After all, he wasn't the only one suffering there.

…

The next morning, Levi awoke to the beautiful sounds of Oswald puking up everything from the previous night in the bucket, which had mysteriously appeared beside their bed. He grimaced, feeling his own stomach roll as he turned over and faced the other.

"Well…" Levi greeted, displaying a fake smile, "This is certainly a pleasant awakening, I must say."

"Shut up…" groaned Oswald, dry heaving once more before wiping his mouth and lifting himself back onto his bed. He looked across to see Levi sitting up; sipping from one of the glasses of water which had also magically appeared with a hand placed lightly over his torso. He swallowed deeply, and Oswald could see clearly that his first priority had been taking the painkillers, "You okay?"

"Hm?" Levi turned towards him, titling his head towards Oswald and grinning weakly, "Well… if I said yes, I'd be lying."

"What's up?" Oswald asked, only a little bit concerned for his friend.

"Crack comedown," he replied quietly, eyes drooping as he remembered exactly how he got addicted, "It was at this point that I usually took the next fix, so…"

"Do you need anything?"

"Nah," Levi then clambered off the bed, abruptly standing up and staggering over to the bathroom.

Oswald watched, calling after him with a grimace, "You gonna be sick?"

"Yep." He slammed the door behind him, collapsing on the ground in front of the toilet and hanging his head over it.

Shortly after, Oswald heard the disgusting sounds of his friend throwing up from their room, and considered going in there to assist him. However, after brief contemplation, he decided against it, considering Levi had never assisted him in the past with his hangovers. Speaking of which, Oswald dry-swallowed the painkillers set out for him, feeling the aftermath of getting completely wasted. He didn't even try to imagine how much he had actually consumed.

A few moments later, the door opened, revealing Break and Rufus, who entered and shut the door behind them. Rufus went to sit on his bed, pulling out a book and starting to read, blatantly ignoring Oswald and Break, and not even bothering to ask where Levi had ventured to.

On the other hand, Break smiled sympathetically at Oswald, moving the bucket to underneath his bed and sitting onto his own.

"I see you woke up then, ehh?" he said, kicking his feet up onto the bed and laying back against the window, "What did you do last night?"

"Do you really have to ask that?" Oswald retorted, "I think you already know."

"Well, from what I can see, you relapsed," he said bluntly, "But what I want to know is not what happened, but why?"

Oswald thought about it for a few seconds, and finally came to the conclusion that he didn't really know why, "I'm not sure… I guess, well… we weren't really ready to get help. The Baskervilles forced us into here. I guess we were just okay as we had been. Neither of us really want help."

"Huh… and you think all of us do?"

"I… I don't understand what you mean."

Break rolled his eyes inwardly, "Do you truly believe I think that I can get better?"

"… I never really thought about it… I guess you always seem to go along with everything, so…"

"Hmph. So naïve," Break commented, grinning to himself as he watched as Oswald's frustration and confusion escalated, "5 years… for five years, heroin was all I turned to. The only thing which I felt ever listened. There was only one person I ever talked to about it, and he tried so hard to get me off it. I didn't care of course," he paused, sighing and glancing away to face the window, "Sure, I've done the withdrawal, but that's only the physical addiction. We all want to run back to our vices, more than it may appear. In some ways, the more you behave in here, the quicker you get out."

"So…" Oswald contemplated for a few seconds, "You're telling us to behave so we get out faster and relapse?"

"No. I'm telling you that's why I didn't choose to break out." He admitted, "I'm not doing this for myself. I am doing it for the person who sent me here. It's hard though. Really hard."

"Huh, you're telling me." Oswald agreed.

After a short pause, Break chuckled to himself, "Sometimes you just have to find a purpose, convince yourself you have a reason, and paint a fake smile on your face; just to get through this. After all, the more you tell yourself a lie, the quicker it becomes the truth."

"Uh…" Oswald was lost for words, trying to understand and register everything he'd just been told, all whilst his head felt like it was being repeatedly smashed with a hammer because of the hangover.

Fortunately, around that time, the usual loudmouth and conversation starter stalked back into the room and landed next to Oswald on his bed next to him, whacking the side of his shoulder with his long hair and smiling weakly to him.

"Hey Oswald, you making new friends?" Levi mocked, gesturing towards Break, "You are truly hopeless without me."

"Says the person who can't even do their own hair…" Oswald retorted.

"Oh that reminds me," Levi grinned, taking a gulp of water before picking up his hairbrush and shoving it to his friend, "Do my hair."

Oswald stared at the hairbrush in his hand, "… what."

Levi laughed to himself, pulling his cardigan back over his shoulder and twirling a strand of his hair around in his fingers, "I need someone to redo it."

"…"

"Aw," fake pouted Levi, "Oi, Rufus."

The red head never looked up once from his book as he responded, "Yes?"

"I need you to do my hair again."

"I did it last night," Rufus pointed out.

"Yeh but… we broke out."

"And why exactly did you decide to do that?" Break intercepted, "I think all of us here know it was your 'brilliant' idea."

Levi smirked, "Cause we're the bad kids."

Oswald instantly threw him a disapproving look, "What the hell?"

"I'm curious though," Rufus began, finally laying down his book and sitting up to face them properly, "What were you expecting to get out of last night? Surely you knew you'd get caught?"

"I guess we just wanted to get one more fix before we actually took things seriously here," Levi suggested, but showed no sort of sincerity in his expression.

"Yeh…" Oswald mindlessly agreed, knowing straight away that Levi didn't mean what he said in the slightest, "But when we met one of the members of the Baskervilles, she made us feel pretty shitty about breaking out."

"But did you get what you wanted?" Rufus asked.

"Yeh, I suppose we did get completely wasted," Oswald replied.

"We didn't get everything we wanted," Levi pointed out, receiving a questioning look from the others, "What? I was hoping to get laid."

"…"

The room fell into silence.

"Oh great," Break was the first to speak up, joking sarcastically; "Now you're a sex addict, too."

"Why did you say it with such sarcasm?" Levi questioned, "I was serious."

"Ugh," Oswald grimaced, trying to erase the images of Levi asking his sister to make love with him when he was, literally, right next to him, "Do you have any innocence left at all?"

"Uh, look at me," Levi replied, grinning as he wrapped an arm around Oswald's neck, his hand hanging off of his friend's shoulder, "Why would I need innocence?"

Oswald frowned deeply, attempting to detach his friend from his shoulders, "Could your ego get any bigger?"

"Probably," Levi responded simply, "Give me more people to fuck and let's make this a bet!"

"I wasn't serious…" Oswald face palmed, throwing Levi a side glance once he finally released him.

"Have you guys always been friends?" Break mused, watched the two of them with a perplexed look on his face, "You seem like complete opposites."

"I got him into the Baskervilles. So he does everything I say." Levi informed Break.

"I would've got in on my own, though," Oswald grunted, "You can't fight for shit."

Levi slapped his friend, "Shut up."

"Whatever it was," Break changed the topic, "You complement each other quite well. It's weird; I'll admit that."

"Good to know we confuse people," said Levi, standing and lying on his own bed, "I'm going back to sleep now."

"Me too," Oswald copied his actions, lying back down and wrapping himself in the sheets.

In a matter of seconds, the toll of the hangover had hit them, and they had fallen asleep immediately.

"So," Break asked, getting up and sitting on one of the chairs, "When are the visitors coming to see us?"