I am so sorry.
As fast as they could, Dani and company rushed down to the Ink Machine room. As they neared it, they noticed there wasn't any inky webs coming out into the hall.
"That's odd… where's Joey at?" Wally asked, as they stopped to come up with a plan.
"Somewhere." Dani said.
"Are you sure he took Bendy down here?" Allison asked and Dani nodded.
"Yes and I feel like this might be a trap." She replied.
"I'm getting that feeling too." Sammy confirmed. "Can't really do much without that bowl. So let's come up with a plan."
"I think it's simply. We'll take care of Joey and get Bendy while she works on that spell. Not much else we can do." Thomas replied.
"Hm…" Dani hummed as Boris suddenly stood up straight and looked down the hall. "What is it?"
"Bendy's in there!" Boris replied. "I can hear him crying!"
"Joey probably put him in a cage again so that's likely not helping." Dani said, "Hopefully the others will be here soon."
Dani took a deep breath and leaned against the wall.
'Come on… now's not the time to be tired…' She thought to herself.
She then glanced down at her arm and started picking at the bandages. Might as well start taking it off as they wait. That way it won't be a problem later.
"Why are you doing that?" Wally asks.
"Because I need to use my blood for this spell and I'm not about to cut my other arm open." She stated.
"That's fair." Wally shrugged.
Dani frowned when she took the bandages off her arm. The cut was clearly infected and she had dry blood all over it too. Looks like she might have to reopen it somehow.
That thought alone made her shudder. Dani really didn't want to cut herself but it looked like she was going to have to.
"Ah!" Wally yelped, suddenly jumping in her arms.
"What?" She asks as she heard a Searcher groan.
They looked down and saw Jack was suddenly with them and was holding a bowl too. Sammy thanked him and took it.
Boris whimpered when they didn't move. He and Bendy never got along in the cartoons but he was seriously worried about him now!
"Can we go save Bendy?" Boris asks.
"We will. We just have to wait for backup to arrive." Dani replied, comforting the wolf. "This might be a trap so we can't just rush in."
"She's right." Sammy replied. "Do you still have the page ready?"
"Yes." Thomas nodded.
Jack groaned again and went back into the ink, likely going to find the others and lead them to where they are.
A few minutes later, they finally joined them.
"Allison, do you have a little knife on you?" Dani asks.
"Yeah. Here." Allison said, handing it to her.
"Thanks." Dani said, picking her cane back up. "Ready?"
She got some nods and hums as a response.
Taking a deep breath, she headed down the hall with the others following close behind. Still not seeing any of the ink webs as they walked up to the door.
Peaking inside, they could see Bendy in a cage on one table. And a pentagram on the floor beside him.
"Put the bowl and book beside Bendy." Dani whispered to Sammy and Thomas, who nodded as a response.
Slowly, they walked inside the room, making a 'shushing' motion to Bendy when he looked up and saw them.
After approaching him, Boris opened the cage door and Bendy quickly jumped out, and landed in his arms. Boris continued to hold him as the others set everything up.
Once everything was set, Dani began to look through the book to see what all they had to do. One step involved putting blood into a bowl and putting that bowl inside of a pentagram. Well, there just so happened to be one beside her.
As she was about to cut her arm, the inky webs finally appeared. Dani turned around and started trembling when Joey came out through a inky portal. Joey, grinning like always.
"I see you fell right into my trap…" Joey said, slamming the door shut by controlling some ink.
"Come on….let's take care of him…" Thomas said, worriedly.
Dani watched as several of them stepped forward with their weapons.
She didn't want to see what was going to happen. The aftermath of it. Or anything else. But she couldn't get herself to look away…
"Hey! Snap out of it!" Wally said, shaking her shoulders.
Dani let out a small gasp as she came back to reality. She looked behind Wally, to see Joey laughing.
"I would LOVE to see what you all think you can do to me!" Joey said.
"Come one, you got to do this!" Wally muttered and reminded her.
"Okay…" Dani nodded, the very real feeling of fear overwhelming her.
"Please hurry." Wally said, looking back at Joey and deciding to stay by her for the time being.
"I'll try." Dani replied as she double checked the page and held her arm over the bowl.
For a moment, she cringed before making a cut and holding her arm over the bowl, watching her blood fall into it.
Dani glanced back when she heard a growl and several people cried out in pain. The very lost one that was supposed to be beside her was now running towards Joey with a pipe.
Meanwhile, the toons were sitting under a desk, trying to be safe from the madness that was going on around them.
Once enough blood was in the bowl, she grabbed a old washcloth nearby and wrapped it around her arm before starting to say the spell once the bowl was inside the pentagram.
"NoO!" A growl came again.
"Huh?" Dani glanced behind her again to see Bendy running towards her.
She yelped as she hit the deck to keep him from pounding her in the face.
"You aren't ruining my plans!" Joey said, kicking her with his left foot since she was still on the floor.
"Ow…" Dani whimpered, her right eye now hurting with black ink inside it.
She was about to try and rub it off before…
"…And now that you're here… I can finally be human again!" Joey leaned down and grabbed her by the neck with his larger hand. "And if anyone tries to stop me… well, I can just snap this neck of yours. And I'm sure it'll be easy to do…"
"Let go…" Dani pleaded, trying to kick him.
"Not happening." Joey stated.
"No." Sammy said, behind Joey, making him turn around with Dani still in his tight grip.
"What was that, Lawrence?" Joey asked.
"We're going to set everyone free and fix this nightmare that YOU caused! And we're not going to let you hurt her either!" Sammy replied, before glancing down at the floor. "Meanwhile… they're going to take care of you for us." He pointed to the floor.
"Huh?" Joey looked down as Jack and Shawn popped up and grabbed at his legs. "GET OFF!"
In the process, he dropped Dani and made her fall to the floor.
"Dani, Now!" Sammy said. "We'll keep him from you!"
Dani nodded and got back up, feeling very weak and tired. With the table as support, she read the book and double checked to make sure they had everything.
Bowl…pentagram…blood…room… that was everything! Now…
"Dani wait." Joey said suddenly as the searchers kept their tight grip.
She turned back to him to see him struggling to get up, very close to her feet. So close that she didn't feel comfortable with it. Well, she didn't feel comfortable with a lot of things but still…
"I…I'm sorry. Please don't do this. I-I don't want to go to Hell or anything!"
Joey started making a sniffling noise. Dani glanced around as everyone got up and grabbed their weapons, getting ready to keep fighting.
"Yet you were fine with murdering like 200 people for selfish reasons and trapping THEM in this Hell for oh so long." Dani said, her vision in her right eye going black from the ink with her left's starting to become blurry.
'Oh no. No no…' Dani thought to herself, her heartbeat getting faster as panic started to set in.
"You got to understand…that other guy! I should've been the famous one not him!" Joey said. "Besides I… started to get sick… that illness… it was killing me!"
"Disney never murdered a shit ton of people so that's one reason he's still better than you. And really?" Dani started. "People die. That's no excuse for what you did to everyone else."
"But… I could make you immortal too!" Joey replied, but felt discouraged when she let out a small laugh as she kept her grip on the table.
"Please… like I wanna be trapped here…" Dani rolled her good eye.
"There has to be something!" Joey said, still struggling to get up.
"All I want is for everyone here to be set free. With that said…" She turned back to the book and began reading.
"NOoOoo." Joey's voice turned demonic as he grabbed her by the ankles and forced her to the floor.
"Ow! Fuck!" Dani said, trying to get back up before Joey got on top of her.
"This is NOT the end!" Joey growled very loudly into her ear.
As the others began to race over to get him off of her, he controlled the ink to rise up from the floor and grab them by their ankles, keeping them stuck at that spot.
Ink began dripping off of Joey and landed on her face and body. He then held up his right hand, a claw appearing on his index finger before trailing it down her right eye, leaving a nasty scar in it's place.
Dani whined and started to cry at the pain and the amount of weight he had on her. For such a malnourished body, he was still very heavy.
After forcing the two Searchers back down into the ink, Joey picked Dani up again and threw her into a wall, most likely dislocating her left shoulder. She started to cry even more at the new pain.
"I'm afraid your little journey ends now…" Joey chuckled darkly as he made his way over to her. The ink still trapping the others.
He glanced back at the toons, shaking under the desk.
"We'll get a new home soon. And just think, it could be a big mansion once we're famous!" Joey said to them before turning his attention back to Dani.
She tried to get up. To run. To do something. But her body had enough. After two days or so, it was tired of fighting. Now she just wanted an endless sleep.
Joey kneeled down as she sat with her back against the wall and holding her aching and bleeding left arm.
With one final laugh, Joey grabbed her neck with his larger hand to pin her to the wall and forced his smaller, gloveless hand into her mouth, ink spilling down her throat.
It took all of one second for her to realize how he was going to murder her.
I am so sorry.