On the street in front of the Signal Tower's rarely-used entry door, the street lights suddenly flicker and shake. The effect slowly gets more and more intense, until... it abruptly stops.

Then, one by one, the lights shut off entirely. It starts at the ends of all three adjacent streets and closes in on the entryway. When the last ones finally shut off, a small, raincoat-clad figure is standing in the middle of the rain-soaked asphalt road. All around her, the intensified darkness shifts and transforms like a physical cloth at her command.

She has a promise to keep.

With a simple hand motion and a thought, a nearby car in heavy disuse levitates off of the curb. Another motion and another thought is all it takes to slam it directly into the door, at a speed far faster than it could have accomplished when it was functioning. The sound of screeching metal and the thunderous clang can be heard for miles - including inside the building.

The child only frowns when she sees the tiniest hint of a dent on the door. This might take a minute.

The noise seems to have alerted several of the faceless residents, which shouldn't be much of a problem for Six, now. However, everything other than that is oddly still at the Signal Tower as she chips away at the entry door. It's almost lingering in the air, passed around through the reverberating thrum of the Broadcast, which gets louder and louder with each impact.

Then... once the door is open, out comes a crackly, familiar voice, almost sounding like it's over an intercom. Which is deceptive, considering it's actually coming from right behind her.

"So kind of you to pay a visit, child. Why don't you stay a bit longer?" The Thin Man laughs bitterly. He reaches down to grab her, but stops dead when he notices the wisps of pure dark shadows coming off of her. His wrinkled, dark eyes widen and soften with familiarity. He's completely frozen in his tracks. "...you... have-?" He's cut off by a loud static burst of feedback as he clutches his head, almost similar to how Mono would when he was around those TVs, staggered.

Six whirls around and frantically backs up when she sees... him. He's still alive? But she saw what her doppelganger saw, Mono turned him to dust! Did he somehow pull himself back together, and-?

Then he stops in surprise and grabs at his head. That's... a familiar gesture. Everything clicks into place in that one instant. Mono and the Thin Man aren't the same kind of being. Mono and the Thin Man are the same being. Whatever that thing is inside the Signal Tower, wearing the building like a snail wears a shell, it morphed him into... this.

He stands there quietly, eyes still wide, and staring down right at Six like a deer in headlights. Then, his hand unnaturally jerks and stutters forward to attempt grabbing her again.

This is suddenly more complicated, but she's not giving up. She made that promise that she would come back to Mono, not to the Thin Man. Right now, she needs time to think, and come up with an idea. Whatever he did to her last time that left her completely confused and unable to remember things, she needs to avoid it - nobody will come to save her this time.

So, when he reaches for her a second time... she sticks her tongue out at him and whirls around to sprint directly into the Signal Tower's door. "Catch me if you can!"

"...very well." The Thin Man gets so visibly offended by that, his sideburns even prickle. He quickly pretends that didn't happen and starts after her calmly but with purpose, into the Signal Tower. The doors shut behind them on instinct, marking a point of no return.

What Six can't really see is that there's a raging battle going on inside of him. The Broadcast's influence has an ironclad grip on Mono, but he's trying his absolute hardest to break free, for the first time in a while. Slow the Thin Man down to buy her some time, at least, which seems to be working. Six has a decent leg-up on him.

"I just want to help you," he says. His voice seems to come from everywhere. "Aren't you unhappy, living like this? It's death at every turn." He would know. "It wouldn't be like that, here. You'd be safe."

The scenery seems to distort differently around them with each room they enter, different places only both Six and Mono would be familiar with taking many of these forms.

Every time she sees something to slow him down, she whips her hand and it flies into the path of her assailant. A bookcase from the school, the shattered head of a porcelain Bully who met their end at Mono swinging a pipe, one of those creepy shadow-loving mannequins... but the throws are getting slower and slower, seeming to hang in mid-air like they're slipping through a liquid. As Six travels deeper and deeper into the belly of the beast, the Hunger gets weaker and the Broadcast only gets stronger.

But she can't stop. Not yet. Now she knows what she's looking for.

The Thin Man gains ground on her by taking long strides over a winding bridge of doors, crossing a room that seems like an endless ocean in all directions. In the next room, a grandfather clock from the Hunter's lodge barely tips in his direction... and in the next, he finds her perfectly still.

Her yellow raincoat hides her entire form as she crouches down on the floor, staring at the torn-up remnants of a familiar music box. The room is filled with cloth sacks haphazardly puffed up with stuffing, sorry imitations of human form. The Hunter's loneliness is practically palpable, as is Six's despair. There isn't even another door for her to run through.

The Thin Man takes a moment to absorb this scene again, aware of the lack of exits in sight. This is where Mono first really met Six, and saved her from near-certain doom. In here, the buzzing - screaming - inside of him just seems to get louder, more and more resistance, hesitance. But there's nothing that can be done now, especially not this deep in the Tower. The Broadcast overwhelms all in time.

"Everything will be okay soon..." It's horribly genuine and soft, like he truly believes what he's saying. He reaches out a hand, and finally, she's snapped up into his cold grasp. Six doesn't even start struggling when she's grabbed, as she's far too light in his grasp to do anything. She's... she's really light, actually. Wait, she wasn't even this light when he captured her the first time, what's-?

As he turns the yellow raincoat around in his hold, The Thin Man finds the nome that Mono interacted with in the Hunter's attic. A petrified, inanimate imitation of his memory.

The biggest sack-mannequin full of stuffing, just behind him, is torn open from the inside by the swing of an ax. The second swing hits the back of his knee with murderous force, making him crouch down. Six, in her plain white clothes, climbs up onto the ax, then up his back to his shoulders-

And bites the back of his fucking head with her shark teeth.

She starts draining away everything she can, arms tightened around his neck like she's trying to strangle the monstrous influence out of him. Her teeth are good vectors for that, too. And when the Broadcast she's absorbing tries to take control of her, instead…

It finds itself uselessly stuck in a shadowy double of her raincoat, standing and watching in silence. There's nothing to control in a ghost.

The Thin Man - or, rather, the Broadcast itself, lets out an otherworldly and distorted, horrid screech of static with everything it has left in his body. His form starts literally falling apart at the seams, bits of static and pixel distortion breaking off of him and fading into nothing. The Thin Man gets smaller, and smaller, and smaller, until...

...all that's left of him is Mono, Six's arms now wrapped around his limp body instead of The Thin Man's gross neck. His eyes are completely static with no trace of his pupils. He appears to be left in some kind of daze from the whole thing, which... yeah. Not really surprising. "...Six...?" He groans, not fully conscious.

He's woken up fast, though. The illusion around them falls apart similarly, although more literally. Chunks of wall and ceiling fall away to once more reveal walls of disgusting flesh and indistinct meat underneath that absolutely doesn't belong to it, writhing with anger and urgency. It's coming to engulf both of them, faster than last time.

Static fading from his eyes, Mono stumbles to his feet with a sharp gasp, wincing in pain from doing so. He doesn't have a choice but to use his legs, though, so he gets to running anyway, not even getting a chance to process his emotions or get a moment with Six. Exactly like last time... will it end the same, too?

Normally when Six ran for her life like this, she was terrified. Her heart drumming in her chest, blood sounding like a tidal wave crashing repeatedly into her ears, the works. But right now, she feels... calm. She's completely focused. She has Mono back, finally. Panicking now simply isn't an option - she can't jeopardize this moment after all of the luck and raw persistence it took to get here.

This time, Mono has the head-start, but he's hobbling due to the wound on the back of his leg, which makes Six wince. She can only hope it's smaller on Mono than it was on the Thin Man. Still, he doesn't fall too far behind even as she overtakes him, thanks to little glitchy teleportations that take him a couple feet forward.

The exit seems to show up exactly when she expects it, every moment of the last time this happened burned into her memory. She can see an ordinary road outside, just past a layer of static obscuring her view - but she knows it probably won't actually lead there.

Yet again, the bridge is collapsing under her feet…

Six is here. She saved you from yourself. But how long will that last? Mono's a buzzing mess of emotions, ones he now understands fully. He's not having quite as easy a time as Six is in his head, or with his body, unable to calm himself - but that only seems to drive him forward harder, motivating him to keep going. When he's, again, presented with the leap of faith, he struggles... but makes it with the aid of one last frantic teleportation forward.

As he's once again dangling his entire life from her grasp, he expects to distrust her with it... but he doesn't.

In fact, somehow, dangling from the abyss, he finally feels at ease. Six came all this way back for him. She wouldn't just let him fall again. And so, he places his trust in his best and only friend to be his lifeline, maybe even more confident than he was the first time around.

Six keeps a firm hold of Mono's hand when he latches onto it, panting and staring down at him for a moment... and then raises her other hand. With a gesture like she's picking something up, Mono suddenly feels weightless, and floats his way up onto the platform. She still keeps firm hold of his hand, tugging him down the rest of the walkway until they're right in front of the door.

Mono doesn't expect that - he doesn't clearly remember anything about before, so he didn't know Six has powers now too! That excites him, and there's a big doofy smile on his face as she pulls him to the exit.

He stares at it quietly, transfixed. It hits him that... once he walks out of there... he's free of the Signal Tower, and the horrible Thin Man. He's really with Six again. Hopefully, for good.

Then she lets go of his hand and turns around, glaring daggers at every single eye pulsating and emerging from the walls. The creature, the unknowable entity in here, seems to be unable to grow over the bottomless crevice that now separates them from it. Maybe it stays in here because it can't handle reality…

Six coldly realizes that she would have been the same way, if not for Mono.

"You can stay in here, and starve. Or bore yourself to death. I don't care. You need to learn to stop playing with your food." She turns around, finally buttoning her raincoat back up. "I did." She walks out the door, uncaring of where she'll end up this time. All she needs to know is that Mono's coming right after.

He already starts to tear up a little bit, looking back as Six tells off the eyes that tormented him with their gaze. "Y-yeah!" Mimicking her, he also buttons up his jacket and follows her right out, not without turning his head back to stick his tongue out first, tears still in his eyes.

Reality shifts and warbles for a moment as they exit... then they tumble out of another flickering television, onto a wooden floor. Six gets up onto her hands and knees and shakes her head, looking around for a moment - just to make sure there's no Viewers. But they're alone. Just another dilapidated apartment.

Six shifts into a seated position, looking down at her feet. She... she did it. She really pulled it off, after... She's not even sure how long it took. She feels like the luckiest kid alive. Despite all the horrible things she's gone through, she's been given so many amazing opportunities and dumb-luck coincidences, and they all built up to this.

...Now what?

Mono sits down beside her once he's sure it's safe, finally resting his leg (and rolling up his pants leg to stop any bleeding), staring ahead of him in familiar mutual silence as everything weighs down on his tired shoulders. He really thought - he would've been stuck like that, forever. That he could never get out. He can remember that much. But... he was wrong.

There's always hope, even in a world like this. He's always innocently believed that, no matter what. And that all was completely shattered, for a while. He became a monster. But maybe he can put the pieces back together, if he can gather them all… starting with the sixth.

"Th-thank you." Is the first thing he says to her after a moment, voice shaking. "...did he hurt you?" He's the one asking this, despite having a gaping ax wound. He's not even worried about it.

Six shakes her head. "He didn't even get a chance to grab me." She pauses, pulling her knees up to her chin. "I'm... sorry about the ax. He was really tall. It was the only idea I had."

Mono seems relieved that she wasn't hurt, and only remembers his leg is injured when she brings it up. He's been in worse pain. "Oh! It's okay..."

Something feels off. Six was usually quiet even when they were first traveling together, but she never felt this closed-off once they had spent some time in each other's presence, let alone right after finally saving him. It's like they're back on the door floating across the ocean again. In her own mind, Six is realizing that all of the bad things Mono did weren't really him, but everything bad she did was probably really just her. All of the things she had to do to survive on the Maw…

He can tell something's bothering her. She only acted like this at first, but then she started getting more comfortable around him. What happened between now and then? "...what's wrong?" He figures he might as well try to ask.

Six is quiet for a long time, seeming to tug her hood closer around her face. Like she's hiding from him. "...you should... go. Away. From me." She keeps tacking on more words, unused to talking. "You're... out. You can go."

Mono only gets more concerned and confused. "But... I just got back! I'm not gonna leave you again," he refuses, with a shake of his head. Why does she want him to go all of a sudden?

Damn it, she forgot how stubborn he is. Maybe she can make him want to leave? "Because... because I hate you, okay? You made me do all this stuff to save you, and... and..." She stops, not because it's too painful (it is), but because she can tell he's not believing a word. She sighs and draws inward again. "...You should run, because... that's how you deal with all of the monsters that try to kill you. And now I'm one of them. I had to... become something else, so I could save you. And now I'm-" She tries to hide a sniffle, so she can keep acting cold and distant. "I'm not your friend anymore."

Yeah, he clearly isn't believing anything she's saying. But he does look really distraught, especially with those last few words. "...Six..." He starts, and pauses, trying to find words. "...wasn't I... just a monster, too? You still saved me. Even after what he did to you." He looks firmly at her. "Nothing will ever change my mind about you. I don't think there's anyone else like us." Static clings to his jacket as he says this. "That just means... we have to stick together." He sniffs back tears, but they threaten to fall. "So... I'm not running. I don't care how scary you say you are, because I'm not scared! Okay?!" Yup, here they come.

Six's breathing gets funny. "That wasn't you. That was... whatever it changed you into, after you were stuck in there. Now you're you again. But I... I can't... go back to how I was. And even if you have powers, they're-"

The moment is interrupted by an angry, otherworldly rattle. A Viewer has been drawn in by their conversation and the flickering TV, and starts approaching with the expected violent intent. Six only takes a second before raising her hood and parting her bangs, producing a bright beam of light from her right eye while the left is shut tight. Mono's never seen that before. The Viewer's noise turns from anger to horror as it rapidly freezes up, ending up as a petrified statue.

After that's done, Six turns to Mono, grimace fully visible now. "...They're not the same. We're not the same. Not anymore, we're..." She chokes back a sob and tries to cover her face, to hide her still-glowing eye and inhumanly sharp teeth. More ominous wisps of shadow appear around her as if to help, and the temperature in the room starts dropping. "If you stay near me, I'll probably kill you."

Mono, truly and honestly, sees her petrify that Viewer, and... looks excited about it, for a second. Not scared. She has weird eyes like him! And can absolutely destroy those monsters, it's hilarious! But he quickly remembers how upset he is for Six again, and wilts.

He stands up, leg not hurting all that much anymore. "...nnno, I really don't think so." He concentrates, and makes the TV shut off so they're not interrupted again. "Maybe we're not the exact same. But..." He raises a hand, and gradually absolutely mangles the TV into an unrecognizable heap as a demonstration. That's something she hasn't really seen before, either. "I could do that to you, if I wanted. Does that make you want to run? No, right? Because I wouldn't ever want to." He turns back to her. "And... I could die either way. I'm safer with you than alone," he says, bleakly, but factually. "...but, that's not gonna happen. With you." He states that, with full confidence and certainty. "You're my friend, no matter what." He's clearly not taking any other answer.

Watching him un-make the TV like that, Six can't help but imagine what it would be like if she and Mono got into a fight, now that they both have powers. Why isn't he giving up? Okay, well, she knows why - because he's Mono. But wouldn't he have given up on getting to that stupid door in the TV if he knew what was behind it? If he knew that it would be putting himself in danger? Why doesn't he realize that staying with her will do the same?

...Maybe it's because... he's actually right? Maybe she's just not thinking about it the right way? Her head pivots toward the ground, and she hides her face behind her bangs and hood on impulse. It took her until now to realize, but... maybe she's not afraid of her powers. Maybe she's just afraid of herself.

"...I'm-" She chokes out, tears finally starting to flow. "I'm really sick of people dying because of me, Mono." Her raincoat doppelganger flickers into existence briefly, then vanishes again. But this time, there's a different glitching remnant. This one looks like a boy about Mono's age, with a shackle around his ankle and a nome hat. Mono doesn't quite have context for either of those apparitions, but... he's seen those bite marks on her arms, once or twice, and those ghosts of the past briefly appearing coincide with her moving to bite her own arm again. It's an instinct thing, sadly one of the only ways she had to relieve stress and anxiety for a very long time.

Mono stares quietly at the glitching, shadowy children appearing - one familiar, one not-so. He doesn't know the context for either of them, but... he can get the idea. Carefully, he moves over to her, gently placing a hand on her arm. He doesn't forcibly stop her from biting it, but tries to keep her from doing so by putting a barrier between her mouth and arm. Having Mono make contact like that both puts a barrier between her and her unhealthy coping mechanism, and gives her something to focus on and ground her.

"...I'm sorry." Slowly, as to not be sudden, he then wraps both arms around her in a consoling hug. The chill he gets from doing so doesn't bother him. "But... I promise, everything will be okay. I'm here now."

She practically dives into the hug the moment his words sink in, and she finally lets the tears flow. "I'm... I don't want any more people to die because of me-" She hiccups. "So- So I'm going to stay with you, forever, and make sure nothing bad happens to you!" She's only a little taller than him when he doesn't have his bag, which is basically perfect for burying her head in the shoulder of his big brown coat. This sobbing fit has been building up in her for a long time.

Mono can't help but start crying, too. Tears flow down his cheeks gently as he smiles, holding Six close and letting her release everything built up. He can't imagine how long she's been holding it in and piling it up. He's just so happy that he doesn't have to lose his friend again, and that he can be there for her, after what she's been through for him. "I-I'll try to keep myself safe. And you, too..." He sniffles. "I missed you." He squeezes her just a little tighter.

"I missed you too. I'm- I'm sorry I dropped you the first time. I saw your eyes, and it was after him and- I was happy, and then I wasn't, and I was angry and blamed you, but it was… fake. You were trying to make me happy for real. I just... was too confused to know, and then I got scared for a second, and... it was so dumb. You're my best friend... and if you're never gonna be scared of me, I should never be scared of you."

"It's- it's really okay, I swear. I forgive you. He was really scary... but we don't have to be scared anymore."

Eventually they end up knelt down, still hugging, until the last of the tears have been shed. "...I'm... really tired." Six finally speaks up. "Do you wanna just... put stuff in front of the door and sleep in here?"

Mono's looking a little sleepy by then, himself. The exhaustion from... everything is really starting to set in. He blinks sluggishly. "...yeah. Sounds good." He hesitantly breaks his hold on Six to stand up, quickly grabbing onto the nearby windowsill and tiredly hoisting himself up to peek outside at their surroundings. "Clear." He carefully hops down, wobbling a little on his leg as he does so, and pushes a mildly heavy box towards the door.

While he checks out the window, Six checks the other rooms, making sure there's no other doors. She also finds some curtains blowing in another window that look clean, and tears off a strip of the fabric. She comes back to him pushing the box and adds in a chair under the doorknob, tilting it just right and giving it a kick so it's firmly in place. Then she hops up on the couch with him, wraps the torn curtain around his hurt leg, and ties it off.

Mono stares down at his wrapped leg quietly, looking back up at her with an appreciative, warm smile. He yawns, rubbing at his raw eyes, and settles himself down beside her. He's already drifting off. "Nnnnight..."

"Gnight, Mono..." She curls up like a cat.

The petrified Viewer is still there. It will probably scare the hell out of them in the morning.

(A/N: Thank you for reading all the way to the end! This story was a collaborative effort between cinnasonic (account owner) and siren-nate on tumblr, with the cover art generously provided by remadra. All three of us are sick and tired of people demonizing Six just because she made one big mistake (she's got a lower body count than Mono, guys), so admittedly this was partly fueled by spite and to show just how much more depth her character can have - without it coming at the cost of demonizing Mono instead.

I sincerely hope you enjoyed the sum of our efforts. Please review with your thoughts!)