Haha... Surprise? Still alive and no I didn't fully abandon this story. Don't think I've ever mentioned it but I always am so upset when a project I like gets abandoned so I wouldn't do that to you guys, I'd eventually give you an ending even if it was a rushed unsatisfying one. I just kind of had to take a rushed leave of absence for my own sake that I didn't even know would be this long. I'll explain more of what happened in my personal life after the chapter and give a couple heads up for the future if anyone wants to hear it but if not. Enjoy the chapter. No real bad trigger warnings in this one just mentions of a panic attack I believe. Welcome back and as always take care of yourselves and thank you for reading.

Coffee_Addict: He's so adorable.

Octorat: Hey, I'm right here too you know.

Coffee_Addict: But look at him! I wanna keep him. Jan and Emmy won't mind right? They seem to like him too.

Octorat: You know you can't do that Rem.

Coffee_Addict: Eh? Never thought you'd be the one to stop me from being impulsive, you usually join me.

Octorat: Um, well he is my brother's soulmate. Like as much as we argue and I like messing with him, I can't let him not at least have a chance to be happy with him… If Ro doesn't want him then he can be kidnapped into our cult.

Coffee_Addict: We are a cult now? Sounds legit. Can we have those big black cloaks?

Octorat: Obviously.

"You two know you can talk to each other instead of texting. We are in the same room," Virgil sighed, breaking the near silence.

"Oh, uh, we're in a group chat with Emily and Janus, sorry for not including you, Doll," Remy lied.

Across the room Remus was rolling his eyes as he leaned back on Remy's bed, shifting his weight back so he was braced on his shoulders with his knees bent up over his head. Remy learned better than to dwell on Remus never sitting normally. He focused his attention down to the blind roommate in his arms.

"Anyways, are you feeling any better now or are you still anxious?" Remy asked.

Virgil ducked his head lower, trying to hide from Remy's line of sight in spite of still being held by him. His hands rolled over his fidget cubes once again as a new but different type of energy bubbled inside of him.

"I'm mostly better. You didn't have to literally hug me this whole time, you probably have more important things to be doing," he muttered embarrassedly.

"This is what you signed up for, babe. If you need physical contact, I'm your bitch, got that? That's what friends do." Remy grinned.

"But I have Ember…"

"Who is great, and trained to help you and whatever, but she aint human now is she. You were breaking down because you're lonely here without your family. I'm just proving you aren't alone."

"You know Rem and Jan, so you might as well be family. And if you don't accept that I will kidnap you and carry you across campus in a burlap sack to hang out with us whenever you get lonely," Remus piped up without moving from his strange position.

"Why is your voice kind of strangled?" Virgil asked.

"He's just being weird, don't worry about it," Remy sighed.

Virgil leaned deeper into Remy's arms. It'd been so long since he'd had any good friends like this. The willingness to actually physically touch him and the kindness they gave, it was so much like Patton. He had to stop thinking about him. He's gone. Two years gone. He had romantic soulmates. Forget him.

"You okay, babe? Somethin' wrong? You're crying again," Remy said, his voice clearly pinched from distress.

"Fine, fine, I'm fine. Just being stupid," Virgil replied, quickly wiping his cheeks.

"You're not stupid, spill sis. What's bugging you now?" Remy pried.

"It's nothing, really, I was just… reminded of someone," Virgil answered carefully.

"Okay, good someone or bad someone," Remy pressed.

"Good, really good. Just painful," Virgil sighed with a soft and sad smile.

"Aww, emo's got a crush. Jealous Remy?" Remus grinned, finally rolling back over to sit in an attentive position.

"Hey, don't go stealing my lines," Remy scolded. "But is that true Virgil? Is there a person you like."

Remy wasn't sure how he felt about the idea. He was going to try to get Virgil closer to his soulmates, he deserved to know them, but if he liked a classmate or something he didn't want to ruin that for him either. Meanwhile Virgil frowned deeply, debating how to answer.

"N-no. Maybe kind of. It doesn't matter he's long gone with his soulmates," Virgil finally replied.

"Soulmates?" Remy clarified, sharing a suspicious look with Remus.

"Yeah, he had two if I'm correct," Virgil shrugged.

"Oh really now. Do tell me more, you've got my attention," Remus said slyly as he moved across the room to sit on the same bed.

"It's not a big deal, just a little highschool crush that went nowhere. I mean I couldn't tell him, he was already happy. He was just the one that got me to accept the fact I wasn't straight," Virgil replied awkwardly.

"Well that's great…" Remus said, straining to keep a kind and interested tone to his words. "Tell us what happened, who was he?"

"Patton was a really kind person, he was always there for me, but he moved off to go to college with one of his other soulmates who was the same age, the other one was our age I think. I don't know. I just keep thinking about him randomly, it's ridiculous but it hurt letting him go, you know? Guess what they say about never forgetting your first heartbreak," Virgil laughed to hide the painful clenching in his chest.

"Patton?" Remy muttered, sharing another look at Remus who gave a nod to confirm he was thinking the same thing. "Sounds like a nice guy. Sure you'd love to see him again, right?"

"Yeah, I'd be happy even as his friend if I had the chance," Virgil replied with a soft smile, the tips of his ears burning a bit.

"Heh, well then, I can-"

Remus abruptly stopped talking when Remy stole his phone which he'd already pulled up his brother's contact on. The two shared a frustrated glare of differing opinions while Virgil blinked in Remus's direction curiously. Finally Remus sighed and leaned back, waving his hand dismissively in the air.

"I'm sure chances come more often than you think or whatever," he grumbled.

"Thanks for the support, but I doubt that and it's okay. I'm getting over it," Virgil replied.

Remy's phone went off in his hand and he frowned deeply.

"Uhg, parents are calling. I better take this in the hall," Remy groaned.

Virgil shifted off of him so he could get up. Remy swiftly made his way out of the room while Virgil awkwardly kicked his legs over the edge of the bed. Although he enjoyed Remus's company he felt a bit awkward about being left alone with him, he'd never gotten to know him in a one on one type situation. They'd only been together in a group. He felt badly but he did hope Remy would be back soon to save him from his own lack of social skills. To his surprise he heard Remus getting up off the bed to cross the room and dig through his backpack.

"What are you up to?" Virgil asked as he began approaching again.

"Just doing a fun thing, hold still," Remus grinned.

Virgil flinched as a pen was pressed against his forehead.

"W-what! What are you writing!" Virgil panicked.

"Trust me, it's nice. Please?" Remus pleaded, still fighting to try to chase Virgil's moving face.

"I don't know, I don't think Lisa would want words on her forehead, can't you write it somewhere else?" Virgil frowned.

"But then it won't be as fun," Remus pouted. "Fiiiiinnnnne, can I write on you hand then?"

"Fine, I guess, but it better not be anything mean or embarrassing!" Virgil warned.

"Oh trust me, it'll be great, she'll love it. And if she doesn't I'll take full responsibility," Remus replied, snatching Virgil's hand forcing it flat.

He quickly began to scribble down a message across the palm in large but messy letters that were made too fast for Virgil to make out. Meanwhile Remus was having to hold his breath to prevent himself from snickering at the chaos he was about to cause. It was for the best, plus Remy only told him he couldn't tell them Virgil was their soulmate, not that they simply had another one in general.

"Remussssss."

Remus's enjoyment was short-lived as he heard a voice scorning him from the doorway. He had already moved away and pocketed his pen well before Remy came in, there was no way he was caught.

"Remy, your phone call was quite short," Remus chirped innocently.

"I cut it short when your phone started going off," Remy replied, holding up the phone he had stolen earlier.

"Haha, looks like my brother is looking for me," Remus said, his laughter turning a bit more nervous as snatched the phone away.

Remy frowned and began checking Virgil over for where he knew Remus must've written on him from the snippet he'd caught of Roman's texts.

"Hey Virge, why don't you go to the bathroom and wash that off? He was pranking you, you and your soulmate probably don't want that written on your hands," Remy suggested.

"Of course it was. What did he write?" Virgil frowned.

"I'll spare you the details, just go ahead and wash your hands," Remy smiled softly before glaring at Remus who in turn gave an innocent shrug.

Virgil nodded and left into the other room.

"Really? 'Roman's wearing Disney princess underwear'? That's how you decided to mess with them?" Remy sighed frustratedly.

"But can you imagine their reaction? It's perfect," Remus snickered, opening up his phone.

RoyalPain: Remus! What the actual hell!

RoyalPain: I know that was you. I know your pen.

RoyalPain: Wait how the hell did you even write that? I'm with Logan and Patton.

RoyalPain: Holy mother of creation, do I have another soulmate?

RoyalPain: What, the fuck, I have another soulmate and YOU knew about them before I did?

RoyalPain: AND YOU DIDN'T TELL ME!

Remus snickered at the conversation. Remy glanced at it over his shoulder and sighed.

ChaoticTrash: This is my way of telling you.

RoyalPain: Well who is it?

ChaoticTrash: I've been sworn to secrecy.

RoyalPain: What? Why? Does he not want to be with us? Is that why we didn't know about him?

ChaoticTrash: Nah, not by him, he doesn't even know you exist.

RoyalPain: What? How does that work?

RoyalPain: Remus.

RoyalPain: Remus, I fucking swear.

Royalpain: Don't ignore me young man.

Royalpain: REMUS!

"Well, you're going to have to deal with that now. And if you tell him, I kill you. He needs to comprehend the situation and how difficult something like this will be for Virgil," Remy warned.

"Yeah, yeah, I like chaos and driving my brother up a wall with frustration, I don't want to hurt the kid, you know that," Remus replied dismissively. "But they need to know at some point, it's not fair to them, you know? And the longer you wait the more he's going to lose trust in you when he does find out."

Remy frowned and looked away.

"It's not fair, you don't get to act like Emile and Janus," Remy pouted.

"Heh, don't get used to it," Remus winked. "Plus half the reason I want to put an end to this is because I'm going to rip my hair out if he keeps pitifully pinning after his soulmate without realizing it's even his soulmate. It's gonna drive me crazy, the guy literally lives across campus, it's a ten minute walk."

"Soon we'll have to get together with the two groups and the four of us can explain the situation to them and then try introducing them to Virgil and seeing how it goes," Remy suggested, brushing his bangs back absently as he paused to think. "Oh by the way, I'm going to tell Jan and Emm about this."

"Eh? No! They'll lecture me for the rest of the day," Remus pouted.

"Suffer."

A/N: I'm really sorry about the sudden disappearance. I've been honestly trying to come back to writing since Christmas but a lot of issues have come up in my personal life. First my family got Covid which isn't that horrible but it did mess things up quite a bit especially since it was during finals week. I was A-symptomatic but my family was quite worried about my father. After that there were a lot of familial dramas such as my school, both my sister and my father's jobs, and all of my cats coming down with various serious illnesses (where we were constantly having to hand feed them, give them steam baths, and various medications). On top of that someone said something to me that reminded me a little too much of a very toxic and manipulative person that had been part of my life that I'd already connected to various other traumas in my past so I've been having a lot of issues recently of the emotions I felt during that period resurfacing and placing me in a not very stable mental state. Beyond that I was just an idiot who decided that "oh I'm in a really bad depressive episode, I'm not taking my medications properly. Everyone says taking them irregularly is really bad for me so I'll just stop taking them for the time being." I was on birth control and anxiety/depression meds, two medicines that deal with your mental state, and I abruptly stopped taking them. Yeah, I was not aware just how badly my mental state would suffer than that. Also one of the funnier horrors in my series of unfortunate events is I managed to set my computer on fire. I turned it at the exact same time as a power surge and the cpu fried, hahaha I swear my life would make an amazing comedic drama at times.

Anyways I'd like to say that I'm doing better now but these past two or three weeks are the first time I've even had my phone on for more than a few minuets in six months out of the amount of anxiety I had about the outside world because I already felt so out of control and beyond the walls of my house is just a whole world of uncertainty and lack of control so I could bring myself to deal with it. But as you can see I've started writing again. But I don't know if my metal state will start slipping again or not so I can't promise how frequently I'll be able to write. What I can say is I'm nearly done with chapter seven of this story and if you are reading it, which is a very valid if because it's a rather odd story, the next chapter of Faded Beauty is also complete and I'll likely post it in two days or so and the chapter after that is also nearly complete. I'd also like to announce a new "series" I'll be starting soon as well for the times where I'm unable to write either of these stories. I write to escape and during this time I needed to escape these stories because they reminded me of the outside world so I did a thing. I'm calling it Sanders Sides: Across the AUs. Essentially its a series of kinda oneshots of different AUs I've come up with that I've considered making full length stories or I to just get out a certain urge. It's just to give people random things to read when I'm not at my best and unable to write my other stories and also to see if anyone is particularly interested in seeing me fully write out any of those ideas once I've finished my current stories. I may even take AU requests on that series if people would like to see anything in particular so you can be looking forward to me officially publishing that thread probably within the week if not then early next week. Again I am so so very sorry for vanishing without any warning. I promise I'm not abandoning this story, I have far to many ideas to let them go to waste. I hope you have a wonderful day or night, thank you for reading this far and I hope you're taking good care of yourself.