"I hope those boys are alright. Edd has been in the machine for nearly 27 hours now, and the other Ed will have to be ejected at the same time as the first when his three days are up."
"Doctor, I just got recent mental stress charts on the tall boy. He just recently went through a massive amount of mental pain!"
"It would seem that something is digging into the three boy's subconsiouses and using it to cause them pain for some reason. This is very strange."
The three Eds looked up at the figure in front of them and quickly backed away in fear. He looked like a 14 year-old boy, with straight black hair and a large trench coat to match. His skin was very pale and he wore blue jeans and sneakers. He looked at the Eds with a blank expression that could pierce through your soul like a hot knife through butter. His eyes had no color; the boy's iris's were white.
"....Who are you?" Eddy said when he finally got the courage to speak.
"My name is Painajainen. I was sent by the doctor to help out your condition." The boy said.
"What kinda name is Painaj-jain-en?" Eddy blurted out.
"It's Finnish." Painajainen replied softly. Ed and Eddy just looked at the boy blankly.
"He means he's from Finland." Edd explained.
"Oh." The boys said in unison.
"You can just call me Jainen if you want. Follow me, I know the way out." The boy started floating away while beckoning the three others to follow.
The Eds followed Jainen for a few hours until they reached a sort of forest. But unlike other forests, the trees were so close together that they seemed to form a large box, save for a parting near the middle. Edd noticed that Jainen could fly yet he didn't have a little light following him. When the boys went into the forest, they plopped to the ground and their lights disappeared.
"We are going to the edge of Eddy's mind, so you won't be able to do anything you couldn't do in real life from here on." Said Jainen softly. He had nearly a monotone voice and Edd simply assumed he didn't get out very much. Eddy grumbled while Ed pouted a little at the fact that they couldn't fly anymore, but they went on. The forest seemed like a maze, with lots of partings and intersections and different paths to choose from. But Jainen went through them as if he lived in the strange place. After what seemed like a few hours, a tree fell down right in front of Edd, who'd been trailing behind the group a little while he was lost in his thoughts.
"Double-D! Are you ok?!?" Eddy shouted. The tree was very large; its trunk looked over 15 feet high.
"I'm fine Eddy, the tree simply fell in front of me. But it's too large for me to climb over!" Edd shouted. He suddenly felt a surge of fear and realization fall over him; when Eddy and Ed were alone, they had to live through their worst nightmares and insecurities. And now Edd was alone.
Edd tried to calm down but suddenly felt it getting hotter around him. The trees started catching on fire as another tree fell behind Edd, trapping him. Edd's hat suddenly disappeared and everything seemed to get taller around him. He had turned into a small child no older than five, and the burning forest around him turned into a burning house.
"Oh no, not again!" Edd shouted. A wooden pillar that was on fire fell on his head, which was covered in shiny black hair. He screamed as his head caught on fire, singeing the skin on it and causing Edd to double over in pain. Like last time, he quickly patted the fire on his head out with his hands and tried to find a way out.
"We should go; we can pull your friend out of your subconscious when we get back." Jainen said coolly.
"No! If something bad happens to Double-D, that white light could appear and he could walk into it and die! We have to get to him before that happens!" Eddy said. He knew what happened to him and Ed, and he knew that nothing horrible had happened to Edd yet.
"We can't do anything about it, that log is too large. We must hurry back before your friend dies." Jainen said. Eddy simply ignored him and tried to find a way to get to Edd.
Edd knew what was going to happen next. He saw the silhouette of a man and a woman in the flames. And he heard screaming from them, horrible screaming that could put even Ed at his happiest into the fetal position. Edd was watching his parents die in the fire that burnt down his house. The top of his head, which was once filled with black hair, was now a deformed pile of burnt skin with nothing but a few stray hairs around it.
Edd broke down crying. He had suppressed this memory for so many years; living alone while subconsciously writing letters on sticky-notes and believing they were from his parents. He had lived off of the family fortune that was left from the fire, and no one ever found out that he was an orphan.
But now he was living and reliving that memory over and over again in detail, from his head catching on fire to listening to the piercing screams of his parents. Edd was wracked with pain, both physical and mental for what seemed like an eternity. But then a bright, white-colored light appeared in front of him.
