(A/N) Hey guys, sorry that this one is going up late, we've just had some deadline issues recently, but we're all doing our best to get us back on track! Our next update for Phase Two: Betrayal, will probably be a little delayed, but after that we'll be right back on track, and I'm working on getting our other fics up and running back on schedule too, so bear with us! Anyway, here we are, back with California after Mich's death, and if any of you have seen the one-shot TunelessLyricput up this week,"Michifornia", I think you'll be able to imagine how he's coping. (Hint: not well!)

Enjoy!

Chapter Seven – Relapse

Agent California

Written by BrambleStar14

"California had changed after Michigan's death. I know that we all had, to some extent, but Cal in particular. Hell, he was barely recognisable as the person that he had been before. He had been a good soldier, if at times unwilling to follow orders, but now…"

"Agent Carolina? What was he now?"

"Now he was a liability, a threat to his own squad. He had snapped, and none of us wanted to acknowledge it, none of us wanted to voice the elephant in the room, but we all knew that if he didn't change, if he didn't recover, then he'd follow Mich into the grave sooner rather than later. The bigger concern, although we didn't acknowledge it at the time, was that he might take some of us down with him."

- Agent Carolina and the Counselor discussing California's mental deterioration in the months after Michigan's death, taken from the Counselor's audio records.

Like every other human being since the dawn of time, Cal had his good days and his bad days. More often than not, ever since the…events on the Mother of Invention, he had been having bad days.

And today, Cal was having a bad day.

It hadn't been easy, even to attempt recovery. Not that he had tried all that much. He felt like he had reached rock bottom. In between staring at the wall, imagining what could have been and what he could have done, feeling like a pile of shattered glass, he would wake up at night, screaming, tears running down his face, the most emotion he actually tended to show nowadays. And, of course, there was always the running commentary.

'Cal? Cal. Caaaaaaal.'His other side never shut up anymore. He used to be able to block him out. Used to. Past tense being the key part of that statement. Since his exposure to Harper and since-

His thought process caught suddenly, snagging, like it refused to say it. If he said it, became real, inescapable. He couldn't let go.

Since Ark,he couldn't stop hearing the other him. He wouldn't shut up. Ever. Cal even caught him managing to regain control for a few seconds, talking out loud, quite against his will. The very idea made him shudder. He hated the idea of losing control. He knew that it was only a matter of time, this time. He hated watching himself in the mirror, seeing the demons lurking behind his own eyes, whiting out and waking up to see a grin on his face that he hadn't been wearing before. The worst time was when he woke up near York's bed with a knife, poised casually near the sleeping man's neck.

Cal had locked himself in the bathroom that night, crying. It scared him. York, his friend, one of the nicest guys that Cal knew, and he was a danger to him. To every single Freelancer and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. The thought caused bile to rise in his throat yet again, as it had every time he thought about it.

'Seriously Cal, you can't ignore me. Or think about me without me knowing. Please talk. Pleeeassee? You've been boring for ages. It's more fun when you argue back. Makes them think you're insane. I mean, you are, but they don't know that.'

Cal scowled, his blank eyes staring at the television in front of him, his hair slightly ruffled by the cool breeze that flowed in through the nearby open window. It was like having a very talkative and extremely annoying shadow. One that knew everything about him. He could hear them behind him. The pair of them. York and Florida were whispering in undertones on the other side of the room and he could literally feel their searching gazes on the back of his neck, his hairs standing on end.

Why couldn't they just leave them- he shook his head roughly- him, leave himalone. Sota would understand, if he hadn't left, and Cal wasn't ashamed to admit his bitterness at that fact. He had thought that Sota had his back, no matter what. So much for that. Neither would Mich-

He stood up abruptly and walked to the door, ears almost twitching at the sudden silence within the Texan apartment. Opening the door quickly, he walked out, heading back to his room before they could question him.

(Page Break)

Cal was having another bad day.

This one was quieter. For once. He just needed space. Or so North had commented quietly to Florida when Cal had walked suddenly away from him without warning. Cal knew that Butch meant well, but he didn't need, didn't want,talks about-

About his feelings. About Ark. Or about any of it. Didn't want it, didn't need it- He shook his head rapidly, trying to clear it. He was going in endless circles. That seemed to be a metaphor for his life at the minute. Walking aimlessly in circles. It was so typical of him. He got close to people and they always ended up abandoning him.

Mark had Cal reached down onto the floor next to him, picking up the bottle easily and taking another swig, enjoying the burn as the remaining drops trickled down his throat slowly, in an almost desperate attempt to wipe his mind - to forget. Placing the bottle clumsily back down with a loud clunk, he stared up into the sky, legs dangling from the edge of the rooftop as he leant backwards, looking out at the small, insignificant lights in the sky and wondering where it had all gone wrong.

Harper had done it, Cal hissed to himself. He had allowed himself to become far too close to the Innie and where had that ended up? He blinked rapidly, wiping away the rather surprising presence of tears on his face. Why was he even crying? He quickly took another drink of the alcohol that he couldn't even put a name to next to him, although he had a sight suspicion that it may have been extremely cheap beer, still staring upwards, legs swinging freely in the open air.

And then Mich-

He gritted his teeth angrily, turning his head to look down at the long drop below, as though staring into the abyss he had found himself hanging over. Why did she have to try and take Ark down by herself? They could have done it together. It didn't have to be her alone. Hell, half the time Cal considered turning a gun on himself, when it all became too damn much for him.

'Technically, you ran away from Ian,'the other him commented snidely, and Cal could almost see him, sitting next to Cal like a ghost, legs swinging above the fall below them in exactly the same way as his own. His usual cocky, arrogant smirk was absent from his face as he looked away from Cal, concentrating instead on the drop below them.

'The two of us, you and me, we were doing fine. You even admitted it, you liked the Innies. You said they were fun-'

"Shut up," Cal spoke aloud, scowling. "Things were different. It wasn't the same back then. And I wasn't used to you."

'You act like I'm some different person who you never knew. I am you. And if you'd stayed with the Innies, Michigan might still be alive. Or maybe you'd have killed her yourself. Never know how these things go,'it chuckled quietly, but seemed unable to gain any amusement in his reaction this time around. Cal glared at it, and if looks could kill, his other half would already be buried six feet underground. With scarab beetles inside the coffin.

"I said shut up!" he snarled, louder this time, ignoring the other guy's sniggering. "It's not true! I tried! If she'd stayed with me…if I'd been quicker…if I'd killed Ark-"

"Then she might have lived. Maybe. But she hasn't. You made the wrong choices." It never wore of, the strangeness of hearing himself say words that weren't issued by him. He got ready to retort, when a voice rang out behind him.

"Cal? Who are you talking to?"

He turned his head slowly, wincing as the effects of the alcohol began to kick in, a strange layer of fuzziness surrounding his eyes, as though his doppelganger refused to depart. York stood on the roof behind him, eyes warm, mouth turned downwards and the stress lines that he had gained over the last few months were easily visible. He looked like shit, but Cal doubted that he looked any better in the slightest. In fact, the opposite was far more likely.

"York." His voice was slightly raspy from disuse, apart from the screaming when he woke up in the middle of the night or the talking to himself. "You look like shit." Well, what else was there to say? York blinked a couple of times, apparently surprised at the fact that Cal was addressing him directly. He hadn't been talking to the other Freelancers pretty much throughout the entire 'trip'. Shaking it off, he walked over slowly, sitting down next to Cal, knees drawn up.

"Cal, man, are you alright? We're just wondering if you wanted to come down for a while. I know you've been quiet, but we got a few movies and I think North went to get pizza. Cal?" He paused. Cal was relieved. For once, they weren't trying to bring Mich-

To bring her up. York slowly stood up as Cal took another slow drink, not looking at him, while he sniggered next to him, watching Cal carefully. As York reached the door which led back down to the rest of the building, Cal finally spoke up.

"Sure. Pizza. Why not?"

York stopped before turning around, surprise evident on his features as he regarded Cal with a slight smile on his face. Slowly, Cal got to his feet, finishing the bottle in his hand before dropping it next to the growing pile of its previously emptied brethren. Forcing a smile on his face and followed by the mutinous whispers issued by himself, he walked past York through the door.

(Page Break)

Cal was, yet again, having a bad day.

South had been talking again. About Mich. He gritted his teeth as he repeated the name inside of his head. It was agony. He hated forcing himself to think about her. It was too painful. He was still like a pile of shattered glass, fractured and broken. He wouldn't ever be the same again. For one, the other half of him still hadn't left. It continued keeping up a regular commentary and Cal had started letting him take over for a few minutes at a time.

It was freaking the others out slightly, even if they refused to show it. How else would he have expected them to react when he suddenly became more violent, more vindictive and more importantly, far more aware of his surroundings, a fact that South discovered to her cost after being on the receiving end of their fist when she decided to make another rather callous remark about Mich.

Carolina had dragged her out as Cal had settled back into his lethargic, broken state. Cal had made more attempts at interactions, had tried to act like he used to, become more of the person he had been before, but it was just impossible. He simply didn't feel the same. He couldn't act how he used to.

So here he was, sitting on one of the beds in the room he shared with York, possibly his own, hunched by the open window, feeling the breeze on the scarred section of skin covering the right hand side of his face. It seemed to be the only thing that served to calm him down these days. He was rifling through the various photographs that he possessed of either himself or Mich throughout their lives, one hand absently twisting her dog tags around his fingers like some bizarre toy that he clung to, childlike and unashamed.

"You know," his double said aloud, using Cal's mouth, lying on the bed with his head leaning against Cal's hunched up legs, holding a photograph of a grinning Mich alongside a laughing Cal close to his eyes. "You actually look really happy in this one. Just saying."

Cal snorted. "Thanks. I'll be sure to take yourexpert opinion into account when I scrapbook them."

His double burst out laughing. "Nice. Back to jokes. Moved on so fast, Shaw?"

Cal froze at his words, staring at the dog tags he kept around his neck, having never removed them since he left Project Freelancer, as though they held the answer to a puzzle he had been trying to solve for years. Slowly, he placed the photographs back into their box, before standing up, dislodging his double, who fell onto the floor, laughing through his muttered curses.

"Not moved on," Cal said, rubbing his eyes as he walked to the bathroom, pausing to stare at his own battered reflection. "Just... staying alive. For her. For Mich." His double raised his eyebrows, following Cal into the room, wearing a half-serious face for a change.

"So, this is you trying to move on? It won't be the same anymore." Cal knew. He was broken. He was technically eligible for a psychiatric check-up. Which would likely end up as a failure. After all, the ones he had gone through before hadn't helped him that much. He was filled with bitterness and anger and- he sighed, admitting it- survivor's guilt. He blamed himself for her death.

"I know. He took her."

His double sat on the side of the bathtub next to him, watching him closely."Does this mean you'll listen to me more often?"

Cal looked at the eager face, a dark parody of everything he was, had been, could still be. He shrugged, a universal sign. His other self took the gesture at face value and grinned.

"You know, you're available again. You could always go back to-"

"No."

(Page Break)

Sixteen tickets.

The symbolism wasn't lost on Cal. York had bought sixteen tickets from his own earnings to a Grifball game. Rampancy vs Maverick. The old Cal would have been excited beyond his wildest belief, eager to see every player and every single move from the sport he loved so much.

He could still feel the enthusiasm, but now it was considerably more muted as he cheered alongside the rest of them. The stadium was brightly lit, spotlights illuminating the boxed arena. Swords flashed through the air, carving through steel and flesh. Players screamed as they were cut down and forcibly respawned.

After one ferocious swipe from a Rampancy Hybrid, some new kid who had been subbed in, Jackson Rothe, Cal reckoned his name was, consulting the match program that he held in his hands, his double, sitting in Mich's seat to Cal's left, jumped to his feet and clapped.

"Did you see that!? He just sliced him in half!" he howled in glee, pumping the air with his fist. Cal couldn't help it, grinning as he tugged him back down, drawing an odd look from York, sitting at his right, though his attention soon reverted to what had occupied it before - half back on the game and half back on Carolina.

Maverick soon had to substitute in a new Runner after their starting one got himself injured through a bone-snapping mixture of Rothe's gravity hammer and a failing respawn system. Some young kid, nineteen-ish, Alex Cross – as the announcer informed the crowd- stepped up, rapidly darting through Rampancy's defenders and evening the score at 4-4.

At this, Rothe went on a rampage, carving his way through Maverick entirely on his own, showing incredible ability, wielding a sword and a hammer simultaneously. Dropping the sword in favour of the bomb, he raced for the goal. This was it, his first real game, his potential break, when Maverick's Tank stepped out in front of him, grav hammer swinging, catching the kid on his left side and propelling him to the other side of the stadium. Rothe cried out as his respawn settings kicked in, sending him back to his own starting position with a low 'thrum.'

"That must have hurt!" the double noted wryly. For some reason, York looked over and nodded at Cal himself. Shrugging to himself, he turned back to the game, just in time to see the lights suddenly go out. Confused whispers raced throughout the stadium, building to a crescendo of confusion. Screaming, yelling, panicking and the harsh barks of the security as they tried, and failed to restore order.

Then the lights came back on. Looking around for a brief moment, Cal's survival training kicked in, and he noticed them. Armoured soldiers marching into the stadium through the various entrances, wielding rifles and all manners of assorted weaponry. The crowd hadn't quite noticed them yet, but the Freelancers had, always aware of their surroundings, even here. Cal and his double both stood up in perfect synchronisation, Cal's hands dropping to his belt but finding only empty air, searching for the array of weapons that he had carried with him at all times as a Freelancer.

His sharp eyes picked up the emblem on their uniforms, and he felt his heart lurch, his mouth dry up and his body grow cold.

The Crimson Sun had arrived.