Pretty Little Liars: Paying the Cost

Chapter 10 of my Pretty Little Liars story, enjoy.

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Now onto the story.

Disclaimer: I don't own Pretty Little Liars or their characters.

Season 2: Episode 10

Stunned shock and silence followed Ryan's announcement, until finally Hanna found her voice.

"Wait what, no, Mona...that's-"

But then A burst out laughing. "Oh Ryan, good, very good."

Then, confirming Ryan to be correct, A pulled down their hood and removed their mask, along with the voice changer, to reveal that A was indeed Mona. A rather insane looking Mona.

"I'm impressed, very impressed. The great brainiac Spencer Hastings couldn't do it. But the loser photo nerd did." She remarked, shaking her head. "Who would've thought it possible."

The others all shared a look at that while Paige and Morgan quickly got out of danger, escorted by Tony as they all turned to face Mona too.

"That's-" Spencer began to protest but then sighed. "How did you find out, Ryan?"

It was then he put the file he was carrying down, at a glance it was clear inside the file was a number of their A texts, as well as a few other details.

"What is…?" Alison whispered.

Ryan then explained. "There was no trick to it, it was simple and rather boring. I simply gathered all this evidence."

"So that's why you were doing all that snooping around?" Aria realized.

"And why you worked with that guy Caleb." Tony added.

Ryan nodded and continued. "Yeah, with all this, I simply built up a psychological profile of A, then matched the profile to the most likely candidate...I was right."

Mona glared at that, clearly put out at being brought down by something so simple.

The others were quickly recovering from their surprise and now it was clear Mona was cornered.

That didn't stop her from being put out. "I don't believe this. You are lying, there's no way you did that."

"It's true, you ticked all the boxes." Ryan replied calmly.

"Urgh." Mona growled. "Well it doesn't matter. How does it feel huh, knowing that I've drawn you all around on a leash, keeping you all afraid with your dirty little secrets. Ruining you with so many of them, you all saw it through my little fun house, how it must feel for all of you, knowing you're all nothing but manipulated, used-"

"We're stronger for it, we're all closer together now." Alison said, cutting her off. "Most of what you showed us, we already knew, we already told each other."

"What?!" Mona snapped.

"You're not as clever or as good as you think you are Mona, honestly, I don't get why you ruined it with this nonsense." Tony remarked.

Mona glowered at him but then Emily put her gun down and smiled. "Well, it doesn't matter, it's over now, we got everything we needed, right detective?"

Mona started at that for sure enough, the police were present and it wasn't long before she was arrested. That was when something odd happened, before being taken away, as she passed Hanna, Mona leaned in and whispered something to her. Then she was taken away.

"Hanna?" Aria queried, worried.

Hanna shook her head. "It's alright, it's, it's nothing, just nonsense like she was spouting from before."

They nodded, it was clear now what was going on, Mona was simply mentally unbalanced but she was stopped now, the threat of A was over.

XXXXX

"Spencer I…" Tony began awkwardly.

Spencer just smiled. "It's okay, I know, I get it."

With that they hugged and Ryan and Aria smiled while watching. They had left the police station after being debriefed and giving their statements about Mona now Ryan and Aria were happy together and Tony and Spencer were repairing their relationship and finally becoming the happy couple the others knew they could be, now that the unfortunate issue that had caused Tony to lose his temper was all talked out and the damage repaired.

"Well, that worked out better than it could have, that was lucky." Emily remarked.

"Oh yeah, I think you made all the difference, Em, getting your gun like that." Alison remarked with a grin.

Emily just shrugged, as if not believing she did all that much to make a difference. Alison meanwhile sighed, now finally make sense of something that had been building for a while.

'Well shit, I'm falling for Em, I can't believe this, how did I end up in this situation?' She thought bemusedly. 'Ah well, I'll...I'll wait for now, Em is still reeling from Maya's betrayal, I don't want to confuse or hurt her more.'

At the same time they knew that, having been checked on the hospital, Paige and Morgan would be doing alright too and were now officially started their relationship.

Jason smiled softly as he sat down on the sofa, having handed out the drinks, holding his own.

"So...what's the story?" He asked casually. "How did we all end up back here at Rosewood huh?"

Ian and Garret both grinned and they all took a drink before Garret responded.

"Well, I never left, it's you guys who left and came back." He explained.

Ian nodded. "Yeah, true, but well, it's been quite interesting since coming back."

They all smiled at that and Ian then glanced at Garret before looking over at Jason.

"So, hear that your sister had a hand in exposing the Vanderwaal girl as this...A character who's been harassing them all this time?"

Jason laughed softly. "Yeah, well. It's over now, that's what matters."

Garret sighed. "The A issue is, but Detective Linwood is still working on the serial killer issue, we need to still stay alert."

The others nodded but quickly tried to return to their happy reunion. But even with the seemingly happy reunion, Jason was uneasy, seeing Garret and Ian being back and hanging out together.

'I just hope it's not...that again.' He thought darkly.

The last thing he wanted to see, on top of all the current problems, was the return of that rather, unsavoury, thing.

End of chapter, hope you enjoyed it, read and review please.