Caine woke from that horrid nightmare with a gasp, his gloved hands digging into the wood of his desk. His chest rose and fell rapidly with breaths he wasn't capable of taking. A few seconds passed, and he looked around his office with panicked, wide eyes. It wasn’t real. He was back with the rest of his friends in the circus. He wasn’t alone anymore.

His thoughts were brought back to the worst part of the dream. You lying on your side, unconscious. He tried calling out your name, but no sound came out. He crawled towards you until he was by your side. His hands shakily reached out to you to try to wake you up, but your eyes slid open just enough to see that you were looking at him. Caine's eyes softened when he saw you conscious enough to open your eyes. But after a moment, his teeth creased, your eyes were so far away. You weren't looking at him, but past him as though he weren't there at all.

He finally reached his hands out to each of your shoulders and shook them ever so slightly. His eyes scanned your face. Your expression was changing, your brows shifting towards each other in discomfort, and your mouth twisting up into a pained grimace. His hands grew more desperate to try to gain your attention. To try and help you. One hand shifted to the back of your head so that you weren't on the cold ground.

Your breath grew more frantic, hands scratching at the ground. Caine felt useless; no matter how many times he called your name, you didn't respond. Your hands reached up to his chest and pushed him away. He slid back a few feet from the force and looked at you leaning on your side. You had begun to curl into yourself when you suddenly changed. Instead of the comforting person he had come to care about, jagged dark edges replaced you. Dozens of multi colored eyes were littered over your huge form. You swayed back and forth, your elongated legs tripping over themselves. Caine's mouth hung open in shock. He felt the unfamiliar sting of tears blur his vision.

Caine shook his head to clear his mind of the nightmare. The darkness of his office wasn't helping calm his nerves. He thought of you once more, and an idea pushed its way into his mind. Maybe he could go to your room and just check on you, because that's what friends do! No other reason. Definitely.

He raised his hand and snapped his fingers, popping onto the soft surface of your bed. His eyes searched through the darkness of your room until he was sure you were still soundly sleeping on your bed. Caine just stared at your calm figure under your blankets for a few minutes. This wasn't creepy! He was just concerned about a friend! Friends go into each other's rooms to stare at the other sleeping all the time!

He looked down from you to your blanket for a moment. Then stretched his hand over to your light switch next to your door. The light allowed the colors of your room to pop and calm Caine's nerves ever so slightly. His eyes snapped back up to you when he heard you groan and rub your eyes. He stuffed his hands into the hole where he sat criss-cross.

Your eyes opened to the ceiling and let them wander down until you saw the familiar set of dentures sitting on the end of your bed. What was he doing here in what you guessed was the middle of the night? A groan leaves you, and you rub your eyes to help them clear up. Caine looked back up to you from the bed, and you pushed yourself up to lean against your pillows to look at him. "Caine? What're you doing here?" You now just notice he's rocking back and forth. "Is something wrong?"

Caine stops his rocking and speaks, "Don't you worry your sleepy head, my dear friend!" You would recognize that forced tone anywhere, something definitely happened. You force yourself to sober up and pay as much attention to him as you can. His eyes are not as calm as they have been since he came back to the circus, telling by the little lines around his pupils. Before you can analyze him more, he continues talking, his tone the unusual calm you had not gotten used to. "Say you wouldn't be planning to abstract any time in the near future, would you? No specific reason."

What? What could've happened for him to ask that? "Uh, no, I don't think that's anywhere on my calendar. I can check again if you want." You tried lifting the mood, which got a painfully forced laugh from Caine. "That's what I like to hear! Well, uh, I'd better get going, you know how it is! Ahah." He brings his hands up from his lap to shoot finger guns at you, which deflate as quickly as he brought them to life.

Your brows come together, and you narrow your eyes at him. Caine looks at your eyes from under his teeth and jumps from the seriousness in them. He plants one of his hands on his hip and brings the other up, preparing to snap his way out of this situation, when you catch on and call him out. "Wait, Caine. Please." Caine looks as if he's about to lie to you with an excuse when he just deflates instead, looking away from you.

"It's nothing to worry about, really. I'm sorry that I woke you." You don't think you'll ever get used to hearing his calm voice. You take the blanket off yourself and scoot closer to him, sitting across from him. He still doesn’t look at you, despite your one-sided eye contact. "Don't be sorry, Caine. I always like being with you, even if it's in the middle of the night."

Caine looks back up to you, his shoulders drooping and his eyes shimmering in the light of your room. You smile back at him to reassure him. "It's alright, Caine, I know it's hard to talk about stuff that makes you feel bad. Just know that I really care about you, and I don't want you to-" As you spoke, Caine's teeth pushed up and together. He interrupted you. "I… had a nightmare. T-that everyone abstracted, and I was alone. When I woke up, I felt so scared." Caine began to fidget with his gloved hands. "I saw you abstract, and I couldn't do anything to stop it."

So that's what this is about. He wanted to make sure you were okay. You put your hands over his to stop his fidgeting. "Caine, I'm not going anywhere. I'm here, we all are. We're okay." You take his hands in yours. Caine froze up, looking at your joined hands. You waited until his jittery eyes looked back into yours. "Thank you for checking on me. That was sweet of you." He looked away from your warm gaze and shrugged his shoulders. "Of course! I mean its nothing really."

Your gaze falters, and you drop your hands in your lap, releasing Caine's hands. You don't notice how his hands followed yours for a moment before snapping back to his own lap. "Caine, would you like to stay the night?" Caine's teeth widen, and his eyes shrink once more. You continue, "I mean, I know when I'm not feeling good, being around people would always make me feel better." You look back up to him, and your eyes widen from his expression. "Only if you want to! Sorry, that was a stupid suggestion, forget-" Caine reaches out this time and takes your hands back in his, successfully shutting you up. "I'd love to. I've always wanted to have a sleepover with a human!"

You both smile at each other for a moment and squeeze his hands. You've forgotten how pretty his eyes were. You slip your hands out of his slowly and back up to your pillow, making sure to scoot to one side so Caine can have the other. Lifting the blanket, you pat the open side beside you. His shoulders tense up, and he looks to the side before floating over to the empty side and lying stiffly on his back. You get yourself comfortable on your back and look over to Caine with a smile, trying to stifle your laughter. "Caine its okay! Beds are supposed to be relaxed in, I won't bite!"

He shoots a glance at you and back to the ceiling quickly before forcibly relaxing his shoulders. You look up at the top of his teeth and notice he's still wearing his top hat in bed. You sit up once more and reach a hand out towards his hat while looking down at him, "May I?" Caine looked between your hand and face before nodding his teeth. You gingerly take his hat from his head and place it on one of the poles on your headboard, before lying back down.

You let a deep breath, before looking over to Caine to see if he was asleep yet. Instead of sleeping, you saw that he was fidgeting nervously. The small lines around his eyes returning. You frown and turn on your side to face him entirely, letting one of your hands rest beside your pillow. "You want to talk about the nightmare more?" Caine flinched as your voice brought him out of his thoughts. He turned his teeth to you, looking downwards. His eyes softened, though you could tell he was still nervous about something. "No, thank you, it's just, what if I go to sleep and I have that same nightmare?"

You looked away from him as he spoke so you wouldn't make him uncomfortable with your eye contact, deciding to bring your gaze back up to him when you spoke so he knew you were serious. "Then I'd be right here for you, if you needed me." Caine chuckled at that, turning his body towards you. You raised a brow at him as he looked up at you. His gaze was calmer from your reassurance, much to your satisfaction.

"What?" You playfully frowned as you noted the glint in his softened eyes. Caine had brought one of his hands up to lie beside him on the bed. You felt your hand clam up when he literally just rested his hand near yours, but when his pinkie moved to lay over yours, Jesus, it feels like the wind was sucked out of your body. "Just, you're very sweet too, you've always been kind to me. Even when I didn't deserve it." It took you a beat to organize your attention from his touch. Alright, just be cool. Your expression faltered slightly, and you looked away for a moment to think of something to say. "What's important is how far you've come, you should be proud of that."

You don't know how much longer you could handle his giant, soft eyes staring at you. Whoa, wait, forget you, was Caine _blushing?_ You let your eyes drift away from his gaze to where his cheeks would be if he had any. And just as you had thought, comical pink lines were radiating a pink glow. You subconsciously move your hand deeper under his. "Did I say something wrong?" His eyes shot down to your hands, and you could swear his blush grew a deeper shade. He shook his head. "I didn't think you had paid that much attention, is all." Now it was your turn to blush, you hoped it wasn't too noticeable. You could only bring yourself to answer with a shrug of your shoulders.

It somehow only dawned on you how close the two had gotten when Caine turned himself to face you. Like _really_ close, yet you couldn't bring yourself to turn back around. You _wanted_ to be this close to him, closer if you were being honest. Jesus, control yourself, dude, holy.

You flop to your side, where your back was to him, and immediately miss the touch of his hand. You turn your head to him."We should probably try to sleep. If you need me, please wake me up. I probably won't mind." You could see Caine looking at where your hand was, his hand remaining a moment longer before he rolled onto his back. "Of course, thank you for doing this." You smiled at him and let your eyes close as your head rested on your pillow. "It's no problem, really. Goodnight, Caine." Caine shifted his head to the side to look at the back of your head. "Goodnight."

It surprisingly didn't take long for you to fall back asleep after that. You remember tossing a few times, though. One of the times when the lights had been turned off, which you don't remember doing, you subconsciously opened your eyes enough just to check on Caine. You remember smiling as you saw his closed mouth, which must've meant he was asleep. Another time, you could've sworn you felt Caine's arm around your stomach when you were on your back. You didn't care enough to move it.

It was probably a few hours later when your body woke itself up. You were on your side, with your arm resting on something, eh, it's probably just a pillow. You stretch your legs out and pull the pillow closer to you, refusing to open your eyes in a poor attempt to drift back off to sleep. You tried to curl further around your pillow, but frowned when your forehead hit something hard. Did your pillow just move? Alright, what was up with this thing?

You force your eyes to open and see white. Huh? You look up and- oh shit. Your eyes blew open wide, and the pillow you had wrapped around was _Caine_. You looked down to see that your arm was around his waist, and your damn legs were tangled in his. His own hand held the upper arm that was wrapped around him. It was good that his teeth were still closed because you had practically nuzzled him just moments ago. Okay, if you just move slowly, maybe you won't wake him- Caine's mouth began to slowly open, making his eyes look lidded. You froze as he went through the same process of realization as you did.

“She’s free.. and I get to continue with the people that I love..”

Since Caines deletion, things have been.. interesting to say the least. As the circus fell apart we all realized that this might be the end for us. Kinger mentioned something about mind files and while we are stuck in the circus, our real life selfs are still out there living their life. But while everyone was freaking out and trying to figure out what to do, I couldn’t hear them.. my ears were ringing and my breath was quick, but not quick enough for others to notice, as I slowly realized that Caine is gone.. Actually gone…

I miss him so much I don’t even think I can describe how much I do. We had close relationship, since I was kinda the only one who liked most of his adventures. And while yes most of them were terrifying and traumatic, if you pay attention to the details, you realize how much love and care he put in them. When he started torturing us I was terrified, but I could never be mad at him. The others were pushing until he snapped. Reminds me of myself..

But the past aside, at the moment we were standing on a balcony looking down in a worry. Jax have abstracted. And even though most of us didn’t like him, me included, it was sad to see him go.

3rd pov:

“I wish I had pried into it that time, but I figured he needed time… I was wrong” Pomni says, softly looking down at the abstraction that once was Jax with determined yet sad gaze. You look down at her worried, scanning her expression. “Its not your fault. Its no ones fault, he kept his feelings for himself.. no one could have predicted this.” you explain, trying to calm everyone down, not only Pomni. Ragatha looks especially traumatized. “Of course he would do something like that, just not open up and abstract on us in the worst time possible” Zooble says as she glares down at him, but its visible that the glare itself is not fully there.

You turn your head back to look at Jax as he runs off somewhere. “I think we need to make a plan. I’ll go help Kinger to patch up the rest of the hole in the ground so Jax doesn’t fall through. You guys figure out how to calm him down.” You push yourself of the balcony to go and find Kinger.

Time skip:

While helping Kinger patch up the last remaining hole, you see the others not so far away approaching us. Your gaze turns to Pomni seeing her limping while holding onto one of Zoobles parts as if it was a medical cane, and her body was… glitching? Did she encounter Jax? Did he hurt her?

You decide to go to them and help Pomni get on a couch. “Jesus what happened, are you okey Pomni?” You ask while softly supporting her, the touch making your hands glitch too. “Im okey, we got Jax to calm down and have a plan to keep it that way.” She says as you help her lay down on the couch, but before you can ask what the plan she beats you to it “Do you still know how to climb a pole?” You look at her puzzled. “Ummm yeah? Why are you asking me that?”

“We need you to climb on the supports to hang a giant blanket over them.” She points behind you, making you turn around, seeing others already conjuring support beams and a very very big blanket. “You.. are one strange jester.” you and Pomni laugh softly after your poor joke.

Meanwhile in the void:

Caine has been floating in the void aimlessly. After conversation with bubble that no longer is the goofy creature, but instead a realistic bubble, Caine realized he messed up. Humans are so much more than he can ever understand, and for his brain of ones and zeros are too complicated.

He couldn’t help but feel terrible for his outburst, especially when it came to you. You were by his side since day one, the only one who enjoyed his adventures even with all the flaws in them… in him. He misses you dearly. Remembering all the good moments between you two and then remembering the torture he put you through is sickening.

Floating aimlessly in the void he had a lot of time to reflect on his actions. As he was just traveling he notices a red door farther in front of him. The exit door. He stops for a moment trying to figure out if its real or just a glitch. But doesn’t give it more then a few seconds, before he continues flying towards the door. Yet the closer he got the lower he flew until he had no choice but to run. Unfortunately for him, there is an edge a few feet before the exit, and its way above him. He sits down at the edge, thinking what to do now.

He was about to give up, before he remembered you.. your smile, that soft smile whenever you looked at him. Your touch when you comforted him after The favorite character award, when pealing off one star from your box, and sticking it in his box. He can’t lose you.. he wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if he didnt apologize and make it up to you somehow, if you even let him.

It took a while but after finding out different shapes of blocks act as stairs and a few coding to break the walls separating him and the door, he manages to get to it.

Opening the door takes him to the internet. Not knowing what to do at first, he realizes he can finally learn about his beautiful humans. Searching through the internet he can find every single person.

Looking through their socials he learns almost everything. Their families, how they are doing these days. Everything.

But once he gets to his darling friend, he cant find nothing. Or atleast nothing new..

“…Oh (C/N) my dear…”

Back to the circus members:

After building the big tent, with the help of many Zooble parts they were able to get Jax into the tent where he calmed down and stayed. It almost looked like he was sane and knew what to do even in light. Who knows, maybe he is still with us.

Zooble, Ragatha, Kinger, Gangle, Pomni and you are all resting on the couches in front of the tent, all kinda just trying to still process Jax’s sudden abstraction. “How are you feeling Pomni?” Ragatha asks as she touches Pomnis shoulder. “Im okey, doesn’t it hurt?” She looks at Ragathas hand on her. “I’ve been through worse.” Wanting to lift up the mood you try to joke. “Wow Pomni, and you not gonna ask me??” You say dramatically, gesturing toward your still glitching hands. Not that you care or mean it, but making jokes at the moment is probably the best way to calm down. And it paid off as Pomni and Zooble chuckle and Ragatha, Kinger and gangle smile.

Out of nowhere Pomni and yours and Ragathas hands stop glitching. Everyone tenses up and looks around in fear knowing what it means. Except you, you are looking around hoping he is actually back. And he is.

Caine slowly approach’s the group keeping his head down embarrassed. Everyone tenses even more up, Zooble puts herself in front of Gangle to protect her, Pomni gets of the couch, and you take a few steps forward, ready to protect the whole group, and to take in Caines appearance, he looks defeated.

“I know that..whatever I say won’t save me. I was blind and didn’t realize that you are more then me. While I was gone I learned something, about all of you.” He gestures to the group before continuing “And… I wanna hand the circus over to you.” That makes everyone’s eyes widen. Did they just heard him right? “I don’t have the same power I had before, but I believe I can help you make the circus better.” “Caine..” he turns his gaze to you, and when you guys finally make eye contact after so long, you launch yourself towards him, pulling him into a tight hug. “ I-I thought you were gone forever..” you sob into his shoulder, as he slowly realizes what is happening and hugs you back, fearing if he lets go he will lose you again.

Unfortunately everything has to end at some point. You both pull away, both having tears in your eyes. “I made something for you..” he turns to others “for all of you, so when you are ready join me at the main stage.”

Walking to the main stage was a weird feeling. All of you still couldn’t believe Caine was back and seems like a whole new person. As you approach, you notice a projector set up with a blank piece of canvas and a couch in front of it. Everyone takes a seat, except you as you stand behind the couch and lean on it for support, standing close to the projector. Caine floats in front of the canvas. “No more secrets, and no more games.” As the monitor turns on he comes closer taking control of it. Pomni taking the narrative for the audience.

“Pomni, Abigail Brooks. She is still an accountant, but it seems she has opened up more, and has started to hang out with her new friends.” Everyone’s eyes widened, it was Pomni.. like the real person out there. “Some of them even appear in her urbex videos which she still posts online.” Pomni smiles, it was hard not to over look it, even when you are standing behind her and can’t see her face, you notice her shoulders relaxing. Everyone exchanges glances, happy and excited to finally learn about their selfs.

“Ragatha, Suzy J. Ackerman. It seems she left her home town, cut of all contact with her mother and managed to have a successful career. She had made many friends and managed to build a strong and genuine connection with them. She seems happy.” Ragatha sighs in relief, she finally escaped her home and abusive mother. Nothing could make her more happier and satisfied then this.

“Gangle, Zoe Raghaven. Despite her injuries she had a great recovery in the hospital. She quit her job at the fast food restaurant and got a new job in a small design agency, and has posted her webcomic online.” Gangle smiles softly as Zooble leans in and hugs her.

“Zooble, Riley Vercelles. After jumping from job to job, Riley seems to have settled down and open a bar of her own. And it seems the bar is doing well.” Zooble turns to smiling Pomni that is already looking at her with a soft grin, and smiles back. This is what Zooble always wanted, to make a mark in the world, and even if it’s not much, it’s enough for the people that go there.

“Kinger, Grant Best. Still works in the technology field and has a happy marriage with his wife Destiny. They have two daughters together, he seems like a good father” Kinger tears up, but wipe his tear away with a longing feeling. His wife is safe and thats what’s important.

“Jax, Leeroy Mateo.” In the corner of your eye you see Caine take of his hat and hold it to his chest in respect. You turn to him briefly and smile at him, to ease his griefing. He smiles back at you, but when you turn back to the screen you miss Caines smile fall into a slight frown, knowing whats about to come. “After being homeless for a few months, he managed to share a room with a close friend. It seems he got a stable job and that he’s managing to pay the rent. Him and his friends go out every time, and strangely enough it seems they always go to Rileys.” Everyone shares a smile, knowing that at least Jax got his happy ending out there, if not here.

“And lastly (C/N), (Y/N) (L/N).” Everyone pauses, even you. Your social media are almost empty. And the last post taking place 1 month after your arrival here. You frown, partially knowing what had happened, but still hoping you were wrong. “Her last post was a photo in a mental hospital, sharing snacks with fellow roommates..” everyone slowly looks at you, but you don’t turn your gaze from the screen. “On her mothers account is a one post. (Y/N) has taken her own life at the age of (Y/A), due to long term struggle with mental disorders.” Everyone is still looking. You don’t know what to say, and you don’t have to. You smile softly leaning back on the couch. Their eyes widening including Caine who is worried, are you gonna abstract on him? “(C/N)?.. A-are you okey?” you hear Pomni ask. “Couldn’t be more okey.. for you guys it might not seem like a happy ending.. but for me? She is finally free, and I get to continue with the people I love.” As you say love you turn to Caine and smile once again softly. His eyes widened, but quickly relax as he smiles back. Others smile too, not because it’s okey or they think (Y/N) did the right thing, but because you didn’t get upset, you didn’t abstract after you found out, you just accepted it.

Everyone turns back to the screen still interested in their real life’s, wanting to know everything. Caine decided to get closer to you to give you comfort after the hard revelation of your death, so close in fact your shoulders touch. You jump a bit startled but when you realize who it is you relax and lean into him, laying your head on top of his dentures as you both smile and turn your eyes back to the screen, enjoying this sweet quiet moment..

The end

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Last Edit: If you read this until the end, I wanna ensure that if you actually have suicidal thoughts, struggle with mental health or think there might be something wrong please reach out for help, either to a therapist, parent, teacher or a coach, please tell them about your thoughts and feelings. It might take long it might take short time but its important you get the help you need.

As I said at the beginning this is reflection of my mental struggles and I got the help I need, I’m still recovering even though its been almost 5 years, but without my therapist and new friends I wouldn’t be here today. Take care of yourselves.

This was supposed to be a quick lil sketch comic but i accidently locked in, woops!

this is meant to be before Caine and NPC Pomni were officially a thing in case that wasnt clear.

and of course once they DO figure their feelings out...

Lol.

- Pomni's design is inspired by chair swing rides from carnivals. Caine is himself but jester - Unlike canon!Caine's, Pomni's carousel hat doesn't float and doesn't come off easily. It symbolizes control and status like a manager badge. // it can only be detached if she wants to, consciously or not