"What the hell is going on here, Ryan?" Gerard demanded, stepping into the area behind the bar with his doe eyed friend. "Why is everyone one of my damn characters!?"

"I was gunna ask you!" Ryan exclaimed. He reached up and tugged at his hair as his he shook his head. "I'm freaking out! I can remember the party, but then I felt really funny and... I've just been having lapses..."

"Lapses?" Gerard questioned, "What do you mean?"

Ryan's eyes shut tightly. "I mean, sometimes I'm me, and sometimes I'm just watching me... The character you created version of me be me?.." He opened his eyes, revealing an uncertainty within them. He looked back at Gerard with the shake of his head, "I-I don't understand."

"That doesn't make any sense." It was Gerard's turn to shake his head, "How are we talking right now, then?"

Ryan shrugged, dramatically. "I don't know! I was Northern Downpour, but, then I heard someone using my actual name and I was just me again..." He looked up at Gerard, "You're actually Gerard?"

Gerard nodded, putting his hands on Ryan's shoulders. "Yes, except I've been awake this whole time. Everyone's acting like one of my characters, Ryan, but you and I seem to be the only ones with memories of the party and beyond. Hell, Frank gave me a- it's just not Frank! It's a copy..."

Ryan looked somewhere between sad and scared. His brown eyes were starting to fill with tears as his mouth opened to speak. "Brendon said he loves me."

Gerard watched Ryan blink out soft tears as he continued. "He only knows Dallon as a bandit here, even then he barely knows him. He said he loves me and he's kissed me and-"

"Ryan, it's not real." Gerard insisted, tightening his grip on Ryan's shoulders. "Brendon and Dallon are together, just like how Frank and Jamia are." It hurt Gerard to say the words, but he had to. If Ryan was conscious of the party, that meant this had to be some kind of illusion, right?

Ryan's wide eyes looked back at Gerard as he gave the quick shake of his head. "It's different here. It's like we all got our wish. I wanted Brendon, Breezy wanted Dallon, and you wanted Frank. Where's the harm?" As he spoke, a clouding was starting to fill his eyes.

"Ryan?" Gerard tightened his grip on Ryan's shoulders, "Hey! Don't space out on me!"

Ryan blinked rapidly, but the clouding was still visible in his eyes. "Why is this happening?" He asked, softly. "It's getting harder to remember... To be me."

"It's only been a few days." Gerard shook Ryan's shoulders, but not enough to jar him. "Get a hold of yourself!"

Ryan just stared at Gerard for a minute. "I'm just becoming part of the game."

"What?"

"You made a deal, and I witnessed it. Maybe that's why I get spurts of consciousness." Ryan spoke softly before tightly shutting his eyes, "I want out of this... I think?"

Gerard shook his head. "Ryan, this isn't funny, please, what are you talking about?"

"That man." Ryan's features scrunched, "That's when the funny feeling started..."

"What man!?" Gerard demanded, feeling his frustration increase immensely, "Ryan!?"

Ryan's eyes snapped open. The cloudiness had almost consumed it, leaving only a small vacancy that it was closing in on fast. "Help me." Ryan whispered before the clouding finished filling his eye.

Just like that, the recognition was gone.

"P-party?" Northern Downpour blinked at him, "W-what are you doing here, sir?"

Gerard pulled his hands away from the Killjoy's shoulders. Ryan was gone. His character persona was all that remained, but why? What did Ryan mean by any of what he had said?

"Should I make you a drink?" Northern asked, wiping his eyes almost as if the motion was done at a subconscious level. "Or would you prefer to make your own?"

Gerard felt his shoulders slump. "I'm not in a drinking mood..." He muttered, walking around the bar counter. He had been so close to answers; yet he had only ended up with gibberish he'd have to decipher from what he already knew and what Ryan had told him.

The killjoy had already moved on past their conversation. He was shuffling different liquor bottles and pulling shot glasses from under the counter. He was focused on his current task of mixing drinks for the group.

Gerard his his face in his hands. He could really use a longer conversation with Ryan... Perhaps calling his name again would work as it did before? He had claimed that that was what pulled him from this spell, or game, or whatever this was.

"Ryan, please, I don't understand." Gerard let his hands drop to the counter, shifting his gaze up to the killjoy's face. "I just want to go home."

The killjoy looked up, but no hints of Ryan were regarding him. "Who, Sir?" Northern asked as he shook a mixed contraption off to his side.

Gerard felt like he could burst out every curse word in known language at the response. If it worked before, why not now? How could he trigger Ryan back into the present moment?

Before Gerard could think it over further, the door of the room they were in flew open. Demonic Devotee lead Fun Ghoul into the room with a serious look on his face.

"Northern, get the radio." He ordered as he strode behind the bar's counter, "The Ghosted Report should be coming on at any time."

Northern nodded, quickly abandoning his drink making to follow Demonic's orders. He ducked under the counter while Demonic poured the drinks that Northern had left.

"Hell yea." Fun Ghoul grinned as a shot glass was passed to him. He downed it in the blink of an eye.

Gerard held off on the one that was passed to him. Demonic, however, followed Fun Ghoul's league. A chug and another pouring to fill his and Fun Ghoul's shot glass.

"What are we drinking for?" Gerard asked as the two clanged their glasses together before downing them again.

Demonic shuddered from the drink before responding. "We're drinking to this." He gestured to the air around him, "All we have left..."

Northern suddenly popped up from under the counter. He set a battery powered radio on the counter before beginning to fiddle with the dials.

"Good job, Downpour..." Demonic mumbled, leaning close to Northern. Gerard could have sworn he caught Demonic brushing his lips against Northern's cheek.

"-We, unfortunately, have names to report today." The radio roared with Doctor D's voice, prompting Northern to jerk his hands away from the device. Everyone at the counter exchanged looks as the radio continued.

"Starlight Diamond has been ghosted en route past Battery City. Her car was blown sky high, making her a true bit of stardust. Still no word from the team she was with, but silence gives us hope that the strays made it out..."

Gerard sucked in a breath. Another friend was lost, but who had he deemed Starlight Diamond? He turned his gaze to Fun Ghoul, surprised to see tears in the Killjoy's eyes.

Fun Ghoul didn't seem to be conscious of the moisture building and spilling from the corners of his eyes; his gaze was intent on the radio.

"Be on the look out for some young renegades that have been reported to have been confiscating cargo-"

"Enough of that." Demonic turned off the radio before lowering his head. "Shit."

"Not Starlight." Northern slipped his hand into Demonic's, "We just saw her..."

"I told her not to test the Dracs near battery city!" Demonic exclaimed, hitting his fist against the counter. Northern squeezed the killjoy's other hand with a sad look in his eye.

"She was stubborn, there was nothing you could have done."

"Always a feisty one, Starlight Diamond." Fun Ghoul smiled past the tears that were rolling down his cheeks. Gerard wanted to reach out and offer him comfort, but Fun Ghoul had other plans. He swiped the tall alcohol bottle from the counter and raised it in the air, "To Starlight."

Demonic and Northern both reached for their own shot glasses, raising them before mumbling the same words. Gerard raised his shot glass as well, though he didn't drink. He was watching Fun Ghoul.

The tears continued to fall from the killjoy's eyes, but he did nothing about them. He just drank as if nothing was spilling from his eyes.

After awhile, Demonic and Northern moved to another corner of the room, speaking lowly to each other with foreheads pressed together. Fun Ghoul continued to drink, as if the intoxicating liquid was water. Gerard had to finally put a stop to it.

"No more."

"Buh, Party-" Fun Ghoul's words slurred as he looked at Gerard with bloodshot eyes.

"I said no more." Gerard hesitated before adding, "That's an order."

Fun Ghoul reluctantly nodded with a pout. Tears still flowed from his eyes, which Gerard reached out to swipe away.

"She was... She was something..." Fun Ghoul drunkenly murmmered. Gerard shushed him, continuing to wipe tears from his eyes.

"I'm sorry, Ghoul." He whispered as he desperately tried to remember who Starlight Diamond was. Ashley was Gasoline Threat Angel... Breezy was Desert Hurricane... Oh no.

Gerard froze as the realization hit him.

Starlight Diamond got her name because of her love for laying in the grass with her longtime boyfriend and viewing the stars. She would lean into the crook of his neck as he played his guitar, both watching the vast sky above.

Starlight Diamond was Jamia.

Gerard's own eyes filled with tears as Fun Ghoul slumped against the bar counter. He muttered something indistinguishable before his eyes fell shut.

Gerard didn't know what to say. He may have made Jamia distant in the comics, but he had never killed her. She shouldn't be dead... How was she dead!?

"Sir?"

Gerard tore his eyes away from the empty air he had been staring into after Fun Ghoul had slumped against the counter to look at Northern Downpour. The killjoy smiled timidly at him, nervously tugging at the bandanna that loosely hung around his neck.

"I've convinced Demonic to let you stay the night. I can't guarantee how much of the morning he'll put up with you, though." He gave Gerard a smile that unfortunately couldn't be returned at the moment.

Gerard swallowed, trying to force words out. "Thank you R-Northern. We'll remember this."

Northern bowed before retreating back across the room. Gerard discretely watched as Northern sat himself down next to Demonic and cupped the other killjoy's cheeks in his hands. Demonic's gaze shifted up, making Northern smile when their eyes connected.

The words I love you were clearly mouthed before they were kissing each other. Gerard felt that to be the proper time to turn away.

Fun Ghoul was snoring where he had rested against the counter. His cheeks were still damp and trails of tears still seemed fresh on his face. Gerard tugged up his leather sleeve, brushing it lightly against Fun Ghoul's cheek.

He was crying tears he didn't even know were there, for a relationship he didn't even realize existed. Gerard turned away from him, feeling guilt rising within him. Was it his fault? It was his world, after all, but he didn't create this story! The events unfolding were someone else's doing entirely...

Gerard began to consider Ryan's words again. A game... A deal... The man... The man?

Did Ryan mean the bald man they had run into on the way to Brendon's party? Gerard recalled the strange feeling after the man touched him... Did that have something to do with all of this?

Perhaps the man had done something to trap everyone here... He had seen Gerard's artwork, but he would have no way of knowing the finer details...

Gerard bit his lip. He had gotten new information, but answers somehow seemed further away than ever before...