"...I'm sorry that I keep showing up like this. 

I really am. 

I know how much you want to just...

close the door on the whole thing. 

I know how wrong it is. 

I just..."

"No apologies are needed, Sam,
you know that.

After all, marked men will always have difficulties

               walking away from the past.

I can hardly blame you,

because it's not like

I'm much different.
Sit with me, Sam.
You're going to wear a hole
right through the floor
         if you don't stop pacing."

"...Thank you, my friend. 

So much has been happening lately. 

I've been... chasing so many leads.

Any lead. 

Trying to find Valtiel. 

Looking for any hint of the bastard 

in anything... 

but the further I go, the more lost I feel I become. 

Nothing connects.

It's like... walking through a fog. 

Nothing holds any depth, I don't...

I don't understand it. 

I don't understand... any of it. 

It's a fog.

It's all just... 

a fog."

"Congratulations, Sam.

You've somehow made your way down

                             another rabbit hole.

         Were the first two not enough for you?

It's difficult to find a thing like that in the first place,

but now it doesn't even want to be found.

I have to wonder...

are you simply chasing shadows, Sam?

Then again, aren't we all?

It's not like you're in any

different a situation than the rest of us...

Ever since everything collapsed in on itself,

things have just gotten worse.

Almost makes you

miss the leash, eh...?"

"For the record, I tripped down 

this particular rabbit hole.
...And yes, I suppose I do miss it. 

In a way.

I never liked the Organization, but... 

I never wished for it to break apart like this. 

Not completely. 

Sure, I always wanted to roll 

some of the Highers heads across the floor... 

but the System had a purpose. 

A needed purpose."

                 "Yes, it did.
Things have turned out quite sour,
haven't they?"

"...How are you

holding up?"

  "Well enough.

Don't you start wasting energy

 worrying about me.

             You're stretched thin enough as it is."

 "....Do you need anything?

 I could do a supply run for you

if you need it.

You really shouldn't 

be here anymore, my friend.

It's not safe.

You need to bury yourself."

"I'm as buried as I need to be, Sam
Besides, if I vanished from the
face of the earth,
I'd miss out on these little chats of ours."

"...You have me torn, my friend.

Lately, it's as though the only time
my mind stops screaming and the world calms a bit

is when I have the chance to speak to you

even just for a little while.

But I know... that I shouldn't be here.                                       

I know this is selfish of me.

I don't want something to happen to you.

I want you to disappear somewhere

where not even The Author 

 or Redlight

or any of them

myself included

would be able to find you.

And yet... I don't...

know...

what I'd do without you."

"...You'd survive, Sam.

Like you've always managed to.
You've survived so much.

more than one person

  should ever have to.

         And you'd do it again,

if you had to."

"...And what if....

I've become tired of simply surviving, my friend?"

"You'd be alright,

 Sam."

"...What I'd be...

is alone again.
Shooter is long gone. He never really

came back to begin with.

Redlight's copy of him was amusing in some ways,
but it reminded me of how much I do miss the Cannibalistic Nutcase.

Requiem fell in a mess of blood and brains.

Philip may have seemed cold

but he was a Good Man.                                       

Good Proxy.

He cared for those who worked beneath him.                                    

Most of which are now gone as well.

Diamondback, or Rick, rather, has fallen off the grid. 

No one has seen heads or tails of him in months.

Pariah, Vanessa, Howler, Bismarck, Dreadstrife, George, Larthmor...

They're all the same.

Each one is gone.

Even The Butler is avoiding me at all costs.

And I don't even know why.

Alex has been Lost for years

but I finalized it by my own hand.

Even Loki is Gone..."

     "...The Butler is avoiding you?

Seems a little

out of character for him.

He seemed rather loyal to you."

"Loyal? No, not really.

Just linked to.

I Converted him, after all. He was my first.

Though that was after I danced

on Slender Man's strings

and slaughtered everyone inside the mansion 

he was employed in.

Probably the closest I've ever been to truly being Hallowed by Him.

Tackle Fucking Everything style.

I was driven at the Family.

While Father took the Child.

Heinrich had me by the collar when I came to.

Shaking me. Screaming at me in German.

Demanding I tell him where the 'Abomination' took his charge.

He cared for that little girl. Catherine.

Cared a great deal. Like an uncle.

He was close to his employers.

That was plain to see.

And the hate that he had for me.

The... lunatic that had come wearing claws

 and a bloodthirsty grin...

Heh. That Hate ran deep.

Almost as deep as the sorrow.

Yet he couldn't kill me. He didn't have it in him yet.

But it was Father's Will for that to change.

So I told him that, 

if he really wanted to find Catherine,

that there was only one way
to truly explore a Wolf's Den..."

"...'Join the Pack'."

"Exactly." 

                           "Yet he was a loyal friend of yours.

Despite the past, you stood on even ground.

 Why would that be?"

"...I imagine that he learned what it meant
to be upon His strings.
And I did save him in Detroit.

It's a long story for another night..."

       "...Yet, all of a sudden,

that doesn't matter anymore?

Doesn't that strike you as a bit... odd?"

"..." 

"...Well, at least you have Kali still.

And... Leo... as well.

Right?"

"...I'm going to lose him to Valtiel before too long. 

I've been throwing myself into research. 

Digging into everything. ANYTHING.

Even you have said you've been looking a bit. 

And I can't find anything.

Not a damn thing.

And when records do exist, they're vague at best.

It seems anywhere there has been even

a hint of some Activity or another, the records

are never complete.

If I don't find something, 

I will lose Leo too.

I'll have failed him.

And, as for Kali...

Honestly, I'm surprised each morning when I wake up 

that she's still here. 

Alive. 

Practically a miracle. 

I don't... want to go back to being alone, Winston. 

I shouldn't be bothering you anymore,

but the Silence is... too loud. 

Too... consuming. 

It'll eat me alive. 

It'll EAT me..."

                          "...I know, Sam.
I know.
And that's why I'm still here.
You'll always have a seat here.
Right beside mine.
We can just... keep talking.
Until we sort something out.

                       Just keep going.

And it'll sort out."