This is probably going to be the most crappiest thing I have ever written. I've just gotten into white collar, and I have nothing to do until university starts up so my psycho plot bunny has appeared after reading depressing Neal fics on here and watching sad youtube videos. I decided to write a depressing, and I mean depressing Neal story.

Summary: With the recent death of Ellen, old wound's of Neal's were forced open and he is forced to deal with all of his buried emotions being released at him all at once. He begins to slip into a depressive state over Ellen's death, and Kate's death and things that had happened in the first years of his prison sentence. Along the way Neal begins developing unhealthy coping methods to deal with the emotions he is experiencing. Is it too late for Peter to intervene and save Neal from destroying himself?

Warnings: This story will most likely contain mentions of illegal drug abuse, substance abuse, alcohol abuse, self harm, suicidal themes and nature, disturbing content, and maybe implied non-con although not graphic.

Chapter 1 – Finding Silence

~ I awoke only to find my lungs empty; throughout the night it seems that I stop breathing. Now my dreams are nothing like they were meant to be, they are nothing but empty, hollow shells that makes me afraid to sleep because of what haunts me – such as living with the uncertainty that I'll never find the exact right words to say, which would completely explain just how, I'm breaking down. ~

The first thing that I noticed was that it was pitch black; I couldn't see anything at all. Oh god what was going on? Where was I? I looked around but all that was there was darkness, miles and miles of darkness stretched on in front of me. I waved my hand in front of my face and was instantly disappointed at the results; I couldn't make out the outline of my own hand 5cm away from my face. Oh god was I blind?! That had to be it, after everything that had happened I'd now lost my sight. I can't believe this could-

My thoughts came crashing to a halt as a light bulb above me dimly lit up a small amount of the room I was standing in, in front of me was a large wooden mirror, the sight in front of me made me wish that I was blind. Staring back at me was a small four year old boy with piercing blue eyes rimmed with redness and undried tears. His brown hair was sticking out in all directions and his torso and hands were covered in blood.

Ripping my vision away from the mirror I slowly lifted my shaking hands up to my face and noticed that they were stained with blood, I had blood all over my body and my hands, oh god what had happened. Whose blood was this and why was I covered in it, and more importantly where on earth was I and why was I a small child again?!

"N-Neal..." a voice behind me cried out. I spun my small, four year old self around to face the location of where the noise had just come from.

"H-hello?" I managed to stutter out, "Who's there?" it was then I noticed that there was another light at the end of what looked to be a long hallway. The light was flickering off and on allowing the room to only briefly be covered in light before the darkness once again consumed it. It was as if the two were battling it out over who got to consume the room fully.

I slowly made my way down to the end of the hallway and paused, whoever was calling for me was in the room in front of me, I looked down and paled as I noticed that there was more blood near the door way that lead into the room. I took a deep breath and held it as I waited for the light to flicker back on before forcing myself to step inside the room. As soon as I stepped inside the darkness had already once consumed the room. I was terrified as I waited for the light to flicker back on; it was taking longer than usual, had the darkness finally conquered the light in the battle for dominance over the room? I shakily let out the breath I was holding and realized that the light didn't seem to be turning back on anytime soon. This was a mistake; a bad idea. I didn't like standing in the dark, alone, in a room with a pool of blood on the floor. I wanted to run and that's what I did, I turned around and ran, I got about half a metre before I hit the wooden door and bounced onto the hard wooden floor. I placed my hands out beside me to steady myself and regretted the decision immediately as they came into contact with warm, sticky liquid. I only hoped to God that it was not blood.

Firstly though why was the door shut? I never shut the door? Was someone else out there, was this all a game? Where was my mum and Ellen, what was going on?! Where was all the blood coming from!? It was at that moment the light conquered the darkness and the room became filled with the warm glow from the light bulb. I instantly regretted the light winning as my eyes came into contact with the frozen ones of those of the dead body lying on the floor one foot in front of me in what looked to be another pool of blood.

"This is your fault." A deep voice came from behind me that was evidently laced with hatred, I felt the air beside my face move as an arm shot out from behind me headed straight for my mouth, before the strange man behind me could clasp his palm around my mouth I managed to scream one final word.

"Ellen!" he screamed into the empty bedroom, his body bolting upright so that he was sitting in his bed with one hand running through his now sweat dampened hair, pushing some stray strands out of his eyes which could now fully see everything that was in front of him. He was back in his apartment; it was all just another one of his nightmares.

Neal clenched his eyes shut and shook his head as if he was trying to shake off the nightmare that had just occurred and the thoughts that accompanied it also. He'd been having these nightmares on and off for the past two weeks, with no idea as to what it was that had triggered them as it had been roughly a month since Ellen's death. He'd had a nightmare or two straight after her death, but never like this, never to this extent, never this bad. He brushed some more stray strands of hair from his eyes and glanced over at his alarm clock, the fluorescent green numbers stated that it was 6:42am. He had managed to get two hours of sleep having just fallen asleep after four am.

Peter would be expecting him at the office in a little over two hours, today was one of the days that Neal had to get to work by his own means. Peter and he had created a schedule where some days he would get picked up by Peter himself, or he would have to get to work by his own means of transport – today was one of those days. He was grateful of that fact, as much as he hated using public transport he didn't really feel that up for the usual happy morning chatter between the two.

Pushing the damp covers off of himself he made his way into his dimly lit bathroom, the only light that illuminated the room was the amount that streamed in from the small window in the corner. He couldn't help but cringe at the simple thought of light illuminating a room; he stood in front of the small mirror and again cringed at another simple object. It was insane how much just thinking about light, or a mirror could affect him. However, looking back into the mirror he also cringed at his own reflection that was staring back at him.

I really do look terrible.

The dark circles under his blue eyes seemed to be getting a shade darker as the days rolled on. It was a clear sign that he wasn't getting the right amount of sleep that he needed thanks to the ever persistent nightmares that haunted his sleep. His eyes that were once full of life and mischief were now dull and empty. The darkening circles underneath just complemented the look. His hair was sticking out in various odd ways from the obvious tussle he had while he was in bed dreaming. His cheekbones had become more prominent also from the lack of food that he was consuming.

Sighing, he turned the knob on the tap for the cold water and cupped his palms underneath the faucet and once an adequate amount of the water had gathered, he bobbed his head down towards his hands and splashed the freezing water onto his face. If the nightmare hadn't completely awoken him, the freezing cold water now had.

He stared back at his reflection once again as he watched the water droplets trickle down his brow and run down his cheeks. As the droplets were running down his cheeks he noticed home similar it looked to as if he was crying. He had long ago stopped crying – it was if there were basically no more tears that he could physically muster up and cry out. Everything inside just felt empty and numb to him now. But watching the water droplets made him remember the times that he had cried over the ordeal. The tears he cried when Ellen had died, the tears he cried when Kate had died, the tears that he had cried throughout his prison sentence – the times in there that he had wished he had died. The tears he had cried when he first started having the nightmares, those nights he woke up in a panic, his heart trying to escape his chest and his throat raw from crying. The tears that he had cried when he realized that he was never enough and would never get answers.

Remembering these times when he had felt emotion, made him feel a twinge of sadness. The smallest bit of hope that he had left was relieved to find that he at least could still feel some emotion – even if it was only one emotion, and the one he wanted to feel the least, not everything was numb. He wanted to feel happiness again, he wanted to feel alive. But he knew that was a lost cause. Those feelings were long gone, and he had a strong suspicion that they were never coming back again.

He sighed again as his mind wandered back to the nightmare that he had just had. He remembered what the unknown voice said to him, this was his fault. Ellen's death, Kate's death – they were all his fault. The people who meant the most to him, the people he was closest to kept dying because of him. He was a curse, a problem, he caused innocent people's deaths – he was a monster. They didn't deserve to die, nobody deserved to die because of him. He couldn't let anybody else die because of his very existence. He had to distance himself from Mozzie, June, and especially Peter. He couldn't have them dying or being hurt simply because they were friends with him. He couldn't handle that happening because of him; he could not handle another death on his hands. His palms could not be laced with another person's blood again.

Shaking himself out of his train of thought he decided that a nice, cold shower would do some good right about now. He slipped his t-shirt over his head, but paused midway with his arms still in the air above his head, shirt still in their grasp. His reflection caught his eye, he wasn't surprised to notice the outline of his ribcage beginning to be more prominent. He knew he should eat more, but frankly he wasn't that hungry and to be honest he really just couldn't be bothered with the task of eating. Removing the rest of his clothing he stepped into the shower, turned the cold water on and let it wash over his body. He closed his eyes and relaxed, leaning his head back against the cold tiled wall.

After a good 20 minutes in the shower he stepped out and wrapped a towel around his waist, and shook his head to expel any excess water off his hair, the remaining water that stayed attached to his locks of hair dribbled down his back, the effect causing a shiver to run up his spine. He made his way into his wardrobe and started rummaging around for some clothes to wear; grabbing his newly found attire he began to get dressed for work. Once he was dressed he headed into the kitchen to make some much needed coffee.

Glancing up at the clock on the wall as he walked into the kitchen he noticed that it was 7:15am, he was expected at the federal plaza for work in just less than an hour now. He opted to catch a cab this morning rather than the bus as he wasn't really in the mood to be around a bunch of people just yet. Neal was normally considered to be a people person, he was referred to as the outgoing one, he was extremely well with people, but as of lately he felt more and more like being in solitude and staying away from human contact. This was completely against everything a con-man should be. He wondered if his colleagues had noticed this sudden change in his demeanour, the withdrawal from socializing with others, the lack of charming others, the outgoing, charming Neal Caffrey was reclining from human contact. But then again, he was also a con artist, if he wanted them to notice these changes, they would, and if he didn't want them to notice, then there's no way they could see through his cunning acts. He tried his hardest to make it look like everything was going well in the world of Neal Caffrey. He entered that building and exited it every day with those fake smiles plastered across his face. Nobody would ever suspect that they fell almost immediately once he entered the elevator carriage's privacy and were replaced with a blank, empty expression.

After making his much needed cup of coffee he nursed the cup in his hand, after the cold shower he'd just had the warmth from the cup was refreshing. He walked out onto his balcony and stared down at the silent streets below him as he watched the trees gently move from the slight breeze. There were a lot of people in sight, as it was now past 7am; only and many people were making their way to work. He wondered how they felt, what was happening in all of these strangers lives – were they happy, sad, single, married, widowed? He realized then just how insignificant his own existence was, all the people in his life that cared about him were dead. If he was to die, would anybody stop and notice?

Walking back inside after 10 minutes of standing there, he placed his empty cup of coffee into the sink and rinsed it out, leaving the cup in the sink to dry. He contemplated making something to eat, but decided against it as he felt nauseous just thinking about having to consume food. He really needed to start eating more; his clothes now practically were hanging off of him. He knew that this was something he wouldn't be able to con his way out of his colleagues noticing, he didn't think he could lie his way out of explaining his rapidly deteriorating weight. He used to weigh a good solid 150lbs, but he was fairly certain that was into the low 140s, possibly even the high 130s now. He just hoped that his colleagues knew him well enough to not question him about it, or bring the topic up with him in general. The last thing he wanted was Peter asking him if he had anorexia or some other form of eating disorder. At that thought he silently chucked to himself, that could be an interesting conversation. He didn't deliberately starve himself; he had no problems with his weight he knew he was already on the thin side. He just wasn't hungry as of lately, that was all.

It was now just past 7:30 and he was due for work in half an hour. Outwardly sighing he grabbed his phone and wallet that were resting on the table and slid them into his inside suit pocket, grabbing his black fedora on his way out, flipping it up onto his head. June was out of town this week visiting her grandchildren so the place was empty except for the odd maid or two that would do their duties and then not be seen or heard from for the rest of the day. This was fine by Neal, as solitude was beginning to be one of his all time new favourite activities.

Walking outside he hailed down a cab and gave the driver the address to the federal plaza, it was only a 5 minute drive in this traffic so Neal would be getting to work early, he hoped that didn't raise too many suspicions, but honestly he couldn't bear to be alone in his apartment by himself right now. All that was flashing through his mind was the memories of the dream he had experienced last night, and right now, that was the last thing that he wanted to dwell on. He instantly thought back to a quote he had said to Mozzie once when they were discussing Mozzie's hatred for people who self-loathed.

"The most dramatic conflicts are perhaps those that take place not between two men, but those that take place between a man and himself, where the arena of conflict is that of a solitary mind." Neal wasn't against people self-loathing like Mozzie, but he never thought he'd ever imagine himself doing it, but as of lately there seemed to be a first for everything.

His thoughts were interrupted by the cab driver telling him that the fair came to $12.40 and that he was now at his destination. He looked out of the window and noticed that they were outside the plaza, glancing at the clock it was now 7:42am, that wasn't too early he deduced. Handing over the money to the driver he climbed out of the vehicle and headed towards the entrance to the building. Heading straight towards the elevators once inside he mentally prepared himself for when he exited and plastered that well exercised fake smile across his face.

"Morning Caffrey" Diana was the first person to greet him as she was walking past the elevators just as he had stepped out, "Peter's in the conference room with a new case." With that she walked off to get some requested files for Peter before also heading towards the conference room herself.

"Morning Diana, and great, I just love the new cases, as long as it's not mortgage fraud." Neal cheerily said through a smile as he headed up towards the conference room where he could already see Peter, Jones and the few others that belonged to the Harvard Crew. Sighing deeply he walked up the stairs and entered into the conference room where Peter was mid sentence explaining what the new case was.

"... so he's basically making this seem like a private club with exclusive membership high interest offers, when a new member joins they pay the joining fee of $2500 and they are then asked to get two other people outside of the company to join as well with a joining fee of $6000 this is mandatory and must be done to secure their membership, they are also told that the more members they can get to join in, the higher their rewards would be as a sign of gratitude. The new members joining fee is significantly higher than the cost of the employee's, and with lower interest rewards. These two newcomers are then also asked to find two new members each to join in with an increased fee of $9,500 now and so on and so forth with every newcomer, two new comers are asked to join at an increasingly high price, and offered declining interest rates."

"So it's basically an H-Y-I-P?" Neal asked leaning back in his chair, already seemingly bored of this case. It was more investment fraud, another pyramid scheme, a high-yield investment program by some poor company who probably had only embezzled a few thousand dollars in total before the FBI caught on. They never had any interesting cases anymore, it had been ages since they had a good art forgery or a high profile theft.

"Morning to you to Neal, and well basically yes, except, as you weren't here when I was first explaining. This case is extremely sensitive, and not many details have been released as of yet, and any information that has been disclosed needs to be kept private as the man in charge is believed to be Cameron Pierson, CEO of-"

"Cameron Pierson? The multimillion dollar CEO of Nitrac Insurance?" Neal asked, the shock was evident in his voice as he decided to change his mind on this being referred to as boring. "That's the case? We're investigating fraudulent claims against Nitrac Insurance's CEO? Oh this just got so much more interesting." He said trying to cover up a smile as he admired the work Pierson had done, this was a significantly large case.

Peter noticed the way Neal's eyes had lit up when he mentioned the case was regarding Cameron Pierson, one of the most wealthy men in New York, and Nitrac Insurance was one of the most popular insurance companies that there was also. Peter also however noticed how dull looking Neal's eyes were previously before Pierson's name was mentioned, but he pushed that thought into the back corners of his mind.

"Yes Neal, I thought you'd enjoy this case, that Cameron Pierson. That poses a problem though, it's going to be harder to get evidence on such a high profile man, and it's also going to be harder to just casually go undercover, get hired and record some evidence. Pierson only hires certain people, not based on their skill or their degrees, he chooses randomly as I've heard-" Peter was cut off mid sentence.

"No, he may look like he chooses randomly but there's always a reason behind it. You don't get that rich, that quick and have such a successful scam based purely on luck. I'll go undercover, using one of my trusty aliases and see if I can buy in and work my way up, that's never failed before has it?" Neal suggested.

"You just want to meet the man. Add him to your little con artist fan club or something." Diana commented, whilst laughing as she also had noticed that Neal seemed to get interested when Pierson was mentioned.

"Fan club? Really Diana? It's more like an exclusive cult." Jones joked, adding his two cents into the conversation, Neal's interest in the case was not lost on anybody in the room, even the Harvard crew.

"Really guys I'm hurt. I'm just helping out... but you know, if you have a better idea I'm mor-" it was Neal's turn to get interrupted this time.

"No, Neal you can go undercover, we'll allocate you some money so that you can buy in, does Nick Halden work for you?" Peter asked, resulting in ending his team's harmless banter between each other but not before adding his final bit "and besides, we all know that it's probably some type of underground gang." Earning a chuckle out of Diana and Jones.

"Nick Halden works fine, and you guys, you're all so cruel." Neal placed his hand over his heart, as he feigned being hurt by that comment. "When and how do I meet Pierson?"

"Well we have an employee of Nitrac Insurance, Jason Brenner, who is the one who brought these accusations to our attention in the first place. He hasn't got any interested buyers yet who are willing to buy some membership, so we're going to have you as his first buyer. You're going to buy in, and start bringing in many more buyers under you, fake buyers of course, but Pierson will see you as a good game player, and we're hoping that this leads to at least a discussion between the two of you and possibly even warranting you getting hired as an employee so he can keep this amount of buyers coming in from you." Peter explained.

"Oh well this sounds fun." Neal plastered that well exercised smile on his face, at the beginning the case had sounded interesting and he was looking forward to meeting Pierson initially, but it was as if someone had flicked a switch in his brain and just drained the entire amount of excitement he felt regarding the case. All Neal wanted now was for it to be over and to go back home, lock himself in his apartment away from everybody and sleep. His drastic mood changes were beginning to happen more and more frequently, and as much as Neal wanted to deny it, they were starting to concern him.

This was not what Neal was expecting when he arrived at the address Jason was driving him to, looking over at Jason who seemed to be equally confused as to why they were here. Taking a deep breath he tore his vision from Jason back to the run down hall, which looked like it had once been a sporting facility.

"Is this the right address?" Neal asked, glancing back to Jason who was climbing out of the vehicle. "I thought you were taking me to meet Mr. Pierson?" he asked, climbing out of the car to go and join Jason in front of the building.

"Ah, you must be Nick Halden." A voice from behind him bellowed, causing him to turn around and see a small Asian man heading towards him from inside of the building. "I've been waiting for Jason here to finally bring in a buyer, took him long enough though. I'm Mr. Cheng and I'm one of Mr. Pierson's assistants, to be given a meeting with Mr. Pierson you must first earn the right to that meeting. He doesn't just agree to speak to anybody that asks."

"Earn the meeting? What on earth does that mean, where's Neal GPS say he's at?" Peter asked, as he, Jones and Diana were all sitting in the van listening intently to Neal's conversation through his FBI issued watch.

"I'm not entirely sure boss, but his location is at the corner of Jefferson and 3rd avenue, it looks to be a hall, uh yes the Hillson Recreational Centre, it closed down about 7 months ago." Jones added, also confused as to what was happening.

"I'm sorry? Earn it?" Neal asked, intrigued but also highly confused as to what was going on.

"Yes. Earn it. There's another Nitrac employee in the building already, with an interested buyer he wants to join in also, but you see unfortunately because they both waited longer than they should have to find a person to buy in, only one of them gets to buy in and the employee who's participant loses, also loses some of those lovely rewards they have access to due to their stupidity and lack of motivation to find someone to sign in. Mr. Pierson doesn't like to be kept waiting. To decide who wins and who loses you get to participate in one of Mr. Pierson's favourite sports – fencing. " Mr Cheng said, walking into the building, leaving the two men standing behind outside.

"Fencing? Are you serious? A little heads up would have been nice!" Neal groaned, to nobody in particular. This was not something that he wanted to be doing now, fencing took co-ordination, agility and quick reflexes all of which Neal possessed highly, but with his current situation he didn't think he'd be able to do as well as needed. His lack of sleep had severely affected his co-ordination and reflexes.

"Can you fence?" Jason asked, worried now about the outcome since his own job benefits were on the line.

"I hope so." Neal sighed and walked into the building.

"Well for once he doesn't sound confident." Diana commented, it was unusual to hear Neal unsure on something. "Neal Caffrey not confident is not a good sign at all." She sighed, she could practically count the amount of times Caffrey was unconfident in his abilities on one hand.

"I'm sure he'll do fine, it's fencing, and he's fenced before." Peter said, reassuring himself and the others, he couldn't help but notice the defeated tone in Neal's voice when he spoke though. He hoped that it was just his imagination; Neal didn't give up that easy no matter what it was. The con man never backed down from a challenge, it wasn't in his nature.

Once he had entered the building he immediately started taking in his surroundings, the walls were a light blue colour and they contained various framed photographs of different sports, there were a few baseball photos, some rowing photos and a lot of fencing photos. The frames surrounding the photos had about a millimetre of dust sitting on top of them, and the glass covering the photos was also a dusty shade. It didn't look like Pierson regularly felt the need to clean this place.

Neal heard the door behind him open, assuming that it was Jason finally catching up to him he kept walking to the end of the corridor. There was a large room in which he could see three other men standing off to the side, he had almost reached the doorway when the light bulb in the room in front of him began flickering off and on, before settling back to lighting up the room with the dull glow. It was in that moment that his breath caught in his throat and he visibly paled.

He was no longer standing in the hallway of the sporting centre, he was back in that house and there was blood, so much blood everywhere, on him, on the floors, on the body – the body – oh god the body – Ellen. He heard a scream ring out in is ears as the images assaulted his mind.

"Mr Halden?" Jason asked, placing an arm on the young man's shoulder. He had walking behind Neal when suddenly he had stopped and just stood there with a frozen expression on his face. If he didn't know any better he swore the younger man in front of him was going into some type of shock. "Are you okay?"

It was only a matter of seconds before his stoic expression fell across his face and he shook himself out of his reverie. "I'm fine, sorry I just remembered something that I had forgotten to do, it's nothing." And with that his favourite con man smile was placed across his face and he had entered the room where the others were waiting.

"What's wrong with Neal?" Diana asked.

"I'm not sure but you can practically feel the fear that was in his voice." Jones commented, also noticing how off his game Neal seemed to be today.

"I'm sure it's nothing, he knows the safe word to get us in there. Besides it's Neal, I'm sure he's more than capable at handing himself." Peter reassured his team members, although there was no denying that when Neal had last spoke his voice was in fact laced with fear.

"Ah, Mr Halden and Mr Brenner, about time I thought that you two had forfeited. Meet Mr Lavern and his interested buyer Mr. Stonem." Mr Cheng laughed before picking up a Sabre and handing it to Neal. "You may need this if you want to win."

"Where do we get changed?" Neal asked, looking down at the weapon in his hand, he swore for a second that his mind was playing tricks on him and that the blade look like it was dipped in blood. Closing his eyes tightly he re-opened them to see that he was holding an ordinary Sabre, nothing unusual about it at all.

"Oh you see that's the thing. In this match, there's no protective clothing. You can't get too injured if you know what you're doing and if your opponent also knows what they're doing. It adds some interest into what I find to be a boring sport, of course Mr Pierson doesn't agree with that, but we need our investors to be ruthless and this is the best way to prove to me, and Mr Pierson that you're willing to stop at nothing to get what you want." Mr. Cheng added another one of his disturbing laughs and backed up to where there was a worn out lounge chair. "Let the games begin."

"What d-" was all Neal managed to get out before a blade was whipped in front of his face, caught momentarily off guard he stumbled backwards. "This is-" again he was cut off by the weapon coming into contact with his arm, the impact stung a little with there be knowing protective padding.

"One point to Mr. Stonem" bellowed Mr Cheng's voice, "you may want to actually try if you want to win Mr Halden."

Neal couldn't even think straight as he swung the sabre at the man in front of him, desperately trying to score and block hits simultaneously. That damn light in the corner kept flickering on and off and every time that it flickered off he swore that his opponent's blade was covered in blood. He kept swinging and swinging, the scores were pretty even with him being on five points and Stonem being on six. He had a fair chance of winning this, well at least that was until he took his eyes off his opponent for a split second and they fell on what looked to be that of a body lying in the corner of the room.

Immediately stepping back and lowering his weapon at the sight in front of him he became an easy target and was hit in the torso, registering another point to Mr Stonem. Blinking his eyes furiously he noticed that whatever was there a split second ago no longer was there now. His mind was playing tricks on him and he couldn't handle it, the lack of sleep he had over the past few weeks was insane and it was now catching up on him. He took in a shaky breath and noticed just how much his hands were shaking. There was no way he could win this tournament, he didn't even think he could hold on to the weapon that was in his grasp for much longer. Everything around him was tormenting him, everywhere he looked he would be reminded of the nightmares he kept on having, he kept on seeing blood everywhere and if he didn't know any better he swore he was about to have a panic attack – Neal Caffrey did not have panic attacks.

It was like he was drowning in emotions, he couldn't think straight, his head was pounding he just needed everything around him to stop twirling and mixing the colours in his vision together, he needed to stop seeing things that reminded him of that day, of his dreams – when suddenly it all stopped and he gasped in what he thought was shock, or was it pain. Everything stood still, the colours stopped dancing, his heart slowed down to a normal rhythm and the light bulb in the room had stopped flickering. Everything was normal once again in his mind. His emotions were no longer threatening to drown him and he could think straight for the first time in the past hour.

Except he was still hallucinating blood on his opponents sabre. Closing his eyes he wished it to all go away.

"Mr Halden are you all right?" his opponent asked, lowering his sabre to the ground.

"I-I'm fine." Neal answered honestly, unsure of why he was so calm, he was shocked to notice that when he looked at his opponent he was still hallucinating blood until he noticed that everyone had moved in closer towards him and were staring at his forearm. Looking down at his arm he noticed that the sleeve of his white dress shirt had been slit, and blood was beginning to circle around the slit in his shirt.

"I'm sorry I didn't mean to cut your arm." Mr Stonem said, he honestly was sorry for injuring the young con man. Especially since he didn't look to be feeling well when he was in the middle of the fight to start with.

However all Neal could do was glance down at his now injured arm, this is what had brought him out of his subconscious, this is what had brought him out of his horrid thoughts and hallucinations. This is what caused everything to stop.

Pain.

He found silence in the pain.

There we go, first chapter done and dusted. I wasn't expecting it to be this long also. I'll try and keep the next chapters at a 3-4,000 mark. Not 6,000+ haha. But, please review ! that's pretty much the only motivation I have to keep posting chapters on here. I need to know people are reading it, and enjoying it :)