Dante studied the ceiling facing him, and after a couple of minutes, he came to realize that he fell asleep in his office.

Once again, there was nothing. No car driving through, no endless snow fields, and no fire burning everything he could see. Nothing but momentary darkness between points of consciousness.

Closing his eyes once more, he dove deep into his mind, searching for something. His conversation with Kaiser Tigris played before him, but he quickly dismissed it, clearing his thoughts. He cut off all his senses, too, purposefully sealing himself in total darkness.

'Look at you, wasting even more time.'

'You shouldn't have released that yellow bastard.'

'The most valuable hostage yet and you gave him up just like that.'

'So what if you made a deal?'

'He'll just betray you.'

'What makes you think he'll keep his word?'

'Would you truly trust a filthy Genome?'

'You aren't going soft, are you?'

As endless as it seemed, Dante could still hear the voice echo in the darkness. Silencing it proved to be much more difficult than banishing his own thoughts, and after many tries, he finally managed to do so. Finally back into the isolation, he floated in the darkness.

Time lost all meaning, and before he knew it, he was failing to remember what he had been searching for. The thought of giving up put a crack in his clarity, but just as it began to shatter, he heard it. A faint sound of something moving below him, swaying back and forth. It brought him confusion, and no sooner had he realized what it resembled, his eyes opened, and he was back in his office.

'... Waves?'

A knock on the door drew his attention, and before he could respond, it opened up. A chestnut haired boy peeked his head in, and his eyes went wide when their gazes met.

"Y-yo! You were already awake, huh?"

"... Finn?" Dante raised an eyebrow. "What are you doing here?"

"Was going to have launch at grandma's place and thought I drop by."

The boy came in and closed the door behind him. Dante used that moment to check the clock, realizing it was already 11:34.

"I heard what happened last night." Finn said. "Who was that blonde guy?"

[Did you lose the fight?] A voice came from behind him, and the yellow bag the boy was carrying dropped to the floor.

Holding a hand to his forehead, Dante heaved a sigh.

[Finn, I think he's in a bad mood.] Said the bot, earning him a glare from the boy.

"I heard something, too." Said Dante. "From Viktor."

The name froze the boy.

"Guess you learned nothing from the mess you got yourself into."

"C-c'mon! You know how Vik likes to exaggurate things." Finn trembled.

"I heard from Suzuka as well."

"Guh…"

Dante didn't know what was so shocking about what he said. Of course he would know everything. The news always reached him, whether he likes it or not.

"We agreed that you would study for your entrance exams." Dante said.

"Please don't say you have a lecture prepared." Finn sulked into one of the couches.

"I have a lecture prepared." Dante said.

"C'mon…"

[I have lecture prepared for you too!] Jake jumped onto the coffee table. [You have left us out of a lot of things! That's not fair!]

"That's right!" Finn looked up with a start.

"Left you out, huh?" Getting up, Dante went and prepared a cup of coffee for himself.

"You went an fought Black Skull without me." Said the boy, his voice low. "And you didn't tell me about Rose leaving."

"Finn…" Drawing in a breath, Dante slowly let it out. "I'm not in the mood for your bullshit."

Silence returned to the room, as if it had been isolated from the entire world.

"I remember telling you to live a normal life." Dante said after a while.

"And I told you…" The boy struggled to let the words out. "Don't count me out just yet."

"Jaguar is dead, Black Skull is gone. It's already over."

"The heck it is!"

Jumping to his feet, Finn turned around, his face twisting with a glare.

"Paragon is still out there!"

"Paragon?" Confused, Dante turned to look at him, one eyebrow raised. "What about him?"

"What about…" noticing his raised voice, Finn slowly simmered down. "He's… he's your target, right?"

"Yeah… and?"

"And… I thought… I thought we were going to take him out… Together…"

That was the deal, or that's how the boy perceived it, at least. Dante could see how he had arrived at that conclusion. The two of them had made a deal with Rose—she would help them take out Jaguar, and they would help her take out Black Skull. Two had their goals achieved, so that only left one of them.

"You know how you can help me?" Dante said, still looking at his reflection in the dark surface of his cup. "By not getting into any trouble."

"..."

"You study, get into a good school, and rise in this shitty world. Anything other than that is not for you to worry about."

"I thought…"

"You thought wrong." Dante said. "This isn't a local gang we're talking about. Last thing I need is a brat drawing attention to himself."

The door slammed open, its hinges making a faint creak as it slowly swung back into place. Dante didn't even bother looking behind him as the boy rushed out. Standing there, he just raised his cup and took a sip from the dark brew.

[Not cool, man.] Jake said. [Not cool.]

Sparing him a glance, Dante let out a sigh.

"Shouldn't you be following after him?"

[Shouldn't you?]

Getting no answer, the yellow bot soon left as well. Closing the door, Dante walked back to his desk and sat down.

'Great. That little shit was starting to be a pain in the ass.'

'Still, you don't think that would be enough to stop him, do you?'

'What are you going to do if he gets himself into trouble again?'

'You should have hammered it into his head a little more.'

As the thoughts kept piling on top of each other, Dante clicked his tongue and opened a messenger app.