As four went deeper and deeper into the cavern, they realized the kid was right. The silence wasn't silent at all. It was masked sobs and sniffles from within the heart of this mountain of anger and pain. Once the four reached the bottom of the cavern, they saw memories engraved upon the rocky stone. Several had cracked and many more had broken and shattered like glass as the sound of crying filled the air.
As they rounded the corner, the Ghost was on his knees in the center of a grassy field with a single tombstone within its center. The four stayed silent, listening to the pained cries of anguish the Ghost let out.
"Grandma... Old Friends... I need your help, now more than ever..." He sniffled and sobbed again. Once they'd died down, he spoke again in a broken manor everyone on the outside never got to see.
"I-I... I failed you... please... Come back... Grandpa... he's gone... please... please forgive me..."
John, Charlie and Stagolee eyes' softened and became sad. However, Lemuel closed his eyes letting the tears run down his cheeks as he sprinted to the Ghost and hugged him.
"You didn't fail her, Ghost" Said Lemuel holding the Ghost.
The Ghost's eyes hadn't left the tombstone as tears fell in staggering silence. The other three vestiges came over and hugged him.
"Why are you four here..."
The Ghost's hollow question caught them all off guard.
"Ghost, we came because we need you." Said John. The tender look in his eyes was met by the hollowed out, empty, teary-eyed stare of the broken Ghost.
"I hurt you in my fit of rage. That's how it always is... I watch people getting hurt around me, I rush to help them, and get broken down by fake friends... my mother... my sister... and yet, I force myself to smile... My Grandma smiled for an additional sixty years after she lost my Uncle Craig... So why can't I feel the way my smile looks..."
Charlie covered his mouth as even Stagolee's twisted heart cried out in pain.
"You can't feel the way your smile looks, Ghost, because she couldn't either." Stagolee patted his shoulder. "She smiled brighter than the pain that was eating away at her from the inside. She taught you to do the same because she saw you walking in the same steps that a hero does."
Charlie looked at the ground, tears falling at last. The four vestiges somberly said what they were all thinking in unison. "You lost your soul and sanity trying to be the hero in an environment that would've made any one of us a villain." They nodded and stood the Ghost up.
"My heart gave out after beating a steam-drill, therefore I lost my heart. You gave me yours to feel that passion of swinging that hammer, just one more time." Said John Henry. As he took a stepback, Lemuel Curtis stepped towards him.
"I was the last surviving Tuskegee Airmen of the Initial class of airmen first pushed through. I died old and the last surviving member of that class. You shared your heart, mind, and the pieces of your soul that had survived, you shared all of those with me so I wouldn't be alone, Ghost." Lemuel stepped back with John and Badman Stagolee stepped forwards and took off his Stetson hat.
"I killed a man after I gambled away my hat here. Was sentenced to twenty-five years in prison, only to be imprisoned again fourteen years later, dying of tuberculosis a year after I was locked up again. You made my anger, your anger. You used your rage to try and help others, while I used it to harm. You used my voodoo to heal while I used it to curse and destroy, Ghost." Stagolee nodded as he stepped back with John and Lemuel. As he did, Charlie Wiggins stepped up.
"I crashed trying to prove that we black folks can race just as good as anyone else, hell if not better. I lost my right leg and my right eye, and my son watched as I kept trying to race, slowly withering away in the old memories of my racing days. You gave me your eyes to see the way your Grandpa smiles at you, the way your Dad looks at you. You gave me your legs to feel the rush of the speed again. You gave me life again, Ghost." Rather than Charlie stepping back, the others stepped back up to the Ghost, who's tears had stopped falling.
"You didn't fail, Ghost." Started Stagolee, "As you slipped in and out of consciousness, I took over as Dr. V, and gave your Grand-Pops some of that copper will energy you have. Dr. Sue seemed to believe he was alive... I'm not certain... but there's a good chance he is."
The Ghost's eyes locked onto the four and he gave them all a hug. "Thanks for saving me.... but enough crying. I have to know... I must see him with my own eyes!" The mountain vanished, as did the storm cloud above it. The sun of his mind came back out as the four were catapulted back into the Ghost's mind, reigniting his conscious mind.
Outside, Dr. Sue had packed up her equipment and was about to leave when the Ghost snapped awake and shot upright.
"Perseverance!?" She exclaimed as he tossed the bedding aside. He was covered in bandages, wearing his pepsi-cutoff shirt with a pair of shorts. Perseverance groaned in pain as he stood up.
"Woah, easy there..."
"I NEED TO SEE MY GRANDPA!" He said as he pushed past her trudging towards the hospital's exit, undeterred by the pain, unstoppable to the staff and Dr. Sue as he walked outside for the first time in two months. He limped towards the Council building fighting the pain. Dr. Sue called Archie, Scott and the other members of the Council to inform them he was blazing a trail for them.
He shoved open the doors and limped up the steps. As he turned the corner, Vik, the Busch Hunter, Nolan and Mike Brisson were standing about. They were all shocked to see him up and moving again. They chased after him as he burst into the Committee Chambers. The members were near the door as he hit the ground in pain. However, he picked himself up to see his Grandpa standing before him.
"You're alive!" Cried the Perseverance.
"Aye! Look who's awake! How are you feeling buddy?" Said Archie hugging his grandson.
"I hurt." Laughed the hero.
As the others joined him, the Busch Hunter gave him a gift.
"The hell is this for?"
"Consider it a, "You're alive and awake present!"
As he opened it, it was something entirely different from the normal gifts the Busch Hunter would give him. It was a true, hero costume with the name "Perseverance" stamped in gold lettering on the red satin cape.